Today has not been a waste because...

I went to Speech Day at my son's junior school [which he leaves on Wednesday :-(]
I finished reading some stuff to add to a paper (which is totally not related to my PhD but which is an update of some research 18 months ago)
I finished a draft of said paper and sent it to my boss to take a look at
I am going to have some wine and watch tv with my husband :-)

Today has not been a waste because....

I did at least open the thesis and write some words.
I set up a useful collaboration for my supervisor.
I identified final presents for dad's birthday (now just have to get 'em).

Erm, drat that's it so far, back to work!

The postman delivered some books (including the one on writing a lit review)
I did some reading
My son left his junior school

*took the morning off; did some exercise; got a delivery i was expecting
*made some progress with some writing
*found a paper that is highly relevant to my thesis
*drafted the acknowledgments section of my thesis (that counts as a chapter, right?).
*spoke to my mum on the phone

Today has been mediocre but I shall cheer myself up and then head over to the one goal thread....

*Meditated this morning
*Watered the plants
*Washed my hair and managed to look halfway presentable
*Does planning to exercise count?
*Made a more realistic plan for my week

Now for the goal thread and some actual work!

Today has not been a waste because a mate of mine, who is an English graduate - so knows where to put commas and those commas with dots above - said that she will proof read all of my chapters when they are eventually done - for free (my favourite word). Split-infinitive? Clause? Oxford comma? They can go and eat shoots and leaves, because I know somone with a zero tolerance approach to puntuation. (up)

Spent all day in graduation (and two more coming up tomorrow and Thursday) but when I got out I had an e-mail from my supervisor saying that the 2000 words I sent yesterday ( the first I have sent) were "a good-enough start, but I propose we leave proper examination til Sept, when it will all be even better and set in context" which given the feedback on my proposal was all "yuk" " don't like" "change this" " get rid" etc i was encouraged by.

(Oh & I should have posted that I had a fab weekend - children are away with my parents so my husband took me away Sat/Sun for a surprise weekend to the North Pennines which is an area I am considering using for fieldwork and we spent Saturday in tourist information centres (and a cafe) and all day Sunday looking at tourist places associated with my PhD research (he took lots of pictures for me) so he is in my very good books (he even doesn't mind that our summer holiday has been arranged around places I want to visit for my PhD) :-) )

not a waste today because
1. satchi sent a letter to the real estate agency
2. satchi's getting herself together (back to work on your thesis, satchi!!! GO GO GO)

love satchi

today was not a waste because I had a really enlightening conversation with a colleague who confirmed my reservations about my project (basically it's enormous and needs to be streamlined) and told me that I definitely need to be more assertive with my supervisors and not be quite so accepting of everything they decide we should do. Also I made a small amount of progress with the paper I've been working on!

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Today was not a complete waste because I wrote 880 words of my discussion. Although I feel it is not very good and will need completely redoing, but its a template and its better than nothing! I've also found a few new good papers to discuss which will hopefully back up some of my theory.

*added about 600 words and 6 figures to a chapter
*emailed supervisor with update on (little) progress
*half sorted out an order for a component for a printer that needs repairing

Well done Sim, sounds like good progress to me!
I've achieved rather modest gains on the thesis front, however in the theme of this thread I have....

Had some amazing chats with my best friend
Eaten gorgeous macaroons made by said friend
woken up from the first half decent nights sleep in weeks!
Made an appointment to see someone about my sore back

hmmm, macroons. hmmmm, sleep :-)

*skulks back in*

Apologies for my inexcusable absence these past weeks (you all missed me, I can tell ;-)). I've been even more befuddled than usual as I was moving across the country and starting my new Masters! And before anyone asks, no, I didn't manage to finish the thesis before I went. So I now have the somewhat dubious honour of being simultaneously a masters and a phd student (and not in the order one would expect).

On the one hand the space has made me feel less overwhelmed by the thesis, more positive. But equally, I'm now very busy with the new course and feel the phd slipping ever further from my mind. I can't imagine having my brain in gear enough to finish it properly, let alone survive a viva. And while I want to finish it up, it seems less and less relevant now I'm pushing in another direction.

But finish I must! I won't let my supervisor down like that and I suffered too much to come out with nothing. So please feel free to lambast me on a regular basis and crack the e-whip to keep me plodding forward :p
Hope everyone has been ok and look forward to catching up over the next week or so.

Today has not been a waste because I typed up my Internal Evaluation report in one day- and have just sent it off.