Boot camp day 1

I’m at my first day of a three day “dissertation boot camp”. I’m working on adding to four chapters: my issue and literature context chapters and the ones I have started on repertoires of contention and political opportunities.

In the lead-up to starting my undergrad program I bought the only printer I have ever owned. I knew I wanted a PostScript-compatible black and white laser printer to be able to print off attractive essays and a deep discount on a large office-calibre machine tempted me into buying an enormous monster which was always hard to cram into residence rooms and which certainly didn’t accompany me to England, Ottawa, or Toronto. Since then I’ve done all my printing with machines belonging to other people, reasoning that it’s better to have someone else handle the maintenance and nice not to have another big whirring box taking up a corner of my room.

Now in the context of the dissertation and some other fairly ambitious writing projects I’m thinking about ordering a Brother HL-L6200DW printer. Several run-downs of well-regarded printers mention the model, for which a 12,000 page print cartridge is $167.86. It does look pretty large but, since my room isn’t in a house where playing music from the stereo often makes sense, I could sell or give that away to make space for it. That could be fitting in a couple of ways. Tristan actually picked out the stereo in Ottawa, as a possession suitable for somebody with a new and well-paying government job and a reasonably noisy one bedroom apartment to himself. A few days ago, he strongly endorsed Brother’s monochrome laser printers for reliability and affordability. Trying to live simply it makes sense to invest in things that you would use frequently and to remove things from your life which are used as rarely as my stereo, especially if those things are cluttering a significant amount of the space you have to work with.

After a summer of expenses and little earned income I am wary of adding even more to my recent set of alarming credit card bills, but everyone who I have spoken to so far sees a printer as a reasonable purchase for somebody in my position.

Author: Milan

In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. In the fall of 2005, I began reading for an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford. Outside school, I am very interested in photography, writing, and the outdoors. I am writing this blog to keep in touch with friends and family around the world, provide a more personal view of graduate student life in Oxford, and pass on some lessons I've learned here. View all posts by Milan