Rejected

Refereeing manuscripts of academic papers is something of an obligation when one develops expertise in an area. However, I only publish when I've got something to contribute, so tend to be hard to please. Having let three tasks wait until the deadline of refereeing two had passed, last night and this morning I got stuck in... and rejected all three. I tried to be constructive in my criticism and, ultimately, I feel sorry for the authors being victims of a system that requires them to publish quantity rather than quality. 

After that, A left for a 10-day walking holiday with friends, and I failed to get stuck into coding again. For once this wasn't due to the distractions of unrelated work, but because I had a stream of exchanges as I guided a new user successfully around some issues when building our software on a system we've not used for testing. Since usage rather than production of software is our ultimate goal, that I left him happy and grateful made it a good day. 

Eventually I got out to take my five Turf zones for the day (maintaining a streak that will earn me a badge) but, more importantly, giving me the chance to stretch my legs, think, and get a breath of fresh air. It was late when I got to St Mungo's graveyard