2026 Summer session: Week 6

 Hello everyone

Lupin season continues! The visual impact of a giant field of lupins is always wonderful, and my feeling is the more the better. Our local highways are beautiful right now, all the ditches and banks are full of flowers. My garden ones are a bit past their prime but still lovely especially up close… Beautiful up close on individual stalks, and beautiful when they contribute to a giant field…

 

I’m struggling with overwhelm right now, everything feels too big, and small actions seem inconsequential, so this week’s prompt is my reminder to reset, and to remember the power of small actions repeated over time and space. What are your favourite, or most effective small actions, in work or life, that are valuable on their own, but also multiply and grow and contribute to making things beautiful?

Goals below, have a wonderful week!

DEH

-take shoes to UPS for return
-swim x2, gym x2, outdoor bike ride x1
-plant cucumbers
-book August trip
-work on new paper
-lots of editing stuff

JaneB

A LOT of meetings and diaried items this week, so it's going to require attention to get anything TLQ done this work week. And hopefully the decluttering happens this Friday.
SELF-CARE:
* 3x20 intentional movement, 1 x making, 1 x small thing with people, reading every day (with dinner, in waiting times)
* doing and planning some food prep
HOME AND ENVIRONMENT:
* 75% of chores
* make the most of the decluttering session (if it happens!) and if not do one thing off the small items list
TEACHING AND ADMIN:
* another exam board this week and associated paperwork
* one hour on Icky Admin Task
* checking in with other research masters student
* one block on teaching for next year (I have multiple small tasks like correcting problems I noticed with slide order, updating case studies, changing discussion questions that didn't work as I'd hoped etc. - I jot these down after sessions during the year when I often don't have the bandwidth/time to do them properly, then batch them as part of preparing for the next year. These are well suited to fitting in around meetings to add up to a block
RESEARCH:
* submit small group paper if people reply
* help student if needed with changes on rejected paper
* write draft text for second set of results from modelling problem, and run a couple more sets of modelling
* start working on revisions for the group paper (I submitted a revised version in April - It's come back quite quickly with a much more positive and useful set of comments, thankfully).

Julie

1. Big Article: 3 days
2. Collect inter library loans, return a book, borrow others.
3. Read two articles for teaching prep meeting.
4. House/life admin: do proper clean of cooker and oven, plan for being away next weekend & family visit, find out about visas for summer trip, niece's birthday and Father's Day.
5. Self-care/fun: run x 3, try for a walk the other days, read, journal, enjoy weekend away with friends and family visit Sunday evening.

heu mihi
1. Write 6500 words (I have an end-of-month goal I'm trying to reach)
2. Process one journal submission; process one revision; maybe start the next submission
3. Annoying life stuff: Deal with car thing, deal with excise task thing, settle upcoming travel to see parents; email catch-up
4. Grad students: Prep for (and preside over) a prospectus defense; read grad student's exam document

Susan

1. Enjoy my sister's visit, even though she is not staying at my condo (that was the plan)
2. Start unpacking
3. Do the minimum of administrative work to make sure the wheels all keep turning.

Daisy

Make project plan for intern and two other students
Do data processing for student project
Open one of the research project docs and do more than one thing
Conference accounting and catch-up with everything

Exercise