Justification of my existence

So being a graduate student I have the things called progress reviews. This a meeting that rolls around every 9 months to a year and for it you are required to write an 8 to 10 page paper that proves you are worth what they are paying you and that you have a plan for at least the near future. You then stand before the three facutly members that make up your thesis committee and discuss the paper for a while.

The problem: Being only a second year grad student, this is my first progress review. Not a huge deal (have to have a first one sooner or later some time right?) but this department is not standardized in the least. All the help I got when I started this was: 8-10 pages single spaces, figures integrated into the text. Those aren't the high points......that's all I got. So I was way stressed by some outside factors the first time I tried this and just put together something that I knew wasn't good but might just be enough to get me by.

It wasn't.

My committee was not happy. Lucky for me, the faculty I have been assigned are not the kind to scream and yell at you. They just let you know that you didn't meet expectation and very kindly say something that amounts to "fix it, or else". And then leave. So here I am trying to redo this using the much more exact specifications given to me by the chair of my committee. Still not fun, but at least it is coming. If I wasn't so damn ADD all the time I could probably just sit down, focus, and do it. But I can't, so I have to take frequent breaks and do things like write this in order to let the urge to kill subside. It will get done, and it will be at least adequate. At least that's what I keep telling myself. If it isn't, then as of monday the title of this blog will probably be something like "the suffering of a fomer grad student who now has a B.S. in a life science which isn't much better than a GED".

p.s. note to aspiring grad students....lot's of writing involved, so if you are like me and have add, dyslexia, and motivational issues......get started on the writing WAY in advance.

~blair