The Next Steps Forward

So now that I have polished off loose ends, I am starting on some new projects. One of them is a collaborative project that is the main focus of the semester. I've never worked with a research team this large before, and it's interesting balancing the dynamics. Meetings tend to be much less efficient than I prefer, in part because another member doesn't seem as "on task" as I'd like to be. However, the time that this other group member spends thinking about research directions could lead to future projects or to this project being less superficial. I try to focus on the fact that our differences are what makes collaborative projects good.

I'm also starting to work on a theory piece. I had a theory piece reject last year--two reviewers liked it and one didn't, and the editor went with the one that didn't. However, the reviews gave me some interesting ideas about different directions to take with the paper. One direction was using the conceptual development in the earlier paper as the literature review of an empiricial paper. I've done that. A few people are looking at it for me, and then one or two rewrites and it's off (mid-June?). The other direction was to take the conceptual development to another level, to really consider the ontology of what I'm talking about. Although I was/am frustrated that the original piece was not at least given a revise and resubmit, I have to say that I'm excited about this new direction. A little intimidated because of the twists and turns I see ahead for this paper, but still very excited. I'm hoping to have a draft done in the next few weeks and maybe submit it in late July or August.

In my "free" time, I've been running more and more. I just finished a long training run. Later this summer, I'm running my first marathon. It's nice to have something to talk about other than teaching and research.