TLQ: The Movie! (Session 3 2023) Week 7: Intern week

 

Good morning everyone!

This is a special week at our film set, we are hosting a group of interns from the nearby film school! This is a great opportunity for us to pass on some hard-won wisdom and hang out with lovely young filmmakers who are starting their careers. Your interns will be following you around and engaging in various assigned tasks throughout the week. They will also be writing reflective essays when they return to their course, so they may have some questions for you along the way. Please make them feel welcome, and enjoy the time with enthusiastic students!

To get you in the mood for intern week here are some questions… Answer whatever you feel like, as always!

What advice would you give your former self if you met you at a major transition point in your life?

What was the best advice you ever got from people ahead of you?

What do you wish someone had told you earlier in life?

 

Reports from last week as always…

 Dame Eleanor Hull

- swim twice, cross-trainer & weights twice, walk at least once, yoga
- revise assignments for mini-class
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Alms chapter, also some time on Latin, conference paper project
- do some House Task (or garden, or Life Stuff)

 Contingent Cassandra

Prepare for big church-committee planning meeting tomorrow (Sat)

 

Julie

1. Teaching prep for next week and after - now less urgent, but would be good to keep on top of.
2. Finish report for committee.
3. Finish grading conference abstracts (can do this in short bursts)
4. Finish sorting notes and photos.
5. Work on grant application.
6. Finish packing up kitchen (work starts Wednesday)
7. Exercise if feeling well enough.

 Heu Mihi

1. Read through 1/2 of chapter 2
2. File sabbatical report
3. Write, circulate, and get feedback on hiring requests
4. Italian presentation
5. Process article revision for journal

 JaneB

a) pace myself, allow time and space for counselling/GP stuff and reacting to counselling,
b) reinstate some key habits - move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day, 5 fruit & veg., picking up spaces that get messy, filling in my daily log, taking vitamins.
c) basic environment stuff - catch up with bin emptying, laundry, dish washing, filing financial papers
Work stuff, not divided into three categories for now:
d) do email triage on no more than two week days for no more than 2 hours total
e) go through paperwork for Individual Risk Assessment for overwork and stress, and draft out my responses
Fun: (I consider this medicinal in the current circumstances)
f) at least a couple of blocks of time reading, crochet, and playing or preparing D&D. Do the next seven Inktober sketches, never mind which day.

Susan

1. Read and return 4 more articles from big collaboration
2. Maybe start reading the book that I clearly don't want to read except I do?
3. Spend two hours going through email and trying to get it under control
4. Keep up with classes
5. Organize room for end of term party, deal with budget stuff, schedule a gazillion meetings, and other administrivia
6. Do something fun at the weekend or before
7. Healthy eating/ exercise / sleep

 Daisy

Edit paper draft from post-doc based on comments from colleague
Complete PITA grant application and send to readers
Finish/edit professional magazine piece
Go to bed early every single night
Trip at end of week

Unicorn takes center stage

 See the unicorn! 

 https://escholarship.org/uc/item/76p774sp#main

 (And check out the unicorn's neighbors!)

TLQ The Movie (2023 Session 3), week 6: interviews

I hope you all enjoyed your lessons and the social gatherings of last week where you got to show off your creations and the stills from your outdoor activities! The spinning and weaving lessons, and especially their products, fit in very nicely with the castle backgrounds. Dame Eleanor's gluten-free brownies were excellent (and got her out of the sulks, I'm glad to say), making a delightful finish to the Thai meal prepared by Daisy. We managed to sneak a few great minutes of footage of the sing-along, as well! 

This week, we're back to interviewing you all. Please tell us about an important mentor or mentoring moment from college, grad school, or your early career. 

And, of course, let us know how you did with last week's goals, and what your new goals are. You are such a marvelously creative and productive bunch of people! It's inspiring to work with you all! 

CUT! What is that blasted inflatable unicorn doing in the corner of the set? Get it out of here, and we'll take this from the top.

Contingent Cassandra

Professional:
--Finish & submit study leave app
Household:
--Continue sowing fall/winter greens
Personal:
--Take a full day off, or as close to fully off as I can manage (it’s time, and Saturday is looking possible)
--2x some sort of intentional movement: stretching, weight-lifting, or walking
----Friends & family: touch base w/ NY nephew; make plans w/ local niece

Daisy

Try again: Read and comment on paper draft from post-doc
Do two local paper sections
Complete PITA grant application and send to readers
Write professional magazine thing someone inexplicably wants to pay me for…
Exercise (seriously) at least 3 times

Dame Eleanor Hull

- swim twice, cross-trainer & weights twice, walk at least once, yoga
- prep a couple of assignments for mini-class
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Alms chapter, also some time on Latin, conference paper project
- do some House Task (or garden, or Life Stuff)

heu mihi

1. Stay on top of course prep; this should not be a challenge, but it feels hard at the moment.
2. Finish up this round of ch. 1 revisions and clear the deck to start in on ch. 2 next week.
3. Write two more recommendation letters
4. Follow up about spring talk
5. Deal with some action items coming out of recent meetings

JaneB

a) pace myself, allow time and space for counselling and reacting to counselling,
b) reinstate some key habits - move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day, 5 fruit & veg., picking up spaces that get messy, filling in my daily log, taking vitamins.
c) basic environment stuff - catch up with bin emptying, laundry, dish washing, filing financial papers
Work stuff, not divided into three categories for now:
d) do email triage on no more than two week days for no more than 2 hours total
e) go through paperwork for Individual Risk Assessment for overwork and stress, and draft out my responses
Fun:
I consider this medicinal in the current circumstances, based on my research into burnout...
at least a couple of blocks of time reading, crochet, and playing or preparing D&D. Do the next seven Inktober sketches, never mind which day.

Julie

1. Sort out notes and photos.
2. Write research plan and send to mentor
3. Write some of grant application since elf refusing to show up.
4. Write report for committee meeting.
5. Start grading abstracts for conference I'm on the committee for.
6. House jobs - start packing kitchen up ahead of having it all redone in 10 days, find someone to fix back door.
7. Book flu jab.
8. Have fun on weekend away

Susan

1. Read 3 more essays from big collaboration
2. Read 2 chapters of review book
3. Keep up with classes
4. Planning for next semester
5. Follow up on student issues
6. Book room for end of semester party
7. Try to deal with one small decluttering thing each day
8. Do one nice/fun thing
9. Healthy eating/exercise/sleep

TLQ: The Movie! (Session 3 2023) Week 5: Mad Skills!

Good morning everyone!

Before getting to the weekly task lists we have a few logistical things to address. For those involved in the unfortunate incident with the canoe and the inflatable unicorn, we did confirm with a biologist that the leeches in the lake are non-venomous so any lingering discomfort is probably due to ingestion of the local algae. Our physician will be happy to provide the appropriate medicine.

Call times for this week are posted, and since most of our extras are filming backgrounds scenes this week we are concentrating on skills that our main cast need for their characters this week.  We already have experts booked for lessons in archery, windsurfing (on the other lake without the leeches), landscape painting, and pastry-making. We have some free spots, so have opened up the call for experts. What skill have you always wanted to learn? Let us know and we will do our best to get a trainer for you, we may even have time for two things so if you cannot decide right now you can sort it out later when we have our experts on-site.

Have a great week! (and sorry for forgetting to put the goals up last time I posted!)

Last week's goals:

JaneB
Self-care: pace myself because no one else will. Move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day. Read & file post from last month or so. Chase up on counselling referral.
Eat more fruit and vegetables and don't buy more bread (other than seasonal specials).
Teaching: Prep week 3 and make a start on week 4. Chase up missing students. Deliver week 2 classes. Mark some MSc dissertations. Mark first year formative writing samples.
Research: Once co-authors reply, replan consultancy paper. Ignore Special Collection Chapter until co-author prompts me. Other things doubtless need doing... but I can't think of them as specifics.
Admin: summarise annoying report. Prepare for, attend & follow up from meeting I forgot.
Fun: one each of a chunk of time reading, drawing, crocheting and playing D&D. Half an hour is enough to be a chunk except for D&D. Write a birthday wish list.

Susan
1. Write letter of rec due
2. Read essays for big collaboration
3. Start reading book for review
4. Keep up with classes
5. Deal with new administrivia
6. Work in garden, plant kale and chard for winter
7. Have some fun on the weekend.
8. Healthy eating, exercise, sleep.

Daisy

Read and comment on paper draft from post-doc
Read and comment on student chapters
Write policy documents
Do two local paper sections
Complete PITA grant application

heu mihi

1. Check off as many to-do items for chapter 1 as possible
2. Accept papers for conference sessions
3. Second article review
4. Notes/rough draft for the rest of the book review
5. Come up with exam questions for grad student (this is not optional, actually)

Julie

1. Finish new module handbook and VLE - Urgent!
2. Prep first class of new module for Thursday.
3. Read PhD student's chapter
4. Finish sorting office
5. Finish sorting notes and photos from trip
6. Planning, put dates and deadlines in diary, work out a schedule
7. Try to eat healthily and exercise
8. Do some minor house jobs.
9. Book a flu jab!
10. Enjoy family weekend for my dad's 80th.

Dame Eleanor Hull (I copied these from last week, didn’t see new ones)

- swim twice, cross-trainer twice, walk at least once, yoga

- do some other teaching prep, esp MS-related handout

- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Alms chapter, also some time on Latin, conference paper project

- do some House Task (or garden, or Life Stuff)

TLQ: The Movie! (2023 Session 3) Week 4: Influencers

We have terrific footage from our castle shoot! Really excellent work, everyone, thank you so much. This is going to be a great episode (um, yes, if this movie/pilot goes well, we may have TLQ: The Reality Show), with the scientists in appropriately atmospheric field gear talking about the stones used in building the castle and the ecosystem both in the castle's early life and now, as well as the medievalists and historians discussing daily life and literature, of various periods, wearing those gorgeous velvets and brocades. That was a great idea, they look so rich on film! Oh, yes, we're looking forward to showing off the rough cuts! 

So speaking of showing, who is there in your life or from your past that we should invite to the premiere? (Or maybe even interview, and include some footage of that . . . where's my assistant? Get people's names and contact info, will you? We'll see if we can work in some cameos.) Former professors, old boyfriends or frenemies, your current supporters or providers of funding, who do you want to see you looking both glamourous and professional while you show off your fantastic research and ability to make your field interesting to our viewers? What do you want these people to say about you when they see the castle episode?

(If some of these people are dead, we'll include a seance: that would make for an exciting shoot! More notes---are you getting this? See if you can book another shoot at the castle, and get the equipment we'd need for shooting a day-for-night seance with spooky effects. And make sure the stars talk enough about these people that we can produce appropriate effects; also see if any of them ever did any filming or at least voice recordings that we can get permission to use. No, this isn't strictly a documentary, we're producing ART here.)

And, of course, we'll do the usual checking in about how you did with goals and what your new ones are. You people are so marvellously productive, I love it!

Contingent Cassandra

Professional:
--Complete all grading necessary to file comp & lit midterm evaluations; file evaluations.
--Keep up with post-evaluation comp & lit grading
--Ask 1-2 more colleagues for model study leave applications
--Draft my own study leave application and get to my chair (who needs to write a support letter)
Household:
--Continue sowing fall greens
--Continue containerizing kitchen items, with goal of clearing dining table and adjacent windowsill of objects that aren’t supposed to live there.
-- At least begin moving books and bookshelf sitting where the refrigerator needs to temporarily live while I’m working on the area around/behind its usual spot
Personal:
--Exercise: take at least one short and one medium-length walk; stretch x 3; lift weights x 2
--Friends & family: touch base w/ NY nephew; make plans w/ local niece.

Daisy

Keep up with weekly schedule
Read and comment on paper draft from post-doc
Write newsletter
Write data section of local paper
Draft of PITA grant application

Dame Eleanor Hull

- swim twice, cross-trainer twice, walk at least once, yoga x5
- grade a set of papers
- do some other teaching prep, esp MS-related handout
- research 1 hour x 5, mainly Alms chapter, also some time on Latin, conference paper project
- do some House Task (or garden, or Life Stuff)

heu mihi

1. Work through 1/2 of chapter 1 in hard copy (hard copy revisions are an important stage in my writing process)
2. One article review
3. Grade papers
4. MAKE NOTES on BOOK for REVIEW
5. Make additions to Zero Waste presentation and look into getting it online
6. Start reading grad student's chapter
7. Be firm with hair-cutter that hair absolutely must be shorter this time!

JaneB

Self-care: pace myself because no one else will. Move intentionally for at least 10 minutes a day. Read & file post from last month or so. Chase up on counselling referral.
Eat more fruit and vegetables and don't buy more bread (other than seasonal specials).

Teaching: Prep week 2 and make a start on week 3. See or at least schedule a meet with all my undergrad project students and my post-grads (one new one, one back from leave, etc). Mark some MSc presentations (and dissertations if time, but there won't be).

Research: Try to add text from long report to consultancy paper draft (aiming to submit end of month, probably not going to happen). Draft application for PhD funding which is due end of week. Ignore Special Collection Chapter until co-author prompts me.

Admin: summarise annoying report. Try to prompt intern back on track but not feel guilty if they're still not able to do much.

Fun: one each of a chunk of time reading, drawing, crocheting and playing D&D. Half an hour is enough to be a chunk except for D&D. Write a birthday wish list.

Julie

1. Sort out notes and photos from trip
2. Finish unpacking crates in new office
3. Set up VLE for new course, plan teaching, pull handbook together.
4. Revise last year's handbook for team-taught course
5. Do any outstanding marking (boycott is over, but not entirely clear if I have anything to mark, since I was on leave)
6. Get back to healthy eating and exercise.

Susan

1. Keep up with grading, LMS, and other class stuff
2. Schedule informal events for department, send out notices
3. Other administrivia related to graduate program
4. Start reading essays for Big Collaboration
5. Make medical appointments
6. Sleep/ exercise / eat healthfully
7. Do something fun at the weekend