Category Archives: work

is the PhD a ‘journey’?

Posted on March 23, 2015 by pat thomson

It’s not at all uncommon for doctoral researchers to think about the PhD as a journey. And they generally use the PhD-as-journey as more than a simple metaphor – it becomes a, even THE way of explaining to other people … Continue reading →

Posted in Hughes and Tight, journey, metaphor, PhD, thesis, work | Tagged , , , , , | 31 Comments

what’s the use of ‘out of office’ notices?

Posted on September 29, 2014 by pat thomson

I’ve had a pretty busy September. I was on leave for a week in late August and then went straight to a conference in Portugal. After a brief and frenetic period at home/work, I had two back-to-back conferences in London. … Continue reading →

Posted in work | Tagged , , , , | 12 Comments

the christmas list

Posted on December 21, 2012 by pat thomson

I like a good list. I like the order of it, the sense of things to get done and cross off. I woke up early this morning knowing that I had to make a list because it’s nearly Christmas, the … Continue reading →

Posted in academic life, Christmas list, time, work | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

finding the time to blog

Posted on December 5, 2012 by pat thomson

How do you get time to blog and tweet? This is a question I get asked a lot, as I’m sure other academic bloggers do too. The question is often accompanied by some kind of unspoken criticism. It’s as if … Continue reading →

Posted in academic blogging, leisure, social surplus, time, work | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

travel diary: what academics do in hotel rooms

Posted on May 29, 2012 by pat thomson

Academics get to travel a lot. Its one of the perks of the job I guess, but it only becomes a perk if you actually work at it. A lot of the time we collectively don’t. In fact we travel … Continue reading →

Posted in app, marking, pdf, thesis, travel, work | Tagged , , , , , , | 9 Comments