Obligatory Borders Report

I finally got a chance to talk to compilerbitch last night - she'd arrived before me and waved at me as I was looking around blankly:-) mstevens came along suffering the effects of caffeine withdrawal soon followed by neonchameleon suffering the effects of management training courses:-) Conversation took place over such varied topics at physics/maths/tax returns/bonds vs shares + hedging and loads more besides. Vino came along just before doseybat arrived. Then came puzzlering - a close friend of mine from Oxford who I've not seen for a very long time.

At around this point we start hearing rumours that Ratzinger has been elected Pope and some people start making feeble attempts to find out whether it's true or not. Bella Italia on Little Argyll Street was our venue for food - on the way there we stopped at an information point thingy and have it confirmed that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is Pope Benedict XVI. neonchameleon had rather a lot to say about this:-) I'm not sure what to think - he's 78 and was elected very quickly (I'd been expecting the conclave to last for about a week). My money's on him being a stop gap between John Paul II and the reformer they'll elect next time round. Maybe it's the case that the Cardinals know something we don't know - perhaps Ratzinger is already ill and 'knows' he's not going to live for more than a couple of years?

hairyears, ewtikins and cyberiantiger came to join us at Bella Italia. Heens and Vino and then Sarah and Bat left us to do other things. The rest of us made our way to Hagen Dazz and decide that the queue was too long and instead went go to Rendezvous (both places in Leicester Square) for ice cream.

Obligatory Borders Report

I finally got a chance to talk to compilerbitch last night - she'd arrived before me and waved at me as I was looking around blankly:-) mstevens came along suffering the effects of caffeine withdrawal soon followed by neonchameleon suffering the effects of management training courses:-) Conversation took place over such varied topics at physics/maths/tax returns/bonds vs shares + hedging and loads more besides. Vino came along just before doseybat arrived. Then came puzzlering - a close friend of mine from Oxford who I've not seen for a very long time.

At around this point we start hearing rumours that Ratzinger has been elected Pope and some people start making feeble attempts to find out whether it's true or not. Bella Italia on Little Argyll Street was our venue for food - on the way there we stopped at an information point thingy and have it confirmed that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is Pope Benedict XVI. neonchameleon had rather a lot to say about this:-) I'm not sure what to think - he's 78 and was elected very quickly (I'd been expecting the conclave to last for about a week). My money's on him being a stop gap between John Paul II and the reformer they'll elect next time round. Maybe it's the case that the Cardinals know something we don't know - perhaps Ratzinger is already ill and 'knows' he's not going to live for more than a couple of years?

hairyears, ewtikins and cyberiantiger came to join us at Bella Italia. Heens and Vino and then Sarah and Bat left us to do other things. The rest of us made our way to Hagen Dazz and decide that the queue was too long and instead went go to Rendezvous (both places in Leicester Square) for ice cream.