Paul

Random question...

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 08:54:02 GMT

Does anyone have a good recipe for butternut squash? There was one in my last veg box, but whenever I've tried to cook with it in the past, it's turned out to be insipid at best...

And the pantomime starts again...

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 10:16:52 GMT

I've just had my first threatening letter from the TV licensing authority, exactly a month after moving in - I wonder how long it will take to persuade them that I don't have a TV this time... (At my previous address, it took about three and a half years, fifty or sixty letters from them, and three or four visits.)

Mon, 10 Mar 2008 12:49:30 GMT

My attempts to buy a flat finally seem to have worked...

Thu, 07 Feb 2008 12:30:54 GMT

It strikes me as remarkably unhelpful if a pair of scissors marketed as being 'suitable for lab use' has acetone soluble handles. As a result I now have smears of congealing black plastic all over my hands...

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 16:26:12 GMT

Out of curiosity, I thought I'd keep track of the bits and pieces of clothing I made over the last year, and it came out as: 12 frock coats, 11 waistcoats, 4 pairs of trousers, 6 pairs of britches, 3 shirts, 2 cravats, 6 sashes, 4 jackets, 4 pairs of pockets, 3 skirts, 1 pair of hose, 1 pourpoint, 2 hats, 1 tablecloth, 1 apron, 1 cloak, 1 phone case and 1 wallet.

Sadly, rather few of those were actually for me...

Books Read in 2007

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 08:44:34 GMT

The Black House - Patricia Highsmith (f)
Time is the Simplest Thing - Clifford Simak (f)
Miracles and Idolatry - Voltaire (r)
Kitchen Confidential - Anthony Bourdain (r)
The Broken Kings - Robert Holdstock (f)
The Club of Queer Trades - G.K. Chesterton (f)
Vile Bodies - Evelyn Waugh (f)
A Canticle for Leibowitz - Walter Miller (f)
The War Hound and the World’s Pain - Michael Moorcock (f)
Funeral in Berlin - Len Deighton (f)
Chatterton - Peter Ackroyd (f)
On Natural Selection - Charles Darwin (r)
Boarders Away: With Steel - William Gilkerson (r)
The Observations - Jane Harris (f)
Meditations - Marcus Aurelius (r)
Smiley’s People - John le Carré (f)
Fragile Things - Neil Gaiman (f)
Through a Glass Darkly - Donna Leon (f)
The Naming of the Dead - Ian Rankin (f)
The Secret Pilgrim - John le Carré (f)
Moll Flanders - Daniel Defoe (f)
Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman (f)
The Hell-Fire Clubs - Geoffrey Ashe (r)
The Lost Continent - Bill Bryson (r)
Puckoon - Spike Milligan (f)
Eleven - Patricia Highsmith (f)
Agent Zigzag - Ben Macintyre (r)
Cooking for Kings: The Life of Antonin Carême - Ian Kelly (r)
Newton: A Biography - Peter Ackroyd (r)
The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid - Bill Bryson (r)
The Book of Lost Things - John Connolly (f)
Necropolis: London and Its Dead - Catharine Arnold (r)
The Adventure of Death - R.W. MacKenna (r)
Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula le Guin (f)
The Tombs of Atuan - Ursula le Guin (f)
The Great Fire of London - Peter Ackroyd (f)
The Bachelor Home Companion - P.J. O’Rourke (r)
The Shadow in the North - Philip Pullman (f)
The Farthest Shore - Ursula le Guin (f)
Tehanu - Ursula le Guin (f)
Victorian and Edwardian Ghost Stories - Richard Dalby (ed.) (f)
The Other Wind - Ursula le Guin (f)
Tales from Earthsea - Ursula le Guin (f)
The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde - Peter Ackroyd (r)
The Early Asimov, Volume 3 - Isaac Asimov (f)
First Light - Peter Ackroyd (f)
Single & Single - John le Carré (f)
Sheet Metal Work - R.E. Wakeford (r)
The Jaguar Hunter - Lucius Shepard (f)
Earthsearch - James Follett (f)
Earthsearch II: Death Ship - James Follett (f)
Blake: A Biography - Peter Ackroyd (r)
Pompeii - Robert Harris (f)
Monstrous Regiment - Terry Pratchett (f)
The Shape of Snakes - Minette Walters (f)
Ascending Peculiarity: Edward Gorey on Edward Gorey - Edward Gorey (r)
The Cornish Smuggling Industry - Paul White (r)
A Murder of Quality - John le Carré (f)
London’s City Churches - Stephan Millar (r)
The British Seaman - Christopher Lloyd (r)
Marlborough - Correlli Barnett (r)
Night Watch - Terry Pratchett (f)
Boarders Away: With Fire - William Gilkerson (r)
English Music - Peter Ackroyd (f)
The Man in the Picture - Susan Hill (f)
The Great Art of Artillery - Kasimir Siemenovic (r)
A is for Ox: A Short History of the Alphabet - Lyn Davies (r)
Monty: His Part in My Victory - Spike Milligan (f)
It Just Occurred to Me... - Humphrey Lyttelton (r)
Making Money - Terry Pratchett (f)

(f) - fiction
(r) - reference/non-fiction/biography/essays
Titles in italics have been re-read.

Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:13:05 GMT

For those who want to take a look, wyte_phantom now has a website displaying some of the corsets and other pieces of clothing she's made for people - here.

Laptop Question...

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 08:53:14 GMT

I've money in my research budget to buy myself a laptop, but as I know very little about them I was wondering if anyone could offer me advice as to what I should get. It needs to run Windows XP (as a lot of the analytical software I use won't run under Vista), and ideally it should be small, light and rugged enough for me to easily carry when I cycle to work. Any suggestions?

Website update...

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 08:27:17 GMT

Having been typically lazy about sorting it out, I've finally updated my website again - as ever, thanks again to everyone who has let me use their pictures, and if I have made you something which isn't on the site, I'd be very grateful if you could send me a photograph or two...

Abort, Retry, Fire?

Mon, 12 Nov 2007 09:16:54 GMT

However, whilst the shot was putting plenty of holes through the base unit, it was doing nothing more to the screen than leaving minor spall marks on the glass.

So something a little larger was tried:

It then became apparent why it had been quite so difficult to get the screen to break - the glass turned out to be be best part of two centimetres thick. Compaq obviously expect their computers to get a lot of abuse...

Thanks to orkamedies for the use of the ordnance, and wyte_phantom and evilmattikinz for the photographs.

Embarrassment...

Fri, 19 Oct 2007 10:40:10 GMT

When I was in Denmark last week, I happened to notice in a bookshop that the paperbacks seemed to be incredibly expensive - out of curiosity I picked up the nearest hardback to see if they were similarly overpriced. It was only after I'd been holding it for a few moments that I realised it was 'The Da Vinci Code' and was immediately overcome with terrible sense of mortification, horrified by the idea that someone I knew might have seen me with it in my hand^* (the fact that I knew no-one else in Copenhagen being beside the point).

* As with the occasion on which I bought a copy of the Telegraph^† because they were giving away a DVD of 'Orlando', and immediately bumped into three people I knew whilst holding the dreadful thing...

† For which midnight_echo is entirely to blame...

Fri, 19 Oct 2007 10:13:45 GMT

I've just put in an offer on a flat and it's been accepted. Fingers crossed it won't turn into such a stressful, costly and fruitless disaster as last time...

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 17:43:56 GMT

I've just realised that it's five years to the day since my PhD viva, and it's still as vividly terrifying in my mind as it was at the time...

Mon, 24 Sep 2007 09:25:13 GMT

Not a bad start to the week - I've just won a £20 book token from the UCU's crossword competition. (Of course, this was balanced by a second letter from the Union telling me that they want more money from me for my subscription, but nonetheless...)

My brain has stopped working...

Fri, 14 Sep 2007 12:13:19 GMT

I've spent far too long compiling a literature review for a piece of research I'm about to start and still have a depressingly undiminished stack of papers to get through, but my brain has stopped working - I've just read about a page and a half of the latest paper to make it to the top of the pile before I realised that it was actually one I'd written myself. I think I need a break...

Fri, 14 Sep 2007 08:58:42 GMT

If anyone's going to Dr Fell's from Southampton on Saturday, and has space in the car, I was wondering if I could beg a lift? Thanks.

The joys of dealing with estate agents (the latest is a series of themed whinges)...

Wed, 12 Sep 2007 09:51:52 GMT

'How about this property?'
'No, it's in Shirley. I told you that I don't want to live in Shirley.'
'Or this one? It's not in Shirley.'
'Yes it is, you're just calling it something else. I still don't want to live in Shirley.'
'This one, then?'
(With a note of hysteria)'No, it's in bloody Shirley!'

[Also repeated with a series of properties several tens of thousands of pounds outside my budget.]

Mon, 10 Sep 2007 17:12:41 GMT

I was supposed to be viewing a couple of flats tonight, so dutifully left work early in order to get there in plenty of time. Needless to say, the bastard estate agent didn't bother to turn up. Again.

Mon, 10 Sep 2007 15:01:21 GMT

I've finally sent off the completed version of a chapter I'd been asked to write - it's been hanging over me for months now and I'm very glad to see the back of it. (I know when I get the proofs back it will be full of mortifying and inexplicable mistakes, but just at the moment I don't have to think about it any more...)

Thu, 06 Sep 2007 14:36:00 GMT

It occurs to me that if I'd treated my students in as shoddy a manner as estate agents have treated me over the past year, I would have long since been fired.

Tue, 17 Jul 2007 08:12:19 GMT

I've finally got round to updating the website of clothing I've made for people. Thanks to everyone who has let me use their photographs, and if I have made something for you and don't have a photo of it, I'd be very grateful if you could send me one - hopefully it won't be quite so long til the next update...

Wed, 04 Jul 2007 11:29:17 GMT

Winchester - and, more importantly, the corridor outside my office - is full of exchange students, who seem to be unvaryingly loud, hyperactive and ill-mannered.

Thu, 15 Feb 2007 16:10:54 GMT

I was thinking I should get round to updating the website of clothing I've made for people, so if I've made you something and it's not on the site, could you send me a picture or two? Thanks.

Books Read in 2006

Wed, 03 Jan 2007 09:50:01 GMT

The Honourable Schoolboy - John le Carré (f)
Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman (f)
The Story of English - David Crystal (r)
Smuggling in Hampshire and Dorset, 1700-1850 - Geoffrey Morley (r)
Milton in America - Peter Ackroyd (f)
Smuggling in the Bristol Channel, 1700-1850 - Graham Smith (r)
England in the Age of Hogarth - Derek Jarrett (r)
Tiger! Tiger! - Alfred Bester (f)
Princesses: The Six Daughters of George III - Flora Fraser (r)
The Plato Papers - Peter Ackroyd (f)
Details of the Rocket System - William Congreve (r)
The Fountain Overflows - Rebecca West (f)
Hogarth and English Caricature - F. D. Klingender (r)
At Day’s Close: A History of Night-Time - A. Roger Ekirch (r)
The Necropolis Railway - Andrew Martin (f)
Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem - Peter Ackroyd (f)
Pirates: A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates - Charles Johnson (r)
Restoration - Rose Tremain (f)
Gridlinked - Neal Asher (f)
Hogarth’s England - Eveline Cruikshanks (r)
City of the Sun - Sarah Bryant (f)
Smuggling in Yorkshire, 1700-1850 - Graham Smith (r)
Maigret Stonewalled - Georges Simenon (f)
Maigret at the Crossroads - Georges Simenon (f)
Gods of the Greataway - Michael Coney (f)
To Any Lengths - Georges Simenon (f)
Nights at the Circus - Angela Carter (f)
Perfume - Patrick Süskind (f)
Cat Karina - Michael Coney (f)
The Comedians - Graham Greene (f)
The Man in the Maze - Robert Silverberg (f)
The Wreckers - Bella Bathurst (r)
The Battle of the Boyne, 1690 - Michael McNally (r)
Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino (f)
The Name of the Rose - Umberto Eco (f)
Europe in the 18^th Century - George Rudé (r)
Medieval Women: A Social History of Women in England 450-1500 - Henrietta Leyser (r)
Tyburn - Alan Brooke and David Brandon (r)
The Knife Man - Wendy Moore (r)
Someone Like You - Roald Dahl (f)
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar - Roald Dahl (f)
Black Barty - Aubrey Burl (r)
The Innocence of Father Brown - G.K. Chesterton (f)
Over to You - Roald Dahl (f)
Cocaine Nights - J.G. Ballard (f)
Ripley Under Ground - Patricia Highsmith (f)
The Ministry of Fear - Graham Greene (f)
The Man Who Knew Too Much - G.K. Chesterton (f)
Ripley’s Game - Patricia Highsmith (f)
On the Pleasure of Hating - William Hazlett (r)
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad (f)
Use of Weapons - Iain M. Banks (f)
Wise Children - Angela Carter (f)
Gloriana - Michael Moorcock (f)
Tale of a Tub - Jonathan Swift (r)
The Flood - Ian Rankin (f)
Louis XIV - Philippe Erlanger (r)
Wintersmith - Terry Pratchett (f)
Man Walks into a Pub: A Sociable History of Beer - Pete Brown (r)
Into the Sea of Stars - William Forstchen (f)
Death at La Fenice - Donna Leon (f)

(f) - fiction
(r) - reference/non-fiction/essays
Titles in italics have been re-read.

This seems rather appropriate...

Sun, 10 Dec 2006 18:10:53 GMT

Epitaph on the Politician

Here richly, with ridiculous display,
The Politician's corpse was laid away.
While all of his acquaintance sneered and slanged
I wept: for I had longed to see him hanged.

- Hilaire Belloc.