Running to Stand Still

It's official. Sometimes being a graduate student, and being a grown-up, means biting the bullet, realizing when you're beat, and picking up the pieces.

In order to defend I have to have my finished dissertation to my committee two weeks ahead of the defense. For my original date that would have been tomorrow, which is clearly not going to happen, for all of my efforts. I could push back until the first week of August, which would still mean fall graduation, but not fall registration, I'd still be defending Summer II semester. But my adviser and I had a little chat. And I had a long hard think. Even to defend the first week of August, I'd need to have draft done by Monday, so that I could do a round or two of revisions with my adviser before it would have to be to my committee.

This is where the bite the bullet part comes in. I can and will work to finish the whole document ASAP, but given the size and complexity of my final data set, and the background research I will need to do, I expect at least a 10 day commitment to finish it all up. This means I will miss the Aug 7 deadline, likely by only a few days, but there it is. And if I am going to miss it, I might as well give myself some breathing room to make sure the defense is the best it can be.

New targets: Dissertation Submitted to committee no later than July 31 (and in a shape to minimize revisions) but hopefully by July 30.
Defense: Sometime the first week or week before classes in the fall.

Sigh.