Tomorrow (Monday April 25, 2011) begins the two week march to the official end of the semester for us here at Purdue. I am anxious for the semester to end, but also pensive about the summer, as I have lots of things to accomplish.

This summer, I will begin working on my Prelims which will allow me to move into Dissertation and Candacy mode for graduation. I have three written prelims and one oral prelim. Once all four are completed, I then have to have two semesters of dissertation credit before I can defend my dissertation and apply for graduation. So if I complete all four by the end of the summer, I can graduate in August 2012; however, if I finish all four by the end of fall term, I am eligible to graduate by December of 2012 and so on.

On the work front, I feel like I am doing well. I have been getting trained in a new department, but I think I did something wrong on Friday night, as my back has been killing me since Saturday morning. It is so bad, I can hardly walk or raise my arms much higher than chest level. Thank goodness I have text to speech on my computers or I would not be able to get anything completed.

If all calculations go as planned, I will end the semester with a 4.0 GPA.