Wash, Rinse, Repeat
My life still is in the busy-as-hell cycle where EVERY weekday is basically the same at the moment:
1. Get up at 5:15am in order to get to the indoor track at 6:00am to run zillions of loops.
2. Get back home and potty the dog, and quickly TRY to gussy myself up ENOUGH so I do not frighten folks of all sorts.... and get to the U within in 10 minutes of 8:00am.
3. Quickly check on the various critters in my lab spaces to make sure they are doing ok before even more quickly checking through e-mail to at least TOSS OUT all the extraneous, detritus e-mail we get each and every day, so that later I can focus on actual "valuable" (quotes purposeful) e-mails.
4. Run across campus to class and BIG VOICE LECTURE (3 hours on Monday, 4.5 hours on Tuesday, 4 hours on Wednesday, and 4.5 hours on Thursday).
5. TRY to do all the damnable, computer electronica when I stagger and stumble back to my outer office after class. But, this means trying to accomplish all the damn e-mails, write out all the damn presentation materials for my undergraduate researchers so that they have at least a framework on how to begin preparing for their research presentation talks at the conference that occurs at end of this month, write letters of recommendation for kids trying to get into medical school, dental school, graduate school, and other such pursuits (I had THREE letters of recommendation due TODAY, for instance), write out a research strand for an upcoming grant I will be applying for, file reports for the grants I currently am operating my research from, submit forms for all sorts of documents and reimbursement forms from the grants for items purchased..... and on and on.
And, I still am NEVER done when I give up and shut down all the damn electronics at 6:00pm to head out (potentially to swim, or perhaps just to home). The only exception has been my steadfast shutdown of the damn day at 3:30pm on THURSDAY, so I can at least try to go to the shop and perhaps find a straggler or two left over from the Retiree's Cigar Group.
What I am keeping my finger's crossed about is that POTENTIALLY, things MAY free up a bit now that it is time for my classes to start sporadic exams scattered through the remainder of the semester (during an exam, I can usually get a whole helluva lot done on the computer, which helps), and when this end of the month conference has happened, it will be an "hallelujah moment' I believe, for then I can get that sizable chunk of time back as well that has been given helping the kids get prepared.
I do not know if it me getting old, or if it is me becoming a curmudgeon, or if it was so much EASIER to do all these things when I had a pipe clenched between my teeth..... but it did not used to see so damn, all-encompassing. I still think in many ways it is the excessive intrusion of electronica in the workday, but what the hell do I know?
PipeTobacco
