I tried to sleep, but couldn't. I'm really tired, but I have an interview tomorrow which I need to prepare for. I think I'm going to be far to tired to inteview well.


I've got an awful lot to fit into the month that's allowed for corrections.

Congratulations, Flossie!

Well done on getting through your Viva! The more PhD students I talk to, the more finishing starts to seem like a bit of a long, drawn out, slightly anticlimatic experience. I guess it'll all feel a bit more celebratory when you finally get to prance about in silly robes at graduation.

Give yourself a couple of days to breathe, and then crack on with the corrections? The exhaustion and feeling low will partly be down to to the sudden relief of having it all over and done with, and coming down off adrenaline.

Perhaps your new theme will be more inspiring after a few days to reflect. It can be difficult to immediate accept feedback on your work, but you may find it gives you all sorts of new insights into your material that enthuses you to look back on it again. If that's even possible after all the years!

Busy months are good. The more you try to get done, the more you do get done. Just make sure you also slot in time for relaxing and fun; because you're definitely overdue it by now!

Well done Flossie

Congratulations Flossie! (Can't ever imagine getting there myself!)

In my experience it took weeks to sink in that I had a PhD - the viva was a bit of an anticlimax, albeit an anti climax followed by a major party!



Well done!

A party that you have any memories from?

congratulations flossie

(sorry I seem to be late by a few days.......only just noticed the post)

A few - I used to know your suprevisor in those days althouigh he wasn't there that night!

What a shame, I was hoping for some good gossip!

You have a PM!

Where is everyone?

I haven't done anything in about a week

I've spent a lot of money on an aeromaplane and hotel this morning and need to work out how the expenses claim forms work presently.

Sorry have just only spotted this thread.

CONGRATULATIONS DR FLOSSIE Many congratulations on getting your PhD. I hope the corrections are going ok.

I got my PhD in 2008 and I still can't get used to it I completely agree that it is a complete anticlimax, I expected a marching band, fanfare, fireworks, slap up meal, major party and a huge banner with I am a Dr on it. All I got was a cup of tea.

I haven't got it yet. You can be failed on corrections....

I feel like I'm banging my head against a brick wall.

I really, really, really want the job I was interviewed for yesterday. I hate this waiting to hear business.

What's it for? How did the interview go?

I haven't done anything constructive in weeks.

It was for a RA post. I really enjoyed the interview, it's a really interesting project with lots of potential for future work and I'm confident that I'd be happy spending the next 4 years of my life working on that project with the people who interviewed me. I'm trying not to build my hopes up too far though. I hope I don't end up as 2nd choice again - that seems to be my speciality at the moment.

You sound like you need to have a bit of a break and then come back to your stuff with fresh eyes.

I've pretty much had a break for a few weeks while I've been watching daytime TV!

I have no motivation to get this finished at all - why did I do it in the first place?

I was like this for quite a while with mine, at around the same stage in the writing process. Once the 'I haven't got long left to finish this thing' panic set in things suddenly speeded up.

Good Luck for the job. Did they let you know when they would let you know? (that sentence sounds entirely odd! )

They said that it wouldn't be until later in the week.

Well, at least it's Thursday today

I have a missed call on my phone, but no answerphone message.

Eek, that's annoying. I take it it's from a witheld number?

No. It's from the correct dialling code, but the next bit isn't the same as the usual numbers for the uni in question (they are normally 222 and it's 245). I don't think I'm feeling brave enough to ring the number back.

Oh. Hmmm that's odd.

Is is at the same uni you're at now?

I had a 'Notification of the Outcome of Your Application' email from the uni in question earlier this afternoon, which started "I write with reference to the interview you attended recently for the above post and regret to inform you that your application has been unsuccessful on this occasion" but I realised after a moment that this was referring to a job I was interviewed for last month as it had the ref no and title for that job...

That's just a bit nerve-wracking

Slightly freaky timing as well.

Whoever it was hasn't rung back yet, so if it was the uni it is most likely to be a 'no'.

Good luck and fingers crossed - that all sounds very nerve wracking!



m reading this from an internet cafe in Holland whilst en route to FEPS in copenhagen (Sleeper train tomorrow night).



BB2 - might see your suprevisor!!

thanks StuMac. I don't think I've got the job, because I'm pretty sure I would have heard by now if I had.

It's really disheartening because even for short term posts (e.g. 6-8 month ones) I'm interviewing against people with a number of years post-doc experience, experience of working on major international projects, track record of securing research funding etc, and they always get the jobs. I keep getting told that I interviewed well etc, but that the person they've appointed has more experience etc, etc. In my subject you can't get this kind of experience without a job, you can't do funding applications without a job, etc.... I have 5 publications which are already out (including pieces in high profile international journals, and all bar one of my publications are single author) which is well above the norm for someone who's just at the end of their PhD (or at least it's above average for my subject) and yet I also don't have enough publications.

This is what worries me and so far has stopped me from applying for anything.

I don't want to try and then get disheartened by being rejected everywhere. I'm worried about being up against those who have several first-author publications and have presented at internation conferences....

To be honest I think you're being a bit hard.



I've been doing academic reasearch for a long time now and have supervised 12 theses and well over 15 post docs/ RAs, and I work in place with a pretty good reputation reputation, and yet most of us strugle to see decent applicants. (Being discrete here but most people know the institution I'm referring to).



Yes the real top notch people get good applicants from all over the world, but most of us see CVs like that pretty rarely.

I see. I guess I don't really know what to expect and I won't really find out til I actually try. I can only compare myself to those that have done their PhDs along side me for the past few years (and they're all better than me!)

A lot of people who do not very good PhDs turn out to be very good post docs. You can learn a lot from a difficult degree, and if you then start again on a new problem, the experience of spending three years struggling to get data against all odd really pays big dividends and the next project you're involved in flies.



Then theer are students who do PhDs invery high profile labs - the project was completely mapped out by someone with huge funding and can run a lab with very high levels of technical suport. Some of these students never struggle because technicians look after almost every critical aspect of their work. They end up with good PhDs, loads of papers and turn out to be useless the first time their cells die on them.



PhD is not a graded degree - and my advise to anyone who's struggling is just to get over the hurdle and, once you've done that, put Dr in front of your name and put the experience behind you and move on to something else.



You'll be astounded what a difference a new start can make.

That makes me feel a lot better, thank you

I think I need a new challenge

How formal are people normally at conferences? (Clothes wise)

When I went, not very. However, I didn't present.

Depends on the subject and the conference. In my subject things are pretty informal, but I know that isn't necessarily the case in all subjects. Ask your supervisor.

My experience is that the younger/less experienced researchers tend to be more formally dressed than the more senior ones.

I have a job offer. It's not the job I was talking about last week which I really wanted. To be honest the project sounds really boring and there'd be an awful lot of travelling (and it's part-time). I'm not sure whether to say 'yes' on the basis that it's a job or whether I really don't want to spend the next part of my life doing it.

Congratulations on getting an offer. Have a good think about the circumstances, and do what's best for you.

What Barry said

Congrats on the offer, even if it's something you don't really want How long is it for? Would you gain lots of experience from it even if it's not exactly what you want to do? Is is really going to be that boring?

Entertainingly we now have a rope hanging from a girder in our room should things get too bad. (It has a temp/humidity sensor dangling from it as someone is monitoring the building for a year and originally they put their sensor about six inches away from where I put my tea).

Less entertainingly, has anyone used Markov or artificial neural networks? If so can you point me at a comprehensible explanation and demonstration of how data is meant to be used by them.

I turned it down. I know that probably sounds crazy in the current job market, but it would have been 2 years of doing something that I really didn't want to do and I would have had to have the rest of my life centre around it (no music lessons, no orchestra, no music group, no social life). 1 year might have been okay, but 2 years is a long time to be doing something you hate. It wasn't the kind of job where you could really quit part-way through. Saying 'no' feels like a massive relief, and I've been wanting to dance and sing round the room since, so I definitely think I've made the right decision.

Please, please can one of my other applications end up as a job....

Glad you've made your decision. I bet you feel relieved having done that.



Fingers crossed Flossie

Out of interest, what subject/topic were/are your PhDs on?