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SUMMER IS HERE ☀️
ya girl has earned her 2nd master’s degree and is about to rise into her 5th and final year of her ph.d. program—BUT FIRST. SUMMERTIME.
i finished my 4th (penultimate) year of my Ph.D. program and earned my second master’s degree and now i have ENTERED THE ZONE OF SUMMERTIME AND FIC WRITINGGGG (and dissertation too but i’m taking a baby break from that right now!)
written june 6, 2024 @ 2:14pm
greetings, my lovelies!
the last five months (january, february, march, april, and may) have been so rich with productivity, milestone accomplishments, and overall life happiness!
let’s first do a quick recap of my goals, which i posted in my last entry on january 6th:
✅ master’s thesis (#2/in passing):
✅ finish final revisions on my (second!) master’s thesis then send it to my advisor for final feedback (if applicable) and approval, so that i can apply to
✅ graduate for my (second!!!) master’s degree for this spring
done!
✅ prep hiring ad for potential research assistants so i can find my RA for the spring semester (last semester my RA was soo good and i got so spoiled, gah).
i ended up with 4 RAs by the end of the spring semester! 😂 some were… more efficient than others. but overall, all 4 of them contributed in some way to the success of my project, and they all learned quite a bit along the way!
✅ write 1-pager invitation letters to my potential academic committee members asking them to serve on my dissertation committee, and send the letters to my advisor for feedback, approval, so she may send them to the committee invitees on my behalf and Cc me. (🤞 and hopefully they have the time and availability to accept! otherwise i have plans b and c, sigh.)
invited and accepted on the SAME DAY. so happy!! my advisor asked if they could keep a copy of my invitation letter as a template/guide/reference for her future advisees 💕💕💕
✅ prepare slide decks for my dissertation defense proposal and rehearse the hell out of it. schedule said proposal defense/oral exam.
i did! i passed! i am ABD!
✅ update my docs for the ethics board re: data collection updates for round two of data collection.
done!
✅ prepare and rehearse for conference presentation: present my preliminary findings at the Big Conference (which includes making sure i got all my grant money!!) done!!!
my presentation went GREAT, i got all my grant money, and i got a lot of interest in my research from audience members (including NEW and NOVEL followers completely outside my typical professional circles!!), so i was so happy
❓ pick which damn algorithm i will use for my cluster analysis.
i think i have…. maybe… THANK YOU SUNSHINE LIV. 💕💕
✅ update non-fiction book along the way based on master’s thesis and dissertation study and everything else that cannot fit in an academic paper or journal article.
i was so inspired during my conference that i wrote the whole damn first chapter!
and then later (still on the list!!)!
prep manuscript for journal article based on the master’s thesis paper once it’s published in the repository and
i shall do this over the summer!
publish a few mainstream articles for general audiences as well, to share some findings with the rest of the world and potentially generate some concrete interest for publisher connections about the ✨need✨ for my book 👀
i shall do this over the summer!
collect new data, transcribe new data, code new data, analyze new data, and write about it 😂😅 / dissertation
yep, i gotta do this starting like next week 😂😂😂
some new goals for the summertime
fandom things:
finish snow globe
get closer to finishing that one night; it will be poetic if i finish it around the time that i defend my dissertation (tentatively scheduled for late February 2025!)
post another arc for at the center
professional things:
submit journal article manuscript
complete data collection (and recruitment, therein) for dissertation study
finish 50% of rough draft for nonfiction book
i have all of june, july, and most of august to get these things done!! all of the most expensive and most time-consuming adventures were completed this past month in may (traveling to cancún, family visits), so the rest of the summer is all about sleeping well, staying active, and being productive AF ✨✨✨
something that i will work on doing over the next week or so is getting my writing trackers updated and my word counts up-to-speed! i’ve been keeping track on various platforms (notes, scrivener) but while i was in the zone of Academic Land i didn’t always have time to open up this site and update the graphs. i shall rectify these figures soon! thank you for your patience, all!
thanks again, all, and happy writing!
she who is thriving and is entering the peak optimal zone of summertime productivity, and wishes the same for all of you,
kris✨
i have finally opened up my dissertation document (and my non-fic book scrivener file) and must return to the Land of Academia
i know i said in my last post (on jan. 2nd—FOUR days ago) that i was going to go back to work, but then i accidentally wrote another 15,233 words of fanfiction, so. (i mean it, this time.) back to my other passion project!!!!
i know i said in my last post (on jan. 2nd—FOUR days ago) that i was going to go back to work, but then i accidentally wrote another 15,233 words of fanfiction, so. (i mean it, this time.) back to my other passion project!!!!
written january 6, 2024 @ 10:35pm
this post contains the following:
chapter update! | snow globe
milestone! | 100k words written since august 1, 2023
back to the phd grind (for real this time) + goals
before i delve into the “kris is actually working on her doctoral dissertation/master’s thesis paper for her second master’s degree/prep for dissertation proposal defense” topics, here are a final few updates to wrap up the winter break (i.e., fandom extravaganza):
chapter update! | snow globe
to absolutely no one’s surprise, this two-shot three-shot story is now a multi-chaptered fic with four parts.
On July 1st, the lonely house at the top of the mountain was finally sold.
— In which Jack(son) Overland tries his best to befriend his neighbor, one woodworking project at a time. { neighbors-to-lovers!fic, modern-mountain-living!au }
Prompt from @aicosu: Three-word sentences: "Just say it."
ao3 ❆
part i: bushwhacking grandma (13,282 words | aug. 4, 2023)
part ii: barnyard peasant (11,550 words | dec. 20, 2023)
part iii: Scandinavian woodworking techniques (13,163 words | jan. 6, 2024)
part iv: [coming… later!]
thank you! for all of your beautiful comments, replies, reactions on both of the new chapters! 😭🙏
an observation. i’ve never wrote a fic in which the characters are experiencing time more or less the same way i am as the author (i.e., part i is set and written in july/august and published in august; part ii is written during fall and early winter, then published in december; part iii is written during christmastime and then published right after the new year… who knows what will happen with part iv 👀).
milestone! | 100k+ words
on january 5, 2023, i hit 100k+ words written since august 1, 2023! (5ish months)
(80.13%) fandom: 80,264 words
(16.42%) dissertation study: 16,448 words (does not include emails, grant applications, grading student papers/peer review/peer feedback, slide decks, or data coding and data analysis. 😂🫠)
(3.45%) non-fiction/dissertation book: 3,454 words
fall 2023 was a time of data coding, data analysis, transcription, data cleaning, data annotation, peer feedback/review, grading student papers, and many many grant applications (money!!!!!!)
spring 2024 will be a full-throttle academic writing semester!! all my heaviest deadlines for career-related goals and benchmarks are january, february, and march... 💪🥲
between december 20th and january 5th (16 days), i wrote 37,074 words of fanfiction! 😭🙏
(in other words... of all of my fanfiction writing since august 1st... i wrote 46% of those words in the past two-ish weeks during my winter "break" 😅) CLEARLY, I WAS CRAVING CREATIVE OUTLETS for something squishier and freer than my rigidly structured academic register! and now i've left it all on the internet-table lmao and it is time to return to my ✨Professional Voice ✨
(to be fair, another 48% of fandom writing was completed in august, in the final weeks leading up to the fall semester 😂 the other meager 6% remaining percent was scattered throughout the hectic fall semester—to no one's surprise!)
TO THE DISSERTATION/BOOK, WE GO
back to the phd grind (for real, this time) + goals
here are the things that i must complete by the end of march (though not necessarily in this particular order! 😂):
master’s thesis (#2/in passing): finish final revisions on my (second!) master’s thesis then send it to my advisor for final feedback (if applicable) and approval, so that i can apply to graduate for my (second!!!) master’s degree for this spring
prep hiring ad for potential research assistants so i can find my RA for the spring semester (last semester my RA was soo good and i got so spoiled, gah).
write 1-pager invitation letters to my potential academic committee members asking them to serve on my dissertation committee, and send the letters to my advisor for feedback, approval, so she may send them to the committee invitees on my behalf and Cc me. (🤞 and hopefully they have the time and availability to accept! otherwise i have plans b and c, sigh.)
prepare slide decks for my dissertation defense proposal and rehearse the hell out of it.
schedule said proposal defense/oral exam
update my docs for the ethics board re: data collection updates for round two of data collection.
prepare and rehearse for conference presentation: present my preliminary findings at the Big Conference (which includes making sure i got all my grant money!!)
pick which damn algorithm i will use for my cluster analysis
update non-fiction book along the way based on master’s thesis and dissertation study and everything else that cannot fit in an academic paper or journal article
and then later:
prep manuscript for journal article based on the master’s thesis paper once it’s published in the repository and
publish a few mainstream articles for general audiences as well, to share some findings with the rest of the world and potentially generate some concrete interest for publisher connections about the ✨need✨ for my book 👀
collect new data, transcribe new data, code new data, analyze new data, and write about it 😂😅 / dissertation
and i shall do all of these things while teaching two courses at two different institutions and writing letters of recommendation for my students and writing more grant proposals and doing other university responsibilities
and life! 😂😂😂
thank you for reading and following me on this journey!
i hope everyone’s januarys are off to smooth starts 💖💖💖🙏🙏🙏🙏 i’ll still be on and off tumblr over the next few months, but already i can feel the dissertation-dopamine cravings entering my bloodstream, i.e., suffering but being really happy about it 😉💖
thanks again, all, and happy writing!
she who has actually returned to work-work for real this time and has her diss!doc sitting open and ✨updated✨ in a browser tab,
kris✨
speeches, meetings, emails (oh my)
when the onslaught of emails is so much that you project the experience onto fictional characters
when the onslaught of emails is so much that you project the experience onto fictional characters
the initial start-of-semester race has… calmed?
part of me almost wishes i were actually keeping a word count of the emails i’m sending for academic + work purposes. i wouldn’t be able to sustainably track that kind of data, but i would love to know very seriously how many words i am sending out into the email universe—particularly because i work really hard to make my emails as clear and concise as possible. BUT OH WELL. i don’t dare track that data, so other data points (e.g., papers, book manuscripts, dissertation proposal) will have to do.
dissertation status:
still waiting for feedback on the most recent paper i wrote! once that comes back to me, i can incorporate that feedback and submit a shorter version for publication (e.g., research journals)
trained my new research assistant!
doing a deep, close read of the literature to know everything inside and out (and to catch up on any new articles that dropped in august while i was taking a bit of a break)
started my manuscript for the non-fiction book (based on my dissertation research but for a mainstream audience!)
had my first meeting of the year with my advisor and potentially have my official shortlist for the other two members of my academic committee 👀
currently ✨on track✨ to defend my dissertation proposal in november 2023
website & fic updates!
had a very inspiring conversation with @sunshinemellow-fic over the weekend about writing and revising one’s writing vs. yeeting unbeta’d word vomit out into the tumblr- and ao3-wilderness, which resulted in the opening of 1-sentence fic requests!
after i fulfilled a few prompts, i was like, “oh shit, this moment is probs a good opportunity to start transferring old 1-sentence fic over here.” lo and behold:
added a new (non-linked) page for 1-sentence fic
added a button for the 1-sentence fic page to the fanfiction page
added this week’s newest additions of 1-sentence fics [butterfly, acupuncture] — although you can see i still need to fix the dates
started adding a few older 1-sentence fics from Olden Times but then once i felt like i got to a good stopping point, i decided to leave the older ones for Later™ (i have to clean up that fic-only tumblr tagging system anyway!). therefore, i will leave this project for a Later™ treat when i need to engage in mindless organization and order 🔥✨
x-posted a tumblr-prompted drabble into ao3 (because we can’t trust tumblr 🥲🫠🙃)
find the woman in white on ao3!
in other news —
🍺 many adventures this labor day weekend (many cocktails, many lagers, though not necessarily together)
🦋 PURCHASED AMC TICKETS TO SEE THE ERAS TOUR IN THEATERS; this has, clearly, moved up our plans to create 1989-inspired flower crowns and friendship bracelets, i must PREPARE
🍇 i picked fresh grapes straight from the vine on vast farmland (and later made homemade grape juice) and now i can never go back to grocery store grapes, what have i done
thanks, all! ♡ and good luck with the rest of your week!!
back to “school”
except my nine years of taking higher ed classes are OVER and i have entered the promised DisserLand ✨
except my nine years of taking higher ed classes are OVER and i have entered the promised DisserLand ✨
back to school-ish
this week was a ‘soft launch’ back into the semester!!
emails, preliminary planning, prepping for some events… it’s like the calm before the storm, except it’s already sprinkling. 😂
i think everyone just collectively feels like we have to “go back to work” two-ish weeks BEFORE we actually have to go back to work because the anticipation is too much.
also, for the first time in my entire phd career, i actually feel properly rested after this summer (since i took a break from phd stuff for most of august and just focused on making as much money as possible the whole summer through OTHER non-academic channels). so like. I’M EXCITED TO GO BACK?
and it’s so refreshing that i will only need to commute only once every week or so. that’s the main game-changer. i can be excited about going because i will only go so few times this semester, so it’s a TREAT rather than a SLOG.
I AM READY, LET ME GO BACK. ✨ i want to finish this dissertation as soon as possible!!!
writing progress ✨
officially have written more for snow globe this month than what i wrote to finish frosted sea glass! such is the nature of writing two-shots, i guess!
✨ it's also very cool to see that on good days i tend to write ~3k words on the days in which i write! i'd never formally kept track before.
🔥 on a REALLY good day, i wrote 7500 words.
💪 on other days, i squeaked out only like 100-300 words, haha.
💤 and then i have let myself take some solid breaks after finishing frosted sea glass. on those days, i reread my favorite fics!
also, yesterday was a bit of a soft launch for me with getting back into the swing of the semester. (i will not, however, count any words written in emails. 🤣🫠🙃🙏 oof.)
you can also follow along with the word count (‘23-’24) tracker! i update it most days!
i’m not sure yet how much fic i’ll be able to write in the next few weeks as the semester ramps up, but i hope to be able to squeak out at least 100-200 words fo writing for fandom each day! a little bit is better than nothing! 🤞
hope y’all are doing well and whatever end-of-summer stuff you have lined up is going well. ✨ happy writing, all!! ♡
🌊 beach day = mermaid!au writing session??
mermaid!au season. 🌊✨
this pattern is what i have been telling myself for years but 😂
i’ve always said that my writing is very seasonally-driven (seasons of climate, seasons of life), which i still think is very true.
one of the reasons why i have so many very nearly finished WIPs is because i only write certain stories with certain vibes when i can tap into that headspace. and there is no better time to write “mysterious angsty star-crossed summertime sadness mermaid!au” fic than the end of summer. 🌊✨
we were supposed to go to the beach yesterday but the night before that is when i realized that my tumblr account had been lost. 😅😅😅 i ended up staying up pretty late to salvage as much as i could, so yesterday’s day trip got postponed. 😂😅 today’s beach adventure was much much needed (and not only for frosted sea glass vibes and motivation, lol).
i’ll try to squeeze in at least one more beach day before i return to campus for the fall semester, which is in just a few weeks!! i’m so grateful to finally have reached the dissertation stage, as it means that i can primarily work from home. i’m also so fortunate that my colleagues and advisors are so understanding and accommodating of my commute and are allowing me to only come to campus only once every other week or so. 👏✨
already, i can feel ✨2015✨ vibes, in which i had worked three teaching jobs and did my master’s degree part-time while working—and to give myself breaks from all the academic reading and writing, i wrote like 150k words of fic. 😂 (primarily in the form of jelsa one-shots, lmao)
it’s a very specific creative headspace and I HAVE FELT ALL WEEK, existential tumblr crisis aside. 😂🫠🫠🫠
one of the pages that i’m saddest about losing in the tumblr debacle is the ✨2015✨ record-keeping of my writing productivity, fandom- and academia-wise. 🥲🥲🥲🥲 in its honor, and to optimize this ✨2015✨ headspace, i will make a special tracker here, to acknowledge the words i’ve written this year (2023-2024), starting from this month, august.
it would be lovely for everything to come full circle: all the fics i started writing in order to take a break from working on my master’s thesis (e.g., at the center) and my bachelor’s degree (e.g., that one night), getting finished and wrapped up by the time i complete my doctoral program and defend my dissertation. 😂🤞✨ it would help clear the way for me to start publishing original fiction and non-fiction—starting with my dissertation research!!
in the meantime, will i update the summertime sadness mermaid!au or the wintertime sadness mountain!au next? 😂😂😂😂 WE SHALL SEE.
as for my tumblr drama: still no word yet from tumblr support. 🥲🤞 i remain cautiously optimistic while also giving up all hope lol. i’ll e-mail them every 3 days until i hear a response. 😅😅😅😅🙏🙏🙏
thanks for your continued support everybody!! sun and sand (and chardonnay) helped mitigate the sting of Tumblr Termination™ 🥲🙏✨💕💕💕💕💕💕
happy writing!! 💕✨
in a shocking (SHOCKING) turn of events, i have yet again extended snow globe, and, as it turns out, i wrote 29,134 total words within 13 days (across a span of 133 days)… including writing 11,987 of those words solely on june 6th.