a couple months of travel

I’ve been meaning to blog for a few weeks now, but haven’t been able to get back here for awhile.  As I write this, it’s past midnight and probably not the best time to be blogging.  But I figured I could at least post a photo or two, and check back again sometime soon.  (The complete album of photos of the places mentioned in this blog post, if you want to stop reading my ramblings, is here: http://picasaweb.google.com/lauren1/NorthernEnglandScotland.)

Edge Hill University in Lancashire

March and now April have turned into months of travel.  A friend of mine described me as a whirling dervish (only in the context of this travel, of course)!  Most of the travel has been great: good places, and for good reasons.  Falling under this category is what another of my friends dubbed my “Tour of the North,” which encompassed visits to Liverpool and Lancaster (as well as Edge Hill University, which is located in-between the two, and with a pretty campus, seen above); Manchester, which was unfortunately-but-probably-typically looking a bit gloomy the day I was there…

The University of Manchester

…and now Sheffield (where I am as I write this).  I’ve been here for a few days for an excellent workshop on experimental design and statistics.  Here’s a couple shots I took in Sheffield today.  The weather has been gorgeous this week!  Uncharacteristically so, everyone says.  Needless to say, I’ve been loving it.

a park in Sheffield

more of the park in Sheffield

Also falling until the good-places-for-good-reasons travel were a few days in London last week for the British Association of Academic Phoneticians.  And then the week after next I’m headed to Baltimore and Washington, D.C., where I’ll not only get to give a poster at the ASA and a talk at Georgetown, but I’ll get to see my husband and in-laws in Towson, too.  The reason my husband’s in Towson is the other reason for my travel recently, the very sad side of all this travel, which has to do with my mother-in-law, her illness, and then her passing on March 21st.  She was an incredible person.  I can’t begin to do her justice here, but I recommend you check out Jefferson’s blog and his speech at her memorial service, which can be found here.

So I haven’t been a good blogger lately, but I’ve been making the most (or trying to!) of planes, trains, buses and cabs, and all the sites in between.  A visit to Oxford by a friend let me see more of my current home, as well.

Oxford

On the subject of all this travel (which, I should say, is nothing compared to what my dad has been up to lately), the other day I decided to blatantly copy an idea from Stanford linguistics professor Dan Jurafsky and list my upcoming travel and talks on my website.  I’m still unsure as to whether this makes me look like I think I’m as important or awesome as Dan is (which is clearly not my belief or intention!), but it somehow makes me feel more organized just to have it up there — and if you’re in the area of one these places, please come by and say hello!!