Finally submitted something for publication 10/23/11

Yay! I have finally submitted something for publication which if it is accepted will be my Master's thsis! I feel like I want to do a little dance but at the same time my heart is racing like crazy, nervous about the process. For those of you non-masochist who didn't go to graduate school let me explain the publication deal. Basically you need to get as many pubs as you can possibly get. The averages do vary depending on what you are do. For example, I have one friend that does neuro behavioral stuff with rats which is going to take her about 3 years to get that one study completed while I have another friend who collects all of her data online so she gets about a half dozen studies complete a year (yes she is also a super over achiever). For me there is no reason that I should be getting at least 1 pub a year, but because I tend to get distracted playing in the numbers it has taken me just over 2 years to submit my first paper. One of the cool things is that I am first author on it! Back to the submission process. Usually the study write-up is submitted to a peer reviewed journal. Then if the journal editors think the paper might be a good fit for that journal they send it out to volunteer reviewers, then you wait. And wait. And wait. The journal this paper is submitted to says I will hear back in 60 to 90 days although they told my co-author they give their reviewers 45 days. Once a decision has been made a letter is sent back to the author saying whether it was 'accepted, accepted pending revisions, rejected strongly encouraged to resubmit, rejected still accepting revisions, rejected please don't resubmit' with comments from the reviewers. I don't know that much about this particular journal that I submitted to but most journals don't give out many accepted or even accepted pending revisions. So I am hoping for a rejected strongly encouraged to resubmit pending revisions, and reviewer comments that are constructive. So please keep your fingers crossed for me for the next 45 to 90 days. ;)