Oxford Blog

Yesterday C and I moved into a house on Catherine St, just around the corner from my sister. more

I had an uneventful flight – the best kind – got through border control and customs at Heathrow, carted my baggage to the bus station, rang C, and had time for coffee and a croissant before getting the bus to Oxford. more

After a drive down to Canberra and back with my father and step-mother, I finally have my visa! A big thank you to the visa unit staff who took pity on me and put my visa into my passport on the same day – Australia Post probably wouldn’t have been fast enough for me to make my (already delayed once) flight. more

I was supposed to fly to the UK on January 25th, with C, but with no news about my visa application since December 17th that didn’t happen. more

This was my first experience of international relocation.  This is like moving house locally, but with a whole pile of added complications. more

Talking about the weather is a particularly English pastime, but the UK weather at the moment is rather dramatic. more

Today was my last day at work. I’ve been working at the University of Sydney, first for Anatomy and then for Medical Sciences, for sixteen years, so it’s a pretty big change for me – I don’t think I’ve lived in a house as long as I’ve worked in the Anderson Stuart building. more

Oxford is not a big city, which restricts our options. (We thought about renting a cottage in a village outside Oxford, but infrequent bus services and the lack of parking in the Uni make that seem impractical.) more

Books I have read are unthreatening, placing no pressure on me and offering the comfort of a familiar experience. In contrast, unread books are not so relaxing – some bring back memories of unwise purchases or over-eager review copy requests, some have remained unread because they seem difficult or daunting, and even the most docile of them whisper an insistent “read me! read ME!”. more

Books are cheaper in the UK. This was true even before the pound crashed and the Australian dollar boomed, but the price difference is now striking.

So I’ve been deferring book purchases ever since C got the job and we decided we were moving to the UK. I might start with the entire Archipelago Books back list…