When to use SparkNotes for a Magister Artium

Master's
I spent this afternoon being productive thanks to the Phinished community. I keep on being surprised at how much it helps to know and feel that you are not the only sucker that has committed yourself to finishing a dissertation. I still envy people who have a taught Master's since it seems that being taught would be much less effort than playing Rumpelstiltskinwith your ideas (trying to turn straw into gold or loose ideas into a coherent Master's).

Rumpelstiltskin
by H. J. Ford

Occasionally another kind of alchemy is required. I've read and reread my primary sources over and over. I should know everything off by heart by now, but still my brain sometimes turns into straw. In computer terms, I made a file for MA and just dumped all the information in there. My internal search engine doesn't always work. Which introduces us to our good friend SparkNotes.

I used to be a lecturer before I accepted government employment and capitalisation and became a Language Editor instead. This means that I know all the arguments against SparkNotes. I even wrote a rant in a test feedback after what seemed like millions of second-year scum (who wanted to become teachers) decided that it was just too difficult to read the play or failing that the Charles Lamb summary. If you really want to read the rant, you can find it here. It is not necessary to read between the lines to see I was disgruntled and annoyed.

However, at Master's level I think SparkNotes are incredibly useful when techno peasant brain indexing fails. Since I'm comparing Jane Austen's novels to that of E.M. Forster I keep looking for links until the boundries between the novels break down and I am left with characters trying to sneak into each other's books. My latest problem was inflammation in the Austens. Does Eliza Bennet or Marianne Dashwood fall in love with Willoughby? It's Marianne. Then what is the name of the ungrateful blister (it doesn't help to read P.G. Wodehouse in the bath neither) who slanders Mr Darcy?

Once the people in the books manage to run amok in my brain good old SparkNotes comes in useful. The students are correct - it is much quicker to consult notes than to plough through the novel. In my case the novels are strewn throughout the house as I move my writing space. SparkNotes solves the Austen problem: Eliza admires George Wickham. And the notes also quickly point out that Mrs Moore in A Passage to India has, by another marriage, a daughter named Stella and a son named Ralph (I was convinced his name was Henry or John). The factual inaccuracies also do not bother me since I know the novels. I can disdainfully sniff at plot analyses and move on.

In short, SparkNotes is a telephone book with the full names and surnames of characters. The notes also contain the address or name of the novel from whence the character escaped.

Studying in Paradise

Master's
The house I live in now used to belong to my grandfather. He always said that he lived in Paradise with his friends, the birds. I have to agree. Today was a perfect autumn day. My clothes felt fresh and warm from drying in the sun. I had the privilege to work on my Master's in the garden under the Jacaranda. The day was mild enough that I had my head in the shade, but my legs could be poked out into the warm, soothing sun.

Ye olde techno peasant notebook in beautiful surroundings

Project 36
The only part that marred the effect of being able to study in utopic surroundings is that I'm ravenous most of the time. I kept on having to get up every so often to search for sustenance.Yep, I've gone from feeling hungry to starving. The first three weeks of following my eating plan were invested in forcing myself to eat regularly. Now I have more portions to eat, but I have to exercise self-control not to overeat. Vegetables cooked with only herbs and water don't count as portions - so my veggie intake has gone up quite a bit for those times when I just need to fill the stomach and not take in additional carbohydrates.

Supposedly the increase in hunger shows an increase in metabolism. I would be sceptic, but I've put in a valiant effort to remember the last time is that I was constantly hungry - my early teens. I don't think that this means that another growth spurt is on the way (pity, since a little extra height wouldn't hurt). But it is the kind of hunger that occurred just before the puppy fat went. Let's hope!

Three bricks of butter

Master's
I've been advised that it's not most brilliant idea to post the topic of an unfinished Master's on the internet in case another sneaky, power-hungry Master's student runs off with it and finishes writing before I do. So if anyone was wondering, perchance, that's why I just refer to it as the Master's. Most of the time.

I made a classic mistake when I started writing the dissertation. I changed my methods. Usually I have a techno peasant notebook in which I happily scribble while I read and then I pick out pieces when I write the chapter. I tried to go all electronic this time. Now I'm back to yea old pen and paper for planning. My eyes seem to like me a lot more suddenly.

Note to self (aka to any Master's readers): do not change what works. Especially not for a (silly) idea.

Project 36
I  went back to the dietician, Marthie Leach, today. I've been doing the eating plan (nothing that makes you eat that much can be called a diet) for a little less than a week. I'm very pleased with the results of the hobbit lifestyle.

I didn't lose any weight, but I did lose 1,5% body fat. This is apparently the equivalent of three bricks of butter!

Inspiration to keep going

Gym
I actually went to gym yesterday. I skipped my friend, the adducer machine, last time so this time I was drawn to its awkward embrace. To anyone that has the good fortune not to know what these are, a picture:

Thigh adducer

Unlike the exercise balls (Getting the (exercise) ball to stand still and the (metaphorical) ball rolling) there is no attempt to romanticise this particular exercise. It's embarrassing. My gym has the decency to at least have you facing the wall with a photo mounted on it so that you have something to look at while you struggle to bring your thighs together.

1. Take one short lady (me).
2. Select your punishment (resistance).
3. Pull up the lever that brings the stirrups (what else can I call them?) close enough to swing your legs into them.
4. Sit on the seat.
5. Lift left leg up and swing it over and on to the stirrup.
6. Wiggle the derrière and make circles in the air with the right leg until it is in the other stirrup.
7. Brace yourself in the frog-on-its-back leg position.
8. Lower the lever that stops the machine from moving.
9. Slowly bring your knees closer to each other until you achieve the elusive mono thigh.
10. Slowly relax legs.
11. Repeat steps eight and nine 30 times in total.
12. Pull the stirrup lever up.
13. Elegantly swing a leg out of one stirrup.
14. Straddle one leg of the machine and hop on one leg until you are free of the machine.

I missed the 30 reps since the machine only put the weight on one leg instead of both. How terrible.

Eat like a hobbit

Master's
Misery loves company as do struggling Master's students. (Is "struggling student" a tautology?) At any rate, my friend and fellow perseverer Anja started blogging again and says I inspired her to start up her blog, Coram publico, again.

It seems that I have finally relaxed and slept enough to start writing. I was starting to read Emma again when the whole of one chapter of my Master's flashed into my head. Parallel structures, parallel plots, love and marriage and structure cannot be two chapters! Luckily I have a MA notebook (the techno peasant version with a book and a pen) in which I noted my ideas so that they wouldn't go missing in the night. Hooray! It feels like I'm finally starting to get work done.

Project 36
My visit to the dietician went remarkably well. I do not feel that I will starve - instead I don't know how I'm going to eat so much. Apparently the way to lose weight and make the good old tum happy is to eat like a hobbit. Yep, my eating patterns were predicted by JRR Tolkien. Breakfast is to be eaten within an hour after surfacing from a night's sleep. Since I usually skip breakfast this is the worst part. Then follows elevenses, lunch, supper, dinner and a before-bed snack.

I've been attempting to do the portions a day. It's harder than I thought. Not because I feel that I'm being starved, but because I don't feel that I can eat as much and as often as expected. A few days of eating hobbit style have convinced me that the reason for eating as soon as possible after waking up is that it is the only way to eat so much in one day!

Sleep
Incidentally, Marthie Leach, the head dietician at Litchi Living made my day. I've lost 2 kg since I stopped working and started sleeping (1.5 weeks). That's right, sleeping your eight hours a night (or a bit more in my case at the moment) will make you lose weight. This explains why the care bears and any other creatures that inhabited fluffy clouds in the eighties were just cuddly and not "overweight" or "fat".

See, cute and cuddly!