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April 2011

Off out to Convent Garden (is this wise?) for a birthday party. Sadly, there is shopping to be done beforehand, I have been told.

Hurrah! Book chapter on Pynchon, DeLillo, Terrorism and the Cold War accepted! Also doing final edits to 'Pynchon and Wittgenstein' #phdchat

Woah. Apparently prince William is getting married tomorrow. Why didn't somebody tell me? #thenewsisntdoingitsjob

With apologies to Adorno: It is Pynchon's courtesy to spare the reader the embarrassment of believing himself cleverer than the author.

I don't quite agree with that "cult of done" stuff. Academic thought requires time to think. Do something. Think. Do it again.

Just ordered a Kindle! Unfortunately, this is a birthday present from Helen to me, so have to wait a month before I'll be allowed to use it.

1.) It's a basic attack; 2.) they imply they can break public-key cryptography (they'd have a Nobel Prize if they could)

This new Beastie Boys single is ill: bringin' back that old school rap. I really can't pull that off. #notdownwiththekids

"I'm sorry about that, Pete, but the one thing I really can't stand for is tailgating." Mr. Eddy/Dick Laurent, Lost Highway

Just looking at SlideDeck. What I don't get: it's GPL licensed. But claims that gratis version is "branded". If it's GPL, can just remove?

Finished first draft of book chapter on auto-subversive behaviour in academic publishing. Anyone want to read & give feedback? #phdchat

Sascha Pöhlmann, alongside whom I am speaking in Glasgow in June, is an inspiration for the generosity of his feedback on my work.

Just got hold of a lovely quality recording of Leftfield at Coachella, then realised the setlist lacks Release the Pressure and Inspection.

+1 RT @PaulOBrien I will ONLY buy a @htc Sensation if it's security unlockable, simple as that... Come on @htc! Listen to your fans!

Laurel and Hardy reference just went into Zombies chapter: "“Another fine mess you've gotten me into”: Why is academic publishing as it is?"

Anybody else not receiving Twitter emails for new followers/DMs... just started happening to me over the last day.

Will try and chip in to tonight's #phdchat as I'm doing a lot of conferencing at the moment, but can't promise full hour :P

Uploading the third video presentation from the first meeting of the UK Pynchon Network. Vimeo's limits means this is taking a while.

Symbiosis conference first draft; CHECK. 2 hours. (Just a reworking of a chapter section into speakable form). Good day today!

Ice cream van has begun circling our block. I'm in danger of using the "I deserve one" rationale for having written conff. paper #dangerous

Oh dear. BT and TalkTalk lose substantial part of judicial review of Digital Economy Act's illegal filesharing measures.

So I spent this afternoon writing an awesome Android app. Last minute fail: no REGEXP support in Android sqlite.

Although I like him, Grayling is disingenuous. A militant atheist is, clearly, one who believes others should share their disbelief.

Bah. Work quota not finished for today, but I need to stop. Will make it up tomorrow. David Foster Wallace for me now!

Right, not answering any more pre-panel posts. Panel starts at 1pm and I have an inordinate number of things to be done before then!

Was about to go to the gym when the dulcet tones of the ice cream van went speeding past my house. Mr Whippy with flake it was.

Deflected apologies aren't apologies and are used to belittle the recipient: sorry you were upset, sorry you don't understand #Lansley

Pleased to announce that I will be part of the Q & A panel for @GdnHigherEd's session this Friday on "Life After the PhD"

Off to Sussex for conference abstract discussions, journal editorial board meeting and supervisor get-together.

Having a day off research tomorrow in order to put our NEW SHED together. It doesn't get more exciting than this.

My copy of The Pale King arrived massively damaged. Have to return by post. Sigh. Read Beckett's Worstward Ho to make myself feel better.

Unsurprisingly, the material I thought was rubbish yesterday looks great by the light of day. So subjective! #phdchat

Frantically ploughing through this tedious Thomas Hardy novel so I can start the new David Foster Wallace tomorrow.

Hey, that's the way research days go. You win some, you lose some. Just need balance towards the former! #phdchat

Bah. Slow research day. Dislike most of my work. It'll look better in the morning, though, I'm sure. #phdchat

It's not "disgusting" that Sally Hunt criticises VCs for huge salaries (cf @mariocreatura), it's just her hypocrisy. Critique is still valid

According to the friendly librarian in Humanities 1, they test it every Thursday. Been coming for years and never noticed before.

British Library fire alarm went off at 9.20. Hope this doesn't mean there'll be one of the two annual drills later. #tedious

I'm getting used to Ubuntu Unity. It encourages me to use workspaces better and, hope performance on fglrx and display issues will be fixed.

Edging very close to a first draft of the Zombies chapter. I say "edging", more like dragging my undead brain across the soporific floor.

Took the plunge and upgraded to Natty beta on my laptop overnight (well, it's got 10 mins left). Hope my inability to sleep was unrelated.

In a quandary. I know the best way to ensure Ubuntu 11.04 works on my hardware is to use the beta. I dread a month of pain ahead, though!

My paper in Portsmouth is scheduled under "bondage in the Western World" panel. Details tomorrow, but I now expect much dodgy twitter spam.

My favourite sentence written today: Mason & Dixon with its “latitudes and departures,” its “there and back again”s and its mechanical ducks

Today is massive drive to get lots of last thesis chapter into article form and more work on 'Zombies' book chapter.

I recommend any sane news organization employ @stebax to write a column for them ASAP; pretty much all he writes is gold.

Wondering if my metaphors are getting too specific when I'm using hypervisor virtualization & rootkits in relation to academic publishing

Trying out free software alternative to Scrivener, Kabikaboo. Not as feature-rich, but working well for me. #phdchat

I have, once more, been let down by the BL cafe in my "Monday morning treat" scheme. Lack of croissants makes me sad.

God, I hate doing web design/coding pricing for friends. How do others do it? I feel guilty, but my time is precious :/

Bah, YouTube's length restriction is really tiresome. How am I supposed to upload academic conference papers?

Thanks to @MarkKohut for pointing out that I had mistakenly written "World War I" in that Berfrois piece, omitting the second digit!

Developing an application with a user profile in it. What terminology should I use for non-binary gender option?