After a couple of quieter weeks

Birthday Flowers from my sister

News wise it feels quieter. I am now registered for next year but am not able to pay my fees. I suspect that the entry for next year has been done wrongly, but as it is such a close run thing on whether I would or would not have to make fees, we will probably in the end ignore it. I was having to pay a years fees and then get two thirds of my fees back because I would progress to writing up. The tradition chapter is signed off so I am now onto the one on belonging. Unfortunately I am realising there will be a lot of rewriting of the tradition chapter and I am also just beginning to put together the opening section on belonging. It is taking longer than I would like (I’d have liked it written by today but I need to do some more reading before I can write the last bit). Perhaps of more interest is that I am writing articles for St Andrew’s magazine “The Messenger” and also posting them on a blog called Reformed Practical Piety . The first one is up and the second will come out at the start of October. I pre-write them, send them to James and then set the publishing date once we have a proofed version. These are not pieces from my thesis but bits I have written specially for the magazine on one strand of my thesis.

The other thing is I have sent the drafts of the data chapters to my two congregations. Helen, who is church secretary at St Andrew’s Chesterfield got back to me to ask me to print extra copies. Commenting on what she has read she says I found out things that she never knew about St Andrew’s, which an interesting comment. It makes me wonder if I have got things right or whether there was a culture where if you do not actively seek information you do not get it. If so why? I will have to wait until the final feedback I think to sort that out. From Herringthorpe I have heard absolutely nothing. I know the copy of the chapters arrived and only that because I sent them special delivery. Different congregations, different ways of behaving. I also have heard nothing from David the minister at the time at St Andrew’s admittedly I sent him them by email, maybe I should check if his email is current.

Work wise it has been quieter. However I am now moving teams to one which is more big computer orientated. I call it supporting “toys for the boys” research, as it is all about working on big computers that have software most people who use computers do not care to use. It does fancy things but you have to be able to program it in detail. I tend to point out that the entire support for the other 80% of the researchers who use computers is me. Anyway it is just a different team structure and a slight change in some of the things I was involved in at work. I cannot help improve communications in my previous team if I am in a different one. I think there is more going on but I am not sure and I may have to be deliberate about what I will and will not do.

For my Birthday I took James and Jean out for an Indian at Tamarind which is part of the former Glossop Road Baths complex. It used to be called “Saffron Club” and boasted a Indian Curry Lovers listing, but I never got to it when it was that. The meal was superb, we asked for mild to medium dishes and there was just so much flavour in them that was not hidden by strong chilli. They brought us poppadoms and chutney dishes. I tried one of them and Jean asked me if it was hot, I said not really but it was sour. She tried it and her face said it was not as she expected but admitted that I was right it was sour. Actually it with the mango chutney on a bit of poppadom was delicious. The main courses were superb and the rice cooked superbly. Unfortunately they only had the English desserts available and they were all full of cream while the ice-cream was fancy. I also tried Cobra beer and it works fairly well with an Indian meal.

Amigurumi I have made this summer

Over the summer I have been making a couple more amigurumi for people at my writers group. I charge people £5 which is donated to writers group and then they pay me something towards the wool (usually another £5 much to my embarrassment as that is more than the wool costs) the latest couple are in the other photo attached. The lamb has a hat because I put the eyes into the wrong side of the head, so rather than let my slightly untidy decreasing show (it never is as tidy as the increasing, although in fairness I doubt you could have told that) I put a beret on I must stress that these are ornaments not toys, when I make toys they are substantially different.

Balancing essay writing, placement activity and birthday

This time the reporting will be thematic rather than weekly.


I have over the last fortnight been preparing for my supervision. This involved me deciding whether to re-write the article from the talk I gave at SLS or whether to write something fresh on the discourses around older age. The thing is that I am finding the literature rather poor and though I can find endless stuff on older age, it all reflects broad discourses from society in general rather than what I am seeing in the churches which are largely discourses crafted by older people themselves. It seems odd that somebody who is official studying older people in the church, has not spent time actually talking with them. He might analyse the NT, OT and early church well, he might even deal with the pressures in society well, but how do older people in the church construct themselves and how do others in the church construct them is a very lightly touched upon and seems to me to be the elephant in the room. Anyway I felt that unprepared to tackle that and I know that I really need to have my new computer here to handle the recordings that I decided that the revision was in order. Actually part of this was that I came across an article on small groups which had the actual article interspersed with scenes. As different parts of narrative I was using stood quite well on their own and the narrative did not have narrative tension as a whole I felt that reshaping things like this my be advantageous. I also needed to put in some very basic ethnographic stuff and also Reformed Liturgy stuff. Anyway I was at the stage when it was sent out to my proof readers, thanks Ruth and James, and then Martin, my supervisor found that he was fully booked on the date. So I am now in the process of rearranging the date of our meeting and sending him the essay to comment. I may well try and get something written on discourses around old age next weekend or at least some reading done.

Placement wise things are going well. I remember being amazed with St Andrews Chesterfield about how the access changed when I had been there over a year. This time I got a list of dates, times and meetings, plus I have spotted that evening services actually are a bit of an odd animal. It is low key but it is also one of the place where the informal discourse that runs the church goes on. The previous Sunday evening service they ended up deciding what they would do for the next while. It was suggested that they might follow a book. The initial suggestion was The Purpose Driven Life but when Mike Thomas checked that he found that it was not how he remembered it. So much to my relief they moved onto The Me I want to Be by John Ortberg. One day I was down town doing something that needed to do, and passed by our local CLC bookshop (yes I know, but it is the sole remaining Christian Bookshop in Sheffield). I went in to see if they had it, which they did, so I bought it and photocopied a portion of it so people had chance to prepare for this evening. Hopefully Mike will have ordered the copies by next time. Also I wrote an article for their quarterly magazine this time and mentioned their notice board was in need of a revamp, hoping very much that by the time it was out, nobody would have done it as it was several months ago that I actually checked it. It had not been. So when the fabric group got to view the board they agreed with me. The problem is that people who come to the church don’t see it regularly. They largely come by car, park in the car park and go straight into the church. However the noticeboard is the main physical presence for most people as the church is set back from the road. I also got another interview in on Friday, well I say an interview the lady just talked at me the whole time having read my questions in advance. She certainly had lots to say and I think having someone to listen was important.

Also since the bank holiday I have been doing the layout of a booklet published by the writers group I belong to. I enjoy doing layout. It is something that comes naturally. That can not be said of my copy-editing skill and therefore the most annoying things have been when I have had to do copy editing and not layout. About 50% of the changes requested once I had done the final layout were copy-editing. The worst one was the last where I was asked to put in a setting for an extract from a novel. Only the setting desperately needed copy-editing before in could be included. I particularly hated doing it as the writer is Russian and her normal prose has a Russian feel to it, that I think really enhances it. However this was long convoluted sentences that were written in different past tenses and was really quite difficult English to read. Now I could turn them into clearer English but that would be English-English and I might loose the Russian sound to the piece. It was a very difficult piece piece to copy edit and I am not really happy doing that. The changes that the printer wanted were just technical bits that I enjoyed the puzzle of sorting. Oh I also got to design the cover, and used a fractal from Apophysis Software. The printer asked what it means, the answer is that it does not mean anything except what the viewer sees. Fractals can be spectacularly beautiful or just chaotic.

Birthday was quiet on the whole. I failed this year to get the day off work, accidentally letting someone believe I was free on that date and thereby allowing them to create a meeting on that date. I did however have Friday off, although I was interviewing for my PhD on that date. On Friday I went to Breakfast (having done a Tescos shop on my computer first) then went onto Traidcraft to buy chocolates for the person I was interviewing.  However they weren’t open so I went up to Blackwells, not intending to buy, but then they had a book on Theological Anthropology and as that might be one description of my PhD I thought I better get it. Not that I had come across the term before but I am doing a PhD in theology that is decidedly anthropological in nature. Unfortunately I suspect the theological issues I will end up talking about will be significantly different to what the writer thinks they should be. For those who are interested while St Andrews Chesterfield was very concerned over communion, with Herringthorpe it is Baptism. If anyone had at the start of the PhD said I would have to have a chapter on the sacraments, I would have thought them crazy but it is increasingly looking as if I will. Anyway lunch time I went out to Roche Abbey taking a sandwich and a bottle of gingerbeer with me. I also took my camera with me and got some photos of the abbey and surroundings. Unfortunately I am still feeling my way with this camera (it was Olympus Mju not the Nikon DSLR) and I have not quite managed to get to doing everything right at the same time. So some are over exposed where I got it right on others and I managed to get my thumb slightly in on the one that I think has the best composition. If you are interested you can see the pictures on Flickr. In the evening I went out with the Dicksons to the Hui Wei> which is an interesting Chinese restaurant. They had a party with children in it and were slightly distracted with them, but the food was still good and slightly different from your normal English Chinese restaurant.

However the net result of that busy day was that I was whacked yesterday and as a result did not get things I was planning to do, done, so stayed at home this morning to finish off the essay.

This coming week is when everything starts up again so I have my writers group on Monday and Bible study on Tuesday at Herringthorpe. I will be interested to see if there is any change with who turns up as there no longer is a proper meal before hand. I actually suspect on the whole not. They are looking at Acts this time so we shall see how it goes. They seem to change the style of study pretty regularly. I have been to set book bible studies, I have been to talks by Nicky Gumble on video and I have been to themed bible studies and that in less than a year. Hopefully the rest of the week will be fairly quite. As there are more students around staff are getting back into teaching mode.

Birthday, Migraines and

Lets see about this weeks news. Monday I was down for a supervision at Birmingham. It is becoming a bit of a routine, but I should have been suspicious when I started drinking lots of coffee that perhaps I was not as well deep down as I was on the surface. I got there, only to find no supervisor. Some clown had booked a meeting for him, that clashed with our supervision which was on the day he got back from Holiday!! After waiting for fifteen minutes I went to the departmental office (the first time I have been there as this was the undergraduate one at the Edgebaston Campus and previously I have always dealt with the postgraduate office at Selly Oak. I ended up having a coffee in the office and reading while waiting for him. Trains also were having bad days, the train I should have got, but remembered wrongly and did not get to the station in time for, didn't run (there are some advantages to forgetting things at times).

Tuesday was my birthday, my original plan was to visit Rotherham Local Studies library and then go out to Roche Abbey but I could not book a car (did the car system know something I didn't) so I changed it to going swimming. I woke up in the morning, feeling as if everything was too much for me, so after opening cards and pressies plus phoning my parents I went back to bed. When I am at home I tend to think "Life's too much I will go back to bed" instead of "Life's too much, uh oh migraine, go back to bed". Which meant that by mid afternoon I was thinking of myself as lazy and bullied myself into going swimming (not recommended with a migraine) So I did swim. I also stopped by Jessops and spotted they had a lens I wanted at a price cheaper than I was getting on the internet (they were selling off an end of line which was why) unfortunately they only had it with a Cannon mount which is not much good when as I have a Nikon Camera but I managed to order the lens over the internet. Perhaps swimming does lift migraine temporarily, but I still would not recommend it.

Wednesday woke again feeling grotty, this was a work day, so I had to put in the migraine line and ring people up. Actually I had spotted that there was migraine about as I was exhausted far more than I ought to have been the previous evening so made sure I had the phone numbers for the next morning ready by the phone. In the evening I installed my foot pedal onto my computer and started using it to transcribe. It was just so nice to have the recording played for audio typist rather than for a person to listen to. There are subtle differences. With audio typist mode it goes back slightly when you stop it so you can check the last few words and pick up where you are typing from. It is also easy to play a passage two or three times until you get what is said. With a normal listener mode it starts off exactly where it finishes and the one thing I have tiresome in the transcription is that the software does not easily go back about the last sentence, so I have to go back a whole chunk and listen to it again.

Thursday some more transcription in the morning. The old technique as I had started doing this recording this way. Then into work to find out what was on the go. Not much it seemed and finally got to shop for food in the evening. In other words a fairly normal day if there is such a thing.

Friday was in work all day. Actually spent most of the time dealing with people. Anybody want anything from Ghana or to send anything too Ghana as I think I have a courier in the next month due to having sorted out one person from a pickle they have got themselves into once again. Then I went out with the Dickson's to Nawaab's for a meal. They both seemed to enjoy it and we ordered too much food (about a third of it was left, when we had all reached the stage where it was physically daft to try eating anymore). They of course then offered us dessert! No we didn't have any and coffee was at my place.

Saturday was pretty quiet. I went down town for some bits and pieces and then started creating a powerpoint presentation to give to elders at Chesterfield. I am also aware I am going to have to use another method of writing my piece for the next supervision as the weekend I would write on is very booked around. However nothing exciting was bought.

Today I have been to St Andrew's Chesterfield both morning and night. The morning as I had finished transcribing an interview with a couple where the husband had since died and I therefore wished to hand the interview directly to his widow. I normally send them by post. The numbers were few but the Junior church had a good time, I could see it on their faces when they came out. I came home had something to eat and had a nap, then went off with my camera firstly towards Ecclesall woods to have a play (most of the pictures were duds) and then onto Longshaw Estate, where I discovered that the new lens I got works fairly well for taking pictures of birds at birdfeeders. I went straight on from that to St Andrews, or sort of, I was doing fine until I decided to follow roadsigns instead of my instinct and I managed to do a massive detour and arrive just after six. Fortunately with Just Desserts this does not matter.

22nd Sept 07

I am writing a day early in an attempt to get this out after a long period (about a month) of not writing. The reason has been essay preparation followed by a holiday that although only 10 days long manage to include two Sundays, the first through travelling up, the second because I was there and my internet connection was limited. Yes I still had wireless broadband, but at Morag's not where we were staying. That meant it was the time I could nab between demands from Jenny and Cait. The fact that my parents also wanted to read any family epistles, meant that there was a reduction even in that time.

Lets see if I can update people. First thing I can recall is worshipping at St. Andrew's Chesterfield for the first time. Problem one is how to make clear to the minister that the one thing I am definitely not there to do is to check how REFORMED it is!! I might be interested in how it embodies its Reformed position or even how it rejects it, but I will not make any judgement on whether it is making the grade as a REFORMED church. I am interested in "how" not "what". Of course you have to look at "what" to understand "how" but you are looking relationally. I am jokingly-serious thinking at present that I should get a t-shirt with "I am not the Spanish Inquisition" on the front and "nor have I any dealing with section O". Section O being the URC national disciplinary procedure which we seem to have inherited from the Congregationalists at least on my father's account. It rather functions in the same manner as the "men in grey suits" do in the Conservative Party, i.e. quietly efficient when necessary.

Then I have moved offices (again, and I doubt I will get through this year without a second move). Although I am technically in an open plan office, I have got a good space almost private surrounded with 5'6"(plus) screens and two windows (I am the only non-section person with two windows to myself! I may as well make myself comfy, as living in packing cases is miserable and the last time I did that I stayed put for three years. They told me it was temporary and then did not succeed in moving us out. The only worse experience of office space I can remember is when I basically had a open office to myself (technically I was sharing with a very part time guy). The rest of the space was huge and housed junk! So I am not a fan of big offices, I just like offices with plenty of bookshelves. At present am succeeding in keeping it tidy. I still would like my white board up and to put up a couple of photos.

We have also got as far as I think I can take St. Andrew's sound system. In that we have now put permanent supports for both the lectern microphone and a back up pulpit microphone. Both of these are wired. It now means I need to get the instructions re-written for doing the sound on a Sunday. Cliff has also shortened one of the leads for use in the pulpit.

Then there was holiday. Driving up was good, I am slowly finding a good place to stop at on the way up. I went to suss out Caerlaverock WWT site. It looks good and I am hoping to see a Barnacle Goose at Christmas time. For those who have not known me long, my M.Sc project was on Barnacle Geese. I wonder what would have happened if I had decided when I finished that that I really wanted to do was to do the job I had trained for and become an Ecological Statistician. Certainly I would have had a very different but interesting life. Not grumbling, my present life is interesting enough but it is one of those paths not taken that I am semi curious about. I don't think it occurred to me that it was a serious possibility at the time, there is really only entry for about one person per year into that field and something that was that exotic just felt totally out of my reach. If I had, I probably would have worked abroad for several years and even my jobs in the United Kingdom may well have been in out of the way places.

Well by going there I have discovered there is also a National Nature Reserve and a RSPB site at Mersehead. If you add in the cross at Ruthwell it should be easy to spend a day there and break the journey up. Coming down I think will need to be a single journey with lots of stops. There comes a time when getting home to your own bed out weighs the length of journey left. Of course choosing a date is important.

We did many of the things that a week up in the South Rhins includes. That means at least one visit to the RSPB Site on the Mull with a stop at the Gallie Craig from something to eat, a trip to Port Logan Botanical Gardens (my parents also managed to visit the Port Logan Fish Pond which is a rock-pool that was converted to house fish indefinitely. Originally this was so the laird could have fresh fish when he wanted it, but now is used rather as an aquarium for North Atlantic species although I do not think they have either whales or dolphins. We went also to Ardwell Gardens (because I got them mixed with Logan Botanical and thought we could get lunch there) and also saw the Kirkmadrine Stones .

The Saturday was my birthday and Morag and the girls had gone to town making a birthday cake in the shape of a church. As Morag says it was a bit high for me. The service was at 8:00 a.m. and signs of stained glass. However there was a goodly sized congregation of Jelly Babies including one of the doing the sound system! Some photos of the tripe are on Flickr.

I think the highlight was the "folk" concert we went to. Not because it was good. In many ways the event was just totally wrong for us. Three people with hearing aids and the fourth having to put her hands over her ears because the music was so loud. The main reason others seemed to have come was for a change in drinking venue. However we spent the whole of the first half sending messages to each other using pen and paper! A waitress came around to ask us if we wanted any more drinks, we said no but some more paper would be nice! Other people were trying to talk regardless of the performance but I think ours was the only conversation where every word was "heard" by all participants. In the Irish sense the crack was good even though we would not have chosen either the event or the venue if we had known more about it. The music was not bad being a person performing pop classic ballads, just loud (it was getting distortion from the speakers so even those with good hearing could not hear the words). Yes I knew some of them so I am pretty sure of my classification.

Another find was getting a Zen Stone plus and an Audiax FM Transmitter, means I can have music on to lower thought distraction when driving (almost essential on Motorways). I find that CDs need changing and radios have talk which actually is too distracting. Having the random selection playing from a good portion of my music collection (I have not put on my Christmas and Easter specifics) means that I get flow of music while I am driving without problems. The one thing I have discovered is I am eclectic in my music choices. Anything from pop balladeers (Chris de Burgh, Bruce Springsteen), some Jazz, through Celtic pop (Clannad, Runrig, Iona), Christian Praise, classics (both Mozart and moderns including Part) to world music particularly Indian and Jewish. Very little is particularly mainstream but it does cover a wide range.

I got back on Tuesday and since then have been trying to sort out precisely where I am supposed to be (with things going on it is nearly three weeks out of general circulation). I spent Thursday in Birmingham at a meeting of my supervisor's research students. My Supervisor has just been promoted to chair of liturgical and congregational studies! I am glad for him after a tough year in which he has lost both his parents. He is also deputy head of school and moved back to Edgebaston campus!

I think that is largely everyone up-to-date with what is going on, I will need to send a couple of notes to subgroups of you tomorrow with specific news (as I am at St. Andrew's Sheffield tomorrow it will have to wait until then), by the way we are having harvest at St. Andrew's tomorrow, I think global warming has brought the Scottish harvest forward to September from One World Week in October!! Does anyone with curiousity out there know what the theologising* behind "He was a master builder" is