Hello everyone!
We’ve reached the inevitable end of the session! It kind of flew by as many of them do… Thank you for joining us here and chatting, and for the empathy, encouragement, commiseration, and joy you’ve shares. Thanks for humouring me with the intentions, I enjoyed that! Thank you for sustaining this community, it is a lovely little corner of the interwebz and I love that you keep coming back!
Picture this week is of local peaches and strawberries, none of which are from anywhere near my garden… I am a terrible gardener who loves the idea of gardening… The total sum of the fruit/vegetable things that came out of the garden this year is as follows: one green pepper (my daughter it); very sparse crop of sour cherries (a big fat happy raccoon ate those, we caught her in the tree a few nights in a row, she just looked at us and I’m pretty sure flipped off the cats who were staring…); zero raspberries (not sure who ate those but maybe next year?); and four pods of sweet peas (I thought of eating them but then picked them too late so now they are seeds I guess?)… But, I did enjoy the process most of the time, so it was worth it. Maybe that is the lesson…
So, on to enjoying our proverbial harvest we planned at the beginning of the year with our goals and intentions!
Last week’s goals below:
DEH
-
get back into a routine (for exercise; morning stuff; evening winding down)
- finish the most recently requested set of revisions to W essay & send it
off
- one hour each reading for next project and working on M festschrift essay
- probably more editorial stuff b/c co-editor has gone AWOL again
- write to some friends
JaneB
SELF-CARE:
* 4x20 intentional movement, 3 x making, 2 x small things with people, reading
every day
* update the tasting menu and do at least one thing a day
* take the time to make nice attractive meals that are not just "the
usual" a couple of days
HOME AND ENVIRONMENT:
* 75% of chores
* make more progress on the Living Room Project
* do all the personal finance tasks on the summer list
TEACHING AND ADMIN:
* finalise comments on the timetable release (due this Friday so can't wait til
next week)
* one high speed email triage (some missing resits, ongoing student support
stuff)
* set up new teaching bullet journal/daily notebook (fun because it involves
nice things like washi tape and writing in all the headings in nice writing,
NOT working!)
RESEARCH: nothing
Together those things should take no more than 2 hours
Julie
1.
Catch up on emails - lot of teaching prep, urggh.
2. Start on revisions to one article.
3. Try to spend some time on Big Article: get back into writing mode.
4. Teaching prep: write short introductory paragraph for first-year module, set
up meeting for first week of September, chase difficult colleagues.
5. House/life admin: post-holiday laundry, financial stuff, thank you gift for
friends whose house we borrowed in Toronto, nephew's birthday present, take son
for MRI scan (not serious, physio is just trying to figure out why he has shin
pain).
6. Self-care/fun: get back to running, be outside in the garden as much as
possible, read, carry on the cross stitch I started on holiday.
heu mihi
Beach
goals!
Susan
1.
Look at manuscripts that might be helpful
2. Start thinking through plenary talk in November
3. Logistics for trip to archive next week
4. Book travel and hotels for research trip at end of month.
5. Enjoy time with friends and colleagues
6. Keep reading
Daisy
Work on dossier and make actual progress
New student chapters
Major grant task
Make a term schedule and plan for research and writing
SESSION GOALS
DEH
Intention: divide and conquer!
Complete 2 conference papers and 1 Festschrift essay,
Revise 2 syllabuses for fall classes
Stay in shape
Go on 3 trips with my husband
Take care of necessary house and personal maintenance
Deal with special-issue editing tasks
Urgently finish way overdue essay
Daisy
Intention: breathe
One
new first-author paper ready to submit
One student paper ready to submit
Get reasonable start on new project
Help student finish up thesis work
Regular exercise, and some kayaking
Trip with kid
ADDED GOAL do promotion dossier for full
JaneB
Intention: life and work kintsugi
SELF-CARE:
regular intentional movement, making, doing small things with other people and
reading for pleasure. I want to do all these things an appropriate number of
times a week. I also want to explore a wider range of kinds of making over the
summer, and I have an aim of having a more habitual practice in all these areas
by the time we start back with students.
HOME AND ENVIRONMENT: regular chore habits, plus working on the living room
(shelf-box-sofa project), working on clothing storage/management, and working
on my finances.
TEACHING
AND ADMIN: it is summer, but...
* I need to rewrite my final year honours module to fit into a different
trimester (and fit around the honours project drama - modern students canNOT
seem to work on anything else around the few weeks before the project is due,
and I'm leaning into that because there's no point fighting it any more)
* I have a lot of minor tweaks to do to my other teaching (spread across four
modules)
* I WANT to work through the practicals from another colleagues modules - they
teach GIS mapping, and I want to be up to date on how they are teaching it so
that I can better support my students (and know what I can expect from them so
push them to deliver on it in assignments - most assignments should have a map
included, and this is one of the tools we can ask them to use).
* I'm on a "task and finish" group (i.e. co-producing a report for
Faculty) which might or might not involve a lot of work
* There will be extra work around trying to show we are taking the current
recruitment crisis seriously (so much drama and stress and other people not so
much dropping balls as yeeting them into orbit or dropping them into random
abysses), but I don't know what will be my part. I'll roll that in with getting
settled in to my new admin role
* I also want to get one of my MSc by Research students completely done (and
working on publishing her work) and the other much closer to submission than
they are now
RESEARCH:
As ever, balls in the air!
* contribute to governmental advice reports
* keep up contributions to Big Project (which is doing my head in because, too
many people and too little clarity and organisation)
* progress at least three writing projects from a list substantially
Julie
Intention: be more focused
1.
Research/writing
i) Finish 30,000 word chapter asap and get irritating editor off my back. (I
have kept to deadlines, he keeps deciding I need to add stuff.)
ii) Have a full draft of Big Article for people to read and comment on. This is
top priority.
iii) Make some progress on a grant application, but this is lowest priority.
2. Teaching & teaching-related
i) Preparation for new team-taught module next year.
ii) Sign off final corrections on a PhD.
iii) Meetings with students about final-year dissertations for next year.
3. Life admin/house
i) Finalise summer travel
ii) Get a standing desk & proper adjustable chair.
iii) New chair for reading corner in spare room.
iv) Persuade kids to declutter their rooms?
v) Clear more garage space?
4. Self-care/fun
i) Exercise: run at least 3 x week when at home, find weights and/or pilates
class
ii) Travel and meet ups with friends.
iii) Read, preferably in garden.
iv) Journal, also preferably in garden.
v) More creative stuff
Heu mihi
1.
Writing for fun: Get to a point with a (creative?) project where it will be
easy-ish to sustain going into the school year. In an ideal world, this would
mean about 40k of a messy draft, but I'm not fixing a number on it.
2. New research: Read some primary sources to find another topic for a case
study. (I have an idea for a very different kind of book that I might enjoy
working on.)
3. Existing research: Complete and submit festschrift, which includes writing
the introduction.
4. Home: Annual deep cleaning stuff (garage, windows), clean out computer
files, get patch of ceiling fixed, scrub or otherwise deal with the stupid
popcorn finish on the bathroom ceiling
5. Crafts: Finish knitting shawl, start sweater, anniversary book, new journal?
6. Italian: Make my way through a substantial part of this rather more
difficult (and very long) novel that I've started
7. Habits: Add some actual sitting, maintain exercise
8. TLQ: Check in on Mondays at least 75% of the time!
Susan
Intention: welcome new adventures
Teaching and admin:
1. Finish my time as graduate chair without leaving too many unfinished tasks
Research:
2. I am expecting to spend much of the summer dealing with copyedits of Big
collaboration (a collection of 30 essays on my historical period I am
coediting). We have been told that we'll start getting copyedits in early June.
3. Keep up with research on Rest of My Life project, especially preparing for
the keynote I'm giving at a major conference in November
Have a marvelous few weeks before term starts and we gather for the next iteration! Thank you to Dame Eleanor for offering to host, I got a sneak preview of the planned theme and I’m very much looking forward to the creative possibilities in there!
How is it mid-August? I'm on-contract tomorrow! Yipes!
ReplyDeleteFirst, a word about our next session: it will have a theme, which you can either just treat as creative writing/fantasy life, or allegorize so as to make connections between it and your TLQ tasks. I think I'll need a couple of weeks to set up a "zero-week" post that will explain the thematic elements in some detail, so I'll hope to have that up on the 30th. If things really go sideways, it might be the first weekend in September. I expect we'll run into December.
OK, how I did last week:
- get back into a routine (for exercise; morning stuff; evening winding down): Hysterical laughter! Sir John took a header off his bicycle on Tuesday, broke his arm, sprained both wrists. My routine now includes all the cat stuff & other household things he did, and sleep has been very iffy. He's fine, really, these are minor injuries that will heal, but this really makes me think about the "what if" situations that I need to be better prepared for, in case. So, anxiety despite knowing we're okay this time!
- finish the most recently requested set of revisions to W essay & send it off: NO. About 75 minutes on this one, but a lot of that was trying to track down a reference for something I thought was generally accepted but seems iffier than I thought.
- one hour each reading for next project and working on M festschrift essay: HALF hour, YES.
- probably more editorial stuff b/c co-editor has gone AWOL again; some e-mail. Co-editor surfaced but I'm not sure I trust this.
- write to some friends: ONE. Better than none!
Great Cat, what a week. ALSO: some teaching-related tasks; and I spilled tea on my laptop keyboard so I'm not sure whether I may need to replace the machine or if it will dry out! I've plugged in an auxiliary keyboard for now but this may be the push I need to sort out all my computer issues.
And now for the session goals!
Intention: divide and conquer! This was VERY helpful & I"m going to keep it.
- Complete 2 conference papers and 1 Festschrift essay: YES to conference papers, a lot of notes & drafty stuff for the Festschrift
- Revise 2 syllabuses for fall classes: NO, progress on actual plans for weekly class work in one course, which will be helpful, but this is now TRQ for the coming week.
- Stay in shape: YES
- Go on 3 trips with my husband: YES, they were fun and will be good to remember though there were some tiring & frustrating bits. And at least he didn't get injured till they were all over!
- Take care of necessary house and personal maintenance: SOME; did several medical things but am still delaying another; house is at least no worse but there are things I really want to do, and other things I really want to hire other people to do.
- Deal with special-issue editing tasks: MOSTLY? I hope!
- Urgently finish way overdue essay: YES but this is the one I'm still doing final revisions on. At least it's down to pretty minor fixes.
Overall, it was an eventful and memorable summer, and I did get a lot done, including a plan for an essay that is a spin-off from one of the conference papers (implications I hadn't considered till I gave the paper), and I'm starting a small writing group for medievalists via a private blog -- these are mostly people I met at conferences this summer, but include a classicist who is an old friend. HM & Julie, you'd be welcome to join if you like: we plan to start as an accountability group, perhaps with some drop-in Zoom writing dates, and move to sharing short bits of writing (2-5 pages) with the main goal being more encouragement than critique, but with the chance to get suggestions on early drafts. My eligibility requirements are Ph.D. in hand and a clear grasp of what paleography means! I think you both qualify. :) But obviously I will still be around here because of the broader focus and long-standing connections. This group means a lot to me.
Sounds like a nightmare week. Hope recovery is swift. You got a lot done this session. Thanks both for offering to host next time, and for the invitation to a new writing group. I'm always happy to join these things, but I'm an early modernist rather than a medievalist, with no palaeography skills (sixteenth-century documents can be beyond me) so I may not qualify. I won't be offended if I don't!
DeleteOh my goodness, what a week! A far too exciting end to a busy session. Thanks for offering to host, and offering the allure of fantasy and allegory.
DeleteJulie, you don't need the skills, just to know what it is! I'm trying to ward off being encouraged to write methodology sections that any Journal of Old Things editor would immediately cut. If you want, I'll send you an invitation!
DeleteBest wishes for a quick recovery for Sir John! And for the laptop keyboard...
DeleteLots of session goals accomplished, I'm glad the trips were fun! Divide and conquer is a great reminder that things get accomplished when tackled in segments or stages and that not everything needs to be vanquished in one blaze of glory...
Please send me an invitation, then. Zoom meetings may not work depending on time differences, but the more writing accountability I have, the better!
DeleteWow! That's a lot to deal with in a single week. I'm glad that the injuries weren't more serious.
DeleteThanks for the invitation to the writing group! I'll hold off for now because I want to keep expectations for myself reasonable while I start my term as chair, but maybe in the future!
Thank you, Daisy. I loved the session with all the photos of plants each week. Today's post is a nice reminder that fruit is one of my favourite things about summer - seasonal berries, cherries, nectarines etc. We had peaches in Canada from a farm stall along the road that were amazing.
ReplyDeleteLast week:
1. Catch up on emails - lot of teaching prep, urggh. - MOSTLY
2. Start on revisions to one article. - YES
3. Try to spend some time on Big Article: get back into writing mode. - YES (more than I expected)
4. Teaching prep: write short introductory paragraph for first-year module, set up meeting for first week of September, chase difficult colleagues. - YES, NO, NO
5. House/life admin: post-holiday laundry, financial stuff, thank you gift for friends whose house we borrowed in Toronto, nephew's birthday present, take son for MRI scan (not serious, physio is just trying to figure out why he has shin pain). - ONGOING x 2, YES FOR REST
6. Self-care/fun: get back to running, be outside in the garden as much as possible, read, carry on the cross stitch I started on holiday. - YES (2x), SOME BUT TOO HOT!, YES, NO
It was stupidly hot here Wednesday to Friday, so my brain was not firing on all cylinders, but I managed more writing than I expected. Still not back in a routine and too much going on with kids/other stuff for that to happen until September, I suspect. But that's school holidays always.
Canada's fruits and the autumn markets are still something I remember fondly three decades or so later! It sounds like you had a wonderful trip and a very busy summer.
DeleteThat looks like a good week -- sorry about the stupidly hot -- when it's too hot to be outside it seems like a waste of summer. Who knows, maybe universities will switch to having summer terms as a regular thing and giving us the fall/autumn off!
DeleteI'm picking a container of peaches or other fruit every afternoon on my drive home these days... Just cannot resist them, and I know they will be gone soon so it is a wonderful treat. Sometimes the strawberries or raspberries don't actually make it home - it is only a 12 minute drive so gives some context for how good they are!
DeleteGreat reminder to take advantage of fruit while one can! Our tree is yielding peaches now, and my husband is putting them in everything, which is just fine.
DeleteAnd session goals:
ReplyDeleteIntention: be more focused - NEEDS WORK!
1. Research/writing
i) Finish 30,000 word chapter asap and get irritating editor off my back. (I have kept to deadlines, he keeps deciding I need to add stuff.) - YES (ongoing drama about payment, but hopefully sorted)
ii) Have a full draft of Big Article for people to read and comment on. This is top priority. - NOT YET, BUT PROGRESS (should be next month)
iii) Make some progress on a grant application, but this is lowest priority. - NO (abandoned this at the midpoint)
2. Teaching & teaching-related
i) Preparation for new team-taught module next year. ONGOING & ANNOYING
ii) Sign off final corrections on a PhD. -YES
iii) Meetings with students about final-year dissertations for next year. - NOT REQUIRED
3. Life admin/house
i) Finalise summer travel - YES!
ii) Get a standing desk & proper adjustable chair. - IN PROGRESS
iii) New chair for reading corner in spare room. -DITTO
iv) Persuade kids to declutter their rooms? - NOPE
v) Clear more garage space? - NOPE
4. Self-care/fun
i) Exercise: run at least 3 x week when at home, find weights and/or pilates class - MOSTLY (running), NO (did look, but not good times, maybe next session)
ii) Travel and meet ups with friends. - YES!
iii) Read, preferably in garden. - YES
iv) Journal, also preferably in garden. -SOME
v) More creative stuff - A LITTLE
Not a bad session overall. Big Article has progressed a lot, but it's now way too long and still not finished. And my imposter syndrome keeps flaring up. But my mentor is organising a workshop with colleagues to read and comment on a draft, so hoping that will (a) be the kick I need to finish it and (b) won't end up with them telling me there's no argument.
And I did a trip that was definitely the holiday of a lifetime!
That looks like a lot to me, and it's well worth having a holiday to remember!
DeleteSo glad you had a great trip! That is a wonderful highlight that you will all remember.
DeleteA too-long article is infinitely better than a non-existent article, so I'm counting that as a major win for the summer and I'm very impressed with all the work you got done!
Sounds like a good session overall, including the decision to bail on the grant application! How liberating!
DeletePeaches and strawberries happen to be in my fridge right now, and I had both with yoghurt for breakfast. Definitely a plus to summer!
ReplyDeleteLAST WEEK:
was stupidly hot for multiple days as Julie says - fifth official heatwave of the summer apparently, and I do hope it's the last, but not that optimistic. And many actions of humans are making me very depressed, alongside the "Sunday scaries" for being back to work tomorrow after two weeks off (far too little), and the inevitable downhill to semester feelings that come with August - lots of anxiety, and I'm still feeling heat-unwell and sullen/pudding-y! That said, there were some good moments in the week and it was more productive than last!
SELF-CARE:
* 4x20 intentional movement, 3 x making, 2 x small things with people, reading every day one - heat and sullenness!, yes, yes (D&D), yes
* update the tasting menu and do at least one thing a day no, but I did a few of the things from the previous version!
* take the time to make nice attractive meals that are not just "the usual" a couple of days not really. it was hot! Did eat icecreams though, very important part of holidays!
HOME AND ENVIRONMENT:
* 75% of chores yes (thanks to decluttering service and progressing the living room project, but I'll take the win!)
* make more progress on the Living Room Project yes! living room now contains a large number of Ikea boxes, with the help of the declutterer many piles and boxes of STUFF are now all neatly corralled in one corner, and a handyperson is booked for the coming week to move the big furniture, assemble the new storage arrangement, and attach it to the wall safely before I start adding piles and piles of books and craft supplies
* do all the personal finance tasks on the summer list about half of them. Made a decent start on Thursday (yes, it took me a while to sidle up on the task), then on Friday moved on to trying to do some medium term planning (I am really not feeling any motivation to continue working - another bad set of journal experiences and I am just feeling very unappreciated and irrelevant and TIRED - teaching climate change related topics is really grim right now). The [swearword] pension website won't [swearword] let me log in because [swearword] it won't recognise my personal information (even though I googled to check it was right). I called once, had everything reset, failed to log in AGAIN, called again, the guy said he'd reset it but it never even tried to let me log in, so I had a good ranty sob and gave up for the day and the week. GRRRR. But I have solved one mystery (a savings thing got transferred to a different bank, with which I already had an account, and somehow both accounts are now under the same number but issuing different statements and with different logins, and I was VERY CONFUSED therefore had been hiding from sorting it out. But that help line person was SUPER nice and ignored all my stressed-out stammering)
TEACHING AND ADMIN:
Delete* finalise comments on the timetable release (due this Friday so can't wait til next week) done
* one high speed email triage (some missing resits, ongoing student support stuff) done. Sadly included infuriating news from very large collaborative article resubmission - they have rejected it because the response to referees letter wasn't acceptably detailed. The only guidance offered was that where I noted "changed" against specific points (such as "two spaces instead of one between sentences" - the referee was very pedantic) I needed to say "changed as recommended" or otherwise show I had done the thing requested, and that I needed to explain in much more detail exactly what had been changed. Why do we send a tracked changes version of the manuscript along with the letter? The letter was already about 11 pages single spaced. I am so tempted to just tell them sod it, withdraw the paper. But I have eleven co-authors... Le Big Sulk. And one of our students who is studying overseas this year is having terrible problems not being allowed into courses by a university we've never had issues with before and had sent a lot of distressed, angry, "I feel everyone misled me and didn't give me enough information" emails. My fault, I know, for trying to be a Good Citizen and support students who need help (there was also one of those who was very grateful) but still. I needed a boost and got a wet kipper slap)
* set up new teaching bullet journal/daily notebook (fun because it involves nice things like washi tape and writing in all the headings in nice writing, NOT working!) about half done (I did all the fun bits!)
RESEARCH: nothing I actually did something because one of the model runs finished quicker than expected so I set another one going.
Together those things should take no more than 2 hours not counting the fun bits of the journal, they did stay in their lane
Sorry, lots of ranting. I do not like this version of me, but this is the version that is showing up!
DeleteSESSION GOALS ETC.:
Intention: life and work kintsugi. I love this intention and will keep it at least for the next few months, might make it my word of the year for next year too. It has encouraged me to notice things that have changed in the last couple of years, and where I am doing better - for example, a couple of years ago I was struggling to read once a week, and I just passed a 270 day reading streak according to my Kindle (my life is just better with a chapter of fiction or well-written long form prose a day - and it reflects that I have more capacity for focus, less total brain wobblies than I was having). But still very much at the stage of finding all the pieces of the broken pot and mixing the glue, not having the lovely old-new object to admire!.
SELF-CARE:
regular intentional movement, making, doing small things with other people and reading for pleasure. I want to do all these things an appropriate number of times a week. I also want to explore a wider range of kinds of making over the summer, and I have an aim of having a more habitual practice in all these areas by the time we start back with students. movement has been patchy, but heat waves and the usual pressure-reduction "flopsies" - I did at least do something pretty much every week. Making went better - I've got past the slow and annoying part of my big crochet project, found a style of "mindful painting" which works for me and sometimes produces images I find very attractive, practiced some different watercolouring skills, made some woven objects using raffia which was fun, and have some solid embers of enthusiasm for making, long may that last. I'm showing up prepared for both D&D games and I think doing OK socially, and I have a call scheduled to catch up with a friend (which we've been "meaning to do" since Christmas - we now have a date and time in our diaries). I need to do more, but I only have so much capacity, and I need to pace myself. Reading is going well - I just wish some key authors would WRITE MOAR FASTER :-). I need more quality mind candy.
HOME AND ENVIRONMENT: regular chore habits, plus working on the living room (shelf-box-sofa project), working on clothing storage/management, and working on my finances. I have progressed all these things! Habits remain imperfect but I show up and do some every week, The shelf part of the living room project should be finished by the end of next week and I have done some research and made some decisions for the "sofa" part. The clothing has at least all been purged and put into places with labels/a map of what is where and my bedroom is much tidier for now (the floordrobe is much reduced). I'm part way through the finances.
TEACHING AND ADMIN: it is summer, but...
* I need to rewrite my final year honours module to fit into a different trimester I have made an outline
* I have a lot of minor tweaks to do to my other teaching (spread across four modules) I have managed three blocks of time, maybe
* I WANT to work through the practicals from another colleagues modules hahaha *sob* no
* I'm on a "task and finish" group (i.e. co-producing a report for Faculty) which might or might not involve a lot of work I have done a substantial piece of work for this, and am sure there is more to come. Le Big Sigh
* There will be extra work around trying to show we are taking the current recruitment crisis seriously (so much drama and stress and other people not so much dropping balls as yeeting them into orbit or dropping them into random abysses), but I don't know what will be my part. I'll roll that in with getting settled in to my new admin role slow progress here but there is some
* I also want to get one of my MSc by Research students completely done (and working on publishing her work) and the other much closer to submission than they are now yes, not really but I did my best
RESEARCH:
DeleteAs ever, balls in the air!
* contribute to governmental advice reports everything is running behind and lots of urgent action expected in late August. Ugh!
* keep up contributions to Big Project (which is doing my head in because, too many people and too little clarity and organisation) been to a lot of meetings, clear contributions beyond that will be expected but timelines unclear. ugh!
* progress at least three writing projects from a list substantially rejected paper heavily revised and resubmitted, major revisions paper substantially revised and resubmitted, multi author paper substantially revised and resubmitted (ish because of referee response issue ranted about earlier), small collective paper submitted. All the tedious stuff but things are making progress.
I also kept plugging away at the modelling project, and we've passed a solid milestone in the last month, along with solving multiple unexpected problems along the way.
For me, the academic year doesn't properly start until late September, so I do still have a month to make a bit more progress on some of these things. If I can find my get up and go... which is probably aestivating! Maybe we'll have a couple of frosts in September, my allergies will abate, and everything will feel more possible...
DeleteI think the important thing is that you showed up, rant and all! You've plugged steadily away at so many things, made real progress, and it sounds like you've been enjoying yourself as well. Hooray for new shelving and a more organized wardrobe!
DeleteYou have done so much research and paper stuff this session, I think that is a huge win! And the finance and organizing things are so time-consuming but great to have done...
DeleteAnd seconding DEH above - showing up is the most important step for anything.
Also, I learned a new word! I had never heard "aestivating" before and I looked it up and it is now up there in favourite word/concept list!
A lot of progress - a lot 'revised and resubmitted' which, as you say, can be tedious, but is definitely progress. And the living room sounds as if it is going to be great. I love new shelves and putting stuff on them. I also have to sidle up to financial tasks, so well done.
DeleteIt sounds like you've made a lot of progress in many areas! I'm sorry about the nonsense with the article, though. Will they let you rewrite the letter (as ridiculous as that is) and re-resubmit?
DeleteMid-August... Great peaches, I'm eating about 6 a day in that magic 2-hour window when they are perfectly ripe after getting them home... Nothing better than peaches basically right off the trees!
ReplyDeleteLast week’s goals
Work on dossier and make actual progress PROGRESS WAS MADE
New student chapters SOME
Major grant task MEETINGS AND SOME WRITING
Make a term schedule and plan for research and writing WORKING ON THAT TODAY
ALSO DONE credits: Went off on Monday afternoon with 3 colleagues and took a fabulous kayak trip to a huge nearby lake, best possible way to spend 6 hours (minus the run-in with a leech!), and made the whole week feel like vacation. Also managed beer with another friend, first department meeting as head (so much organizing and writing for that!), continued clean-out and organizing of department, and major association stuff with lots of meetings…
Session goals
Intention: breathe
I think the reminder was helpful, it was a super stressful summer and I’m struggling with major changes and associated emotions, but having the reminder to breathe and pause was a really effective strategy. It definitely helped in remembering to take things easy some days, and to do small things that would be restorative and fun. Also helped with the emotional stuff which was/is so much harder than I anticipated.
One new first-author paper ready to submit HAHAHAHAHAH NO… just no, not even close… I don’t even remember which paper this was supposed to be!
One student paper ready to submit GREAT PROGRESS, it is in student’s hands now for a while
Get reasonable start on new project YES! That was fun and will eventually be useful
Help student finish up thesis work NOPE, but only partially my fault
Regular exercise, and some kayaking YES!!!!! I biked to work a lot, started lifting weights again, and have been kayaking a few times, (mostly in the last two weeks but still counts!
Trip with kid NOPE, she had a great summer job and wanted to do it for literally the entire summer and loved it, so no travel. That’s fine, we will do others when she is a slightly financially challenged Uni student!
Added goal do promotion dossier for full STARTED, will be my main focus for the next two weeks until the whole thing is due.
Overall grade C+ …. Certainly not my ideal summer, but did ok with what I could and managed to do good work. The university-wide drama and uncertainty and general angst did not help. I did not manage to take any actual time off longer than a couple of days here and there but there were some fun things so I will take it! Did get a new deck and managed some excellent deck-sitting…
Good luck with the dossier! They seem like a stupid amount of fussy work but it can be great to see how much you have done. I hope there's a good raise coming along with the promotion. The new deck, deck-sitting, and kayaking all sound great, and we had a terrific day out--thanks again for that! Sir John keeps telling people about it as a feature of the trip!
DeleteI think 'did ok with what you could' is more than enough with so much on your plate. The kayaking sounds great, hope you have some time left for that this summer.
DeleteKayaking sounds wonderful! Anything that can make a week feel like vacation is a win.
DeleteThank you for hosting! Great session, as always.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to jump right in with my report so I can go back and read/comment on everyone else's stuff.
Last week:
I successfully enjoyed the beach. :)
Session goals:
1. Writing for fun: Get to a point with a (creative?) project where it will be easy-ish to sustain going into the school year. In an ideal world, this would mean about 40k of a messy draft, but I'm not fixing a number on it. -YES!!! I hit 40k on Monday morning. So I guess I did fix a number! I'm going to try to keep plugging away through the fall semester, because unfinished projects bother me.
2. New research: Read some primary sources to find another topic for a case study. (I have an idea for a very different kind of book that I might enjoy working on.) - NO! Not even one little bit! I did bring some books home, though. Maybe I'll open them someday.
3. Existing research: Complete and submit festschrift, which includes writing the introduction. - YES
4. Home: Annual deep cleaning stuff (garage, windows), clean out computer files, get patch of ceiling fixed, scrub or otherwise deal with the stupid popcorn finish on the bathroom ceiling - UMMM no, not really. Garage - not yet. Windows - not yet. Computer files - why did I list this? Ceiling patch - We have a person who can do it when he's done with our never-ending deck project. Clean bathroom ceiling - YES.
5. Crafts: Finish knitting shawl, start sweater, anniversary book, new journal? - Yes, yes, not yet (late because of beach), no.
6. Italian: Make my way through a substantial part of this rather more difficult (and very long) novel that I've started - Yes, about half. That's fine. It's more than 600 pages long!
7. Habits: Add some actual sitting, maintain exercise - Very little sitting, less exercise than I wanted because of travel, but that's ok.
8. TLQ: Check in on Mondays at least 75% of the time! - Don't think I quite got there, but I did a little better than usual!
Excellent progress on the Italian and writing (both creative and festschrift)! You listed the computer files so you'd have something to jettison, I expect. Glad to hear you had a good time at the beach, and all the best for the start of the fall term.
DeleteVery impressed with all the progress in writing and reading and exercise while traveling and doing house things!
DeleteAnd very glad the travel and family and trip and beach things were fun and restorative! Good set-up for the start of term, hope it goes really well!