Thursday, April 08, 2010

What's wrong with me?

Why, when I'm trying to finish a manuscript, did I accept two manuscripts to review? Could I really be this desperate to put off writing?

On the plus side, I received a promotion last week. Woo hoo! What does it mean? It means I'm now eligible for international travel, and can submit proposals for agency post-doc lines. Doesn't mean I'll get either, but it's nice to know I can throw my hat into the ring now.

ETA: One review down. One more to go (fortunately it's a resubmit).

5 comments:

soil mama said...

congrats on the promotion!

so, how long does it take you to write a paper? I'm mostly just curious at what speed others write or what's "normal." someone mentioned 10 pages a day and that seemed a little crazy to me. That would mean cranking out a manuscript in just a few days...

Tom said...

After all the data has been analyzed, it takes me a good three to four weeks. I can hammer out M&M in a day or two, but getting the figures just right takes a bit of time (especially when you're dealing with multiple graphs) for me, and the introduction is the absolute worst. I HATE writing introductions. After that, R&D go by fairly easily granted I'm up on my literature and can tie it in smoothly.

Of course, where I work, I'm required to send it out for an initial peer-review to see if it's "print worthy" which then takes a couple of extra weeks. So the process for me can take a couple of months. Which means if I hope to get a second paper out before the end of the fiscal year, I really need to get this puppy done pronto. *sigh*

soil mama said...

OK- that's sounds more normal to me. Figures are a bear, and most of my figures are a composite of smaller figures which makes the process take that much longer.

I agree, I think my intros take longer than my discussions, but with each I end up spending a lot of time looking for just the right reference... and it's usually over piddly things since I often know the main references I want to tie in with my work...

good luck getting yours out the door.

Cath@VWXYNot? said...

Congrats on the promotion!

Philip H. said...

First, congrats on the promotion - you deserve such things. Second, you are a scientific overachiever - if these threads are any indication. You are just living up to your potential.