Universal Understanding

I have been having a clearout this weekend and found a pile of last year’s Christmas Cards on a shelf. (I am talking 2006 here..) Now one weird thing about being Head of School is that I get a whole bunch of scientific-corporate xmas cards. I get a card from two different bits of ESO, one from JAC, one from the Principal, one from companies I bought a lot of computers from, and this year even one from AWE (don’t ask). But some cards from 2006 suddenly seemed evocative of a lost era – the last ever card from CCLRC, and the last ever card from PPARC. The latter says “Five Supernovas, Four Ghostly Neutrinos, Three Solar Orbiters, Two Sub-atomic particles, ONE BIG BANG”. I get the joke, but it doesn’t scan, and it doesn’t quite make sense ..

But saddest all is my card from the Gemini Observatory. It says “Best Wishes for a Season of Universal Understanding”.

Yeah, right.