I Still Got It!

One thing which used to drive my mother (hi mom!) crazy when I was in school was the fact that I would leave large research papers until the bitter end aka not starting until 24-48 hours before it was due.  I tried to assure her that after so many years in school I have mastered this process down to a science.  The use of modern technology and the internet also helps my case.  I am also an academic adrenaline junkie, found also in grant writers and program evaluators (hello undergrad major), which means the stress in the final hours before a deadline helps crank out a quality product.

After sitting around for a month contemplating what I should write my final HELP paper on (this is the thing half of our grade is riding on), I could put it off no longer.  With 25 hours to go I headed to the library to start pulling and printing articles.

NERD ALERT: You know that feeling you get when all your MeSH terms line up, you are able to find thoughtful quantitative and qualitative articles sprinkled with some policy analysis and everything is coming together beautifully in support of your hypothesis?  Well it was all that and more last night!

With twenty articles R&D'ed (read and digested ... basically highlighted and written all over) and stacked neatly on my bed, paper writing can commence.  Always start with the policy suggestions because this is by far the easiest thing to summarize ... then some of the body ... background ... conclusion ... body ... intro ... back to the body to make sure everything in the intro was covered.  And after 3 hours or so of listening to the click-clack of my computer keys, I have a pretty solid draft and it is time for bed.

The typical morning routine consists of a latte, writing the introduction, proofing, throwing together my references, proofing and then SUBMITTING. 

And voila!  A ten page paper is written with five hours to spare!

Yay for being a humanities major in undergrad.