It's 2 a.m. - do you know where your articles are?

After a week of craziness (well, really, a month of craziness, I suppose), I'm back home with my family for a little break before wandering southward to spend some much needed time with my Sweetie for the summer. Happily or sadly, depending on how you look at it, there really hasn't been a lot to report recently. Work moves at a snail's pass, and the end of semester has finally come and gone with nary a whimper from me or my students. While I have no delusions about not needing to work rather a lot this summer, I am looking forward to some small breaks and maybe taking it a bit easier than I have been for the last little while.

However, I find myself facing a kind of funny situation (weird funny, not so much ha-ha funny). I'm tired of work, and I know that I do need a break. But, now that the pressure's off (well, somewhat off, although not really...more just on very temporary mental trickery kind of hiatus) I find myself inspired to work. But not normal work through the day and have the evenings off kind of inspired. This kind of inspired is frantic at two a.m. inspired. Thus far, it has involved the download of new idea-mapping programs and virtual notecards, the seeking of articles in enormous databases, the filing of data into reference management programs, the reading of theoretial articles in place of the new Jamie Oliver cookbook, and all kinds of other apparently very important tasks that consume me late into the night.

I don't know that I'm complaining, per se. Really, anything that gets me a bit closer to getting the dissertation done, or even a bit closer to just being able to get the dissertation done is fantastic in my books. But I'm hopeful that inspiration doesn't keep hitting so late. This two a.m. thing? It's a wee bit tiring, and doesn't seem to lend itself well to quality work. But, for now, I'll take what I can get.