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You're a great writer. Hillarious. :) My post supervision trips to the bathroom to throw up are much less poetic :( argh. post supervision...



Urgh - I feel like my thesis is a work of historical fiction sometimes. sigh.

Here again finishing a chapter. Will try and conclude before bed. And do spellcheck before lunch tmrw.

My friends in London are all off work. Here in Manchester there is a few cm of snow: but there is a blizzard going strong right now!!!!! More snow!

Feels like my Scandinavian adopted homeland right now!:p

Congratulations!!!! :)

hello there misspacey!

Thanks *sips coffee*

Good luck with your reading. :-)

Quelle suprise! I'm back here again :$

Chapter due this week (well monday really, but it will have to be saturday...)


I'm trying to get this chapter right since a lot of the argument is quite fine. ack. So tired. Running a conference on Friday so hope I won't look too crap. Argh. I wish I could stay up until the wee hours and go into uni without people saying that I look soooo tired.

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I had a long and awkward (yet relieving) talk with my boyfriend about this issue recently. When I finish in the autumn/winter I will be moving away for work wherever I can get it. That's just the way it has to be. At 26, and with (I hope eventually!) a PhD I can't rely on us ever working in the same city. Perhaps something will work itself out long distance, but I am not so sure. Still bringing it up now means that the cards are on the table and it won't be a horrible shock in 8 months when I start applying for jobs all over the place.

I am in the third year and my relationship is suffering. They are a PhD student too. Everything is so confused and scary. Not a good place right now. Must concentrate on writing. :-(

I accept this call to arms with a mixture of trepidation and courage.

I want this PhD to be over and done to a good standard between Sept and Dec. I have circa 30,000 words so far - and by the end of the month will have about 45,000 altogether. After that I will have another chapter of 15,000 words, then my lengthy intro/conclusion/ epilogue/ and scene setting section.

I want a job and I want to relocate - and I want to change my complicated personal life. Finishing my PhD will bring me sanity so I can start the next stage in my life. So no more slacking and wasting time procrastinating. I am finishing my marking today. Then tomorrow I will start my next Chapter in earnest. Every time I waste time I am consciously think about how time wasting just traps me in a pretty unhappy place. I am divided between trying to apply for post-docs and academic posts in the South East. Or just moving to London when I finish and applying for musuem jobs or other posts. Eitherway I would like this PhD to end.

I consciously try and wear clothes with a sense of humour. Manga cartoon prints, primary colours. It makes me feel young, even if I am 26 this year. :$

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Thanks for you comments people! PamW - I've just resigned myself to the idea that our institution's undergraduates aren't as good as all the hype would say they are (or the university would like to think!).







Yes - you make a good point Heifer - I had always thought that because at GCSE and A Level/first year undergrad I was taught to remove politically problematic/ offensive language and terms from my writing that others would have done too. I guess it is a shock when you spend time with left wing friends and academics - and then mark some pretty conservative and ill thought out work!

That aside, there has been one essay that was fantastic and that kept me alive at 1am!

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I am currently marking thirty undergraduate essays and I am halfway through. I have already had to fail two people (one for sustained and extensive plagarism and the other for handing in a half finished essay) and I have only allocated one first so far. I have found some of their comments shocking - such vast generalisations, some deeply problematic classist language - plus the use of gendered language. I don't say this to be snotty and berate undergraduates at all in the pretense that my work is sooo much better - I just find it shocking and depressing. I had to explain in my notes to one student that the British Empire wasn't "glorious". It is taking over an hour per an essay because I don't feel like I can allow problematic comments and theoretically unaware slip-ups go unchecked. And then I worry about being too harsh and a pedant. But some of these comments demand a response.

I also feel angry that earlier markers haven't pointed out that they can't used language like this.

Does anybody else feel this way? :-(

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I am running a conference in Jan, handing in a chapter in Jan, giving a paper in Jan, and submitting to a journal in Jan - arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Merry Christmas.

Oh and lest I forget - c40 hours of marking to do for the course I have been ta-ing on. Argh. I'll need a weekend away in Feb.


I'll be taking work on the plane to my parents - and feeling guilty when I do 'owt at my boyfriends house on the 25th and 26th. :-(