I started writing conference proposals for various aspects of my diss research last November. So at this point I have some presentations lined up, one of which is SHARP in July. On the one hand: good for me, giving myself some external deadlines that I must meet or face certain public embarrassment! How well I know myself and my many, tragic flaws! On the other hand, my lazy side completely hates me for doing this to myself.

In about 35 days, I need to be able to coherently detail Ephraim Chambers’ conceptualization of encyclopedic authorship. This is totally doable, provided I don't screw around at all. And there’s the rub, because summers and their general lack of structure are never easy for me. This summer I’m teaching, which is good. But the teaching is for a long stretch two evenings a week, which throws off my usual up-at-5:30 schedule that I employ when I need to seriously get things done. So my current plan (which sort of but not totally mimics Debbie Hawhee’s) is to get to my desk by a decent hour in the morning, work on diss-related matters until 1 or so, then move to whatever other work needs to be done for the day, and then play on the evenings I’m not teaching. This will be interrupted by at least a few road trips, since there’s still some Minnesota left to see and Mr. Husband has research in Madison, but it should still generate a reasonable pile of Done.