Eli

Hey! So I fell of the map there... After my supervisors comments (actually, he yelled at me for half an hour), I had a couple weeks of permanent student-dom! I pretty much stayed in my office for 14 hours each day and just worked like a crazy person! I don't even know what happened in that time anymore...its a blur. Somehow I lost two weeks worth of this challenge and as it turns out my supervisor still treats me like a turd, so my struggle was for nothing! I did get a lot done though, and I did learn a lot, but I don't think it was much more than what I normally do...it was really just more stressful and I basically didn't get to see my partner (because I'd come home and go immediately to bed). My realization: My supervisor has unreal expectations of my time. He's never here anyway, so he really has no idea how hard I work or how long I spend at school each day. I think his assumption that I'm a terrible student is due to my lack of data output; I am working really hard, but I haven't been putting out data as fast as he'd like so it appears as though I'm doing nothing with my project. I have data, but I've been holding it back because I wasn't sure about it and wanted his feedback before I really put it out there...but he's been gone and completely unavailable so my data just sits here....sigh....vicious circle!!! In conclusion (again), my supervisor has unreal expectations of my time when you take that expectation literally and apply it to my current schedule. Therefore, if I simply continue my current work schedule and just output data, he will be satisfied! I also realized that my supervisor is not the guiding type and is a bit of a bully (there's a whole story that accompanies that observation which involves the half-hour yelling session...) and I'm wasting my time waiting for his help and guidance and support. Now I can move on knowing that I'm 100% ON MY OWN with my project. With that said, I honestly don't remember what I did or didn't do for the last 2 weeks in terms of my challenge! I know that I missed 2 weeks worth of Wing Chun classes but I have no idea if I walked or bussed to school... I honestly don't remember getting to or leaving school...*zombie* How much of the challenge is left?

Hello All! Sorry I'm late on updating. I really only have Sundays available for this and I kind of missed it this week with other busy stuff... I've been keeping to my schedule really well, I personally feel really great about it; however, I just met with my supervisor and he thinks I'm doing terribly which really makes me sad and confused. I asked him about it and he said he doesn't think I work hard enough and I spend too much of my time on non-school things! I really don't know what to think about that. As it is I don't have any time for non-school things (as you know from reading my previous posts). This brings me back to another "How do they do it?" moment... What do I do?! I thought I was being really productive during my school time. Apparently that's not enough? Do I have to start taking my school home with me? I don't know if I can do that; it might be physically possible, but I think it would be detrimental for my own sanity and personal life. What do you guys think? Wing chun is still going really well! I've been taking time to practice in the mornings or in my office if I don't have a chance in the a.m. I find it to be really calming and helps centre me. We've also started applying the wing chun forms to fighting scenarios which is really cool! I've crapped out on the walking to school thing a bit. There were a few days last week where I walked to and from school. This week I've been bussing it or getting picked up. Mostly this is a consequence of my supervisors comment; I suddenly feel as if a 40 minute walk is taking too much time away from school. So I've been opting for the 10 minute bus ride so that I start earlier and finish later every day. Thanks for the replies before! I'm sorry I haven't had time to answer...it's been a crazy couple weeks...very emotional and frustrating. I'm powering through though!

Update: ok, so far I've been doing really well with everything! I've been walking to school everyday and practicing wing chun. I'm actually starting to improve a bit and my muscles are getting used to the wing chun stance and movements. I did take the bus to school and home on Friday because it was raining like crazy (70-ish mm or something insane like that?!) and super windy...just a disgusting day. I also kept up with my school goals! However, my supervisor didnt get back to me with my draft corrections yet, so I'm kind of stuck at the moment. It's making me really nervous! Still haven't figured out "How other people do it". I think my partner and I have to sit down and make a list of all the things we want to do. Then we have to narrow it down to just a couple things and figure out how we can do those things together (so we have more together time). I think part of the problem with our exhaustion might actually be from lack of proper sleep! We both dream A LOT! Which means were not hitting the REM sleep as much as we probably should. I'm thinking its our mattress? We don't have a box spring so it's a bit in even and not as firm as we'd like. Going to check some used listings for a cheap boxspring. That's my plan: list and boxspring Thanks for the reply Nuala! Procrastination is such a huge issue...I do it too. The scheduling helps me though! I'll let you know if I figure out how other people do it

Update: I walked home yesterday, walked to school today and am going to walk home again today (my bus pass expired, so that's helped!). I also did yoga this morning and plan to get some wing chun practice in tonight. I had a wing chun class yesterday morning and will go to another one tomorrow. I also submitted a draft of my thesis proposal to my committee today (a day late according to my personal school schedule) so that felt great! I'm now completely mentally exhausted and might go home early to get some house chores started before I have to go to bed and wake up at 5am to go to wing chun tomorrow. My partner is working a late shift tonight, so I probably wont see him until tomorrow evening How do other people do it?! Still trying to figure that one out.

Hello! I don't know where the time has gone, but I totally missed that the challenge started last week! School has been crazy, so that's probably why I forgot about NF... I've moved from the Druid's to the Assassin's guild because I feel like you might be a huge help to my Main Quest at this point in my life. I started out in NF as a human who wanted to eventually become an elf druid-assassin! I'm getting closer to becoming an elf and I've finally reached a point where I can start my assassin training (but still be Druidy). MAIN QUEST: To be come an elf druid-assassin...which basically means, for me specifically, that I would like to become more toned, flexible, and more disciplined (both mentally and physically). Mission 1: To walk to or from school once every weekday Mission details: I have a 3.3 km walk between home and school. It usually takes me about 35-40 minutes depending on the day. I would like to walk this at least once a day rather than taking the 10 minute bus ride. If I happen to walk both to school and home, that's great too! I will allow myself two MISS days total over the course of the challenge in case I have a lot to carry to school and back (because walking that far with too much weight is more damaging than helpful). Mission purpose: To sneak some fitness into my extremely busy schedule in the hopes of toning up and dropping some of my leg fat. I don't want to drop body weight, however; I've been keeping myself at a steady 132 lb. (I'm female, 29 yrs, and 5'6") and I think that's just about perfect. What I'm after is toning but I have too busy a schedule to accommodate strict gym dates (believe me, I've tried!). I've used this goal in some previous challenges to good effect, but have fallen off the wagon a bit (or perhaps I should say "fallen onto the bus"...). Mission rewards: +3 STA, +2 CONS Mission 2: To practice Wing Chun everyday for 30 minutes Mission details: To spend at least 30 minutes every day practising Wing Chun, even if it's just the breathing or standing position. Mission purpose: I recently started learning Wing Chun kung fu and I absolutely LOVE IT! It's like I've been missing something in my life all this time, but never could quite figure out what it was... it was Wing Chun For the first time in my life since discovering I loved science, I actually have a drive to be REALLY GOOD at something. So that's what I want to do, be the best I can be. Mission rewards: +3 STR, +2 DEX, +1 CHA (just because...) Note: Part of being the best I can be will require some added flexibility. In order for me to preform Wing Chun, I need to keep my muscles limber and that will require some yoga. Rather than making yoga a mission or side quest (it doesn't really fit as a side quest), I'll just add it in as a side note because I'd still like to track my yoga progress because it benefits my ability to complete this mission. Mission 3: To be disciplined with my study schedule Mission details: I have been making and keeping to a strict study schedule because it has helped me organize my time and be more efficient. I will be posting my monthly schedules here (if I can figure out how...), for accountability sake, and I would like to keep to the schedule EXACTLY. I will, however, allow 2 days of extension total for the duration of the challenge in case something happens (like a doctors appointment, car breaks down, etc...). Mission purpose: Typically, in graduate studies, your supervisor implements some sort of guidance and study direction. Unfortunately, my supervisor is almost none existent in my life and I've had to make huge changes to my study behaviours and technique to keep myself on track according to the guidelines set out by the school of graduate studies. This is one of those changes. Mission rewards: + 3 WIS LIFE SIDE QUEST: To figure out how to balance school, fitness, and my relationship Details: My rule has always been this: work hours are for school only, evenings and weekends are for personal life only. I'm finding that I have so much school work to do all the time that it occasionally blows over into my personal time. I also seem to have so many things on-the-go in my personal time (e.g. house chores, hobbies, fitness, ect.) that they seem to invade my work time (like right now...at school, not working, but writing on NF instead...sigh). With so many things taking up those two slots, its difficult to find time for all the other things I want to do and also time for romance with my significant other! My partner and I were discussing this problem the other day. We both have so many things we would like to do with our lives (e.g. get in shape, eat healthy by preparing meals ahead of time when we're busy, learn another language, learn to play an instrument, get a dog, save money, get more sleep, spend more time together, quit some bad habits, etc.). Our problem is that we both are so busy all the time that when we do actually have TIME, we're so exhausted from our lives that we just fall onto the couch and never get up again! Our question to the universe was this, "How do other people do it?!" So this is my life side quest; to figure out "How other people do it" and also to get to the root of our own issue and figure out how to make the most of our lives! It doesn't really make sense to either of us to always feel so exhausted. There is a lot of life to be lived out there in the world, but we can't seem to get out and live it. It's not really even that we can't find the time, because there is time we just are using that time to feel like buckets of jello on the couch.... What's going to happen if we have kids?!?! I'm going to keep working through this issue during this challenge and hopefully figure it out Please reply if you have any suggestions!!!

I posted this in the Reports thread already, but just wanted to copy it here for those of you who have been following me Eli's Back in Action Final Report Well, things didn't go as smoothly this challenge as I'd hoped. I learned a lot though, so that's always a bonus Goal #1: Keeping and following a self-made school schedule with deadlines Awards: +3 Cons, +2 Wis How I did: I super aced this goal!! I am so proud of myself for this because usually I'm a HUGE procrastinator and this time I really kept myself on task. I made very efficient use of my work time each day which really felt great. Because I met all of my personal deadlines, I give myself a score of 100%! And I was further rewarded during my committee meeting this week when my entire committee told me I was doing an EXCELLENT JOB! YEAH!!! I'm so happy! Thanks Nerd Fitness Goal #2: Music or reading instead of TV Awards: +2 Cons How I did: Well, this goal went completely down the drain... I think I managed to get in 1 hour of music during the ENTIRE challenge! For that, I'm not even going to award any attribute points. What I learned: I now know that I have a hard time making time for things after my day is over. My school work takes up a HUGE part of my life, both mentally and physically (in terms of physical time and energy) which leaves time for little else. I found that I was spending the majority of my time AFTER SCHOOL spending personal time with my partner and also doing house work. On weekends, we usually just turned into couch zombies and attempted to recover from the week! Sometimes we made it out to do some adventuring. In short, I've learned that there are 3 things in my life that are MOST important to make time for and they are, in no particular order: school, partner, chores. Everything else that I want to achieve in my life tends to fall to the side or is fit into some gap in my schedule. Goal #3: Jogging Awards: +3 Strength, +3 Sta How I did: I managed to jog for only 1 of my weeks out of 6 this challenge. It's not bad! I know that I did a lot of other things that could potentially have been substituted for jogging (gym, Ultimate Frisbee, walking to school...) but I chose to NOT include those in my goal. But it's a start! I think I'm going to try to keep this goal for next challenge but I may actually change it to "using cardio machines in gym" because I find that worked out quite well these last two weeks as an afternoon study break So for this, I did one sixth of my goal, so I will give myself one sixth of my points! In closing, this challenge was fairly eventful. I started out strong, kind of gave up on my second and third goals near the end... But I learned a lot about myself and how I organize my priorities. I may also be moving to Assassins for the next challenge Good bye Druids! You've been good to me! You stuck with me through my Gluten related illness! Thanks for that Eli

Eli's Back in Action Final Report Well, things didn't go as smoothly this challenge as I'd hoped. I learned a lot though, so that's always a bonus Goal #1: Keeping and following a self-made school schedule with deadlines Awards: +3 Cons, +2 Wis How I did: I super aced this goal!! I am so proud of myself for this because usually I'm a HUGE procrastinator and this time I really kept myself on task. I made very efficient use of my work time each day which really felt great. Because I met all of my personal deadlines, I give myself a score of 100%! And I was further rewarded during my committee meeting this week when my entire committee told me I was doing an EXCELLENT JOB! YEAH!!! I'm so happy! Thanks Nerd Fitness Goal #2: Music or reading instead of TV Awards: +2 Cons How I did: Well, this goal went completely down the drain... I think I managed to get in 1 hour of music during the ENTIRE challenge! For that, I'm not even going to award any attribute points. What I learned: I now know that I have a hard time making time for things after my day is over. My school work takes up a HUGE part of my life, both mentally and physically (in terms of physical time and energy) which leaves time for little else. I found that I was spending the majority of my time AFTER SCHOOL spending personal time with my partner and also doing house work. On weekends, we usually just turned into couch zombies and attempted to recover from the week! Sometimes we made it out to do some adventuring. In short, I've learned that there are 3 things in my life that are MOST important to make time for and they are, in no particular order: school, partner, chores. Everything else that I want to achieve in my life tends to fall to the side or is fit into some gap in my schedule. Goal #3: Jogging Awards: +3 Strength, +3 Sta How I did: I managed to jog for only 1 of my weeks out of 6 this challenge. It's not bad! I know that I did a lot of other things that could potentially have been substituted for jogging (gym, Ultimate Frisbee, walking to school...) but I chose to NOT include those in my goal. But it's a start! I think I'm going to try to keep this goal for next challenge but I may actually change it to "using cardio machines in gym" because I find that worked out quite well these last two weeks as an afternoon study break So for this, I did one sixth of my goal, so I will give myself one sixth of my points! In closing, this challenge was fairly eventful. I started out strong, kind of gave up on my second and third goals near the end... But I learned a lot about myself and how I organize my priorities. I may also be moving to Assassins for the next challenge Good bye Druids! You've been good to me! You stuck with me through my Gluten related illness! Thanks for that Eli

Hey!! Wow...long time, no update!! So, it's been a weird couple of weeks. This week, my partner's mom was visiting so we spent the week in a slightly stressful "holiday" state from which we are now recovering The week before was also incredibly stressful but as a result of school deadlines and supervisor issues. In terms of my goals, the only thing that I accomplished over the last two weeks was my school goals! I didn't play music, read a novel, or go jogging but I did sub for a friend's frisbee game (90 minutes of sprinting...) and we somehow won the entire championship for my own frisbee team's league (only won 3 game out of 8...?!!?). I also took on a bunch of knitting orders which has conflicted with my goal of finishing some personal knitting projects...but that's ok because I can use the extra income! Oh, and I keep giving the jellyfish away without taking a photo! They are super cute though

Hey, thanks for the support! Ya, this colleague is a bit of a problem. He seems to think he's in competition with me and there is no need for that. It's not even a competition to be the best student; it's a competition for rank and heirarchy! A bit ridiculous considering we're all poor grad students. I think the only positive strategy will be to just not "play" and continue to work through my personal school goals. Now that I know what he's capable of, I will refrain from discussing any part of my life with him. If he's not aware of what I'm doing, it will be harder for him to twist stories to make me look bad (and seemingly make himself look better). I'm lucky, in a way, that I have a greater unstanding of our field of study than him so I should not ever be in a position to ask his advise. He, however, will likely require my assistance which I am no longer willing to give (and that's saying something because I'm an extremely generous person). That might be a bit harsh, but I was really shocked by his behaviour. Everyone gets a chance, in my books, to prove their worth/essence/core...he has proven to me that he's not worth my time or energy. Moving on still feeling a bit run-down but I'm slowly getting better! Going to make sure I do some yoga stretches at school today because my neck has really been sore (office chair posture...). I made some cute knitted-crocheted jellyfish last night! Pretty excited about them. Also managed to work on a considerable portion on my boyfriend's cardigan! Can't believe it's already Wednesday...going to make an effort to play my bass tonight though!

Hello! Update from last week... not good. It turned out that my field work/field trip was such a super stressful experience that I was unable to do anything other than work on school. I had some fairly emotional moments (in private) as a result of continuously catching one of my overly competitive colleagues misinforming my supervisor of my progress behind my back (progress which he knows nothing about; just wanted to establish his superiority within the group and to our supervisor). I'm still incredibly furious about the situation...in short, his actions sent my emotional state spiralling into a disappointed and frustrated abyss... With all of that, last week's trip really didn't do much for me on the NF front. I had a few days of flu-ish feelings (I think my cold from last week was still hanging on) and really didn't have the energy to do any additional physical activity other than the hiking and rock climbing that was already planned for the trip. I was too exhausted every morning to wake up with enough time to manage yoga and I didn't touch my novel...I instead spent long hours in my dorm room furiously working on my thesis research in preparation for meeting with my supervisor and the group presentations. I think it's safe to say that I worked myself ragged last week with all the stress, emotional anxiety, bad colleague encounters, and flu-ish symptoms. Overall, pretty depressing week. I did, however, get a lot of school work done so that's something

Cool! Thanks for the tips! Update from last week! Ok, so I managed to sneak in ALL MY JOGGING TIME for the week!! I'm super proud of that. I, however, did not manage to play any instruments or read my novel I DID manage to finish a couple of knitting/crocheting projects that have been on my plate for a REALLY long time! My diet has been good and I've been walking to school most days (although my partner started a new job and has been kind enough to drop me off and/or pick me up from school some days). I really need to start doing more yoga because I'm feeling a bit stiff; my busy schedule lately has been tricky and most days I'm just too rushed in the morning or too tired in the evenings to do anything but sit on the couch (thus why my goal of playing music/reading a novel has gone down the drain this week...). HOWEVER, I did manage to catch up of all my school work as listed in my August schedule and I'm very happy with my progress!! I'm currently across the island with my working group and supervisor doing some field work/group catch-up. I have brought my novel and intend to read it!! I also will try to go jogging, though we might be too busy for that (maybe when I get back home on Friday...). I have a room to myself, so I plan to do yoga every morning!! I'll update you at the end of the week to let you know how I did!! Cheers! Eli

Just went jogging with my friend Lina... For 45 minutes!! And I got my hair done today! Awesome!!

Yeah! I just started playing Ultimate last summer. I've been playing with the women's league and it's pretty fun! Hey! Sure, we can meet up for jogging! I generally keep a pretty slow pace and take walking breaks Ya, it occurred to me after I posted it that Regatta was only in St. John's, lol. We checked it out yesterday, watched a few of the races, but left pretty early due to the crowds. There were soooooooooo many people there yesterday that I was starting to feel claustrophobic! It felt a bit like what I imagine being a zombie would feel like...slowly shuffling along with a hoard of other, lifeless creatures occasionally bumping into one another. It was really draining (both physically and mentally) to be stuck walking around with so many other humans. There weren't even gaps in the foot-traffic! It was just a constant flow of people either moving the same direction we were, or going the opposite way. We went home and recovered on the couch under a giant blanket

I did it!! I jogged!! It even took me 30 minutes (though it felt like the fastest jog ever...not sure why?). I took a break from school at 2:50pm, got changed, jogged from my department to the trail, jogged the trail to the far end of the lake and back, jogged back to the department just in time to run into my supervisor (who I haven't seen for 2-3 months...)! Now I'm back into my day clothes at 3:40pm. Yeah! The jog was actually pretty nice! I think I will try again this week. Doing really well on my school deadlines! Tomorrow is a holiday in Newfoundland, so I will get off-set a bit on my schedule because we are planning to go see the festivities I still haven't played my bass this week or read my novel, but we did have a friend over last night and played board/card games instead of watching tv...so at least I didn't spend yesterday evening in front of the tube again! Also, I've been feeling as though I might be transitioning to Assassin guild! I think this might be my last challenge as a Druid (for now!). In September, I'll be starting a martial arts class which will bring me closer to my ultimate goal of becoming an Elf druid-assassin hybrid! Exciting

End of week 1 report: Well, I completed all my school related deadlines from last week!! I'll be starting another set of deadlines tomorrow (Monday). I didn't make it out jogging AT ALL... I'm very sad about that but I think I've figured out the issue I'm having with that goal: time. I can't seem to find the time to go jogging! So I've decided to go during school hours. I've washed all my gym stuff and I have it ready to take with me tomorrow morning! I spent a lot of time this week watching movies, tv, and playing video games. I only managed 1 hour out of 3 for music stuff. That's been a challenging change of habit. Music or novel reading instead of the tube...hmmmm. I'll keep working on it! Over all, not a bad week considering I was a bit ill. Played frisbee tonight and am completely exhausted... My right index finger also is developing a goose-egg from a rather daring bit of defensive playing I also slipped in a puddle and fell very hard on my butt (it hurt). But, good times! I can feel my cardio improving! Now to add jogging to the fitness list!