Stumped

A week from tomorrow the clients from my favorite project will be here for two days for our every 6 months or so review. So here I sit, with every spare minute I have for the remainder of the week marked off my Outlook, pondering how to even start my presentation. My PM set aside 2 hours and 15 minutes for my presentation according to the newest agenda.

This morning after telecon he told me he wants me to include everything we have done on the project since it started. I laughed (we all laughed) and he said he wasn't joking. And to top it off he wants a poster made to hang on the wall detailing the major experiments with quick noted results and pictures. He wants all of it on Monday. It made me feel a little ill.

The task is seeming so incredibly monumentous right now that I can't even seem to start it. Yet, I also know if I don't, I am going to be so screwed and in front of my most favorite clients.

I can feel the stress, the increased heart rate, fingers that can fly on a keyboard but no idea which keys to fly to, a slight choke in my throat. All the while in the back of my head reminders that I have two other projects chomping for results for *their* review scheduled the first week in March.

This project is coming to an end. It was successful, the patent was filed, the technology is being transferred to the client's lab where it will hopefully propel them to stardom in the tech industry. In a little while, all that will remain of me on this project is my name on a patent that they licensed from my company in their file cabinet. In exchange I hope to be sitting on a nice mound of royalties that could be a downpayment on our next house. It is with joy, yet sadness, that I wrap up this project, present the final results next week, hang on for a few more months for consulting and then bid a fond farewell.

So now, to start from scratch with a nearly 3 year old lab book. Damn I wish my handwriting was neater.