Tales of Chocolate, Caffiene, and Sugar Babies

Imagine . . . a library of old, books on the shelves, magazines on display racks, weeks of world newspapers stacked up, and massive wooden tables lining many a study room. And NO FOOD OR DRINK at all.

But wait, in the libraries of the 21st Century, not only can you have food and drink, they provide coffee shops right inside the library! Imagine that! So, I got very good at ordering a LARGE cup of joe about 7:00 pm, adding lots of cream and fake sugar, snapping on a top, and heading to a computer for some serious research/writing. To make it even better, I often added M&Ms, Hershey's Kissables, or Sugar Babies. On particularly stressful nights, I might have had all three!

My musings on the library exist because I have spent most of the month of February 2006 working on Chapters 1, 2, and 3 of my dissertation, or magnus opus as Gus called it. I am way more into the nooks and crannies of McClure library and Gorgas library than I ever thought I would be. Still, I got it done in the space of about month. Not that I got much sleep during February. Did I mention that I had a 3-day killer migraine in the middle of it all, too? But, I turned my 69-page masterpiece over to my committee last Thursday, February 23.

My proposal meeting is on Thursday, March 9, when they get to tell me what I need to do to fix it so I can get on with my research. Hopefully, not much will have to be done so I can get Institutional Review Board approval on March 15 and get started. More later when I find out how the first three chapters were received.

For more information about me and my graduate school work, please check out lauriefowler.com