Enter Simon Leather

It's just my luck that Simon Leather was in South Ken for a conference today. I waved at him as he was weaving through the lobby. He squinted - is that you? - and then hopped over. Literally.

I hope I'm not overdoing my enthusiasm... I can feel the "!" in almost all my sentences.

"Hi Dr Leather!"

I'm not sure if I should call him Simon or Dr Leather, even though he calls me Jackie and signs off as Simon and we could easily have been on first-name terms. I've always felt that Titled People should be addressed appropriately with their Titles.

We talked about Silwood and the people at Silwood, and horse-riding "for rich people". And a bit about his history with the Scouts - he was wearing the same scout lapel pin I saw him wear during the zoo trip. I started with a "Happy belated Thinking Day (!)"... 22nd Feb yesterday was world guides/scouts day... and he just rambled on.

We'll meet next Thursday to discuss the OoP.

Sarah's the one who's doing Ian Owen's birds. So many of us had it as our first choice... it was her second choice and yet she got it. That really pisses us off (not the fact that it wasn't I who got the project, but that the system allowed such a thing to happen). But I'm not complaining. I'll never achieve the same level of buddiness with Ian as I could with Simon. And insects are trustworthier research subjects than birds. I'll see if the next time I'm down at the NHM I could hunt down an insect-collecting/sampling expert and bug *cough* pun *cough* him for advice.