Answer: I don’t know yet, I’m still really busy!

So although it is like over two months since I defended my thesis, I’m still up to my knees in post-PhD things to do. I’ve been really busy, but busy in a much more relaxed, nicer, less stressful way than before. And while I may be both at a bit of a loss, it feels good to be posting in a new category ‘Life After The PhD’.

Some of my time lately has been taken up with actually putting the finishing touches to the thesis following the examination. I turned the corrections around pretty quickly and got those approved by my internal examiner. After that I had to submit the final version. I’ve attached a picture of the hard-bound, gold lettering version of the thesis! Still can’t quite believe it’s done but when that copy went in it was officially the end of my PhD. My next official duty will be my graduation on 17th July.

I’ve been giving thought to what I am going to do next and have been working on job applications. Those have kept me busy and I will be presenting my work, for the first time as ‘Dr Robinson’, at the Politics Postgrad Conference at Newcastle at the end of this week. That should be fun and it will be a good opportunity to talk to many of the earlier stage students that I just haven’t had the chance to meet yet. This is the first time we’ve tried to get all the PhD students in Politics in one room together to present their research, so hopefully it will be a good day!

A particular highlight since my last post was the Portuguese Ambassador, His Excellency João de Vallera, coming to the University to give a lecture and to meet with students studying Portuguese or those interested in Portugal and the Lusophone world at Newcastle. Here’s a link to the photos on the SML Facebook page (you might see me in the suit again!)

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.345557745546084.1073741829.205023906266136&type=3

The Portuguese Ambassador’s visit was a very successful day and a few weeks after he came we had the Lithuanian Ambassador come to give a lecture. So Newcastle is clearly the place to be for a bit of senior diplomat spotting!

While I still have a long to do list, no job, not much money, and a stressed out girlfriend who still needs to finish her thesis, I have been able to find some time to relax. We had a fun time at the Newcastle Beer Festival a couple of weeks back and we spent Easter in France, which was lovely.