daily life of a pdh student

Can any one briefly write their daily activities (time table, if you will). I am curious about how daily life is for phd students. Like many hours you study, when exactly -- where, if you don't have an office (it seems like I won't get one on my first year or because I am an RA - I'm not sure). Studying in the library would suck - it'd be very nice to be able to leave you stuff behind when you're done working.

What do you do on weekends? Also, how do most phd students spend their summers -- the first summer in particular. Thanks.

Well I certainly won't be able to go into the depth and detail of others; however, I just started Monday and this was a breakdown of my week.

Monday: 9AM-10PM (meeting at 6).
Tuesday: 9AM-8PM.
Wednesday: 8AM-7PM
Thursday: 9AM-6PM
Friday: 9AM-5PM
Satuday: 10:30AM-5PM
Sunday: Relax and watching a full season of "Big Bang Theory."

I'm in a biochem lab so its a lot of hurry-up-and-wait type work. Set up some reactions or other procedures in the morning, look at recent stuff been done by others in the lab while the reactions are going, etc. I'm putting in as much time now as a I can so that I can get all the experience/knowledge/etc down while I have no classes or teaching.

I'm up there all day but have a lot of time where I'm eating or even goofing around on the computer. It isn't so much that I'm DOING something while I'm up there all the time. Rather, it would be pointless to leave for an hour and come back.

I'm glad I'm starting now so that I can not be AS overwhelmed once school starts in the fall.

Thanks applecat, but I was hoping more of a day's breakdown, not a weeks. But it's good to know that you're almost always working.

Sorry about that! I'll offer my daily breakdown in the summer if you'd like, but I'm betting youre more interested during the school year (I also would expect the days to be much different between my first summer and the summer of those in later years).

However, here is a daily breakdown.

7AM: Wake up, eat, shower, etc
8AM: Leave to school
830-9AM: Check emails of various sorts and review daily plans
9AM: Set up first reactions or check the previous nights finished product
10AM: Calculations, computer modeling,
11-1: Most variable part of day between lunch, finishing a reaction, setting up other projects or more computer time
1-5: Literature searching, reactions, learning about other related group-mates works, talking, etc.
5: Eat dinner
530: Set up any finals things for the day
Til leaving: Computer modeling, chat with others

Though I feel busy each day I've been in lab, the following breakdown makes me feel like I'm really not doing much at all! Ha. I suppose I'll keep that in mind this week and pay attention a little more closely to what I'm actually doing! Hope this helps just a bit.

This is my summer routine pretty much every day.

0600 : Wake up
0600 - 0730: Breakfast - potty etc.
0730: Drive to train station. Arrive in 10 minutes
0746: Train comes. Arrive Downtown Chicago at 0835.
0900: Arrive on UIC campus.
0930: Workday starts. Server Maintenance. Log checking. Take calls from users. Repair computers.
1230: Lunch
1300: Class starts, goes all the way until 1630.
1640: Back in office until 1745. (Or sometimes to the gym)
1745: Walk to train station.
1810: Train leaves. Arrive on the other side by 1915.
1930: Back Home for dinner.
2000: shower
2030: Homework, if any
2200: Daily Counter-Strike: Source / Team Fortress 2 session
2330: Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Thats less then 5 hours of sleep. Musn't we sleep for 8 hours to really have our brains working on full capacity.