Morning! Er, afternoon!

Hello all. I've had a day off - hope your lives have been enriched by the opportunity to do something more interesting than read my meandering/whining/moaning.

Where have I been? I've been tramping the mean streets of Stoke-on-Trent and no, I wasn't lost. Anita, who lurks on here, is starting a lecturing job at Keele and needed someone to point out where not to live in Stoke - luckily, she found a great place after 30 minutes and we then drank tea and I tried to say something positive about the place that doesn't include Stoke City FC. Any suggestions?

Guess the workload at Keele University? Is it 13 modules per year, like me? Or 10? Or 3? Does my management think there's a link to teaching quality, student achievement, research output and workload? No, it doesn't.

King Billy (Goat)

Puck Fair is one of Ireland's premier (and oldest) cultural events. Turns out that our friend Anita, who lurks on this blog, is Puck Royalty. The Fair's disastrous cross-border goat trading problems have reached the front page of the national press and her da's quoted. Looks like she'll be donning a goatskin if the passport doesn't appear.

She's moving to Stoke - hope she doesn't expect this (or any other) sort of cultural activity…