{"id":2686,"date":"2013-09-10T20:36:28","date_gmt":"2013-09-10T19:36:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/?p=2686"},"modified":"2013-09-10T20:36:28","modified_gmt":"2013-09-10T19:36:28","slug":"in-which-we-make-a-move","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/2013\/09\/10\/in-which-we-make-a-move\/","title":{"rendered":"In which we make a move"},"content":{"rendered":"

There’s a lot of change going on in my life right now, all at once. In addition to giving birth sometime in the next fortnight<\/a> and needing to finish up a major piece of work-related writing before that, my lab has just moved across town. <\/p>\n

We leave behind us a remote satellite outpost in Archway<\/a>, its listed buildings sold to developers for purposes unknown. It was never optimal, but it is still filled with good memories for me, being the site of my first independent position. Also, we have now physically split from the clinic, where basic scientists and medics have been working together just a floor apart to understand the deep biology underlying chronic urinary tract infections. Our very close collaboration will continue unabated, but with the clinic moving a few miles north, and us moving a few miles south, it will never be as free and easy. So there is definitely an element of sadness about leaving it all behind.<\/p>\n

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\nPacking up…<\/em><\/p>\n

Now, we find ourselves amidst a bewildering array of hundreds of piled-up crates in a building within the university’s main campus – a stone’s throw away from Euston Station. We’ve moved into the abandoned floor of a very old building, nominally refurbished as a place to temporarily “decant” various university departments who are ultimately destined for new, not-yet-completed buildings. Our date with destiny is in two years’ time, when we move again to our (hopefully) final resting place a few blocks further south. So we’ll be here a while, in this strange place with its antique hardwood and glass cases, wooden benches and other charming nostalgic touches, like walls that can’t be drilled because of the asbestos. Still, with a lick of paint and a deep clean (including that alarming space on the lab floor cordoned off with ancient radioactive tape), it’s now looking pretty good. <\/p>\n

Of course, while it’s great to be back into the mainstream – with its easy access to collaborators, seminars, proper caf\u00e9s and, let’s face it, people who actually work with lab reagents I sometimes have an urgent need to borrow on short notice – moving labs is always incredibly disruptive. You really don’t know where to begin. But like true Brits, we said sod the microscope suite, tissue culture and lab benches: let’s start with the tea room<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Untitled\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And once I’m allowed to drink again, I’ll be very happy indeed to frequent our new local, one of my favorite pubs<\/a>, which happens to be just across the street.<\/p>\n

So raise a virtual glass to our new home, and all the scientific adventures that will soon be playing out here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There’s a lot of change going on in my life right now, all at once. In addition to giving birth sometime in the next fortnight and needing to finish up a major piece of work-related writing before that, my lab … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nostalgia","category-the-profession-of-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2686\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/mindthegap\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}