April 2006
Well, this really must be a record "late start"!
As usual, I'll blame pressure of work and hope nobody noticed the late
arrival of this page. Winter has taken a long time to turn to Spring this
year, but we are just starting to be able to spend a bit of time in the
garden tidying up ready for summer and playing with the cats. I'm not "on
duty" for the Spain field course this year, so the students' Easter vacation
gives me a chance to catch up with things at work and at home. This year
I've been busy both with the final stages of "The big book" (which is due
to be published this month) and with proposals for new degree routes that
I've been responsible for putting together, as well as my usual work. I've
also been putting the first bits of material onto the PhysicalGeography.org.uk
website that I'm developing. Everything seems to be coming together OK,
so now it's a case of first catching up with all the work that I've been
forced to let slip and then regrouping and making plans for the next few
years. Watch this pace!
| Meanwhile, we've enjoyed a visit from Jack and
Emily, some winter walks in the country, a trip to the new "Monkey Forest"
at Trentham, and a little sea-side trip to Wales. We've been out (or stayed
in) for lunch or evenings variously with (Big) Keith and Elaine and Carley,
(Little) Keith and Louise, The Girls from the Library, The Girls from Riding,
Liz (and Susie), Zoe and Rich and Adam and Simon and the EOG folk, Debbie
and Mart, and assorted folk to do with work. I'll let you decide which
of those activities each of these photos relates to! |
Jack and Emily???
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Feeding time at the monkey park?
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Does this look like fieldwork?
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n-scale 4x4 foot in progress
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I've also been doing some "work" on the model railways, including the
little 4x4 foot n-guage, the garden-00 and the indoor-00. My soldering
and LED work remains shoddy at best, but it pleases me when my little control-panel
lights change colour as I throw the little switches! |
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I was very pleased to get gifts and a card from departing students,
saying thank you for the help I've given over the years they've been at
Keele. I have to say that one of the best bits of my job is that you sometimes
(just sometimes) get the feeling that you've actually been able to help
somebody and really make a difference. A lot of students don't even seem
to want to learn or to improve or to do their best, but when there
is a student who does want to, and when at the end of their studies
you can feel that you've helped them, it's very rewarding. So: thanks for
the book and the jam, and thanks for letting me know that I helped a little
bit!
On a less happy note I'm a hundred and twenty quid poorer after a tyre-shredding
puncture led me to engage the services of the kwik fit fitters, and a further
hundred and thirty quid poorer for having to have my tank drained etc after
I fuelled up my car (a diesel) with unleaded petrol. Luckily I realised
my mistake before starting the engine, or else I might have needed a new
engine! A hundred and thirty quid seemed like a bargain at the end of the
day after we'd feared the worst. Swings and roundabouts, eh?
July 2006
Collecting the team's
award on Degree Day.
Click for bigger version.
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Part of my work at Keele involves heading up the team of lecturers
that teach the Physical Geography course. This year, the team won a prestigious
University award for "Learning and Teaching Excellence", and I got to go
up on stage on Graduation Day and collect the award on behalf of the team!
Here's a picture of me in my formal academic gown receiving the award from
the Deputy Vice-Chancellor. My Mom, George and Debbie got "VIP" tickets
to the graduation and had seats right at the front... which is how Debbie
got such a good photo! Well done to Richard and Zoe (and me!) for all the
hard work that led to getting the award... let's hope the students get
the benefit from it that we are aiming for. |
| So, what else is new? Well, I finally got round to buying some electrofrog
turnouts... and I've actually joined the N-Gauge
Society. Debbie's sad obsession with lorries has taken an alarming
turn for the worse and she has joined the Eddie
Stobart Club! We now spend happy hours lorry spotting over cappuccinos
at Keele services! Now we take turns: I take Debbie to enjoy the trains
around Crewe and she takes me to enjoy lorries on the M6! |
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| We have also discovered the Churnet Valley Railway, and we took Jack
and Emily there for a train ride... they even got to meet Thomas himself!
There are some more pictures for you, Jack and Emily, here.
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| We went to the pictures see Garfield-2 with Jack and Emily, and to
see Pirates of the Caribbean (which Debbie liked because J.Depp and O.Bloom
were in it) with Debbie D and Mart. We've had a whole lot of barbecues,
my big new book has actually appeared and everybody seems to like it, and
I'm going to take the first week in August off as a holiday to celebrate!
I've also been helping the launch of a new website by doing some publicity
for it! The site is www.childsglacier.com,
and it sells DVDs of ice collapse at an Alaskan glacier... check it out! |
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We had a morning out at Manchester Airport... didn't fly anywhere,
just went to the airport! I think it was mainly an excuse for Debbie to
go onto the motorway and spot more Eddie Stobart lorries! |
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August to November
2006
A rare and welcome get together with Robin, Ruth, Lucy David and Elizabeth,
who came for a visit in August. We also had a nice visit from Gen and James
and Rachael... but I don't seem to have any photos from that! |
Another month, another rescued pigeon. This is Bendt, a young wood
pigeon that our next door neighbour found struggling in her garden. A few
days rest and recuperation (and growing up) on our garage roof and it was
able to fly away. |
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Debbie's dream day out: a trip to
"Truckfest" in September and the
chance to sit in an Eddie Stobart Lorry! |
Dodd the dog and his little pal Kipper the cat doze together on their
shared duvet. Dodd has had some health problems throughout the late Summer
and into Autumn: he is beginning to get liver problems that throw off his
brain chemistry and give him alarming siezures. He doesn't seem too bothered,
but they are quite scary and stressful to watch and deal with: the vet
has given us medicine to shove up his bum to bring him out of the fits...
By coincidence Kipper has fits, too: she's an epileptic cat, which is apparently
quite rare. |
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After we broke our camera by taking too many photos of Eddie Stobart
lorries, we had to get a new one and we've been playing with it pretty
much non-stop! Debbie took it to Newmarket, I've been taking lots of photos
around home and Keele, and we've both been using it for train and lorry
spotting duties! Here's a nice shot from Keele, looking south west out
of Meg's field towards the Shropshire hills. |
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| A real treat in October: Teresa came to visit! On one of the days Mom
and George came up too, and Teresa cooked us all a proper big lunch. In
spite of the best efforts of our oven it didn't turn out to be Cinders
and Dust or Chicken a la Phoenix! |
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| Other things I've done recently include a trip to the Churnet
Valley Model Railway exhibition, a trip to Manchester Airport to see Debbie's
Mom off on her trip to Cuba, a LOT of trips to the vet with my credit card,
the purchase of some more n-guage track and pointwork for the new developments
on my model railway, another trip to Quik Fit with a nail in my tyre, a
lot of teaching students about physical geography, writing an article that
the journal "Geography" asked me to write about teaching Geography, working
on the finishing touches to a research paper about moraines in Greenland
for the journal Geografiska Annaler, arguing (sorry, I mean "discussing")
with colleagues and administrators at Keele about the best way to run Geography,
breakfasts in Morrison's, writing a grant application to the Royal Society
for lab equipment for my low-temperature experiments, selecting a new Physical
Geography lecturer to join us at Keele, early morning visits to the livery
yard to put Meg out into her field after her cosy nights in her stable,
watching "Monk" "Blue Murder" and "Criminal Intent" on TV, helping Colin
next door to fix a bug on his computer, holding down an epileptic cat during
its fits to make sure it doesn't bang its little head, excursions to the
M6 and the West Coast Main Line, walks in the autumn sunshine... There's
actually have so much stuff filling the days (and my memory is so time-independent)
that it's hard to remember exactly what happened when. When did Gen visit?
When did we drive down to Aqualate to meet Mom and George at that coffee
place? Debbie has been to Newmarket a few times, but we don't go far together
just now because somebody always has to be on hand to look after Dodd if
he has a fit.
I'm starting to think more and more seriously about following up my
interest in Westerns (cowboy films) in a more academic context. I'm thinking
of bridges between Physical and Cultural Geography and a 3rd year module
on Geography, landscape and cinema. I'm thinking I should read more of
Antoine de St Exupery: there must be lots I haven't read and lots I've
forgotten of what I have read. I'm wondering: if Physical Geography were
music, what would it sound like? I've reorganised one of the sitting rooms
to make it more comfortable for listening to music and reading. I'm thinking
about the art of Mondriaan. I have acquired 4 new bronze coryadors
and 4 bleeding heart tetras.
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December
2006
I had a Christmas greeting by e-mail today that
wished me a "happy, interesting and prosperous 2007". It came from Lithuania
and was addressed to me, two Russians, another English person, a Canadian,
and somebody from Belarus. One of the nice things about my line of work
is that it does put me in the way of many "interesting" things! |
Speaking of interesting things, here's a snapshot of Christmas
in the Knight household. The bird is saying "just try it". |
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| Here's Dodd the medical miracle, enjoying his 15th Christmas! |
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Merve, and all of us, wish you a
happy New Year! |
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