child careworn

[jrtom]

As y'all know, Corwin's been crawling for a couple of weeks now. Understandably, he's having a ball exploring in ways that he couldn't up until now, and is much less patient with being put in his playpen or any other confined area.

And our apartment is still not feasible to childproof. Too much stuff, too little space.

And I'm still on, two days a week, as the only person watching him during the day.

And full-time child care is still approximately as costly as rent...which is not cheap around here.

And I have managed to get perhaps about an hour's worth of work done today.

(I am theoretically having my candidacy advancement and dissertation topic defense in about 6 weeks. Lots to be done.)

And our child care provider is taking a week's worth of paid vacation next week. (Of course, if _we_ go on vacation, or if he's sick, we still have to pay her the full amount. I don't get paid $60/day to take care of Corwin even when I _am_ taking care of him, much less when I'm not.)

And a week after that, I'm up for jury duty of the usual unknown duration.

*sigh*

I need a break.

Comments

Child care

[fdmts.livejournal.com]

And our child care provider is taking a week's worth of paid vacation next week. (Of course, if _we_ go on vacation, or if he's sick, we still have to pay her the full amount. I don't get paid $60/day to take care of Corwin even when I _am_ taking care of him, much less when I'm not.)

Have you considered outsourcing? There are undoubtedly highly educated individuals in India who would take a full time child care gig (and do a fabulous job of it) for a third the price...

Re: Child care

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

You propose an intriguing solution. However, for this application, I believe that the turnaround time and overhead would prove to be prohibitive.

Now, if we had cheap matter transportation....

(Amusing note: actually, our day care provider is from Iran (I think).)

Re: Child care

[fdmts.livejournal.com]

Thus the "full time."

Re: Child care

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

Well, yes. However, I'm assuming that we would, for whatever perverse reason, still like to see him occasionally.

uuuughgghhgghhhh

[amnesiadust.livejournal.com]

Hey, I've got jury duty tomorrow myself. (Maybe. They didn't need me in the morning. But they might still need me in the afternoon. We shall see.)

I am almost hoping I get selected to serve. Not that I really need the inconvenience, but I think the novelty of being involved in civic processes would balance it out. At least the first time. :)

I keep forgetting that at some schools, "quals" and "candidacy" are not the same thing. At Chicago we called "candidacy" what other people call "quals" and what they call "candidacy" we call our "first committee meeting" which is really not much of a big deal. Good luck preparing for yours though.

Re: uuuughgghhgghhhh

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

Let us know how the jury duty goes. (I got called up once before, but the defense attorney decided he didn't want me. I think he thought I was annoyed at his continued mispronunciation of my name, but he was hardly unique in that--the judge and prosecutor couldn't say it right either. :> )

The way that the academic process works here is like this:
* "phase 2 exams" aka area exams: take these in your concentration once coursework is done. I did this after my first year here.
* "advancement to candidacy": once you've published a couple of papers, you convince a 5-person committee that you're capable of independent research. Probably analogous to orals elsewhere. International students are encouraged to do this ASAP because once they have advanced, they no longer pay tuition (just fees) and are thus equivalent to in-state students. (I think I have that right.)
* "topic defense": once you've picked your dissertation topic, defend your choice to your dissertation committee, and sketch what you're planning on doing.
* "final dissertation defense": everyone knows this one.

In my department, advancement and topic defense are often combined. This confuses the heck out of people in other departments, especially as it's not unheard of for people to do those two in conjunction and then defend their thesis the next quarter. (For people who want to get all their bureaucratic hoops out of the way at once, I guess.)

I wouldn't mind the jury duty so much except that the location is inconvenient and the public transportation system here sucks. Also when I was coming back from my last abortive jury duty stint, I got a flat tire, almost got heatstroke, and my bike _frame_ actually broke, so bad associations galore. :P

grrflffll

[amnesiadust.livejournal.com]

Actually at Berkeley they don't have a final dissertation defense. No oral hazing, I mean. You just get your committee to sign off on the document (which they may or may not have read carefully) and you're home free.

That's how my predecessor (O He of Awful perl Script Design) escaped... grrr.

Re: grrflffll

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

Actually at Berkeley they don't have a final dissertation defense.

WTF? That's ridiculous. How does the committee know that the student actually knows anything about the subject? I mean, you'd hope that the advisor would know, but I could imagine an advisor just wanting to get rid of a student and, well...

(Not to mention that I believe that demonstrating your ability to answer unexpected questions and communicate clearly through speech is important...)

Re: grrflffll

[amnesiadust.livejournal.com]

How does the committee know that the student actually knows anything about the subject? I mean, you'd hope that the advisor would know, but I could imagine an advisor just wanting to get rid of a student and, well...

You really have no idea how apropos these comments are in this case. :)

Re: grrflffll

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

Ah. How lovely. *sigh* At least one can hope that there was an understanding that the student wasn't going to get a recommendation from, well, anyone at Berkeley at least.