Finally home
I finally got home last night. I've got one chapter of my dissertation nearly finished, and it's bloody huge. over 20 pages of single-spaced text, which will likely expand to about 75 with the required formatting and figures. Two other much smaller chapters are probably about half done (currently about 3 and 7 pages of text).
The other main informational chapter is gonna be the bitch, though, and will require a lot of time and energy. That's the one that deals with the phylogenetic (familial) interrelationships of all the various critters, and messing with other peoples' analyses. Over the break I found another one I need to talk about, and from the looks of it most of their data is redundant with what I've already got, but I still have to go through it, which is just tedious. Then there's the intro and outro, which are actually likely to be the toughest to write, just because I suck at them.
I've also got another paper that's about half done, that I'll be able to throw together within a week of actually being able to work on it, that has nothing to do with the dissertation, but which will is full of good, new information that might even be useful to someone, somewhere.
Anyway, I'm now done with the Smithsonian and hippo dissection, and that much closer to being able to get on with my life.
I managed to slice my hand open again last week, but that had nothing to do with the dissection. First, some backstory on that: A few years ago, I slipped on driveway ice and fell on the antenna of my car, bending it over against the rear window. (I think it was me, and not the other guy with me, but I really don't remember for sure anymore.) The antenna was already broken, otherwise it would have retracted. I laughed, and told him to leave it there, I thought it was cool. But no, he tries to straighten it back up, and it breaks off in his hand. I knew it was going to happen, I just failed to actually stop him breaking it off. Fast forward to last week. I'm clearing snow off the trunk to open it, and catch the jagged stump across the pad at the base of my thumb. Not deep, but jagged and it bled a lot.
This semester is going to suck. Really bad. I'm not optimistic about being able to finish by the end of the semester, but if not, I'll definitely be able to finish over the summer. Regardless, I'm gonna be working my ass off, and likely unpleasant to be around. The other hippo hacker has noticed the symptoms of wanting to finish-up-and-get-the-hell-out in me, getting more obnoxious, impatient, etc. So I'm not likely to have much personal stuff to post here this semester, but I've got so much end-of-the-world stuff saved up, those are going to be starting back up shortly and with a vengeance.
The other main informational chapter is gonna be the bitch, though, and will require a lot of time and energy. That's the one that deals with the phylogenetic (familial) interrelationships of all the various critters, and messing with other peoples' analyses. Over the break I found another one I need to talk about, and from the looks of it most of their data is redundant with what I've already got, but I still have to go through it, which is just tedious. Then there's the intro and outro, which are actually likely to be the toughest to write, just because I suck at them.
I've also got another paper that's about half done, that I'll be able to throw together within a week of actually being able to work on it, that has nothing to do with the dissertation, but which will is full of good, new information that might even be useful to someone, somewhere.
Anyway, I'm now done with the Smithsonian and hippo dissection, and that much closer to being able to get on with my life.
I managed to slice my hand open again last week, but that had nothing to do with the dissection. First, some backstory on that: A few years ago, I slipped on driveway ice and fell on the antenna of my car, bending it over against the rear window. (I think it was me, and not the other guy with me, but I really don't remember for sure anymore.) The antenna was already broken, otherwise it would have retracted. I laughed, and told him to leave it there, I thought it was cool. But no, he tries to straighten it back up, and it breaks off in his hand. I knew it was going to happen, I just failed to actually stop him breaking it off. Fast forward to last week. I'm clearing snow off the trunk to open it, and catch the jagged stump across the pad at the base of my thumb. Not deep, but jagged and it bled a lot.
This semester is going to suck. Really bad. I'm not optimistic about being able to finish by the end of the semester, but if not, I'll definitely be able to finish over the summer. Regardless, I'm gonna be working my ass off, and likely unpleasant to be around. The other hippo hacker has noticed the symptoms of wanting to finish-up-and-get-the-hell-out in me, getting more obnoxious, impatient, etc. So I'm not likely to have much personal stuff to post here this semester, but I've got so much end-of-the-world stuff saved up, those are going to be starting back up shortly and with a vengeance.