Halfway through the first week

After the stop/start feelings of Freshers' week we have now started in earnest. Today I taught my first classes of the new term. I have two great groups - one sweet collection of first years and one slightly more cynical but endearingly lovely set of second years. Both classes went rather well given that I haven't taught since June! I always get first day jitters and, after conversation with erstwhile colleagues, I realise I am not alone.

So tomorrow is split into two with the morning in uni meeting students and planning classes and the afternoon at my office at home drinking green tea and grappling with the language chapter of the Book. My day is usefully divided with a yoga class. Now I'm not into all the chanting business and would run a mile from anything 'spiritual', but I do find yoga a really useful way of stretching out, particularly as my workouts get tougher and tougher. I started this class just last week and it is free for staff - hoorah!

Amongst other exciting bits of news...I have had a new school haircut and am very chuffed with it. I now have a fringe for the first time since 1994 when I grew it out (one of the most painful experiences in the life of the young Mole). The new fringe is just little and falls to the left. Quite nice really. D is still under the weather and has got through many pills over the past few days. I even persuaded him to take a cup of Echinacea tea so he must be really ill! I am taking a wee trip to Stockport on Thursday to do a bit of work in the John Rylands Library in Manchester. I am working on an amazing archive I have just discovered. I won't be able to get right through it in a day but at least I can suss out what they have. The best bit, of course, is that I can catch up with the 'rents. Looking forward to seeing you both!

I've also been reading a number of new blogs. Mostly they centre on academic fashion (in the clothes sense of the term). Now academics are notoriously bad dressers. With my two eyes I have witnessed some truly frightful fashion faux pas. You would imagine that a lady on a Professor's wage would invest in a couple of good outfits...you would be wrong. I once saw a relatively well-known lecturer attend a conference in a pair of cut-off trackies. Now I am no fashionista (I can hear my Mum and Sister laughing at this - I was once told that I had a "very original sense of style". Make of that what you will!) and I certainly don't place any worth on the clothes you wear, the car you drive, the house you own or any of those (ultimately) petty trivialities that we focus on in life. People get obsessed with these things completely forgetting (or choosing to forget) the more important questions of life. But I do think that if you are going to teach a class or give a paper, you should at least steer clear of sports wear. So I was encouraged by these blogs. I'll add a couple on the side bar in case you should be interested.

Anyways, I'm going to have a cup of tea before bed. I did a hardcore workout tonight and my bones are tired!

I'll post again soon - probably Saturday evening after my trip over the Pennines and after Wigan RL have won the Super League Grand Final. Come on the Cherry and Whites.

CSW