I had almost 10,000 words ...

After a helpful meeting with my supervisors earlier today, it looks like I still have a lot more work to do.

Unfortunately I've fallen into the trap of saying lots of interesting things that don't really addresss any one question in particular - I got a little bit lost along the way. It didn't come as a surprise really (I knew that I'd lost sight of what I was trying to achieve as I was writing, but couldn't work out what else to do but keep writing in the vain hope that an argument would fall out of the sky!). The encouraging thing was as they asked me questions about why I had included certain things I was able to articulate a reason much more clearly than I had expressed it in what I had written. And they thought that I had obviously done a lot of reading and thinking and had a good solid base to work from.

What I need to do now is clarify what I am trying to achieve and then set out to rework the material I've already written. It seems that I have a couple of options - some of which will involve largely starting the writing process again (although building on all that I have thought about so far) in order to try and do what I originally set out to do, although there is an option to change my original aim, reshape the question and use most of what I have written with some substantial changes. I'm meeting with Mark again tomorrow afternoon to try and work out a structure to progress things, but he and John are confident that I will be able to hand in something that is helpful.

I still have 3 weeks to go, so all is not lost, and I have learnt a lot along the way which is the important thing. If I am honest I am feeling a little fragile and not really sure I will be able to pull it off, but I'm sure something will get handed in even if it is not as I'd hoped.