Episode 1418: 33% To The Finishing Line...

Am about a third of the way to the combined word count of my dissertation and essay, which is a reasonable place to be, I guess? Still have three weeks to go before they're due. Was so determined to write something today (managed two paragraphs in the end) that I denied myself the new episode of Suits. (Am saving it for the coach journey to London tomorrow, which is typically stultifying. Might also bring along a Thomas E. Sniegoski novel or two, am really getting into his Remy Chandler series. It reminds me of Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files, but substituting a seraph-turned-PI as the main protagonist.) Although I think I've proven to myself that I don't need to be in the Library to write a decent-sized chunk, I'm wondering if it might be worth relocating next week. Fairly sure that if I could get up early, one full afternoon of work, two at the most, could see me producing a good second chapter, i.e. not requiring major revising in my supervisor's eyes. Of course, I could be wildly misjudging the calibre of my writing here, and maybe that first chapter I sent him is horrible and I'm basically screwed, but I'd like to think that's not the case.

Episode 1417: Too Many Late Nights...

So everyone thought Cards Against Humanity was pretty great! Drinks at the pub sort of turned into a repeat of Toby's birthday drinks, in that we went to Cryfield for a bit after closing time, and then ended up in Heronbank and had food in the early hours of the morning. Went to bed around 6 am, so it's not surprising that I haven't got much work done today. I did start on the opening paragraph of my second chapter, but then I went to this pub quiz that a bunch of us have been going to for the past couple of weeks, so that was it, as far as getting work done went. Am going to write a bit more tomorrow though! Kind of have to, since I'm spending the whole of Saturday in London. I was actually hoping to have this middle chapter done and dusted by this week, so that I could finish the whole dissertation by the middle of August. Might've been too optimistic, but at least I did leave myself a buffer of a fortnight, even if half of that was really meant for writing the essay on Thom Gunn and Paul Monette. Ah well. I'll work it out somehow, like I always do. Just need to keep writing something each day and the words will accumulate!

Episode 1416: I Should Really Be Working...

Have just discovered the fancy new Kyocera printers that've been installed in the Library and the Learning Grid. (They're black and look very state-of-the-art. Turns out Kyocera is a Japanese company. Figures.) Instead of each printer being named for its location, the system's now designed so that you send a print job out, and then you have to sign in at individual printers to 'pull' the job. Cuts down the hassle of having to rifle through a stack of papers to find what you printed, I guess. Only realised there were new printers because I'm printing off Cards Against Humanity so that a bunch of us can play it later in the pub. Going to have to cut all the pages up, which might take me a while. Really should be writing my second chapter instead of going to the pub, but I figure I could actually do the entire chapter in just one day, if I worked on it continuously, without the usual procrastinating. Ditto for the final chapter. Makes me glad that I did get to do the conference paper, since this is precisely why I wanted to do it.

Episode 1415: Desperation Is Never Classy

Urgh. Tried to be good and went to bed at just past 1 am, only to wake up at half past 3 and be unable to fall asleep again until it was around half past 6, and waking up around 2 pm. So basically, no different from the past week or so. Ended up chilling for the rest of the day, but it's okay, I think. Supervisor's only getting back to me with comments on what I sent him early next week anyway, so I can probably take the rest of this week to work on my second chapter, starting from tomorrow. Anyway, it recently came to my attention that nominations for Sundress Publications' annual Best Of The Net anthology are closing soon, so I asked people following Eunoia Review on Facebook and Twitter if they had any recommendations. Not many have been forthcoming, although one writer seems to have interpreted this as an open invitation to get her relatives to start spamming the journal's submissions e-mail to recommend her work. I don't think there's anything wrong with getting your family to drum up support for you, since it's perfectly reasonable to expect them to be supportive. What I'm unimpressed by is how transparent the attempts at self-promotion have been. I mean, it's one thing to post a comment or tweet putting oneself forward, but no one else has seen fit to start sending me typographically schizophrenic e-mails that I'm pretty sure have crossed the line into spam. At the end of the day, I'm not going to choose who gets nominated based on a popularity contest, okay?

Episode 1414: Recharging...

Was up till nearly 5 am, finishing that first chapter. As soon as I'd sent it off to my supervisor and switched off my laptop, of course I remembered that I hadn't really talked much about the one thing that he remarked in one of our past sessions that he supposed I would be mentioning in this chapter. Not sure where I could fit it in now though, without interrupting the flow of the chapter as it stands. So I'm hoping he doesn't call me out on it, to be perfectly honest. I've given myself the entirety of today off, but it's back to the grindstone tomorrow (evening). The going should be easier, now that I'm onto the chapters that are about the Merlion poems themselves, so it's more about the close reading now, which is what I tend to be better at. Barring any major disasters, it's feasible to have the whole dissertation done by the end of next week, as long as I keep writing at the same pace (but preferably with better sleeping habits), which would leave two weeks for tweaks and writing that other module essay. Not going to be a terribly fun August, but then again, everyone else on the course should be in the same boat. Right?

Episode 1413: Go Murray!

So much for waking up to attend morning service. Only got to sleep at around 6 am, and briefly contemplated not sleeping and staying awake till it was time to go to church. Then I figured that if I did that, I'd end up sleeping the whole afternoon away anyway, which meant my usual habits of procrastination would mean not doing any work until way after dinner. In the end, I ended up watching Andy Murray play Roger Federer for the tennis men's singles Olympic final, which Murray won in straight sets! I particularly liked how he sealed his victory with an ace. Then I wound up messing around with iTunes for most of the evening anyway, so I didn't start writing until, once again, around 9 pm. Am still going, although I'm wondering if I should just pack it in and continue tomorrow. Part of me thinks it makes sense, going to bed at a reasonable hour. Part of me thinks that I should just man up, finish the chapter, and send it off to my supervisor, however late I have to stay up. Then I can take a breather for the whole of Monday, genuinely not touching any academic work at all. I really just want to get it over with, but I'm also concerned that in my haste, I'll end up repeating myself needlessly in my writing, and of course, this will be my blind spot and I won't be able to tell. A couple of people have responded to my request for extra pairs of eyes to go over the chapter, but let's face it, ultimately the only person whose opinion matters at this point is my supervisor, right?

Episode 1412: Amazingly, Still On Track...

I'm actually surprised at myself. Despite waking up at nearly 2 pm and frittering a couple of hours away in the afternoon on Granado Espada, I'm still on track to finish my first chapter by tomorrow night. (In fact, if I start working right after going to church and having lunch, I could actually be done by dinnertime, if I wanted to be.) I think part of it is having only one TV show to watch today, which was Common Law. My enthusiasm for this newest USA Network offering is waning somewhat, now that there's only one more episode of this freshman show to go. I just don't feel like there's been enough character growth over the season, beyond the sort of throwaway moments that other shows can get away with because they build their characters up consistently. Common Law started off with basically cop and therapy clichés aplenty, and then seemed happy to rely on the 'blue skies' branding of USA Network to carry the show forward. The other thing that I watched today was a documentary about the Gifted Education Programme made and uploaded on YouTube by Choon Hwee, whom I've known since our primary school days in NYPS. For any of my non-Singaporean friends who've ever wondered what kind of schooling I went through back in Singapore, it's worth checking the video out because it probably does a better job of explaining things than I would. It's a slightly surreal feeling, recognising about 50% of the people she interviewed for the documentary, some of whom I haven't seen in years.

Episode 1411: If You're Not Watching Suits, You Really Should Be

After seeing this week's episode of Suits, I think I might have to qualify my comment on Teen Wolf a couple of days ago. That will henceforth be described as my favourite teen drama, whereas the USA Network show is my favourite drama. I've loved Suits since it's first season, and I think it's probably the best show airing on that cable network right now, followed closely by Covert Affairs. It's just one of those shows where I couldn't imagine anybody else playing the characters, which is saying something, given the relative interchangeability of American actors and actresses these days. Gabriel Macht is especially brilliant as Harvey, and I also particularly love Sarah Rafferty as Donna. Anyway, I was thinking of having an early night, since I started working on my dissertation chapter around 9 pm (which is early for me, considering I woke up at 2 pm), but I'm so caught up in it that I'm once again probably not going to bed till something like 3 or 4 am. At least this time it'll be because I've been doing work though, instead of procrastinating by refreshing Facebook or something equally sad.

Episode 1410: Messed Up Sleep Cycle!

So I think staying up till the morning last Saturday after Toby's birthday drinks has completely messed up my sleeping patterns since. Only managed to fall asleep at around 4.30 am today, which meant I got about four hours, as I had to wake up to meet Sarah to tidy up Kidz Klub stuff. Would've taken a nap after I got home, but I ended up chatting to Alex about this site he's got an idea for. Essentially, the site would kind of curate all the good free stuff on the Internet, including things like self-published books, webcomics, videos, etc. Sifting to find the gems basically, so that other people don't have to. Didn't do any work today either, as I went to a barbecue with some of the MA people, and then the pub quiz next door after that. Oh well, it just means having to write about 1000 words per day, over the next three days! That's perfectly manageable, and at least I've had an idea since yesterday what I need to write next. Partly also the reason why I couldn't fall asleep, as I kept going over what I wanted to say and how it would link to the next point, and then the next point, etc. I'm hoping that I'll be so tired tonight that I'll have no trouble falling asleep, and that this will sort of reset my sleep cycle.

Episode 1409: Just. Keep. Writing.

My sleep cycle appears to be completely out of whack these past couple of days, but at least that doesn't seem to be stopping me from getting work done. Have written nearly 1000 words of the first chapter now, which means I'm still on track to finish by Sunday. I think the shape of the chapter is finally starting to emerge, which is reassuring. In any case, I've decided that I need to force myself to just keep writing, as long as I have a direction that'll keep me going for a couple of paragraphs. Once I've got a chunk of material down, I'll be less inclined to keep mentally shuffling potential ways of linking all the ideas I've got and more inclined to just fit things into what's already on the page. There's really no part of what I've researched so far that would be completely irrelevant, so it's a case of how much can I string together in a coherent fashion that will lead into the next chapter sensibly and serve the dissertation well as a whole. I mean, everyone that I've ever spoken to about my ideas for this chapter (and the dissertation in general) agrees that they make sense, so I can't be too far off, can I?