tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18157421942234126992024-03-19T12:11:51.641+00:00Precision Handlingxerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-30862695134699870672013-11-08T13:05:00.000+00:002013-11-08T13:05:44.392+00:00O tempora, o moresDear God, it's happened, All Souls <a href="http://www.all-souls.ox.ac.uk/userfiles/file/Policy/RecordedDecisions/SGM-011212.pdf">has decided to become an institution like any other</a>: it has announced the end of the practice of inviting shortlisted Fellowship Examination candidates to dinner on the day of the vivas. That is, no longer will it elect its <strike>Prize</strike> Examination Fellows according to their ability to suck up to senior barristers ("sometimes, dear boy, you must take the smooth with the smooth") over the port and walnuts. It even expects them, in a half-hearted fashion, to do some work: <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 17.91193199157715px;">Fellows working outside academia must maintain active academic interests, albeit in a very part-time fashion. </span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17.91193199157715px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">What weasel words in that final phrase, that eat the ones they follow. Magnificent rearguard work in the relevant committee to get them in.</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 17.91193199157715px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17.91193199157715px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">It gets worse, or maybe better, but certainly different: the translation paper has become optional, so that to become a fellow in classics you no longer need to know either Latin or Greek. </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17.91193199157715px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 17.899999618530273px;">"O brave new world, that has such creatures in it." Indeedy doody, Miranda was talking about men.</span></span><br />
<br />xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-14463624128764582972013-09-30T17:10:00.000+01:002013-09-30T17:10:14.950+01:00Comparative highway engineering[This is a message from our sponsor, Network Rail.]<br />
<br />
The Hitchin flyover is now open and has either had a dramatic impact or made no difference. Well, in several months, out of the dozens of trains that I've taken on that route, one (1) has used it. I'm ramping up my train travel so expect further incisive commentary on this exciting piece of engineering in<br />
<br />
...wait for it, cliche fans...<br />
<br />
due course.<br />
<br />
(I so envy the skill of people who know how to typeset accents. No Good Boyo can typeset anything, it's his Marxist training,)<br />
<br />
Right, message over. Back to the New Jersey Turnpike shortly.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-3398088671346425652013-08-15T06:55:00.000+01:002013-08-15T06:55:56.253+01:00Imperial child rearingYoung Amestris has graduated from high school / passed her A-levels and is off to college (the University of Thule, to study ultimatics) and the world should know the key to this success. The key is to have the correct rules, and here they are.<br />
<br />
1) I don't care what you eat but you must eat something. [You can let this one slide when they're 12.]<br />
<br />
2) No mess.<br />
<br />
3) No tattoos. Especially not the hip alternative ones, they look particularly gross when you're 30.<br />
<br />
4) Never even think of doing smack. Junkies are boring beyond words and heroin is their substitute for having a personality.<br />
<br />
5) No motorcycles, no boys with motorcycles. Ever. You might come back from drugs or disease. You don't come back from brain or spinal damage.<br />
<br />
6) If you meet a boy called Adam Spratt, run away. You know how you can't get pregnant from sitting next to a boy on the bus? If the boy is Spratty you can, even if you're a boy yourself. Spratty is insufferably charming and swarthy and good-looking, has a nasty moustache and is totally useless and unemployable, a complete drone in fact. And the grandchildren will be equally swarthy and have equally nasty moustaches.<br />
<br />
Right, that's it. I'm off to solve global warming next.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-17445331554399085952013-07-24T05:37:00.000+01:002013-07-24T05:37:10.466+01:00Don't go WestOne pleasure of the New Jersey Turnpike is WBGO. It says it's a jazz station but is more unreliable than that. If it were more reliable it would be worse.<br />
<br />
The other day I turn it on to find it interviewing Cornel West. Wikipedia describes him as a public intellectual which is not the same as an intellectual; he left Harvard in a huff after the president suggested that he might like to do more with his time than make rap CDs. Well, one rap CD actually.<br />
<br />
Which is enough to establish him, or anyone, as a humourless bore. So I flip. The next channel is a country station playing a song about reggae cowboys.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-72128362324411327412013-07-20T19:45:00.000+01:002013-07-21T12:50:26.124+01:00Piker boyThe New Jersey Turnpike plays a large part in my life, although I live in London. This is because the alternative is Route 1 (rout not root). After dropping off the family at Newark airport I very nearly found my way onto the turnpike but as usual missed the crucial sign telling you to swerve across four lanes of traffic towards Elizabeth. The swerve is not the problem, the problem is to remember that Elizabeth has anything to do with any other destination, intended or not. So I was stuck on Route 1 the whole way. And I had to trust to God that it was indeed Route 1 that I was stuck on, there wasn't a sign to be seen. Getting lost in that part of Jersey is no fun, the Sopranos was a documentary.<br />
<br />
Route 1 is like any major highway, fast heavy traffic all the time. But with lights. You're in a herd, barreling towards these lights at 80, wondering if you can stop if they change. And JESUS CHRIST THAT WAS A LEVEL CROSSING. No lights there, what happens when a train comes? No doubt about it, the turnpike is worth its $6.50.<br />
<br />
It has other attractions too. The Newark runway is right next to it, so you can be tooling along at high speed only to be overtaken by a 747 coming in to land. And is the smell that of the refinery at Linden or is it that smoking heap of machinery? Which is either my friend Bruce's clunker or a Dreamliner having an emotional crisis. My money's on the Dreamliner, Bruce's clunker has more self-respect.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-1692518935889295052010-08-05T04:27:00.003+01:002010-08-05T04:38:14.333+01:00Brain strainI look up from Powell and Pressburger's A Canterbury Tale on the laptop to see that the white lino floor of the kitchenette is undulating. No, more than that, it's writhing. A quick mental check of the drugs I've taken recently confirms, only 2 beers, so WTF? Oh, I remember, I'd run out of dishwasher detergent so had improvised with the liquid stuff, seemed a good idea at the time but isn't, the dishwasher is pumping out foam by the gallon.<div><br /></div><div>Remember, I screw up so you don't have to.</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-47202297118878932372010-07-27T01:39:00.004+01:002010-07-27T02:12:21.587+01:00Living la vida locaI've known Charlie since we were 2. Now he's a corporate litigator in mid-town Manhattan; when Consolidated sues Amalgamated Charlie's in there chopping someone off at the knees. Saving widows and orphans? Don't be silly, they're poor. At lunch we discuss my legal encounter of the previous day, which was a phone call from Carlos' lawyer asking, can I be in court tomorrow to do my bit as a character witness. Well with more than 24 hours notice it would have been a pleasure, but I'm in NY. Carlos doesn't know anyone else respectable (trust me on this, I honestly am respectable, really boringly so) and I wanted to help; he is a, er, shall we say less polished version of my brother and it would be a shame for him to go away.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-89670932597622341182010-07-01T22:40:00.003+01:002010-07-01T23:01:05.439+01:00UsefulI'm spending a few days with my mother; my brothers and I have been taking turns doing this since our father died earlier this year. Of course, the rota is approximate, since life gets in the way (not as much as death I suppose), but that's fine. We even managed to arrange the funeral without fighting. The point is not to be useful (fixing windows, throwing away unnecessary correspondence, suggesting that maybe that bill should be paid, doing it myself if the reaction is too hostile) as it is just to be there and reassure her that we don't plan to put her in the poorhouse ("Mum I don't think they have poorhouses any more").<br /><br />Anyway we're not here to be useful we're here to be interesting. Aren't we?xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-85576240187068979542010-06-29T16:29:00.003+01:002010-06-29T16:47:49.961+01:00Feel the fearI watched the England-Germany game until it got to 4-1, then stopped. It was embarrassing, like watching an animal that's been run over twitch and die. I know nothing about football and could understand less of what the manager said. That is, he sounded scary and impressive, but while what came out of his mouth was grammatically and syntactically correct, it conveyed no meaning, especially after I thought about it. Is that why the English players looked so terrified?<br /><br />"Christ what does he want us to do now?" "I've no idea but I'm really really afraid and I'm going to cry, please will that nice referee blow his whistle."<br /><br />Oh btw I'm taking a break from poker. Recently I've encountered some significantly bad luck (no excuse, the paradox of the gambler's ruin is that even a skilled player is highly likely to encounter a terrible run of luck some time) and this has made me play much worse, tentative yet rigid. Let's see if I can stick to that resolution.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-44463016432141930582010-05-02T14:42:00.003+01:002010-05-02T14:51:04.657+01:00PsychometricsPrecision Handling is dedicated to public service and the extermination of adverbs. In the first vein here is one in an occasional series of personality tests.<div><br /></div><div>You are a science nerd if when you overhear people discussing chemistry it disappoints you that the subject turns out to be sexual attraction and not the stuff involving, you know, actual chemicals that smell and explode.</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-67915251695498957272010-04-19T11:33:00.003+01:002010-04-19T12:02:14.852+01:00Ash and cashMme and Mlle Inkspot, plus girl cousin, went to New York to have some fun and are stuck there by the Icelandic earthfart. Of all the thousands (millions?) of people in this situation they are some of the luckiest; they have grandparents to stay with and a beautiful (especially in the spring) city for entertainment. God knows how long they'll be there, so I had an idea: enroll them in school. Precisely, put them in Hoboken High School (the grandparents are in Hoboken, across the Hudson from midtown Manhattan; when planes crash into the World Trade Center or land on the river my father-in-law doesn't have to move from his desk to photograph it). I read that HHS is New Jersey's second most improved public school of 2009, so they should acquire valuable life skills such as buying drugs, smuggling boyfriends' weapons past the metal detectors and catching STDs. Completely brilliant though I say it myself. The girls put their feet down at this prospect of re-enacting West Side Story so they're going to a completely reasonable school elsewhere in town, starting today.<br /><br />And what are the mice doing meanwhile? Playing poker it must be admitted. Last night was a catastrophe, wiping out most of the previous week's gains. Swings and roundabouts, roundabouts and swings.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-28434049789893151322010-03-27T20:46:00.003+00:002010-03-27T21:03:24.949+00:00Second setIt's 11-30 and Mlle inkspot (15, and conscious of it) isn't answering her phone. She'd said that a bunch of them were going to Ollie's house so eventually I phone there. No says Ollie's dad, I thought they were at your place. <div><br /></div><div>Eventually she does phone in. </div><div><br /></div><div>"Where are you, I've been worried?"</div><div><br /></div><div>"Don't worry dad, we're at Ollie's house."</div><div><br /></div><div>Oh my god she is totally busted. At least she sounds sober, so above all I'm thrilled at being ahead in parenting tennis, it's the first time.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Oh my god you are totally busted. At least you sound sober, but I'm cross, this isn't a game you know."</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-15950437442289678982010-03-09T16:14:00.003+00:002010-03-09T16:31:09.581+00:00Life at the topTo Precision Handling's promotions committee again. I'm there to give the minority view. Well, my view's in the minority and I give it. Maximum Boss comes in. He's meant to be even-handed and impartial and all those other things that nobody ever is and proceeds at once to nobble me. I'm from the same branch of PH and he's particularly supposed not to nobble me.<br /><br />"I hope you're going to promote Buggins [also from our branch]."<br /><br />"No I don't think so, the letters are negative [and even libellous]."<br /><br />"Doesn't matter you should promote him anyway."<br /><br />This happens in front of everyone so is easy to resist. Which is my point: if you're going to nobble someone shouldn't you at least do so competently? That is, privately, with hints of blackmail? Anyway it didn't work, hurray.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-77316859324062585162010-02-27T18:36:00.003+00:002010-02-27T19:00:44.270+00:00King's LynnUrgent text: "Dad can i get my cartilidge pierced, ada's mum is taking her."<div><br /></div><div>No you can't. Not until you can spell cartilage anyway. That held her up for 5 seconds, thanks internet, love-15, god you're rubbish at this Inkspot, ffs raise your game. I phone Ada's mum, who is certainly not taking Ada anywhere near a piercing parlour, Ada's been grounded for various teenage-type infractions. 15-all, that's better, I might even break her serve. My real objection is that the idea nauseates me, who cares about that. </div><div><br /></div><div> "Right i'll get pregnant and do drugs so you'll have a spastic baby to raise. And then i'll get its tongue and belly-button pierced." </div><div><br /></div><div>Christ it's a bit early for the nuclear option isn't it? 15-30 anyway. So I find internet sources saying how painful it is. There are even more sources saying it's a doddle, 15-40. So no you can't because I say you can't and it's illegal without parental permission until you're 16.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Right i'll go to kings lynn and get it done illegally, you can get anything illegal in kings lynn."</div><div><br /></div><div>Game over. But what is this with King's Lynn? It's a completely harmless small port on the east coast of England, miles from anywhere, too dull even for Eliot to write a poem about. How did it get this louche reputation?<br /><div><br /></div></div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-8861085566271998902010-02-06T22:57:00.002+00:002010-02-06T23:13:52.647+00:00Special needsLast week I had an appointment with Arry ("with a haitch") at the gym. He's a strength and conditioning coach; these words have not been part of my life so far. What I was doing on the not-a-bike is irrelevant to Arry who has given me horrible things to do which are as horrible now as they were at the start. I think I hate Arry and want to kill him, only he's a nice guy and Hayley (with the profile and engagement ring) might not like it and I don't want to upset her. So I'll just swipe feebly at his ankles as I try to get up off the floor. The worst thing is the realization that if Arry and Hayley are professors of gym then I am in year 3 (= 2nd grade) and sat at the special needs table. On the other hand I've put on weight so at least I can say to Arry, look how useless your fucking gym is, I'm even fatter than when I started.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-4359250222537606942010-01-25T10:39:00.003+00:002010-01-25T11:04:05.846+00:00Happy new yearI've started going to the gym. It is, of course, ghastly and the sort of thing that no sane person would choose to do, except that there was a photograph the other day that left no alternative. First I had to be inducted (induced?) which meant that a trainer person (wonderful profile, I could have looked at it for hours, but an engagement ring too) took 75 minutes explaining the equipment to 4 of us. But if anyone asked, but what should I do personally, me, inkspot, the unproud owner of several chins, oh I haven't got time to answer that. When I go to the US there is a similar gym where I work and there, in the most litigious country in the world, induction means signing a chit promising not to sue if you drop a weight on your foot.<br /><br />So I've no idea what to do. There's a machine with strings and pulleys and weights and I pull at that until it hurts and then I go to another machine with pedals and handlebars only it's not a bike and I press buttons until it tells me I'm doing something called cardio. It also asks me how old I am. Damned impudent, and I'm so vain that I lie to it. Yes, I lie to a fucking machine, that's how vain I am. Cardio is 85% but of what there's no indication (fat burning is 60% if that helps). Anyway if I can read it right I'm usually beyond cardio so, given how I feel, it's 85% of dead. The only funny thing is that the not-a-bike is situated in front of rather a cleverly lit mirror so while you're getting all red and sweaty and dizzy you can look at yourself and pretend that you can see a cheekbone.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-63244805277742821022009-12-17T19:54:00.003+00:002009-12-17T20:14:17.844+00:00Winter sceneI live in a particularly desirable part of a picture-postcard town. Well, I say desirable; it's certainly desired, although it looks like a cheap slum and is an expensive slum. It's next to a park and river and nature reserve, all adorable. There's a car park too, for the convenience of all. Including the doggers. When I take the pug for her late-night constitutional there has usually been a car, driving slowly around, or parked and signalling in various ways with its lights. (OK, maybe I'm wrong, but then explain the empty Viagra packets scattered around in the morning.) <div><br /></div><div>Except that recently the police have cleared out the doggers and replaced them with drug dealers. Please officer, can we have our doggers back?</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-56958063191754063952009-11-11T06:58:00.002+00:002009-11-11T07:09:40.677+00:00Setting sunThere is a conference this week in Tokyo for the 60th birthday of someone who is both a friend (older!) and distinguished; it's a pleasure and an honour to be here. Not all of the organizers are totally efficient, so I've been staying in a couple of different places, including Shibuya. This is full of love hotels and fashionably dressed teenagers, though I don't know who the love hotels are full of. Not me anyway.<div><br /></div><div><br /></div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-75970011261662124322009-10-29T10:10:00.005+00:002009-10-29T10:23:46.301+00:00I tre naniKinosaki is famous for its hot springs. The food here is excellent, the local speciality being crab. Otoh you will also be given eggs cooked in the springs; they prove that water at 80 degrees is insufficient to boil an egg. Avoid. A further "plus" is being accommodated in traditional Japanese inns, which includes the traditional cramming of 3 adults into a room fit for one. A crone comes in the evening to arrange the mattresses in an orderly row, like something out of an economy version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. However, there is no Snow White. I've discussed this with the other dwarves and we've agreed to advertise the position. Ladies, feel free to apply. And when I say position I mean positions of course, there's no need to stop at one. Why not seven? "But 3 into 7 doesn't go" you reply. <div><br /></div><div>Maybe, but we'll have fun trying.</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-1714927849802408872009-10-17T16:36:00.004+01:002009-10-17T17:39:53.345+01:00Mellow fruitfulnessMore interesting things happen to me in, or in relation to, Bristol than I have any right to expect. On Wednesday I met Lulu Labonne for lunch (very good smoked salmon, very, er, experimental fruit salad, my responsibility). In the East Village she would be unremarked, in Bristol her black on black was deeply ironic, as is she. Her shopping included a green anti-personnel device that she claimed was a vegetable, but there are more edible-looking things in the Horrible Mediaeval Weapons section at the V&A.<div><br /></div><div>The next evening Mrs Pouncer ("Clarissa darling") met me in the Isambard, the Paddington station pub. Frankly, the place wasn't good enough.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Vodka and vermouth please". </div><div><br /></div><div>"Sorry, we don't do mixed drinks".</div><div><br /></div><div>"But this is a pub isn't it?"</div><div><br /></div><div>"Yes, but we don't do mixed drinks, they're separate franchises."</div><div><br /></div><div>Trust me, nothing on this blog is invented, it's all true. (Well, not quite, I invented Carla Bruni, but Sarkozy is real, he's a horrible little psychopath.) </div><div><br /></div><div>So we moved on to dinner.</div><div><br /></div><div>"It's got to be kosher."</div><div><br /></div><div>"OK, there's a Chinese restaurant, Chinese food is kosher isn't it?"</div><div><br /></div><div>I've long chosen to believe this, maybe I got it from Calvin Trillin, and have taught it to my daughter. Even sweet barbecued pork buns are kosher in a Chinese restaurant, there's a Talmudic dispensation or something.</div><div><br /></div><div>"For god's sake Inky, they used rectified lard."</div><div><br /></div><div>So we went Indian ("they're kosher"). </div><div> </div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-18074034385256339202009-10-04T22:28:00.004+01:002009-10-04T23:01:13.474+01:00Classical educationIn a recent New York Review of Books (no link, it's a paysite) Glen Bowersock reviews two books on classical Greek sex between men and boys. He starts by explaining the words erastes as lover and eromenos as beloved. These are the usual euphemisms, but eros connotes physical love, i.e. sex. So in fact erastes = fucker and eromenos = (male) fucked, but the NYRB doesn't like the f-word. Most of the article is taken up with a detailed discussion of the evidence for exactly what happened (intercrural rather than anal apparently, and it goes on from there). Thank you Professor, it's your job to know this sort of thing. I must admit, I like grown women but this stuff functioned well as a form of higher porn. Oh, and the Romans were no better than the Greeks; google coitum plenum et optabilem to see what I mean.<div><br /></div><div>So why on earth did Thomas Arnold choose classical Greek and Latin as the basis of an English boys' boarding school education? Lytton Strachey is hilarious on this subject in his Eminent Victorians, explaining that classics was what Arnold knew, so he would, wouldn't he? But Strachey was himself as gay as a Bristol pub, so why didn't he comment on the fact of Arnold institutionalizing a system where boys, of the same age as the eromenoi, were closeted, as it were, with teachers of the same age as the erastes? It is surprising that responsibility for a correct analysis should be left to this blog, but Precision Handling does not shirk its obligations.</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-27414867639172020732009-09-28T16:34:00.004+01:002009-09-28T17:17:50.078+01:00Lost weekend<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQHfwJ14tppBgzxUnxioKsPVVG-tYrhIoBLDAo3Q88KSZYYzoK45YNLItONmq27FqLb3zoeqnIUICN5diyUbaIASEUrxVvub4MzohWSskos7xbiIMd6NpgmfJks1jpzXP_aVNY0-BLWrY/s1600-h/image010_800x600.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQHfwJ14tppBgzxUnxioKsPVVG-tYrhIoBLDAo3Q88KSZYYzoK45YNLItONmq27FqLb3zoeqnIUICN5diyUbaIASEUrxVvub4MzohWSskos7xbiIMd6NpgmfJks1jpzXP_aVNY0-BLWrY/s320/image010_800x600.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5386543710229597906" border="0" /></a>The poker club meets in the back room of a pub 1/2 hr away. Here's Carlos; he doesn't have a heart of gold, but I'm solid with him because I found him an expert witness (a maxillary surgeon) for his assault case. The question is whether the other guy's smashed face is due to encountering a wall or Carlos. "It's OK Inkspot, the police are probably going to drop the case because the other bloke has a terrible record, but thanks anyway. Really, thanks a lot." It cost me a 5 minute phone call to a surgical friend, but the British class system is as rigid as ever and Carlos has the wrong contacts. Except for me.<br /><br />I played until too late, so Saturday was a bit of a write-off, I was too tired to be a useful family member and the morning was a bit tense. Sunday we had lunch with friends, he's gentle, she's beautiful. They have a lake in the grounds, so after lunch ("That lamb was delicious, you could really taste the innocence", stolen from Arlington Hynes at bogol, thank you Arlington, it was a great success) we went swimming. Despite the Indian summer it was too cold to stay in long, and the children were too intelligent to go in at all. Dinner was chips from the Turkish chip van; you don't get that in the country.xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-37547422935307258312009-09-19T11:08:00.004+01:002009-09-19T12:27:59.358+01:00Me me meSome time ago <a href="http://chantree.blogspot.com/">Gadjo</a> was kind enough to tag me; it's taken this long to think of anything to say.<div><br /></div>1. Telling people that I'm a mathematician stops most conversations. It's easy to change the subject: "That's a fabulous bracelet, it looks like something worn by a warrior princess". Some women like being compared to warrior princesses, but real warrior princesses tend to think I'm a drip.<div><br /></div><div>2. One of my ambitions is to introduce my brother (divorced, single, straight, glamorous, good-looking) to warrior princesses, such as <a href="http://earwigsandwich.blogspot.com/">Miss Whiplash</a> and <a href="http://nursemyra.wordpress.com/">Nursemyra</a>. He spends his time going to horrible places full of angry people (Iraq, Kosovo, Darfur, Burundi, ...) and trying to fix their lives. Ladies, form a disorderly queue please.<div><br /></div></div>3. OK, settle down, more math now. It was chemistry that got me into science in the first place; my dad gave me a chemistry set when I was 8 or 9 and it was the best present ever. The experience of doing math is like that of doing chemistry; things (chemicals or ideas) react and transform, creating new colours and smells in ways that are at first unexpected, then explicable. Without the unexpectedness it would be dull, without the explanation stupid. And of course it brings pleasure, at its best like a rocket shooting up your spine and exploding in your brain.<div><br /></div><div>4. When I had just finished my PhD I first met my US contemporaries at a conference and was blown away by finding out how much more they knew than I did. That was the single biggest intellectual event of my life till now, because of the way it overturned my view of what it means to be a mathematician and taught me that knowledge, deep and broad, and creativity are inseparable.</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-32649885627426093342009-09-16T07:15:00.005+01:002009-09-16T07:26:09.305+01:00Eat your heart out Jacques CousteauLast night I went swimming with whales. As one went by I squirted mustard in its ear. That made the whale thrash around a whole lot and I woke up at 4-30 in a Bristol hotel room. <div><br /></div><div>Bastard whale, now I'm going to be useless at work today.<div><br /></div><div>Oh btw Freudians, it was mustard, it was yellow.</div></div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815742194223412699.post-23899263250586263212009-09-05T17:24:00.003+01:002009-09-05T17:41:57.179+01:00Exotic job"Dad, why don't you have an exotic job?"<div><br /></div><div>??</div><div><br /></div><div>"Well, I'm a mathematician, that's pretty exotic compared to most people. But what do you mean by exotic job?"</div><div><br /></div><div>"Oh, it's where you wear a suit and take the train really early and work in a bank and come back really late [and bring back shedloads of money], that's an exotic job. Like my friends' dads have."</div><div><br /></div><div>Damned private school.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Look, if it weren't for mathematics those guys wouldn't be making any money. And it's really beautiful, plus it underlies everything else in this world, from electronics to our understanding of the spread of disease. You wouldn't be texting your friends without that. And you can't even tie your shoelaces without understanding math. [Memo to self: verify this last one, it's a bit dodgy.] And anyway you should always be proud of your own family and stick up for them."</div><div><br /></div><div>There might have been some finger-wagging during this.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Yes daddy yes daddy."</div><div><br /></div><div>A few weeks later the school play approaches.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Look darling, I don't want to embarrass you at the school play, so would you like me to wear a suit?"</div><div><br /></div><div>I do actually have one, I got married in it. I've a horrible fear it might have shrunk meanwhile.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Oh no dad, don't bother, everyone knows you haven't got an exotic job."</div>xerxeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03787696262480033808noreply@blogger.com18