Book review: George Saunders - Pastoralia

I discovered Saunders when I decided I wanted to read all books of the list of 101 Books Tech Alumns Should Read. Saunders was the very first on the list (along with Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow), and that's right where I started reading. From there, I split away from the list. I ended up buying all Saunders' books after reading CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, In Persuasion Nation and the Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil (which were all recommended by Paul Verhaeghen in the list).

I recently read "Pastoralia" and I would recommend it to everyone. By tweaking our reality just a little bit, and showing a demented post-capitalist dystopia that looks just a little bit too familiar, his stories challenge our views on society, and laugh at how we can get enslaved in mediocrity.
But contrarily to what you might expect, his stories do not radiate with depression. They are, in fact, of the funniest satire I ever read - which makes it at the same time sting even more, because of the similarities with our daily lives.

Just give it a shot, you might love it as much as I do.

You can read some of his writing here.

Pzizz

After my recent nights of insomnia, I discovered Pzizz. If you go to "Try Pzizz free" on the website and leave your email address, you can receive two free tracks in your mailbox: one for a 20-minute nap, and one of 60 minutes which guides you into sleep.

I've been using the 60 minute track for an entire month now, and it is simply brilliant. I have never heard the entire 60 minute track yet, as I always fall asleep at some point while listening to it. I listen to it on my phone, and since it doesn't require a headset, I an just keep my phone (in airplane mode) near my pillow and listen while drifting off into sleep.

There is also a Pzizz app, with full functionality, creating a new sleep track for every night to improve the benefits of the method. However, the app hasn't been updated since 2010 and is reported to crash and not work properly. If the app gets updated and can run in the background, I'd get it within a heartbeat.
But until then, I keep enjoying the free tracks I got and sleep like a baby.

The benefits of 750 words

I've now been using 750words for two months, and I've made some interesting observations which I would like to share.

1. Coherence

I've noticed that my entries have become much less random. I now can pick a topic (sometimes two topics) and write my entire 750+ words about one topic. It helps me to expand on one idea and see how I can flesh it out as much as possible - a great tool to improve my writing.

2. From journaling to writing practice

I keep my metadata, and expand on them, but the majority of my entries I now consider as an excellent opportunity to practice writing. The benefit of being able to toy around with ideas while writing, and seeing where it takes me, helps me to train my "writing muscle". However, I've noticed it doesn't seem the right place for me to keep a journal; instead, it seems like a training camp for my writing.

3. Ideas  

Recently, I glanced over my entries at 750 words, and I realized that many of those entries could be polished or used as a basic idea to expand on here on my blog. It also indicates that I enjoy writing about a wide scope of subjects - and that I can't just limit myself to writing only about my research, or only about my experiences as a graduate student.

4. One disadvantage - exporting entries

I've exported the March entries - but since the export command gives you a .txt-file, you end up with a giant string of unformatted text. I wanted to save the "best entries" somewhere special, but I've noticed that is not really possible. While I enjoy taking my journal out, and flip along the pages and see what I wrote earlier, I don't really like how I can access my entries at 750 words. Therefore, I'm considering to pick up journaling again as well, as it seems to complement my writing at 750 words.

How to make meditation a habit

We all know about the beneficial effects on our health and lives of meditation. Just yesterday, I came across this article, which shows that mindful meditation is also one of the unexpected treatments for depression.

I've been practicing meditation on and of over the past few years, but I find it extremely hard to make the habit stick, even though I write it as an item on my to do list to remind me to make time for it.

When I get busy, I don't meditate because I can't find the right time for it.
When I get stressed, I don't meditate because I have other things on my mind.
When I am traveling, I don't meditate because I can't find the right place.
When I am tired, I don't meditate because I just want to sleep.

And then I came across this lifesaver from Zen Habits: "How to Meditate Daily." This article inspired me to start cultivating my habit of meditation in my own way.

First, I started analyzing why I can't make it a habit - and I found that I need a set time.

I've been practicing at night, right before going to sleep - but whenever I have a good book, I keep reading late and then realize I need to sleep right away if I don't want to be too much of a zombie the next day.
I've thought of practicing first thing in the morning, but I know that when I roll out of bed, I just want to get going to my office and start the day.

And thus, I realized that the best time for me, is right when I come home. So far, it is working like a charm. The advantages of meditating upon coming home are the following:
- I clearly mark the end of the day. It's time to refresh my mind now such that I can continue working tomorrow (or in a few hours, when I decide to work at home a few more hours).
- Usually I do some brain-dead things upon getting home, like surfing around news websites - but certainly mindful meditation is a much more powerful way to relax.

Twitter and scientists

About 2 years ago, I joined Twitter, partially motivated by a workshop on personal branding organized by NWO, partially because I was curious for a longer time already. After dabbling around for a while, following news accounts and my favorite bands, I started seeing the possibilities more clearly.
If you're a scientist or academic, here's why Twitter could be interesting for you:

1. News on higher education

In these days of financial crisis, life in academia is rather uncertain. If you like to stay updated with what the policy makers have ready for you (or better: where they're going to cut budgets next), there are several sources which can give you news on higher education.
My personal favorites:
@GdnHigherEd - news from the Guardian about higher education
@insidehighered - higher education news
@hetlportal - higher education teaching and learning (you might like to check out their LinkedIn group as well)

2. Join the conversation about research in general

If you're a doctoral student, you can find peers from every possible field that are still confronted with the same problems and joys as you are and that are going through the same process as you. #phdchat offers a great deal of content for PhD students: weekly Wednesday night chats, and sharing of tips and tricks about doing research and writing, as well as providing an online support community.
A top 3 of tweeps to check out:
@thesiswhisperer
@researchwhisperer
@PhD2Published

3. Join the conversation about your field

Within your field, you can identify fellow researchers, industry practitioners and companies. Although the concrete research world doesn't seem to have a lively conversation going on on Twitter (correct me if I'm wrong, and point me to the place please), I do have a few favorites to follow.
A personal top 3:
@ConcreteACI
@Concrete_News
@ASCETweets

4. Share content

Once you've found your peers with whom you have a conversation going, you can easily cut and paste a link into a tweet and share content. You can share links to your papers in online archives, links to blog posts, links to presentations on Slideshare,...

5. Tweeting about conferences 

More and more, conferences or events will give you a designated hashtag to allow you to comment in the sideline and make the process even more interactive. Although I haven't attended a conference yet where this really worked out and had a very lively conversation going on during the conference, I expect that this will become more and more popular in the future.

If you're interested in getting started with Twitter, here's a great post from Science has the Answer to help you out!

At the beginning of the road...

I recently was asked in a comment if I'd have some advice for someone who is going to start her PhD in September.

Here's a list of 5 important first steps:

1. The paperwork

There might be a whole set of different institutions that require you to fill out paperwork,and even more if you are an international student. After arranging the paperwork as required by my department, I thought I was done. Only much later on, I understood that I also had to register at the immigration services and that I had to fill out documents for the office of the beadle. In fact, I only finished my "initial" paperwork at the moment when I was 2 years and 5 months into my program. I would have preferred to have everything out of the way as soon as possible (also because I dislike administrative tasks very much).

2. Library

Get to know your library: both the online library system and the library building. Figure out what you need to do to get library access, and learn how to search for papers and documents in the system. During my studies at Georgia Tech, I had learned from other graduate students how to find papers, and that knowledge turned out to be a life-saver when getting started in Delft.

3. Get to know the people in your research group

Take some time to get to know your new colleagues - their field of expertise, but also their skills so you can learn from them and ask for advice. When I arrived to Delft, I took a flying start by starting my experiments within the first 2 months - but that left me with less time than I would have liked to have 1-on-1 conversations with everyone in my research group.

4. Understand the requirements

Do you need to pass qualifying exams? Do you need a certain amount of credits in coursework to graduate? Do yo need to publish a certain amount of papers? Just make sure you have all of this information very clear from the beginning, so you can plan accordingly and avoid unpleasant surprises. In my case, I know that all that really counts towards my degree, is the thesis and propositions. 

5. Explore your surroundings

Get acquainted with your new city and campus, and put important phone numbers in your phone (campus security, housing office if you have on campus housing, cab company, local police). If you'll be living in a certain area for 3 or 4 years, it might be worth getting to know it well from the very beginning.

How to write a paper in two days

On my most popular post "How to write an abstract in 30 minutes" I was asked if I could come up with something similar for writing a paper.
Recently, I've noticed that I need to hack my way through getting a paper written in the least amount of time possible, as things have been getting more and more busy. Here's my method for getting a first draft of a paper to discuss with my advisors in two days (and it also involves answering questions to myself):

1. The masterplan

I never start by staring at a blank page on my computer screen. Instead, I pick up pencil and paper and start to answer the following questions to myself:

What's the target audience?
Is this paper going to a bridge engineering conference, a bridge maintenance conference, a structural engineering conference, a concrete conference or is it going to a journal? Do I have examples of proceedings of this conference from past years or do I have a paper I enjoyed reading from the journal to give me some ideas?

What's my key message?
Around which argument or idea do I want to structure my paper? This key message needs to be related to the target audience.

How do I structure my argument?
Different approaches are possible: I've been using two main schemes in the past:
1) Introduction - Experiments - Results - Conclusions
2) Introduction - Statement - Proof of Statement - QED and conclusions

What do I have?
Which material is ready, what needs to be prepared? Don't make it too detailed. It is important to know which parts of research you have that you can use here, and which parts you have written out somewhere else.

2. Filling up

Now it's time to turn to the computer again, with the masterplan as a starting point. If there is a format provided by the organizers or printers, I immediately start writing in the right format; that helps to get an idea of the length of the article.

The structure
I start with writing out the headings of the paper - depending on how I am planning to structure my argument. At this moment, subheadings (if necessary) are added as well. Sometimes I start with more subheadings, but then in the editing stage leave them out and turn them into the consecutive paragraphs of a section.

The fill
I like to dump all material I have ready into the document at the right section. I pull a few sections from a previous paper, or from a report, or from some word document which holds references and graphs from the literature. All this information gets pasted into the document. Next, I write the missing sections. This typically amounts to more than the double of the number of allowed pages.

3. Editing 

Now it's time again to walk away from the computer. I like to print out this mass of half structured information and sit down with pencil and paper again. I then start to scratch out the information I don't need, condense the text, make the argument stronger and rewrite sentences. Finally, I change the images or I draw additional sketches - only the ones that are necessary to support the argument.

I like comparing this process to making (tomato) sauce: in the "masterplan" stage, I take my recipe and see what I have in my pantry or what I need from the store, in the "filling up" stage, I throw all the ingredients together; in the "editing" stage I make it simmer on the stove for a few hours so it becomes denser and richer and add some spices.

Getting your message through on Twitter

Recently, my fiancé asked me how to reach people with his message on Twitter. He tried by using the same message over and over, and just adding other people or hashtags to it - something which only made him get a few retweets, but not really as he hoped.
As I thought my ideas could be valuable for other people as well, here's a recap of what I advised him to do:

1. Identify the right hashtag

Define where people are chatting about your topic of interest. Some hashtags are just more "alive" than others. Some seem to spark great discussion and sharing of content, and those are the ones you might like to get involved with (for PhD students - if you haven't checked out #phdchat, you surely should).

2. Interact

Share your ideas by reacting to what others say, and interacting in discussions. In the end, Twitter is a platform of social media, and its strength seems to lie in sharing and interacting - and its sense of being a "social" yet virtual platform.

3. Share content 

140 characters cannot always convey your message to the fullest, so don't hesitate to send interesting blog posts, news articles or reviews along with your message. By sharing content, you can provide further support for your idea. 

4. Give arguments for your idea

Just spitting out your message is one thing, but by showing the arguments for your message, you give a deeper layer to the contents of your message. You can interact with others and provide polite and funded feedback on why you agree or disagree with their point of view.

What do you do to spread your idea/message on Twitter?

Slideshare

Do you use Slideshare already?

If you answers this with "no", here is a list of reasons why you might like to consider sharing your presentations online:

1. Easy to share

Slideshare is to me the easiest way of having my content uploaded, in such a way that I can share it online (through LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, an internet forum, or an email contact).


2. Easy to embed

I also really like the way how it allows you to embed your presentations on any other website. I, for example, like to add some of the presentations that I've given on my blog through the easy embed option on Slideshare.
(And I precisely wrote "some presentations" - even though ideally I'd share everything, I still feel reluctant when it comes to sharing presentations of which the information hasn't been published in a paper yet).

3. Exposure

I'm really surprised to see how many views my presentations actually get. My most viewed presentation, in fact. has drawn a similar amount of views as my most popular post here on the blog (that is - a little less than 2000). Here on the blog, my research-related posts typically attract less views than the content which is generally applicable to all PhD students. On Slideshare, however, my research seems to find an audience of its own.

4. Ability to find related content - and researchers

I've been browsing around on Slideshare several times to see which other presentations are seen as similar to mine. Mostly, I find more lecture-style presentations on my topic, and I haven't come across a researcher in my field who has his presentations up there. However, if I would come across a presentation from a researcher in my field, I wouldn't hesitate to get in touch with him/her - and maybe another valuable contact with whom I can enjoy sharing ideas could be added.

 

Gaining confidence in your research

I remember how terrified I was feeling when I presented my research work for the first time to an audience. Over the past years though, and after many presentations, I feel that I have gained a certain level of confidence, which seems to radiate off all more senior PhD students. I notice the same confidence when I see other PhD students that have been around for a longer time present their research (students in their 3rd year seem to gain this inertia, but correct me if you'd think my observation is wrong). I noticed it for the first time on the PhD students senior to me, when I was thinking to myself that their stories and presentations sounded so coherent to me, and they gave me the impression that they indeed are the person who knows all the ins and outs of their precise little field of study.

To determine for myself if, or if not, I have reached the point where other people think I am telling them a solid story is hard to assess, but I can give you an insight on what have been the decisive moments in gaining confidence in what I am actually doing.

1. Practice presenting

 The best way to get used to giving presentations, is by presenting often. I still prefer to start preparing a presentation a long time before the actual date of the presentation, and then tinkering with the slides a few times before giving the presentation, trying to improve it bit by bit. However, if I hear 4 days in advance that I'm scheduled to give 2 "new" presentations (that is, showing information I haven't presented previously), I won't go into paralyzed panic-mode, instead I'll just make the slides, practice and give it my best shot.
The general idea is that every minute of public speaking requires an hour of preparation, but I'd like to think of those hours as the hours I've put into my research - and then I'm more than fully covered to go out and talk.


2. Practice writing

If I now look at the very first papers I ever wrote 2 years ago, I see something that I would do totally different if I were to repeat it all over again. However, by writing as much as possible, and by trying to write for different audiences, I feel that I have improved visibly, and seeing my work visibly evolute, has as well made me gain more confidence (and more speed) in putting papers together.


3. Check your ideas with researchers from outside your research group

Test your assumptions - and see if they are generally accepted. Talk about your research as much as possible to others, and learn from their questions. Whatever might seem obvious to you when you're looking at it all the time, might need further explanation for someone else. 


4. Befriend your data

It's your responsibility to know your data, your experiments, your sample population, your questionnaire results or whatever you studied to the core. I notice that by knowing very well the ins and outs of my test results, and by pulling out examples whenever necessary, I have a unique tool to reply certain questions (in fact, as a PhD student, you're the closest to this information, and the person who has absorbed your own work to the fullest). Take full benefit of that.


5. Reread the seminal papers in your field - and reread them again


It's like being the smart kid who can quote from all the classics in literature, philosophy and poetry - make sure you know the seminal works in your field. No further explanation needed - and no excuses, just make sure you do your homework as you're supposed to.

On perseverance

One of the challenges of the PhD journey, is to hold on tight and plow through the mud when necessary. These days, I'm re-analyzing the experimental data of my first series of experiments, and it's at least, a tedious task. I have 500-something spreadsheets that I've been making already for the analysis, and I'm still not getting there. It's an uphill journey, with only very small discoveries at a time, but it's a necessary step in the entire process.

Here's what seems to be necessary to me to keep going and persevere:

1. Keep track of the bigger picture

It sure wouldn't help me if I just think that I'm moving data around in spreadsheets the whole day (OK, maybe that is what I am really doing). Instead, I like to focus on the fact that I'm going with a fine comb through my data, shining the light on it from many different angles and studying everything step by step, to see if I can find something that glitters in there. Something that gives me new insights on my topic is what I am looking for, and a better understanding of what I exactly learned from all my experiments.

2. Track your progress

For a new report, I typically keep track of my progress in terms of word count. Now that I am revisiting my previous analysis, I have already written most of the text itself, and I'm mainly changing graphs and results and some sentences. If I'd count those words, it wouldn't make me feel too satisfied at the end of the day. Instead, I now see the number of pages that I've altered as a percentage of the total to see my slow but steady progress, and I count the sections which I can alter in a day's worth of time.

3. Eat an elephant, one bite a day

I've been putting off this tedious task for too long - the last version dates from September 2011, and now only in March 2012 I've come to the point of going over it all again. Even though I have other tasks going on at the same time, I now try to finally pick up this task and make it a priority by working on it steadily. Even when I have a full day planned with activities, I try to alter at least one section of the document. Or I try to alter one section in the evening at home. Just one step at a time, and eventually I'll have the task mastered.

4. Reward yourself

You deserve a pat on your back every now and then. There are many different ways to celebrate a good day's worth of progress. Whether you write a hooray-entry in 750 words, or settle with a nice cup of wine and a good book in the evening, or get yourself a delicious dessert, make sure to get your reward. 

5. Don't overdo it 

I'm sometimes tempted to think that if I'd just lock myself down for a few days and pull a few allnighters, it will be done. The fact is that doesn't work: I would end up making mistakes, and research simply isn't like cramming for an exam. It's a process of 4 years, and you don't want to end up tired and sick of it. Treat yourself like an endurance athlete: eat well, sleep enough, get enough exercise and don't beat up yourself over failures.

To Pomodoro or not to Pomodoro?

If you're around this blog for some time, you might have noticed that I refer to the Pomodoro technique every now and then. I am now using it frequently again, since I got the Pomodoro Lite app for my iPhone (which is a total battery drain though). Another list of apps can be found here, from which I tried Pomodoro Me as well, but I didn't get that one working.

Recently, I have as well been contemplating the sense and nonsense of such a technique all in all. Even though I use it, and for some tasks, really seem to need it, it sometimes also feels forced and unnatural.


The advantages

1. It's purpose is clear and simple: focus for 25 minutes on just one task. It's a great help to focus for 25 minutes at a time. We all can get our thoughts together for something as short as 25 minutes, right?

2. I always feel like I'm racing against the clock in the last 5 minutes in which I see time ticking away. It's a great productivity boost, one pomodoro at a time.


The disadvantages

1. I find it difficult to stick to the 5 minute breaks. A "good break" for me is to get up from my chair and get something to drink at the end of the hallway. In a "failed break" I think I don't need to get up, and read my mail. Then, I need less time than 5 minutes, so I start looking for things to fill up time - and before I know I'm reading some article online and the 5 minutes are long since over.

2. Ideally, I wouldn't want to work like this. Ideally, I just got into the flow mode and work for hours straight on something which truly captivates me. Reality seems to be much different though, but still it sometimes feels unnatural and against the logical flow of the mind. Ideally, my mind is so crystal clear that 25 minutes of focus is a piece of cake.

Improving your Spotify experience

I love listening to music, preferably on my own stereo in my room (which was arguably one of the best presents my parents ever came to me with). When I'm in my office, or whenever my CD collection is out of reach, I rely on streaming services. Recently I've been enjoying Spotify very much (although I'm not sure how their 10 hours per month maximum limit now will affect my listening habits - I might just go and head back to Grooveshark). As with most services that I use, I like to get the most out of it. Here are three ways in which I improved my listening and sharing experience on Spotify:  

1. Blockify

Love the service, hate the ads? Here comes Blockify to save the day :) It's an advert blocker, and it manages to mute most of the ads. Great for when you're working with some nice background music and don't want to get disturbed by someone blabbering in your ear about the most random things like jeans fitting your shape or parties which are of no interest to you.  

2. Playlistify

I've used Playlistify to import my playlists from Grooveshark and Last.fm into Spotify. The best part was were I could take my loved tracks from last.fm and have these converted into a spotify playlist. Using the regular last.fm app for Spotify only gives you something like 20 tracks, and my list of loved tracks was over 200 tracks long. Most of these have been successfully transferred into the Spotify playlist.

 3. Last.fm connection

With an app in Spotify, you can connect your last.fm and Spotify accounts to eachother, which enables last.fm to scrobble from Spotify. Before last.fm restricted listening to its audience here in Europe, I used their service a lot. I still really like how they recommend music to explore - and I'm grateful for the link between Spotify and last.fm to now get recommendations from last.fm based on what I stream in Spotify. It also gives me access to all the cool stat applications last.fm has, and the informtion last.fm puts per artist. With the app in Spotify, you can browse through last.fm within the Spotify program.