Hope you're feeling better today!

I should be working through this weekend but my other half starts a new job on Monday, in a different city that he's got to move to and only come back here on weekends, so this weekend is all about making him feel valued and like he'll be missed - me working through the weekend would spoil that somewhat! So I have to take tomorrow off, and part of Sunday until he leaves. And then Monday is my birthday - and I'll be all alone and will have to work through it! That's going to be particularly joyous. I hate working on my birthday - in previous jobs I always booked the day off as holiday, and assumed I'd be able to wangle the same as a PhD student, but it looks like I've failed this year! Oh well. Moan over!

I made good progress on the plan for the chapter yesterday, so have a good idea what I need to do by next Wednesday. I may end up working through the night on Tuesday to make the deadline - let's hope I make good enough progress to avoid that today! Goals for the day:
1.) Tidy up journal article draft and email to co-author
2.) Write as much of analysis chapter as possible

Oh dear Batfink and Linda, doesn't sound like you've been well, hope you've both recovered! That's really rubbish having to work on your birthday Batfink, but at least it will mean you'll get your writing done and you can celebrate after your deadline :-)

I am absolutely stressed up to my eyeballs. I have a million and one things to do, and then needed to do some serious work on my findings chapters. I've got a load of marking to do, need to write and prepare for 3 presentations, write up my meeting notes from yesterday, and then get started on my findings chapters. I need all this done by mid/end March but what makes it even more stressful is that I'm away for a week in March eek! Anyway, I'm going to try not to stress TOO much, and will start by making a plan.

Goal 1- do plan for next few weeks
Goal 2- do all marking
Goal 3- do module prep
Goal 4- do teaching prep

I think that will probably keep me busy all day, so I best get going!

Crikey sounds like you're both very busy! That is rubbish having to work on your birthday, but at least you can celebrate afterwards and you've got all weekend to have early birthday celebrations with your other half before he packs up!

I'm feeling marginally better this morning but I'm a bit bemused as my nose had cleared up when I went off to sleep last night, I was breathing fine and slept fairly well, though I've woken up all bunged up again! Go figure! Anyway. I managed to get a fair amount of work done yesterday so I'm not going to beat myself up today, I'll do what I can but I'm definitely going to get outside at some point as it's a gorgeous spring day here!

Have a good day everyone - I can't believe it's Friday already, how did that happen?!

Hello everyone.

Full of cold and not wanting to work on my birthday, but never mind! I had a great weekend, having a laugh with friends and watching Wales win the rugby (yay!) and saying good bye to MrBatfink.

Now I have a clear week to get lots of work done. Today and tomorrow will be brutal - I have until 9am Wednesday to get my chapter written. It may be a stay-up-all-night job tomorrow. So, I only have one goal - to get my chapter written! It's in two neat sections so today I need to finish the first section.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BATFINK! I know it's crappy working on your birthday, but at least you'll be able to relax a bit after your deadline!

I am still ridiculously stressed; I have to do a presentation tomorrow that I haven't finished writing, let alone started to practice! So that's a bit worrying. I also need to finish another presentation today, stressful!

Goal 1- finish presentation 1
Goal 2- do presentation 2
Goal 3- practice presentation 1

Thanks Button :-)

Good luck with the presentation. It's horrible when the stress levels rise up like that. Try to remember things don't have to perfect, they just have to be good enough - I know I find it really hard to remind myself of that when I'm feeling the pressure, and it just piles even more unnecessary pressure on.

Happy birthday Batfink! Glad you had a great weekend, have a virtual (mince) from us all! I'm "English" but I'll forgive you for the rugby!;-) hope you're not feeling too sniffly this morning!

I spent most of the weekend being full of cold too - I'm feeling better today, fingers crossed, so I'm hoping to crack on. I want to get chapter 6 completed this week, as well as an amendment to the chapter I was writing last month. I then need to crack on with another chapter from 7th March so these are my main overarching goals this week.

Hope your presentations are ok Button - I hate giving them! I'm not going to go into teaching after this needless to say! You'll be fine, I'm sure :-)

Thanks Lindalou! Actually, I'm English too, but I don't support England in any sports (I hate all the petty jingoism that goes along with it) and MrBatfink is Welsh, so I've adopted the Welsh team. It's fun supporting them (plus if Wales lose, MrBatfink's such a grump that I really would prefer Wales to win!)

Work is going slowly but steadily today. Must speed up if I'm going to make my deadline! Back to it I go...

It'll take a miracle to reach my deadline of 9am tomorrow for this chapter!

Oh well, I'll just have to do what I can. I suspect I'll be working through the night. Gah. But I'm surprisingly unstressed about this - we'll see how I feel later!

Good luck Batfink - you can do it! :-)

I'm still slaving away at my desk too - I'm currently redrafting my methodology and it's taking a lot longer than I thought as I'm having to rewrite and add loads of stuff - I might as well have started it again from scratch!

Thanks Busybee! I'm glad someone else is around today. I'm thirteen hours in and still plugging away... definitely going to be up most of the night and probably won't quite finish (tiredness is likely to stop me at about 2 am, then I'll aim to start again at 6 am) but I'll have something to send, even if it has bullet-points for the bits I haven't quite finished.

Hi Batfink,
I've not been working today as I've had the headache from hell (hang over from cold I think) but I was thinking of you! Good luck getting it finished, you've certainly worked very hard! I'll be back on tomorrow :-)

Thanks Lindalou! Hope you're feeling better tomorrow.

Over fifteen hours in now, and it's still a slow slog with a long way to go... I think I will have to bullet point a lot of it. Oh well!

Gosh you're up early or I can't believe you're still awake! Hope you're feeling ok today & not too tired, I think you deserve a nice long sleep now!

Hi all,

I have so much to do today!

Goal 1- write up yday notes
Goal 2- edit presentation 1
Goal 3- cancel sup meeting
Goal 4- edit plan
Goal 5- start next presentation
Goal 6- do questions to ask students
Goal 7- email presenter

Argh!