Monday: Today I worked at my job, 7am-3:30pm. It was honestly very draining today. I did not work on anything lab or coding related today. My sister and her family came over, and so I decided to just enjoy the rest of the day with them (:

Tuesday: Today I attended the “Poster Design” seminar. I actually really liked it. Dr. Anneli Joplin gave very good points on how to design our poster for the symposium. Afterwards, I had a quick zoom meeting with my mentor, who is currently at a conference in Florida. I headed to the library for about 3 hours and worked on explaining what each line of coding means. I had started on it at the beginning of week 6, but lost track of it. It wasn’t as hard as I thought. The only issues were explaining the most complex coding.

Wednesday: Today is the most productive I’ve been since week 3. I have been feeling very down since after my trip to Washington D.C. I honestly don’t want to go too deep in my personal life and mental health, but when things get too complicated and I don’t like it, I tend to shut down for a few weeks. Not just in school, but life in general. After week 3, I would work on my coding, but it wouldn’t be as fun as it was in the beginning. I’m not sure why this happens, but it does bother me.

But today, I prayed in the morning and everything has been going well ever since. I felt happy and content with the work I have done. I refreshed my memory by watching 2 for loops videos (even learned about while loops!).  I edited my abstract and sent it to my mentor. Then I finally finished explaining what each line of coding means (feels like I’ve been working on it since forever).

I gave myself a pat in the back and finished at 7pm (worked since 10am). I took my scooter and roamed around campus. Took a ton of solo pictures and went to the Rice Stadium to re-live memories from my last marching band competition in 2017 (senior year of high school). It was a beautiful day, and I enjoyed it.

Thursday: Today I re-edited my abstract. I received an email stating that the abstract has a limit of 1200 characters, and that meant shrink it even more. I spent 3 hours working on the abstract yesterday, and today I spent another 2 trying to lessen the paragraph *cries internally*. My mentor is currently busy, so I won’t know when I’ll be getting feedback from him. Possibly by tomorrow evening. Afterwards, I began working on my poster. I had so much information, but I can only put very few points, making it very hard for my overcomplicated self.

Friday: Today, at 2am, my brain decided to figure out how I’m going to add what I learned from for loops into the data we have collected. I was stressing out a few hours prior, and it only got worse as I was about to sleep (the overthinking hits me a lot at night). As soon as I got the idea, I typed it down on my phone. I added the picture examples and explained everything so I wouldn’t forget. I felt confident and knocked out right away.

I worked at my job 7am-2pm. Around noon, I received feedback from my mentor. He changed a few words and moved a few sentences around. After my shift, I went home, showered, ate, and headed over to Rice. Since Matt is on his way back from Florida, I decided to ask Rachel for help on my poster. As of now, I have spent 4 hours on it. Rachel agreed on the fact that writing the abstract and creating a poster are very hard. I then worked on my abstract for about 30 minutes. I will leave Rice at 8:30 and plan to continue working on my poster until midnight (to complete the 8hrs for today).