Saturday, January 25, 2014

Sunday check in

Another week, and the first with all my pledges and the semester running simultaneously. It was a long week; revisions submitted Monday, revisions to other draft sent Tuesday, full lab days Tuesday and Wednesday,  comments back on Thursday and the Monday revisions accepted, and grant writing Friday and Saturday,  with the grant sent to collaborators just before midnight. We've started the next set of analyses with great success thus far.

The weekend started off rough,  but a nice walk as a lego Ent cheered me up. I am still struggling with balance, as my fitbit can attest - not a lot of sleep. Some of that is fueled by a respiratory infection. The rest was service commitments. 

Role call:
Miles: 10.2! Now under 800!
Recipes: 1. Pear hazelnut muffins. We had way too much pizza this week.
Writing: manuscript accepted! 1/8.

Goals next week:
Revisions, revisions,  revisions.
2 days in the lab.
2-3 new recipes.
10 miles, 3 gym trips.
The week is going to be busy, and as part of my "be kind to yourself", I am being honest with my priorities next week. I am also going to try to prioritize sleep, so I can shake this cold.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

My fixation with groups and pledges

In an attempt to motivate myself and reinforce accountability, as well as maintain some semblance of work life balance, I have signed up for no less than 3 challenges/accountability groups for the new year. The first was FitPursuit, 4 weeks, 9 miles/week with proceeds going to the Make A Wish Foundation. Easy, since my personal running goal is 10-20 miles per week.

Next, I signed up for 3-30-3 at the gym (3 times a week, for 30 minutes, for 3 months). This was the logical progression of the above - given the weather and my headaches if I run in the cold, I'm going to the gym 3-4 times a week to run. I might as well commit to doing it for the next 3 months.

Most recently, I signed up for the Savage Minds Writing Group, pledging to write 1 hour a day for the next 10 weeks. All of these, of course, directly address the challenges I have set for myself this year. I have been, however, really bad at tracking my mileage for my personal goals.

I did however, finally cook a meal worth counting towards the 84 recipes: oven roasted amaretto sour chicken (recipe here: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/amaretto-roasted-chicken/) with mashed parsnips and carrots. Tonight, I plan to make hummus.

The "Accepted with Minor Revisions" piece was submitted yesterday, marking my first submission of 2014, even if the bulk of the work was last year. Maybe it can be the 0.42 of the 8.42 papers?

Current count
Miles: 39.9!Only 802.1 left to go!
Meal/dishes: 1. Only 83 left to go!
Writing: 0.42. Only 8 left to go!



Saturday, January 11, 2014

Behind, already

It is only Jan 10, and as expected, I am already behind. The January Cure is sort of happening - at least, I think the 11.5 inches of snow will have melted enough that I can move the brewing and baking supplies, in their new airtight tubs, from the kitchen to the outside store room. Once this is done, I can probably do the rest of the Cure and get the kitchen semi-functional for the semester.

I received another rejection email, for a paper submitted in November. I was actually quite surprised by this one. The review was thoughtful and mostly helpful - if nothing else it certainly identified the problem I thought was going on. I just have to think critically about how to resolve this issue. I suspect the best answer is simply more - read more and write more. But it was not a good week writing wise. I made no progress with this goal.

It was a good week running wise -
Monday  - gym closed, massive snow and cold.
Tuesday - 6 miles
Wednesday - 3.5 miles
Thursday - 4.5 miles
Friday - zero
Saturday - goal is 6 miles. 
Total: 14 miles (+ 6) = 20

Cooking. We ate old recipes. Nothing to report.

Saturday, January 4, 2014

New Year, New Goals, New Format

I'm revisiting this blog this year, and really repurposing it in many ways. It will be become a bit more personal than most of my online presence. My research blog, biomarkersandmilk.blogspot.com, is the place to go for my take on milk science and breastfeeding research. Here will be a bot more personal, a bit more of putting together my life and personal goals for another year on the TT.

Here are the 2014 goals:

Run 842 Miles.

Cook 84 dishes, 75% of which are new recipes. 

Publish 8 articles.

Submit 4 large grants.

Finish 2 new lab protocols.

The personal goals: 
Get my house organized.
Keep my house organized.
Go on a small trip somewhere.
Get married.
Have a nice wedding without going crazy trying to plan it and keep it affordable.