A grad-student emotion check-list
7:30am Wakeup and lie awake in Bed
7:31am Realize you spent $18 on last night's dinner, means no eating out
for the next 6 weeks
7:45 am Ready to go to school, will shave tommorrow, will eat early brunch at
(Denny's/Penny's/Lenny's/Dinko's whatever cafeteria).
8:03 am Arrive at school
Realize your foreign officemate arrived earlier today
must have got more work done
8:04am Pass by Advisor's office, chat with Secretary to find out if he is
coming in today. He is, darn.
Need to start work on the draft due this afternoon.
8:15am Read mail
8:20 Delete mail from students taking EE 434 regarding questions about the class
Hate your TA job
Depression: too much work to do today
9:00 For jumpstart: go to coffee machine.
9:05 Kick coffee machine; promise yourself to call up the company
and ask for your quarter.
Wonder why they would beleive you.
9:33 Start printing out loads of stuff that may be vaguely related to
your work.
9:41 Early morning stupefaction
Mutter racist comments to yourself about your officemate
9:43 Curse your officemate in a low tone he would not comprehend
Feel good about he not grasping English well
9:58 finger everyone at the office and most people half way
around the world (using the "finger" command, of course)
10:19 Feel sleepy, should not have stayed late playing tetris last night.
10:31 momentary panic attack
10:43 edit .plan file. write a shell program to edit .plan more easily
10:59 Drop in at boss(advisor)'s office and borrow something you dont need
& and kinda make him aware you are working hard on xyz
11:05 perverted daydreams
11:11 read news
mid-morning yawn time
11:34 Start typing junk at a very high key-in rate to pretend
you are working hard as the boss passes by from outside.
11:35 Press the BackSpace key for one and a half minute until all
the garbage you typed in is erased.
Realize that you can type more than 256 characters per half minute
11:41 Flirt with the new girl in the department
11:45 Print out some slides for afternoon's draft + presentation
11:47 Print them again, you forgot to change the date from last presentation
11:49 Print another copy in case this one gets lost
11:51 Completely forget about sueing the coffee-machine company
12:15 Hunger pangs:
12:20 BigMac/Fries time
Drink a not-so-cold can of coke from your desk.
Ch-Ching, you just saved 35 cents by buying bulk coke
1:00 Group Meeting with boss
1:14 sudden awareness of one's shallowness
resentment towards foriegn officemate for sucking up to the boss
Get reminded by the boss that you need to do some more literature-survey
1:51 Boss hands you the reddened copy of your draft for corrections
1:51:02 The 49 second urge to murder boss begins
1:51:52 Realize that he controls your paycheck/grade/vacation/late nights/social life/getting a paper
out/graduation possiblity/graduation date if applicable/job opportunity and the rest of your life.
1:52:53 Thank him
1:52:54 Thank yourself for not saying something stupid to your boss.
1:53:00 splitting headache #1
1:59 check mail, dont reply though , you are too busy to do that
2:06 more coffee
2:17 Oh No, it is my turn to cook tonite :-(
2:30 Sit through the class you were told to sit through
2:39 look outside the window make unrealistic plans to quit
this degree program and take up a job
Wonder why blonde girls are so pretty
2:48 more perverted day-dreams
Close the office door and open a few gif files.
sharpen pencil
3:06 worry about never graduating
time to write a letter
rearrange desk
call up bank; see if you have any money
fear of losing aid next Fall
Read latex manuals to figure out how to put &$%&% in %$^% format
3:43 watch the clock
make plans to do a all-nighter tonite
Vow to watch only 2 TV programs
4:58 Notice Boss leave
4:58:01 Sudden sense of freedom
9:00pm Come into the office
9:01pm The hard working grad student you are, you have to come to the
office late at night to "get the work done"
9:03 Check mail
Decide it would be a good time to attack those ftp sites
since network wont be loaded
Run into "since network wont be loaded" traffic and get the
pictures into your machine.
Compress all unwanted research/class directories to make space.
Back up all your pictures
10:11 Admire pictures
Begin work; Realize you need references
Realize its too late today to go to the library
Sudden feeling of having wasted the day
10:49 Sudden feeling of possibly having to waste the night
Decide to turn in early and come back very early tommorrow morning
Decide to play a computer-game to put yourself in a good mood.
11:15 Play game after game after game to improve your score and
get on the scoreboard.
Realize that your officemate is still at number 6, two notches
above you on the scoreboard.
12:20 Play until you beat your officemate into the 7th place.
A sense of achievment!! Yes, today was not wasted!!
Return home to find your roommate watching David Letterman
Tell him about the "hard working grad student day you had"
Discuss philosophy with roommate
1:09 Think about becoming a philosopher and dining with 4 others
(The Dining Philosophers problem, hee hee :-) :-))
Argue with him about politics, why people prefer Japanese
cars and whether it is better to set the heat to "hot" or "cold"
to defrost the windshields faster.
1:49 Realize neither of you have bought milk today
Get reminded of the "too much milk problem"
2:04 Forget about getting up early. Turn the phone ringer off
and go to sleep.
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