Monday, May 6

I woke this morning to discover that I had a birthday. I found this out because the breakfast table had presents strewn across it. I received a card entitling me to a Fatboy hammock when the shop gets it in stock; Dancing in Cambodia, a book by Amitav Ghosh; and a Mr Bump mug that amused me greatly.

I cycled to Puotila in the unexpected heat and then walked to Arcada from Kalasatama. At Arcada I received birthday greeting from everyone I met.

I began the working week with a thorough project review. I went through every project in Todoist and checked its status, and then added new projects for the next four Miaaw episodes. I then created projects for every course I will teach next year, and started to make a course template, listing every task involved in preparing and organising a class. This might sound silly but it will stop things slipping through the cracks.

I then spent time finalising the online details for the Interactive Storytelling course. I launched it at 13:00 and then left the building.

I sat in the Acadamic Bookshop for forty minutes looking at the presentation that Irma and I had made yesterday. Wandering around the shop I bought myself The Knowledge Illusion by Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach, as a birthday present to self.

The meeting seemed to go well, and we both left feeling happy, with a somewhat optmistic view of a possible future.

When we leave I photograph a perfectly preserved, perfectly photogenic sixties Mini with a Union Jack paint job. It seems like a perfect end to the afternoon.

We will walk to Kamppi to discover that the largest Muji in Europe hasn’t arrived yet. Humph, we will say before getting the metro to Itäkeskus. From Stoa we will take the car five hundred metres to Puotila. I will grab my bike and cycle to home where I will find Irma checking the mail box.

Irma’s mother will phone to say that a letter for Irma has arrived at her house and we must collect it AT ONCE. We will therefore make a return trip to Kamppi before returning home to sink into depression.

In Spring we change moods at least as often as the sky changes weather.