Sorry sorry sorry

OK friends, it's been a while - and I apologise. The title is not just a result of a habit-forming week spent with Emily and Mark (the wonderful sorry twins) over New Year's; I am, actually, sorry. Those of you who have indicated that you wanted to hear more news from me, sooner than I was providing it, have warmed the cockles of my heart (you know who you are). The rest of you are probably, sensibly, less interested in my life and more in your own, so please feel free just to look at the pictures. I would. That reminds me: my camera is back on deck, on line and on fire! Yay! Watch the quality of photography fail to improve as I stop stealing other people’s pictures! (Oh, shut up Jonny, get on with it.) OK.

Oh, but before I do get on with it, are you all still alive? It’s just that the other day I read the local headlines courtesy of the illustrious online Adelaide Advertiser and found that they read like this:

Pharmacies broken into over night
Today, 02:45 AM

Victims threatened in two holdups
Today, 12:14 AM

Suspect stabbed in home invasion
Yesterday, 11:30 PM

Man shot in head with spear gun
Yesterday, 11:18 PM

Shark spotted off southers [sic] beaches
Yesterday, 03:45 PM

So what with rampant sharks and a whopping crime wave in SA, and the worst serial killer since Jack the Ripper operating in Ipswich where several of my beloved English cousins live, I was starting to suspect that everyone I know and love was in grave danger of extermination over the Christmas break... But I think we've made it.

Anyway, in terms of, like, actual news, what have I been up to? Well, in the weeks before Christmas I stayed in Oxford, planning to get plenty of work done on the essays I had to write. Here's the view over Rhodes House towards the 'dreaming spires' which I was looking at one afternoon while failing to do said work and, well, dreaming...

At least I was in a library. Despite the occasional speccy sunset, when the place drains of students and the weather drifts toward the freezing and grey, Oxford can seem a less than chirpy place to be. I defeated the winter blues by getting in touch with lots of folks from home, which was great. This spectacular hamper of 'Strine Stuff from Mum helped too, bless her cotton socks!

Oh, and, of course, there are always a few other postgrads battling on through the short days, so we tended to find each other by email and occasionally trudge pubwards in the darkness... On one such occasion, Liz, whom you may remember from a previous episode appropriating an abandoned television, turned her kleptomania onto a (huge) box of coathangers found outside a clothes store - apparently hangers were at a premium in Somerville College. No longer! Ryan is trying to help. I think.

I spent Christmas with three wonderful families of cousins who live in Bury St Edmunds and Ipswich. It was fantastic to be in real homes with books on the shelves - and, importantly, family. Had a great week, though didn't yet have my camera back so I can't show you any of it. Then back to Oxford briefly to spend a day and a very fun night with Aneurin who was visiting from Deutschland. I think I managed to show him five pubs - but again, no pictures. On the 30th it was off to Scotland where Out of the Blue had a gig at Gleneagles, one of the ritziest hotels in the country. Whe-hey. Not a bad night, all up. Perhaps not our finest performance, but they loved us in the bar afterwards... And our rooms were, needless to say, amazing! They weren't this blurry in real life:

And here's the outside, looking a very Scottish shade of grey but grand nonetheless!

The place even has its own picturesque little train station. Unbelievable.

The best thing is that I now have a little monogrammed pair of Gleneagles slippers in my room. And some shampoo, and some body lotion. (Not even sure what to use that for - it's like soap, right?) Mum got a letter on Gleneagles stationery, too. I decided to leave the dressing gown behind...

Back to Edinburgh for NYE, but the Hogmanay street party was cancelled (reason being a celebratory storm featuring 100mph winds) which left literally hundreds of thousands of revellers to squeeze into pubs all over town. It was a good night! And then I got to spend a week with Emily and Mark in their beaut apartment in Morningside, resplendent with two cats and enough cat-pampering equipment to send Mum on a guilt-ridden shopping bonanza for Chloe, who only has one climbing gym. These are the cat-hammocks that hang over the radiator. Luxury!

Had a very relaxing week and saw quite a bit of Edinburgh...

...plenty of Emily and Mark (thanks so much guys!)...

...and the odd highland 'koo'. Whoa!

Eventually I had to come back to Oxford and face up to the essays. Got there in the end, dazed, sleepless and relieved... I am now great conversation if you're interested in Louis Pasteur, Robert Koch and how much they hated each other, or the creation of scientific facts as described by the faintly annoying anthropologist Bruno Latour. It is now fourth week, Hilary Term is in full swing and I'm doing lots of reading. For a change. The first big "bop" for the term was Australia Day; if you ever don't feel very patriotic about being an Aussie, just spend January 26th in England. Strange things happen...

Check out Snugglepot and Cuddlepie! (Hannah and Jeni, Aussie Rhodents who actually put effort into their costumes...)

Good times. But anyway, this has turned into a monster blog post. I will leave you in peace. You should all come and see Oxford for yourselves. Follow Jim's lead - he was here for a couple of days, so we climbed a church. Nice.

OK, done. I promise to be more regular and less long-winded in future. In the blog, that is. Send me an email, smoke me a kipper, and stay out of the sun. I am. :)