if you can afford it I would definitely recommend one of these oil free ones http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/4152239/Trail/searchtext%3EOIL+FREE.htm

I know the rental place should do it all for you but if you're cold, you're cold! We bought one alst year (during that really really bad snow and ice) when our heating broke, I was sceptical, having had oil radiators that aren't that warm, but it really warmed up a room within about 5 mins and was really toasty.

You could always sell it on after?

Hey Wal, how about "I made mistakes such as ...mumble mumble mumble...but in general its fantastic and everyone will want to read it, I've already had 3 million hits on my youtube thesis video (the one where I slowly turn the pages allowing people to read it) so please please please pass me with no amendments and then offer me a job"

no heating is rubbish batfink - does your mum/dad know anything about plumbing? Obviously its not their job, but my parents are forever sorting leaks etc out in my house while I stand in the corner saying "I could call a man in" which my mum hates lol.

I'd be very tempted to ask for some of your rent back, to pay for stand alone heating. the HSE have guidelines on providing heating for tennants I think.

======= Date Modified 18 Nov 2010 13:36:54 =======
Thanks Natassia, I'll play around with Mendeley tonight.

I think the lumie clock is great, we usually set the (old) alarm for 6am, but have found that we set it (the lumie) for 6.10 otherwise we were up too early. I've set the (old) alarm anyway just in case, but not had to use it yet - I'm up about 1 min before it (the old alarm) goes off, its quite bizarre!

Hubby's not sure about it, he thinks he wakes too early with it (he means about 5 mins before the alarm would go off)

ah, heating :-)

I have the heating on, but my feet clearly haven't had the memo.

I've got gas men digging up the road outside and its set off all the car alarms in my street!

Have done no work this morning due to being rubbish and dodgy external hard drive not working.

see I guess I'd have to have some sort of online thing, so we could both access the database and use it from different sites.

I am working on a piece of work with my supervisor. She has asked me to get her references ready for a journal publication. At the moment, she does it all by hand.

I suggested using endnote - as that is what I use. But the uni only supports refworks and after a quick look it seems weird and not as good as endnote.

But I need a programme we can both use and as she doesn't have endnote, I can't really use it.

It has to be a VERY simple programme (think your great great grandad could use it) but also be able to have all the journal formats in, like endnote does as output styles e.g. select output style 'journal of postgraduate forum'

any ideas?

stuart should have gone last night IMO, he clearly pretended to learn stuff about not being too pushy or a complete arse over the last few weeks, but was actually just not doing anything. Although I'm very tempted to adopt his team meating strategy with my supervisor "do you think I should write this chapter now, come on come on, decide, a decision has to be made, right I'm making the decision, its not going to be written"

======= Date Modified 18 Nov 2010 09:31:59 =======
I've been quite suspicious over the whole thing, I'm assuming some news story has been slipped out underneath it all that's something like "government decides to carry out random shootings to reduce population". I wouldn't be surprised if at least, they've been planning this for several years and waiting until it looks like a horrible winter, with no money to suddenly say "but yay, we have a wedding" to supposedly boost us all.

I too fear the constant drivel of James Whittacker - he is a complete moron who is clearly not liked by any of the royals, but persists on hanging around the outer circles like that unpopular but desparate kid in school who learns all the school gossip off facebook, but then recites it as if he were there.

The way I see it, if we're paying for it all, we should get to do phone voting (free of course) to decide details about the wedding, perhaps even choose another bride? and the dress, the venue etc etc.

And most shocking of all, she's from trade!!!! :p

Right, I'm doing RA work again today, so my first goal it work out which data set to use and start adding the latest data to it.

That email I sent yesterday - was a bit weird in the end. Basically this person asked me to do some work. This person knows my sup very well. But my sup said I shouldn't do it as am so busy at the mo (and apparently this other person likes to take advantage if you let them). So I wrote a polite email saying that I was so busy and that sup wouldn't want me taking on extra work. At which point, I get a reply that says basically, "that's a shame becasue i was sorting out a contract for you for another matter" so I'm thinking, "oh no, i've lost out on a job opportunity!" But when I thought about it, I've only met them once for about 30 mins. They have NO idea if I'm employed, or what kind of work I'm looking for, or that I can do, whether I even want a job, and how much pay I'll be expecting, so all in all I'm inclined to think of it as a catty comment designed to make me feel rubbish. Any thoughts?

1k is not bad at all! Congrats!

I've just had to send one of those horrible emails - I initially agreed to do some work, but have since got really busy and have had to turn it down (its work for a prof) so I feel a bit embarrassed, but my sup knows the prof and will kill me if she finds out I've taken it on!

I'm finding it very ahrd to keep the temp up in my office ,I have 2 cats and a dog, the door closed and slippers on etc. but the heat keeps dropping (even with the heating on!)

you can easily do it with a digitical dictaphone or if you're by your PC you can plug a mike in and record it - I'm sure a range of programmes do this. You could also use your iphone if you have one.

ok, breathe, its fine. Go back to the basic bullet point list of sections you need to have written and aim to do one of them by the end of the day. You can do this, otherwise you wouldn't be here.

My mum has a greate phrase for when I'm feeling like this... "bigger fools than me have done this" i.e. other people have managed to do this who are half as intelligent than I am, so I MUST be able to do it :-)

======= Date Modified 17 Nov 2010 10:45:01 =======
sounds like a nightmare, there's a new PhD girl in my office and she will not shut up. YOu daren't mention anything to any of the other people in there (most of them are actually postdocs so don't want to be disturbed) because she'll jump on it and run with an entire conversation. e.g. Me: "the printer's out of toner, is it xxx we go to for those?" Her: "I had a printer once, it was really funny because......." ARGH!


Have you got your heating sorted yet?

well I went on a course last week but obviously that only introduces SEM - I should probably go on another course to get the more advanced stuff but have not got the time or money to do so.

I start a new job today - my supervisor is getting me to do RA work 3 days a week. I stupidly thought 'its probably realistically only 2 days work, so I can get paid to do my PhD on the 3rd day' she's just emailed me a list of work she wants me doing from today until friday. IT IS NOT 2 days, more like 6 weeks worth of work in 3 days ARGH!

So no PhD work for me today. :-(

Hubs is also trying to get an applicatoin form ready for promotion boards, and he's getting me to do most of it, so also have to find time to work on that before tonight, as it needs to be handed in for tomorrow. STRESSFUL!

As it was 8 years ago, you've got some experience,I wouldn't hide the MSc. MScs are often marked differently -when I did mine it was fail, pass or distinction, no merit. So a 'pass' could be interpreted as a high merit lol. no one would know! And it is experience, did you do ok on your research project (if you had one)?