Lakeside office accommodation priorities (Rousse)

We all stood in a neat line on the corridor conveyor belt that carried us through the main building of the new lakeside campus. We were interested to see our new workplace and discover the names of our future office mates.

I advised the new head of school that the last time we moved campus we elected to share rooms with others outside our home research groups. This was to encourage interdisciplinary research. I also noted that it was not a good idea for line managers to share with their reportees.

While I had easily partnered up with BB last time around, now it was more difficult to choose an office mate, not least due to the recent influx of new appointees. One – a man called Vivien – was a jewellery maker. He had set up a stall to display his wares as a means of introduction to our colleagues, even though he wasn’t there in attendance himself.

Really I just wanted to share my office with BR. The only issue here was that he wanted a water feature in the room. When I found him to propose that we partner up, he was busy constructing channels for a stream to flow past his desk and into the lake.

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Adulterer caught with Loake shoes (Rousse)

First a brand new suit, then three pairs of brown Loake shoes to be delivered to his city apartment…

I had no option but to force TPR to confess to his affair.

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A naked man and an almost naked swimmer (Rousse)

BD slipped through the door that connected his flat to ours. It was lovely to see him, but I’d rather that he’d visit clothed. He told me that he had run out of underwear and asked me if I thought that TPR could help out. I took the backstairs up to TPR’s bedroom (we slept apart at this time) and found him sorting out his wardrobe. TPR could easily spare a pair of Saxx for our naked friend.

Later, MSB and DB persuaded us to go for a winter outdoor swim in the River Tyne. TPR followed them straight across the snow to the water while I struggled to undress. A kind woman undid my bra strap for me, then I removed my trousers – only to discover that I had forgotten to put my swimming costume on under my clothes. I resigned myself to missing out on all the ‘fun’ of splashing about with the others in the freezing river.

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Fly-tippers and drunks (Rousse)

I expected to sit with JB (resplendent in a green dress) at table 19 at the staff meeting, but instead found myself next to GR. Even though retired for almost a year, LM joined us. GR had just swept the board in the annual teaching awards. He was happy to share the secret of his success with the pair of us: giving his students ‘the eye’.

After the meeting, I invited my immediate colleagues back to my street for a party in the shed that I had installed on the pavement just outside number 20. PC, DH and FR hesitated over my invitation, eventually refusing. So instead I walked with BR back to his house.

We took a long, boring route along the main road, trudging like a pair of refugees, or recently released prisoners. We passed some people fly-tipping, but were too nervous to challenge their behaviour. We were also sorry to see that the yellow-painted building that used to be a nature centre had been sold by the council and was now a residential property. Then we had to navigate our way round a group of drunks fighting outside a pub.

Eventually we reached BR’s house at 8:30pm. From there I rang my mother and told her that I would soon set off home by bus.

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Hunting down the Brazilian mafia (Rousse)

When TPR refused to take me on holiday, I set off on my own independent adventure: to hunt down the Brazilian mafia on the mean streets of Sāo Paulo.

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Three suspicious spots of blood on a bridal gown (Rousse)

The three neat spots of blood on the skirt of my bridal gown would be enough to convict me of murder. There was no option but to burn the (otherwise) beautiful dress – now.

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Conference skiving (Rousse)

One day at a conference was quite enough for me these days, so I made a good contribution on day 1, then lounged about in my hotel bedroom on day 2. I would have done the same on day 3 had my emeritus professor colleague not turned up at my door to complain about  ‘unprofessional behaviour’.

I argued that (for a biomedical scientist at an information science event) CA had done a fabulous job when she delivered my paper on the second day, and that I trusted her to do the same on day 3. I really was surplus to requirements.

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Dissertation and desertion (Rousse)

My dissertation was due for submission in a matter of weeks and I hadn’t started it even though I had all the access to resources that I would ever need, now that I lived in a cubby hole in the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford.

Meanwhile TPR was on the verge of making it official that he was leaving me. I tried every trick in the book to keep him. I even led him naked round a pork factory. This wasn’t as outrageous as might be assumed: we were invisible, so long as we didn’t pick up the free samples of meat on offer to the general public.

I was convinced that TPR was simply depressed – the small bottle of whisky that he carried around with him was my evidence of this. Fortunately he cheered up when presented with the challenge of cooking sausages, including specialité de la région black boudin, for my French family.

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Boris Johnson paves the streets with gold (Rousse)

The latest government scheme to placate the population was Boris Johnson’s initiative to pave the streets with gold – or at least coins embedded into the pavements of Loughborough.

When I asked a man who looked like an engineer if he would fix the wheels of my shopping trolley, he answered that he would do so on one condition: that I helped him prise 50p pieces out of the pavement and give them all to him.

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Reckless driving on the River Tweed (Rousse)

My father was super-impressed that my school friend PM (was PS) owned the land that ran from the back of her house all the way to the River Tweed.

‘Is the bank solid?’ he asked, as he inched the wheels of the black Range Rover closer to the crumbling sandy ledge above the water.

I drafted a panicky status update for Facebook about my fears of a watery death. However, I was too nervous to post it for fear that my contacts would judge me as a show-off.

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