tooth soup

Stress is a

funny thing. It’s a fact of modern times that our lives have become more stressful. I’ve had due course to experience my fair share of stresses during my educational career: assignment deadlines, public speaking, and, of course, examinations. But as I approach the end of my Ph.D. stress has become a kind of background noise. Much like a high-pitched hum in your ear is a sign that you will soon never hear that particular tone again, this constant buzz of stress has become the indicator that soon, on the other side of submitting my Thesis, I will never have to be this hung up on a deadline ever again.

Consequently, I’ve started going a bit mental.

For a start, there’s the more-than-usually obsessive behaviour concerning blogs that I visit. If yours is one of the blogs I comment on and you’ve seen a general trend towards higher pageviews per week, that’s probably me. What used to be an during-coffee-breaks activity has become a between-thought-processes one. I write a sentence, whoop, how’d Firefox get up there? Well, better go look at a couple of blogs quickly while it is. Aaand back to work. Next sentence, rinse, repeat. It’s like I’m some kind of hyperactive social networking Jack-fucking-Russell.

Secondly, there’s the increasingly short fuse I have towards people asking me when my thesis is going to be due/how I’m going on my thesis. This can be usefully illustrated with the below graph:

It’s insane. And these are people I generally like. Heaven forbid a friend gets a new boy/girlfriend who sweetly asks what I’m studying and how long I’ve got left to go. I’ll be picking their flesh from between my teeth for weeks.

But the worst thing is how my brain keeps coming up with ideas that have absolutely nothing to do with my Thesis and finishing it off. The prime offender being stories (or exercises for me to post up on my blog so that I can write stories, bravo self), but also ideas for websites, workshops, places I can go on holiday, things I want to do for Lou, all sorts! It’s as if my right brain is tired of my left brain going on and on and has thrown manners out the window and taken to just butting in whenever it bloody well feels like. Working on a chapter for molecular mechanics and out of the blue, a potential story for the Twelfth Planet Press `Speakeasy’ anthology leaps to mind. Or an idea for a pitch to the Voiceworks folk. Or a stupid blog post explaining all this. Gah! Brain!

Also the title is a reference to Scott Pilgrim vs. The World which you should all go and see immediately. Brilliant, funny, technically accomplished. 4.5 stars from me.

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