Today is my department's thesis deadline. I'm at 233 pages. It's 5am, and I'm tiiired. I think this was my first all-nighter since undergrad. Ugh, I'm old.
My faculty thesis advisor is in the process of giving me an ulcer. He is mysteriously unreachable, and I need to get my title page signed today. He wanted to see a more up-to-date draft when I talked to him on Wednesday, but he promised he'd sign my thesis when I brought him the draft on Thursday morning. Well, yesterday came and went with no sign of the man. So today is the final day... the process of turning everything in becomes significantly stickier if he's MIA again.
In the continuing trend of my whining, LaTeX takes FOR-E-VER to compile and display my thesis. Therefore (heh, I've gotten so used to using words like "therefore," "whereby", "thus," etc.), I have to wait nearly 5 minutes for it to chug and redisplay when I recompile after any changes.
I'm tempted to lie down for an hour or so, but I'm afraid I'll feel even worse if I sleep. Plus, there's always the added panic of, "what if my alarm doesn't go off?!?" Oh, nevermind... I forgot that I haven't finished my acknowledgements. I guess I'm staying up.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Sunday, May 20, 2007
182 pages and counting...
About 150 of those pages are the actual thesis; the rest are appendices. I still have to add Appendix B (additional results), finish Appendix A (detailed description of my algorithm), write the abstract, and make any final changes that my advisor can come up with on Monday. The thesis deadline is Friday. It's going to be close, but it'll happen. IT WILL HAPPEN.
They've started putting up the graduation stuff on the lawn. It's currently getting soaked in the rain, but it was another reminder today as I was walking to work that the end of the term is actually here. Apparently this coming week is finals week? It's amazing how insulated you can get from that stuff when you don't have any finals to take. :)
They've started putting up the graduation stuff on the lawn. It's currently getting soaked in the rain, but it was another reminder today as I was walking to work that the end of the term is actually here. Apparently this coming week is finals week? It's amazing how insulated you can get from that stuff when you don't have any finals to take. :)
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
The newest demotivator
From despair.com:
For the past few years, my dad and I have given each other a Demotivators® calendar from for Christmas. In college, I always had the calendar up on my wall, and once another friend of mine gave me a real motivational poster. “I saw your calendar and thought you might like this,” she said innocently. I chuckled to myself because that’s what I love about these (aside from the biting sarcasm, of course)—if you don’t look closely to read the fine print, it looks like any other drippy motivational poster that you see ads for in Skymall.
For the past few years, my dad and I have given each other a Demotivators® calendar from for Christmas. In college, I always had the calendar up on my wall, and once another friend of mine gave me a real motivational poster. “I saw your calendar and thought you might like this,” she said innocently. I chuckled to myself because that’s what I love about these (aside from the biting sarcasm, of course)—if you don’t look closely to read the fine print, it looks like any other drippy motivational poster that you see ads for in Skymall.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
You know you’ve been staring at Matlab too long when...
... your thesis plots start to look like robots! These figures look completely boring when they’re stretched out, but when they’re munched up like this, I think they look like cute little aliens. :)
When I get a little stressed, I eat a lot. Usually in front of the TV, trying to unwind. When I get more stressed, I eat very little. I’m barely hungry, not much sounds appetizing, and even if I do manage to find something I’m interested in eating, I can’t eat very much. I was doing okay in this department until yesterday. I couldn’t eat much breakfast and my lunch made my stomach turn. This morning, breakfast was a lost cause.
I gave my technical advisor a draft of chapters 6-7 of my thesis yesterday. He’s already seen chapters 4 & 5, but I’m still working on chapter 8 (results) and haven’t really started chapters 1-2 (intro & equations of motion) or chapter 9 (future work). Chapter 3 is written, but the first part needs to be axed. After all that’s done, I need to write the abstract. Did I mention I’m supposed to have a complete draft by Monday to give to my faculty advisor? On my schedule for next week is writing the appendices, which will be detailed diagrams of my algorithm and the original algorithm, as well as the zillions of plots that I can’t include in chapter 8. Last are the acknowledgments. If I can make it that far, I’ll know I’m gonna make it.
I gave my technical advisor a draft of chapters 6-7 of my thesis yesterday. He’s already seen chapters 4 & 5, but I’m still working on chapter 8 (results) and haven’t really started chapters 1-2 (intro & equations of motion) or chapter 9 (future work). Chapter 3 is written, but the first part needs to be axed. After all that’s done, I need to write the abstract. Did I mention I’m supposed to have a complete draft by Monday to give to my faculty advisor? On my schedule for next week is writing the appendices, which will be detailed diagrams of my algorithm and the original algorithm, as well as the zillions of plots that I can’t include in chapter 8. Last are the acknowledgments. If I can make it that far, I’ll know I’m gonna make it.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Bike seat
Last week, my fantastic boyfriend offered to run errands for me while I worked on writing my thesis. One of these such errands was getting my bike fixed. I usually leave my bike locked up to a parking meter outside my apartment, which means that it gets mangled from time to time by inept parallel parkers or stumbling drunk college students. For example, one day I came outside to find that overnight the chain had come completely off the front rings and was hanging by the right pedal. The last time I rode my bike before winter was in full swing, I noticed that the rear brake was sticking to the hopelessly misaligned rear tire and at regular intervals, it would make a horrendous squealing noise (and jerk me forward when I was trying to coast). When I tried to brake, I got a low roar. The combination sounded like a cat getting run over by a garbage truck.
I figured I’d look into it later, since I wasn’t planning to ride my bike much in the snow. I brought it inside and promptly forgot about it. A friend of mine makes and fixes bikes, so when the weather got nicer and I remembered, I tried to coerce him into fixing my bike with an ice cream payment. But somehow we could never settle on a good time to do all of this.
Enter: Josh. Of course, by the time Josh wrestled my bike down the four flights of stairs to get it outside, the squealing was at a minimum. “So, what exactly is wrong with your bike?” he asks. I swear, it was worse in the cold! In any case, the bike is now fixed, rideable, and much less noisy. :)
So now that the weather’s nice, I’m back to riding my bike to work. The only problem is that since it’s been a while since I last rode regularly, I haven’t redeveloped the callouses or posture necessary to keep my (ahem) butt from getting bruised by the seat. Ouch.
I figured I’d look into it later, since I wasn’t planning to ride my bike much in the snow. I brought it inside and promptly forgot about it. A friend of mine makes and fixes bikes, so when the weather got nicer and I remembered, I tried to coerce him into fixing my bike with an ice cream payment. But somehow we could never settle on a good time to do all of this.
Enter: Josh. Of course, by the time Josh wrestled my bike down the four flights of stairs to get it outside, the squealing was at a minimum. “So, what exactly is wrong with your bike?” he asks. I swear, it was worse in the cold! In any case, the bike is now fixed, rideable, and much less noisy. :)
So now that the weather’s nice, I’m back to riding my bike to work. The only problem is that since it’s been a while since I last rode regularly, I haven’t redeveloped the callouses or posture necessary to keep my (ahem) butt from getting bruised by the seat. Ouch.
Friday, May 04, 2007
The longest document I have ever written
My thesis draft has now exceeded 100 pages! A few people have asked me if I have a page goal, and the answer is no. I’m writing as much as it takes to explain what I need to explain. I imagine it will be about 150 pages of actual text and maybe 30 pages of appendices. Hitting 100 pages was just cool because it’s a round number and I’ve never written anything this long before.
When I was looking at different graduate schools, I found that several places offered non-thesis options for the master’s degree—it was just based on coursework. While that appealed to my laziness, I suspected that a thesis degree would carry more weight with potential employers. Now that I’ve finished my job interview circuit, I still can’t say for sure whether more opportunities have been open to me because I’m doing a thesis, but I like to think so. :) There had better be some payoff at the end of this mess! In any case, it’ll be nice to be “published,” I guess. Bonus if my advisor and I can put together a conference or journal paper afterward.
When I was looking at different graduate schools, I found that several places offered non-thesis options for the master’s degree—it was just based on coursework. While that appealed to my laziness, I suspected that a thesis degree would carry more weight with potential employers. Now that I’ve finished my job interview circuit, I still can’t say for sure whether more opportunities have been open to me because I’m doing a thesis, but I like to think so. :) There had better be some payoff at the end of this mess! In any case, it’ll be nice to be “published,” I guess. Bonus if my advisor and I can put together a conference or journal paper afterward.
~~~
I was washing my hands in the bathroom after lunch today, along with this woman who’s in there practically every afternoon re-applying her makeup. She looked at me and said, “Are you a student here?” I smiled and said yes. “Okay,” she continued. “I looked at you and thought to myself, ‘she can’t be old enough to work here!’” Apparently I’m 25 going on 12.
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Josh and I celebrated our two year anniversary this past weekend. We didn’t actually do much since I'm still frantically writing my thesis, but it was really nice to just spend some time together since we haven’t seen each other in a while.
Speaking of the thesis, it looks like this might actually happen—I might actually graduate on time. I was really worried for a long time that I’d have to stay here for the summer, after everyone else had left. It’s still going to be tough to finish everything in the next three weeks, but I think it’s do-able. It helps that my officemate is in the same boat, so we’ve been able to commiserate on our behind-schedule-ness.
About a week and a half ago, the weather here started to get really nice. I walked to work everyday, amazed that the sun still actually existed. The only problem was that it was also pretty windy, which created some problems for my eyes. Because (watch out, armchair ophthalmologist diagnosis coming...) my corneas were damaged from being irritated for such a long time and are only now slowly getting better, my eyes still dry out very easily in the wind. I noticed that my eyes were itchy and red after my mom and I spent a weekend at the Cape last September (windy), this whole mess started when Lauren and I were tramping around England for a week last spring (windy), and my eyes were itchy and dry after ice skating for a day with some girls from work a couple months ago (also windy, although some may have been self-generated).
A few days ago though, I realized that even though this whole eye ordeal has really sucked, this was probably the best time for it to happen. I’ve been so busy with school this past year that even if my eyes were cooperating, I haven’t had time to do a lot of outdoor stuff where I just couldn’t wear glasses. Plus, I haven’t had to drive on a regular basis in grad school, where wearing my glasses definitely cuts down on my peripheral vision.
Speaking of the thesis, it looks like this might actually happen—I might actually graduate on time. I was really worried for a long time that I’d have to stay here for the summer, after everyone else had left. It’s still going to be tough to finish everything in the next three weeks, but I think it’s do-able. It helps that my officemate is in the same boat, so we’ve been able to commiserate on our behind-schedule-ness.
About a week and a half ago, the weather here started to get really nice. I walked to work everyday, amazed that the sun still actually existed. The only problem was that it was also pretty windy, which created some problems for my eyes. Because (watch out, armchair ophthalmologist diagnosis coming...) my corneas were damaged from being irritated for such a long time and are only now slowly getting better, my eyes still dry out very easily in the wind. I noticed that my eyes were itchy and red after my mom and I spent a weekend at the Cape last September (windy), this whole mess started when Lauren and I were tramping around England for a week last spring (windy), and my eyes were itchy and dry after ice skating for a day with some girls from work a couple months ago (also windy, although some may have been self-generated).
A few days ago though, I realized that even though this whole eye ordeal has really sucked, this was probably the best time for it to happen. I’ve been so busy with school this past year that even if my eyes were cooperating, I haven’t had time to do a lot of outdoor stuff where I just couldn’t wear glasses. Plus, I haven’t had to drive on a regular basis in grad school, where wearing my glasses definitely cuts down on my peripheral vision.
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