Friday 24 April 2009

A Bit Of An Apology ... And More

I seem to be spending all my time apologizing at the moment. I didn't write a post yesterday and I had said that I would endeavour to write every day. In my defence I did write two on Wednesday, but I really did mean to write about what I got up to yesterday; however, I was so tired I just couldn't summon up the energy to write about it. And I was having a little bit of trouble with my Internet connection, but that is now sorted and here I am.

I travelled north London yesterday morning to listen to a lecture being given by 'S'. When I gave my lecture a few weeks back he said that if there were any that I particularly felt like attending then I should feel free to come along. So I did. I found it very interesting and gave me a perspective on various different psychodynamic theories; ones that I had not really looked into before. It has interested me enough to look at the work of Klein and Winnicott in more detail so that I can see where they were coming from.

My journey to the university was horrendous and at one stage the bus that I was travelling on took more than half an hour to travel a distance of about a mile. I sent 'S' a text message saying that I was still south of the river and that I hoped that I would arrive in time; he sent a reply indicating that I should not worry if I was a little late. As luck would have it when I eventually arrived at Victoria and made a dash for the Underground I did not have too much of a problem getting through the ticket barrier and down to the platform and a train arrived almost immediately. On arrival at my destination station I set off for the university building as fast as my legs would carry me. I do walk a fair bit, but while I generally use an average walking pace, yesterday I needed to get my legs working rather hard to get to the building in time for the 10am start. After booking in at the reception desk, I made my way upstairs and found the lecture room without too much difficulty and walked in just as 'S' was finishing his brief introduction on the subject of the lecture.

After the lecture 'S' and I had a discussion about how well my lecture had been received and that the students had talked about it for a few weeks afterwards. We also discussed the short course that it is hoped that the university will be running in the summer and what the dates for that would be. I have been asked to lecture again, so I will need to think about updating my lecture a little in readiness for this.

I had decided that I would do a bit of wandering round Oxford Street after the lecture, so I headed for the Underground to make my way to Oxford Circus. Just as I came out of the station the police were closing off a large section of Oxford Street, in the direction that I wanted to go, because of a major gas leak. I could not believe that this had happened to me on top of the problems that I had already suffered on my earlier journey. So I had to turn round and walk in the opposite direction to that which I wanted to go in order to get on the Underground again. I walked to Bond Street station and got on a train to Tottenham Court Road and then turned into Charing Cross Road and started walking down towards Trafalgar Square. I love looking in bookshops and Charing Cross Road is just the place to do this, but it is nowhere near as much fun as it used to be. So many of the specialist bookshops have now gone although Foyles is still there and I had a most enjoyable hour wandering round Blackwells.

By the time that I got home my legs and feet were aching and I needed to sit down and put my feet up for a while. So that is my excuse for not writing a post yesterday, and I am sticking to it.

1 comment:

cb said...

I think it;s hard to keep up a daily posting schedule as some days it might just not feel right! The lecture sounded interesting though and it's great to hear that yours was so well-received.
I also love Charing Cross Road although I haven't made it there for a long time..