It's not a question of time--it's more a question of awareness! Because I know I should be doing other reading, I wind up wandering around aimlessly a lot (well, mentally--it's not like I'm doing laps inside my apartment) instead of settling down to do it. And then I look up and I've wasted a lot of time.
So--yes, I could! And that works reasonably well with longer books, when I've tried it: classic novels, history books, etc. It's the shorter novels that are the problem; when I pick one of those up, I'm probably going to lose a whole day to it. I do the whole "just one more chapter" thing until it's silly not to go ahead and finish. :)
I've been finding a certain amount of sanity in the notion that I may read *one* Sherlock Holmes story every day when I get home from work. Or *one* chapter, if it's one of the novels. Pick up the mail, clean out the litter, read a story.
But before I was rereading canon, I would set a timer for about 15 minutes and just go until the chime rang. It helped a lot.
Pretty much all I do since grad school is read and do housework (plus wrangling the kids, of course). It's not a bad lifestyle at all. But, of course, you have to find somebody to finance it... (And I do go a little nuts, occasionally.)
Ugh, money. Somehow it always foils all my plans for indolence and sloth!
I do wonder how I would fare if I didn't have something besides grocery shopping forcing me to leave the house sometimes, though. I suspect that I wouldn't be very good at working from home every day, although I like being able to do that a few days a week.
The urge to Drop out of grad school to have more time to read, (Or do whatever it is that makes you happy, or feel energized) makes perfect sense to me, but think before you act on it. You are in grad school, so you can eventually get a position that will eventually allow you the leisure to both read and write.
Oh, I'm not actually planning to drop out--not seriously. I'm not sure about the forthcoming leisure, though: I suspect I'll have *more* of the same things to do, assuming I get an academic job. Although maybe I'd feel a little less hopeless about my ability to do those things (and therefore stress out about them less), if someone actually hired me to do them; I would have cleared the first hurdle, anyway!
I know. I'm projecting. I'm working on my retirement and trying to work up some enthusiam to go back to school and get my Masters -- but, right now, with now real time to myself, that's all I want, time to travel. Don't know if I'm ready to research and write and read for grades and a degree again.
Fair enough! I guess the question (which I'm currently asking myself) is whether the degree will help you: either to provide incentive to do things (in the way that I always write more when I'm in a creative writing class, for example), or resources, or a sense of accomplishment, or like-minded classmates...
Which makes sense! I think the problem at the moment is that I'm at the stage where I have a lot of reading I don't want to do (like skimming books that aren't really on my topic so that I can say in the dissertation that they're not really on my topic), and a lot of reading that I'd much rather do instead.
Dorothy Parker has a great book review where she writes about wanting to give up book reviewing so she can read newspaper articles. :-) This made me think of it. I'll see if I can dig up the title for you.
Oh, if you find it, please let me know! That sounds very much like this sort of grad student paradox: if only I didn't have so much reading to do, the real reading could begin!
The newer edition doesn't seem to have it, more's the pity.
Anyway, it starts like this:
"You don't want a general houseworker, do you? Or a traveling companion, fluent, refined, speaks French entirely in the present tense? Or an assistant billiard-maker? Or an elevator girl? Or a private librarian? Or a lady car-washer? Because if you do, I should appreciate your giving me a trial at the job. Any minute, now, I am going to become one of the Great Unemployed. I am about to leave literature flat on its face. I don't want to review books any more. It cuts in too much on my reading."
She also has a great line about "sneaking off to the dear, strange things I truly ached to read and to ponder."
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So--yes, I could! And that works reasonably well with longer books, when I've tried it: classic novels, history books, etc. It's the shorter novels that are the problem; when I pick one of those up, I'm probably going to lose a whole day to it. I do the whole "just one more chapter" thing until it's silly not to go ahead and finish. :)
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But before I was rereading canon, I would set a timer for about 15 minutes and just go until the chime rang. It helped a lot.
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I do wonder how I would fare if I didn't have something besides grocery shopping forcing me to leave the house sometimes, though. I suspect that I wouldn't be very good at working from home every day, although I like being able to do that a few days a week.
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Oh--and congratulations!
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The newer edition doesn't seem to have it, more's the pity.
Anyway, it starts like this:
"You don't want a general houseworker, do you? Or a traveling companion, fluent, refined, speaks French entirely in the present tense? Or an assistant billiard-maker? Or an elevator girl? Or a private librarian? Or a lady car-washer? Because if you do, I should appreciate your giving me a trial at the job. Any minute, now, I am going to become one of the Great Unemployed. I am about to leave literature flat on its face. I don't want to review books any more. It cuts in too much on my reading."
She also has a great line about "sneaking off to the dear, strange things I truly ached to read and to ponder."
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