Well, the reason I've been quiet for a bit is cos I got a kind of flu-like thing last week (10 days ago) and after I got better I had a load of stuff to catch up on. I'm just about back up to speed now, although that partly depends on a few things getting done this weekend. I examined a PhD last Friday when I was just about recovered, which was fun despite my slightly less than 100% state. Since then I've been mainly catching up. Middlesex has carried on with its amazing range of speakers. I went to see David Putnam the other day giving a really good talk on how he moved from film to education. The main idea was that film can be a really important thing if it has to do with our common humanity and collective responsibility. He's fed up with films where bombs only land on just the right people and murders leave no widows. So maybe he was in education even when he was in film? I also made it to the session with Guy Jenkin, who wrote loads of TV comedy including some Spitting Image and Drop The Dead Donkey (I always thought that was a great title and a not quite so great show) and Graham Lineham who wrote Father Ted among other stuff (of course a great show but I've always had a bit of a problem with priests - not that I particularly know any or anything). I would have maybe seen Howard Brenton but he cancelled at the last minute, and I definitely would have seen Michael Rosen (on 'Are books for children worth reading?') if the subject review I was involved in hadn't taken 10 hours (from 9.15am until 7.15pm). This was in Middlesex's country park campus where I used to be based and will be again after summer. Funny to be moving back and it feels longer ago than I'd realised. I'll miss Tottenham but I'm looking forward to being back to the countryside. This week I also managed to miss Kiloh's appearance for the school team in the girls' football finals. I felt less bad, though, when I heard she didn't get to play. She's usually one of the subs but they didn't use any subs in any of their games, which was sad for the four kids who didn't get a game. I was pleased to hear that Kiloh took this really well and said it was the team that mattered. Or is she a bad player if she hasn't learned to get on the moby to her agent as soon as anything like this happens?

B-)