The beginning of the second month

On 1 August I signed an offer to purchase an old, rambling house in Newlands. So now we are committed. The kids can cycle to school, and it is ON the highway to work. Of course it is still a whole adaptation to realise that I cant just stroll over to the office if I forget something. Now, once you hit the highway, you must persevere.
I had a number of interesting meetings. Firstly there was a Dean's meeting. I find it a really nice, reassuring place. Once again, I am new, but still, I feel welcomed, and accepted. Then there was the Executive Committee of the Senate. Here's where the BIG GUNS are represented. I felt more than a little out of my depth, but the Vice Chancellor was very kind, and even explained to me the things that I was supposed to explain to the meeting. My instructions from Colin were to "Just sit there and act stupid". I promise you I did not have to act at all. I came over quite stupid enough. THEN, the exciting one was the Faculty executive. The energy is astounding. We did not get through half the agenda, even though Colin, who took the Chair, tried his level best to keep the thing brief and to the point. We will have to consider how we make that meeting more meaningful, though.
Last night there was the launch of the Environmental Resource Centre. It was highly exciting, and I can see that the departments of Multimedia, Film & Video, Photography and Journalism could have an absolute field day working in that centre. I took lots of business cards, and will soon be getting some stuff off the ground.
More importantly is that, there, I met just about the whole of the research section, and discovered that the University already had in place many of the things that I wanted to create. THUS, all we have to do is harness them. I have asked Juana to schedule a meeting to get the research initiative up to speed.
The really nice thing is that we are all very much looking forward.