Silver landmarks a huge hit with the tourists (Rousse)

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.

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Chocolate cheesecake recipe wins national award (Rousse)

Hidden on the back page amongst stories of minor sporting triumphs, and presented in a tiny font, I read the most exciting news. My friend DT was the overall winner of the UK chocolate cheesecake championship!

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European cyclist cheats (Rousse)

We were cycling across Europe from Istanbul by tandem. The others on the trandem were cheats. All their “pedal” power was generated by a motor hidden under the third saddle at the back of their ridiculous bike.

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A deeply regretted relocation (Rousse)

My talisman was a 12 inch long clear plastic tube just large enough in diameter to carry my mixed coin collection. It was three quarters full, so also served as a rattle for grown-ups. This provided a comfort as I tried to make sense of our foolish decision to move to London. On the underground it also attracted the attention of tramps, who tried to wrench it from my grasp whenever the lights dimmed in the carriage.

TPR and I asked ourselves over and over again why we had given up good careers, a comfortable lifestyle in Edinburgh, and easy access to the highlands to move south. Here there were no suitable jobs for us, we were forced to live in sub-standard housing, and it took two flights to reach out favourite holiday destination. Our relocation decision simply made no sense at all.

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Voodoo academic claims end to African famine (Rousse)

“Prior to the agrarian revolution…” boomed the pompous voice across the lecture hall.

We were supposed be celebrating my birthday with tea and cake, but instead were forced to listen to this overblown academic drone on and on and on, convinced that he alone could solve the problem of famine in Africa. His line of argument drew on his own latest book, a work that was based on not a single jot of empirical research.

It was rumoured that this same man kept a head and shoulders portrait of me under his desk at work so that he could stamp on it at regular intervals, voodoo-style.

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Bunny hitchhiker antics (Rousse)

As I was walking home I saw a big grey rabbit riding outstretched across the radiator grill of a car.

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Blackhouse bathroom bonanza (Rousse)

KA was still in the middle of her shift when I arrived at the newsagent’s shop. I was meeting her from work to take her my new house in central Hexham, next to an outpost of Newcastle University. KA grabbed a free copy of Choice magazine for me from a display rack, and then we set off.

The last time that I had checked the work on my new home the restored blackhouse had been enhanced by the addition of a glass portico. I was appalled that this had since been dismantled, and I feared that the house had been vandalised. KA and I went inside to check, accompanied by a small group of Teesside High School alumni.

There was nothing to fear. The entrance hall was bright and airy, wooden-floored with whitewashed walls. TPR was also there, showing off the palatial rooms in the main part of the building. What marked it as our future home was the proportion of bathrooms to bedrooms – seven to three – plus a massive steam room.

I decided to ignore the post addressed to a complete stranger that I found on the leather sofa in the sitting room. Nobody other than us would ever have specified so many bathrooms in such a small living space.

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Daring Dane defeated by dastardly handbag thief (Rousse)

A handbag thief was on the loose. His method was to slit the base of his victims’ bags from behind then deftly extract the valuables from beneath. He performed this trick on me as I walked down the street.

I later found out that many of the running club girls had also been targeted. Brave Dane MSB was not going to stand for this. She chased after the thief with a dagger. Unfortunately her tiny weapon was no match for his scythe.

Then we discovered that the whole dastardly handbag-thieving operation had been masterminded by the criminal himself in league with running club member and double agent KL.

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Hugh Grant lookalike lost in the US (Rousse)

This was an incentive holiday with a difference: as well as winning a place for yourself and your significant other, you were also allowed to bring along some friends. So JW, DT and other Edinburgh pals were joining us in the US to celebrate TPR’s career success. What I didn’t appreciate was that not all of TPR’s immediate colleagues had been lucky enough to secure places at the event. I made a terrible faux pas by listing everyone invited by TPR in the presence of a bearded engineer who had clearly not made the grade.

As things turned out, the trip was not a complete success. I lost TPR somewhere in the city and in his place ST turned up, all woeful about his various inadequacies. I called the police with a simple description that would surely help them track down TPR. “He looks a bit like Hugh Grant” I explained.

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Faerie Queene revision strategy (Rousse)

ST claimed that he’d done no revision, but I didn’t believe him. What was certain, however, was that I was yet to open Spenser’s Faerie Queene. I didn’t even have a copy of the poem in my possession and the exam was on Monday! My only hope of passing was to get hold of a modern English translation and learn the whole dratted thing off by heart.

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