A Don’s Life

To tweet, or not to tweet?

I have just signed up to a Twitter account. Many people (including some commenters) had urged me in this direction. But, in the end, the reason I took the plunge was very simple. Fiona Maddocks had given me a bit of much needed support on Twitter in the face of AA Gill and his "how could someone from Newnham understand a willy?" line. (Let him come to Newnham, I say...There's an invitation, Mr Gill!). I couldn't find her email address to say thanks, so I signed up to Twitter to do it that way.

Soon enough I found had some good friends "following" me.

So what now?

Mr Willetts, soft A levels and the "pool"

I spent a few hours before leaving for Egypt (burglars, forget it, there are still some family living in the house), in the Cambridge Admissions Pool. It is an unfortunate nickname, maybe. But a very good thing. All the details of candidates to individual colleges, who did not make it at their first choice college but were thought worthy of a place at Cambridge, are available in this "pool" (which is, in fact, the Newnham dining hall, stuffed full of files and reports and references). Representatives of all colleges with places still to fill are there, looking for good students. In most subjects (mine included) there are also meetings of all the Directors of Studies and Admissions Tutors in the different colleges to make sure that as many of these students are accepted as possible.

I know how ghastly it is to get one of those letters saying that you application was very good, but that there was no place at your college of choice. But, let me assure you, that there have been hundreds (literally) of academics in the Pool these last few days looking to find good students for the remaining places, scrutinising the applications, reading the references -- and all those statistics about the average exam results for the school in question, the number who go to university etc . The truth is that we want to take as many people as we can -- we dont want to reject the good. Dont believe what the papers tell you about how cavalierly or unfairly we take the admissions process.

But meanwhile, if he has been correctly reported,  Mr Willetts has been pontificating.

The pig: cooked and consumed

Several people have asked for the upshot of the pig story. (And, a warning again, if you are a committed veggie, I would skip the following photos.)

Well I am happy to report that it was successfully cooked and consumed (see above) yesterday, my birthday. And thanks go to especially to my friend Jo who took the lion's share of the cooking, to the daughter who did more than me, to the staff in the kitchen who gave us instructions, and to Andrew and Jo who accommodated the 17 people (more than can fit in my kitchen) to eat the beast ... which, I think we have established, was a "she". And, of course, to Patrick, the donor!

The explanation for my low in-put into the cooking is quite simple. The daughter and I turned up at Sidney (with the stuffing) to prepare the animal for the oven. The trouble was the daughter (official photographer of the occasion) had forgotten her camera battery, so I drove back to get it....took 30 minutes.

By the time I returned, both Jo and daughter had thoroughly acclimatized themselves to the animal. They had washed it, lamented its poor missing/misshapen ear, put their hands inside it, stuffed it and were in the process of sewing it up. I missed out on the "getting to know" stage, and when I saw what was going on I did indeed feel slightly squeamish. Yes, I'm a carnivore, but at 3.30 on New Year's day I wasnt quite ready to have my hand up a dead pig's bum.