So I have been re-reading my thesis lately, not that I need to memorise it before my viva next week, but I do need to familiarise myself with the words I typed in a caffeine-fuelled stupor before Christmas.

As I was reading, a few words jumped out off the page as being somewhat unexpected. But in the context of the thesis they make perfect sense, I didn’t put them in for a bet or anything, it’s just that four or five years ago I would never have guessed that of the 100,000 words these five would feature anywhere:

1. Haemodialysis. All foreign policy theses need to deal with the removal of waste products, such as urea, from the bloodstream. I’m not taking the piss.

2. Qatar. I admit that had I wrote ‘catarrh’ that would have been more disturbing but of all the countries mentioned in my thesis this one is the most unexpected, although Mauritius, Croatia and Romania get a mention and 5 years ago I wouldn’t have been able to see a connection between those and Portuguese foreign policy priorities either.

3. Tungsten. I really should have done a follow-up to that guy a few years ago who wrote his PhD on the history of darts. That would have been so cool. Imagine going to the pub to do your interviews!

4. Bourdieu. Only a passing reference to the French anthropologist. Other great French thinkers, I’m sure, will be jealous of Pierre for getting a mention when they didn’t.

5. Fisheries. I know the Portuguese love their fish, but there’s nothing duller than fisheries policy, but somehow it crept in.

I did achieve the rare feat of writing a Politics/International Relations PhD without referencing, or even reading: Foucault; Marx; Gramsci; Hobbes; Kant; or Katie Price. Kudos?