Tuesday, January 22

Irma got up early and so I followed suit. I had already washed, finished breakfast and just begun to put my coat on when my alarm went off. I got to the bus stop at the gas station thirty minutes earlier than ever before.

The temperature hovered around minus twenty two.

Tomas and I spent most of the day talking with groups of students about their projects for the Innovations course, and the research that they needed to do. Tomas had booked each of the groups who presented yesterday for a thirty minute tutorial.

I stepped out from this process at 10:30 to supervise the final presentations for the second year CMS course, which I had postponed, by popular request, from before Christmas.

Jutta, Fred and Nathalie acted as the panel of judges and the presentations went well. They revealed a fairly large range of effort, skills and talents, with two presentations catching everyone’s attention for their success in capturing the brief in smart, easy-to-use, sites that showed real design flair.

One presentation which began “I had totally forgotten about this but…” led me to surprise everyone in the room by my refusal to accept it, my flat statement that I found the website and the attitude both completely unacceptable, and my outrage that anyone would dare show up with something like that.

The room fell silent for several minutes.

The presentations finished well, and I gave a jolly summing up at the end. Nathalie told the students how much the standard of work amazed her, and Jutta and I had a long conversation afterwards.

Tomas and I will continue answering questions in the tutorials until shortly after 15:00. My fun with the CMS group will mean that I have had no lunch.

After we finally finish I grab a quick lunch of unexpectedly delicious Indian porridge, and then go for a walk around the building. I look outside at the bright light bouncing off the snow and photograph someone walking past. I turn and walk the complete length of the building to stretch my back and legs.

I will then rattle off a series of tasks that I find in Todoist, before racing out into the snow.

I will go to bed even slightly later tonight, because I will wash my hair and I strongly dislike going to bed with it soaking wet. I will not fall asleep until approximately 20:45.