I’ve been planning for a while to take some time off this summer to focus on the startup (we’re hoping, fingers crossed, to launch this fall). And I’ve been saying all along “mid July.” I have to say, mid July came a lot faster than I was expecting, but here it is.
What I’m hoping for most out of this break, is the ability to step back from research a bit more and not feel so guilty about it. I’m not sure I want to put it completely on the back burner (that’ll just mean even more work once I come back), but rather learn to feel okay if I don’t manage to do any research on any given day.
And, because this is my “final” week, things have ended up becoming super busy. Today I need to go to campus for a presentation to some high school students about my research. A presentation I’ll fully admit I haven’t prepared for and don’t really plan on doing much more than making sure certain files still open. Tomorrow there’s a workshop in the morning I’m debating going to. It’s probably a good thing to go to, but it also means giving up pretty much the entire morning. On Wednesday I have my normal research group meeting, although we’re doing an extended one this week (fun fun) and then in the afternoon there’s a talk on preparing your thesis for submission (and since the rules and format have changed since my Masters, it seems worth going to). Thursday, I have a meeting with the other main co-founders of the startup (one is finally back in town) and that’s going to be a tough conversation (if we talk about what we should). Then on Friday, there’s another grad talk, specifically about preparing for your defense (I went to one on candidacy a few years ago that was super interesting). And, then to top the week off, on Saturday there’s an awards ceremony that I need to go to because we’ve been nominated (although I’m not even sure we fit the criteria).
On top of all the meetings and talks and what not, I still need to find time to write, work on my experiment, and exercise. It’s only Monday morning, but I’m already exhausted. It’s very tempting to just go back to bed.
