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Lancaster

12 December, 2007

Porcine preclusion

Why does cheap meat (especially catering bacon and sausages) smell so disgustingly sickly-sweet?  I have to open the windows whenever J. has brought a bacon bun into the office for his breakfast, and it's deeply unpleasant to pass County Diner (Cartmel Coffee Bar, as was) each morning.


2 November, 2007

What would happen if...?

The Guardian reports the "most bizarre tests ever conducted in the name of scientific inquiry" *.


21 October, 2007

I can REALLY see my house from here

Moorlands, Lancaster, UK.It's not news that Microsoft's equivalent of Google Maps features oblique aerial photography of certain areas in addition to the standard top-down vertical images.  However, I hadn't realised that Lancaster is included in the coverage.

Blackpool is one of the examples used to advertise the facility, but I discovered that the coverage continues up the Fylde coast as far as my home town (and no further, nor further inland).  It may or may not be coincidental that the University has fairly close links to Microsoft.


3 October, 2007

Cheeky buggers!

Grr!  The University's student newspaper has nicked one of the Ministry's photos to illustrate an article about the city.


30 September, 2007

Handicapping themselves?

As is entirely proper, prospective UK university students are under no obligation to declare disabilities at any stage of the application and pre-registration process.  I fully support that in principle, but in practice it's problematic.


24 August, 2007

Worst of both worlds

Earlier in the month, I mentioned that my area of Lancaster is about to receive wheelie bins and recycling boxes; two of the former (for non-recyclable domestic waste and garden refuse respectively) and three of the latter (two for glass, paper, card and cans, one for plastic bottles).


26 July, 2007

Bailrigg Evolved

Just heard that the University is about to begin 'the Halo Project'.  Excellent!  Especially when the students are away, the multi-level maze of passageways and wooded parkland on campus would be ideal for a live-action version of the (depressing) combat game.


19 July, 2007

Fledged

Well, that's it for another year.  The latest crop of Bowland College's students have graduated.  Well done, and all the best.


1 July, 2007

In the news

It's interesting to note that a certain S.Gregson¹ wrote to the Lancaster Guardian in order to introduce himself to the electorate of Kendal as their prospective MP with policies including reallocation of church funding into education, 'abstainance from interference in the internal affairs of other nations' and clearer separation of church and state by removing Bishops from the House of Lords.  It's even more interesting that he said all this in 1837.


26 June, 2007

Don't cut the corner

If one has, say, a old sofa one wishes to dispose of, Lancaster City Council offers two alternatives*.


13 June, 2007

Invigorated

A while ago, the University offered free (I think) sleeveless dayglo waistcoats to personnel who commute by bicycle.  I didn't get one myself, partly because I already have a sleeved high-visibility jacket and partly because I was unwilling to wear the logo of a cycle activists' group.


17 May, 2007

What's the problem? No, really: what IS the problem?

Apparently, there's a proposal to erect a mobile phone mast in Golgotha, on the eastern edge of Lancaster.  I've been trying to discover a little more about it, both in terms of factual information and pro/anti arguments.  I've been struggling.


14 May, 2007

Good view, but damp

One of the items at a College management meeting earlier today was to distribute copies of the new smoke-free workplace regulations as they apply to College residences.


3 May, 2007

Just a bit of fun

One effect of the early fine weather is that students have started to use disposable barbecues before College authorities have had an opportunity to post signs prohibiting them.


13 April, 2007

Bicycling monarchy

Arriving at work today, I was told by a cleaner that I won't be able to park my bike in its normal place on Monday, as "Her Royal Highness" is visiting.


5 April, 2007

Wild about Lancaster

Sometimes I really appreciate not living in a major city.  There was a kestrel over my street earlier today, and I've just seen my first bat of the year, flying over my own yard.


23 February, 2007

Worth seeing

Sorry to be pedantic, but when I read a press release about a new police support officer who can be "... seen around the Campus with a yellow reflective coat riding his pannier fitted mountain bike", I wonder whether PCSO Owen is cold when his coat rides around without him.

5 February, 2007

Close to home

Well.  That was poignant.

I've just returned from the cinema, having seen Nick Broomfield's 'Ghosts'.  It's the story of Chinese illegal immigrants coming to the UK and struggling to subsist whilst paying-off their debts to people-smugglers and support their families in China.  I'm not spoiling the plot by revealing that it culminates in their deaths – that's the whole point.


24 January, 2007

Libraries at sunset

I've already established that I had my camera with me today, which was fortunate, as this was a clear evening in the one week of the year that my normal leaving time almost exactly coincides with sunset.


5 October, 2006

Student focused

One thing I will say for the new(-ish) commercialised Freshers' Fairs is that the marketers know their targets.


9 September, 2006

Hidden heritage

This is the 2006 Heritage Open Days weekend, an annual event during which various buildings of architectural/cultural significance, not normally accessible to the public, are open for visitors.  Most towns across the UK have one or two; the Lancaster district had 17 this year, of which I visited five today.


5 September, 2006

Listen to Lancaster

I'm not entirely sure why, but the Guardian has published a podcast (.mp3) tour of my home town*, amongst other areas of North West England.
It's, well, kind of cheesy, and factually incorrect on a few points, but worth 14 mins of one's time, if only to hear the local accent.


18 August, 2006

Screening out

Lancaster currently has two cinemas: a dedicated arts cinema in a theatre and a two-screen mainstream cinema.  According to a leaked redundancy letter to staff, the latter is to close next week.
No, really; it might actually happen this time.


7 August, 2006

Cathartic

I want to be a builder.

What other job allows one to state intently at a blank wall, mutter something about it looking "about right", then hit it with one's full strength and a sledgehammer?


21 July, 2006

Creeping corporatisation

The University's Academic Registrar retires in September, 38 years after arriving.  She's being replaced by a 'Director of Governance and Planning'.
I don't know how I feel about that.  Does the title matter?


17 June, 2006

Uh oh...

On the way to Sainsbury's just now, I passed a police cordon – lots of blue & white tape and officers directing pedestrians to the opposite pavement (US: sidewalk).  I also saw my first forensics team, in white hooded overalls, working in a secluded pedestrian underpass.


17 June, 2006

Opportunistic rubbish

There's a fountain in Lancaster's Market Square, which happens to be sponsored by Nuclear Electric.  It also happens to be leaking at present, apparently (I thought they were supposed to... whatever).


5 May, 2006

All or nothing

There's a poster on the wall in the foyer of Uni. House (central admin) – not something merely pinned to a noticeboard but framed, like a certificate or official statement. My line of sight must have passed over it dozens, probably hundreds of times, but I've never really registered that it's advertising Anglican services at Lancaster Priory.


27 April, 2006

Lose 'em

Yesterday, Ian rightly mentioned that the inside (i.e. nearest the kerb) two feet of a road is the most likely to hold debris or have pot holes. Cars and larger vehicles push stones, etc. out of the main carriageway, but bicycles don't have the weight or tyre width to do the same.  It's a fundamental flaw of on-road cycle lanes; most debris collects in the area reserved for the very sector of traffic most vulnerable to it.


21 April, 2006

Shameful

There's a notice in the Uni. House porters' lodge saying:

This office will be unmanned from 3pm.
I think 'unmanned' is the correct adjective, but I can't help reading it as a verb....

7 April, 2006

The pungent Dr. Merriman

One of the University's senior History lecturers, Marcus Merriman, died last week aged nearly 66, a matter of months before he was due to retire.  I didn't have reason to encounter him often, indeed I'm not sure whether we ever spoke in person, but I certainly recognised him whenever he was in earshot, as a founding member of the institution and a true character.


3 April, 2006

Dream job

I think it must be work experience week at the local secondary schools, as there's a slightly overawed-looking teenager wearing a shirt and tie in the Uni. House post room today.

No offence to the Uni. porters, who do an excellent job, but I tend to associate the role with older men (I think they are all male), especially retired police officers.  Is university portering really a career to which 14-15-year-olds aspire?

26 March, 2006

Reet grand

Effete southern national newspapers might offer CDs and DVDs as promotional freebies, but the Lancaster Guardian has its priorities straight:

FREE pint of beer for EVERY reader!


14 March, 2006

Who cares?

Each year, a group of local inactivists erect and occupy a yurt in Alex Square (i.e. the middle of campus), to celebrate One World Week (I thought they disapproved of globalisation... whatever).


12 March, 2006

Snow? In March?

It never snows in central Lancaster.  Well, it never sticks, anyway – I think it's something to do with inshore winds.
So it was a bit of a surprise to wake to several inches of snow in my yard and in the street, and more arriving in one of the more intense blizzards I've ever seen in (lowland) Britain.


10 March, 2006

You can't say that!

In researching text to accompany a few photos, I discovered that a prominent local landmark, the disused Royal Albert Hospital, opened in 1870 as the 'Royal Albert Asylum for Idiots and Imbeciles of the Northern Counties'.
Things change, eh?  By modern standards that's a rather... startling name.

3 March, 2006

Snowy photos

As I said, I didn't have my own (6Mpx) camera with me today, but when another blizzard began, I decided to borrow the office camera.  Photos of happy students in the snow might be useful for the prospectus or other publications, so I rationalised it as being not only for my own benefit!
Unfortunately, the 2Mpx compact is both restrictively basic and rather difficult to use well, and few parameters (such as exposure or white balance) could be manually configured, so the results aren't great.

2 March, 2006

Nay! Nay, I say!

The City Council is undergoing consultation about whether to repeal a 1978 byelaw which bans cycling on Morecambe promenade.  I'd heard that the byelaw had already been amended years ago, so was slightly startled to hear I've been acting illegally.


24 February, 2006

Northern values

I suppose it's normal for planners to adopt systematic names for new housing developments.  A cluster of streets in my childhood home village were named after motor racing circuits: Monza, Daytona, etc.  Here in Lancaster, many streets in Bowerham seem to be named after dukes; in Abraham Heights, it's US presidents.
Each time I cycle through Primrose, I'm impressed that the cross-streets are named after fine, aspirational standards:


15 February, 2006

Baa!

I'm attending an all-day Section Heads' meeting tomorrow, to discuss strategy, five year plans (v. stalinist...), etc.


13 February, 2006

What are they expecting?

Cycling to work this morning, I saw a 'Your Speed Is...' active sign being installed on a lamppost on Barton Road.  I don't know how it'll work (radar?), nor whether it has been located well (~50 m after a school and a childrens' crossing point).


1 February, 2006

Well done, Nigel!

The current lead item on the 'ticker' on the BBC News home page is that my local fish & chip shop is the best in the UK!

And I was cursing them for the shop being closed last night, as they were away in London....

30 January, 2006

Phone home

There's an odd little booth near the middle of campus; no larger than 3m x 2m, in recent years it's been a baked potato kiosk, then one selling ice creams, and now it's a mobile phone repair shop.  It's too small for both a shop sign and a window display, so it just has a series of slogan boards at the foot of the window, swapped every fortnight or so.  The current one caught my attention.


4 January, 2006

1300

A nice round number, though 'unlucky for some'.  It's also the number of sp*m e-mails received by my work account overnight.  Not over the week I was away, but overnight.


23 December, 2005

Homonym corner

Heh.  A medical practice in Morecambe has taken out an ad in the local paper thanking their patients for their patience during renovation of the building.  Patients with patience?  Well, it amused me....

The ad on the facing page is a bit worrying, though: koi carp promoted as 'ideal seasonal presents'.  I thought the advertising of pets as presents was discouraged nowadays, and an expensive ornamental fish isn't exactly cuddly, anyway.
Not to mention "Bonzai's now available."  Is he?

12 December, 2005

At least it's quick

The University's 'Tech Support' division has made a change to its user services: consumables such as blank CD-Rs and DVD-Rs will no longer be available from the reception desk, but from a vending machine nearby.  It'll also dispense cables, batteries, USB pen drives and even mp3 players.


16 November, 2005

Journalism (or genetics) today

Main headline of the local student newspaper:

From small chestnuts come mighty oaks
I despair (again).

15 November, 2005

S'mine! All mine!

The University seems to be hosting a 'cycling roadshow' (an exhibition of aggregates and pink tarmac, perhaps?) today, in a tent marked 'Lancashire: The Cyclist's County'.

Strangely, the cyclist in question isn't named.

13 October, 2005

Insert clever title here

This morning, I noticed a tiny sign indicating that there's a Police Office on campus – it seems that's a legal requirement.  However, we remain one letter away from it being occupied: there hasn't been an Officer there within living memory.

Having asked around, I've discovered that one of the College Principals wants to install soundproofing and make the office available as a piano practice facility whilst the Police aren't using it.  I suppose a soundproofed room would be handy for interrogations, too....

13 October, 2005

Missed opportunity

The University's 'Travel Plan Co-ordinator' circulated an e-mail this morning promoting a potential scheme whereby, as I initially understood it, staff could buy bikes at a rate subsidised by the University and Inland Revenue (ie. the employer and tax authority).  That'd be a great idea, and an encouragement to those considering cycle commuting.  I began drafting a reply saying that I'm not currently looking to replace my bike, but that I'd like to express my support for the concept, and might use it at a later date.

However, before sending that, I happened to read another response, from someone who'd already studied the small print at the scheme's website.


27 September, 2005

Damn joyriders...

From the Lancaster Citizen:

Two chickens were stolen from a shed in Lancaster's Ashton Road.  The chickens were later recovered by police.

22 September, 2005

Valued service

I can't claim credit (or blame) for spotting the following slightly odd juxtaposition in the University's internal e-mail newsletter:

THE VICE CHANCELLOR WOULD LIKE TO PAY TRIBUTE TO THE FOLLOWING MEMBERS OF STAFF who have completed 40 years' service with the University....
OLD MATTRESSES AT THE UNIVERSITY COULD BE TURNED INTO HANGING BASKETS as part of a new recycling scheme....

9 September, 2005

Is that a...?

Thumbnail map of Lancaster and Morecambe. ©NRTDoes anyone else think this thumbnail of a map of the Lancaster area looks like something from an anatomy textbook?

It's a size issue – really. On the full-size map (not 1:1 scale!), the peninsula looks more like a geographical feature and less like an, er, appendage.

I suppose this illustrates just how exciting Morecambe isn't.

21 August, 2005

Colonial Amusements

Amusement arcade, Lancaster. ©NRT 2005
What; like contriving wars to separate indigenous people from their natural resources?  And buying them off with shiny toys like a new telecommunications system, run by (and for) corporations in the 'mother country'?

Surely that could never happen.

Click the image for more.

12 August, 2005

Relying on thin ice

One of the advantages of ISS (tech support) at the University is that everyone has a pet project, an area of expertise perhaps only tangentially related to his/her job description.  I'd like to say it's deliberate and encouraged by managers, but it's more just a default reaction to everyday requirements.

Unfortunately, these extracurricular specialisms soon become core to peoples' de facto roles within the system, and when one person is off work, everything falls apart – there's no formal support for, say, troubleshooting Java, only one man's personal interest, and if he's unavailable, enquirers are out of luck.

10 August, 2005

Blown away

Derelict dairy, Lancaster. ©NRTNow this I have to see.

Click the image for an enlargement.

18 July, 2005

On aggregate, leave it alone

The short section of cycle track linking Collingham Drive and Bailrigg Lane, Lancaster was resurfaced a couple of weeks ago.  The grass verge had been encroaching onto the tarmac, so that needed cutting back, but otherwise I was surprised that the Council considered there was a need to do more.  I've always thought the surface was very good (not that I'm a tarmac connoisseur) – no potholes, puddles or even trivial irregularities.


14 July, 2005

Parochial? Here?

Lancaster's free weekly newspaper, The Citizen, reports the London bombings as "London bomb anguish spoils mum's birthday" – the only angle even mentioned is a local woman's concern about her London-based son, who wasn't even in the city that day.


8 July, 2005

Mother of all colleges

Look; Pendle College and Grizedale College are adjacent to one another on the Lancaster University campus, and have a similar sort of status in the University history.  Is it really so surprising that they became merged in my world view, and that I've just informed a senior member of one that he helps run Grendel College?

28 June, 2005

Congratulations! Take a seat

It always amuses me when senior academics are promoted to full professorships with the announcement that '[Name] has been awarded a Personal Chair', as if he/she has previously had to stand or share.


27 June, 2005

Fortress Bailrigg (again)

We're locked-down again.  All but one access route to University House (central admin) is locked, and that one side door is blocked, no, hidden by two bouncers in Uni. Security uniforms.  Apparently, several people are cycling to the G8 Summit in Edinburgh, and passing Lancaster today; there's a presumption that they may call in on the way, as an ongoing response to the University's prosecution of other protesters.
A 6'1" bearded man with a ponytail, wearing sunglasses, shorts, a 'Firefox' T-shirt and dayglo cycle jacket was obviously stopped attempting to get into the building.  Unfortunately, that was me; the duty porter had to vouch for me.


23 June, 2005

Maybe in the next edition

The University prospectus includes a feedback form, which a surprising (to me, anyway) number of people do return.
One submission received this morning informed us that we provide insufficient details about (not 'for', 'about') amputees.

Er....

12 June, 2005

Lancaster station by night

Lancaster railway station looked quite attractive this evening, a few minutes after closing and hence deserted, but before the lights had been switched off.  Even at 23:20 there was plenty of light in the sky, to, allowing me to take a couple of photographs.

6 May, 2005

It Says Here

So, Lancaster's Tory again, after eight years under Labour.  I think it has to be considered that way – this was always a Conservative stronghold until the extraordinary 1997 election ousted the 'Thatcher-in-all-but-name' government, and with the backlash against the Blair government and an outgoing MP who, frankly, was an ineffectual representative of his constituency, it's no great surprise that the area has reverted to its more usual party allegiance.


28 April, 2005

Ambushing wildlife

Sometimes I really like cycling to work.  This morning I passed seven squirrels, four rabbits and a startled stoat - startled because, as with all the others, it didn't hear the bike until I was 3-4 metres away (not that I was trying - I'd probably have been more obtrusive if furtive).

You don't get that in a city as large as Manchester, nor even in rural areas if travelling by car.

24 April, 2005

Cranial damage?

The website of the University swimming pool has a safety notice:

Diving must only take place along the sides of the pool.
Perhaps I'm missing something, but from where else would one dive?
Actually, that's not 'from', but 'along', which doesn't sound too safe.

21 April, 2005

Didn't ask you that

The University website has a feedback form, inviting comments about the site itself.  It clearly states that it's not for general enquiries, and that prospectuses cannot be requested via that route, but it's a truism that if a form – any form – is provided, it'll be used for whatever purpose the user chooses, irrespective of the provider's intentions.


19 April, 2005

Not literally, you fool

I've just attended a meeting at which it was reported that one of the accommodation blocks is experiencing thefts of food.
Hardly novel for a university or any situation involving communal living.  The odd part was the suggestion – quite serious – that chicken fillets (the edible kind) are frequently being stolen for use as the inedible kind (ie. bra inserts).

Okay....

18 April, 2005

Should have thought of that before

Last September, the University hosted the Corporate Venturing Conference, attended by BAe Systems, DuPont and other companies with significant presences in the region.  Predictably, certain activists protested outside the building, and six broke into the venue itself.

Several months later, the protesters have now deployed the 'wide-eyed innocence' act, on being charged with Aggravated Trespass ("trespass with intent to intimidate, obstruct or disrupt").  They invaded a meeting on private property (those standing outside were on private property too - campus isn't a public space), and expected the University to like it?  Yeah, right.


1 April, 2005

Flowering sycamore

Sycamore blossomThe main campus of Lancaster University has a perimeter road and one which bisects the ring via an underpass beneath (yes, really) Alexandra Square.  My office overlooks the western side of the underpass, so my third-floor window is actually level with the canopy of a mature sycamore tree.
Consequently, at this time of year, I get to see something a little uncommon, close-up: sycamore blossom.  Click on the image for a clearer view.
And no, this isn't a tiresome 'April Fool' joke.

28 March, 2005

Just park i