Return to the Fray

Hello again. I'm back in Cambridge and have just emailed an essay to my supervisor on rhetoric in Sidney and Milton. I had a relaxing break over Christmas, which I needed, and am feeling a lot more refreshed for the new term. We had some snow, as you can see below. Though I was only home for a couple of weeks it gave me some time to catch my breath. Christmas was mostly family stuff, though our gatherings on Christmas Day are not quite so big as they used to be, now that married siblings have their own family franchise elsewhere. On Boxing Day we had a family convergence on Peterborough with 17 of us. Other than that I caught up with a few friends and suchlike. We watched A Walk to Remember as a family and my sister called me hardhearted for failing to cry.

It's been good to catch up with returnees, particularly on Sunday, when I spent the day quite sociably with HT people in different assortments (+ some StAGites at the end of the day). We ate pizza chez Chris & Tim & co for lunch and tried to sort out the dilemmas of the world of education for the 101 trainee teachers present, after which I attended the international tea hosted by John and Jeni Cooper. We walked to and from this occasion in the rain, and I think this was a factor in there being fewer people present than normal, but it was eminently pleasant as always. We concluded that the latter rain was friendlier, more refreshing and less wet than the former rain (does this point to Latter Rain Revival?). In the evening 7 of us (a perfect 7 ...) converged on Nando's where we bumped into a StAG contingent also in pursuit of post-church cuisine. Some of this assembled company then crashed a Jesus college house kitchen (is that too many qualifying nouns in a row) where we chatted and played video games on a temperamental TV. Since then I've been alternately working and failing to work.

It's good to be back.