I only got three hours of sleep last night due to a very long telephone conversation (it was worth it!) but oh man, the gravity of the situation is definitely sinking in right now! :eek: To put it mildly, I have to write an essay that is due this evening, and it just dawned on me that the essay is 30% of our grade, which means I need to do a bang-up job because I don’t want to risk failing the class by fudging up on a paper that turns out to be almost 1/3 of all the graded coursework in the class.
I’m trying to write an 8-page essay comparing and contrasting examples of philanthropy in the books Middlemarch and Bleak House. I read both books (a month ago) but didn’t think of the topic until recently, so now I’ll have to go back and look in the books’ tiny, tiny print to find page citations. I know its my own damn fault if this paper doesn’t go well, but god damn it, I still have five hours to work on it, so I’ll sure as hell give it my all! If anything sympathetic Dopers out there have any advice to offer me (aside from stating the obvious, like don’t procastinate ) about how to stretch this topic into 8 pages of cited, well thought doublespaced literary beauty I’d love to hear it.
Just two words. Font size, my boy, font size.
My kids always try to pull that one. Gee, the teacher will never figure it out, guys… :rolleyes:
Grab yourself a large pot of coffee. Espresso would be a good choice. Throw yourself into the subject and just do it. (And get off the sdmb!) There really isn’t too much more you can do, as I’m sure you already know. Yesterday I wrote an 800 word editorial on the funeral services for an 18 year old boy. After three hours of sleep and with a mangled, bleeding finger and my three year old destroying the house in the background. Sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do.
And stop checking back here for responses! You’ll get distracted and never get it done!
Advice? Sure. GET OFF THE MESSAGE BOARD AND START WRITING!!!
For what it’s worth (not much) really the largest font you can do without coming off like an ass is 11 in Times New Roman. Side margins can be set to 1.5" (default is 1.25") and the top and bottom to 1.25" (default is 1"). You can also set not double-spacing, but line spacing to “exactly” at “25 points”. Any more, and you’re really risking coming off like a doofus.
This might gain you three-quarters of a page on an 8 page paper.
I’m here to offer you sympathy not advice. OK, maybe just a bit of advice concernig the WhyNot’s post. I think you can get away with the font size 12, at least that was permited at our department AFAICR.
But back to sympathy (offering it and maybe getting some from other Dopers). I’ve been suffering from the lack of sleep the whole week, finishing off a translation of a book which was due 2 weeks ago. I sleep max 5 hours a day to get more work done, but feel exhausted so that my efficiency is rather lower than it would be if i slept 7-8 hours. Plus I’m substituting my friend who went to Belgrade for a couple of days to see Machine Head (luckily just a 1 1/2 hour lesson today) and tomorrow we perform our play twice in the morning plus I have my regular class in the evening.
So, Incubus, you’ll have to try harder to win the “time-missmanagement” award.
Just to update before I bury myself in this thing-
Tweaking font sizes and margins isn’t going to work. This is a professor who reads papers very carefully. Being short of 8 pages is not insta-failure, but he sets that length with the understanding a well-written essay will probably wind up being that long. Making it ‘look’ longer will not improve the content. If it is short, it better be a rock-solid paper.
I called in sick from two other classes, to give me more time to work on the paper. I have between now and 4:30 to work on it (The class isn’t until 7, but lucky me I have piano lessons on this very important day). Ironically, we were going to have a party in class, with booze and lots of food, but estimating the physical state I will be in at 7 PM this evening, I won’t really be in the mood for all the conviviality. I’ll just turn in my paper, ask the Professor what type of questions he will be asking on the Final, go home and SLEEP. Then tomorrow I can wake up and start studying for finals
Oh well…after this I will be finished with college. One more last-minute writing cram session won’t kill me…right?..RIGHT?! :eek:
Oh, good. I always hated the “X-number of pages” assignments. They’re so arbitrary. I writes lots o’ words. I could easily write 8 pages that say nothing at all. Conversely, some students (not many, but some) are nice and concise and get to the point and support it well by page 5. Why should they pad with crap and filler to meet a minimum page length requirement?
Unfortunately, it is much, much shorter than the suggested 8 page size. My brain is constipated; nothing else is going to come out. Really all I can do now is cross my fingers…As long as I get a ‘C’ things are ok.
) about how to stretch this topic into 8 pages of cited, well thought doublespaced literary beauty I’d love to hear it. 
