Half way there!

Much relief is being felt here at 'Research Towers'; in a fit of looking things up I found the dissertation handbook. Good idea to have it to hand I thought, but on looking at the important info I found the thesis should be 25,000 words, not 20,000. Coming, as it did, in the middle of the driest part of the reading and writing, this was not good news. In fact it was almost really bad news, but emails zapped back and forwards in the ether to and from my tutor, who reassured me that it should be about 20,000 words and certainly no more that 25,000. Wow, what a relief! That was another month's writing and reading that had suddenly reared up over the horizon and caused a mighty panic.
I'll go back to my corner of the house, smile sweetly at the computer, breathe deeply and write another 500 words for the evening. I am now past the half-way mark, so I aim to write about another 2000 words so that I can have a choice as to which parts I cull, rather than having no choice at all.
All this comes before the research part which I begin next week!
Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this?

Sometimes, just sometimes...

my rather dry research (well methodology is not the most lively part of the dissertation!) can make me laugh!
I am researching all the different methods of assessing creativity at the moment, the reading is throwing up all sorts of unknown words, - thanks goodness for the online dictionary is all I can say! Here's one for you - hitoriometric!! This kind of research, looks at the achievements of creative individuals, their life and their place in history. Fine, that looks understandable. Then a wonderful sentence caught my eye, in an otherwise extremely heavy reading session:
"Often this will mean that the participants in a historiometric study will be deceased, but this is not an absolute requirement." Phew - what a relief!!

Must get back to the day's 500 words, except that I am skiving off tomorrow, so it will have to be a thousand today. Somebody, please tell me why I am doing this?

How lovely!

Breakfast this morning was eaten to the accompaniment of the church bells tolling out some lovely peals. I went into teh gym only to find that the ringers were Devonshire people on a bell ringing trip up here in the Midlands. After finishing at Chetwynd, they went on to Newport so I heard a double whammy - lovely!

How I have changed!

Here we are - its half term and I have at least 3000 words to write for the disseratation. Yes, its time to knuckle down to that creative process with a vengeance!
The odd thing is that I have changed my working processes totally. In my previous younger life of academic work, I had to write in total silence, which as you can imagine was not too easy at college. However, there has been a revolution in my working practise.
I NEED music playing in the background, otherwise I prowl around unable to settle down. It has to be light in style, or else I listen to it properly and don't work. It can't be too upbeat otherwise that distracts me too. At the moment I am hooked on Elton, but has anyone any better ideas for gentle music that is not too distracting, but also not too mushy?
The other thing that has also changed is the snacking - what used to be a pile of chocolate bars has now become a bag of dried apricots from apricot roundabout in Leh.They are similar to Hunza apricots, but have more of a tang to their taste.
Three more months of this.....

National Pride

We have been immersed in Trafalgar mania this week. I had never learnt anything about the Battle of Trafalgar or Nelson in my own school days, but I have made up for it now. Wow, he was a treasure! We have searched the net and found out so much information at school. I think that this 'immediate' history is very exciting and the kids have loved it. I shall be escaping from writing those 3000 words this week to catch up on a few programmesbout hte celebrations!

Aargh - this technology!

Machines are purely mechanical right?

HAH!

Well, tell me why the radio internet connection will work for one laptop, yet for another sitting right next to it, the 'machine' does not recognise any signal? This is just tonight, last night it worked like a dream... What is it up to? Hmmm, I think there is an element of moodiness in all of this, you know, that thing called emotion!
Does anyone else have the same problems?

Success!

Well, I wonder what it was that suddenly unblocked this site? I have this funny feeling that computers have their moods - why else would a machine suddenly allow access to a site that it had blocked for a fortnight? Are they really boxes full of little gremlins that take the huff?!!!
Whatever it was, I can now access my own blog as well as that of others, so I feel as if I belong in my own blog again! So here's a simple question -Has anyone else been taken in by the packs of small avocado pears? I find them such a wonderful buy, but then eat a whole one each time! Where has moderation gone? They used to be a treat, but now they are something that we regard as 'ordinary'. I actually remember the first ones that we ate in this country, my uncle sent them down to us from London and the small piece that we each had was such a treat! I wonder what today's children will remember as a treat? Will they remember these things? Do they even remember the little things like the small toys in their Christmas stockings?

Which reminds me - even though my children are grown up, I still enjoy making the stockings up, and have started collecting small things for them, Then there is the cake to make and the puddings to boil. It's almost time to mention the 'C' word!

How weird!

I cannot get into this site and yet I know that the site is available to others! It is very strange as reading my posts is something that only works when I see it posted in its final state. If anyone out there knows what has gone wrong, could you let me know please? I am very curious!

Friendship

What is it about real friends? They are among the very few who dare to and are able to speak the truth about everything to us and know that although we may get very cross, we do in fact listen to them, even through a time of possibly angry reaction. Their message gets through. My daughter at a very young age claimed that her friends were the most important thing to her, she was so right!
One of my friends has taken me to task for my reaction to something this week, I won't go into details, but the gist of the message was, 'rise above it'. He is so right and I am going to take this on board.
Thank goodness for friends and firends - life would be impossible without you!

Great spirits.

I think I may have mentioned that I am working on a dissertation at the moment and that 'moment' is going to last until the end of February next year! It is proving to entail a lot of work. However, at this stage I am enjoying that work as it throws up all sorts of ideas that are novel and it also exposes nuggets of knowledge that I have always intuitively felt but not known that others, and indeed 'important' others have already considered and commented upon the subjects. I have a feeling of ignorance that causes a state of isolation, leading from the state of 'not knowing'.
Einstein is a man who I am getting to know in this vicarious way, his quotes keep appearing in the reading about my subject area. Even the rather dry methodology section is throwing up interesting comments from him.

'Great spirits have always encountered opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.'

Now this is one to chew on, especially when the research is going through a phase that seems to resemble a dark tunnel! Do you read on for many hours in the determination - that your viewpoint has some relevance and someone somewhere must have commented upon it?
What is a mediocre mind? What is a great spirit?
I think one day I shall read some of his works, rather than stumble across some of his sayings second hand. Mind you, this will probably not include his mathematical works - there my mediocre mind will surely show itself!
And what about this from Arthur Clark?

'It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value.'

Eeek - how does that tie in with educators and education? !

More holiday snaps

Are you ready for some more? These are some of the sights from Ladakh that surprised me for various reasons. I try not to prejudge holidays and so often find that some parts, either the scenery or the people really surprise me. It was certainly a shock to see some of the scenes that we came across - from the sudden change between bare mountain and verdant valley, the street scenes, the people in all their guises.
But see what you think - this is the view down to Leh from the hills around. The sandy surface was a surprise, especially when the coours of the sand changed dramatically, sometimes to pinks and vivid purples.







This was a leafy lane we walked down, the cricketers were happy to note that the trees were willows, in fact they grew everywhere and were reminiscent of the use they used to have in this country - coppicing for wood, weaving into baskets, fences, the longer branches being used for roof timbers etc.


And then those lovely streams flowing down from the mountains. Most nights we camped beside a stream, sometimes a small one that was diverted for irrigation purposes, other times it was a roaring torrent the almost hammered you off to sleep. They were lovely, the sound and the feshness of air around them was incredible. Enjoy!


This was the noisy one!

Research

I think I may have mentioned that I am working on a dissertation at the moment and that 'moment' is going to last until the end of February next year! It is proving to entail a lot of work. However, at this stage I am enjoying that work as it throws up all sorts of ideas that are novel and it also exposes nuggets of knowledge that I have always intuitively felt but not known that others, and indeed 'important' others have already considered and commented upon the subjects. I have a feeling of ignorance that causes a state of isolation, leading from the state of 'not knowing'.
Einstein is a man who I am getting to know in this vicarious way, his quotes keep appearing in the reading about my subject area. Even the rather dry methodology section is throwing up interesting comments from him.

'Great spirits have always encountered opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.'

Now this is one to chew on, especially when the research is going through a phase that seems to resemble a dark tunnel! Do you read on for many hours in the determination - that your viewpoint has some relevance and someone somewhere must have commented upon it?
What is a mediocre mind? What is a great spirit?
I think one day I shall read some of his works, rather than stumble across some of his sayings second hand. Mind you, this will probably not include his mathematical works - there my mediocre mind will surely show itself!
And what about this from Arthur Clark?

'It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value.'

Eeek - how does that tie in with educators and education? !