Sunday, 25 February 2024

2024 Weeknote 8

It's been a bit of a nothing week. Term started but I found myself a bit listless and struggled to get much done, partly because I was quite literally listless - everything on my list was either massive and unstartable without taking some time to break it down, or tiny and over in a flash. I had a ski meeting on Monday night and an exam board meeting on Wednesday, and took my hurty leg (which I now think might be an over-extended ACL, following a conversation with someone at work) to a gym session at which we just did upper body. I'm actually missing my usual gym routine, even though it wasn't particularly often, so I've got a physio session booked in next week. 

I did resign from my permanent job. This isn't quite the news that is seems to be, because I will apply for a senior role when it's advertised internally and I am about 70/30 sure I'll get it. For various reasons, though, it was sensible to quit what I no longer have any desire to return to and the thought that I might not get the senior role and then I might have next year off is as comforting as thinking that I will get it. I can't lose. I was also approached about being involved in a bid to do some work across the region over the next three years, led by a woman I have wanted to work with for a while, and the head is happy to support me in this so that was an exciting whiff of the future as well.

I finished The Vanishing Witch and started a new book called The Ottoman Secret, which is set in an alternative reality where the Ottoman Empire defeated Vienna and went on to conquer Europe. It's OK but I realised when I started it that the main recommender, on the front cover, is Lee Child - I wouldn't normally read this genre. But it might be good to branch out.

I finished the outstanding How the Word is Passed and liked it so much that I ordered a physical copy as well. It's World Book Day soon and we've been asked to read to all our classes that day from a favourite book, so I will choose that one. I've got a couple of new audiobooks in the wings but think I will next be listening to An Inspector Calls because that's the team dress-up for World Book Day and I should probably know what it's about.

I am really, really close to finishing the hexagon blanket - just two more hexagons to go. And then the sewing in, and the blocking, and the sewing up. It is too big to lay out on the sitting room floor, I can't imagine how big it will be once they're all blocked. 


The different colours down the right-hand side are piles of hexagons in the colourways where I didn't have two full skeins of yarn - mostly these are piles of 4; I'm not totally sure how to incorporate them yet. I think it's interesting how similar the two colourways in the middle look, both quite pale grey. They are not the same, the upper one being Winter is Coming, which is the one I still need to finish (hence the gaps) and the lower one being A River Runs Through It. 

Lenin came to do his inspection and he found it passable. 

This weekend was the last chance I had to get out in my kayak if I wanted to meet my resolution, so yesterday I duly strapped it onto the roof of my car and set off in search of water. They turned out to be ill omens that I got the ratchets ratchetting first time and that the sun came out as I set off. My first attempt, down by Hanham Mills, would certainly have resulted in the loss of my kayak and/or my death as the water was very high (the pier was higher than the bank) and flowing at considerable speed. I nearly went home but then decided it was too nice a day to waste, so I headed to Bristol harbour, as I thought the water would be calmer. Probably it was but I never found out because the road to my usual spot was closed. I probably could have reached it via another route, but by that point I had been driving around for the better part of an hour and I would have probably managed 20 minutes on the water before I needed to reload to make it home before dark.

So I have failed in my resolution, but not for want of trying. There was a huge puddle in the Hanham car park, maybe I should have put it in there. My PT suggested that such a choice might help me become an internet sensation, though, and I think that's best avoided. 

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