In the Netherlands

It was going to be a short visit! I didn’t want to be away from the cat too long, and I also wanted to have time to see Nick for a bit. And I booked 5 days away. Two of these are travel. And two were Christmas. But it would have to do. 

On Christmas Day I would be with my sister. And on Boxing Day with my mum. And the day after I was hoping to see some cousins, but only one was available. And I thought I’d go for coffee in the morning with my old friend Koen, who had recently reappeared again after some 30 years.

At my sister’s we would make Christmas dinner. I had suggested the menu. It required a lot of oven. And we only started after a game of Carcassonne. So it got a bit late! But it was fun to do a big cooking session with my sister. And when it was almost ready we went upstairs to change into something glamourous. I borrowed a pair of smart shoes and felt super fancy! 

The next day I was at my mum’s. And there I made progress with my physiotherapy. The exercises he had given me all required a step of sorts, and mum’s place quite purposefully doesn’t have any. But I found suitable steps right by the front door. And I did the interval training I had been advised to do right outside the medieval city walls. 

Running territory

Otherwise we mainly sat at the table, with coffee or urea or wine or beer, and newspapers and books. Unspectacular but snug! 

Going for a coffee with Koen next morning was good too. It’s funny how so much is still the same as in 1993, but the curating of our images is gone now. This is nicer! And he had picked a nice cafe. 

On my way to the cafe

Lunch with my sister and cousin was good too! It’s always nice to see them. And there were updates on jobs, children, siblings, partners and parents. And again the venue was good. 

With my cousin (middle) and sister (right)

On the way back I popped into a shop to buy a thank you for the neighbour who was looking after the cat. And then I was back at my mum’s table, for the last evening. And I made my sandwiches for the next day. It’s a long way home! 

The next morning I got ready, and said goodbye to my mum. It had been a short visit, and there were some people I would have liked to have seen but hadn’t, but that’s life. It was time to start heading back to my own place with my own cat. For a little bit of homely winter holidays! 

To the Netherlands: train again

I seem to have developed the habit of alternating taking the train and the boat to the Netherlands. Both has its drawbacks, so after suffering those of the one means of transport, I take a break from them and next time suffer those of the other. So after my late summer ferry trip it was time for another Eurostar journey.

I had been a bit late booking, and had had to book fancy tickets, as the economy ones had sold out. So I went out on ‘plus’ tickets and back on ‘premier’ tickets. Might actually be quite nice! 

Before you get to the Eurostar, though, you of course first have to get to London. And that’s not trivial. I made sure to check what train I would need if the booked one would be cancelled. And the first thing I did after waking up on the day of travel was check if it would be going. And it was. 

It wasn’t busy. I had two seats for myself. It was quite comfortable! And I got to London without issue. Not with the travel, anyway. I did have trouble with my phone. It did its not wanting to charge again! If I plugged it in it would stop charging quite soon, and then I would have to unplug it and plug it back in many times before it would connect again. I imagine that’s how you make your charging port even worse quite quickly! And that worried me. I had both my UK train tickets and my Eurostar tickets on my phone only. And it had a notoriously short battery life. I had better try to get my tickets printed! 

The not very busy train to London

On Euston I found the Avanti West Coast ticket office, and explained my predicament, to no avail whatsoever. They said I had an e-ticket, and there was no way they could print it. And gave me useless advice about buying a charger. I have a perfectly fine charger thank you very much. What I don’t have is acceptable customer service. I would have to sort something out in the Netherlands. Not easy when it’s Christmas! 

I went to St Pancras and got to the Eurostar terminal. There I asked them the same thing. And they happily printed my tickets for me. That lifted my mood a bit. 

Getting to Brussels went fine. When you have a ‘plus’ ticket you get room to swing a cat, and a meal! I enjoyed that. And after the 45 minute wait in Brussels it was the same getting to Amsterdam (without the meal). 

In Amsterdam things got a bit less relaxed; I saw I could catch a train to Amersfoort, but I needed to check in for that. And where do you do that? When entering the station. And I was already in the station. Shit! And leaving the station you can only check out. But if you check out without having checked in, the system assumes you have failed to check in, and they’ll charge you. That happened, and got me nowhere. I then just snuck out after someone else, and then I was outside and could finally check in. I still caught the train! And then it was only a short ride and the walk to my mum’s place. I got there about10 pm. Success! Let the festive cheer begin! 

Arriving in Amersfoort

Passport expiring

I’ve lived in the UK so long that I already have to renew my passport from her for the third time. And every time the possibilities are different.

The first time there were still many consulates in the UK. I went to a small Welsh town to sort things out. It was all very pleasant. 

The second time, budgets had been cut, and the consulates had closed. There was only one UK option: London. But you could also do it in Schiphol. Back then I still flew. So that’s what I did. It was a bit nerve-racking: you could only book an appointment for applying for the passport; not for picking it up. You would have to hope you could get such an appointment, which you could book after the application, before you were due to fly back. Not ideal! But at least it worked out. 

In 2025 it expires again. And now outsourcing has taken over. There are a few cities in the UK where you can now renew your passport with a commercial company, and Birmingham is one of them. And that’s not nearly as far away as London. And what might come in handy is that it’s not overly far from Shrewsbury. 

I have an appointment! There didn’t seem to be many slots available so I went for one. It’s in January, even though my passport doesn’t expire until late May. Oh well! At least I’ll get it over with…

Back to the physio

It was in September that I did the fateful Thursday Night Hill session over Moel Eilio! And my running hasn’t been the same since. Most of the time I didn’t run at all, except for my laps of the parking lot. And I miss it. So when my marking load lessened, I contacted the physio again. Could he slot me in before Christmas? And he just could: on the 23rd.

I decided to go on bike. I wasn’t in a hurry and the weather was good enough. And it’s not a very sweaty route. So that went well! Even though I had to stop twice for reasons of having an insect in my eye. Hurray for the little mirror! 

Along the route

This time, we already knew what the culprit was: my peroneal tendon. But clearly, it needed a different approach. 

The physio had his usual look and prod. He reassured me that my daily ankle test runs (generally a few hundred meters) had been a good idea. And he said I should ramp up the exercises. More repetitions, new quite strenuous exercises, and even some added weight. Ok, I can do that! And he suggested interval training instead of my ploddy runs. Better 20-30 seconds of either speed or uphill running, followed by 20-30 seconds of walking. 

He also asked if I had any races coming up. I said I was trying to manage my expectations! But that I did have both the Nick Beer 10k and the Trawsfynydd race in the back of my head. He said he had faith I would be ready for them. I hope he’s right! I will sure do my best. 

I biked home before the weather turned too wet. It’s a nice ride. I hope I won’t have to come back anytime soon, but if I do, I hope I can go on bike again. 

Later that day I did an interval run. It went ok! No limping. And I did my first round of the exercises. Let’s see how this goes! 

Throwing axes

Nick wanted to do something that involved his youngest son. And what do you do with teenagers? Throwing axes, of course! I had only just realised the day before that that was a thing; bizarrely, it had come up during lunch the day before (I have an axe-obsessed colleague). The older son had places to go. So on the late Saturday afternoon we headed for the Shrewsbury shopping centre, where this would take place. 

We got there and signed in. Only then did I realise it’s not a given you can do that with a young teenager. But Nick had checked. They allow people from the age of ten to do their thing there! 

The place had two lanes; essentially cages with one side open. Makes sense; you get axes flying around, and you want to limit where they can go. We got one, and an employee showed us how to throw the axes, and how to work the machine that would detect whether you hit something, and if so, what. It also kept score. And then we could start! We gave the machine our names, and picked an avatar. And Nick started. 

It was quite fun! The basics of the throw are easy. It’s just that sometimes it goes wrong and the axe bounces off the wall. And I mostly got the hang of it. I won the first game convincingly. And the bloke who had showed us came back to provide some extra guidance. Fewer axes bounced after that. 

Nick throwing an axe

The first 3 games we played on a projected (and simplified) darts board, but after that we tried some others. They can project all sorts onto that wall! We also did a version of whack-a-mole, where moles and rabbits would pop up, and another game where we were trying to hit zombies walking across the board. 

The hour went by fast! I think it was a good idea. And we all won games. Just me the most! Not sure I will get invited back. Although it would be fun to do this again, with both Nick’s sons. Who knows! 

First walk from the book

 Nick had given me a book with Shropshire walks for my birthday. I figured we would have a lot of fun with that! And I was soon right.

I had intended to see him the week before my birthday, but storm Darragh got in the way. So I moved my train ticket to the week after my birthday. A bit close to Christmas but so be it! And it would be good but gusty weather so we could do the first walk. I had picked one around Myddle, not far from where he lives. 

The Red Lion, where the walk starts and ends 

We started around noon. It was fine weather! And Shropshire is very pretty. There was a fair amount of sloshing through wet fields. There mud splatters on my trousers came up to crotch height! But that’s ok. 

Scenic bridge

Walk selfie

View from a ridge

At some point, the route went through a copse. It was cross-cut with mountain bike trails. The book was a bit vague here: ‘keeping ahead and right at each fork’. That should lead us down to a garden edge where we were instructed to go right onto the road. Well! We made our way through, and ended up on a road by the corner of a garden. And turned right on that road, as instructed. 

By then Nick was keen to cut the route short. He has to be careful with his back, and was also eager to get back to his son. That was fine; we could forget about the public footpaths and just walk back over the road. But then we realised we already were on that road. We had come out of the copse too far to the north, and had accidentally already taken the shortcut! So bad navigation, good outcome. And we can just come back one day to do the loop we now left out. 

Hopefully, Nick’s back will keep improving, and maybe we can at some point do entire loops, including the longer ones! But even like this we had a good time. It was a fab present! 

Term over

The end of term is often terribly hectic, but this year, after I finished the three sets of marking, things got easier. The day after I would see a cohort of students for an exam practice session, and that needed preparation, so I worked another evening, but I knew that was a one-off. And after that session I had a fairly relaxed day. In the afternoon, I had the presentation of  a student who couldn’t do it on the official day, and I saw a dissertation student. In between I did all the smaller tasks that had fallen a bit by the wayside. 

The day after there were more student presentations, then doughnut eating, the seminar about physical oceanography in Bangor, and then another student presentation and a meeting with my Welsh tutor. One week left!

That week was a bit fragmented. First a whole day of student presentations, and then a day with meetings about academic integrity, and teaching administration of dissertation projects. And a brief Christmas celebration with the Teaching and Scholarship team. And the day after that I had the morning to myself; mainly for providing feedback and grades for the students who had done presentations. And in the afternoon we had a Christmas lunch for the entire School. 

Atmospheric commute pic

That Thursday I was on Main Campus; at graduation in the morning, and listening to my tutees doing their presentations in the afternoon. And on Friday I had almost nothing timetabled. I spent the day trying to leave a clean-ish slate for the new year: all feedback given, all academic integrity admin sorted, et cetera. And the plants watered, as they will be alone for two weeks. And then Marjan came to get me to celebrate the end of term with a drink. And that was it! Back in the new year! 

Winter graduation 2024

I had the date of the winter graduation in my dairy quite far in advance. But when the email came asking if we would register our presence there, I hesitated. Should I skip this one? It had been so busy with marking! I really can do without sitting in a room clapping for well over an hour, and being expected to be waiting around for at least half an hour before that, if I am desperately trying to get marking done. But then I had the bulk of the marking done the week before. Should I go after all?

Then there was an additional event. Suddenly I heard that our old Head of School, David Thomas, was going to get an honorary doctorate. I was surprised. This man is a professor in our field! I thought they gave honorary doctorates to people who didn't have traditional doctorates. I clearly remember Hamza Yassin getting one. That made sense. And the weird thing is as well that our School had not nominated him. Nobody seemed to know who had. And as a matter of fact, he was decidedly unpopular in the school, and he knows it very well. But because it would be a doctorate in marine science, it would be our School presenting him with it. And that peaked my curiosity.

I tended to get on with him. He has the subtlety of a brick, but at least something is happening. And if you are direct back at him, he accepts that. I can deal with people like that. I find these quintessentially English people, who beat around the bush like there is no tomorrow, much more difficult to deal with.

With all that in mind, when the day of graduation came I put on a dress and biked to the main campus. There I checked if they still had a gown for me. Normally you'll have to reserve these, but I hadn't. And they put my name on a list, where I also saw one of my colleagues. I wasn't the only one! But they still had one, and I went to Council Chamber.

All gowned up

At some point, David arrived. He was amused and confused. Even he didn't know who had nominated him. And he was aware of some people not having a very good day what with him getting this honour. But there we were!

We did the usual thing of lining up, walking in, sitting down, and clapping for an hour. Some of it is just politeness; there are generally several schools in one graduation ceremony, so you would be clapping for students in, say, social care, that you'll never have heard of. But some of the students were ours, and then it is always a lot more exciting.

My view during the ceremony 

Then came the ceremony for the honorary doctorate. I don't think our Head of School was enjoying giving that speech! But he delivered it. And then David speeched himself.

Genuine warm smiles: our current Head of School left, and David right.  Pic by the university.

Then we were ushered out into the courtyard. There I sought out the students I knew to congratulate them. But then I slipped away. In not much time, my first year students would be delivering there presentations, and I wanted to get ready for that. But I am glad I went!

Jennifer, who got her MSc and is now doing a PhD, with my colleagues Martyn (l) and Mattias (r). Pic by the university.

A year in sport

A lot of things are more fun when you can quantify them! Which is where Strava gets a lot of its appeal from. Exercise is fun, and it is even more fun if you also get to see how much you did of it. So when last year, Strava offered me my year in sport, I enjoyed that. And this year it did it again, of course! And not only do I now know how much I did (roughly, as sometimes the recording goes wrong), but also whether I did more or less than I did last year. And the result is unequivocal. 

Last year I did an activity on 250 days, covered 4107 km with 76 km of ascent, and took 325 hours to do that. 

This year I seem to have got more active. I did an activity on 288 days, covered 5193 km with 98 km of ascent, and took 414 hours to do that. (The pictures are not entirely consistent because I took screenshots on two consecutive days. The overview is from December 18, which is the same date I checked it last year, and the other shots are from December 19.)

I also was the most active in July again. Not entirely sure why! 

I figured I could do more this year than last year. And I did! And the interesting thing will be how 2025 will look for me. I really hope that in January I will be back running, and soon back to my normal levels of it!

This year’s overview 

Distance covered

Time per month

Activities per month

The heat map of 2024

Fish tank at work

The university has jumped on the well-being bandwagon. We have a well-being champion now, and there is a miniature budget to do something to boost the School’s well-being. About a year and a half ago, I was involved in realising our first initiative; the School had bought a picnic bench, and I was one of the people turning it from flatpack into functioning bench. But we seem to get this money every year, so we were wondering what to do with it next. And one of my colleagues campaigned for a fish tank. And when the project got approved, he asked me if I was enthusiastic about it. Not really, was my answer. He was shocked! 

There were hurdles along the way! We wanted it in our coffee room, but that is on the second floor, and estates said that the floor wouldn't be strong enough hold the weight of the fish tank. I was surprised about this; robustly built humans exert more pressure on the floor, and that evidently goes well every day. Surely a fish tank that spreads its weight out over a larger area shouldn't be a problem? But the decision has been made. The fish tank had to be on the ground floor.

The first thing to appear, of course, was the tank. It had sand on the bottom and chunks of dead coral stacked up to provide some topography. And when that was all sorted, the fish appeared. I did enjoy checking for any new arrivals, put my heart wasn't really racing because of the little fish. But later, I heard that there was an anemone in there. That got my attention! The next time I walked past I had a look. And indeed, there was one hiding amongst the chunks of coral! That was fab.

Then an email was sent around, by the bloke who had campaigned for the fish tank. By coincidence, it was also the bloke who had won last year's cake competition. And he said that the first round of the competition was now over, but that week he would be making doughnuts to raise money for the fish tank. He wanted some soft-bodied corals in there, but there was no money anymore in the fish tank budget. And his doughnuts are famous! So that day I went to the coffee break, had a lovely doughnut, and gave generously.

Only two working days later I happened to walk past the fish tank again. And there were new creatures in there! That must have been the coral. I didn't expect them to arrive so soon. But now that thing has my attention. I didn't realise this type of invertebrate floats my boat a lot more than some admittedly very handsome little fish swimming around. But it's clear that that's the case! I'm happy now that we have this tank. I hope our little invertebrate friends will thrive in their new home. I think my well-being has been served well by this initiative, quite against expectation…

Handsome critter! Btw the human eye does not perceive the tank as this blue…

Another critter

Two fishes swim past a third handsome invertebrate 

The anemone gives acts de présènce

Fake references

Fake references shouldn't be a thing! Unfortunately, they are. I've had to call people in before, because they had non-existent references in their reference list. And generally, it turns out that the student in question had had an attack of bad time management, and basically panicked. And involved AI. Not a good idea! And given that it is marking time again, this is the time when that sort of thing might happen again. And it did.

In this case, I had to call two students in, and in both cases I had detected the issue myself. One student only had three references, and they were incomplete. And if it is just three, you might as well check. Especially as one of the references looked like something I should know about. But looking them up didn't work. And if it's a full reference, with journal, volume, issue, and page numbers, you can just look them up precisely where the student claims they are. But with just title, authors, year and journal, you can’t. I asked that student to send me the PDFs of the articles, in case they existed. Unfortunately I did not receive such PDFs.

In the other case, I just spotted a reference that surprised me. I know the author, and I thought the year was a bit early. Was he really already publishing about this topic in that year? So I had a Google. And nothing came up. They also were two articles by an author combination I hadn't seen before. I looked these up as well. Nothing. One of them was a complete reference, and then you can check these very page numbers in that very issue. And if it doesn’t match, you have conclusive proof that the reference is fake. I checked all the other references; the student had a lot more, and the majority fortunately existed. Four didn't.

I have no idea how often things like this slip under the radar! You can't possibly check all the references of all the assignments you mark. But we would normally mark assignments in our own field. And then you get this sort of things I had. An unusual year, an unusual combination of authors, an unusual topic, might all raise suspicion. I know I'm not the only one; I remember a colleague who had noticed that there was a reference to a paper of an author writing about a particular species of fish, and my colleague knew that this person did not actually study this fish. So I think we pick up quite a lot of this kind of things. But I will never know!

Well I never know? Well, I could of course do a test, and select a large number of assignments at random to check if all the references exist. If you check enough of them, you will get a statistically robust result. But this sounds like so much work! The idea is interesting, though. And it will be interesting to see if there is any pattern in what goes undetected. Hm! I might be onto something. I wish I felt I had the time to do this sort of thing. Because it is genuinely interesting to get an idea of the scale of this problem. And get a few clues on what we could do about it…

Last big teaching day of 2024

In one of my modules, we do student presentations. And that has to happen at the tail end of term. So quite often, it’s the last big thing. And big it got! There have been years with fewer than 20 students, and then it’s quite doable. This year we had loads. And then it’s such a long day! I had had to make the individual presentations shorter to fit it all in one day. 

The students uploaded their slides the Friday before. I just had time to make a schedule before I had to head for Main Campus. The presentations were on Monday!

It fit, especially given that I suspected there would be no-shows. There were quite some non-submitters. And there were two students who were allowed to record, and one who was not available on the Monday and presented the week before. 

There also tends to be an issue with the room. I remember one stone cold room, and last year a room with fine temperature but only wooden benches. This year we had a cold windowless room. Will we ever be comfortable? 

This year it went well. The level of the presentations was high, time keeping was generally very good too, and the students asked loads of questions. The students only had 7 mins each, but some had teamed up in twos and threes so they had 14 or 21 minutes for their group, and could go a bit more into depth. We had 26 students presenting overall. 

The non-submitters all failed to show up. But I later noticed that most of those were inconsistently registered. There is the module website where they submit their assignments, and the overall website with the module overviews, and they didn’t agree. So that’s a relief! A bit confusing that I now don’t know who is in my module, but probably, most of these absent people were absent because they were not actually on the module. A good reason! 

The only teaching I now still have is the presentations of my freshers! And then it’s done for 2024…

A transatlantic cable on the US shore in 1925; there were quite many talks about submarine cables

 

Another bike ride for exercise; fog edition

I'm still not running! So I still depend on my bike for exercise. And on my birthday I had been busy with other things, so the day after I decided to do the usual ride to the surge pond. And it was mild weather! But also quite cloudy.

I quite happily biked to the gate I had to lift my bike over. And then I had it for the reservoir taking the right turn to the surge pond. And then I quite quickly ended up with my head in the clouds. Which was okay! It is a bit of a pity you don't get to see the spectacular views, but there is something atmospheric about a foggy landscape.

In an hour I got to the surge pond. And after a bit of water drinking I turned around and went back. And going back is always quite quick!

The surge pond

No view; just fog

Some ruins near the road 

Ducking underneath the clouds again

Two weeks earlier I had taken my mountain bike out but I hadn't quite enjoyed that as much. (Not sure why I didn't blog about this but I clearly didn't.) It is December, the landscape is completely waterlogged. You spend too much time trying to not fall on your face in the slippery mud, and not enough making your heart and lungs work. So I think I will be dependent on my commuter bike for exercise for now. But that's OK! This is a nice ride, and I'm sure I can think of a few others. I still haven't done the full loop through Ogwen Valley and Peris Pass! That should get my blood flowing too…

Birthday walk and dinner

Sue and Dean were around on my birthday, and they were happy to do something. They knew Nick was not going to be available in the evening. And they suggested a walk and then dinner at their place. That sounded fab!

Not long after Nick left I got on my bike and biked to their place. And we pretty much immediately got into the car to make the most of the remaining daylight. We were going to do Cwm Idwal. A classic walk! We have done it for New Year's Eve as well.

It was slightly gloomy weather, with a fairly cold breeze, but we have seen a lot worse. And it was atmospheric! And by the time we reached the far end of the walk the light was very beautifully low. And we started to see little lights on the hillside. There were clearly several people out there on much more adventurous hikes than we were!

The start of the walk

Birthday selfie

Fading light; Picture by Dean

Light almost gone when we get to the gate! Picture by Dean

It was dark by the time we were back at the visitor centre. And when we got home I parked myself on the sofa. I hoped to radiate an atmosphere of harmlessness! The resident cats are notoriously shy, but I have had interaction with them before, and I was hoping that it would happen again. But my efforts initially spectacularly failed. The cats clearly thought I was terrifying.

We had a drink and some nibbles, and then sat down for dinner. Dinner was fab! And festooned with cake. And then we went back to the living room.

At some point I went into the kitchen to get another drink, and one of the cats was there too. This time she seemed to be so distracted by the fact that that is where food is served, that he didn't run away. She even briefly let me pet her! Success!

Altogether it was a lovely birthday! 49 now. Next year will be a big birthday. But let's not think about that quite yet!

Finally, a Penrhyn castle (birthday) date

I had never gone and properly visited Penrhyn castle. I had been there; there is a Parkrun there, and I have run that a few times. And once we went to have a coffee afterwards in the café. But that's it! And I felt I should go and see it. In a way, it is a hated building; it was built with the profits from slave labour on a Jamaican sugar plantation, and owned by the family who were hideous to the local quarrymen. It was also the owners of the estate who inspired the Great Strike, the longest industrial dispute in British history. I have heard several people say they think it should be razed to the ground. But I don't think so; you can't blame the castle for this. You might as well turn it to your advantage now it's here anyway!

I had intended to go and see it with Tim. And we were going to do that after a run. Then that was the run during which he broke his ankle. So we never went! And I was a bit superstitious after that; would Nick break his ankle if we would try to get to the castle? But that is of course an irrational thought.

He came to visit me the day before my birthday. On the actual birthday, he had a Christmas celebration with the dojo his son goes to, so in order to be there a bit during my birthday weekend, he came the Friday evening. And he was a true romantic flowers and chocolate. Unfortunately, he was rather under the weather. So I figured an indoor activity for the Saturday would be a good idea, and the castle was open, so we went! After a birthday breakfast with a present. A book with walks in Shropshire! We'll make good use of that.

When we got to the castle we first saw a few Parkrunners leave just when we entered. I found that a bit sad. I want to be a runner! But my time will come. 

The castle

We walked up to the castle and went in. We had a look at the larder, and then came into the kitchen. And there are a lady approached us. It was Janet! From the climbing club! It turned out she was a volunteer there, and guided tourists. And she didn't have a group, so she took us on. That was fab!

The kitchen

We got a tour of some of the parts of the castle that were meant for entertaining, and some of them that were private quarters. It was not as if the latter were not opulent! But there was a difference in the levels thereof. 

Janet told us a lot about the history of the castle, and the provenance of the materials used, and the life of one particular lady who had lived there: Alice Douglas Pennant. She showed us two places where she had scratched her name into the glass with a diamond ring! Quite an act of rebellion, but now a lovely historical artefact. 

Dining room

Staircase

When Janet was done, we did the traditional loop fairly swiftly and then went to have a coffee in the café. And a nosy in the miniature secondhand bookshop. And then we are good to go back again. After all, Nick would have to leave fairly soon. 

I was glad I had finally seen the castle! And Nick loved it so much he said he actually wanted to go back some other time to see more. And we were so lucky to bump into Janet! A lovely birthday surprise. Couldn't have gone better!

History of physical oceanography in Bangor

We normally have a Friday lunch seminar. It is either internal or external people telling about their research. I go if I'm not otherwise engaged, by e.g. teaching. It's quite nice to listen to talks about things that are a bit outside your own area of expertise.

This week was a special one; it was actually a public lecture by Tom, one of our professors in physical oceanography. And he was going to talk about the history of that subject within our university, which by now spans 60 years.

He started out with Jack Darbyshire, a local and very clever lad, who was involved in predicting waves within the context of the D-day landings. He seems to have been the first appointee in this subject in the brand new School of Ocean Sciences. 

He also spoke of the first research vessel that we had, and what research people did with it. And he mentioned another early researcher, John Simpson, that we seem to have headhunted from Liverpool right after his PhD, and who would stay on to become first professor and then head of school. He has long since retired, but is still active! And I noticed he was actually attending this talk online.

A whole parade of faces came past, including my old line manager James. And a lot of people who are still here. It was a genuinely entertaining and informative talk. I will even forgive Tom for calling benthic foraminifera (that were mentioned within the context of James) phytoplankton. They are neither phyto nor plankton!

He ended this with mentioning another local and very clever lad, my office neighbour Iestyn, who we recruited a few years ago now. We had come full circle!

I hope that in another 60 years’ time, the situation will be such that someone will again be doing a seminar like that. We have survived so far; made that long continue!

Tom standing by his opening slide. By coincidence, the backlit head in the foreground belongs to Iestyn

Improvised solution to IT problems

It was some two weeks ago that I blogged about my computer being work-shy since a fire in a university data centre. I figured it would all have been sorted by now! But no. Things got worse. 

The next day neither of the solutions that had sorted me out before worked. So I was back phoning the IT helpdesk. And they said: unplug everything including the network cable, leave it for five minutes, then plug everything back in, leave it at the login screen for an hour, and then you should be fine again. So I did.

I had this enormous pile of marking to do, and this was really something I could do without! But what was I going to do? When I had plugged my computer back in, I decided to go to the computer room of the master students, down the corridor. That's not ideal; I can't talk to these computers, so I have to read off the screen and then make notes on paper. I would then later dictate these notes to my computer when it was working again.

There was only one student there who didn't seem to mind my presence. But I was aware I shouldn't be there! But I also had a few options.

When I came back after an hour, my computer indeed worked, and I could resume my normal business. But it was annoying. And it happened again.

The next step was that the helpdesk said the problem basically came through the network cable. If I was just not using one, that would circumvent the issue. So they were going to get a Wi-Fi adapter ready for my computer, that I would have to pick up from main campus. They also said that there were people working on the root of the problem, but it was unclear how long that would take. So this at least would keep me going until it was properly sorted.

The next time the problem presented itself, I switched my computer back off, unplugged the network cable, switched it back on, connected the adapter to the university’s Wi-Fi, and I was rolling! 

It would be nice if this problem would get properly solved. But for now I can work again with not too much inconvenience. And that matters…

The temporary solution

Still not racing

Instead of doing the Betws Trail Challenge I did two loops of the parking lot near my house. That was all I figured my ankle could take. And I didn't want to build things up too fast. And that was late November.

It is now mid December. How are things? Well! I built things up to 5 loops of the parking lot. That is some 380 m. So the good news is that I am indeed not building it up too fast now. But it also means that it took me two weeks to go from about 200 to less than 400 m. That is really slow. If I keep that going, it will take me two years to get back to 10 km form. I think it's time I see if I can get back to the physio. I hope he has ideas! Because this is frustrating.

The moon over the parking lot 

I am also now missing The Christmas fun run of the running club. So what's next? I don't think I'm registered for anything at the moment, but the next race in the general running agenda is the Nick beer 10k. It's on February 9. Could I possibly get my ankle back in shape on time for that? I have no idea! The next one along the line is, I think, Ras Llyn Trawsfynydd, a14k race, on April 13. That's four months away. I really hope I can do that! And also, it is a lovely race. I suppose time will have to tell…

Third batch done

I finished the second of the three big piles of marking on a Sunday morning. And after breakfast, I just started on the third. It had crept close to the marking deadline, so I had better get going. And it was a large cohort. 

The assessment was quite straightforward. I had given the students a pile of data, and the idea was that they select some of that data, plot it up, use these plots for answering the research question, explain why they came to that answer, and then compare that answer to other answers out there in published literature. And marking the plots is very quick. And the rest took more time, but still less than the other assignments I had marked. 

Sunset over the North Sea; the setting for this assignment

 

I basically marked all day Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, only taking off the Monday evening for the dinner in Llanberis, and 7-9 pm on Tuesday for Welsh class. And then I was done on Tuesday 11pm. I was so relieved. But also dead tired and with sore arms. 

I can now finally do other things again! Not a moment too soon. I have student meetings coming up, and student presentation sessions to organise and attend, and an exam preparation sessions, and a list of academic integrity cases to deal with, and loads more. And more marking, but not such big piles anymore this semester. I feel a whole lot better now that this is behind me…

Tom & Siobhan back

Tom and Siobhan, who had spent a year on the other side of the globe, were back. And almost immediately, they went to collect their cat again. Pwd’s stay with Martin had come to an end! And only a few days later we all came over for dinner. 

I had been very hesitant about anything that consumed time and wasn’t marking. But because I had marked the entire weekend, I decided I could afford an evening off.

It was good to see them again! And it seemed reciprocal. Especially Pwd when he spotted Martin. He immediately went in for pets! That was cute. And when we all sat down, he didn’t waste time and sat on his lap. Tom looked on with hurt in his eyes. But it was quite sweet. And I really should have taken a picture.

There was a lot to catch up on. A lot had happened! Mostly with Tom and Siobhan, who had been up to all sorts of adventures. But things had happened in our lives too. And discussing that over dinner was really nice. 

After dinner we went back to the comfortable seats. And after a while, Pwd wandered over and actually sat on my lap. Very peacefully. He had never done that before! Again; I should have taken a picture. But I didn’t. 

Then it was time to leave. It had got late without me noticing. I wrestled myself out from underneath Pwd and put my shoes back on. And I yawned the entire way home. 

It was good to have them back! I hope this will be the first social engagement with this lot in a series. And the community will grow. Since they left, both Martin and me have started new relationships, so hopefully, we will meet up with all eight of us in the not too distant future. It might require some interesting logistics as that is a number that doesn’t automatically fit inside a living room or kitchen! But I’m sure we will make it work…

Second batch done!

When storm Darragh kept me at home, I took advantage of that by making progress on my enormous marking load. And it worked! By the evening I had done the marking, although I had not yet put the grades and feedback on the assignments. I figured I could do that the day after. 

Is that reasonable? One could argue not. What about taking the Sunday off? But what I had done after finishing that batch was check when the next pile was due. And the answer was: pretty much immediately afterwards. So I had to keep going.

That happened sooner than I intended. When I went to the kitchen to give the cat her last meal of the day, I was reminded of the fact that I had started defrosting the fridge. And it was mostly done! Just not entirely. And I didn't want to leave the fridge defrosting overnight. It would leak water everywhere. So I figured I couldn't really go to bed yet. What do you do if you can't go to bed? You go back to your marking! So I put some of the grades and feedback where it needed to go. But then I finished the defrosting I went to bed. And the next morning, before breakfast, I finished it off.

I then still had to look at the few academic integrity cases resulting from that assignment. I didn't want to give the students their grades and only afterwards raise the possibility that not all these grades were definitive. So I wanted to at least tell the people involved what was hanging over them. But when I had that ready I could ask my moderator on Monday morning to do the moderation. He had been warned it was coming! And as soon as moderation is done, it can be released to the students. And then it's properly sorted…

Picture from the field trip in October; the marking had been the field trip report

Storm Darragh

I was going to go to see Nick! But then storm Darragh appeared on the horizon, with an amber weather warning in tow. The trains already struggle to run in fine weather! No way you could get to England in an acceptable way with that kind of weather. And driving in a storm means risking flooding your car or ending up stuck behind a tree that had fallen over the road. I really hadn’t enjoyed driving through Storm Isha. So I decided to move my trip back. 

The day before I would travel, the weather warning turned red. Red! Really not travel weather. And when I was just calmly eating an orange that evening, I received the alert from the government. My phone made the most hideous noise. And a warning message appeared. Not really necessary; I had kept a close eye on the weather and already changed my plans. But now I know what the government does when there is such a weather alert out. And I was lucky; friends of mine were either trying to have a phone conversation or driving when that thing went off. Scares the shit out of you!

Serious forecast

I had made sure to take a vulnerable plant inside, close all my windows, and secure the bins even better than normal, to make sure nothing would start flying around. And then I went to bed and hoped for the best. The winds were forecast to be stronger at about 7 am.

When I woke up the next morning it was clearly windy, but nothing out of the ordinary. I was relieved! I had been a bit worried about storm damage.

As the wind didn't seem to be too bad I went to the shop before breakfast. I could go and get myself my Saturday newspaper. Or so I thought. And then the first storm damage became apparent: the supermarkets hadn't had their normal delivery of newspapers! Oh dear. I tried the other shop later in the day, and that was successful. And I admired the wildness of the river on the way.

No newspapers! 

What the village looked like

The river a bit upstream

I basically spent the whole day marking. It was rubbish weather and it needed doing. And it needed doing even more as on Monday evening I wanted to go and have dinner with friends. But I didn't feel like I could take the evening off without getting some of that marking out of the way beforehand. And I made good progress!

I did do a few loops of the parking lot, but I didn't do anything in the way of proper exercise. I didn't fancy going out on my bike in that weather, and that is the only type of exercise I currently have available to me! So it was basically a very dull day, but there was also something snug about staying indoors with the cat. 

Funnily enough, all was well here I was, but Nick had both a (long) power cut and no water. And his weather warning had only been amber or yellow. I jumped that gun! 

I suppose that was a very unspectacular report of my first red weather warning. That day without a named storm two days before had better stories! But as far as I am concerned any weather warning can turn out unspectacular. I'm not a big fan of storm damage! And I'll probably sooner or later will get some of that anyway…

A very wet commute

Spoiler alert: I've recently been doing very little other than working, commuting, sleeping and eating, so some of my blog posts might be a bit trivial. Including this one. Which speaks of a day that had strong winds and rain forecast for the middle of the day. So I made sure to time my commute well.

In the morning I managed to get in before either rain or strong winds started. Success! But in the afternoon, the rain was slamming so hard on my velux window I didn't think I would be that lucky in the afternoon. So when I heard the rain stop, I quickly decided to go home, and do the remainder of the working day in my home office. But that meant I got onto my bike not long after the rain had stopped.

I got to Hendrewen Road, which gets me out of Bangor, without problems. And also to the top of the hill. But on the way down I noticed a lot of water running over the road. And I am a bit weary of that. Sometimes, that water freezes, and then the road becomes terrifying. If I think this might be the case I take the long way around. At least it was fairly warm this day, and I wasn't worried about ice.

I know there is one dip in the road that collects water in high rain. And I wasn't surprised to see that that had indeed happened. But there were no cars around, so I just biked in. What else can you do? Normally that goes fine. This time I was surprised to see the water was so high it came over the top of my shoes. That is the deepest I have ever seen it!

Water running down the road in one direction

Walter running down the road in the other direction

That second stream had created an impressive puddle

Me after I came through on the other side; you can't see the tide line on my trousers, but I think you can see my shoes are soaking

If I would have been in a car I might have flooded it, but of course you can't flood a bike. The worst that could happen is that the floods have brought in debris you bike into, and fall over. But that didn't happen. So I just got to the other side with wet socks and shoes, and an interesting tide mark on my trousers.

When I got home I just hung out socks, shoes and trousers, and the next day everything was dry again. But I do think it would be a good idea if the council increased the drainage of this road. You could wait for it to indeed flood someone's car! And that it is full of black ice when temperatures drop below zero is not without risk either. I'm not going to hold my breath. But I suppose it is good I found out the easy way just how deep the water can get on this road!