O procrastination, bane of my existence!

[tarigwaemir]

Durant Avenue, on the Feast of St. Pacific of San Severino

Causes of stress and anxiety:

1. I have no ride to the departmental retreat this weekend. I need to leave late in the afternoon because I teach Friday section, and unfortunately, no one is leaving after 2 PM. Everyone has told me that I needn't worry since surely someone will be planning on arriving late. Actually, I don't even particularly want to go to the retreat; the only appeal is the prospect of having an entire weekend to myself. But it will be a waste of my P.I.'s money if I don't go.

2. Also, I'm supposed to prepare a poster for the retreat. I thought I could get away with not making one, but my P.I. strongly suggested that I do so about a week ago, so here I am, being a good grad student and pulling an all-nighter to finish this poster in order to get it printed in time. Of course, I could be sensible and just pin up some graphs instead of designing a nice-looking poster using a vector graphics editor. Then again, I don't really have enough data to present, so I'm kind of forced to make pretty diagrams to cover up my lack of results. -_-

It's 4:30 AM and the poster is only 2/3 complete. What data I do have, I haven't finished analyzing yet--hence the missing 1/3--so I'm not even sure how to present it. Am burned out and would very much like to skip tomorrow's lecture but I skipped Monday's as well...

3. I signed up to present papers for my seminar this week. I'm excited about the papers but haven't had a chance to review them yet. Maybe I should take a break to do that since I feel so unmotivated about the poster right now. I suspect though that my brain is too fried to do any deep reading.

4. My students requested extra practice problems with solutions, so at some point before I leave for the retreat on Friday, I need to supply them with said problems and then solve them myself since I don't actually have any solutions manuals with me. Plus, I'll have to triple-check my answers to make sure I don't make any mistakes when I provide them with the answer key.

5. I also have to grade 60+ quizzes this weekend.

6. I've gotten next to no experimental work done (other than a RNA isolation) and suspect that I won't be able to fit in the qPCR runs and cloning that I planned to finish by Friday.

Thanks to everyone who wished me a happy birthday! Steve came over the night before, and we made red bean buns. He also brought sea squirt, which I'd never eaten before, and I made myself seaweed soup, which is traditional Korean birthday food. My parents sent me a birthday card and three textbooks (which I requested). Also, schwimmerin sent me a cute card. ^_^ Steve gave me a set of Nabokov: an annotated version of Lolita, the famous Lectures on Literature, and Strong Opinions. I finished The Defense a while ago (my first Nabokov novel) and thought it was rather brilliant, so I'm finally giving in and reading Lolita after all. Probably will attempt to finish it during the retreat (if I can get there).

I spent my actual birthday napping and doing laundry. On Monday, the lab threw a little birthday celebration for me. We had ice cream, Choco-Pie (thanks to the new post-doc who is Korean), scones from the Cheese Board, and a cantaloupe. All in all, a very good birthday.

I also met up with two high school classmates in Chinatown on Monday night. I hadn't seen either of them in a while, so it was good to catch up again.

Okay, back to work. I've consumed enough caffeine that I don't feel tempted to go to sleep but my head is very groggy. I ought to have gotten more of this poster done over the weekend. -_-

Yours &c.

Comments

[offtheshoulder.livejournal.com]

Yikes, good luck with all of that! And happy belated birthday :).

[angelyrique.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Extra problems? Those students sound annoying. Ha ha. Sounds hectic. Trying to post though my cell. How does it look? xD That's a question for the both of you. Yes, I'm bored.

[troisroyaumes]

Thanks! :D

[love_archived]

*hugs* I think I forgot. T_T HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU.

[troisroyaumes]

Eh, no worries, I forget all the time too, even with LJ notifications.

[tokyofish.livejournal.com]

ARRRGH! I KNEW I had missed someone's birthday! Happy Belated Birthday!!!!

And have a sympathetic wince for all the work you have to do. O___O

[troisroyaumes]

Thank you! <3 We should do lunch sometime, maybe next week?

[tokyofish.livejournal.com]

Yeah, sure.

BTW, it's too bad you're going to be gone this weekend. There's a huge used book sale in the city.

[troisroyaumes]

Aw, sorry to be missing it. :(

[emblem.livejournal.com]

Speaking as someone who basically had to slap together a poster in three days (it was also due on the same day as MY LAB MEETING), and then ran off to another conference ...

... science sucks sometimes. I feel your pain. Chin up, it'll be fine. And you can take a long, long nap afterwards.

[troisroyaumes]

Ohhh, that sounds painful. Good to know you survived the ordeal. I got my poster together but now I'm worried that it won't get printed in time. -_-;;;

I'm already scheduling long naps during the limited free time at the retreat. XD (Hey, as long as I don't fall asleep during the talks...)

[bravecows.livejournal.com]

Eep. :( Hope life eases up on you soon. Am glad you had a good birthday! What is sea squirt like?

[troisroyaumes]

Thank you! The end of the tunnel is in sight, so I'm feeling a lot better.

Sea squirt is very salty and fleshy. It reminds me a bit of mussels (a similarly strong flavor), although the raw texture is rather like a lychee fruit, since it is soft yet chewy with seawater-flavored fluid in its center.

[uminohikari.livejournal.com]

Mm, seaweed soup! I'm glad you had a good birthday~

[troisroyaumes]

Thanks! <3

[schwimmerin.livejournal.com]

Steve sounds like quite the foodie! Glad you liked my corny card, haha.

And, oh dear, that sounds really terrible. I should have given you a Time Turner for your birthday, apparently...

Also, I refuse to permit you to feel guilty about not doing work on your birthday weekend :P

[troisroyaumes]

It's hard to avoid becoming a foodie in SF. ^_^

The end of the tunnel is in sight! So I just need to hold on until I'm actually at the retreat.

I feel like I'm in a perpetual guilt trip. ^_^ Oh well, soon you too will worry about whether you're working hard enough in lab...then again, you're much better at time management than I am, so probably not. Lend me your orderly brain, Jenny~ XD

[tryogeru.livejournal.com]

ooh! the Dalek came! Sooooo cute!!! Thanks~~~

Oh, and what did you want for your birthday?~

[troisroyaumes]

Glad you liked it!

Hmm...is Mary Roach's Bonk out in softcover yet?

[(Anonymous)]

It's not out in softcover, but it's not v. expensive in hardcover. Unless you don't want to lug it around in harcover (I like the larger softcovers myself).

Or, you know, I have it in audiobook. I can megaupload that to you if you want (can't remember your opinion on audiobooks.

H (too lazy to sign in)

[troisroyaumes]

Replying here so you see this comment. If the hardcover's not too expensive, I'd like that. (I don't have the patience for audiobooks, I'm afraid...) You can get me a used copy if that's cheaper. ^_^

[jaebi-lit.livejournal.com]

Steve gave me a set of Nabokov: an annotated version of Lolita, the famous Lectures on Literature, and Strong Opinions.

o_O A significant other with good taste!

[troisroyaumes]

Hee, yes, quite a rarity. ^_^

By the way, I finished Queen's Play and ohhhhhhhhhh. ::flails for words:: Need to find next book immediately.

[jaebi-lit.livejournal.com]

Lymond is <3. Not just <3, but </3 and anguish and devotion and everything all rolled up together. A veritable mess of contradictions, he! Thought of you today because I had Japanese-style curry for lunch! I got it from that posh Japanese deli in the Ferry Building, and they probably make it all from scratch. it's nice, but it just doesn't taste the same when it's not made from the brick-of-curry-mix that you get at the Korean market. :(

[lacewood]

XOOO

I totally missed that it was your birthday. HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY! <333 Nice to know that it was a good one XDXDXD

And aw, I hope your week gets better, and that you have fun during the retreat *pats*

[troisroyaumes]

Hee, I forget everyone's birthdays too, so no worries! Thank you! And yes, I'm almost at the end of the busy stretch, so just need to keep going for a little bit longer before collapsing. ^_^

[shoujo22.livejournal.com]

Well, I know that we don't talk much, and despite my being eons late, I want to wish you a happy birthday anyway. So:

Happy Belated Birthday

I hope that you can get to that retreat...and catch up on some well needed rest. You're really pushing yourself these days ^__^'.

[troisroyaumes]

Hey, better late than never! Thanks! Also, I'm bad with remembering birthdays too, so it's really fine. ^_^

I did manage to find someone to give me a ride there, and soon I should be finished with everything pressing and be able to just collapse. ^_^

[shoujo22.livejournal.com]

Good for you! So then, please try to relax, okay?

[ldmoonflower.livejournal.com]

Happy belated birthday! Sorry I missed it!

[troisroyaumes]

Thanks! No worries, I miss everyone else's birthdays myself.

How've you been?

[flonnebonne]

Belated happy birthday! And sorry if I'm adding to your stress. :(