• Location: Shelford, Cambridge, UK
• Mood: sleep-deprived
• Music: Metallica: The memory remains

Diary dump

I made it home last night, thanks to some good Samaritans who rescued me from being stranded and gave me a lift for the last couple of miles. (Had they not done that, I probably could have walked it, but a big suitcase and a lot of rain and the fact that it was 1 in the morning would have made it unpleasant.) Now I'm going to make a list of all the stuff I wanted to write about in the past three weeks, before I forget it.

Three PhDs in three consecutive weeks meant it hard to get work done in the lab. I appear to have been appointed as the lab's official filkmistress, which is fun. Also several good and some outstanding lectures (Craig Thompson and Kim Nasmyth, among others), set up what should be a useful collaboration. Getting headhunted, which was flattering but didn't work out.

Jewish community responsibilities mushrooming on me. Led the Progressive service 10^th March, and the traditional egal service with ploni_bat_ploni on 23^rd. In between I attended a bunch of more or less official meetings, including being elected to the Progressive group Board at their annual meeting. I've confirmed that I will be teaching the American kids and possibly some others for bar mitzvah starting after Passover, and I have taken on some bits of adult education too. I'm working on sorting out the gabbai mess with the main community.

I started doing formal exercise, and I want to talk about that a bit.

10^th March: another party chez BB, which led to me getting invited to a piano concert the following week. Also an art exhibition by an acquaintance.

The Levellers gig on 11^th I already wrote up, ditto the film of The Queen.

20^th March: Talk on Swedish linguistics with the international researchers group.

Three books: Jan Morris' Last letters from Hav (quirky), Kate Atkinson's Human Croquet (disturbing), Ursula Le Guin's City of Illusions (ok).

General topics: debunking and discussing the recent miracle drug story; why I am pessimistic about the future of LJ; cool essays I should link to; a bit about racism and lashon; something fairly silly about sexuality.

I have found my mobile phone. I can't remember the phone number though, so if anyone has a record of it, could you give me a shout? Edit: Thanks to lethargic_man and ewtikins who got back to me within a few minutes of posting! My mobile number is +44 780 3000865, valid for the next week or so.