I hate writing

The cold I thought I was getting over a week ago came to fruition that evening and has been with me since. I stayed home from work to try to get better and felt okay this past weekend in Chicago, but since then I've felt the same cloudy tired blahness every day. My teeth hurt from the sinus pressure, I break out into coughing fits that give me headaches. The other night I went through half a box of tissues, although things seem to have dried up since. In the middle of a long cold like this I begin to wonder if I'll ever be back to normal, if maybe this cold will stick with me forever and I'll be forced to drag through all the rest of my days sniffling and coughing and holding my head.

Maybe I need to be hitting the whiskey -- I seem to recall that working when I was younger, and in my prime.

Anyway, in the midst of this illness I had grantwriting group, where I was simultaneously slammed and complimented almost to an embarrassing level. Slam: Your sentences are hard to read because they have too many words and clauses and subclauses (this is what happens when I have to cram 10 arguments into a single page). Compliment: This problem may stem from your extreme thoughtfulness as manifested in the fact that you are the best reviewer here and your comments are always wildly helpful. I was a little stung by the writing comment, as I've always considered myself a good writer, but I have always tended toward sentences that require a diagrammer's mind (like mine) to fully grasp in one read. But I was pleased with the reviewing comment because if there's one thing I think I'm actually good at in this world it is editing and, more broadly, figuring out how a piece of writing could be more compelling. I get to do some of that in teaching and advising and working with other colleagues, and those are the times I feel most useful as a human being.

Going down the spectrum of feeling useful is when I have to do any of my own writing. This week's task was to fix those Specific Aims we tore up last week and add a whole Research Design section. Fortunately the National Institutes of Health are soon moving to a shorter application length, meaning I only have to crank out 6-8 pages instead of 14. But the first thing I did yesterday when I finally got going was to completely re-write the Specific Aims page, by which I mean I wrote up Specific Aims for an entirely different study. I think it's a more interesting study (writing up the research design for the prior study sounded so boring I just couldn't do it), but it didn't move me forward terribly well. I need to write up some semblance of a Research Design to turn in tomorrow at group. I'm procrastinating, and my teeth hurt.

Because even further down the spectrum of feeling useful? Planning actual research. I know I managed once upon a time to pull it off, but often I have no confidence that I can do it again. It involves talking to people, building connections, relying on others, filling out paperwork. Everything that makes my stomach churn with anxiety.

Werk

I opted to work from home today, since it was snowing, and it was an open day sandwiched between days full of meetings. I managed to finish this paper that has been plaguing me lightly for years and heavily for a couple of months, and I was feeling good, and then I checked my messages and I was immediately depressed under the suffocating weight of everything that dissatisfies me right now. Home life is good, students brighten my day and make me feel like I know stuff... and the rest puts me in a funk. If change is coming, I'm inclined to resist it less and less.

I need to write papers and get them on my CV as fast as possible.

Found!

The copy card I was convinced had fallen behind the (immovable) desk was actually holding my place in a journal I didn't finish browsing a while ago.

Yesterday I was peppy, and it was warm out, and I made it to the bus stop early, and the bus was there, and I got to work door-to-door in 45 minutes.  Today, tiredness and scratchy throat, rain, no bus (either left early or never came), much later longer bus, 90 minutes.  Boo.

So the plan is just to mope in the office, keep warm, and read journals.

Validation

I like it when what I think is true about the world is corroborated by a much more systematic view of the literature. I always have this fear I'm missing some major article, and it appears I'm not when it comes to HIV-related stigma.

I took a break from data analysis (which I'm redoing in a different way) because I just hit total frustration with the way some of this data works out... there's a question on the survey about whether the respondent used a condom the last time they had sex followed very shortly by a question asking how often the person uses condoms. You would not believe the number of people who say they used a condom last time but then say they never use condoms and, worse, the number who say they didn't use a condom last time followed by saying they always use condoms. OMG, are you not listening to your own answers! Never mind the big hunk of missing data I can't account for at all, other than people didn't want to answer the question.

So instead I'm reading, because that is way less frustrating and I have a huge pile.

Vacation has been good so far. We've mostly been bumming around, eating and shopping. We've re-devoted ourselves to making our way through the Sopranos (I already watched it all, but Joey has not). We're not doing anything fancy for New Year's Eve, just going to a tasty local Italian joint and then partying at home.

The New Year will bring attempts at: 1) real weight loss; 2) getting these manuscripts out the door because they are actually going to fill some gaps in the literature; 3) writing up a real research plan for my next study instead of having some vague notions of what might be nice.

Chrome!

Holy hell is Google Chrome so much better than the ancient broken version of IE that is installed on my work computer!  It's probably also better than the newer version that ought to be on here.  I'm just glad it installed without the need for admin privs... I'm just going to assume I'm not breaking any regs by using a more secure browser.  Seriously, though, try it out if you haven't already.  It's so fast.

I'm still working on this damn paper.  Instead of writing, which is what I thought I'd be doing today, I fired up SPSS to check some things in the analysis.  Oh, there are so many things in the analysis that bother me, now that I actually look at it.  I'm going to try to tidy some things, but I don't think the analysis will change substantially.  SPSS is extremely easy to use, but there are some places where I'm looking for functionality that exists in Stata and I'm not finding it.  It may be that I just don't know what I'm doing, but it's also likely that SPSS is just not super sophisticated.

I'm glad I'm going over the paper with a fine-toothed comb, however... there are some clear wtf moments that I think reviewers might notice.

This week is going by a little too slowly for my tastes.  I really can't wait to get out of town.

Mid-week

I'm already looking forward to the next vacation! I want some more eggplant!

The ceiling has finally been fully restored to my office, so I think they must be completely done in here. Nothing is coming out of the heater despite my requests to the thermostat I now have in here, but it's not actually that cold -- I'm just a big baby. Now that I have a ceiling and no evening visitors to wreck my stuff, I reassembled my lamp (I hid it in a drawer because it was constantly being moved, including once out into the hallway). During the ceiling mess they installed a motion sensor on my light, which would be useful if I had a strong interest in using my light. Now that I have a ceiling for the lamp to reflect off of, I'd prefer to go back to that. I had to cover the sensor so that the overhead fluorescent grossness wouldn't click on everytime I wiggled in my chair. Now my office is cozy again.

Too cozy... I'm feeling sleepy.

I need to get this paper out the door. It really just needs some updates, but I'm finding myself tortured by some of the language we used in the paper, which is slowing me down some. Also the abstract is deeply flawed, and I don't understand why journals only give you 150 words. Gotta get pithy, I guess.

And I usually like red

Starbucks is doing this Red campaign thing where they donate $.05 for every eligible drink you buy to combat HIV/AIDS. But they're pitching it as some reason to get more coffee than you usually would. How about you just donate your $2-4 to a decent HIV foundation or NGO instead of buying extra coffee?

I think the train is going to be nuts this evening. But I got my lecture done and mailed out for tomorrow, so I can just relax and read magazines.

Counting down

I can't wait to go to NJ tomorrow night and have some vacay!

Today went by fast, since I had meetings straight through until 2:30. We're searching for a new chair (maybe... the search includes the current chair, who retired from the PHS, triggering a new chair search, because bureaucracy is awesome), so today and tomorrow there are meetings with the candidates and their job talks. Today I also gave the first half of my scintillating wisdom on survey design and implementation. Busy days are good because they move me quickly to vacay!

Tomorrow I'm going to try to shlep to the Comcast place up in Rockville so they stop charging me for the cable box I'm not using. It requires all sorts of transit.

I had to stop watching Hardball tonight because it's become all about the depressing economic situation. The election was way more fun!

Go Harvard! Beat yale!

1) I'm sad to miss the H-y game. This is the first season I didn't make it to a football game.

2) Then again, 23F feels like 14F? Maybe I'm not that sad to miss it. Jameson can only do so much.

It's cold here in the DC area too (although still about 10 degrees warmer). I think today is going to involve staying inside under the electric blanket and tomorrow I'll go out shopping when it's warmer.

I guess I should also finish my slides on survey methods.

Fixed my chair!

A week or so ago, I set out to determine why my office chair was so damn uncomfortable. The seat was all pitched forward, and I couldn't get it to move. Today I opted for the brute force step-on method, and it worked! Now I don't have to scheme how to make this chair blend into a conference room when I swap it for one of the nice chairs there.

Bureaucracy

I need a computer that is not only way more functional than this clunker on my desk but that is also filled with delicious statistical software, so I can, like, do stuff. Research office folks say that comes from finance; department chair says it comes out of my startup funds, which research office is currently holding in an unknowable status.

I'm determined to push this paperwork through the system! I finished it a long time ago!

In other news, my office still has no ceilings, but I've started to be able to tune out much of the surrounding office chatter. It remains absolutely freezing, however. I hope today's faculty meeting is in a warmer room. I'm going to have to bring my new electric blanket into work.

I got my blood drawn Tuesday for a variety of tests, and all was normal except that I have high total cholesterol. Five years ago when I was participating in the diet study, I had totally low cholesterol. It's gone up like 70 points! Then again, I am a lot fatter. But I've lost weight since I started incorporating like 3 miles of walking into my commute, right? False. I'm not eating any more than I was, as far as I can tell. It's bs.

I just found out today that the Prez might possibly maybe give us feds the day after Christmas off. This would help a lot in my pusuit of 2 weeks away from the office with only 4 accrued vacation days. I'm excited to go to the Jerz for Thanksgiving next week, despite my disbelief that it's already next week!

This just in: As of tonight, all USB storage devices aren't going to work on any of our computers. Awkward. I don't know why DOD cna't put us on our own network so we can act like a University.

Crummy IS

I haven't had internet at work all week. I called Monday, bothered them in person yesterday, but when I called again this morning, the woman told me the ticket hadn't even been assigned yet! Incompetence! I need to get my class ready!

Friday!

I'm not being very productive at the moment... I finished my IRB stuff (which I've done before over the years, but every school makes you do it again), and then I've been poking at ICA logisitics, answering emails, etc. I'm feeling bummed because I think my dissertation-based paper didn't get accepted to NCA -- I heard about a panel I'd forgotten I was sort of on (my advisor is the presenter) last night but haven't received any word on my own paper. Depressing. I thought it was much better than either paper I'm presenting at ICA -- the measures are better, it's a friggin experimental design for gods' sake! Maybe I'm just sourpussing too soon and I'll hear this weekend.

I'm also grumpy because neither my advisor nor my boyfriend are emailing me back today. It's cold and boring in here, and I need email to get through! I stayed up past my bedtime last night at TV Night, so I'm real tired.

The commute remains bad. Yesterday I tried alternate routes, which were new and fun, but no faster. Good options to break up boredom. Today I got here and the parking garage was full, so I had to go park by the Navy Lodge. I can't wait to move.

Limbo

Monday and Tuesday were pretty much what I expected: getting an ID badge, parking, touring the grounds, getting small amounts of work done, etc. Today all the weirdness hits home. I'm currently a contractor until I get my PhD and I can take the official federal job, so that's causing all sorts of delay in the sense that everything including the format of my email is based on this idea that I'm a 6 week contract employee instead of a real faculty member. Also, there are just other sorts of half states I'm dealing with. The computer that was in this office turned out to have a problem, so I'm using this older computer temporarily, which means I can't set it up how I like and I'm trying not to even save much to it -- it doesn't even have the latest version of IE or anything, so it really feels temporary. And finally, my office, while vastly cleaner than when I saw it during my interview, still has a ton of other people's leftover crap in it. I don't know when it's going away. I've moved the stuff I don't want over as much as possible so I have lots of empty shelves waiting for books and things, so that makes me feel better.

Finally, I seem to be at this weird social juncture in which orientation appears to be over but I'm not really feeling like I have all I need to move forward with things like my class (it would help if my Blackboard woudl get activated). Not that I don't have three conference presentations to prepare for next week, but still.