Just docking back with the mothership following a midweek jaunt down to Nottingham. Nice city: lots of green spaces, all the shops you could want, friendly taxi drivers and proper pubs.
Was joining in with East Midlands Division and EMBOC in their afternoon of AGMs and assorted entertainment. Great to see partnership working, enthusiatic professionals from different sectors in the area. Venue was Djanogly City Academy School, a big name for a high-ceilinged venue, rather like an aircraft hangar I thought! Alarmingly quiet without pupils but I can imagine how noisy and hectic it must be on a ‘working’ day. Our main venue was the drama studio, had to suppress instinct to start my Lady Macbeth or Much Ado routines…
Had encouraging thoughts from Joan Bray, EMBOC, who had had a difficult morning with flooded electrics and whatnot at Nottingham Central Lib, but still managed to show great passion for the profession and its future. Madeline Cox reported on a study visit to the British Library where she researched some Nottinghamshire astronomers. Turns out they all thought the sun was inhabited back then by a ‘differently organised race’ - I thought it was librarians who were ‘differently organised’! Alison Barlow shared her experience of IFLA In Durban, including some evocative photos and a moving video of one of the speakers recounting a saty in solitary confinement in which books (and especially Moby Dick) became a lifeline.
I joined this random cast with my own stories and snaps under the heading of ‘kissing with confidence’ - thinking about performance anxieties and how professional involvement can boost confidence and extend your skills. Not sure I was very coherent but hopefully the message came across that professionals should be proud of their achievements and that it’s easy and fun and worthwhile to get involved in the wider profession.
Not sure I’m very proud of the backlog on my work desk, though I’m trying to beat the mess and made some physics book vanish quite successfully this morning.
Tonight it’s packing for a few days in Spain visiting family - plus I have to plant some strawberry plants which chose exactly the wrtong day to be delivered!
