LL.B (I think...)

Today I tootled off to Sheffield to attend my beautiful, intelligent, generous, loving niece's graduation ceremony. Sheffield Hallam University hire out Sheffield City Hall, which is a very impressive building - this is her and me outside beforehand in the damp, blustery afternoon (she's the one in the mortarboard...).

I had a couple of surprises - their Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Faculty Dean used to be one of our Faculty Deans, and I thought he was still at Hull, but apparently not. And their Chancellor is Professor the Lord Robert Winston of Hammersmith, he of IVF fame. He has an amazing biog - awards up the wazoo, research enabling the birth of children free of genetic illnesses, and an appeal which raised over £13 million to build and equip the most advanced reproductive research centre in Europe. I imagined, since SHU will have lots of graduation ceremonies this week, that his would be a bit of a generic, "off out into the world so behave yourselves and live up to your potential" speech by rote, but how wrong I was. Throughout the ceremony, a red admiral (I think) butterfly was fluttering around the auditorium, and he began his speech by reflecting on the ephemeral nature of a butterfly's life, and took it from there. I was a great speech, I thought, tailored to the fact that he was speaking to a group of potential lawyers, barristers and judges.

And a lovely catch up with my family :-)

My poor little brum-brum has done some mileage lately - and it's not over yet ;-)

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