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14 May, 2014

Eight Chapters of an Academic Life, VII-VIII



VII
between colleges
on a bicycle saddle
the haiku composed

VIII
examlecturetute
grantwritingpapermeeting
ah! cherry blossom

1 comment:

  1. VII
    It seems that I spent a lot of my day on my bike. I have recently been using a "Jawbone" device to track my activity, and it tells me that I travelled over 11km, yesterday alone, and was "active" for just under four hours... The image of academics sitting behind their desks does not correlate with actual practice. :)

    Bike rides, between work locations, and between nurseries, give me some valuable thinking time - it is surprising how many of my less terrible ideas have their origins in the time spent on my bike. It is a great time to clear out the mind and contemplate. It is also a time when haiku are composed.


    VIII
    The daily rush of academic life is hectic indeed. It seems that we are all attempting to squeeze so much into our small amount of hours - for me, it is constrained at both ends of the day (in the best possible way) by the desire and necessity to be with my two boys. This makes daytimes a frantic blur... punctuated, as in this haiku, by a beautiful sight that completely halted me.

    Cherry blossom!

    The image that makes the haiga is Merton Street, a charming old part of the city that often gets cordoned off so that it can be used to film a movie or TV series. I rather liked this casual photo, snatched using my iPad before a lecture, which an anachronistic car in the frame.


    Toodlepip,

    Hobbes

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(and thanks)