Zero day weekend

After a wonderful weekend off last week, I was back at uni on both Saturday and Sunday this week, due entirely to the monster event that is now known as HESTEC. HESTEC week ends with community day on Saturday, wherein we throw open our doors, have booths, presentations, funnel cake, music, and Cheech Marin(?). I was involved in organizing a few things, mainly student posters, and was in helping. After a slow start (which rather panicked my colleague Jon, who was the main organizer), things picked up late in the afternoon, and we had a couple of display rooms packed to the gills. We actually ended running about an extra longer than we planned. (This rather messed up some plans for the evening, but that's another story.) It was actually rather good, and this morning I got some ideas for something we might do next year.

Of course, after having tens of thousands of people on campus Saturday, what does that mean for Sunday? Clean up on aisle three! I came in and was taking down the posters and doing a few other odds and ends. Wasn't here for long, but I was here.

I'm hoping that now that this unexpectedly hellish September is over, I can move on and start getting a few other long delayed tasks done in October. And now I've found a secret weapon. On Sunday, I found a clip on the 'net that I can play at those times when I need to dig deep to keep going. I have 14 minutes and 55 seconds of a soul-stirring, make-you-believe-you-can-go-on, video of... a pick-up truck. (Requires RealPlayer to view.)

Yes, I know this sound terribly "new laddish" or "bloke-ish." But it's wildly out of character for me -- I don't even like pick-up trucks! Always been more of a sports car driver myself. But this really must be seen to be believed. It's a clip from the BBC's car show Top Gear (now showing in the U.S. on the Discovery Channel), which I've taken to watching for its incredible good humour and inventiveness, even though cars don't interest me much.

I hope there won't be too many days where I feel the need to watch that video. But it's nice to have something to rev you up, so to speak.