2024 Weeknote 19

I have no excuse for not writing this yesterday, other than, yesterday, I agreed with myself that I could do as little as I liked. Consequently, there was some tidying and putting away of things that had been languishing in the wrong place since Christmas; there was a successful attempt as dismantling the floordrobe; there was a nap; and there was plenty of book-reading in the sun. Having said I would give up on Still Life, I decided to give it one last go and it suddenly got really good so now I can't put it down. I am rushing to get this finished so I can get through a bit more before bed. I do have a sneaking suspicion I should have read A Room With A View first, though. 

There was some TV watching last week - more Tattooist of Auschwitz - but not very much as I was busy trying to get a few little projects finished before the conference I went to over the weekend. One of those projects was the presentation I made on Friday so it was good that I managed to prioritise that. I might have finished my quiz round in the bar as we waited for the quiz to begin. However, it was all as successful as I wanted it to be. It's such a lovely event to hang out at: everyone is friendly and kind, people just start chatting to me out of nowhere and there's a good deal of very wholesome learning to be done as well. 

This year's historian was William Dalrymple who almost never speaks in the UK as he spends a large proportion of his time living in India. His talk was fascinating, even though I find he is a bit repetitive now I've read the books and listened to the podcasts. I suppose we can't expect everyone to come up with fresh material all the time, particularly when his was already a pretty fresh take on the history of the British in India. 

Naturally I made him take a picture with me for my wall of historians.

Other notable sessions included a scheme of work about why women are constantly accused of being mad when actually they're just being human beings, and an overview of student perceptions of the British Empire. Empire is my bag at the moment, I can't look away from it. I was quite stern with a very well-known history author and all-round legend during that session but this is the sort of thing that presses my buttons these days.

So, it was a very worky week, really. I didn't mind it. I feel like I'm emerging from my grouchy chrysalis. 

Rachael and I booked flights to Kazakhstan this week as well, which helped my motivation somewhat. The chance to ski outside of Europe, finally! Too exciting. 

The book is calling me.