Wednesday, April 13, 2011

The plural of conference is insanity

I have a piece of advice for graduate students:
Do not, under any circumstances think that presenting at two conferences in the span of one week is a good idea...ever.  This is especially true if you have to cross nine time zones to go to your first conference and then re-cross those time zones to go to your second.  If you find that you absolutely must present at multiple conferences, even though I have told you not to, at least don't be a procrastinator like me and make sure you finish both of your papers well in advance of the deadlines.
I was in L.A. last week giving a paper on a panel with Regan and our friend Naomi.  L.A. was awesome, and I can't wait to post lots of pictures of delicious food and one really fun hike to a waterfall.  The conference went pretty well, but it came at the end of our trip.  By the time we got back to Amsterdam on Monday morning, I was wiped out.  I have spent the last few days either sleeping off the exhaustion of jet-lag or freaking out about a paper for another conference that is so not near to being done.  I'm not sure I can put two coherent sentences together at this point, let alone an entire paper for a very important conference.  I'm terrified that I will embarrass myself and forever brand myself as "that woman who gave a shitty paper about intellectual networks in Asia."  Isn't that everyone's fear?
I have to get back to my paper now, even though I would prefer to be doing almost anything other than what needs to get done.  Stress makes me want to avoid that which I need to do most.
That was my advice to you for the day.  You are welcome.

2 comments:

  1. *Excellent* advice... I can add that if you are traveling all those time zones with children, don't expect to recover from the jet lag for at least a week. (See what you have to look forward to;-)) I clicked on the follow button to keep up with you!

    ReplyDelete
  2. He he. Great title! I don't want to know this experience first hand.

    ReplyDelete