Bagel Belly Blog

Tis the season to be running around like a madman

So .... been kinda quiet around here.
Quietness usually indicates a serious lack of time to blog, and that couldn't be more accurate for this week.
On Sunday, it was back to Zurich for a couple of days on-site at ETH Zurich, helping out on the analysis phase of a project we've just begun for the Functional Genomics Centre. Some seriously cool stuff we'll be involved in there, bringing together many of the different threads of research and development we've been following for the last four years. More on that later.
One of the cool things (literally!) about this trip to Zurich was that they'd had snow on the afternoon I arrived. Great for skiers, not so much fun for pilots, as our pilot said after a fairly bumpy landing. Crosswinds and ice do not a comfortable journey make. Anyway, it was a beautiful winter wonderland, and I even got to have a late night walk and snowball fight. Excellent.
Three things dragged me kicking and screaming into a more festive mood: The Muppet Christmas Carol on Saturday, some 'interesting' christmas decorations on a house in Zurich, and this home-made Christmas card from one of Massimo's daughters. Not to mention the disgraceful number of Christmas cookies I ate ;-)
Finally, I arrived back in the UK yesterday afternoon just in time for the Luminas humbug dinner:

All the UK folk associated with Luminas went out for a non-traditional Christmas meal in an excellent Lebanese restaurant in London. The food was great, the wine was, if anything, too drinkable, and it was a pleasure to see our virtual team all in the same place for an evening. It was the high point of what's been an enjoyable year. More photos of the festivities can be found on flickr.
Today I spent racing round town doing my Christmas shopping, and in a moment I'll dash across country to start preparing for Christmas. So, season's greetings to one and all, I'm off. Bye for now!