Skip to main content

Overcommitment

Overcommitment, Finals Week, Spring 2016 (Essay #27)

The first in a series of short essays on the too many things I commit to.

Overcommittment, Summer 2016 (Essay #39)

The second in that series.

Misunderstanding metaphors (Essay #68)

The first in a short series of essays about my workload. In this one, I examine metaphors relating to work.

Sometimes tasks take too much time (Essay #70)

The second in that series.

Nibbled to death by ducks, episode 1 (Essay #85)

The first in a new series about my workload (originally intended as the third in the previous series).

Taskcading (or tasks cascading) (Musing #358)

A return to reflections on my workload.

Overcommitment, late summer 2017 (Musing #387)

What I have left to do this summer.

Nibbled to death by ducks, episode 2 (Essay #388)

In which I continue to reflect on my workload.

Nibbled to death by ducks, Episode 3: Revenge of the ducks (Musing #389)

And then I start to lose.

Saturday with SamR (Musing #396)

One day in my life.

Sunday with SamR (Musing #397)

And another.

It seemed like a good idea at the time (Musing #406)

One of the reasons I don’t always get things done.

Missing a musing (Musing #409)

One of the things I didn’t get done.

Dreading September 1 (Musing #427)

Too many projects, too little time.

Recovering from 1 September 2017 (Musing #434)

Which of those projects got done.

Making bad choices, small and large (Musing #436)

Helping students rather than writing stuff. Is that really such a bad choice?

Making bad choices, or perhaps good choices (Musing #437)

Getting sleep rather than doing work. Is that really such a bad choice?

Planning ahead (Musing #440)

Avoiding my current situation.

Where have you been? (Musing #446)

Behind.

Recovering from Tapia 2017 (Musing #452)

Putting myself more behind.

Fall break (Musing #456)

Break is a time to overcommit, or to clean up from overcommitment, or both, or something like that.

Fall broken (Musing #467)

The results of break.

What are you doing during winter break? (Musing #498)

Too many plans.

Another taskcade (Musing #502)

One in a series.

Prioritizing what’s left of winter break (Musing #508)

An update on musing #498.

One hour (Musing #521)

Work I might do if I had an extra one.

Logging my time (Musing #531)

Where does the time go?

Friday nights (Musing #535)

They provide less time for work than I need.

On being a workaholic (Musing #536)

Work the AP reading or take a cruise? The answer should be obvious.

When work and family conflict (Musing #537)

What happens when work obligations and family obligations conflict? The answer should be obvious.

Logging my time (Week three of Spring Semester 2018) (Musing #539)

Learning too much about my (bad) work habits.

Logging my time (Week four of Spring Semester 2018) (Musing #546)

Getting better, I think.

Grading (Musing #557)

More on being a workaholic.

Logging my time (Week six of Spring Semester 2018) (Musing #559)

Getting sick.

Logging my time (Week seven of Spring Semester 2018) (Musing #566)

Getting better again.

Planning for spring break 2018 (Musing #569)

Sixteen days of spring break. Nearly thirty days of work. The numbers don’t work.

Logging my time (Week eight of Spring Semester 2018) (Musing #574)

A reasonable week, for the first time all semester!

Making more work for myself (Musing #580)

Or maybe not.

My advisory board (Musing #582)

Getting help with my tendency toward overcommitment.

Reflections on spring break 2018 (Musing #588)

What got done during the sixteen days of spring break and what I learned from paying attention.

Facebook reminders (Musing #590)

Remembering bad decisions.

Unproductive (Musing #615)

An apt description for this weekend.

Just another summer weekend (Musing #685)

Perhaps not quite as busy as my academic-year weekends.

Reflections on just another summer weekend (Musing #690)

How it really turned out.

A draft of my 2019-2020 sabbatical proposal (Musing #727)

Planning too many activities for the next year.

Meta-reviewing (Musing #760)

Yet another professional activity that doesn’t relate to my fellowship.

Looking ahead to summer 2019 (Musing #774)

After eight consecutive summers with students, it’s time for a different model.

Preregistration appointments (Musing #810)

Talking to students.

SIGCSE mailing-list workflows (Musing #812)

Some of my many activities.

Preparing camera-ready copy for SIGCSE 2019 (Musing #826)

About three days of work.

Plans for SIGCSE 2019 (Musing #832)

More precisely, too many plans.

This year’s sabbatical (Musing #886)

Projects big and small.

Too many opportunities (Musing #920)

I’m glad I don’t have to choose.

Conducting a salary review (Musing #954)

More work than I anticipated.

Preparing for the onslaught of the semester (Musing #986)

I’m on sabbatical; things are supposed to be easier than this.

Ways to say No (Musing #994)

The problem is all inside my head, I said to me.

Too much to do (Musing #997)

What else is new?

Summer MAP/MIP proposals (Musing #1011)

So much yet so little.

A draft sabbatical report (Musing #1100)

A bit late.

Surviving Fall Term Two (Musing #1113)

Among the many reasons I wasn’t musing.

Plans for Winter Break (Musing #1115)

A lot to do; hopefully not too much.

Some of SamR’s stuff to do (Musing #1156)

Not too much!

Back of the (virtual) envelope calculations (Musing #1170)

Running the numbers.

So many research papers to assess! (Musing #1258)

Doing the math

Experiments in portfolio mastery grading (Musing #1261)

A good idea that needs some work.

Distractable (Musing #1269)

One of the causes of overcommitment. Perhaps a symptom.

Overcommitted again, naturally (Musing #1272)

I’m hopeless.

Writing a lab (Musing #1274)

One of the many places my time goes.

Writing assignments (Musing #1277)

Another place my time goes.