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I’ve been getting quite into the rugby lately. It’s the wrong kind of rugby, obviously, and the whole “line up and throw the ball in” thing still confuses me a bit, but it’s good fun to watch down the pub and there’s a good chance that France might win the tournament. I got chatting to a woman during the France v. Ireland match who mentioned that there was going to be a live match between the Italian and French under-20s teams in Grenoble, and that it was free for women (!), so of course I said yes when she offered to get me a ticket.Read More →

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Number 9 in a series of N… This photo was taken by my mum in Galleries Lafayette in Paris. Apparently “Acne” is upscale designer clothes, and you can find it between Stella McCartney and Vivienne Westwood. Heh.

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The Shag Cafe has a new house band. Naturally, they’re called “Shag Band”. They’ve got a very cool washboard – actually two different types of washboard with various other bits of kitchen equipment bolted to it. Here’s a very short clip – apologies for the sound quality, but I think the video does capture a certain je ne sais quoi, and at least it is short…

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I’ve had another two posts published over at the Vitae researcher blogs. One is on organising your references with citeulike (a website that I think is brilliant), and the other is on what makes a good academic homepage. The homepage question is a big one, I think – all of us academics have a homepage of some kind, but there’s little consensus about what should go on them. So if you’ve got some opinions do pop over to the vitae blogs and leave a comment.

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Number 8 in a series of N… Chambery airport isn’t really in Chambery. If you’re going there, you should probably realise you’re looking at a 20euro taxi ride from the train station. Or if you have a bit of time, you can take a local bus (number 6) to the end of the line (Voglans Eglise), ask for directions, and then take a 15 minute stroll downhill, arriving at the airport on foot. And on your way, you’ll pass a dog training centre called Hot Dog Education.

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I’ve been playing with a javascript zoom thing, which is available free from this site, as a means of displaying panoramas better. I think it works quite well. Here are a few examples – Grenoble after sunset, the Chartreuse mountains and a very snowy Grenoble from the memorial to the troops of the mountain. I think the last one came out best.

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Number 1 in a series of N… The wines of the morning! Discounted wine between 8am and 2pm! Marvellous. Must remember to pop in on my way to the lab.

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I mentioned a while back (in this post) that I’d applied for a paid blogger job with VITAE, the organisation that supports UK researchers, but didn’t get it because I couldn’t make an induction session in London. To my delight I was contacted a few days ago and asked if I was still interested. So I’m now on the official team until it’s reviewed at the end of March. The theme of the blog is staff development and career support for researchers, but people seem to be interpreting that quite broadly. My first post as one of the core bloggers has just gone up hereRead More →

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Number 7 in a series of N… Actually, I think that if I were to suffer a massive career change and open a native American gift shop in France, I might well call it Sioux Venir. I’m really rather taken with the name. I’ve never been in, of course – I don’t have much call for bows, arrows or dream catchers. But I do like the name. Comedian Dave Gorman, upon my recommendation, has entered this shop into his Pun Street. So thanks to this shop, I’ve been mentioned by twitter ID on Absolute Radio. Fame at last!