Post Punk Kitchen Forum

I've had a number of professors who refuse to read paper by students who go over word count substantially. This is going to be my policy as well going forward. Being concise is an important skill!

Just thinking about my class schedule is making me so tired.

I'll switch your class schedule for my research/lab rotation schedule.

So stoked that I'll be performing my first surgeries this semester and that my patients are coming from a local humane society and going home to loving families afterwards!

So you'll go to internship for me too then?

Actually, I want to do that. I'd miss the kids too much.

Just moved into my grad student housing and I'm homesick. Hopefully it will get better when classes start up in a couple weeks.

word count for journal... Y U NO LONGER?

guuuh. I will just write the whole thing in internet slang. Maybe then it will be 3,500 words.

Man, I know survey methodology is a good thing to know about, but the reading for the class just puts me right to sleep. I needed two 20-minute naps just to get through one chapter.

First day of the new semester tomorrow, and it's going to be a busy one: office hours, teaching from 12-1:10, and a seminar from 1:20-4:20. Wish me luck (and join me in thanking goodness for Luna bars)!

Good luck Desdemona!

I'm about to head into my second full week of classes. It's been fine so far. Less traumatic than I thought returning to grad school (in a different program at a different university, mind you) would be.

One of my classes, the professor keeps telling us "you need to start on the class project right away! like today!" and then not posting the project info online. It's stressing me out bigtime!

I am so not ready to go back to school tomorrow. Nope, not ready.

I just finished a Masters in Library Science. I am proud to say I didn't fluff the program however (which I am not sure is the case with many MLS students). Most of my program, I balanced it with a crappy part time job and internships, along with my own independent research agenda.

I was lucky to get a year contract at the University where I did internship work shortly after graduating. Not balancing multiple commitments and deadlines, while making a living wage is kind of surreal to me. (I have insurance for the first time since leaving the nest, and good insurance! I am not quite sure how this happened.) Having just a 40 hour a week job is like being condemned to freedom, I constantly feel a sense of guilt in the background of my mind.

I've only been done for a month, and I have found myself finding obligations to fulfill in order to feel normal. These include projects for professional societies, collaborations with people on campus, and exercise and reading quotas. After so many years of school, it is weird to live without some type of goal post to move toward. (Also, I really, really, should be publishing.)

I wish I had teaching opportunities. (Thing #3 of 72430 that I didn't think about when signing up to do a ph.d. abroad.)

I'm in the first year of my PhD. These last few months, I have had a REAL problem motivating myself and getting to work, especially in the mornings. I am usually very productive between 2 and 5 am, but that's just not long enough.

I don't get much support from the uni, and I don't have any deadlines, except for the big one four years from now. I'm basically supposed to do my research, write a book and 'bother' my supervisor as little as possible. My colleagues are all in another city and are doing their own thing or waiting for me to come around so then can complain about their sorrows, so I think it's best to see them only once a week.

Damn you PPK, why are you more fun than early medieval cemeteries!

Okay, I am going to WORK now. Thank you for reading my lamentations.

Cornelie, we should talk. I thought all Dutch universities used the same model, but it sounds like our universities have very different approaches. Do you have annual reports you have to file? Or a grad school responsible for your training (and etc.)? Here, I'm expected to meet with a daily supervisor once a week (we meet twice a week because I'm often gone for weeks at a time), and to "check in" with my promotor once or twice a year. The first few months I was also really, really lost. Writing schedules for myself helped, kind of like pretend syllabi for classes I wanted to do. So did coming to the office every day, and staying there for the full 8 hours, even if nothing much was done. It took awhile though. I think some more structure in the first semester would have helped me a lot.

Ask and your shall receive! Spontaneous meeting with my supervisor this morning, during which time he wondered which semester to share his M.A. course with me (sounds like fall, next year) and decided that I should give a guest lecture to the current batch of kids on October 11th (using his data with my own approach). I like it.

Yay for getting to teach lutin!

Thanks for the advice. I'll send you a pm.

I'm teaching two classes of 23 students each with 7 writing assignments to grade over the course of the semester. So... you can have one of my classes, Lutin!

Depends on what you're teaching, quark!

Composition for college freshman?

Um , with all due respect to the PPK, nothing is more interesting than medieval cemeteries! In all seriousness - your work sounds fascinating; I'd love to hear more about it! What's your field?)

Thank you Desdemona :-) You are right and I do love my research, but cemeteries can be a real pain in the asparagus sometimes too. I'll pm you some info on my project.

Seconded! Medieval anything is interesting.

Wait! PM your info, too, cornelie!

Oh dear, now I have a fan club :-P

pm's on the way.