What is this "relax" of which you speak?

The Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowship was submitted on 7 Nov. -- two days ahead of schedule.

The poster for the SETAC meeting was emailed to Kinko's on 18 Nov. and finished on 19 Nov. -- it is bright, shiny, all KINDS of sexy in its 40" x 56" glory, and ready to be shown off on Sunday. Can't wait to see the looks on the faces of all those stuffed suits when they realize the chick in the power wheelchair with the dog is the primary author.

The NSF DDIG grant was submitted today -- a whopping hour and a half ahead of the deadline.

All I have left to do school-wise before moving home is make a 5-minute PowerPoint describing some of my data and what statistical methods I used to analyze them, with my presentation being given on 1 Dec. -- maybe I'll get around to it on Monday.

Tomorrow is dedicated to reading a big chunk of The Sweet Far Thing, playing games at MSN Games, a possible nap in my chair, and maybe "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" on USA.

Relaxing. Let's see if I remember what that is.

Everything is sent, plus a plug

I uploaded my FA manuscript, and I emailed the copyright form to the journal -- all yesterday morning, on 09/09/09. Gotta have some luck in that.

Now I move on to more analysis of data I have, I sit down with our departmental animal development guru for developing a staining protocol for my fish, I sit down with our departmental statistics guru (yay, we finally have one!) and figure out how to analyze some other data I have, and I get started on my fellowship app, my grant app, and my SETAC poster.

I'm going to go finish reading The Summer Tree, and I'll flip through my friend Marrus's new book that just arrived in the mail today. Marrus is a one-of-a-kind woman who lives life on her own terms and is obviously comfortable in her own skin, and Lightsurfing is partly about how she got to be that way. She's a fabulously talented artist (see her latest painting) who doesn't receive nearly enough recognition or money. Please, support her talent by purchasing her book here.

/shameless friend plug

No, I did not get a free book for typing that. I paid the $33.95 -- but the butt balloons Marrus drew next to her inscription to me were free. I love my friends! ::grin::

It's been a while

Well, life goes on -- even when you lose the majority of your baby fish to a power outage brought on by a hurricane. You get frustrated, you get mildly (or not so mildly) depressed, but you just keep plugging because the alternative -- the big "Q" -- makes you feel like you're going to throw up.

So what have I been up to? I've been analyzing hatching data collected by my assistants which is at times a bit confusing to figure out. I've been working on an essay about how scientists can actually in fact be spiritual that I will submit for consideration by an author who is putting together an anthology on totemism and animism. I need to be working harder on it as it's due on November 1st. I also need to be working harder on my prospectus, the presentation for my General Exam, a fellowship application (since I probably won't be finished by next summer with this latest setback), and a poster abstract for a conference in the spring. The fellowship application and the poster abstract are due by the end of November.

I do my best work under stress.