First decent sunny afternoon so after a full day attacking a fellowship application it is....guess what...ROSE PRUNING TIME! This one is my favourite, it's called Tottering-By-Gently! 🌱

👇👇👇👇🧪

Happy pancake day to those who celebrate # pancake

This is fabulous and something I have long worried about. Especially given that we are likely to be pricing all of the small people with the hypothesis testing skills out of the market... 🧪 network.febs.org/posts/thinki...

My evening choices are 1. Finish grant 2. Deep clean kitchen And of course I am going for 2 because it's "easier"

🚨NEW PAPER ALERT🚨 Great to finally get this one done and dusted for all the #EV nerds out there, it's important to think about function as well as content! 🧪 www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/27...

this is such a fun place sometimes...

Journals: yes, we will take four or five months to review your manuscript and not ever reply to any of your queries Also journals: now it's been accepted we need you to read the proofs and get back to us in 24 hours and yes, we are aware it's 2am on a Saturday 🧪

Lime harvest for a win! 🌱

Did a rather idyllic thing and strolled the dog into town to collect fresh pastries, he got a biscuit and I am now enjoying the pastry at home with a cup of tea and feeling vaguely wholesome #dogsky

If anyone has not seen it I HIGHLY recommend watching Ian McKellan on @colbertlateshow.bsky.social...the full Shakespeare speech on immigrants...absolutely brilliant... www.tiktok.com/@colbertlate...

I wish I still got that excited feeling I got as a PhD student when a paper finally gets accepted, instead it's mostly just...

Anyone feeling nostalgic for saner times I can recommend the Becoming documentary about Michelle Obama, very lovely

Normally I quote post about the actual content of my own science blogs but this time I just want to say I look FUN as a cartoon... 🧪

I've just had my last application to save my career rejected. Feeling very lost and untethered from reality...

Youtube has me feeling seen this morning... youtube.com/shorts/GRCTC...

I worry this is going to kill a lot of careers. Mine being one of them. But beyond the selfish...there's going to be a whole generation of scientists who are not going to be able to support their careers, this is going to affect UK research in a big way...

I think I am about to become one of the missing generation...

My favourite line to use on a regular basis RIP to a legend

I was recently told I was 'not good enough' to stay in academia. But at mid-career leaving seems incredibly challenging and there seems to be no institutional support. Everything feeling slightly hopeless this end at the moment.

Now....I am a scientist, not a humanities person, so I am unused to seeing their job adverts but I must say this one is EXCELLENT and I want this job...

Working on two paper rejections/major revisions whilst teaching and fighting for your job with only five months left on your contract is....draining... #academia 🧪

Enjoying a day off to take in some outdoor sculpture near Pendle...

Discworld QOTD, from Moving Pictures "‘Students?’ barked the Archchancellor. ‘Yes, Master. You know? They’re the thinner ones with the pale faces? Because we’re a university? They come with the whole thing, like rats-’"

Oh no....for UK science people the time has come. The three words you LOVE to hear at this time of year... Home. Office. Returns. 🧪

I want to be the sort of person who is like "YES...I need to know when I'm not good enough so I don't waste my time" and then someone tells you you're not good enough and it's actually kind of crushing... #academia

I've been given a stack of brand new books by an author someone really likes and I've decided, after trying at least 5 of them, that I'm not really a fan but NOT reading them feels like the literary equivalent of wasting food... #booksky

Am just relistening to @yrfatfriend.bsky.social and @michaelhobbes.bsky.social do their first MAHA update and given all this nonsense I am looking forward to the next one...

For UK scientists, the way we use animals in research is changing. Let the UKRI know your views here: 🧪 urlisolation.com/browser?clic...

Need some help from #booksky Any nice books you recommend for a bunch of scientists starting a non work related book club and not wanting to go down the hard work/Wolf Hall style route for our first book...?

Glad to finally be on the road to getting this one out there: 🧪 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

👇 www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/harv...

I am a ravenous consumer of notebooks but do not keep or use them in any kind of sensible order. Today's discovery was grant costings/experimental planning at the top of the page and some kind of sauce recipe at the bottom...

Oh hey, listen, just a quick word. Do not do this.

For any STEM ECRs on Bluesky, the dementia researcher collection is a good place to find lots of perspectives and opinions on all sorts of different aspects of academic life... 🧪

Just spent seven hours dealing with reviewers comments which ranged roughly from R1 'you have some typos' to R4 'i hate everything you've done'...

It's got to the stage where, if a PhD student asks me if they should do an academic post doc in the UK, I have to tell them that they need to not care about money. If they don't care about money then go for it, if they do then here's an ad for bus drivers I saw today which is paid more... 🧪

We've got a lovely local fancy collectible bear shop and I've become slightly obsessed with this haunted creation for the bargain price of £200... witneybears.co.uk/collections/...

This is one for @karenkilgariff.bsky.social

reposting for the garden folks who I suspect are all over this anyway but it can't hurt! 🌱

Every January man... 😭😭😭😭 youtu.be/K_1tNbud-8g?...

Wonder how many of these will make it onto @ifbookspod.bsky.social ....

Family have gone so this is my plan for the evening...

Happy Christmas to all who celebrate it!

I have become the person who sends the paper to the journal two days before Christmas 🧪

I genuinely enjoying wrapping presents...

MY EYES HURT...

Wow this is a seriously serious supplementary figure from @cellpress.bsky.social today. Panels A through UU. I get that Cell likes to minimize the number of supplementary figures. But is this really what is happening here? www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

Oxford preclinical stroke crew out for our Christmas lunch, nice to get the gang together because we all work in different spaces!

I have done this! I emailed someone I only vaguely knew after they published a paper that was so beautifully written and simple. And THEN... Karma came round. A student came and found me the other day and said 'I just found your paper and I think it's just excellent' 😍