PhDs and an unsteady relationship with sanity

With a mid-candidature review coming up in a few weeks, I have been busy ensuring that I look as organised and in-control as possible to my readers for the day. My document is still very much a draft, but I am sure I will have that done in time for hand-in at the end of next week. Fingers crossed. As I have left a draft with my supervisor for a few days, I have been spending time trying to regain what was left of my sanity before I started intense writing over a month ago. I have found that clouds of words eases my tension - which is very unusual, I know - so I have been happily picking a topic and forming word clouds on an awesome site called Wordle.

For those of you who have already endured the loss of sanity through writing or academic life in general, I applaud you if you are currently not in a psychiatric ward. For those of you who have not reached this point yet, I wish you luck when it comes your time. Those of you who are currently at the same stage as me - I'm sure you have found solace in a video game, TV show, or random activity that will help you survive this experience. If not, go out and find one before your thesis sucks out your soul! I have a feeling I will look back in a few months at these blogs and say "sheesh, I was sure a whiny and negative person back then". C'est la vie, I'll survive! What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? Right?!?

Flies, food and pooters

It's official: I can now tell the sex of flies. Not without a couple of hours of getting my eye in for the task, but now I can add to my growing list of "skills of the universe". Even better, I have learnt the revered art of pootering. Which involves a pooter. You make "poot" sounds when you use it. Very glamorous. Essentially, when you are sexing flies or transferring flies to a new "cage", you can transport flies by sucking them up into a tube, and exhaling through the tube to shoot the flies to their destination (there is, of course, a filter between your mouth and the flies). The tube itself is referred to as a pooter by those who work with fruit flies. I have also witnessed someone cooking a special food mix for encouraging flies to lay eggs. It requires a level of precision that perhaps pastry chefs spend years developing, and I know that when it comes my turn it will be a very sad ending. Hopefully I will get the skills I need quickly so I don't waste too many ingredients.

My finger points...

The last few days have been spent writing a paper on the evolution of reptile metabolic rate. For those who have experienced the joys of writing up their results, I'm sure you understand the mental anguish that accompanies this activity. This time round, my writing-stress has expressed itself in the form of  unkemptness and spontaneous self-depreciation. I have also come to realise that having a shirt tucked in at the front, drawstring of my pants undone, and having food stains on my clothes constitutes my current becoming of a dag. Progress is slow, but it is being made. I have also learnt how to make requisitions using the university finance e-forms, which is a much bigger achievement than it sounds (for some reason the logic of finance is unobtainable to me).

My super-awesome poem on writing:

Words on the page are a mess

Probably the cause of my distress

I wish I had a published paper to caress

I need to work harder, I must confess

The effort won't kill me I guess

The best thing about a day of hard work is the satisfaction of coming home and kicking back, knowing you've done good work for the day. I haven't had that in a while, most days I come into uni just in time for lunch, have an extended lunch, procrastinate for as long as possible, then maybe find something more constructive to do for about 40 mins until I give up and go home for dinner. But I have just started a bio-statistics course which might give me some structural backbone to re-construct my weekly schedule. I am going to do a uni work-ethic makeover (amidst writing, I know). This is it people, before I'm tossed like chaff in the wind, I'm gonna re-take my position as a steady-going researcher!