Bad Habits
Oh man. It's 3:48 in the morning, and I am still at the psych building. I swore I wouldn't leave until this paper is finished, and that's what I'm doing.
This mofo is way past overdue. I took an Incomplete from this one class last December. The professor was headed out on sabbatical, and made it clear she wouldn't read anything I turned in until she got back at the end of the summer. Well, the fall chill is already on the air, and the new semester starts tomorrow. (Wait, shit, today.) The Graduate School requires that all incompletes be resolved the semester after they're incurred. This paper is 75% of the grade for the class. Summary: I'm in deep shit if I don't crank this damn thing out right now.
Normally for these half-semester classes, the final paper is a research proposal for something in that field. I like those. I get to practice my research writing, I can tailor the paper to the parts of the course that interested me most, and I often come up with research ideas that I could actually pursue someday. This motherfucker, however, requires answering three paragraph-long multiple-part questions, each requiring detailed knowledge of aspects of schizophrenia. Integration of outside papers with the mountain of class readings is expected.
I know this is bullshit whining, and it's grad school and I should be able to answer detailed questions in a scholarly way. But goddamn, do I not care about (or fully understand) a bunch of things about schizophrenia: the genetic components, the dozens of diagnostic subcategories, the pharmacology of treating different kinds of symptoms. I especially do not want to have to (re)learn them just to answer a question. But the professor is the kind who very easily forms grudges, so mostly I'm terrified of making her angry. So I have to finish this, before she gets any ideas about flunking me.
I'm 2/3 done now, left with the last question, the one where I can't figure out which of my options I hate the least. And I've realized I actually can't go home at this point, even if I wanted to, even if I could stand the 2+ mile walk. Patrick has my apartment keys, and there's no way I'm waking him up at this hour. So here I will stay, for a few more hours at least. I'd rather not focus on how stupid I am for procrastinating yet again. I already know that. Instead, I will learn very quickly about one of these terrible topics, do a lit search to find supplementary material, and attempt to mash it all together on paper while my memory is still on "wtf this is sleepytime" shutoff. I'm willing to forget what I end up writing if it means I get to forget the awfulness of this process!
This mofo is way past overdue. I took an Incomplete from this one class last December. The professor was headed out on sabbatical, and made it clear she wouldn't read anything I turned in until she got back at the end of the summer. Well, the fall chill is already on the air, and the new semester starts tomorrow. (Wait, shit, today.) The Graduate School requires that all incompletes be resolved the semester after they're incurred. This paper is 75% of the grade for the class. Summary: I'm in deep shit if I don't crank this damn thing out right now.
Normally for these half-semester classes, the final paper is a research proposal for something in that field. I like those. I get to practice my research writing, I can tailor the paper to the parts of the course that interested me most, and I often come up with research ideas that I could actually pursue someday. This motherfucker, however, requires answering three paragraph-long multiple-part questions, each requiring detailed knowledge of aspects of schizophrenia. Integration of outside papers with the mountain of class readings is expected.
I know this is bullshit whining, and it's grad school and I should be able to answer detailed questions in a scholarly way. But goddamn, do I not care about (or fully understand) a bunch of things about schizophrenia: the genetic components, the dozens of diagnostic subcategories, the pharmacology of treating different kinds of symptoms. I especially do not want to have to (re)learn them just to answer a question. But the professor is the kind who very easily forms grudges, so mostly I'm terrified of making her angry. So I have to finish this, before she gets any ideas about flunking me.
I'm 2/3 done now, left with the last question, the one where I can't figure out which of my options I hate the least. And I've realized I actually can't go home at this point, even if I wanted to, even if I could stand the 2+ mile walk. Patrick has my apartment keys, and there's no way I'm waking him up at this hour. So here I will stay, for a few more hours at least. I'd rather not focus on how stupid I am for procrastinating yet again. I already know that. Instead, I will learn very quickly about one of these terrible topics, do a lit search to find supplementary material, and attempt to mash it all together on paper while my memory is still on "wtf this is sleepytime" shutoff. I'm willing to forget what I end up writing if it means I get to forget the awfulness of this process!