Xmas Message

See our 2005 Xmas message here

Who's the hippy in the kilt??

G'day cobber! I'm an Austraaalian Scot. I'll be watching Bonny Scotland stuff the Kiwis at Murrayfield this weekend. I must find a hairdresser soon though.....

(Gog and K in Oz celebrating a friend's wedding)

C'mon Bris!

Bristol play top of the league Sale Sharks this coming weekend.....At least we're above Bath in the table currently! C'mon Bris!

Grime & Selwood

The book is beginning to come together now! Grime and Selwood have a new website and my book is now being advertised (in advance of availability) here and there is a mini biog on the authors' page here.

(Pic I used was taken at Olaf and Nicole's wedding last year by Trotzki)

Been ages....

Amazing how time flies! I haven't posted here since April or something. I must start posting more to keep up with that crazy Goggyblog guy in Sydney. He's a prolific blogger these days. I always said he was a blogger all his life. Or something similar....

Laurie's latest antics

Laurie has started walking with the aid of a walker, kindly provided by Uncle Goggy and Auntie Karen. To view the evidence, you can download a short piece of movie here

Patents in Hungary

For the Magyar speakers of you out there, here is a newspaper article quoting my friend George who was speaking at conference there recently - presumably on the subject of patents in biotechnology....

http://www.magyarhirlap.hu/Archivum_cikk.php?cikk=90150&archiv=1&next=0

Our crap media...

I don't know about the rest of you, but I am fed up with the low-brow nature of much of the British media. Channel 4 news and Today are generally excepted here, but even they have been foxed somewhat by reporting the committee stage of the prevention of terrorism bill in the House of Lords in the past few days. Now, I know it is relatively complex stuff, but Mark Mardell's "report" (and I use the term in its loosest sense) on the BBC news at 10pm was vacuous drivel, to such an extent that one wasn't really sure what had happened in the upper house that day at all. I had to laugh though when he handed back to poor old Huw Edwards, who always looks like he's reading an autocue written in Aramaic from the furrow on his brow. Why can't they get back legal eagles like Joshua Rozenberg, who used to be able to summarise the complexities very succinctly? It's lucky that we have BBC parliament channel so that I could turn over and watch their Lordships debating. And the issue, it transpires, centres around the debate over derogating and non-derogating control orders, the former of which are to do with the deprivation of liberty. This, of course, has some quite serious consequences under Article 5 of the European Convention of Human Rights, i.e. the government would have to seek derogation from article 5 were such control orders (e.g. house arrest) to be passed. Where derogating orders end and non-derogating orders begin is unclear n the bill, though the government seems to have suggested that apart from house arrest, no other control orders would be in breach of the ECHR and the Human Rights Act 1998. With such fundamental issues as human rights at stake, this is the crux of the concerns raised in both houses. For example, one amendment that the Lords wanted to introduce under the Deprivation of Liberties in Clause 2 of the bill was the removal of 'on the balance of probabilities' to 'beyond reasonable doubt'. As the Earl of Onslow said:
"My name is also on the amendment. Before we came into the Chamber I was nobbled by a Whip who said to me, "You are not to talk for too long". When I saw my name on the amendment I just thought to myself that you should not have to talk for too long in order to say that it is completely wrong to take away the liberty of a subject and lock him up on the balance of probabilities. I shall now sit down."

But do we get this portrayal from the BBC? No. It's the usual namby-pamby, watered-down shite that they seem to think the average Red Top reader can cope with. Well, it stinks. Ok. Rant over.

Happy Birthday Uncle Rich!!

It's Richard's Birthday today - so happy birthday mate!!
Here is a pic of the birthday boy with his favourite nephew.......

GoggyBlog

Check out the naked rascal as he tours Oz on his way to Sydney (with K in tow).....
Goggyblog

Been a while...

Well, I started with the best of intentions of keeping this up to date, but have failed miserably. Manic few weeks recently, but a bit more room to breathe again now. However, we've had winter D&V in the Mowb household this week, with only yours truly having escaped unscathed (thus far!) It went through the Mowblet incredibly fast (projectile) and poor C has now got it too. I am taking alcohol as a prophylactic measure.....heh heh...

Book publication coming up

I'm looking forward to getting my thesis published. The book's title will be:

Pain and Suffering: Academic Debates at the University of Paris, c.1230 - c.1300

I'm reaching the final stages now; still waiting for proofs and then there's the index to do. I've just had to submit a description for the back jacket cover. I asked Brendan to give it the once over and not only did he make a couple of good comments, but he produced his own alternative version, which is absolutely brilliant! Here it is:

Ouch! That really hurt! Oh yeah? Well imagine it’s 1250 and Boots doesn’t open for another 650 years: what’s your plan B for wellness? That’s the question Don Mowbray asks in this roller-coaster ride through medieval pain and suffering. Yes, it’s ‘put your head between your legs and kiss your soul goodbye’ time down on the left-bank, and only Thomas Aquinas knows where the key to the spiritual medicine chest is kept. The future’s bright!?!: the future’s a red-hot bloody boiling furnace for most of us, mate, says Bonaventure, so why not get a bit of light reading in first with this little side-splitter?!!

About the Author

Don Mowbray used to wear an ear-ring and get arsey with people in pubs who didn’t close the door. He can speak in tongues and has held down a job which nobody can understand for several years. He always buys his round.

Dinner with the V-C

I was lucky enough to have dinner with the Vice Chancellor of Bristol University last week. We had a good chat about how universities will change in the next few decades and he outlined his plans for Bristol. As a graduate and alumnus I hope to be involved in the development of some of those plans in the near future.

Welcome!

Welcome to Mowblog from the Mowbrays in Bristol!