Apologies for the absence,,,

... I have been on holiday from the 14 August and things were hectic before going!
I went on a Baltic Capitals cruise with my parents and it was wonderful! Mum and Dad had said that after the hip replacement they wanted to take me on a holiday and we thought a cruise would combine relaxing with places of interest. In August the Mediterranean is ridculously hot for my fair skin so we hit on the Baltic. We called in Stockholm, Tallinn, St Petersburg (2 days) and Helsinki. All the places we visited are worth going to again. We joined at Copenhagan and drove through the city to get to the ship. We could have gone on a river cruise that night in Copenhagan but were absolutely shattered so went to bed immediately after dinner. Copenhagan looked lovely from what we saw of it so would like to see it again. The second day was spent at sea: talk about relaxing. And we got our first taste of the food: I am refusing to get on the scales as we had a buffet breakfast, great lunch and cream tea then dinner nearly every day. Diet has started officially. The third day was Stockholm where we did a tour of the old town and then wandered round the shops for an hour or so. It seemed nice but was a bit disappointing in comparison to the rest of the cities. Still, if I get the chance I'd like to go back as we never went to the Vasa Museum where there is a preserved warship that looked amazing on postcards.After Stockholm was Tallinn, a lovely city, not sure what I was expecting but I really enjoyed it there. In the afternoon we went to an open air museum which was OK, but we have one in NI that probably is better. We reached St Petersburg the next day: WOW. I can understand why there was a revolution now. Talk about gold everywhere in places at every turn of the head: really quite disgusting when you consider how poor the rest of the country was and still is. The Church of the Spilled Blood was incredible: 8000 miles of mosaic tiles were used to decorate it, interior and exterior (I have photos which I may try and post some time!). The afternoon we spent on the ship being ever so tired. The next day in St P, we went to Peterhoff Palace and the Hermitage museum, again WOW WOW WOW. And again all so decadent. Helsinki was lovely as well and would like to go back: did a city highlights bus tour as only really had a morning there. After that another day at sea to relax before Warnemund in the former East Germany. It was a lovely little sea side town, did not expect it to be that nice at all. In the afternoon took a trip to what is known as the Molli and the Minster: a train ride and a church: really enjoyed that too and then had traditional German dessert (like we needed it!). The final day we went through the Kiel Canal and now I'm back at home. Loved every minute of it, will definitely do a cruise again, most likely with my parents as can't see any of my friends wanting to spend over a grand on one holiday. Either that or alone.
So now it's back to porridge: the job starts next Monday 9.30am and I can't say I'm looking forward to it and I can't say that I'm not looking forward to it. I have a lot to do in the first year research wise and a subject to teach that I haven't studied in a Law School where some of the senior members of staff already appear to dislike me. It's a long story but essentially I had started my PhD at the university, received funding from them and was within a year of finishing when my supervisor got a new job. I tried for an entire summer to find out what was going to happen with my supervision when he left. I got nowhere: I was made to feel guilty when I asked about it, when I went to meetings with my supervisor so eventually I decided it was time for me to move on too so I went with him. Unfortunately the people who were in charge then are still within the management committee. On the plus side, however, the knob who was head of school then is no longer head of school and the new head of school seems slightly better. He couldn't be much worse!
There still is no one on staff who researches in my area so it will be pretty lonely that way. Ideally I would like someone else more senior than me who could advise and support me but it's not possible, this year anyway. I sometimes think I need more support than other people at the same stage of their career and I know I have absolutely no self-confidence in my work, even after getting my PhD and the book contract for it but it's not something that grows on trees. An awful lot of it stems back to when my supervisor was leaving and nothing was done until I left with him, as it seemed to me that the law school was implicitly (explicitly?) saying to me that my research was crap and not worth bothering about. So an awful lot of my new job will feel like proving myself over and over again.