Tag Archives: PhD

Sheffield conference fail (Rousse)

Posted on March 4, 2015 by Dreamaticus

The conference was an excruciating experience. We had travelled to Sheffield with such high hopes, but here we were stuck towards the back of the lecture hall appalled at the poor standard of presentation. Even the supposed ‘big names’ failed … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged appalled, comedy, conference, consumption, costume, costumes, cringe, deliver, drug, embarrassment, fail, hall, hopes, leave, lecture, names, PhD, presentation, pun, puns, recreation, Sheffield, standard, student, students | Leave a comment

Husband’s mystery trips to Manchester while wife heads north to Inverness by foot (Rousse)

Posted on February 17, 2015 by Dreamaticus

The day that I made the round trip by car to Manchester to fix JC’s blinds I discovered that TPR had made the same trip the day before and had another planned for the next. He claimed that these visits … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged ancient, assent, blinds, bus shelter, candidate, candidates, car, civil, coach, colleague, colleagues, culvert, culverts, dangerous, decrepit, doctoral, documentation, embankment, embankments, engineering, examiner, examiners, field, foot, formal, haunted, husband, Inverness, Jim, journey, Manchester, MIles, mystery, north, Perth, PhD, Pitlochry, practice, railway, request, skills, student, students, studies, study, trip, trips, tunnels, Victorian, visit, visits, wife | Leave a comment

A night in the VIP suite at China White (Rousse)

Posted on February 16, 2015 by Dreamaticus

TPR was offered the post of Reader in Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh, even without a PhD. I considered this rather odd, but it was his industry expertise that was sought. In the meantime he had to complete … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged afford, blow, China White, computer science, Edinburgh University, exercise science, experience, grant, highlands, HNC, industry, London, minibus, mutter, night, PhD, reader, student, suite, TPR, trip, University of Edinburgh, VIP, weekend | Leave a comment

Rogue primary school teacher gives up ‘research fellow’ disguise (Rousse)

Posted on December 30, 2014 by Dreamaticus

My immediate thought on waking in my office was whether or not I had any clothes to change into from my red fleece pyjamas. What I thought was a pair of black and white spotted knickers on a bookshelf turned … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged bookshelf, chat, clothes, colleagues, corridor, desk, fellow, fleece, knickers, mark, navy leggings, office, pair, PhD, primary, pyjamas, red, research, rigue, room. private, school, spotted, students, thesis, tutorial | Leave a comment

Cheese throwing with Billy Connolly (Rousse)

Posted on October 25, 2014 by Dreamaticus

Although the purpose of the exercise was unclear, I enjoyed an afternoon of ‘cheese chucking’ with Billy Connolly and BP. The concept was simple. All you had to do was throw lumps of cheese up onto a high shelf. I … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Billy Connolly, breeze block, brick, cellophane, cheddar, cheese, chuck, chucking, lift, lumps, PhD, poverty, propel, Reading, shelf, thesis, throw, throwing, viva | Leave a comment

A party castle and six in a bed (Rousse)

Posted on October 2, 2014 by Dreamaticus

We’d been sharing our big double bed with four PhD students for some time when one day I found a gift bag on my pillow. Inside there was a bottle of wine and a card. The present was from F’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged bag, bed, Borders, camera, card, castle, climb, countryside, double, gift, guests, house, invitation, news, notch, notches, party, Pentlands, PhD, pillow, present, research, route, single, six, spiral, staircase, students, TPR, turret, wall, wine | Leave a comment

Post-PhD depression – Miss Haversham style (Rousse)

Posted on September 11, 2014 by Dreamaticus

She had been depressed for years and now we finally knew why. We found her in her usual spot in bed, cradling a large green cloth-bound book. It was all too apparent that she had never really recovered from the … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged book, career, depressed, depression, dissertation, dress, PhD, thesis, volume, wedding | Leave a comment

How to feed a baby pigeon and other vital advice (Rousse)

Posted on July 3, 2014 by Dreamaticus

I kept a baby pigeon in a tiny cage in the corner of my granny’s kitchen. I regretted my decision to store his favourite food (fresh broccoli) with the coal in the bucket next to the back door. The coal … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged acquisitions, advice. broccoli, anxiety, baby, back, bird, book, books, boss, bucket, business, cage. tiny, Carl Newton, class, coal, coffee, copy, corner, door, dust, enemy, evil, Facebook, favourite, feed, food, fresh, grain, granny, green, hands, house, invoice, iPad, kitchen, library, little, man, mice, mouse, office, pet, PhD, pigeon, refund, rodent, rodents, sprig, staff, supply, textbook, textbooks, title, town, TPR, university, vegetable, vital, worry | Leave a comment

Fake Kate’s fake PhD (Rousse)

Posted on June 14, 2014 by Dreamaticus

I could tell that the other holiday-makers thought that ECM was a bit of a pest. She was running from couple to couple thrusting her business card into the hands of anyone daft enough to take it. I couldn’t tell … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged business, card, daft, doctorate, fake, hands, holiday, Kate, name, pest couple, PhD, publication, service, thrust | Leave a comment

A poor choice of PhD examiner (Rousse)

Posted on June 11, 2014 by Dreamaticus

The second external examiner was a tall, blonde, bitchy New Zealander who arrived very late and immediately laid into the bewildered candidate. This was not going to be an easy PhD viva.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged bewildered, bitchy, blonde, candidate, choice, defence, defense, examiner, external, late, New Zealand, PhD, poor, tall, viva | Leave a comment