direction

OK, so I'm sitting here listening to my boss and someone else chat away about what I am assuming, in the absence of actual evidence, is perhaps research direction. It occurs to me in doing so that one of my reasons for deciding to do a PhD was that I enjoyed this sort of fat-chewing while I was a Pegamental, and figured (quite reasonably, I maintain) that one day I'd like to be able to run a team like that, and that the shortest path to such a situation started with a PhD. Ironically, I expose myself to dramatically fewer of these discussions now. This has a little to do with the fact that I'm preparing (loosest possible interpretation of terms) a thesis, by necessity an often solitary task, but more to do with the fact that my views are a little too contrary to take into a direction meeting here. That sucks - another reason for the devil on my right shoulder to continue his "you should quit your PhD, go back to Brisbane and cut Java code for a living" speech. Convincing little bugger, and he'll get more so when my paper gets rejected in a month's time.