Hi folks, I've done my 10 tomatoes, been to the shop, read the tabloids at the local cafe and had a nice bath. I always work much faster in the morning, funny that, it's like I slow down and get tired later on. I'm pleased because I finished my first re-draft of the thesis outline today, I'll leave it too settle now and read through it again tomorrow. I think I'll pay particular attention to my definitions section. These tomatoes are fab!

Hello, hope you're feeling better today MK. I agree with Eska, you should try and rest if you're il, you don't want it dragging on. It's frustrating though, I took 2 days off last week and felt so discombobulated when I came back.
Struggling again today so lets see if I can get my motivation up. Yesterday:

1. Read play no.2 DONE
2. Sort out registers
3. Mark 3 essays
4. Brainstorm ideas for expanding article DONE

Hmmm, not brilliant. I'm not sure I have EVER completed all my aims, come to think of it! Anywho:

1. Read play no.3 (trying to work out outlines for future chapters, hence all the frantic fiction reading at the moment)
2. Mark 3 essays
3. Continue brainstorming ideas

Will set a minimum target of 10 tomatoes. I'm off to see Strictly Come Dancing tonight with my sister :$:$ So that's something to look forward to!

Thanks Eska and KC. Made it through the meeting and was so exhausted and ill I flumped on the couch for the rest of the day, just doing a little writing on the meeting work before bed. Feeling better today and have piles of work for the next meeting on Monday. Tomatoes are great for goal setting and motivation. Wish I had them in my first year when concrete goals were harder!

Eska, think I'm the opposite of you for working style, I get warmed up as the day goes on and hit my stride around 11/12 at night, when I've to head to bed. The joys of married life and phd don't always combine so well!

You are so lucky KC heading to strictly come dancing! My husband used to tape these for me and we would watch them then when my work was finished for a day. Really got him interested in dancing too which is great!

So goals for Monday:
Understand the two cases of theorem so far
Write these up and type it in
Rewrite the latest case in original terminology
Check the details of paper X
Try to generalise to the next case!

Somewhat unrealistic goals and so much involved in each one but I'll be trying along those lines.
Hardest thing will be working full days over the weekend, always bad at that when Himself is around.

Hi KC and MK, I'd love to be going to a Strictly show as well, although So You Think You Can Dance is my favourite and would be a dream.

I'm having a funny day today, I got up really late - 10:45 and have no great urge to do the PhD work. This is because there isn't that much left to do on it - I have Sunday to work as well, and maybe some time tomorrow morning -I like to leave a fare amount of time, a day if possible, between drafts.


Also, I got this email from my boss saying she wants to speak to me about 'important issues regarding semiar teaching' but didn't say what they are. I don't like this boss, she is manpulative and has undermined me with students in the past, so her mysterious tone is bothering me. Hmm, must find something to do, so my mind is occupied. Might do some reading.

Eska,

I had a similar morning, didn't get really going til lunchtime. But I've started with reading and working on some background material that I'll need for the next step and for my thesis in general. It's a nice break from the specific meeting-related work but will help when I get back to it later. Some reading or background work would probably be good for you too - help you use the time you have but let the draft settle.

I've done nothing today. Probably one hour in total. Every week I seem to have one day where I just grind to a halt :-(

Me too, mine was yesterday. Just let it go. Try and have a really nice evening, relax and you'll be fresh for the next few days then.

Hello everyone, I'm back at work tomorrow so the clear run for PhD work is over. I missed my (self imposed) deadline tonight because there was far more to the latest re-draft that I had anticipated. Reading my book on writing style during the settling time meant I saw loads that needed working on, plus, it just needed more clarity in parts - and it is now 12,500 words long... So I've re-set the deadline to next Sunday, by which time I will have typed up the necessary changes and sent the thing off. I have a lecture to write by Friday, one for next Monday and a load of marking to do in between. But I will make room for the 5 hours or so I reckon I'll need to do it.

I did about 10 tomatoes of writing today and about 1 1/2 hours of teaching prep.

Good luck tomorrow all you good people. I'm off for some beauty sleep now, so that I don't frighten the students first thing in the morning. XX

Hello all,

Hope you're both having a good day. Hopefully this week I can bypass my usual day where I get nothing done! I had a good weekend and am feeling fairly chipper today so fingers crossed. And Strictly was great :-)

Last week:
1. Finish reading source X DONE (I think...I'm losing track of what these sources are now as more and more keep coming out of the woodwork!)
2. Re-read 2 plays, make notes. DONE
3. Finish reading text, research and teach. DONE
4. Have marked rest of essays (3 per day). not done.
5. Brainstorm ideas for expanding journal paper DONE (sort of)
6. Briefly research ideas for next 3 chapters. Not done.

By the end of this week I wanted to have brief abstracts done for my next 3 chapters so I can include them in my Mid Point Progression documents which have to be submitted at the end of next month. It's been harder than I thought, however, to try and narrow down which texts I want to use, but hopefully I can get it done by the end of the week. So:

1. Finish marking essays, add final comments and have moderation meeting (if it's meant to be this week- need to check)
2. Finish reading text, research and teach.
3. Have worked out which sources I'm going to use for next 3 chapters and vague idea of what I'm going to do with them.
4. Continue gathering ideas for journal article.
5. Work out how to claim expenses for conference trip.

Today:
1. Draw up grid of chapter ideas/texts
2. Finish reading text and plan lesson
3. Mark 3 essays.

U guys makes me squirm in shame...

:-(

well done on the writing Eska, hope work is nice for you this week and you get the re-drafting done on time. KC your goals seem like really hard things to do, figuring out sources and chapter plans but you also seem to be motoring along through them - well done!

So for my squirming (you're not alone phdbug!) my goals for today were:
Understand the two cases of theorem so far - DONE (most important case only)
Write these up and type it in - DONE (half typed only)
Rewrite the latest case in original terminology HALF DONE
Check the details of paper X NOT DONE
Try to generalise to the next case! HALF DONE

I've another few hours left today but have meeting and seminar, I'm exhausted and I have dancing later too so I'd say that's my lot for today.
Exceeded my writing and tomato goals for last week which I'm proud of. Not sure I'll be able to keep that up this week though, life commitments getting in the way.

This week I have to write up my year's report. I still don't know what to include. I have done so much this year, that I can't chose just one piece of writing to attach to my report (it can be anything I want up to 5000 words)....

I can't do anything else on my PhD this week, as I have a lot of things to do for my full-time job.

Hey Emmanki. I have my year and a half reposrt soon, which sounds similiar. The guidelines for our were also very hazy but for the 5,000 words I was advised to spend about 1,500 discussing 'the current state of knowledge' of your chosen subject (so a mini lit review I guess), then about 500 on your objectivies, 1,000 on the work you've done so far, 1,500 on what you intend to do next and your anticiapted original contribution to knowledge and then around 500 on a timeline. For the work I've done so far and what I'm going to do I'm intending to submit chapter abstracts. Hope this helps a bit!

Bug, you've had such a hard time recently...Give yourself a break, you work mega hard anyway.

Keep_Calm,
Thanks for your advice, but at my uni things are different. We should only submit written material that will form part of the thesis or will benefit the thesis preparation. It should not be written specifically for the review but should take the form of one or more documents produced during the course of any research recently undertaken. It can be bibliographies, draft literature reviews and research proposals, collection and analysis of data (including data collection proformas, transcripts), or it could be a draft chapter.
So, as you can see, it is fairly easy, but I have to decide what to send, as I have done my literature review, I have collected all my data and I have started my analysis. So much matterial....

Ah I see, Emmanki. In that case I wasn't much help but thought I'd try as I know how vague these things can be. Best of luck.

Thanks MK. I'm still struggling through source material as every time I read one thing it brings up another possibility. Good to have lots of options I suppose but equally none of them are *quite* what I want, which is why I can't seem to narrow them down. It's not that difficult really just a bit hard to distinguish one fairly interesting text from another, very similiar, fairly interesting text!

Today:
1. Finish reading 'Fulgrens and Lucrece' (another one which has crept out of the woodwork).
2. Continue filling in grid.
3. Send various admin e-mails.
4. Mark 3 essays.

Hope everyone's doing well.