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Weekend excitement
The weekend brought a new arrival–a new puppy. If you had asked me as little as three weeks ago if this was on our minds, I would have thought you were crazy. Yet here we are. Her name is Charlotte and we are smitten. Pictures will be coming soon. Of course the evil part of me wants to match puppy pictures post-for-post (and pose-for-pose) with the other new arrival on my husbands side. I saw the glint in my husband’s eye when I mentioned it. But we’ll just let that impulse fade away. This little addition, of course, has brought chaos and destruction from day one. She’s a little stinker…
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End of the week
I’m exhausted. Today was back to back teaching, administering a pre-survey for a research project, and a meeting for reviewing data on another research project. Next week doesn’t look much better. Overall, I;m kind of in a work hole. I have it piled up all around me and I need to dig my way out. I’m going to get myself a chicken sandwich, go home, and probably watch a movie. I’ll have to get some work done tomorrow, but it doesn’t happen that often. I probably won’t get truly dug out for a while. I need to keep chipping away at it. Enough for now.
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First orientation with data managment done
Today is the first of a series of orientations. My colleges are in session and classes start on Monday. I have spend some serious time since RDAP thinking of how to incorporate an introduction to data managment into their sessions. Conceptually I thought this was important because I wanted the seed of these practices, and the ways we could support them in this effort to be there in the begining. The harder part was figuring out what to cut. I already have a full plate with a basic orientation to accessing materials, and I usually hit PubMed pretty hard since that is their main database. Typical session send them thorugh a…
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Day in Review May 12, 2015
It’s been a mix of a day. It started with the death of a pet, one of our mice, that has been struggling for a bit. She had been fighting dermatitis to the point of extremem self harm. If I were in the lab, I would have ended her life for various reasons, mostly scientific. But at home she is a beloved pet. We got past the dermatitis and waaaas starting to regrow hair, but there was a patch of skin on her leg that was severly damaged. We had a couple of interventions because of dehydration. She was underweight. But overall, we felt that the worst was over and…
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Unproductivity
Another day gone, and another day that I judge myself to be unproductive. I own up to the idea that the issue that I am having is psychological. So many aspects of my life feel out of control. I am entering into year two and instead of having a better idea of what to do, I have a worse idea. I suffer from the problem of having so many ideas that it becomes hard to say no. I also have the problem of execution. I find myself getting lost in low payout tasks or being distracted by email. There is a larger question of why do I feel this way.…
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Stress
In many of my entries so far I have been navel gazing at my life and how it relates to a number of different emotional or mental aspects. I thik what is happening is my tumbling toward managing stress. Job shifts are counted as major life changes. This has been a positive one and relatively bigger than most, which for the last two have been lateral moves. I need to look closely at my headache data, but I sense a headache when I get overwhelmed and feel that I’m either not performing enough (quantity) or worry that I can’t pull it all off (quantity and quality). I have a headache…
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Day in review July 29, 2015
We are finally into the heat of summer. I am sitting on my final train grateful that it is air conditioned. Biking to work has been easy simply because I get a breeze. Workouts have been erratic. I had headaches that kept me home from work and doctors appointments that have kept me home other days. I’m just getting back into it. I bought a knee brace with the intention to try running again. And I have an ankle cuff that will allow me to use the weight tower instead of the machines for my inner/outer legs. This mornings workout, the first with the ankle cuff, is probably the reason…
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Day in review July 17, 2015
It’s hot today. I stink on the my final train along with everyone else. Good thing it is a rush hour and I have plenty of room to myself. The week has been full. It took me a bit to get my feet underneath me. Overall, I wasn’t happy about my productivity. However, in the effort to not be hard on myself, that is all I will say. Next week is clean, waiting. I have continued my goal to keep planning a self care or creative activity for each weekend. This weekend is gong meditation. I haven’t thought about it much. There was a time when I would have hoped…
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Start to the week
It’s storming. Thunder, lightening, and lots of rain are everywhere. For me, the weather makes this a fabulous morning despite that I have to be out in it. I’m on the train, facing backward because too many people don’t flip the seats and take up more seats than they should. The conductor flips his booklet to new tickets. He flips the dollars paid to all face the same way, sorts them according to value, and pockets the wad again. The train is busy with random little activity. The woman across from me is moisturizing her face and inspecting it in a mirror. Three rows back, a man in a peach…
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Tired
I’m going on day for of five of a headache. The medication dose has been intermittent. Most times I need to take a couple of doses in a row, maybe a few hours extra in between. But then it comes back. Last night it was at 2:30 in the morning. I’m extremely tired. I think my goal for the day will be to go to the chiro, eat dinner, and retire to bed. That is all.