More thoughts on how things are going . . .

A long walk across the local fields this morning. I am somewhat depressed again, set off by a comment on how few phone contacts I have! I am feeling very mentally tired at the moment, and perhaps my walk was aimed at clearing my head a little.

Probably every English blogger has been putting snowy scenes on their blogs - no reason though why I shouldn't also.

Looking south towards the Ridgeway

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Looking north across the Thames Valley towards Brize Norton

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The frozen duck pond and village church

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The village herd of alpacas

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When covered in snow, our allotment looks no worse than all the others!

In respect of my MSc, I am getting to a stage where I am expecting to not do much more reading (a few weeks time?), and instead will be starting on exam prep and the actual writing of my dissertation. There have been several things that have had a big impact on me as I've been doing the MSc. One major effect has been to be able to access a large number of journals online and, as a result, to realise something of the huge amount of scholarship that is already out there - this raises problems such as how to choose what to work on? Is there always plenty left? Or is this the main reason why scholarship gets down to finer and finer points?

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I am also pondering of perhaps deferring year two of my MSc - then if I can get a PhD place, I might not do this second year.

One recent development in my thoughts on doing a PhD has been my discovery that it is possible to study History of Science to PhD level at Oxford. It turns out that this is offered through the History department (rather than the more usual Philosophy or Science departments). It would be the obvious choice to study there. And living in Longworth is close enough to fullfill the residency requirement that Oxbridge has.

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But one downside of the MSc has been my increased awareness of the negatives associated with academia. Reading books like Adams' The Academic Tribes and Frost & Taylor's Rhythms of Academic Life, together with my own observations at LSE, have produced a much more negative view of academic life than perhaps I had before. So maybe my goal would be to become a "gentleman scholar", publishing a few articles a year in various journals. But if I do a PhD, I would like to be a class teacher for undergrads.

On the work front, I am psyched up to a return to work, but am not really thrilled about it. I have some opportunities progressing, and am very hopeful that one of them would be very suitable (though I am not sure I have done enough to get this one). I should hear in the next week if this is going ahead to the next stage. But the upside of going back to work is that I would definitely be able to do a PhD either starting autumn 2010 or 2011.

There was an article in Saturday's Guardian on vagabonding travel. This was written by Rolf Potts who published a book on the same subject a couple of years ago and which linked in very well with Buryn's Vagabonding in the USA, which I read years ago. I remain very taken with this pattern of travel - it is very similar to aspects of my travels last summer. And of course The Dharma Bums remains among my all time favourite books. So very tempting . . .