Even the recent run of storms has not blown off this little clump of last year’s leaves. Today, on the other hand, was a first real inkling of spring sunshine and relative warmth. I already know it doesn’t last, though. But there’ll be more, eventually.
Data analysis done the retro way, on the train. Who needs expensive software packages when you have highlighter pens of differing colours. And months after the fact, too — these are interview transcripts from St Helena. But hey, I got to them in the end.
After, like everyone else, having ‘a couple of years off due to Covid’, the annual Imperial Stormtrooper Convention gathers once again in hall Darth 4 of the Emperor Palpatine Memorial centre. “It was so nice to be able to strap on the white plastic again”, one delegate was heard to mutter through the helmet.
Or, maybe, it’s a Lego construction, exhibited at this year’s Bricktastic in Manchester. You decide.
“Please. You’ve gotta get me out of here. I didn’t ask to make my life here, a day’s journey from the nearest grooming salon.”
I might think the same if, like this critter, I was living at Scalderskew in the Lake District — I do not know of a more isolated dwelling in the country. If you’re interested, the most prominent peak in the background is Seatallan.
As reliable an early signifier of spring as anything else — and the crocuses are early this year. Nor has their February arrival diminished them in number, certainly not on this lawn in front of Lancaster Castle, anyway.
Working at home today, I thought, after lunch, I would just go out and stretch my legs for a bit. Great timing; this was taken only a few minutes later. On the other hand, this was actually the most interesting thing to happen today.
One of the recent candidates for “Railway pub dog”, Roxy is almost always seen standing, here or (if it’s cold) by the fire. Sitting and lying down are just things other dogs do. She is a patient creature, but I guess that’s a requirement for all candidate pub dogs. The leash is purely symbolic.
For the first three weeks of this semester I have been giving some classes in the Chemistry building, where resides this interesting display: I’m sure you realise what is going on here. As today was the last of these three classes, and I may never come back in here again, I thought I would capture it while I had the chance. They have omitted to include examples of the radioactive elements, but that’s probably a good thing.
22/02/2022 was today’s date, and a Twosday too: so Radon, to bottom right, perhaps is the most representative of these.
Before 2020 I never minded doing online teaching, because it offered variety, and was not the only game in town. But there are limits, and I probably reached mine about this time last year. Fortunately, a sense of Real Normal has largely returned. This particular class was always designed to be an online session — when it works, use it, when not, get face-to-face. Steve, one of my PhD students, peeks his face out from his virtual cell.
And still it rains, seemingly without end. The water race at the end of the old millpond in the woods is only rarely filled, and when it is it’s a sign we are once again in the ‘cross fingers and hope’ approach to flood defence. But the town stayed above water — today at least.
Being 42 