bummer

Writing this thing is hard. I just realized 2 days ago that I need to have my primary proposal done before the end of the month... bummer.

Qualifying exams and Retreats....

I have scheduled my Qual. I am not going to release the exact date. Just know that it is between Turkey Day and Jesus's Birthday. When I scheduled it I was so excited that my whole comittee agreed to meet on the exact day that I wanted. AND that it only took them 4 hours to agree. I am sooo proud of them. For those of you not in Science. This is an extraordinary event, that 4 scientist can agree to meet at a certain time on a certain day within 4 hours has the chances of a black hole appearing next to our planet all the sudden and swallowing it whole.
I took this as a positive sign from the Higher power telling me to hurry up and get my ass up there, that everything is going to be fine.
Everyone keeps telling me that my project is "very HUGE". At least the project that I am proposing to the Qualifying committee. BUT when I meet with my committee they are just excited. They tell me that it might be too big but that it is an interesting exciting proposal. They said, as long as you can fit it into 10 pages without counting figures then it is fine with me. One of them reminded me that they don't need every detail of the techniques in the proposal because it will all come up in my presentation.

We had another annual retreat this week. I feel like the chairman of the department ripped me apart. Everyone said I looked sick afterwards and they all asked me if I was okay. Lets just say, there were many things I didn't like about that presentation and many things after.... But what matters to me is what my Qualifying committee and my boss say about my project. I couldn't care less what the department thinks about it. So I am going to keep writing.
I am looking to finish my background this weekend. And start writing my Aims. I wanna have the first draft by the middle of October to give time to revisions....