jane | July 3, 2008Rather than responding to all of the comments on my last post (and thanks once again---really, you all have done so much to help put me in a better mental state than I've been in in a while!), I thought I would do a brief update in a post.
First and most importantly, I'm doing better. Not great, but better---and that's huge, for me, right now. A few things happened in the past week to help put me in a better place:
1. I did as little work as I could get away with. I went in almost every day with the intention of Getting Stuff Done, but mentally, I wasn't up to it. Normally this would be…
jane | June 27, 2008You may have noticed that there's been some "radio silence" around here, as they say, lately. Never fear, I'm still here, and I'm....coping. Sort of.
Executive summary: I haven't been myself lately, and it's really, really starting to take a toll. (Warning: extreme frankness ahead!)
I am not really sure what triggered this latest, extended meltdown of confidence. It could be the extreme stress of the last few months, stored and bottled up and not really dealt with, finally coming out. It could be the end-of-the-year meeting I had with my chair, which was in some ways helpful (some…
jane | June 17, 2008I have a few undergraduate students working in my lab for part of the summer. They started this week. Working with undergrads is something I do every summer---well, except for last summer, when I was on maternity leave. So you'd think I'd remember, at this point, how the drill goes: how to get them up and running, how much time and attention they need, etc.
Apparently I forgot a lot in a year.
I've forgotten how little undergrads know when they start out---even the best and brightest of them. I've forgotten that they don't know "the rules of the lab", or how to "do" research, or what I…
jane | June 15, 2008In the spirit of this year's theme, "Fearless", I have signed up to run a race that's a bit longer distance than I'm normally comfortable running. Not significantly longer, but longer.
At the time I signed up for it, it seemed like a good idea---I would have plenty of time to train. But then....May hit, and the training took a hit. And now the race is less than a month away, and I'm very much behind in my preparation.
But this year I am FEARLESS, and I know the Worst Thing That Could Happen is that I have to walk for a bit instead of running the whole way. You know what? Big fat hairy…
jane | June 12, 2008I have been waiting for my summer to begin. May was a nightmarish whirlwind of deadlines and heavy amounts of work and way too many obligations, that spilled over into June. (But on the bright side, I did get another article out, so yay me!) Things, I think, are finally calming down, and indeed I think summer for me is about to begin.
But the experience has been unsettling. I've had very little downtime, either personally or work-wise. I haven't had time to reflect on my summer plans, map out what I need to do this summer and this coming school year (as I prepare for the dreaded tenure…
jane | June 2, 2008The theme of this month's Scientiae carnival is "Added Weight: Taking up Space." This theme is very timely for me, since I've been thinking about this topic lately---a lot. And, readers of the old blog may remember that my "theme" for the year is FEARLESS. Well, you can't really be fearless if you're trying to be invisible, so I thought this would be a good opportunity to take stock of what I'm doing this year to be true to the theme and, thus, to take up space in the world.
1. I am more direct in the way I communicate with people, particularly colleagues, but students as well. If there'…
jane | May 27, 2008If you could sit down for lunch, or coffee, one-on-one, with a Very Very Big Name in your field (think Nobel Laureate or, for the CS crowd, Turing Award winner, or similar), what questions would you ask her/him? (Beyond specific questions about his/her work, that is, and the usual small talk.)
The questions that immediately come to mind, for me, are below the fold.
1. What inspired you, honestly, to enter the field/subfield you're in? Were you inspired by a professor or teacher? Intrigued by a particular problem? Or did you just sort of fall into it?
2. What is the most important, crucial…
jane | May 26, 2008I just saw this meme at ScienceMama's, which I believe originated at Sciencewomen. Yeah, so I'm late to the party on this one, but what the hell, it's late and I'm too wired to sleep, so here goes:
In 10 minutes .... I'll hopefully be in bed, trying desperately to get some sleep before tomorrow's busy busy day.
In 10 hours .... I'll be in yet another meeting, cursing the fact that I'm sitting in a meeting instead of doing Real Actual Work That Could Get Me Tenure.
In 10 days .... I will be playing hooky from doing Real Actual Work That Could Get Me Tenure so that I can do Fun Things I Don't…
jane | May 22, 2008Things I should be working on vs. things I've actually been working on this morning:
Should be working on:
1. Finishing accepted journal article with looming deadline (eek!).
2. Finding a new home for the unreviewed journal article.
3. Tracking down weird bug in my research software that my research students found last week.
4. Sketching out research idea that came as a result of a meeting with a research student yesterday.
5. Developing a research/sanity plan for the summer.
Actually been working on:
1. Answering a flood of emails, all important.
2. Dealing with logistics around an upcoming…
jane | May 17, 2008My research straddles several subfields---let's call them X, Y, Q, and Z (because I'm not in the mood to come up with more descriptive terms). Z is really a minor related area, and Q is a peripherally related area, so my research basically falls into camps X and Y. Because of my particular training, and the lab I studied in in grad school, I have always identified myself as being an X researcher, primarily, whose work just happens to include Y.
This may be about to change.
It's been the case for a while now that sending my work out to conferences has been somewhat of a crap shoot. If I…
jane | May 11, 2008In honor of Mother's Day, and in honor of the one-year anniversary of Baby Jane's appearance on Planet Earth, here, in no particular order, are the top five things I've learned from being a mom this past year. And, as a bonus, how each of these lessons can be applied to my career.
5. All plans are tentative.Life is probably not going to work out exactly as I'd like, so be prepared, have an exit strategy/Plan B, and keep my CV updated, just in case.
4. There are some things I can control, like bedtimes and mealtimes. Most everything else, though, is out of my control, and once I accept…
jane | May 7, 2008* Baby Jane is walking. I'm thrilled. And panicking. Luckily, she's still slow, but given how fast she can crawl....well, let's just say I fear for my future.
* I'm working on Part 3 in the series Is Computer Science a Science? (parts 1, 1a, and 2 here). Part 3 will cover computer science's relationship to engineering. At the very least, it will serve as a welcome break from my bitching and moaning about the state of children's clothing.
* Also brewing in the "future posts" category: reflections on my first year of motherhood and the school year, and the whole adjustment to the working…
jane | May 4, 2008Dear Extended Jane Family,
We here at Jane Family headquarters are so appreciative of the love and affection you have for and share with Baby Jane. You are all so thoughtful, and generous, and loving, that it really overwhelms us sometimes.
But... (hey, you knew there had to be a but, right?)
I think it's important for you all to understand this one thing:
Baby Jane does not wear dresses. Ever. OK, not "never", but "rarely". Really.
Let's examine why:
1. Baby Jane spends a good part of her week in daycare. It is a rare day when Baby Jane comes home from daycare (a) wearing the same…
jane | April 30, 2008Do you ever play the game in which you fantasize about what you would do, career-wise, if you couldn't do what you're currently doing?
I do, particularly when I'm having an especially bad week or when someone is droning on AGAIN about stupid inconsequential stuff during a meeting or when I'm buried under piles of grading or when I'm seriously doubting my abilities to earn tenure at my current institution. So yeah, about once every 5 minutes.
Here's what's on my list, in no particular order:
Patent lawyer (yes, I realize this requires yet more school. Remember, this is a fantasy list.)…
jane | April 28, 2008If you read almost any academic blog, or Rate Your Students, or really any site that academics frequent, you'll encounter discussion, debate, and general bitching about students' lack of ability to (a) properly cite sources and (b) avoid plagiarism. Discussions with my academic friends in more writing-intensive disciplines bear out what cyberspace illustrates: students don't, or can't, or won't, properly cite sources.
This carries over into computer science, too, though, and that's something that's been on my mind lately: How do we teach students how to properly "cite", and avoid…
jane | April 27, 2008A numerical synopsis of my weekend:
Number of sick babies in household: 1
Doses of Tylenol administered: 6
Amount of vomit cleaned up: 1 metric ton
Amount of baby snot/drool/various secretions on clothing: 3 pounds
Number of outings canceled: 3
Loads of laundry done: 1
Loads of laundry typically done on a "normal" weekend: 5
Net laundry: -4
Hours of work done Saturday: 1.5 (yeah, I know, this violates the whole Saturdays off thing)
Hours of work done Sunday: 8
Percentage of work that needed to be done that was completed: 90%
Stress level (1-10 scale): 10 at start of day, 3 now…
jane | April 22, 2008It's been quiet around here lately, I realize. As you can tell from the last few posts, life has been busy and angsty and not a lot of fun lately. But a very large burden has been lifted (which I may blog about at some point, once I figure out how to do so without compromising my pseudonymity), and life is looking better and more manageable, so hopefully I'll get back into the swing of blogging Real Soon Now.
In the meantime, here's a random sampling of things that I've been pondering lately.
1. Mr. Jane, who has followed me all over creation and put my career first and has rarely…
jane | April 16, 2008Not too long ago, I had lunch with one of my mentors, a senior woman in a different department who has been just an incredible resource and sounding board for me over the years. Meeting with this woman always makes me feel better: she boosts my confidence when it needs boosting, and is really good at coming up with strategies to deal with the various things I've had to deal with over the years. And lunch on this particular day was no exception.
One of the many things that I've been beating myself up over lately is "difference". Namely, the difference between me and my departmental…
jane | April 13, 2008Last night I had a bunch of dreams (or mini-dreams?) in quick succession, all with the same themes. Come to think of it, they all had pretty much the same plot, too, just different settings, situations, and characters. The dreams are pretty reflective of how I feel my life is going right now, so I'll share one of them:
In the dream, I'm in my office on campus. I've just gotten in, it's late(r) in the morning, about an hour later than I normally get in, and I have office hours starting in five minutes. I've been away from campus for the last few days due to some unexplained family crisis,…
jane | April 8, 2008I've found myself repeating an unhealthy pattern lately.
I have what feels like an overwhelming amount of work to do. So I stay up (way too) late to make progress on some of it. I repeat this for a few days, until I either (a) get sick or (b) become so exhausted that I'm barely functional. At which point I take an entire evening off to (a) lay on the couch and/or (b) go to bed at an insanely early hour. Which means that I then get "behind", because I took an evening off....and the cycle repeats.
At least I've finally recognized this and am trying to break out of it, before it really takes…