The Score: (2/0)

It is almost the end of the week, and I am still very busy at work trying to crank out the last of the papers that have been dogging me since the end of last term. Thankfully, the monster paper that had been eating away at me for months is finally complete and turned in, and now, I only have one and a half more to go. (The score mentioned in a previous blog is now: 2/0.) It is has not been easy to churn out thoughtful, academic words on paper, but, other than the extreme time crunch right now, I feel better about getting it done now than I did three or four weeks ago.


summer benches

I have finally turned a corner on this block I had, so, if all goes according to plan, I should have all of this work done by Monday--every last stinking bit of it. That means, no more reading about me here in the blog griping about work I have to do, something which, it has been pointed out to me, I have tendency to do. However, I also did not want to give the impression that I have abandoned my blog, so I present to you a picture that I took in June. Enjoy.

UPDATE: I guess the game is not going as good as I initially thought it was. One of the papers that I turned in, the small two page prospectus, was not quite up to snuff according to my professor. I'm not sure if this means that I have to redo it, or if I have to take the bad grade for it and move on. (Is the score back to 2/1, or does it remain at 2/0?) On the one hand, I am grateful for the feedback during the summer. I mean, he could have chose not to read it until the beginning of fall term. However, I was really hoping that the paper would have cut it. I was depressed for the rest of that day figuring out what my next move should be. This might change my upcoming plans for the fall, but I'm still hoping that I can pull it off afterall.

The other day, I ran into a small group of fellow graduate students talking about their summers. I did not have the courage to ask them why they were there for fear of exposing myself as someone struggling with the program. Unfortunately, I fear that they might have been on campus that day for a mini-conference about the fall classes they will teach. If that was indeed the reason why they were there, then they already know something is up by virtue of my not being there with them. Since there is nothing I can do about it now, I will not expend any more energy worrying about it. As for the papers and finishing up the work that I am mired in, I am thinking that now is the when the real test sets in. Although I have set myself on a new path, and changed some old behaviors, the novelty of the change is wearing off. Consequently, I am going to have to figure out a way to push my way forward and finish all my work, even though the chain of monotony is beginning to pinch a little.