SuperSenior!

My pal/sports buddy, Ces (Robin's brother-in-law), is playing in a golf tournament soon with some college friends and wanted a "Super Senior" image for tournament T-shirts.

Being at Brunel without my Wacom pressure-sensitive tablet, or a desk (Robin was using the small desk in our flat), I was able to do a drawing in my European office, JTmobile Studio, also known as "the couch."


JTstudios, Euorpean office.


Drawing in Photoshop, from an unfamiliar position, with a mouse, doesn't improve one's drawings. Freehand drawing with a mouse is about half a notch easier than using an Etch-a-Sketch (the plastic box that turned millions of potential artists into disturbed children who hated drawing). Luckily, I gave up on Etch-a-Sketch before it permanently damaged me.

It's OK for this to be a crummy sketch, because I'll place it as a template in Adobe Illustrator and redraw it using vector drawing tools, which are much easier to control using a mouse than the pixel-based drawings you can do in Photoshop.


The Illustrator version. Time restraints and other deadlines (Robin's book) forced me to eliminate the golf bag with clubs spilling out that's visible in the rough sketch. Hope it works for you, Ces. It was fun.

Book deadline done!

This afternon Robin finished her book and uploaded it to the editor and production guru who makes sure all the files are properly made and ready for printing.

To celebrate, we took an afternoon stroll along the canal that I discovered this morning. The Tea Room had closed by the time we got there, so we went next door and had dinner at the Malt Shovel again.

Tomorrow we plan to walk into Uxbridge and do some shopping. Later in the week we may have to go into London to the Apple Store again. "Pleeeease don't throw me in dat briar patch!"

When we got back to Shoreditch Hall from dinner, we continued to celebrate and watched the movie "Sunshine Cleaning" on my laptop that I downloaded through iTunes a couple of nights ago.


A barge dog keeps a close watch on the canal and foot path traffic.


Looks like a veteran barge dog.


There are some dumpy, ugly barges that look like the're from a Mel Gibson Canal Warrior movie, but lots of them are great looking.


Robin: "Hey mister, why is it the women who always have to open and close the locks?"


Man: "In my case, it's because she's afraid of the engine." Fair enough.


We'll try the Tea Rooms later this week.


On the way back to Shoreditch Hall, we stopped by our friendly neighborhood convenience store, run by Ahmed (pronounced ahk-med). He's not in this photo. That's his grandfather with the red turban, and his grandfather's friend in the background. They hang out here in the evenings to keep Ahmed company, and to give him advice. This week I'm going to ask Ahmed if they mind if I take some photos and video of them.


Ah, relaxation.

A Sunday Stroll: a shady lane and barge boats

While Robin was feverishly working to finish the final pages of her book, I walked down to the Malt Shovel pub to check out the canal that runs next to it. A day or so ago, I was looking at the neighborhood on Google Maps and noticed barge boats on the canal. So I went to check it out.


I passed a shady lane that looked surprsingly rural. It turned out to be a beautiful, narrow road to guest cottages, big estates, new luxury homes, streams with ducks, and fields with horses.


A lovely Sunday morning, don't you think, Mr. Ed?


Returning from the shady lane, I doubled back towards the Malt Shovel, peered over the bridge wall and saw them - "Houston, we have barges!"


A barge approaches a canal lock. Out of view and to the right is the Malt Shovel and a Tea House. We'll check out the Tea House later for dinner.


When you approach the lock, your girl friend hops out, onto the bank, uses a crank to unlock the gate, and then pulls or pushes on the gate just enough to let water pour into the lower lock. It's heavy.


Ever wonder what the guy in the boat is doing while his sweetheart is cranking and pulling and pushing? Shoulda' known.


A successful negotiation of the lock. Not unlike the Panama Canal.


The bargers head up the canal full-speed, 4 mph. You're encouraged to keep it closer to 2 or 3 mph, but these kids are obviously wild and crazy thrill-seekers.

You can rent barges by the week, minimum of three days, I think. Available to sleep four or six people. Dogs allowed. It's on the list. Need volunteers to share boat.

All is quiet on the Brunel campus

But then, it's only 10 pm, Saturday night. I heard some students say there's a Jack Daniels party tonight, so, as Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin fame says in the title of the Rockumentary, "It Might Get Loud."

Here's a collection of tidbits from the last day or so.


We had dinner in the University cafeteria, located upstairs on the main concourse, Friday night. Not many people there, but pretty good food. Robin likes their curry and rice.


Each side of the school cafeteria has a large flat screen showing non-stop, high-energy, sexy music videos. Hey Brunel, Breaking News: these kids don't need excitement encouragement, they need enough downers to bring down to a normal operational level.


The cafeteria is upstair in the building on the main concourse. It doesn't look like a main concourse on Saturday, but there's usually more people here than anywhere else on campus.


There are a couple of small stores just off campus, within 4 or 5 minutes of our residence hall. This is where we do light grocery shopping (very light) and occasionally buy wine.


Just a door or two away from the grocery/wine shop is The best Kebob. I haven't tried it yet, but it looks popular. Or maybe being the only place open on Saturday night makes it look more popular than it really is.


The best Kebob. Big glass windows are ideal for video taping customers.


The kitchen in our flat. Those of you who've been to our house can probably spot the difference between this kitchen and the one we're used to cooking in. I mean besides the posters on the wall asking residents not to burn the place down.

Friday and Saturday in flat 137

We've barely left the flat far two days, still working to create the final examples in Robin's book that's due this weekend. I'm starting to feel like we're at the highest Mt. Everest advanced base camp, waiting to summit, and a howling storm is keeping us pinned down, unable to leave the tent.

Speaking of howling, I was reminded at 4am how much fun it is to be away from home for the first time and being a young, drunk student on a Friday night - singing, laughing, vomiting. Having graduated from a Baptist college, I never had this experience, but it sounded like a nice college bonding thing and I'm happy for them. I also hope they're sick as dogs today. Not because I'm mad, but just because it would be good for them. Peace, love, joy, happiness.

OK, I'll admit it. I wanted to send Clint Eastwood downstairs to deliver his line from Gran Torino: "If I have to come back here, it's gonna get bleepin' ugly." A disturbing movie, but it had its moments.

As soon as we get this deadline wrapped up, we've got some plans for the next week that should be fun. We hope to hook up with our friend Lynn from Oxford some evening soon. We've talked about going to Bath for a day trip. And we might try to get up to Birmingham to see Jay, the exchange student from Turkey who lived with us for a year back in 2000. And, I almost forgot, Robin's classes start this coming week.

My signature Brunel pose

I'm pretty sure that most students here know who I am. Not by name, but at night, in the residence halls, in a dozen languages, they're saying "who that white haired guy always squinting at his fist?"

The first day here I saw a couple of people who obviously were parents with their freshmen children (called "Freshers" here), who took an occasional photo of their kids, so they could remember them sober. But since that first weekend, after the parents went home, I haven't seen a single camera, video or otherwise.

Wake up Brunelers! You only get this opportunity once. OK, twice in my case, but the first time I just had a Super8 movie camera without sound. And no computer, digital editing software, or the Internet.

New ballgame now. Quiet on the set! Speed! Roll 'em! Action!

Superstring theory, HP printer, the missing chef, and Malt Shovel - Brilliant!

Everyday flies by so fast. I'm helping Robin with her book deadline by researching text for dozens of slide examples in a chapter that's being wrapped up. She needs content to put on example slides, so I'm putting together copy she can use to create slides that demonstrate certain design and communication concepts. My favorite so far are the slides for Superstring theory (quantum physics, not the stuff you spray with a squirt can). You know, N-point scattering amplitude and 10D space-time coordinates. Stuff like that. Brilliant!

Another SOHO (Small Office/Home Office) milestone reached today. We've got the new HP printer online and printing. We ran into a snag when we realized that the powered USB hub we bought didn't supply enough power to run Robin' external USB DVD drive, which we needed to install the HP software and configure the printer (her MacBook Air doesn't have an optical drive, CD or DVD). Fortunately, Bonjour was working (Mac's automatic local network detection and connection). Brilliant! And fortunately, I remembered that Macs can share another Mac's DVD drive over a local network. Brilliant!


Robin and her HP (Happy Printer).


The view from our window.

Entering or leaving the flat is a process that only campus security professionals could dream up. Entering the building's front door requires holding your electronic room key card up to a sensor until a light turns green and the door automatically opens. Then touch the electronic card to the sensor on the elevator door. When the elevator sensor light turns green, push the elevator door button to call the elevator. Get in the elevator and push the button for floor 4 (even though we're on the 5th floor). Exit the elevator and go to the locked door that goes to the flat 137 hallway. Touch the electronic card to the door sensor. When the light turns green, open the door. Walk down the hall to our door, touch the electronic card to the door sensor. When the sensor light turns green, turn the deadbolt on the door to unlock it. Go inside and turn the deadbolt to re-lock the door. Brilliant!

Our first day here, Robin's card didn't work properly and she got trapped between the elevator and the hallway door. Her card wouldn't open either one. She banged on the hallway door and yelled, but I didn't hear her. She finally realized she could take the stairs, and walked across campus to find someone who could re-program her card.


Brilliant!

After spending most of the day inside, we decided to go to the nearest pub, about a block away, and have dinner out. We walked to the Royal Crowne Pub. We were there several days ago, and the bartender said they don't serve food on Monday or Tuesday, just Wednesday thru Sunday. So we get there and the place is empty except for one or two people. I don't smell food. Robin says (cheerfully and optimistically) "Are you serving dinner?" in the tone of voice that expects an answer like "Of course!" The somewhat grumpy-demeanored bloke says "No." Robin says "You're kidding." "No." "But we've been waiting for two days!" He says "The chef's gone." Robin: "But he'll be back tomorrow?" in a tone of voice that fully expects an answer like "Of course!" He says "No." Robin: "Where did he go?" Grumpy: "He's gone! Disappeared!" Robin decided to take another approach, being a creative and adaptable girl. "Is there any other place nearby?" "The Malt Shovel. Two lights down, turn right, go 150 yards."


The chefless Royal Crowne Pub bartender.

The Royal Crowne still looks like a good place to have a beer, so we'll leave it on the list. The Malt Shovel was just a few minutes away, so we headed that way.


The Malt Shovel

Right away we could tell this was a lucky upgrade in pub choices. Bigger and nicer. Robin asked "What's a malt shovel?" "I'm not sure, but it's obviously the kind of shovel a duck uses" I said.

It was great. Good food with English pub atmosphere and adorable English accents. A fun dinner. I had fish and chips, Robin had Steak Mushroom Guinness Pie. She loved it.

After we order, the waitress says "Brilliant!" When we order coffee, she says "Brilliant." When we pay the tab, "Brilliant!" I guess it doesn't get much better than brilliant. Unless it's "Incandescent!" Or maybe "N-point Scattered Amplitude!"


Waitress and bartender at the Malt Shovel.


A Malt Shoveler rings up the tab.


The Malt Shovel logo. I think that might be malt in the duck's mouth.


Just so you get your money's worth, two more Malt Shovelers.



When we left, the romantic lights of speeding cars on small streets cast our shadow on the pubs walls - as we dove for safety.

Brilliant!