Two strikes

When you're coming to the end of your Masters, summer should be a satisfying time. After the hard slog of winter, with its essays and seminars to prepare for, the months leading to August should be a time of celebration.

But it's not happening that way at the moment. The last few days have been up and down. Friday I received notification that the LSE would offer me a research grant. But which would only cover half the tuition fees - and if I registered as a full time student.

OK... And I'm going to do that with precisely what other funds?

And then today the other scholarship result finally came through - and no, I didn't get it. Even making the short list doesn't seem much of an achievement. In a race for one, you either get it or your don't.

So it looks like I've got several years of badly paid work ahead of me.

What joy!

I've already taken out my bad mood on the ESRC by writing them a letter of appeal on their utterly misguided decision to reject my application. It won't make any difference, but at least I felt better about it.