Back from NY

(8/29/08)

Boy I feel unmotivated. If you took the normal unmotivated feeling you sometimes get while working on a PhD, factor in the "I just got back from vacation" multiplier, and quadruple that, you might get to about how unmotivated I feel. Well, okay, so maybe that's an exaggeration (triple?), but it does get to be a real drag to keep starting and stopping on things. Progress on the PhD has been really slow going. I'm trying to edit my third publication so I can submit it to a journal. Once that's done, I think I'll be in good shape to defend my thesis. Actually, I really could do that in opposite order. In our department you really don't need to have anything written to defend your thesis. Strange I know, but as a result it's sort of difficult to know when you're ready to defend. All my various advisors seem to be in support of me defending and I was going to do it last year around this time, so . . . there's really nothing stopping me, but now I feel a little gun shy. As my friend JP rightly pointed out, I just need to stop being a wuss about it and get it done.

Still, it's a little daunting. Life is a constant disruption these days. This one (going to NY) was a really good disruption, but having a constant start and stop does make it tough to get into a rhythm. Maybe I should try a bit harder to at least do a little bit of work each day. If you have some velocity, no matter how small, you'll eventually get there. If you have zero velocity, there's no way you'll ever get anywhere.

The week in NY was super fun, but kind of exhausting - saw a bunch of friends from high school and beyond, and I basically spent the week running around the city with various combinations of people. This was all great, and I managed to survive, but I think I'm paying for it a bit now. It was the same when I came back from Hawaii - I just feel pretty exhausted and tired. I'll probably try and sleep a lot this weekend, so I can rest up for treatment next week (appointment on Wed, treatment on Fri).

I'll post some NY pics soon, but for now, have a great Labor Day weekend! (Oh, and happy Judgment Day - actually the 11 year anniversary of what should have been Judgment Day. Good thing they melted Arnold in that vat of molten metal! But oh, wait, according to the third movie, all that just postponed judgement day. . . Oh, so confusing. . . ). Oh yeah, and Happy Birthday Dave!