Hi again,

Rubyw: What brilliant advice. Lara, i think it is also well worth speaking to a supervisor as well if you are really worried. It will put your mind at rest. rubyw is also right about getting some rest and not overdoing it too much as you don't want to over worry and being tired tends to make this happen. After all we are only human and things always look worse when we are extra tired. Anyway hope your day goes well today and try not to worry about things.

PS 2.15 is approaching!! Another Dick van Dyke episode hopefully!!!

Tractorgirl I know, I'd better hurry up!! It's my final deadline to get my pics out of the way for once and for all!

I was a bit worried I'd sounded like a panicker in my earlier comment, but I'd hate anyone to give me false reassurance about my work, and for me, my supervisor and PhD colleagues are the best placed to help, as they really know me and what I'm doing. My mum says she can't imagine why on earth anyone would want to do a PhD and put themselves through all this stress and anguish, and she can't wait till I've finished. Maybe we're all a bit strange and we never realised it before...

Thanks everyone! you're all so great, i will respond in detail at the end of the day, but just wanted to say a big big thank you to you all, for your brilliant advice and support. thanks so much!

i am just going to work really hard today and try to get chapter 5 introduction and discussion done. but yes you're right, i should not overwork as being tired does make things worse. and i will speak to phd admin and see what they say.

thanks everyone :-)

Hi girls,

Just checking how things are going on for you before going to bed. I couldn't do much today since I was stuck in work all day, and the worst is that I couldn't finish everything that I need done by Monday when lectures start. Anyway, I'm staying at home tomorrow to work on the thesis, otherwise I'll never get out of this chapter I'm stuck with; I'll figure out what to do with my lectures on Monday morning (I'm not teaching until 6pm). And to make things even worst, last night while I was having dinner, I broke a tooth chewing on a crouton. Just what I need, now I have to go to the dentist as a matter of urgency tomorrow. At least I'm not in pain. Ah well, no point in moaning... I mean, beyond this :p

So, I hope you did make some progress and that you are getting closer than I am. I promise I'll do my best to catch up with you girls from tomorrow.:-)

Thanks so much everyone for your support. I took your advice and spoke to a few people, and have made a deadline for myself, the 17th september. and to just basically glue myself to the chair and just aim now to tie it all up.

i'm not feeling depressed anymore, and feeling much more positive about it. today i worked well on chapter 5, today i started writing the final draft version of the introduction section, which made me feel good because i felt that i was now writing instead of preparing, which made me feel better.

i started on the introduction, and have done most of it, probably have about 30% left to write then can move on to writing the final draft of the discussion. i'm trying not to panic and just working consistently on each chapter and basically thinking that i cant include everything i want to, but just have to consolidate and keep to the main argument, no time for perfection, or very good. just gotta keep it to the "okay" level now. the ideal thesis i have in my head, i cant achieve that and there's no point of having it in my head and failing, i just gotta tie up the loose ends of what i have written and done and submit that and just hope for major corrections to fix it. one person told me that most of my thesis is done, its just tying up the loose ends now and that i am overestimating what i need to do, because i am panicking.

and in a way i just want to submit and get it over and done with, and dont want to drag this on anymore. so in essence i dont really want an extention, i just want to get it done and submit it.

i'm also cutting down on the number of hours i sleep at night, and going to aim to try to wake up at 7am. 6 hours of sleep should be enough. if i feel sleepy during the day, can take a quick hour cat nap.

progress today: total hours of productive time = 6 hours. total words for introduction of chapter 5= 2205 words.
i am pleased with my productivity today.

my technique basically: worked for maximum of 2 hours and then took a break.

i then had dinner around 9pm, and then after dinner relaxed for 45 minutes and watched an episode of "profiler" and then came back to my computer at 11pm, and worked until now.

i am now going to sleep and going to wake up at 7am. which is going to be a struggle as i hate waking up early lol. but i am going to try! i might bribe myself and tell myself i can watch abit of tv to wake myself up and then start work at 8am.

---
Armendaf, i am so sorry to hear about your tooth, i hope you feel better, but poor you, you have my sympathy, and tommorow i will join ya, we can keep each other motivated during the day (up)

Tractogirl and Ruby hope you had a good day, i look forward to hearing your updates tommorow.

goodnight everyone and thanks again :-)

and a big GOOD LUCK to swantje!!

Good Morning!

Today we have the perfect weather to work on our theses; rainy, stormy, dark... there is nothing else I rather do today but work on my thesis [sarcasm] lol!

Lara - I'm very glad to hear that you are feeling better and that after talking to people about your thesis you can now see that you are not doing bad at all and that you are just going through whatever any PhD student go when finishing. It's hard because we work in such isolation, but it is necessary to touch ground once in a while to get the right perspective.

TG - I hope that your headache is gone by now and that you'll be able to take advantage of this fine weather to keep working.

Rubyw - I'm also no very happy talking to people about the deadlines and the process of finishing the thesis; they just don't get it. I'm in a bit of an uncommon position since on the one hand I know a lot of people who have no idea what I'm going through, but they guess it is extremely hard and are very sympathetic, but can't give real advice. On the other hand I know brilliant people who have done their PhD ages ago, on a different area, that can not understand why I'm taking so long. They never try to put me down, but I know they believe I should have finished years ago. Anyway, I hope your pics are sorted now and that you can move on to something else.

Swantje - Best of luck with studying and what's left of your thesis. If it helps, post here your progress, we'd love to hear from you.

So, good luck girls. I'll keep working on that fist half of chapter 3 and report later.

======= Date Modified 05 Sep 2008 11:16:36 =======
Good morning folks. Thanks Armendaf :-)

Well i did wake up at 9am, but felt abit sick for some reason, so stayed in bed. Last night i brought my laptop with me to my bedroom, so that i could get some work going in the morning when i wake up and do what winston churchil did, he used to work from bed till 11am. and then break for lunch, take a nap for an hour, then work again, then take a nap before his dinner at 8pm, and work well after midnight. because he rested often he was able to work 16 hours a day during the war! impressive. so felt inspired to do the same!

but still feeling abit nausious (cant spell it) so might just work from my bed for an hour or so and then go to my study room and work on the desk top.

Armendaf, totally agree with you on the weather front, i woke up this morning, and thought wow it really is september, summer is over!

====

my immediate aim:

finish the introduction section of chapter 5.

i havent done anything yet, just about to start, but i feel that i cant start until i post on here. its like a ritual or something hehe.

will pop back after an hour to update on the progress.

good luck everyone.

Well, technically summer is not over until the 20th-23rd of September when the equinox takes place, but since we haven't had any summer like weather at all this year, that makes no difference whatsoever. ;-)

So, back to work...

Hi everyone!!

armendaf: thanks for the message about my headache! It has gone today so that is good! Lara and rubyw: Hope you are both having a good day. rubyw: Hope all your pictures are ok and don't worry about sounding like you were panicking in your last post!! That is what we are all here for, to listen and help each other as we stumble through this panicking PhD process!!!! Lara: Well done on getting so much done yesterday! You are a star and have inspired me to get moving!! Yesterday i did very little as i felt rubbish but today i MUST get the contents,figure and table lists done and the appendix sorted out! I keep putting it off but must get it done by tonight! Especially as next week i have a feeling i will have loads to do on blasted chapter 7!!!!! Anyway hope everyone has a great rest of the day and speak later. Anyone on the late shift tonight only i will be joining you!!!!

PS You are right, what summer!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Today it is awful and the other day we had sheet lightening above the house and it felt i was in the middle of a fireworks display the noise was so loud!!! Roll on spring!!!

======= Date Modified 05 Sep 2008 15:49:11 =======
Awww thanks so much Tractogirl, you're message made me smile :-)
sounds like you gotta do the nitty gritty stuff today, its a pain! and i will be joining you for the late shift also! really want to get as much of chapter 5 done as possible today.
thanks so much for saying that i got alot done yesterday, so nice of you :)

--
well i took some medicine this morning, and feeling much better now :-) i had to lie down, and then eventually started working at 1.40pm - solidly for two hours, its funny, but as soon as the 2 hours are up, (without even realising) my brain is aching for a break - and i have the "ugh i cant be bothered anymore" feeling - and then i look at the clock and realise its been two hours and that i need a break!

so taking a break now, going to get something to eat, and relax for abit, and then continue working on the introduction. am nearly done, have only about 20% left to write the part about why i am doing what i am doing and why its important blah blah.

and once i am done with the introduction, will reward myself with a break...and then can get cracking on the discussion section which is the brain taxing part (So TG you have my sympathy with chapter 7!). but am glad i have my zero draft of that ,to work from.

so far today i have written 1482 words.

good luck everyone. i'm working on my laptop today on my bed in my study room, i am all nice and comfy and cosy, isn't it grande to be able to work from home :-) i love it.

Hi everyone,

Lara, I'm sorry you've been feeling crap, it's worse when you're got loads to do. I'm really glad you spoke to someone about your work, and it sounds like you wrote a lot yesterday, which is great! It gets out of perspective sometimes, doesn't it. I liked your Winston Churchill inspiration, have you seen his red velvet boiler suit that he used to work in? Very exotic for work wear, can't imagine Tony Blair or Gordon Brown being that flamboyant!

Tractorgirl, hope you've got down to business with those bits and pieces now your headache's gone, with a bit of DM for a legitimate distraction hopefully!

Armendaf, did you get your tooth sorted out? What a crunchy crouton it must have been.

I got my images sorted out last night and went into college this morning quite early (well, earlyish!!). I sorted out all that image and chapter stuff and sent it off, photocopied my first thesis draft and came home in the torrential rain. Now I've got to start going through the whole lot to rewrite, fill gaps, edit, etc you know the sort of thing. I'm supposed to have a second draft of 4 chapters by the end of September, so I'll start looking through all that today/tonight and get on with it properly tomorrow. I've no idea what I'll think of chapters I wrote so long ago, so it will be interesting to find out...

See you later.

Ok everyone, sit down, hang on to your chairs and brace yourself for a major shock: My MA thesis is finally finished!!! (drumroll)

After several nervous breakdowns (which thankfully no-one witnessed) at a time when sensible people should definitely be asleep in bed I managed (after a further nervous breakdown at the computer) to send my thesis to my supervisors as a PDF attachment this afternoon. After arriving in Bielefeld at about 1am yesterday I was determined to FINISH THAT THING OFF. Unfortunately, the iMac I was using had totally different ideas about the whole matter. Major problems ensued. My iBook had already given up on the idea of Endnote 7 and Endnote X which was the referencing software I used for the thesis and which contained all my 120 references. Ok, so my iBook is elderly and sadly lacking in RAM. Plus, I should never have installed the newest Mac system software on it (bad mistake). Understandable.

So I took the Endnote 7, X and Adobe PDF making software with me and installed it onto my parents iMac. No go. After several hours of total horror and desperation I finally managed to get the referencing software to work with Word and format all my references. By this time it was about 6 o'clock in the morning. After this, rewriting the last parts of the thesis was a doddle. I was ready by 9am and fell into bed. In the afternoon I checked stuff like page breaks and made everything into a PDF.

However, trying to actually SEND the PDF as a mail attachment to my supervisors proved almost too difficult. Again, major drama (imagine tears, cursing etc) ensued. I was already wondering whose computer at uni I could hijack for a quick mailing session and failing that, where the nearest internet-cafe was. But, after trying out each of my three email addresses I finally found one which would upload the PDF (after waiting for ages) and send it (less than 1MB - what WAS the problem???) to my supervisors.

Done. One last exam next week Thursday at 11.00 and I am a free woman.

And what have I learned from this whole story? Don't move your thesis from one computer to another, even if everything is SUPPOSED to be compatible.

thanks Ruby for your message :-) thanks for understanding.

sounds like your rearing to go on your thesis, good luck! (up)
-----------

CONGRATULATIONS Swantje! that is so awesome you finishing your MA thesis! WELL DONE you! and wow what a nightmare and panic! well done for getting it all done in time, you are a star! you deserve to reward yourself after all of that. GOOD luck for your last exam! am sure it will go great! just remember to take some time to relax and unwind before you start revising! at least a day off (up)---
===

well i am clocked in for the night shift. i ended up taking a nap after getting some food, i had cramps and wasnt feeling so well, but the nap has done me good, feeling okay now. and am going to glue myself to my bed with my laptop and finish the introduction section - hoping i can get it done within the next 2 hours.

will report back as soon as i am done. then will take a little break. and get cracking on the discussion section, am planning on staying up all night and getting the blasted discussion section done, even if it kills me lol, i am going to drink coca cola to keep me awake. has to be done! and then tommorow hopefully will get the results section done and then thats chapter 5 done and can get started on the other chapters.

good luck for anyone else working tonight!