02 December 2006

Cambridge update

On Monday, I got an email from the secretary of the linguistics department at the University of Cambridge. I was kind of surprised and nervous, not expecting a decision this soon, and via email. However, the content of said email was only one sentence: 'I wonder if you had received my previous email.' Um, no...? So I continued to read the previous email which she had attached. Basically, the admissions comittee wants me to write a paper on a specific journal article in addition to my application, so that they can better decide if I'm suited to their program. This paper was due on: Wednesday, November 29.

[insert expletive here]

So I emailed back, saying that I hadn't received the original email and therefore it would be exceedingly difficult to write a 2,000 word paper on an article in two days, especially since I had to first find the article. After much back-and-forth, I got the very nice and patient secretary to send me the article and give me an extension until Monday.

The gist of all this: Instead of having 3 weeks to write a 'critical analysis' (what does this mean, anyway?) of a journal article, I have two days. (weekend days at least, not evenings after work) What am I doing now? Procrastinating.

Some things never change.

No comments: