I had one of the strangest days ever at work on 11 December 2008, when I had not one but two presidents of unrecognised states in my office at different times. (They did not and still do not recognise each other, so I had to juggle schedules carefully.) Sadly, neither is in office any more; Mehmet Ali Talat lost his re-election bid in 2010, and ( Read more... )

By great good chance I happened to be in New York during the first week of November 2008, so I was able to witness at first hand the jubilation around Obama's first election as President. It's a nice coincidence for this month to come up now in my schedule of posts about previous years' reading, as we watch Trump's inability to cope with the ( Read more... )

This is the latest post in a series I started last November, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially ( Read more... )

September 2008 was the start of our new lives as Belgian citizens, a mere five months after applying. In other family news, my sister C had her baby daughter S, still my youngest relative on that side of the family. I started the month in Slovenia, as noted, and also travelled to Salzburg for another conference. No photos this month, as far as I ( Read more... )

This is the latest post in a series I started last November, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially ( Read more... )

July 2008 began very painfully. At the very end of June I had a vasectomy, and with somewhat imperfect timing moved office a few days later, thinking I would have recovered over the weekend. No. My testicles were swollen to the size of a tennic ball (felt much bigger) and I could barely walk. My gallant intern D and neighbour J did most of the ( Read more... )

We celebrated the summer solstice by having a party in our back garden - something we have done very rarely, in fact. Some nice pictures, though a lot of friends have since moved away. I wish I had taken more. (I also wish I had had my eyes open in the only one taken of me.)


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Started May 2008 with a long weekend at my sister's in France; later on travelled to Montenegro and Albania, and then for a day to Belfast.

Plenty of daytime travel and easily consumed reading meant I got through 39 books that month:

Non-fiction 7 (YTD 25)
About Time vol 6: The Unauthorised Guide to Doctor Who, 1985-1999, by Tat Wood
Kosova ( Read more... )

April 2008 was the month that we applied for Belgian citizenship. A rare month (before this year) when I don't seem to have left the country at all, having arrived home from Ireland late on 31 March and departed for France early on 1 May. This was also the month that B moved from the place near the Dutch border where she had been living since ( Read more... )

This is the latest post in a series I started last November, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially ( Read more... )