I didn't even attempt to post to my blog. After spending the morning running and working, I spent the afternoon getting ready for a wedding. The wedding itself was absolutely wonderful with so much love in the room. My mom very much enjoyed being part of it and proceeded to talk about future wedding plans for me. I'm not engaged and have no intention of getting married any time soon, so I don't know why we're discussing it at this juncture.

Today, I was exhausted. After the wedding,...

I actually made a quasi-break-through on my math research. That feels really rewarding, especially amongst the downs of failure. However, it wasn't a complete "Eureka! moment." It was one where I could say: "huh, that MOSTLY seems right, but that one little discrepancy, I just do not get." Hopefully, one of these days it will all become super clear to me... I do so much hope for that, or else, that's the end of my defense.

For the rest of the day... not so...

Ever feel like you just can't deal anymore? Today I did. Sometimes I feel like I get to the end of the road and don't know how to contemplate moving forward. And the funny thing is, my life isn't that hard.

After a frustrating day of research (yesterday), I was burnt and really didn't accomplish very much at all. I worked, don't get me wrong, but I just didn't get anything tangible done - nothing that I can say: "tada! THIS was finished." In addition, I feel like all...

Today I had one of the most hard day's I've had in a long long time. I did watch 2 nurses take my mom's blood and measure her wound...in an incredibly unpleasant way, but that doesn't even come close to how frustrating research can be.

Today I spent 6 straight hours trying to do research... ok, that's kind of a understatement on 2 fronts. Trying.... well, that I did. I spent a lot of time working to find examples, papers, anything that would allow a particular aspect of the paper...

One of the things that is uniquely difficult for me is my relationship as a grad student with my parents. Unlike most of my peers, it isn't a situation where my parents do not get me because they have no conception of life in graduate school. Quite the opposite, really. My parents BOTH got their PhD's in the hard sciences. Growing up it was bad, because I was expected to score perfectly on any test or quiz (no matter what subject) or else I wasn't living up to my potential. It didn't...