For the third time JB asked if I would help teach the first years how to dance, and once more I happily accepted her invitation. Didn’t she ever read her e-mail?

Standing in her office, I also wondered why JB had never unpacked the boxes from our last departmental move of over a decade ago. I pulled back one of the cardboard lids and inside found a pile of old hardback novels. Dating from the mid-1990s, their title pages were marked up in HTML, as was the practice for a short while in the early days of the World Wide Web. (The idea was that the pages could be scanned directly into automated library systems and thus speed up cataloguing processes. This system was never widely adopted.)

Now that I had confirmed the dance class details I was free to continue my hike with ST and a few colleagues from other UK universities. Our companions included BK (Bath), BC (Manchester) and DA (Leeds). Our route took us north from Scarborough along the coastal path.

Although it was a good 30 miles north of our final destination of Whitby, all along the way we could see Roseberry Topping glistening in the distance. The local tourist board’s decision to paint all the major North Yorkshire landmarks silver was a huge success in drawing visitors to the region.