Monday 8 April 2013

...musings (while drowned in work)...

Alas no proper blog post... I'm well overdue a new post but just been on catch-up mode since the girls were sick for so much of February/March.

At the moment it's really tough, my husband is off on fieldwork & I'm juggling the two girls AND walking the dog. This means that before I get to work not only do I have to get the girls up, fed & dresssed (& me) but we all traipse out to walk the dog, before I drop them at nursery, pick up my routine morning coffee & collapse at my desk.  Then in the evening I need to leave with enough time to squeeze in walking the dog before the girls dinner... this has meant late dinners for them, grumpy toddlers (and hence grumpy me), they go to bed late, I tidy up their mess, contemplate what to eat for dinner, & then try to weigh up whether I'm allowed to collapse on the sofa or need to squeeze in more work before bed.  I don't know how single parents do it... maybe they're sensible enough not to have a dog AND children ;)  
...Though having a dog has its advantages... this morning we revelled in the lustrous song of the blackbird which always lifts the heart & a weary soul (and makes my toddler sing in imitation) :)  

Work wise I'm firefighting at the moment, juggling too much i.e. the normal life of an academic (just feels more acute than usual)... working on multiple projects, writing reports, processing & analysing data, writing papers, making changes to co-authored papers, making changes to papers back from review, reviewing other peoples papers, keeping on top of what is going on in science through twitter and email feeds... and still not feeling like I'm achieving enough :(

But for future 'proper' blogs there is plenty on the twittersphere that has got me itching to write...
* there's lots of articles on women in science at the moment, it seems to be a real hot topic... already I'm wanting to start commenting on posts but aware I haven't the time to do it justice at the moment. But this blog post has got me itching to write...
* bees & neonicotinoids - I'm all in a buzz (ha ha) about what we should do... wait for more evidence or go down the precautionary approach & ban neonicotinoids?  And this got me thinking about my attitudes - I am a precautionary approach type of scientist & have had to argue my corner quite a bit recently (not to do with bees but the bees got me thinking)... but reality is perhaps not quite so straightforward... this is definitely a blog post on its own...
* MCZs - so the government admitted it couldn't afford to assign all 127 MCZs, but can we afford not to have them?  I've had long discussions over this issue...

Plenty of food for thought & plenty of blogs waiting to be written, not to mention 'noise in the sea part II' ;)

But for now back to the grind & work on two urgent reports...
                              ...& then collect the girls, walk the dog, feed dog & girls...

p.s. advice for 'young' (i.e. un-tenured) researchers - do not agree to write reports or get involved in projects unless they lead to papers!  Learn to say 'no' ;) I'm learning this the hard way (a good blog post on this here).