Yesterday I Defended My Master's Thesis

Mum and Matt were there, Mum's spending October in LA with her mum, and took the train down to attend. I presented the essential points of my project in about 30 minutes, with a 21 slide powerpoint, to two infectious disease physicians, a nursing professor, and a statistics professor. My cheering squad of two were the only other people in the room without the title "Dr.". I felt like I was babbling somewhat, but the committee and my family all said I presented very well. Good to know Mrs Heath's standard grade English class, and the Edinburgh Academy public speaking club paid off.

After the presentation and "public" discussion, the committee asked us to leave the room. Mum & Matt went for a coffee, I waited in the hallway to be called back in. After about 15 minutes my chair called me back in, and I was told it's very close to done, I need to expand a few sections and make a detailed table of studies on C. difficile and acid suppression. (That's the topic of my thesis). My chair also mentioned she'd like me to present to her infectious disease class, and I'm going to present the data at the hospital where the study is based. We (my on-site advisor and the team at the hospital) are putting together a paper based on this analysis and will be submitting it for publication. If it gets through it will be my first first-authorship on a paper.

Today I am doing no work. I put Mum on a train to LA, bought myself a couple of scented candles, and had a delicious sandwich, and now I'm catching up on free on-demand tv shows. Yay for Castle!

Tomorrow I begin with the revisions. I want to get this sucker finished and submitted so I can really celebrate.