Pre-graduation things

Although I have graduated before, I never attended a graduation ceremony. For my Masters I had to defend my thesis publicly, wait for half an hour, and then received my official paper. No gowns involved. This time it is going to be a whole other kettle of fish. Never knew there were so many rules in relation to academic dress! And every uni has their own gowns. Although I really like the red ones, ours are the yellow/gold ones on the right. Including the baret (cool!). They cost a bomb, so it really is a matter of thinking about how sure I am about continuing to work in academia. Must say that of all the disparate jobs I had, working at a university suits me best and I like it best too. So maybe it is a good investment to get my own one? Even if it is not red?
Anyway, other things that needed attention but have all been taken care of are printing and binding of thesis and buying tickets for guests to the graduation, which takes place in Parliament House. Great location! Only 6 weeks to go ...

New beginnings

Periods of self doubt on the way have not stopped me from pressing on with the PhD thesis. And it paid off, cause I have actually passed! From 28 Sep 2011 I can finally call myself Dr. Which has reminded me of a very old joke. A guy gets introduced to a woman at a party as 'Dr. Chambers'. The woman straight away launches into a long description of all her physical ailments, ranging from headaches to hemorrhoids. The guy interrupts her with the words "Sorry, but I have a doctorate in economics." "Oh," says the woman. "What do you think should I buy shares in AWB or not?"

Post-thesis

Yes, after months of too hard work I actually managed to get the thesis submitted. So while waiting for the results I am trying to adapt to post-thesis life. It's kinda weird. After 3 years of being mainly in the role of student, all of a sudden I have to assert myself again as the professional person I was pre-thesis. Realise I actually do know what I'm talking about when it comes to, say, teaching or management or communication or road safety. I am not dependent on any supervisor's opinion, instead I can give my own. Without referencing anyone else. Will take some getting used to I guess, but must say I am beginning to enjoy it. Bring on the new projects! :-)

Nightly adventure

My whole life I have been waking up frequently from terrible nightmares, often about choking, getting no air and drowning, or about someone actively trying to strangle me to death. Last year I found out that I suffer from sleep apnea during REM sleep, so that explained a lot. I was actually choking, no wonder I had nightmares all the time! They have invented a lovely machine to prevent this choking routine, and for the last months have been sleeping like I should have all the time: for hours on end, nice deep sleep, no scary dreams. Bliss! Until last night I woke up from an unpleasant dream, and found that the machine was not working. In fact, nothing was working, we had a power outage in the middel of the night. Crap!

Here in Oz the power board is always outside of the house. Yeah, funny, and no idea why really. But it meant that we had to go out into the pitchblack night (where is that full moon when you need it?), armed with a handy headlight (sometimes it pays of to be outdoorsy people) to figure out what happened. Unfortunately the nightly temp had dropped from 30 degrees the night before, to only 9 last night. It felt freezing, probably due to our being scantily dressed. Anyway, could not solve the problem. My heroic husband braved the cold and stayed with the power board, while I unplugged everything in the house. Still not solved. After half an hour we ended up with switching off a whole power group, hooking up the fridge with a very long power cord to the only working power plug, and going back to bed. Where it took about an hour to fall asleep again. Without my lovely snoozer machine. So had a totally awful night sleep.
Sparkie has been in already and could not find anything wrong really. Keep fingers crossed for tonight.

Summer in Oz

We're in the midst of summer. It is dry, stinking hot, with a fierce wind blowing. Still at least a month to go. This year we (or at least I) suffer from an explosion of midges (which we never had before). I found myself allergic to them, resulting in massive bumps after being bitten, which then burst out and ooze yukkie stuff for hours. So what else is there to say about it. Nothing much really, although that may be due to me suffering from brain melt. Gosh, I really really dislike summer in Oz.

Wrinkles and stuff

When we moved from Europe to Australia, I had to get used to the intense dryness here. In summer a humidity of 15% is not unusual, although the last year has been quite wet so far (and we're in a dry part of the country!). Anyhoo, my hair and skin needed some acclimatisation time. And different products to keep the wrinkles at bay. Thanks to my Ozzie cuz, I discovered Jurlique, an all natural biological non-chemical yadda yadda yadda brand of skin care. Quite expensive to buy, but then again it lasts a long time. Most of their stuff smells deliciously and it feels nice too. Wrinkles still pretty minor, so all good. However, yesterday put a little pump of 'purely age defying facial serum' on my finger and all of a sudden it struck me that it looked ridiculously like ... well, there is no better way of describing it than, uh, sperm. Yikes! They surely wouldn't have, would they???

Not that I'm the one to cast a stone

When I went randomly through blogs (in hopes of finding something fun, entertaining or interesting), I was amazed about the enormous amount of journals out there on the wwweb that have not been updated for months or even years. What happened to these people? Did they die? Did they just turn a new leaf, never to look back? Would you not delete your blog then? Are they still planning to blog again 'some day' when they will have time? I reckon we need a blog graveyard, with neat little headstones, for everyone to visit when in need for melancholy.

I think I can spot the exit

Have been wandering through the labyrinth for quite a while now, but it lookes like I can spot the exit. Just a few twists and turns (or so I hope) before submission of my thesis. However, hope to stay into academics, so decided to take up my blogging again. Just because it is so much fun to write in English (or should I say it gets more difficult to write in Dutch?). Anyhoo, post no. 1 is done. Only a matter of 'keep at it' now, both for the thesis and the blog. :-)

Tulips in April

Webber's bureaucracy

When teaching students about Webber's ideas on the ideal bureaucracy, I am often secretly glad that I don't have to survive in one of these. What a delusional thought though: I AM in one! The university displays lots of bureaucratic tendencies, from the zillion page ethics approval forms (now online, which as I hear is even worse) to the stack of forms to complete to get anything copied or printed. Prove this, prove that, get a signature or three (not including your own), what is your mother's maiden name and give us your true weight, while you're at it. And when you finally have used up your whole left brain, start on the right and come up with some truly original research please. Come on then Einstein, give us a thesis!

On so many levels

I have noticed it before, but nothing like a few weeks back home speaking another language to get your ears into noticing odd expressions in English. The most annoying one at the moment being 'on so many levels'. A quick google came up with:
'nuclear power bad on so many levels'
'an incredible story, on so many levels'
'a tragedy on so many levels'
'wrong on so many levels'
'this thing is a genius on so many levels'
'that was awesome on so many levels'
'Michael Jackson drinking bling H20 makes sense on so many levels'

It doesn't actually, make sense that is. What on earth does it mean? Is it that is sounds interesting and like you had really deep thoughts about this whatever you use it with? Did some celeb use it in a tv-interview (without me noticing it) and now it is trendy? Where does it come from? And can we please send it back where it belongs??

Bright week (3)

I realise that red really is the colour that attracts me, but since it is a lucky colour, I don't care. ;-)

Bright Week (2)

Guard at Guengbokgung Palace, Seoul.

Temple in Seoul.

Bright week

'Concrete and Honey' came up with this brilliant idea of hosting a Bright Week , so here are my photo's of some gorgeous flowers in New Zealand.

Taconcubano needs (according to Google)

Taconcubano needs not to wait too long. Taconcubano needs not to go on forever weighing up the pros and cons of these decisions.

Taconcubano is enjoying good health. Taconcubano needs not to worry about a few tiny 'irregularities' in this sphere. That is how it is when Taconcubano gets older.

So yes, Taconcubano needs a hug. very badly.

Taconcubano needs to turn 2 more or gain 26 more Vampire points to reach the next level: Vampire Temptress! Taconcubano should get out there and bite some people!

Taconcubano needs some flowers!

Taconcubano needs not to always be afraid, sooner or later, there will be a triumph over difficulties! Yes, Taconcubano is strong enough to get over this.

Musical chairs

When you want to pursue a postgrad degree, say a PhD or DPhil or whatever you want to call it, the trouble is not to get accepted into the degree, nor is it to get a free RTS place at the uni. The biggest problem is to find a desk to call your own for the duration of your studies. Although the uni is obliged to provide each doctoral candidate with a desk, a computer (that works), a cabinet that can be locked (with the key) and access to a printer (again one that actually prints stuff when you want it), this is not as easy as it sounds. There are no free desks and everybody that has one allocated to them holds on to it as desparately as if we were playing musical chairs. Yet the irony is that most postgrad cubicles seem to be empty most of the time. Uncluttered, though dirty, they show there yellow surfaces to the passers by: no papers or books anywhere in sight and the happy deskowners are nowhere to be seen. So why oh why can't I get one of these nice deserted cubicles, pronto? I'll clean it myself!

Estimating

Just started entering data from my questionnaires and I realise that some people have no clue on estimating either time or distance: already came across 2 people claiming to driver 15-20 hours per week, but then mentioning a TOTAL of 80-100 km for that week?!? Is the rest of the hours on rollers in the backyard???

Well, was I lost or what?

It has been ages since I wrote anything here. First I couldn't write about what I wanted to write about (my boring supervisory problems) and then I was busy trying to make up for lost time (due to my boring supervisory problems). Today I entered the age of Facebook in a workshop and I am required to create a blog (haha, already got one) and link this to Facebook later. We are curious. ;-)

Could my future be this bright?

Or is this whole study a waste of time?



Just some random thoughts while in limbo (waiting for the results of my last unit). Sigh. (Both photo's made in Tonga, last week.)

Back from holiday

And still no grade for my last assignment. How surprising (not). No tutes anywhere in sight, due to the uni's new policy of teaching without sessionals. Good thing I'm really relaxed at the moment, thanks to my Tongan holiday. Plough on with the ethics proposal. Yay! Part of my data will be generated at another institute, so I have to put in 2 ethics forms. The person at the other institute has vanished of the earth (email came back as undeliverable) and the research office he was working for is nowhere to be found (or so the receptionist tells me). It is sooooo Monday!