Pilot Blah

Gah.

Dedoose is not the right software for my research. Using just a spreadsheet will kill me. So now I’m looking at a student license for NVivo which has way more stuff to deal with social media data. Good news: it’s only around $100 for a one year student license. Bad news: after that I have to pony up around $1500 for a full copy if I want to keep using it. More gah. But maybe I’ll just worry about that bit later. First rule of dissertation club: FINISH THE FUCKING DISSERTATION.

I’ve taking a break for a few days because I’m busy and on steroids for my asthma (Thanks, Austin) and it’s wreaking havoc with my sleep. Also insert a kid stomach flu and separate emergency room visit, and having to migrate my upcoming class from Blackboard to Canvas, and there goes my week. My family is coming to visit next week for my daughter’s 6th birthday, which will be fun but likely will not result in finishing my pilot in the next week.

I’m also stalled out on writing my CV and teaching statement because I really have no idea what the hell I’m doing, but I need to get it done. There are some cool jobs open right now and I need to apply for them. No pressure.

I’m glad I’m keeping the password-protected thinky blog, because it helps me figure out where I’ve been in my thinking on the pilot data. I have a tendency to have these “ahah” moments over and over again and think that it’s the first time, Memento style. I think I’m getting somewhere with the mortality/fear stuff. It will be part of my thematic analysis, after I do the more granular discourse/psychodynamic stuff.

I have people I can reach out to for a lot of this stuff, but I have a tendency to curl up in a ball when I’m overwhelmed, which is antithetical to reaching out. I need to reach out. Nobody has to do all this shit alone.

I find that all the thinking I’m doing about psychodynamic stuff is also changing how I look at myself and my relationships. I find that I’m trusting my intuitions a lot more–checking out my reactions rather than just sorting them into rational/non-rational buckets. This may change the nature of some of my relationships, and is a pain in the ass when I’m triggered and I need my denial thank you very much, but I mostly like it. I like having a deeper connection between my feelings and my mind. It makes me more compassionate and better able to draw good boundaries.

Meanwhile, I need to take care of my poor bod and let it heal from the garbage that has infested my lungs. And switch up my hair color. Priorities.