Procrastination or Inspiration?

I have never been one for oral presentations, and so it is normal that i am stressed about delivering the state of my current research. In this light, while i should be dotting i's and crossing t's, i have been thinking about my research overall - the virtual book in my mind that all these paths of interest will someday converge.

For the last year, i have tried to make sure that all of my university classes spoke to my interest in video game theory/studies. In some way, shape, or form i have managed to make classes such as sociology of occupations, or social change, speak to this interest. Even within my contemporary social theory course i managed to sneak in a paper on Rational Choice Theory and Everquest guilds.

But it has come to a point where, as a current prof and potential mentor has put it, i am flirting with academic ethical issues of using one paper to serve another (as in all works being part of the same topic or take off points). In theory, this isnt a problem if the boundaries and issues dealt with in one paper are clearly seperated from one another. And so here my problem lies.

Over this past year, each paper topic has rolled out of another as my interest snowballed... but unlike the snowball analogy - which would usually signify something growing larger and larger, i have been suffering from a case of tunnel vision, trying to define each term, each idea, that i have not been able to actually step back and look at the big picture.

So

After a productive discussion with my professor, i think i see the light. A way to seperate the three conflicting papers - and work them so that they are still useable in a larger context.
Literature Review for 498 - Which will allow me to paint a broad picture of the literature within the field of video game studies; my work in progree for the [crosses my fingers] DiGRA conference, and a sociological look at the processes of identity creation (per differing perspectives) related to games that illustrate these processes. (thank you A. for clearing this up
and leading me in the right direction)

This brings me to procrastination...as i excitedly flesh out which theorists and games i would be interested in looking at, i have an unfinished presentation to clean up...