Some brief thoughts

Dear me, but I have missed you, Dear Reader. I have missed writing and blogging. So much has happened that I'm not even sure where to start or what to write about. As my second to last post makes clear, I am now a father and this has come with all the wonders, joy, frustration and a pinch of the terror that you might expect. In addition to being new father (and husband), I've also been promoted at work and am now the Director of our Office of Electronic Science Stuff. Our whole Office of Research has been re-jigged so it's a brave new world for a lot of people.

For those not in academia, the Office of Research is the administrative arm of the University that looks after the "big picture" for the scientists on campus - Our Vice Chancellor oversees my group, and a couple of other core research groups (the BIG budget stuff, machines that go ping etc.), as well as looking after the compliance groups that keep us legal and ethical (IRB & IACUC for human and animal research respectively) and the financial/funding arm that gets grant applications submitted on time ot the right agencies with the t's crossed and the lowercase j's dotted. On top of this, because she is a research faculty member herself, she also has to write her grants, write her papers and supervise her lab.

Rather her than me...

Anyway, needless-to-say there have been a lot of changes and rather than live blog these events I've been saving up stories to keep things fun and also keep them to the 75%/25% hyperbole/truth ratio I rely on the keep me out of trouble (and libel court).

 

Brief thoughts for now, as I stand blogging in the kitchen while making dinner:

1. You can never have enough diapers, because if you think you do you will have to go to the store late at night and buy more.

2. Your child's smile is the most amazing sight and makes up for the sleepless nights, endless poop and occasional screaming shit fits.

3. Either we all eat before His bedtime, or daddy is frantically cooking at 9PM and will get a potbelly from eating too late.

4. My menu of "10 minute" meals is growing exponentially without sacrificing fun, flavour and taste: tonight chicken Kiev with seared asparagus and garlic mashed potatoes. Easy, cheap and fast.

5. BLogging in the kitchen with the laptop on the washing machine is giving me backache. 

6. Hopefully much more to come and a return to usual service.