“I cook with wine; sometimes I even add it to the food.” – W. C. Fields This is the first of my five-at-a-go wine entries, as mentioned in the last of my monthly compilations (February 2012). A relatively new postdoc at work had one of those brain farts that wreaks havoc on the lab.  When [...]

Si bene quid memini, causae sunt quinque bibendi; Hospitis adventus, praesens sitis atque futura, Aut vini bonitas, aut quaelibet altera causa. ———Henry Aldrich, 1647-1710 † This is Part 2 (February 2012) of my monthly review of wines…Part 1 is here:  The Horse of Parnassus (January 2012). There was a cold snap at the start of [...]

The research group Christmas Party was, like last year, at the boss’ house on the outskirts of Islip (famous as the home of Edward the Confessor, last of the Saxon kings). It is dark, these days, by 4:30 but the party started at 7:30 and I fancied a run after these last few weeks of [...]

My office mate asked how to fix her PC and I gave some suggestions and offered to have a look myself if it all went tits up.  She wasn’t in Monday but had dropped the PC off and I went ahead and took the initiative and sorted it out.  Wednesday there was a bag on [...]

This is a grab bag of stuff from this month, maybe becoming a recurring feature. The concept of ‘Qualifications’ is a funny one in Britain.  To be qualified to do something doesn’t mean that you have the skills to perform a task, but rather that you have “done a course” at the end of which [...]

Socket not working?  Of course not…some idiot has pasted tape across the pins: Yes, the University of Oxford: home to the best and the brightest.

No one got naked or threw up; there wasn’t even a fight. Despite all this, it seemed a pleasant enough way to kill the evening and wait for the cold meds to alleviate the fever. Definitely beginning to understand why Doug Stanhope wants the drinking age raised, though; [paraphrasing]: “Who wants to get loaded in [...]

Jackie used to work at the Pickle Barrel back in the early 80′s after it was bought by Nick and Brian, two former air traffic controllers at loose ends after the whole PATCO fiasco.  In many ways it was the best job she ever had and when she moved to Atlanta many of the Pickle [...]

Jamie had some stuff to post and when she got the stamps and saw what they were, said, “hey…give me another one of those.”  The Royal Mail has been putting out a number of these with great rock album covers (Never Mind the Bollocks was NOT on the shortlist for a sticky back with the [...]

New job approaches and I need to change my work status which means applying for a new work permit and Leave To Stay.  The new form is a bit simpler than the previous one but still has its wee hurdles (mostly gathering documentation, but I’m on top of all that). A sad comment on society [...]