My bug-out kit

Posted on March 12, 2020 by Bruce Ryan

As some of you know, I may need to go to the parental abode with very little notice. So here’s what I have with me almost all the time.

In my pouch/bumbag

In my pannier or rucksack

tobacco, cigarette papers and at least one lighter
passport
iPhone with attached short USB to lighting cable
wallet
regular medications
- fast-acting insulin
- long-lasting insulin
- glucose tablets
- amitriptyline
- aspirin
- atorvastatin
- sertraline
irregular medicines
- nicotine patches
- e-cigarette
- ibuprofen
pens
spork
tooth-brush
Napier ID and business cards

waterproofs
laptop and power-cable
paper notebook
electronica pouch
- laser-pointer ^[1]
- USB 2/3 to ethernet adaptor
- miniDisplayPort to VGA, HDMI, DVI adaptor
- USB-C to USB-2/3, VGA, HDMI adaptor ^[2]
- two USB-C to USB 2/3 adaptors
- USB 2/3 power plug
- HDMI cable
- car cigarette-lighter to USB2/3 power adaptor
- two pairs of Bluetooth headphones
- high-capacity USB battery
- bluetooth mouse
- 2-meter USB to lightning cable
- UK to EU, Australia, US power adaptor ^[3]

Before you ask, I have spare clothes at the parental abode.

[1] because I’m an academic, not necessarily to aid bug-out

[2] because a visiting lecturer once needed such an adaptor to connect his laptop to a Napier projector

[3] mostly because it also has 4 USB 2/3 power-ports

Family misfortunes encore

Posted on February 4, 2020 by Bruce Ryan

Some of my reader might know that my mother has been in hospital. She was taken into Worcester Royal hospital on Friday 24 January due to severe abdominal pain, and had some procedures on Friday 31 January. These had to be delayed while various routine medications were still active. She was then transferred to the Alexandra hospital in Redditch. The Alex is the home of the specialist unit in Worcestershire that is best placed to handle my mother’s conditions.

I’ve been in Worcester since the afternoon of Monday 27 January. I’ve had to leave a lot of work in the very capable hands of colleagues at Napier, £eithChooses, Leith Central Community Council, Leith Harbour & Newhaven Community Council, New Town & Broughton Community Council and Community Councils Together on Trams. (I am doing some CC work remotely as I get snippets of time.) Huge thanks to all concerned! Continue reading →

Bouncing in Bucharest (part 1)

Posted on November 17, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

Elly has been in Bucharest since very early on Tuesday. I flew out to meet her yesterday (Friday). My flight was due to take off at 19:00 but took off after 19:30, after a sudden gate-change from 4 to 18, because the place was at gate 17. A 3 hour 30 minute flight landed me in Bucharest Otopeni airport around 1am Romanian time. Here’s what happened since… Continue reading →

What has Bruce been up to this weekend?

Posted on October 20, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

I’m not quite sure why I wanted to record this. Perhaps it’s to assuage some of my guilt at not being in the peoples’ vote/anti-brexit march yesterday. Anyway, this has been a relaxing weekend so far.

My reward for all of this is nut roast with roasted potatoes, onions, sprouts and carrots. You have been warned!

Saturday morning

Spinning at LifesCycle. We cheated slightly by travelling by bus, due to the rain. I usually prefer to cycle there and back, as warm-up and cool-down from the lovely madness. (Elly and I are on the front-left bikes of that Facebook video.)

Saturday afternoon

much-needed coffee and lunch
catching up with personal and family finances, sadly neglected for a couple of weeks due to work-pressures
washing our manky spinning gear. That’s the only downside!
tidying my desk area after weeks of needing to let rubbish build up

Saturday evening

avoiding watching Strictly Come Dancing
writing a presentation on a project I’m about to finish, so I can demonstrate the outcomes to a high-powered audience. (I think I should not say what the project is just now, but I will blow my own trumpet as hard as I can when the work goes live.)

Sunday morning

proofreading and commenting on a tender written by my ever-wonderful better half.
much-needed coffee and lunch

Sunday afternoon

New Town & Broughton community council website.
Leith Harbour & Broughton community council website.
Leith Central community council website.
£eithChooses social media

Practical Democracy Project session 8

Posted on May 17, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

As usual, this post is an edited version of my tweets from the event. My asides are in blockquotes. Most links are to Twitter presences.

Good afternoon Twitter. I’m at the Practical Democracy Project number 8, in Glasgow’s Tron Theatre. It’s organised by Delib, and has hashtag ‪#PracticalDemocracyProject. I hope to live-tweet so long as my laptop’s battery holds out.

Ben Fowkes is opening ‪#PracticalDemocracyProject number 8. The programme is

An introduction to Delib’s work
Niamh Webster (Scottish Government)
Ali Stoddart (Scottish Parliament)
Vilte Vaitkute (Media Co-op)
panel session.

Lunch is in there somewhere. There will be a round-up of the event emailed to participants. (I’ll share it how I can.)

Continue reading →

Slow and painful

Posted on May 17, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

Yesterday I was at Delib‘s Practical Democracy project session 8 in Glasgow. I’ll blog about the event later. However, after several months of almost no exercise, I decided to cycle back to Edinburgh.

Usually, there is a tailwind when cycling this way. However, there was a strong headwind. That partly explains why I took over four hours peddling (over 6 hours including stops) to cycle 43 miles, why my phone’s battery went flat after 35 miles, why I took drink and toilet-breaks every 10 miles, and why my leg-muscles turned to cast iron before I got home. However, most of the explanation is I am a fat, unfit git.

Photos are below the cut. Continue reading →

15 April: Random Bozo gets stuck

Posted on April 15, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

So my plan for today was

16:15 to 16:40 fly Amsterdam to Edinburgh
18:00 to 19:00 travel to community council meeting
19:00 to 21:00 take minutes at community council meeting
21:00 to 22:00 travel home.

That’s not how it went: Continue reading →

13 April: winding up

Posted on April 13, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

So I planned to got to these:

Speed Dating: discuss our ideas for a better Europe (10:00 to 10:30)
Brexit Breakfast Briefing (10:30 to 11:30)
Advanced principles in democracy: let’s challenge basic democracy and find a consensus (12:00 to 2:30)
User experience = Supporter engagement: websites for political engagement (13:00 to 14:30)
Where to from here? Redesigning democracy (16:00 to 18:00)
Festival closing party (20:00 to 22:00)

Here’s how I’ve got on so far! Continue reading →

12 April: little to report

Posted on April 12, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

I woke around 9am again, staggered to breakfast, and then crashed out again.

I next woke around 3pm, did some shopping, had lunch and then came back to my hotel to blog. You’re reading the results. It’s now 10:40. So I have not done any democracy events today. So sue me – this trip is meant to be a holiday! Part of being away from work (both academic and local democracy) is catching up on sleep. Nighty-night!

11 April: First day of DemocracyAlive!

Posted on April 11, 2019 by Bruce Ryan

I woke around 8am UK time, with a stinking hangover. Not fair! I’d not drunk any alcohol. I finally found the online programme for today’s DemocracyAlive! events. I don’t mean it wasn’t online before, just that I’d not made time to read it before now. I decided on going to these events:

What public services for the future? Digital Transformation and Low-carbon economy
(12 noon to 1pm)
Festival launch (2pm to 3pm)
[Koffiepauze (3pm to 4pm)]
Democracy as a culture (4pm to 6pm)
Talking Europe with Commissioner Vestager (6pm to 7pm)
Talking Europe with Michel Barnier (7pm to 8pm)

Here’s how I got on, mostly recalled from tweets, texts and emails I sent at the time.