it's not because of summertime .. not directly, that is. it doesn't help to have the entire day wide open, and it seems to demonstrate that i am a contrarian:
- when classes are in session, i complain about not having large enough blocks of time to complete a single, long thought.
- now when i have no classes to attend or teach, the sheer length of the day is crippling, and my mind wanders too easily. i become incapable of completing those single, long thoughts.
yesterday i convinced myself to work a little, by making a bargain with myself:
if i buy a small coffee, then i will work either until the coffee runs out or until i finish the thought at hand.
it worked, but i'm hardly proud of that decision and i don't think it will work in the long run. there are too many possibilities for legal substance abuse (i have enough problems with coffee already) and it builds an unnecessary correlation between work and beverage.
what happens if i need to work and there is no coffee, for instance?
when i look into the future, all i see are things that could go wrong .. very wrong.
the thesis work is turning computational (read: frustrating) and my tendencies towards obsessions and compulsions come through.
- i write something down and i don't like it because it's messy and doesn't follow well;
- i write that same something in a cleaner form, but then it's wrong or incomplete or i forgot to add a key point between this part and that;
- i realise that i'm wasting paper, and mentally snarling, i tell myself that i should think more clearly before i put anything on paper;
- an hour passes and i realise this is painfully unproductive; i can't keep everything in mind all at once, so i angrily reach for a page of paper ..
it's not going well .. not very well at all; there's not much progress, if any, and the near future looks like more of the same.
i wonder what i'd have told my younger self, if i encountered him today. would i have anything good to say?
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