Thursday, August 20, 2015

Off-Balance

Yikes I feel weird. Mostly just sleep-deprived, which admittedly messes with basically every other aspect of mental and physical well-being... I'm not particularly stressed or nervous about the start of school, but there must be a slight case of first day jitters going on or something because I haven't slept well for about a week. I was not good about easing into the sleep schedule transition before orientation stuff started up this week, unfortunately.... Over the summer I was staying up past midnight most nights and sleeping until around 9:00 most mornings, but the past week I've had to be at campus by 7:30 or 8:00 each day. So I've tried going to bed earlier, but of course couldn't fall asleep....so I tossed and turned and read for a lil and paced my kitchen for a lil and as a result, I've been getting jolted horribly awake at my 6:30 alarm and wandering around campus like a total zombie. I swear, my head has been throbbing since Monday.

Another thing: each day we've gotten a box lunch catered by the school. Now, I am poor (see the math problem in a prior post) and all in favor of free meals, but I swear to God if I have to eat another turkey and Swiss sandwich out of a box again I might puke all over my orientation packet. And I'm using the term "sandwich" loosely. In fact it's more like a softball-sized white roll, giant lettuce leaf, mushy tomato slice, and a couple shreds of turkey and cheese if you lucked out and chose a good box. The other day they had forgotten to put any turkey on it at all; so I dug my way through the 64oz of bread to find it was just a lettuce and tomato sandwich.

Anyway. Shouldn't complain because it's all free but geez Louise I am ready to start eating some real food again. These weird sandwiches have totally screwed with my eating patterns because HOW MANY CALORIES???!?!!? and the early mornings have screwed with my working out patterns (I usually work out in the morning) so I am feeling very discombobulated by the whole thing. Very grateful to be getting into a more consistent routine soon.

On the plus side, I've gotten most of the major orienting business out of the way. Today is basically free except therapy this afternoon; tomorrow I have PT and then a meeting with my advisor. Actually it's a meeting/interview for the master's student who is technically "replacing" me as his MS research assistant. We spent some time looking through CVs yesterday and wowza it was fun/depressing. I mean, some were impressive but some were downright laughable. One person literally forgot to list the name of his undergrad school, and another listed a volunteer trip to Chicago under a section entitled "International Experiences." Um.

Alrighty, hopefully the recuperation begins today. Happy Thursday to all.

1 comment:

  1. Orientation is awkward in a lot of ways, I'm glad you made it through and get some recuperation time. Box lunches at conferences/meetings/orientations are the pits, but sometimes the pits are cheap/free enough to be justifiable! ;) Seriously, I know that had to be unpleasant but the fact that you did something so out of routine is awesome, taking challenges like that step by step is the way to overcoming a lot of lingering food rules etc.

    Schedule changes at the end of the summer are also rough. Are you a big coffee drinker or a one-cupper? Sometimes manipulating caffeine patterns can help with that kind of thing . . . I'm sure you'll be in the swing of things soon!

    The Chicago volunteer experience literally made me laugh out loud . . .

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