A wasted trip to London

Today's lesson - he that does not check his email will not discover that his seminar scheduled for today has been cancelled!

Terrible journey to London. It took nearly an hour to get to Thornhill park and ride after two cars had broken down on the ring road. But on the way down I was able to read quite a bit - mainly Heidegger's Letters to his Wife, and looking up some bits from Kitty Ferguson's book on Tycho and Kepler.

I learn that the seminar is cancelled about 11:10, when no else has turned up for the seminar and I eventually sought out the department office. Rather than find something to do in London, I headed straight back home getting in just after 1:00.

The second book order from Germany arrived today - volumes 2 and 4 of Kepler's Collected works, Astronomiae Pars optica and Dioptrice. The latter contains Kepler's Conversation with the Starry Messenger. It is also an uncut book, in quatro, and is a really tatty book. Now that one really looks 60 years old! The books had to be signed for and I had a long chat with our postie about why it was that I receive so many books in the mail. In addition to the Kepler, today's mail included Bronk's The Romantic Economist and a facsimile edition, printed to order for £10, of Tycho's Astronomiae Instauratae Progymnasmata. This contains his De Stella Nova 1572 and De Cometa Anni 1577. Sadly it is not a great facsimile with lots of printing smudges and so. It is a nice thing to have but it wouldn't be easy to work from. I expect that many old books will be available as print for order in the next few years.

The afternoon is spent on homework for tonight's biography class and tomorrow's latin.