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| So gave a presentation about my work to some colleagues today; seemed to be well received. Also started writing my paper; feels good to be doing hard, intellectually stimulating writing again. | |
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| So, once again I realise that, uselessly I've left it ages since I last wrote. Back in September I saw the British Museum's Moctezuma exhibition with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) alankria , another superb and satisfying show. I spent most of October frantically trying to get a submission for PhD funding in on time, and it came off! Hurrah! Should get initial feedback in January and a final yes/no in April. Have also had a paper approved for an academic conference next year, and I also have to write an article for the IWM magazine at some point. I'm also back at King's once a week for Japanese lessons; my Nihongo has still a very long way to go, but it feels great to be studying it again. | |
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| Gosh, how lax of me - no posts since June! Won't try and do everything, so will stick to the recent. On Friday had lunch with Natalee, a friend from San Francisco. Met up at the war museum, had lunch at a nearby cafe then went to the British Museum, where we spent a good three hours gazing in wonder at all manner of ancient and historic odds and ends. We repaired to a pub for refreshment before going to her place in Notting Hill for dinner with her, her husband and some friends. Much beer and wine followed, and were in turn followed by a cocktail and champagne. I wandered home thoroughly smashed but not too worse for wear, and it was all in all a superb day. | |
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| Must be in bed very soon, but have just seen something that makes me happy. Namely, a BBC News report showing that flabby, smarmy, racist, BNP-leading bastard Nick Griffin having eggs thrown in his face and driven off College Green outside the Houses of Parliament by anti-fascist protestors.
Yes, democracies sometimes allow knob ends like Griffin to get elected. But they also allow those same knob ends, lacking the courage or strength in numbers to prevail, to be sent scuttling for cover like cowards. And it's delicious to later hear those same knob ends whine about freedom of speech... | |
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| Some good running today. So far for June I'm 4.5 miles up compared to May, and today I ran new bests for both 6 miles and 7.5 miles. Finally got my 6 mile time to under 54 minutes. Bloody knackered now though.... | |
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| Fine evening yesterday; instead of the usual bowling, the bowling club met at a house in Peckham for a barbecue. Much food, fine conversation and fun followed, and the evening was capped with a game of cricket. I wasn't long at the crease, but the first ball I managed to hit sailed gracefully for a six. The very next ball, fittingly, sailed equally gracefully into my wicket and sent the bales tumbling. Ah well.... | |
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| So , a cracking weekend. Yesterday I was at the British Museum, that great palace of culture, architecture and whatever artefacts we managed to swipe during more Imperial times. The fashion now seems to be to ask nicely and to get other countries to lend us their stuff, and the result has been a string of fabulous exhibitions at the BM. Yesterday withalankria I saw Shah 'Abbas and Garden & Cosmos: The Royal Paintings of Jodhpur. Two excellent and very different exhibitions, and I was particularly interested in the emphasis on 17th century Iran as an international trade hub, exchanging goods from as far apart as South America and China. And they say globalisation is a new thing.... Also featured some exquisite calligraphy, textiles, architecture and (suprisingly, Chinese) pottery. Garden & Cosmos meanwhile gave a glimpse of a culture so different through a dazzling array of the most wonderful paintings. I left the BM with that satisfying sense of being newly knowledged.
A stroll through a fantastically busy and toastingly warm Covent Garden was followed by a Wagamama lunch, made better by friendly and stimulating company. We parted after lunch, and I had a look in North Face for a pair of walking boots (decided to put off a decision for another day). Then I dropped in on a sport shop, for some running stuff. Then I went across Covent Garden to St Martin Court, and visited the bookshop that used to be the one I worked in in 2005. I wound up browsing rather longer than expected and found a number of interesting titles, at least one of which might be very useful to my work (it's about post-war Burma 1945-1948). After that I dropped in on Motor Books, the shop that I had worked at but which has since moved one alley down to a different site. Headed home with a satisfied sense of having been busy. That night saw a barbecue of extreme deliciousness.
Today I've been to the cinema with my little brother to see Sam Raimi's Drag Me To Hell, a gloriously gross (gorius?) and over-the-top horror film. Acting nondescript, script reasonably good, sound absolutely pounding and all in all a good laugh. We added to our self-indulgent spending on entertainment with a round of bowling, which I did quite well.
Now, if I can fit in a 3.5-mile run this evening I can get my May mileage up to 80. So if you'll excuse me..... | |
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| Since the 1st May I have run 69 miles. | |
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| On Friday I went for a run; my usual six-mile tramp up and down a path alongside a six-carriage A-road. It's never a fast run, but it is getting progressively less slow. Anyhow, as I made it through the 5-mile mark or so, I was distracted by a beautiful sight. It had been spitting with rain, very slightly, during the last half hour, and now a monumental bright and clear rainbow sat over much of Mill HIll. It was a full, glorious semicircle, with just a ghostly hint of a double rainbow on top of it. With my church school primary education my mind ran to the story of Noah. It was magnificent, each colour melting luxuriously into the next. Even seen standing over six lanes of traffic, there was something perfect about it. A piece of simple natural beauty over an ugly urban landscape. | |
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| So, another fun evening tonight at the Elephant and Castle Superbowl. Yes, it's probably the dirtiest and dingiest bowling alley in all of London (something of a feat!), but it's fun and it keeps me in touch with my old mob. Even better, I set a new personal best today of 162. Not a spectacular score by any means, but satisfying.
Spent most of today doing research for a new online exhibition. Slow work, but it's coming together. | |
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