Carry On Up the Greasy Pole

You're in for a real treat today. I'm live-blogging from Aston University's lakeside conference centre, attending a conference on how to keep my job. I mean of course, how to plan an academic career. I'm with three other Wolverhampton teachers, so of course we're sitting at the back being sarcastic and munching pork scratchings. Our leaders here are virtually all white men, so the institutional conservatism of academia is clearly on my side!

I'll be counting clichés ('on the runway' has already appeared) and 'networking' - a term which makes me nauseous. Oh well, perhaps I'll meet glamorous single academics…

Living the high life

I've often teased Emma for being a typical Man U fan: foreign, lives a long way from Manchester etc. Now I know it's true because I've just received this text:

Just boarded. Drinking champagne. It's a hard life.

She's not flying with Ryanair, that's for sure.

What are you all doing this weekend? I'm going for a walk around Bridgnorth tomorrow, in the company of the Map Twats. Then we're going to find Birmingham's finest indie clubs to celebrate Dan's birthday. On Sunday, I'm going to finish all the marking. Then on Monday I'm off to Aston Uni for a conference on how to get an academic career. I always thought 'career' was what happened when your brakes failed…

Then on Tuesday it's off to Walsall to explain to the PGCE external examiner what a brilliant teacher I am (ho ho ho).