Bartlett's Bizarre Bazaar

A brief diaristic interlude – the kind of blogging that I have little time for – normal service will be restored soon.

Reason one: Last week I moved house. The granny bungalow (it is not quite sheltered accomadation) in which I now live is piled high with boxes and in one of them is my Wanadoo broadband modem.

Reason two: Last week I organised a 3-day postgraduate conference. Not having a staff to delegate duties registering attendees or sorting out a potentially crtically disruptive shortage of coffee meant that these were my tasks, as were all others between locking up seminar rooms and introducing the plenary speakers, and, of course, socialising with the attendees. Actually, I did have one colleague in this adventure, who, despite being ill, did a fair load of work. The conference ran fairly smoothly and was enjoyed by those attending.

Reason three: Last week I gave an academic paper at the conference that I organised. Given that I have spent much of the summer organising a house move and a postgraduate conference, much of the meat of this paper was written over the few free days of the past fortnight. I think that the paper that I presented was fairly well-received, though it was not as successful as the conference itself.

Postscript: Mentally shattered*, I played in the preliminary round of the Welsh Cup on Saturday. I was completely off the pace and was substituted at half-time. We lost.

*Or perhaps I am just crap at rugby.