August drought

The weirdness of August culminated today in a bank holiday library closure. It's amazing how discombobulating I find these rare occasions. The UL is such a staple of life here that when it's shut for bank holidays or for Christmas or the dreaded (and forthcoming) annual inspection, I feel enormous panic about the absence of my little drop-in centre. So much so that I panic-borrowed on Saturday... and now have 9 books on my ticket. Slight overreaction?!?

Postel's Law

So far, I haven't really found a voice for this blog: I've been surprised how wary I've been to post here. My "friends-only" blog is full of my wittering and I suppose that's the crux of it. When I witter, I tend to reveal aspects of self that I'd rather not display to the wider world. And I'd cringe at the thought of people who know me, but don't know me well, making assumptions about me from my random stringing together of words on all sorts of silly topics.
I'm hopeful that I'll grow into this blog and think of things to discuss. In the meantime, I'm taking Postel's Law as my motto, having read it in an article today and immediately having seen its resonance for the internet and beyond:
“Be conservative in what you do; be liberal in what you accept from others.”

declining interest

I should have realised that I was doomed to a life of academic navel gazing in my first Latin class, aged 11, when I felt absurdly happy to realise that my name belonged in the first declension of nouns.

netiquette

A friend has commented recently on the necessity of politeness in email-land: 'there's no excuse not to reply to an email'. I agree with this absolutely in principle. But an exchange I initiated with an academic earlier in the week prompted me to wonder what happens if we take this to its logical extreme: would email exchanges just go on and on ad infinitem? how do you know when the last message has been sent?