Gate repair

The gate to my garden had felt a bit wobbly for a while. I had been eying up the hinges, but I saw nothing out of the ordinary there. Then one day I noticed the problem. Its post was coming out of the wall! It had been fixed with sizeable screws and plugs, but that was clearly not enough. Screws and plugs were just coming out of the wall. I needed to act. From the moment I knew that, I wasn't really comfortable using the gate.

Gate coming out of the wall 

I first removed the gate from the post. The screws that held the two bits of wood together were in good condition, and I could just unscrew them. No such luck with the screws that were coming out of the wall, so I just pulled them clean out. No way I was going to be able to get them out of the wood with those damaged heads and rusty bodies.

After some thinking I decided that the best course of action would be to take a different piece of wood, fill the holes in the wall, put the plugs back in, and then screw the new post in. That would sort it out. And I just picked a suitable piece of wood from my pile of uncut firewood.

Preparing the new beam, in my newish garage setup

Then things got busy for a few weeks. And the weather was generally awful. You don't want to handle a gate when the wind is tugging at you! And it seemed that it was always windy and rainy. One thing I did manage to get done was indicate on the new post where the screws for into the wall should go. And I pre-drilled holes. That was garage work so not so weather-dependent. And in the weekend after the dissertation talks I finally got around to installing the whole shebang. It needed a little bit of tweaking as not everything lined up, but it got done! I have a gate again! I could do with a few days off to do more such chores, but at least this one is out of the way now…

Repaired! 

Almost birthday with Kate

I had only seen her the week before, after her long absence, but the weekend after that would be Kate’s birthday. I enquired if she was up for a birthday cake. She was, and she suggested an additional walk. That sounded great to me! 

On Friday night I baked the cake. On Saturday morning I drove to Penmachno. Bryn was glad to see me again! As was Kate. And we could have coffee with cake in the garden; the weather was good enough for that. And after the cake we went for a walk. We did not want to do anything spectacular; the week before Kate pushed it a bit too hard after her recent illness, and we did not want to make that mistake again. And we did not want the hassle of walking through lots of fields with sheep and lambs, that would require tight control of the dog. We would just do one of her standard loops. But a standard loop in the Penmachno area is still spectacularly beautiful! And we found an amazing spot with a waterfall to have lunch. Bryn liked it a bit too much to take rocks from the pool underneath the waterfall, bring them to us, and shake out his fur, so we were at risk at becoming as wet as he was, but that was only a mild damper on the fun.

The birthday cake

Near the start of the walk

View on the valley 

Near the head of the valley 

Lunch spot

The other valley  

After the walk we had tea and more cake. And after some walk-unrelated stuff I made my way home again. I'm sure we'll find opportunities to get back to race recceing soon!

Dissertation presentations

I was ready for the presentations! I had a box in the back of my car with all the paperwork that was needed. All the files that anyone would need were available on the module website, or on OneDrive. I had my laptop with me so I would be able to do some work.

I got to the venue, Reichel Hall, and it looked ready for us. I had a little chat with the lady with whom I had communicated about my booking. It was nice to meet her in person. And a different lady did the final touches; she made sure there was a sign by the door of all the rooms we were using, indicating what would be going on there.

My program just mentioned rooms 1, 2 and 3, so I stuck signs on the doors. And I put all the conference booklets and marking sheets in the rooms, ready for the morning sessions. And I had myself a coffee.

All ready for us! 

As far as I could tell, the morning sessions went fine! And I was just doing some work I hadn't got around to previously. I entered the marks and feedback of the second year presentations I witnessed two days earlier. I started assigning all dissertations a second marker. I answered emails. And then lunch arrived.

When the rooms emptied themselves, I made sure to remove the morning’s conference booklets, and replace them with the ones for the afternoon. And I checked whether there still were enough marking sheets and feedback sheets. And then I had lunch myself. 

The afternoon sessions had two small snags! One member of staff wanted to be kind, and thought they’d tidy up the morning’s conference booklets, not realising I had already replaced them with the afternoon’s. So that room had no conference booklets! My hard work down the drain. But they meant well. And the other snag was a different member of staff who seemed to have only realised just in time their session started at 13:15; not 15:00. But these are small snags.

In the afternoon coffee break one of the students asked me why I wouldn't join the session he was in. And I thought I might as well! Then he back-paddled a bit. He clearly didn't think I was going to do it! But it was an interesting session so why not. Yes you could successfully argue they were all interesting. But some are still a bit more up my street than others. And everything was rolling fine; I didn't really need to do anything organisational anymore.

After the session it got quiet; I think our room was the last one to empty itself. I went to have a look in the room where catering was served; there were brownies left! That's not good. I filled up a piece of Tupperware I had with me to take home. And I asked everyone who was still around if they wanted some. Even random strangers who were in the building for entirely different reasons! And in the end they were all eaten or taken home. Success. And then I could go home myself! And the next day would be even more interesting for me, as then I had my own session…

That day went well. There was some faff with the room we normally get the catering in being booked, and one of the rooms in which we held sessions having to accommodate coffee too, but it worked out. And by 4 pm I could leave the premises!

There would be one additional session for the staff who had been at the conference that week, but that was straightforward. The worst was over now! And with that out of the way, the academic year was now seriously petering out. And that doesn't mean there's nothing to do; there is plenty of marking, and planning for the next year, and evaluations, and all that stuff. But the end of the dissertation presentations for me is always a bit of a landmark. At least it is the end of almost all teaching, which means that you can decide yourself when and where you do the things you have to do. And that can be quite nice!

Revenge by the cat

The night before the dissertation presentations would start, the cat had a mouse. I could tell from her excited meowing. It is not uncommon that she catches one and lets it go by the front door, upon which the mouse then climbs the curtain there. That throws her! And when I walked past I spotted the mouse. She clearly didn't think she could reach it. And normally I just let her do her thing with mice. I don't enjoy watching her kill, but that's just how nature works. But this time I figured I should be capable of grabbing and releasing it, pretty much before she would clock what was going on.

It wasn't quite as easy as I thought! I dropped the mouse before I had quite lifted it out of the window. A bit of a scramble followed, but in the end I managed to get it out. And I had a bit of an agitated cat on my hands, who could smell mouse, but couldn't find one.

Soon after that I went to bed and tried to sleep. The cat had other plans. Soon she went outside again, and I had visions of her making a point of catching that very same mouse again, to teach me a lesson. I would have no way of knowing if she would, of course! All mice look the same to me, especially in the dark and from a distance. But lo and behold, she came back with one. And noisily played with it all over the bedroom. And it wasn't even the last. After she had eaten it, she just went out again, and got another one.

I am probably reading too much into this! But I do feel like she was making a point. Maybe I should just leave her mice to her, even if they are hiding in the curtain. It's nature’s way!

Katrien’s inaugural lecture

During the tenure of our previous VC, inaugural lectures weren't a thing. This VC is clearly in favour of them. And the first people to be promoted to professor in our School happened to be the celebrated three ladies. Three female professors in a School that before then had only had one in its entire history. I liked that it was them who were kicking off this new tradition. On Valentine's Day, we had been able to witness Yueng’s lecture, which was mainly about polar oceans. And now, wedged between full days of student presentations, we would get Katrien’s lecture about geophysics.

I was early. I got a little chat in with Katrien herself. Then one of her postdocs joined us. And after a while the postdoc and I found ourselves a seat while the room was filling up nicely. Let the lecture begin!

Katrien started out explaining what geophysics even is. And then she did a sterling job in explaining why it matters. She explained how you can sometimes do an entire palaeoenvironmental reconstruction just on the basis of the surface topography of the sea bed. She mentions that if you want to build a windfarm somewhere, you need to understand where you are putting it. How strong are the sediments where you put your turbines? And can you predict its strengths on the basis of geophysics? And if you put a wind farm somewhere, you are probably changing the sediments there. Changing flow patterns of the water will cover some surfaces with sand, and might wipe other surfaces clean of the stuff. For instance. If you are a sand eel, you really care about that sort of things. And if you are something that eats sand eels, you obviously do as well.

Katrien being introduced by the VC

Starting her talk

I really enjoyed the talk. And there were some interesting questions. But afterwards there was very little happening, just like the previous time. There was coffee and there were brownies, but I still don't understand who drinks coffee at this hour. A lot of people immediately left. I had a little chat with my master student who was there too, and then I got collared by a lady from the general public who wanted to know if her relative, who lived abroad, could perhaps visit the school on a day when there was no open day on. She was interested in marine science.

I chatted with her for a bit, but I was aware of the big day ahead of me. So after a while I made a glorious retreat. Time to get home and get ready for the dissertation presentations! But I think Katrien sparked an interest in geophysics in quite a lot of minds now…

Preparing the dissertation presentations in record time

The apotheosis of the dissertation module is always difficult to organise. There are normally only some two weeks of teaching after the Easter break, and a lot has to happen in that time. The presentations need to take place, and deadlines for both presentation slides upload, and for the dissertation itself, have to fall in there sometime. Preferably not all the way at the end, as that would mean it is difficult for students to get an extension. Ideally, there would be time between the presentations and the dissertation deadline, that the students can use for incorporating the feedback they got on their presentation in the dissertation.

And there is some logistics there too; I need to make a talk schedule, and a conference booklet with all the talk abstract in them. And of course, I have to make the latter in between the deadline for the file upload, and the actual presentations. And that can be quite limited time!

This year the students had to upload their slides and their talk summary the very Monday after the Easter break, and did their presentations on the Thursday and Friday of that week. The deadline for the dissertation was the Friday after.

For me, this meant that although I had been able to make a schedule beforehand (but not until after the Athena Swan submission), I couldn't start on the conference booklets until Monday. Everything had to be ready and printed by Thursday morning first thing. And it was also Monday that I could start downloading the presentation slides and get them ready for the conveners. Sounds doable, right? It was still a bit of stress!

That Monday I was in the field. That Tuesday I had presentations in another module all day. It was Wednesday I would have to manage all of it. It is not as if I had an interrupted day for that; I had a lecture in the morning, and a staff meeting in the afternoon. And I couldn't work in the evening either; that was when Katrien would have her inaugural lecture. 

I was a bit wild-eyed that day. Technology didn't help. I had been making booklets, and sorting PowerPoint files into folders, on any computer I found myself logged into. All should just be on OneDrive, accessible from anywhere. But when I got to my office and opened the first file to print it, the talk summaries weren't in it. I accessed the file from a different direction; still nothing. I went into Office365; there it did show up with the talk summaries included. But when I clicked "open desktop app", they vanished again. Technology is supposed to help you! Why was this happening? But I did manage to copy the entire file content over into the desktop app, and print the file that way. First file done. I had quite a few to do.

About half the printing done

The printer I normally use gave me an error message at some point, and refused cooperation. I just went to one printer further away, and that gave me an error message from the start. I would have to find more remote printers! I went to the adjacent building with my last printing, and to mine relief it worked. The only drawback was that it didn't seem to be able to insert staples. I had to do that by hand. Not ideal. But I got it done! And by the time I had to leave to go to Katrien’s lecture, everything was ready! Success!

That was the point I could relax. From there on, everything would probably organise itself. And now it was up to everybody else to be stressed! 

Badly organised day in the field

We had one more field day in the diary in our "geology of Anglesey" module. It's a day that often clashes with the dissertation presentations, so I have missed it several times. This year I was available. I didn't know if Dei wanted me to be there or not. He is very busy, so he sometimes needs a bit of prompting. I started mailing him to ask what the plan was. He just asked if Jaco and I were available. I confirmed. 

I didn’t hear anything so I assumed he didn’t need me. But on Sunday I decided to check anyway. The trip was Monday! It turned out he needed me anyway. He said I might as well meet at the beach. He specified the car park. 

I got there, surprised to not see Jaco’s car. He tends to be early. I got into my welly boots and had a coffee. Nobody appeared. It was a bit like an earlier trip, where Dei had figured wrongly I wasn’t coming, so just left me to my own devices on this same car park, while the others were on the other one. I figured that if nobody would show up half an hour in I would just go home. If you want me to contribute to your trip, then at least have the decency to tell me beforehand (during working hours), and direct me to the actual RV! 

I checked my phone. I had a missed call from Dei. I phoned back. They were indeed at the other car park. Dei said I might as well stay there; the group would walk past on the way to the beach. But I didn’t. I figured it was bad enough I had been sent to the wrong place. If I would just tag along on the way, I thought the message would be that men explain geology, and women tag along as assistants. Not on my watch. I got there just as Jaco was about to start his spiel. 

The first half of the trip is just Jaco running around with his hands in the air, being totally absorbed in the geology. He does it well! But I was still a bit grumpy. And I made sure to tell Dei that I wasn't pleased with how things had been going, and I expected better from him in the future. I hope that helps.

Beautiful rock

When Jaco had pointed out everything he wanted to point out we decided to have lunch. We figured a little grassy field in the dunes would probably be the most sheltered spot. It was indeed very pleasant!

After lunch the students were tasked with actually measuring the orientation of the strata. They tend to not have done this before, so in the beginning they struggle a bit. We each took a few students under our wing. And we clambered over the rocks to find good places to measure. The weather was nice, I felt useful, and my students were good company. My mood brightened again.

Lovely rock pool

We worked quite fast. In not too much time we were finished! And then we admired a few seals who had swum into the bay.

When all the measurements are done, Jaco tends to collate them, and discuss with the students what it means. But I was thinking of the dissertation presentations that were nigh, and for which I had a lot of preparations to do. I figured I might let Jaco do the data spiel without me. We would walk past my car anyway! So I peeled off. Does that mean I was now doing to myself what I had been grumpy about Dei doing to me? You could argue it is. Women don't explain the results to you. But it felt different as the decision was mine. It is not the same if I am just not deemed important enough to even know where we are meeting!

Altogether I left in good spirits. And that's the important bit. The day started shit, but luckily some stunning geology in the sun with nice people sorted it out. As it should!