Wow - what a couple of weeks!

Since last time lots of stuff has happened - just a few mentions here.

We have robins in the garden - there are two, and I have heard that they are very territorial, so perhaps (hopefully) they are a mating pair.This may seem  trivial, but it is a very pleasing event - lat year we had greenfinches in the autumn, and we have seen a few this spring, but it is a first for robins.

Bro2 had a 25th wedding anniversary. Party in a good venue, although a little far from home. Bro1 helpfully gave us a lift, other wise we might have had trouble finding the place. Journeyplanner identified appropriate train, but we would have had to get a bus from the station. Bus route instructions were very odd - "catch the 101 going East" - 15 minute journey - not too bad. Then get off and "catch the 101 going West" for a further 5 minute journey. Odd, this. Why not just get off the first 101 five minutes earlier?  Suffice to say the party was in the Maidstone area (I have blogged about travel in Maidstone before). CuzJ was in such a hurry to get into the venue that she leapt out of her taxi and watched it speed off with the anniversary presents still in the boot. Party was a good opportunity to meet and greet family members I haven't seen for a long time. 

On a world scale, there was an eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland which shut down airspace over Europe for days. The sky became very clear (although apparently there was an invisible ash cloud) and we could hear the birds tweeting. Planes are flying again, but there is still a huge backlog of travellers waiting to get home, including two of my immediate work colleagues. There is a chance that this little volcano might trigger its more pronounceable neighbour Katje, which could be way more destructive and disruptive. Watch this space.

Could I be a nerd?

I got a shiny new iPhone recently, and have rediscovered the joys of twitter and other social networking sites, which has prompted me to restart blogging. I now have three separate blogs on three different sites (but all with a common "grey" theme, which says something about my state of mind, I think - colour has always been an indicator of how I am feeling).  This blog is for general ramblings, and I have another one which relates specifically to my professional development activities. The newest one is for draft reminders of academic writing topics, which I hope will prompt me to actually DO some academic writing. I want to keep them separated as they really are for very different activities.

But back to the iPhone - I wanted to find out how to set up folders in the "photo" application.  The application provides lots of space for albums, but no obvious way of adding a new album, or moving photos between albums. I assumed that this could probably be done in iTunes, where every else seems to happen, but no - there is no obvious way here either.  The online user manual is as good as useless for this. I guess that Apple think everyone must already know how to do this stuff. Finally, after a lot of trial and error I figured it out for myself. You have to go to  "my computer" , then set up a folder called "iPhone", then set up various folders inside that folder. THEN you can ask iTunes to synch folders from the "iPhone" folder to the  phone. Eureka! I now have albums in my photos app.

I love my phone, but it is quite demanding - my emails beep at me and twitter needs to be checked constantly - also facebook. Maybe this is a "new-user" phase that I will grow out of - or maybe not.

I'm still here!

Can't believe I haven't updated this since last September! What's happened since then? Well: 

• I haven't finished my MA (still! - and need to get a move-on as Bex starts hers soon, and I don't want to be left behind). I obviously have a block about this.
• Baby grandson is now just over a year old and has had to have operations on both eyes (poor little man). He has recovered well, and hopefully won't need any further surgery. Tori is coping remarkably well with this.
• My current students have turned out as well as I had hoped. They all passed their first semester and I have high hopes for semester 2.
• We had a LOT of snow at Christmas  - I actually got trapped away from home during the first snowfall and had to be rescued by Bex after several hours of freezing panic. 
•  I got paid for an article I wrote (first time I have had money for writing my opinion!)
• The tumble drier blew up, the cooker still relies on gaffer tape and the boiler broke down again.
• Tori is busy in renovating a flat (and hopefully will move into it in the not too distant future).
• Sadly, my mother's absent-mindedness is not just a funny quirk, but has been diagnosed as early alzheimers.

 I am on holiday from work at the moment, and had promised myself that I would clear out the rest of my wardrobe, retile the bathroom floor, get a new cooker and tumble drier etc etc . But have actually done pretty much nothing.  I DID buy some shoes - pink metallic mary-jane style -which I have hankered after for years. I now have three pairs of "posh" shoes - not many for someone with hundreds of black T-shirts.

Saw my first 3-D film (Alice in Wonderland) and got a headache from the glasses. I'm not convinced about 3-D for film and TV, but it may be that my replacement lenses (I had cataract surgery on both eyes some years ago) make it harder for me to get the full benefit of it.

On a final sad note, we lost our lovely Wookie after a serious illness. RIP.