The Plan: month four (nothing new this time)

1. Health

The gym is fine, but other things are still not going so well. I ate chips/fries for dinner today, but at least they were sweet potato ones and therefore had some vitamins along with the salt and fat... I haven't been too good about getting up early, although I have done it a few times. I haven't done anything about starting weights training either.

2. Professional

I did more work than I realised this month. Before I made the graph I would've guessed I'd done about the same as last month. The work-before-blogs strategy worked better than I thought.

I think my slackerliness at lab has made me less likely to cook proper meals for dinner, since I'm coming home too late. The therapist last time asked if I was feeling like I was back to my old self, or better or still not as good yet. I wasn't sure, because I think some things are better now and some still aren't. What I would really like to get back to, is my work habits from my second rotation, where I got to lab by 9am, worked most of the day, with only short email/craigslist breaks (that was when I was moving out of the dorm and needed furniture) and went home at 6pm. I'm still too far from that to have it as an immediate goal, but I know it's possible.
Actually, maybe I should set that as a goal, as far off as it seems. I did go from no exercise at all back up to what I was doing then, so maybe I could do this too. I'm not sure...
Dividing my required work time up into stages has been working pretty well, but I'm still focussing on 2.5 hours of work a day, rather than on getting things done. What worked during that rotation was that I had a detailed list of things that needed doing and someone regularly (like constantly) checking up on me to make sure I was doing them. I could probably recreate some of that, but I have been slack about even making lists because it's anxiety-producing to even know all the things I should be doing.

• stage 1: finish optimising the assay conditions, repeat the big set of experiments, analyse data

I optimised all the stuff I thought I needed to and then the part of the assay I thought was fine turned out to be noisy, too. I'm hoping that won't need too much more work, because I'd like to have the big set of experiments done before I go home. Today's analysis showed that the noise wasn't as bad as I thought, or at least was due to easily fixed things, so I can go ahead and start the pre-big experiments experiment!

• stage 2: make/find the new reagents I need, use them

I finished the list but have forgotten to show my advisor to get his opinion, still...

• stage 3: in vivo stuff

Apparently this is back on and I should have done stuff for it already.

3. Social

After I had dinner with classmates last month (or was it 2 months ago?), we decided we should get together every couple of weeks, but it hasn't happened again. I should send an email about that. I also need to reply to many other emails...

I have the 4 hour social anxiety group screening appointment next week. I'm scared... I just got a big envelope in the mail today with a pile of questionnaires to fill out beforehand. I thought maybe that would be part of the 4 hours, but what are they going to do that will take all that time?

4. Family

Maybe I should get rid of this section if I can't even come up with a goal for it.

5. Being Selfish

I'm still selfish. I should give blood. I'm thinking more about volunteering for the Samaritans now. Do you think that would help my anxiety about talking to people at all (that isn't so unselfish of me...), or would I just be useless at it?

6. Other

I have been taking the photography class, although I skipped the portraits entirely. This week is the last one.

I knitted socks for my mum for mothers' day, but I haven't done any of my DNA scarf in a while. I should start going to the knitting group again. I completely forgot about going today, though.

I need to tidy my room more often again.

I think I've been forgetting that The Plan is not only about the stars... I should keep track of the other components better.

For the stars this month, though, I think I'm going to add picking 3 things to do each day and making sure I get them done, in an attempt to focus more on what I'm trying to accomplish in lab, rather than just on putting in time. I'm also going to do some of the Overcoming Social Anxiety exercises each day.