Last week I was back in the UK this week to visit friends and family but also for a networking event hosted by UCL's International Centre for NeuroArchitecture and NeuroDesign.
I landed on Tuesday evening and went straight to Cookham to catch up with my brother and and old friend.
It was a nice evening - and meal - but on the way home - quite early, at around 9:30pm - we came around a bend in the road (one with a 30mph speed limit) to find a car speeding towards us, trying to overtake another car. The car hit us, smashing the wing mirror and bursting the front tyre, before speeding off without stopping. Neither car stopped, in fact, so it's also possible they were racing each other.
It was a huge shock - my friend's car was basically undrivable, so we had to get it into a side road and take an Uber home - but it could have been so much worse. It was a glancing blow to the car with an 80mph differential (I'm assuming the other car as going at 50mph, we were at 30mph) so in many ways we got off very lightly.
This is just reinforcing the sentiment I expressed in my last post. Take nothing for granted in 2026!
On the Wednesday I took the day off to visit my mother in Cardiff. I met another old friend for breakfast in Reading (so great to see you, Ben!) before jumping on a westbound train that travelled through gorgeous rural England and Wales.
It alternated between fog and sun… just beautiful.
I had about 4 hours in Cardiff with my Mum, enough to wander around and eat a good South Indian dosa. It was lovely to see her.
The train back was slightly delayed but it was otherwise an uneventful trip.
Being carless, we had food locally, but Eton has some decent pub grub on offer.
Thursday was spent in the city. I'd usually take the Elizabeth Line in from Slough, but because of local roadworks we went to Taplow to take the train from there instead.
For much of the day we met with our new Visiting Scholar (to be announced very shortly!), before we headed to the networking event at the Marquess of Cornwallis pub, right in the University of London district.
After an initial introduction from Geraint Rees, UCL's Vice Provost for Research, Innovation and Global Engagement, we heard more about the International Centre for NeuroArchitecture and NeuroDesign from its two directors. First was Hugo Spiers:
Hugo was followed by Fiona Zisch:
There was a great crowd with a fascinating array of attendees, many of whom were neuroscientists or architects. I had a very interesting discussion with the author of a recent book on the neuroscience of war (Warhead - what a great name!) as well as someone from Google DeepMind. It was a rare opportunity to engage with some really smart people in the same field (or a neighbouring one, if not). 
A really nice surprise - although with hindsight it wasn't surprising they were there - was meeting with Daniel and James, two PhD students working to analyse the 100 Minds in Motion dataset. Daniel is being co-supervised by Autodesk, as we're helping fund his research through the EPSRC programme.
It really was a great event. Thank you to Hugo and Fiona for the kind invitation and the warm welcome!
Once it was over, Dagmara and I headed back near the office to catch up with some colleagues. Despite having been in the UK for much of the week, this was my only real chance to reconnect with Research team-mates.
After last orders - it was mid-week, so this came quite early - I headed back up Charing Cross Road...
... to take the Lizzie Line from Tottenham Court Road back to Slough.
Friday was a lovely day, but I spent much of it travelling home. I was back on the Lizzie Line at around 11am, to get to Heathrow Airport, and flew at 2:30pm to arrive around 6pm.
As we were planning to be up in the mountains for the weekend (normal for us during the winter season), I took the train directly from Geneva up there.
By the time I arrived at our apartment I was getting my first flu symptoms, and ended up in bed for much of the weekend: I did try to snowboard on both days - as much to get some fresh air as anything - but not very successfully. I'm now pretty much over it, so will hopefully be well enough to visit Swissbau in Basel on Wednesday.
Leave a Reply