Visiting the Third Fane of Hell

This week I have been mostly getting lost. Which is nice because I've not had any Leicester Adventures (tm) recently. For those not in the know (a number 1 less than the population of Britain I would wager) a Leicester Adventure (tm) is where while trying to find some main street/motorway/glaringly obvious landmark or making a slight alteration in heading I end up either trapped in a warren of narrow one-way street or driving 5 miles wondering where the heck the main road or any other part of the Midlands I recognise is hiding.

I've discovered a lot of takeaway places and supermarkets this way. Still haven't found the Asdas supposedly near my gaff though.

I went to Birmingham this weekend. A friend of mine had described Birmingham's lovely Digbeth Coach Station as hell's waiting room but the rest of Digbeth was similarly hellish. It was a grey overcast day but I'm convinced the sky had more colour than the surrounding buildings, including the aptly named "Digbeth Cold Storage Area", a vintage vinyl record shop and an alarming amount of adult bookstores. The bookshop I was looking for (which, no, was definitely not one of the aforementioned adult bookstores) didn't exist but I did satisfy my curiousity as to what the Coach Station looked like.

While I had some trouble getting to Birmingham, leaving I discovered that trying to head northeast to Leicester meant a trip through the Midlands via every little hamlet including another aptly titled area called "No Man's Heath". I realised once I crossed two counties and ended up in Warwickshire I was probably going the wrong way home. Unless I was going back to Dundee.

Fencing was very good this week, though they've decided to finally just sod all pretences on Leicester's London Road and dig a really big hole and not allow anyone past. This had apparently caused bus drivers problems as Leicester is a maze. In fact it took me a good 20 minutes to miraculously find myself emerging on the other side of the hole after driving down one street and trying to head back to the London Road.

I've finally decided to take the plunge and get an XL jacket and padding as trying to find some club kit that fits is... a humbling experience. And I'd like to be able to protect my back from any nasty backstabbing sorts.

Work has been pretty much as described earlier, with the added plus that it looks like no-one outside the office is surprised by the problems or really cares. I will have to come in at weekends in the near future as well! To be honest I'd happily work Sat-Sun if it meant I could get 2 days off normally.

It's not all doom and gloom at work. The labs and courses I'm teaching are a lot more interesting this term, I'm a lot more organised and I really enjoy taking the labs (mind you I enjoy anything to do with my job that gets me away from the office and the moan throne therein).

Monday mornings are becoming increasingly odd in that I seem to spend a lot of time dispensing sage non-computing advise on careers and real life issues to my students. I'm not sure when I became old enough to start giving advice people actually listened to, but it seems to have happened.

And apparently I get officially older this month. Fortunately my wits haven't gotten addled yet. Unless you count the lack of direction sense I'm developing...