Wee small hours

It’s just before 1 a.m., and I just submitted my final paper for my first year of grad school.  I did change topics (nobody told me not to!), so my first draft got condensed into one paragraph in the new version and I wrote an entirely new paper in one afternoon.  I’m getting good at that!

In a mere eight hours, I have to be at school to give a quasi-conference presentation on the paper that I just turned in.  Hopefully I’ll sleep between now and then!

And because this is the semester/school year that refuses to end, I do have one more thing I have to do for Friday — my first-year portfolio — but I’m hoping that’s pretty painless.  In theory, it could be fun to reflect on my year of school, but in reality, I’m not sure I’m ready for that on the heels of all these papers!

As I was driving home from a medical appt on Monday morning, I was thinking of all the things I want to do to celebrate surviving a year of the insanity that is doctoral work.  My list?  I want to go get pictures from my trip printed, and I want to go make a CD of dance music at Borders.  These were my fondest wishes in that moment!

I hate to ask but…

I just submitted the final paper for my second class a few moments ago (just before midnight).  Only one more to go.  I really don’t want to write another big paper though!  Could you do it?  (Or at least convince me to not change topics again!)

Also, I found out on Friday that I’m teaching (!!!!!) a new class that starts in just eight days.  I definitely hadn’t planned on doing new lesson prep this week…for an accelerated pace course…while I’m still finishing up my semester.  So…could you do that too?  The lesson prep, that is.  It’s just algebra.  Throw in some x’s and square a few things, and you’ve got a lesson plan.

Thanks so much.

*giggles*

I’m back

We got back in town this evening.  It was a wonderful trip!  I did not want to come home…

I will need to hit the ground running now to finish up final papers for my school semester.  By this time next week, everything should be completely finished.  But I may be pretty quiet until that happens!

I will share photos and stories here and/or via e-mail soon!  I got lots of great shots of the monuments yesterday when my conference was over and the sun came out!

Off I go!

I’ll be crossing state lines later this morning!  Wheeeeeeee!

I am not sure if I’ll write while I’m away (perhaps I’ll leave myself a comment!), but Kathryn promises to take pictures of our visit, so maybe you’ll find me on her blog in a couple of days!

Have a great week!

Grad School #34

One down, two to go.  Big final course papers, that is.  This first paper that was due was probably the hardest though — I didn’t make a final decision about what I’d write about until yesterday.  I wrote most of it last night, polished it up this morning, and submitted it a few hours ago.  DONE!  Hooray!

The other two papers are in progress and the topics are fairly solid, so they should go smoother.  I will be taking the papers with me on my trip (boo!), but I plan to keep them packed away in my suitcase until Monday (yay!).  My brain needs a rest and to focus on something other than research methods and epistemologies!  My conference starts on Monday, so that will feel like the day to get back to work and thinking.

You know, I’ve said before that when you’re in grad school, your fondest wish is to just get a break from thinking.  It just occurred to me that if someone designed a graduate program where the focus was to think Happy Thoughts, it might be much more enjoyable!  Doesn’t that sound fun?

The world

I am slowly getting reacquainted with the world after a tiring, crazy year of school.  Hello world!  I have no classes this week and I had a long “to do” list, so I declared today Errand Day and made eleven stops.  I even went to a store that doesn’t sell groceries or medicine (a rare event indeed!).

Of course, you can take the girl out of grad school but you can’t take grad school out of the girl…  While I was out in the world today, I asked someone if they were doing discourse analysis.  I asked as though it was perfectly normal chit-chat.  They didn’t answer me.  I don’t blame them.  *giggles*

Adventures Ahead

I am leaving town on Friday to head toward a conference in Washington DC, funded by my advisor’s grant project.  I seem to only get out of Michigan about every three years these days, so I especially appreciate these trips and the funding that makes them possible.  My last adventure out of Michigan was to the NIH, also in the DC area!  I can’t complain about that at all though, as DC is my second favorite major travel destination.  (Disney World is, of course, my favorite place to go!  I miss my Mickey!)

In addition to the conference, I’ll get to see Kathryn’s family and several others from the HPS group.  (HPS is a rare form of albinism that comes with the same family of platelet issues as I have, and most of the people I’ll see have been to the NIH for the studies too.)  I had to take a rain check on dinner with the HPSers on my last trip to DC, so I’m very happy to have a plan to meet up with them this time.  And since it was a bad experience with a kidney CT that wrecked our plans last time, I will make darn sure to stay far away from a CT machine.  *laughs*

Now, if my final papers for my classes at school would just write themselves this week (so I don’t have to take work with me), I’ll be an even happier camper. 

The tomb is empty!

Christ is Risen!  I hope you’re all having a wonderful Easter!

Harvard Medical Documentary

The fourth installment of the Harvard Medical School documentary is on PBS this month.  Yay!

The first part of the documentary aired in 1991, and they followed seven students through medical school at Harvard.  The second part showed their residencies, and the third part showed several of them in practice (not all of them decided to pursue a traditional path in medicine).  Now, they are middle aged and quite reflective about this whole process.  NOVA aired a recap of some of the first documentaries this week, and I guess they are going to show more next week.  I have the other parts of the documentary on tape (and have watched them many, many times!), so I’ve seen all the old stuff and could probably recite some of it!  I’m looking forward to seeing how they are doing now.

Grad School #33

Believe it or not, yesterday was my last day in class for this semester and school year!  My classmates will have two more days of class but I’ll be gone to a conference so will miss the real last days.

Now, that’s not to say that I don’t still have work to do.  I have three final papers due, plus a couple of other smaller assignments and maybe four more required papers to read (plus other stuff that I’ll need to read for my papers).  BUT, it’s weird and amazing to think that I am done being in class, participating in the discussions, etc., for this school year!

I am not taking classes in the spring or summer, so my next class day will be in September!  I did decide on courses for fall, and my advisor gave her stamp of approval today, so five months from now, I’ll be back in class.

Five months!  What ever will I do with myself?