PhD Corrections Countdown: 02 days to go

I’m a bit ill today, so I’m not going to write a lot. Was sick down the toilet and then slept until 1pm! Crap.

At least I finished my application for the MA in Translation today, by writing what they call ‘Statement of Purpose’. I do hope they’re going to give me a place. I still fear I may be too overqualified, in terms of – what does SHE want with another degree?

I’m going to send it off tomorrow. Fingers crossed. Hopefully I’ll know within 6 weeks.

PhD Corrections Countdown: 04 days to go

I’ve handed it in today, at approx. 3.30pm. I feel nothing at all.

I’ve asked them what the next steps are etc. to see when I’m going to receive my certificate and when I’ll have to hand in the hardback copies (I think two copies – one for their library and one to store somewhere – I’ll get three done so I have one for myself ).

The next steps, in chronological order, are roughly as follows:

• internal examiner checking my corrections (and hopefully greenlighting it!) –> 4-6 weeks, depending on how busy he is and how long it’s going to take him
• receipt of an official letter awarding me degree of PhD in teh post (some time – maybe a couple of weeks – after the above) –> that’s probably when I can actually start using my shiny new title
• request for hardbound copies of my thesis (probably in approx. 2 months from now)
• July 2007: summer graduation, i.e. official ceremony. I wonder if I have to wait until then to receive my official certificate… I guess that’ll be the case

I wonder how long I shall continue with this blog topic, Life after PhD. I want to change it soon. I think what I’m going to do is to continue with it until I receive the official letter in the post, i.e. once I’m officially a doctor.

I also started the ball rolling with regard to my application for hte Translation MA. I filled in everything apart from teh ‘Statement of Purpose’, and I’ve passed the reference sheets on to two people. I hope they’re going to offer me a place. The only reason why they wouldn’t is if they think I have enough degrees (3 degrees and another one that I didn’t  complete) and have wasted enough time at Universities!

I’ve been enrolled continually at a University (4 in total) since April 1995.

That’s 12 f***ing years.

No wonder I feel institutionalised. It’s the only way I know!

PhD Corrections Countdown: 05 days to go

No change on the submission front. I’ve already said I’m going to submit it tomorrow, so I’m keeping the countdown heading just so as to stick with it.

In other news, my mate Paul kind of f***ed up my G3 Mac. I had dropped it off at his flat on Tuesday, for him to try and see whether he can install a printer. When he disconnected and then reconnected the power lead, smoke started coming out of the power socket – so it seems the mains/power socket is now broken. I.e. I no longer have my Mac! He reckons the hard drive and memory etc. are still going to work fine, so I’ll just have to see if I can take that out and put it into another G3 [which I'll first have to get from somewhere..].

Finally, I learnt a new expression yesterday, which I’d never heard before. it is: ‘drink and dial‘. Urbandictionary defines it as follows:

The inevitable process of calling a romantic interest (girlfriend, boyfriend, etc) while intoxicated to confess random thoughts about absolutely nothing. Usually, you will sound very stupid and pathetic.

 

Friend1: Dude, I called Jessica and told her that I loved her.

Friend2: Are you drunk?

Friend1: Yeah.

Friend2: I told you not to Drink and Dial. Your such a fuckin idiot.

It’s quite neat I find. And quite true

PhD Corrections Countdown: 06 days to go

Nothing new on the PhD front today, really. I’m going to hand it in on Monday and, while at Uni in my office in peace and quiet, I’m also going to apply for this MA in Translation.

The annoying thing with these postgrad applications is that you need 2-3 references. It’s always irritated me a bit that, when applyign for a degree in the UK that you actually pay shitloads of money for, you have to apply for it as if it was a job! I.e. if I’m f***ing paying you, you better bloody take me on! References WTF!

I’m used to being judged on academic merit alone when applying for a degree in Germany, though I can’t quite remember whether we had to in fact ‘apply’ for it, i.e. submit an application. Maybe I just went there and enrolled… it’s a long time ago

So, I want to get this application over and done with before I go to London, which is next Friday (2nd March), so that, by the time I return (end of March), I’ll hopefully have a reply and decision whether or not they’ll offer me a place, upon which I can start applying for a career development loan – I just have to convince the guys at Barclays that (a) I need this MA in order to improve my chances of finding employment and (b) that I don’t have enough money to pay for it myself! I’ll be taking out the highest CDL they’re going to give me, as explained here it will give me a nice chunk of money to play with :

Even if you don’t need all the cash, get the biggest career development loan possible anyway. Take out the loan, plonk it in a high interest savings account (see ‘Where to Start with Savings’) – and you could sneakily make money from study.

 

Then repay as much you can (or all of it) at the end of your study, before any interest is charged, and move whatever debt remains to a cheaper personal loan. This way while you’re on the course you’ll be earning interest on the cash you’ve borrowed for free – on an £8,000 loan, over two years, you can reap £820 profit from the interest, a nice addition to your educational finances.

 

So, I’ll spend my last week in Edinburgh tying up a few loose ends, handing in my corrected thesis, and then I’m off for a bit.

Not for long though!

PhD Corrections Countdown: 07 days to go

going to D&J tonight. Will write when I return. I’m going to show them my (soft-bound) thesis as they feature in the acknowledgements

edit: and here is my thesis! on my Chesterfield.

PhD Corrections Countdown: 09 days to go

Yesterday’s entry was very short. Actually it’s nearly midnight so I’m going to upload now, and then edit

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God, this is turning into a habit.  I’ve actually been very busy all day yesterday, hence I had to edit the timestamp of yesterday’s blog post.

On topic: I did manage to complete my corrections yesterday, and I even went all the way to Uni to print it out . In the evening, I picked up an IKEA TV bench via Freecycle for a friend of mine and then dropped it off at his house.  So, I wasn’t in fact back here by midnight, hence the need to edit the timestamp.

The plan now is to take it to Edinburgh University for binding on Friday. If I drop it in in the morning then hopefully I could pick it up Monday. I’m not too fussed at the moment as to whether or not the corrections and amendments are good enough. They should be! If not, I’ll just correct the corrected version. I mean, what are they going to do?

Not award me the title?

I still haven’t had time to sit down and think, or relax, or take time off. The new project has begun, and my first report is due tomorrow. Plus, I have a little bit of translation to tidy up. Though I have finally been paid some money

I’ve also continued reading A.L. Kennedy’s Everything you Need. It’s alright, but a bit thick/too long. They should have edited it down a bit.  I’m thinking of joining Library Thing.

PhD Corrections Countdown: 10 days to go

It’s 00:22. I’m going to have to edit the time stamp.

For the first. time. ever.

PhD Corrections Countdown: 11 days to go

Today I’ve finished my Methodology section. I think I can make all my deadlines. I’m not sure about tomorrow though. Ideally, I’d like to get it all done by tomorrow PM but I may be meeting Paul to do with my Apple. We’ll see

I also wanted to provide a link to a video supposedly explaining what ‘web 2.0′ is. I haven’t watched it myself (yet), but anaj blogged about it and it also landed in my inbox yesterday from a group I’m a member of. Here it is.

edit: that film is pretty anthropocentric. ‘we teach the machine’ – lmfao.

PhD Corrections Countdown: 12 days to go

will post later, probably even after midnight!! just putting it up now so that it appears with today’s date

very busy at work just now

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back

Got on quite well with my PhD Corrections today. All that’s left now is to proofread the Methodology chapter, and afterwards proof-read all the new sections that I’ve written (am I repeating myself ? )

On a different note, I’ve just joined Snapfish as they have an offer for 20 free prints at the moment. I need to get back into having some nice prints of my photos as I haven’t had a photo album in 7 years or so! I think I’m going to choose 10-14 good shots of landscapes etc. that I’ve taken, and the rest a couple of photos with friends, and then some of my BF and I

Tomorrow a new freelance project starts, and I’m going to have to try and finish my PhD corrections by Thursday the latest. I’m planning to print it out at Uni on Friday, so it’s not all left to the last minute… ideally, I want to submit it next Wednesday (28th). So, I’ll give it to the University of Edinburgh’s library for binding on Monday 26th – Fingers crossed!

PhD Corrections Countdown: 13 days to go

I finished rewriting my introduction today! Great

All that remains now is proofreading various chapters, and then re-reading all new sections. It’s great to finally be nearing the end of a long, long journey. I’m still subscribed to job emails from jobs.ac.uk – each Saturday I get an email with the lastest jobs from various categories, one of which is Media, TV, Journalism. Today it contained a job that, only 6 months or so ago, I would definitely have been interested in! Namely, a position of New Media Research Fellow, at the University of East London.

I got a little bit excited at first, seeing that the job description was to a large degree my area of expertise. However, I just can’t imagine myself continuing with research. I was very keen on it for ages, and I saw myself as New Media postdoc working at some University. I don’t know what has changed, or why it’s changed. Maybe academic work is simply not ‘rewarding’ enough. I mean it can be, or rather, it used to be mentally stimulating and exciting, but the problem is that I’m no longer intellectually excited and excitable to that extent.

It’s as if, now that I’ve sucked up theories for over 10 years (Poststructuralism, Postmodernism, Feminist and Gender Theory, Structuralism, Discourse Analysis, Cultural Studies, Media Theory, Literary Theory, blah blah blah) and built my own theory out of my favourite bits, I’m no longer driven by teh same questions. Academic inquiry and intellectual curiousity was for me driven largely by a desire and a need to structure and understand the world. Whenever I read a ‘new’ academic journals or books these days, it’s largely stuff I already know. Since that’s the case, what’s the point in cooking up the same thing only in different forms?

I’d rather do something new.

I have to admit that I still like to read accurate little pieces of academic thought, even those deploying familiar theories. Check out for example the well-observed reading of Tony Blair v. Robbie Williams, by the – always reliably good – k-punk and his or her latest blog entry, Postmodernism as Pathology, Part II.

I thinkI’ll continue reading stuff like k-punk’s, even after my PhD, and similarly good punk intellectual blogs. A great combination: punk! brains! blog!

“I’M A PUNK, I’M AN ACTUAL PUNK”*

*Gordon from Leith on Thursday morning approx. 2AM