Category Archives: Uncategorized

Party disaster (Rousse)

Posted on April 12, 2014 by Dreamaticus

My fiftieth birthday celebration was a disaster. Everything was wrong: The timing – a Wednesday lunchtime when everyone was at work The venue – a boring hotel dining room in rainy Manchester The guest list – dreary external work colleagues … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Icing sugar icons and a PhD viva re-run (Rousse)

Posted on April 12, 2014 by Dreamaticus

While JA was making pastel button-sized icons out of icing sugar, PL ran some sophisticated programs on his laptop. To begin with they worked silently side by side. Then PL started interrogating JA about his PhD. This raised so many … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

I was Anne of Green Gables and newly married to Gilbert Blythe. For now, however, I was serving as a nurse in World War I. Somehow I had lost my ‘ward trolley’ and was forced to push a bulky office … Continue reading →

Posted on April 11, 2014 by Dreamaticus | Leave a comment

An office affair (Rousse)

Posted on April 11, 2014 by Dreamaticus

Each day that I turned up on campus I discovered that I had a new office. The problem was that they kept packing up my belongings and dumping them in a new location without first removing those of the previous … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

An encounter with a one-legged walker (Rousse)

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Dreamaticus

I slowed my run to match the pace of the man in white wellingtons walking towards the big house. There was something about his gait that gave away that his left leg was false. He told me that his disability … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Down on the farm (Rousse)

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Dreamaticus

I’d always known him as “G”, but my acquaintance was now insisting that all call him “TheFarm”. This was on the basis that this was his pet name at home. I thought that this would be really confusing given that … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The definitive guide to Windows 8 (Rousse)

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Dreamaticus

TPR’s backlist of technical papers and books, combined with his retired status, made him an easy target for publishers. He was even pestered by a man we met on holiday, both in person at the resort and by phone when … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Hanky panky in the headmaster’s office (Rousse)

Posted on April 8, 2014 by Dreamaticus

It was my first day back at school and, before lessons even started, I was called into the headmaster’s office for turning up late. I tried to explain that after years of working in academia I was completely unused to … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Armed, dangerous, hungry (Belle)

Posted on April 7, 2014 by Dreamaticus

I was travelling across Europe in my private railway carriage. I served my guest a traditional ‘pre-breakfast breakfast’ of Emmental cheese and salami served with sweet bread rolls. This would tide us over until ‘proper breakfast’ I assured him. Suddenly … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Missing blue dachshund found after 13 years (Rousse)

Posted on April 7, 2014 by Dreamaticus

The drilling truck was enormous, and looked a bit strange with a mini-trailer attached to the back, but we needed somewhere to carry our plastic beach spades. We manoeuvred the vehicle onto the mudflats and set off in the direction … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment