Helen Chick
I’ve been working on writing a research paper with my friend and colleague Robyn. I think we’ve finished it about 4 or 5 times so far … only it still isn’t done. The old cliche* about the last 5% of a job taking 95% of the time is all too frequently and frustratingly true! What’s worse, is that we know that once WE are done with it, we’ll submit it to some journal and then the reviewers will tell us to fix this, that AND the other (or just outright reject it!). Sigh!
* Hmmm … apparently it’s so old and cliched that I can’t remember exactly how it goes, and googling hasn’t helped. Time-consuming trivia kills you not only when it’s real work, but also when you’re allowing yourself to get distracted!
I believe I have experienced that phenomenon. Good luck!
Perhaps try Googling for “95/5 rule”. It doesn’t give one specific explanation, but has many references that have variations on that, as well as the very similar “80/20 rule” :-)!