Odds and Ends

Unfortunately, it’s a short-ish post from me today as things have been a bit on the hectic side. I don't have a big Easter holiday on the horizon so it's PhD business as usual for me! At the moment I have lots of different things that are demanding my time and attention which, while important, don’t do much to advance my project on the surface.

Firstly, conference season is on the way, so abstracts (short summaries of your work) need to be written, posters produced, presentations practised and travel arrangements made. I've been lucky enough to have an abstract accepted as a talk at a conference this summer and while I'm not writing my presentation for it just yet, it’s in Italy, so  there are lots of things for me to sort out before I even get started. I need to register for the conference before the price goes up (check), make sure I have my travel documents in order (nope), book flights (nope), transfers (nope) and a hotel (nope). All easier said than done when you have to claim everything back on expenses.

I'm also preparing a presentation to give to my physics research group in Leeds. I'm actually quite nervous about it as I've not had to present to a physics audience before. So, that means I'm well practised in skimming over the detail of the mechanisms that under pin my work and I know that this is what the other physicists will be really interested in. Even if it doesn't work out it’ll give me a trail run for the future, but if possible I’d much rather not crash and burn.

As much as I try not to, part of my brain is tied up playing the waiting game, something which I'm not very good at. I've currently got a paper on submission to a journal and I've submitted an abstract for another conference. When it comes to the abstract I should know before the end of the month if it has been accepted, but it could be a while before I hear anything back from the journal. Apparently 3 months is considered a quick turn around and I'm just reaching a month in, so I've got a while to wait yet. The worst thing about it is the uncertainty, there's no standard information system for journals so they can tell you as much or as little as they want about how your submission is progressing. I know I should just let it go and not think about it, but it’s really hard not to look for news when I'm checking my e-mail on a morning.

Finally, alongside these 'side' bits there is some ‘real’ work for me to do. I'm currently coding a program to help me process data more quickly than my current manual methods. I'm really enjoying this bit as I'm learning to use python and although it can be frustrating at times I really like coding and I get a real sense of achievement out of it.

It seems that sometimes in a PhD you have to be a bit of a juggler, keeping lots of balls in the air whilst on a unicycle (at least that's what it feels like). On the upside, it looks like I should be able to confidently say I have ‘good time management’ and ‘multitasking skills’ on my CV at the end of it all!

My advice on how to keep everything going? Don't think about it too much, make to-do lists for each week (I find I don't stick to daily ones) and ask for help sooner rather than later!