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kareinaI haven't been taking advantage of the motivational tool that is LJ and the accountability that goes with posting progress on a regular basis. It has been two months since I moved to Sweden, and I have decided that it is time to actually quit dawdling and do the write-up of the research I did in Milan. So, what progress have I made during those two months, in between having an active social life, maintaining my on-line social life, and just generally settling into my new home?
I have largely finished processing the data I accumulated before leaving Milan and now know what phases were present in each experiment and what their compositions were, and have the data all nicely organized into pretty spreadsheets. I have converted that data into basic paragraphs summarizing the trends seen for each phase, and put them into the results section of the paper. I have finished filling in the spreadsheet listing all of the published papers I could find that report both garnet and talc occurring together in natural rocks, and have the published compositions of those minerals copied into a file of the correct format to make graphs of them to compare with my data (which is very different from the natural rocks!).
Now for the hard part: What do I still need to do before I have a decent paper draft I can send to my erstwhile boss for his edits/comments? Looking at the Word document of the paper in progress I see that it still needs:
* A paragraph or three or five (or whatever it takes) discussing the settings in which the rock types that my experiments approximate are found, and discussing the occurring of talc in the natural rocks.
* A bit more detail on the technical side of the experiments--I have already spelled out what compositions were used in the starting materials and described the mechanics of the experiments themselves, but could use more information on how the experiments approach equilibrium and that sort of information.
* The sections on discussion and conclusions needs to be written, which means that I need to decide what to say here.
Now that I have looked to see what still needs doing, it doesn't look that daunting. However, the fact that I had not taken the time after completing typing up the last part of the results section that I worked upon to acutually think about what would need to be done next probably explains why I haven't done anything more on it in the past several days. Having a good idea of what I need to do increases the odds of my actually doing it. Stay tuned for future progress reports letting you know if I did, in fact, do anything or not.
In other news, the Second half-semester Swedish class has been making rapid progress. We have three more class meetings next week, and then a week off before the exam. Good thing, too. From where I sit right now I wouldn't be able to pass the exam, it will take a bit more time to really learn all of the new vocabulary and the various bits of grammar they've given us (we can now use nouns in both singular and plural and describe them with adjectives that have the correct ending based upon the noun, we can use verbs in several different tenses, and know where to put the verb in a sentence (second position, unless forming a question by using the verb as the question word, in which case it comes first), we can discuss what sorts of things we do in our lives based upon times of day or times of year, and if they are things we do often, occasionally, rarely, or never. We can use pronouns, we can tell time. No doubt there are other things we've learned, but that was all off the top of my head, without looking at the book or class handouts. I can't really speak the language yet, but my reading is coming along nicely, and I am understanding more and more of the things I hear every day.
This evening's entertainment was spending a few hours with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
archinonlive cleaning and organizing stuff here in the apartment. I needed some of the things that have been living in the kitchen cleared out because I will be hosting some gamers as part of a small gaming con this weekend, and it might be nice to be able to actually use the table for that. (He will in in Finland for work this weekend, so it will be good to have company, I think.) It is also good to clean and organize things before my stuff arrives. Though I haven't heard back from the shipping company since sending them the e-mail asking them to contact clovis_t to arrange pick up on that end before delivering it to me. Hopefully they will do so soon, as I really want it here. Hopefully we will finish making room for everything before it arrives.
I have largely finished processing the data I accumulated before leaving Milan and now know what phases were present in each experiment and what their compositions were, and have the data all nicely organized into pretty spreadsheets. I have converted that data into basic paragraphs summarizing the trends seen for each phase, and put them into the results section of the paper. I have finished filling in the spreadsheet listing all of the published papers I could find that report both garnet and talc occurring together in natural rocks, and have the published compositions of those minerals copied into a file of the correct format to make graphs of them to compare with my data (which is very different from the natural rocks!).
Now for the hard part: What do I still need to do before I have a decent paper draft I can send to my erstwhile boss for his edits/comments? Looking at the Word document of the paper in progress I see that it still needs:
* A paragraph or three or five (or whatever it takes) discussing the settings in which the rock types that my experiments approximate are found, and discussing the occurring of talc in the natural rocks.
* A bit more detail on the technical side of the experiments--I have already spelled out what compositions were used in the starting materials and described the mechanics of the experiments themselves, but could use more information on how the experiments approach equilibrium and that sort of information.
* The sections on discussion and conclusions needs to be written, which means that I need to decide what to say here.
Now that I have looked to see what still needs doing, it doesn't look that daunting. However, the fact that I had not taken the time after completing typing up the last part of the results section that I worked upon to acutually think about what would need to be done next probably explains why I haven't done anything more on it in the past several days. Having a good idea of what I need to do increases the odds of my actually doing it. Stay tuned for future progress reports letting you know if I did, in fact, do anything or not.
In other news, the Second half-semester Swedish class has been making rapid progress. We have three more class meetings next week, and then a week off before the exam. Good thing, too. From where I sit right now I wouldn't be able to pass the exam, it will take a bit more time to really learn all of the new vocabulary and the various bits of grammar they've given us (we can now use nouns in both singular and plural and describe them with adjectives that have the correct ending based upon the noun, we can use verbs in several different tenses, and know where to put the verb in a sentence (second position, unless forming a question by using the verb as the question word, in which case it comes first), we can discuss what sorts of things we do in our lives based upon times of day or times of year, and if they are things we do often, occasionally, rarely, or never. We can use pronouns, we can tell time. No doubt there are other things we've learned, but that was all off the top of my head, without looking at the book or class handouts. I can't really speak the language yet, but my reading is coming along nicely, and I am understanding more and more of the things I hear every day.
This evening's entertainment was spending a few hours with
archinonlive cleaning and organizing stuff here in the apartment. I needed some of the things that have been living in the kitchen cleared out because I will be hosting some gamers as part of a small gaming con this weekend, and it might be nice to be able to actually use the table for that. (He will in in Finland for work this weekend, so it will be good to have company, I think.) It is also good to clean and organize things before my stuff arrives. Though I haven't heard back from the shipping company since sending them the e-mail asking them to contact clovis_t to arrange pick up on that end before delivering it to me. Hopefully they will do so soon, as I really want it here. Hopefully we will finish making room for everything before it arrives.