Summer break lasted longer than it probably should have. Lots of toing-and-froing between Prague, Geneva, Saarbrucken for work reasons. Next week it's France at a conference then back to Prague for the last week before full-time Geneva. Slightly glum about the thought of leaving Prague, so here's a misty Autmunal Charles Bridge from this morning.

Even in central Prague there are places with something of the Euston Road about them. The area around HLAVNÍ NÁDRAŽÍ, the main railway station is one such. Sandwiched between motorways (after some '70s "improvements"), the old entrance was essentially replaced by a concrete bunker and the old Art Nouveau structure more or less left to rot. Some pics taken before Saturday's expedition.

The old ticket hall is now a fairly poor cafe, it's hard to get a feel for the demi-dome that's above.





Outside, it's all roaring traffic. Attempt at an action shot taken during an interval whilst at the nearby State Opera a couple of weeks ago.



The state opera has apparently suffered some slings and arrows over the past few years but things are on the up. The renovation of the hall continues, but it's not too shabby.

Konopiště on Saturday, erstwhile home to Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Not so spectacular on the outside as some of Bohemia's castles, things are remedied inside which is essentially as it was since 1914. Unfortunately no photos allowed inside, so the exterior will have to suffice; a sprinkling of peacocks livened things up, nice gardens too.

Some musical treats for the fast-approaching silly season.

http://www.ukuleledisco.com/jake

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4670009.stm

An organist has a bad day at the office:

http://www.btinternet.com/~tim.johnson77/rambler/Messiahorganistoncrack.mp3

Quite a lot of legit mp3s out there, but they're often a whole to-do: windows popping up and registration and all that. Some useful reviews summarising things a little:

http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article_center.php?in_type=110

Saturday turned out to be not so bad weather-wise after all, some pics from strolling around Prague in the evening.

Just behind Staroměstké náměstí, once away from the tourist areas, Prague can be quite quiet at the weekends.



Getting lost in Malostranska; looking back from a dead-end.



The sudetenland issue has been rumbling on and off the last few months here. A new statue of Beneš outside the foreign ministry has been a bit controversial.



Summer and tacky tourist things are inseparable.

Snippets from this week's Nature, might require a subscription.

Quite enjoy scribbling in my lab-book, but times are a-changin' (at least in the bio-sciences). http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v436/n7047/full/436020a.html

Oddly enough some relevant papers to our work; normally our stuff (semiconductors and doping etc) are too grubby and, frankly, old to deserve space in the premium journals, but some interesting work on the doping of nanocrystals; Gibbs' free energy calculations are pretty long in the tooth now, interesting to try a new approach based on the surface morphology, assuming you can control the surface of course.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v436/n7047/full/436032a.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v436/n7047/full/nature03832.html

the supplementary information on PL is also useful,

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v436/n7047/suppinfo/nature03832.html

Lá fliuch báite atá ann inniu, ARÍS!!!!

God's been kicking over buckets the past few days here, although things are currently not so bad: something of a Salthill drizzle. The předpověď počasí (e.g. http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?world=0055, not very encouraging) is for this to continue over the weekend so it looks like it'll be kino time. Prague is still equipped with some decent indo-kinos, probably the best of the bunch is Kino Světozor (http://www.kinosvetozor.cz/index.php?lang=en) which has good prices, a decent cafe and english subtitles on Czech films for us inept monoglots. The next week or so is inspired by the recent Karlovy-Vary film festival and the program (http://www.kinosvetozor.cz/program/filmy/?&lang=en)looks quite promising. If you need me, you'll know where to find me.

The difference a day makes,

Perhaps it's that it happened on what I still consider "home turf" or that it's exactly what one always fears but tries not to contemplate, but yesterday's events have hit quite hard. Most friends who would normally be in that area appear ok, although not all replies received yet: perhaps they stayed at home. As anybody who's familiar with the tube knows, it's a fairly tight unpleasant space at the best of times, a bomb doesn't bear thinking about.

However, Londoners are a resilient lot, judging from the press and world service coverage things are getting back to some sort of normal today. Hardened over the years by IRA scares (and worse) they're a tough old lot. Interesting that something like this brings out the "chin-up, carry on" attitude whereas an event like Diana saw large portions of the populace lose the run of themselves altogether. Wonder how things will have recovered when I'm over there at the end of the month.

Well well well ...

The Chirac anti-midas touch continues, the 30th olympiad goes to the rosbifs.

Hmmmm, can't seem to upload pictures today. Yesterday's lazy snap of a wet and cold Prague will have to wait so. Today is Jan Hus day, yesterday was St Cyril and Methodius (Slavic apostles), more or less the ČR equivalent of St. Patrick's day. Weather was certainly reminiscent of St Paddy's, lashing rain and freezing too (well, 10C) to boot. Bad day for the tourist hordes, especially the sandal wearers.

In the absence of pics some links:

Decision day for the 2012 olympic; bound to be Paris, but could be the old stamping ground of Stratford. Result due at the oddly precise time of 1346 CET. Live coverage on http://www.bbc.co.uk/fivelive/index.shtml?logo

Science magazine celebrates 125 years with some unanswered questions, http://www.sciencemag.org/sciext/125th/

Tough times for Victorinox: http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1521345,00.html

Something odd with blogger today, slow and not behaving as it should, so that's enough for now.