Ouch! Did my back in and can’t walk at present. This was the last day of term too. I was in my office reaching for a book to show the folks doing my HERA interview (Higher Education Role Analysis – another surveillance exersize from the dark side that also makes us do quality assurance, research assessment, cv maintenance in a different format every time, and a dozen other tactics for interrupting the actual work of teaching and research, but hey, what’s my view on all this worth, what answer would I give to stop them inventing new ways to get their happy sheets filled in?).
Anyway, the book was an issue of Left Curve, and then there was this crunching sound across the base of my back, and the next day I could not move. Gregor Samsa from the “Metamorphosis” is my role model now. Given Goldies new ‘brand value’, that we offer a ‘transformatory experience’, perhaps this role thing does make a kinda twisted sense. I am a bug, flat on my back, can’t get out of bed. Faced with the creeping commercialisation of the sector, this seems a valid response, or repose, or refusal, or whatever. Anyway, hopefully it will have cleared up before I get on thee plane to Melbourne on tuesday.
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Cat from Brighton, possibly a friend of Piper Jones.
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Trinketization 
Hey, didn’t know you’re off to Melb! Hope your back’s better (or that you have great painkillers).
Last time I went by the window-lair of those cats they had been replaced by three odd-looking plants. I have a feeling they (the cats) have moved on…
Glad we captured them. Have fun. xx
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Oh dear, sorry to hear about your back. And with regard to those exercises, you will be surprise that they make students do some of those assessment stuff too. I remember having to fill in forms with a stupid, inflexbile template that assumes everyone do research the same way, regardless of their field. I have to come up with some politically-correct way of buttering that report so that I do not lose my meagre funding, coz who wants to pay for you to write bout the abject in Plath (both subjects are virtually unknown here). Not to mention that they will never advance move my papers through the bureaucratic assembly line if I miss just a stamp or a signature. Btw, still awaiting that thesis report from the external in England. Lo behold, my career rests undisturbed for the while, and I continue to plod on in the commercial world.
Everytime I read your blog, I see another book I have not read and despair of ever reading. Maybe if you ever go on a away on a long trip, you can sublet your apt and books to me, and I can then write my book .:D
Have fun travelling. See ya in Malaysia sometime.
xx
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Uh-oh. were you by any chance curving your back to the left while reaching for this issue of Left Curve? Maybe you can sue.
I hope you have recovered and are enjoying the sights (hmmm.) of Melbourne.
xx
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Hey John,
How’s the back? Hope you’re not still laid up. Spring’s far too good to miss. Did you make down to Devon?
Shao Loong
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