Burnout

Hoooly shit it's almost seventh week already.  This has been an insanely fast term.

During program orientation, we were told that the term would seem to go by incredibly quickly, and it has.  We were also told that we would feel totally exhausted by the end of it, which also seems certain to come true.  There's actually a phenomenon called "fifth week blues" at Oxford, because students are tired of work but there's still almost half a term to go.  I know I had a pretty crappy fifth week, and a bunch of other people did too.

The frustrating part about work at Oxford is that you do the same thing every day.  I get up at noon or so, eat, go to the library, and read until I'm too hungry or bored or tired to continue.  Then I come home, make dinner, and depending on the day do something afterwards (write, drink, go back to library, or miscellaneous).  It's actually pretty funny how many humanities majors in the program want to take math classes next semester at their home universities, just so they have a break from reading all day.  Also, I think I've developed Stockholm Syndrome with the social science library, which is a little troubling.

Fortunately, when I'm reading about something I'm genuinely really interested in or passionate about, I don't get bored at all (although I am less productive, since all I want to read about is that topic, not whatever my essay is actually about).

Also, I'm more convinced than ever that the study of how the internet is affecting society is ridiculously under examined topic in academia.  At this point, I've read 75% of the authors cited in most books relating to the topic.  I visited the Oxford Internet Institute, and it's tiny.  Although it seems fantastic.  I was listening in to the conversation of some grad students there about Google's new enhanced reality glasses and they seemed like exactly the type of people I enjoy hanging out with.

I don't want this blog post to come across as too negative -- this has been a really enjoyable and valuable experience.  But I am really glad that I'm getting a break in two weeks.