Birthday Pics (at last!)

This was a post that was meant to appear on my birthday, but was tragically gobbled up by the internet gremlins. They hate me. I hate them. It has taken me a long time to regroup from the loss, but Andrew is heckling me, so here I (resentfully) (stupid gremlins) go:


My new home is at 6a Raven Road in Sheffield.



This is my street. The houses are all joined together. This is a really great idea in principle. Unfortunately there is an unemployed singing teenager living next to my bedroom (I put him in the same box as the gremlins... I hope they enjoy each other).



Lavender grows right outside of my house! A really big bush! With bumblebees. I like it a lot.



There are these little alleys between the joined up houses. If you walk down this one and look left, you will see my front door. If you go through that gate, you'll get to my garden, where we keep the bikes and the herbs that we steal from the neighbors.




C'mon in! (Careful, the stairs are steep!)



Downstairs, we have the kitchen (now thankfully sans Buddhists),



and the lounge, complete with fire place,



comfy chairs, and sheep. If you go upstairs,



and along the hall,



you'll get to my favourite room in the house. I love the bath. It loves me. No gremlins allowed.



I guess that just leaves my bedroom (OUR bedroom, Ed.), where I sleep and work. It looks pretty different now; a lot can happen in six months. We have new furniture, including a desk for me, which means that I can't work in bed any more. I blame the gremlins. Stupid gremlins.

Anyway, this is my house. I like living here. I like my housemates (I like them now, a lot has changed in six months). I like most of my neighbors (except the singing gremlin boy), I like the neighborhood (I can run around and there is a bakery and a green grocer and a scuba diving shop). So all that's missing is you.

Laura's New Haircut & Wedding Rumours

(Here is Laura talking about her new haircut...)

So most of you (who had a chance) didn't even notice. But I DID actually cut seven inches off of my hair. It was really fun. I haven't been to a hair salon in years, because my lovely and talented sister Sarah has been my hairdresser extraordinaire. However, Sarah has been temporarily replaced by Emma, my new friend at the Toni & Guy salon in Sheffield. I was a little uncertain about making my appointment, as Toni&Guy have levels of stylists, and I had no idea which level to choose. (i chose the cheapest one, in the end.) Thank goodness, as Emma was just about as much stylist as I could handle. The higher level ladies and gentlemen would have had no idea what to do with me. And vice versa. Emma had a kind of mod Marie-Antoinette thing going on, with a bouffant hair-do, very pink cheeks, big fake eyelashes and a fake mole. She was cool. I am still not quite cool, but here is what Emma and I came up with:




(this one is my favorite, as it obscures most of ME and just puts Emma's handiwork on display)



Oh well. Maybe if I keep this stylist thing going... I won't always look like a potato.
-------------

Okay, I'm signing on to talk briefly about wedding stuff. Obviously a lot of conversations are taking place at the moment on what may or may not happen wedding-wise, and I'm sure everyone is excited to hear about our plans. Well, here's all we can tell you right now.

One, we don't have any definite plans yet, and we won't have any definite plans (not even a definite time frame) until April at the earliest - that is, once we know where Laura intends to research her PhD. Once we know that we'll be in a better position to discuss where a ceremony and reception might take place (viz. which side of the Atlantic) and when (viz. a time when we are both living on the same side of said ocean). Two, we're happy to hear people's suggestions of what you would like to see/hear/eat/do during our wedding. The Big Day is all about us sharing our happiness with all of you, so naturally we'd like to know how you think we might best do this. Three, the only thing we're pretty sure we don't want is something heavily traditional. It is unlikely to be a ceremony in a church, followed by a reception in a hotel or a castle or anything. We want the focus of attention to be our friends and family getting together to have fun and get to know each other, so we'll be focusing our efforts on creating a happy, fun and relaxed environment in which that can take place.

We look forward to hearing any suggestions that you might have. Nothing is too outlandish! Let your imagination run wild.

The Good News

Something wonderful happened on Saturday, January 13th: Andrew proposed, and I accepted.


(Thanks to Lucy for the photo!)

It was a wonderful, terrifying, completely surprising moment, and I am still recovering. We both walk around with silly grins. I am trying out the word 'fiancé' and calling everyone I know. (not calling them 'fiancé', of course...) Until we know more about where we will be living (due to jobs, PhDs, etc) we are trying our very hardest not to talk too much about plans and dates and practical things like that. But the reality check is made easier by my beautiful new ring...





(Andrew discovered that it's surprisingly difficult to take good pictures of a diamond ring!)

Sparkle, sparkle.

Hooray for the Local Government Association!

I sent them an email to express my support for the 'War on Waste' campaign they have just launched. The campaign involves proposals to tax people who do not recycle their household waste. I received the following interesting email, with more details about the scheme, in reply...

Dear Mr Howat
Thankyou for your comments regarding the launch of the Local Government Association 'War on Waste campaign' that was launched this week.

I will be passing on your comments to Cllr Bettison, and I am sure he will be delighted by your support. I also wanted to let you know a couple of the points of what the campaign is trying to do and say.

In terms of the 'save as you throw' proposals, we are very keen to stress that this would not be an extra tax. The way it would work is that there would be a cut in council tax and then you would pay for the rubbish you throw away. The UK is the only country in Europe (and indeed most of the western world) that doesn't have some sort of scheme like this. One argument that has been put forward to me is that we would not expect to pay, say, £300 for as much petrol as we wanted to drive our cars on the roads for the year - we have to pay for it by the gallon. In that respect why should rubbish be any different?

If I may, I would like to make a couple of other points. We are not calling for every council in the country to use these powers. If the local people and the council felt it was the best way forward to help cut the amount of rubbish thrown away then that would be up to them. As a country, we are facing some tough challenges in the long term. We are running out of landfill space and the UK is set to be hit with landfill fines by the European Union if it doesn't reduce its' reliance on simply throwing away our rubbish - which according to the National Audit Office, will mean that by 2013 councils, and therefore taxpayers, will be subjected to £205million in fines. Not only that, but the cost of throwing our rubbish away is going to almost double to £4.2billion by 2013.

We are anxious that council tax and bills that council taxpayers are kept as low as possible and therefore, by cutting the amount of waste we throw away each year, we can keep bills down.

On a final note, our campaign is not just about local people and throwing rubbish away and hopefully in the coming weeks you will see the LGA turn its attention away from what local people can do to what manufacturers can do. Over the coming weeks we will be targeting the producers of rubbish as well. From supermarkets who wrap their coconuts in clingfilm, to the amount of junk mail, to the amount of space taken up by disposable nappies, we will heap the pressure on those who make the waste in the first place to try and help them to help us keep council tax bills down and preserve the environment for future generations.

I hope this provides some information on what we are hoping to achieve.

Kind regards

Richard Stokoe
Chief Media Officer
Local Government Association

Organ Donation

This is for all the UK citizens (Scots) & subjects (the rest of you) among you,

this petition seems to me to be in favour of a worthy cause, those who agree can sign up by following this link, supplying a valid email address, then following the link they will shortly receive at that address...

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Organ-Donation/

Now all we need is for our attitudes to death and organ donation to shift in the same enlightened way they have in Spain. Luckily our housemate Jane is thinking of pursuing research into exactly this topic, so I'm sure she'll have a cultural sea change under way in no time.

Announcing the iPhone

You all know I'm a big Apple fan, and that I like to keep up to date with latest technology. It shouldn't therefore be that big a surprise to me when I read about next the next leap forward, and yet for some reason I find this thing rather jawdropping. It reminds me of the scene in Casino Royale when Bond is following a map to his Hawiian resort on his carefully product-placed, futuristic Sony Ericsson phone. Only now it turns out it's not only not futuristic, it's positively behind the times! Does anyone else suspect these will become the next must-have, flying-off-the-shelves e-accessory?

How Much Fun is This?

Check this out for hours of hypnotizing fun. My favourite is the one with the crank handle.

Redundant Post

Dear all,

apparently I can't post a picture of myself in my profile until I have posted it on the blog (I don't have anywhere else to host it - apparently my Flickr images are too large). Anyway. I'm posting it here only so I can put it on my profile page, and now you are wishing you hadn't read this!

Me, by Richard Wanderman.

Bond & a bit of Beatboxing

Two little things that lightened up my rather dark recent days... An amusing and I think quite accurate review of Casino Royale, which we saw a few nights ago, and an interesting study in how technology can make people (seem?) more talented (I'll be surprised if this kid doesn't eventually take the world by storm in some way or other).

Two Amusing Animal-Related News Stories

...featuring a pair of drunken elks and an ill-fated rare-Robin siting.

New Flickr Photos

I realised today I actually had a few pictures I hadn't posted on Flickr yet and that thesis work hasn't completely eclipsed my photographic hobby these past couple of months after all. Since it only took five minutes or so, I've stuck them on the Flickr page for your perusal (for those of you still reading this). By the way, I haven't officially reopened the blog, I'm merely sticking one or two things on lately out of a combination of guilt and boredom. I will still email in a month or two when we're ready to start posting again properly. Thanks to those of you who have stuck with us!

Laura Relaxes

Laura suggested I post this picture. It's an attempt at using my new mobile phone's 'panoramic' setting, which involves taking three pictures which overlap. I think the phone smoothes out any minor incongruities automatically. It worked well for the first two shots, but the eagle eyed amongst you can probably pick out where I messed up the blend of shots two and three. Still, not a bad picture we thought... (Click on it to enlarge it slightly). It's from the weekend we spent with my cousin Ken & his lovely new lady friend Fiona only a fortnight ago. You can see their vague outlines in this other interesting picture...

One Small Thing

When I said we wouldn't be posting for a while, I wasn't counting on something this amusing coming along...

Thesis Blues

Sorry for the long hiatus from posting. Needless to say I'm entering a tough phase right now, the last couple of months of my thesis, combined with the beginning of the scary process of building a career, thinking about jobs, publication, conferences, networking, etc. etc. Ick.

Laura and I are both having a difficult time with other bits of our lives too. We have a long list of minor gripes that put together makes for one big boat load of stress. We're down to one computer (Laura's iBook is still not quite recovered), which is tough when we both have so much work to do. Certain housemates are making our lives pretty hellish. And well, we won't trouble you with a long list of moans. Suffice to say however that there will likely be a long break before we post on here again. Once we're in a mood to take pictures and update you on happier events, we'll send an email round, for those of you who don't use RSS to keep track of developments on the blog.

We hope you are all doing all right and will keep in touch/bear with us through this stressful time.

Gling Glo

Sorry we've been away for a while, but on Thursday Laura and I were at a conference in Cambridge. This was surprisingly good fun, particularly for Laura I think, mostly thanks to the Wittgensteinian leanings of talks and attendees. For me it was a little bit like attending a conference in a foreign country. Although everyone spoke my language, there was definitely some kind of intellectual culture these people shared, but which I did not. Thankfully, Crispin Wright was there to give voice to my mainstream unease with the various talks. While I enjoyed Avner's talk on contextualism and Wright's talk on rule-following, Laura headed up to Scotland for Jane's wedding. Now that I'm back, and enjoying Sunday with my ever expanding music collection, I just popped on to share with you this amusing description of an excellent (though deeply obscure) Bjork album I've been listening to a lot lately. It's translated pretty roughly from Icelandic, but somehow I suspect that even with better translation, it wouldn't make very much more sense than it does now. The album is one of Bjork's early collaborations with a jazz trio of all things, and is a tour de force of her unique vocal stylings.

...when the forces of nature Bjork Gudmundsdottir enwraps it self, the partners [the trio] fly high and deep into the core of the jazz-pop of the fifties to the extend that they escape time and space. Listeners will get an unique opportunity on this CD to experience the mysterious and random meeting of umbrellas of the past and sewing-machines of the present, on the keyboard. Katie rocks in Bjork's disguise. Bjork is Bella telephone-operator and Adda Ornolfs. Bjork is Ingibjorg, Sigrun and Soffia. Bjork is. The lyrics span old and classic realms of passion. These are the final scenes of Electra and Oedipus. It is man's wish to kneed together, from time and space, their own special dream-dough. Here is where the dream comes true. Enjoy. (From Bjorkish.net)

The Uses of Philosophy

I found this story (discovery courtesy of the Guardian's Wrap service) somehow reassuring. Even if I don't manage to make it clear to anyone over the course of my career what possible use philosophy might be to anyone but philosophers, perhaps someone else might come along one day and do it for me.

Housemates Needed!

Jane and Steven have decided to move out! They both seem very ready for a place of their own, and good luck to them. But it leaves us needing a couple or at least two individuals to fill their room (and/or the spare room). I attach the following ad in case any of you know someone who knows someone, etc. or in case in a freakish coincidence someone who is looking for a place in Sheffield stumbles upon our humble blog.

- - - - - -

ROOM TO LET - NETHER EDGE

Us
Three open-minded, quiet but friendly academics who like home-cooking, drinking wine and looking out for each other.

You
One couple, or two individuals (two double rooms available), vegetarian/pescetarian, friendly (and eco-friendly) professionals or students (esp. postgrad or mature); chilled, quietly sociable, open-minded, tidy.

The House
Modern 4-bedroom, 5-person house in Nether Edge (near Jacksons); rather gorgeous for the money (excellent kitchen with tiled floor & high quality appliances; bright living room with hardwood floor, bay window and working fireplace, lovely large bathroom & separate shower room); landlord requires non-smoker, prohibits pets & DHSS; we prefer to share household & food expenses; Rent is £150 pcm/pp (excl. bills), £250 pcm/pp (inc. bills: 2GB wireless, cable TV, food, council tax, etc.); available immediately.

Contact
Comment on this post!

Gilliam for Potter & Pullman!

A fun interview with top-notch, underappreciated film director Terry Gilliam (Brazil, Twelve Monkeys, Time Bandits) also featuring everyone's favourite movie critic Mark Kermode and an amusing discussion of the merits of Pirates of the Carribean (I'm with Gilliam on this). But most of all it makes you think, how cool would it be to have Gilliam doing Harry Potter 5 or the Philip Pullman films (His Dark Materials), he would be perfect! In fact, he's the only director I can think of who might pull off the Pullman books without ruining them. Alas, it looks to me like these magical stories are at the mercy of a bunch of hacks. How on earth is Chris Weitz of all people going to cope with the extremely tricky religious material? My greatest fear is that he simply won't bother with it, spoiling the real substance of the books.

Our Strange Academics and Intellectuals

I hesitate to recommend this, because it's surprisingly disappointing, yet it might well be something people should look at, in case they're curious about the strange worlds and minds of contemporary academics. It's a Slate feature, whose premise is a rather irritating man interviewing a large number and variety of influential academics on various topics, all with distinctly religious under/overtones. Among the guests are our beloved (ahem) Dan Dennett, Francis Fukuyama, Steven Pinker, and lots of others I'm not so familiar with. Apart from the interviewer going on at greater length than seems to me polite, never mind interesting, the attempts of some of our supposedly greatest academics to talk about these really exciting and interesting issues are often disappointingly dull. I'm sure there are some gems in there however, so perhaps people could comment if they have the patience to search and manage to discover something amusing. The following link is to Dan Dennett discussing death and the afterlife. Notice his rather poor initial effort not to 'disparage' the comforting illusion of an afterlife!

By the time he was 27...

...Stephen Arnold Douglas had been appointed to the Illinois Supreme Court.
...van Gogh had been a theology student, a semi-trained evangelist in the slums of London and the mines of Wasmes (in Belgium), a French tutor, an unsuccessful art salesman and spurned by love. [I got to that one way earlier!]
...Yann Martel was earning his living as a writer.
...Cho Chik-un held four major Japanese titles as a player of 'Go'.
...Orson Welles had already made Citizen Kane.
...Louis the XV had already fathered ten children.
...Tom Brady (quarterback for the Patriots) had already won three superbowls.
...Alexander the Great had already conquered 90% of the known world.
...Kurt Cobain was dead.

Hmm. Maybe I have some work to do? Or maybe I'm doing pretty well?

(By the way, there are now more holiday snaps on the Flickr page)