Dear blog,

So, this is it. I’m going to submit this AHRC research grant bid this Thursday no matter what (come hell or high water… etc). I’ve managed to give myself three full days at home to do this and am trying not to look at my email and to get distracted. It is hard though (I do have other things to do: reading bits of five dissertations, PhD upgrade material, preparation for this week’s teaching). These other things will have to be done late at night when I’ve done my full day on this, which has to be done now. Quite apart from the fact that it’s sending me mad; I’d have to rewrite the entire thing if it goes into next year. Kill the beast. Always good words of advice.

I’ve found it really tricky adjusting to a new university (I’ve only been in Lancaster for a year) while working on this bid. There really is a different level of support offered by Research Services at Lancaster. I have been used — when I worked at Salford University — to having a research support officer who worked with you on the bid, someone who told you more about the scheme to which you were applying and helped you interpret the various headings under which you write (eg. what are the ‘objectives’; how do you describe your ‘methods’, what would be expected for this scheme, etc etc). It was all much more hands-on at Salford. I’ve also really struggled filling in the figures etc in the JeS form myself at Lancaster, something I’ve never done before.

Oh well, in any case, there are only two and a half more days of this hopefully and then it’s in and done. It’s the last week of term and then I’m off to the University of Padua to give a paper, which will be a nice place to spend my 42nd birthday. The REF results come out that day too…

Sx