Winter?

Today was the first to have the quality of not getting properly light, a depressing characteristic of the Scottish winter. Not wearing a jacket for this morning's dog walk was a bad decision, as I ended up soaked.

I'd woken to a positive email from a different Chinese student interested in doing a PhD with me, and one who looks better suited to the work I have in mind than the one who bailed out yesterday. I'm not counting my chickens, though. I was also pleased that, thanks to a speculative self-invitation, a trip to Manchester to watch a football match looks as if it will now see me giving a seminar.

A plea from a friendly collaborator to produce a new version of our software focused my mind in the morning, and then I went into work for a meeting that didn't happen, and an Office Hour when no students came. All this gave me time to write documents for a funding bid, and book travel for three of us to go to France at Christmas, and for K and I to return. My Year 4 project students turned up, but their progress has been slowed by over-engineering.

After last night's hyperbolic chaos, I was not surprised that Truss resigned, but fear it's all part of a plan to restore BoJo to the premiership.

Having finished watching "Our Friends in the North" last night, I feel slightly bereft.