h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well, easier said than done, however. Oops....

Hmmm... too late now.

Not quite too late - it is only 9.30pm ish and still considered reasonably early - any later than 10pm tonight though and I shall be in trouble with myself - these self-imposed limits are so easy to ignore though...

Self-imposed limits are fairly easy to make, but self-imposed exemptions from self-imposed limits are much more fun, aren't they?

yes I guess so - but they are there for a reason (i.e. my mental health) I think...

had another wobbly day at work today so I have to try and something to sort myself out

Goodness, what have they got you doing at work these days? What happened to the interesting little tasks of dealing with ancient dead beetles and prepping exhibits?

It's the same exhibition work - I've been working on it for well over a year now and it is due to open in two weeks and everything has suddenly got incredibly stressful and totally scary - I've gone all flakey and am not coping v. well and I've tonnes to do and it's all ersting on other people coming through with stuff - and they are not.

But only 2 weeks to go - hurrah ... no idea what I'll do when it's over (other than have a big party!)

That sucks. I hate having it when other people compromise my productivity and reliability. It's just not fair, damn it.

Who are you going to invite to your party?

My party? Everyone is invited

Your personalised gold-plated invite is on its way already - and you can bring some of your little friends if you have to IRL, the gallery is supposed to be opening on Nov 22 - a Monday I think - so the weekend before that will be bonkers - if the gallery is finished by the Friday I intend to drink myself into several comas over that weekend. - let my feathers down - or my 'down down'

Oh dear that was a bit weak wasn't it

Whoa, gold-plated, no less. If it's okay I'd like to bring along a couple hundred Mexican Party Weevils. They're great fun (although their line dancing sometimes goes straight up the wall), and even help clean up afterwards. I'll look after their 'special-mix' corn oil needs.

I hope your opening goes well, and that it's not as bonkers over that weekend as you fear (but given my own experience with deadlines, it will probably be quite bonkers indeed).

So far most things are going to plan - but considering this project has been going on for - blimey if you count absolutely everything - over 7 years... then I can imaging the last five days or so will be hellish - hence enormo stress and nervous breakdown potential.

Are you telling me that they've been putting this exhibit together for _seven_years_? This can't be typical of most museum exhibits. It must be somethign ultra-spectacular!

So, what is it, then? Or are you bound to secrecy under pain of torture?

No - we don't have enormous secrets in the museum world - open access and all that...

Although it has been 7 years, it is a bit of an exageration in terms of exhibition design. The exhibition is based around the discovery of a bronze age boat (i.e. dead old, for the uninitiated) - it was discovered in Dover 7 years ago, and since then it has been conserved etc. and the money has been raised to display it. The actual exhibition work - including the 're-assembly' of the boat has been going on for a couple of years I guess. If interested you can always visit :
http://www.dover.gov.uk/museum/boat/bronze.htm
for further exciting info and the latest (ish) news on the project...

So for an interested archaeology people reading - the gallery opens on November 23rd - seriously fantastic boat...

Is this the boat that sits in a special display case that was sprayed with very hot water mixed with special wax in order to fill in the holes in the wood to give the boat some structural strength? I saw a show on that last year.

No. Next. (That was probably the Mary Rose - which is only about 3000 years older than ours )

But it says right on that web page:

"The timbers were first strengthened by soaking in a soluble wax solution for just over a year before being freeze-dried in three batches. "

Sure it's not the same boat? Or is this just a common preservation method?

Are you questioning my knowledge on the project I have been working on for over a year?
Do you think I would know if a broadcast quality TV programme had been made about it?
Do you think I don't know the difference between soaking in a cold PEG solution and being sprayed with a hot wax solution?

Trust me - it is NOT the same boat

Yeah - the PEG wax thing is a fairly common way of treating waterlogged wood. The Mary Rose (Henry VIIIs (?) flagship) in being preserved like that - our boat was actually conserved by the Mary Rose Trust. The Mary Rose is absolutely enormous though and needs to be sprayed to keep wet at all times. The Dover Boat was in much smaller pieces so after PEG impregnation it could be freeze-dried to remove the rest of the water in a controlled enough manner to stop it falling apart. There isn't a freeze-drier of quite the scale needed to freeze-dry the Mary Rose. (Blimey, aren't I the know-it-all)

(Groovy Dover Boat webpages eh? all my own work (if your browser supports css - if not, um.. nothing to do with me... ).

I wasn't questioning your vast knowledge of the subject! Honest!

OK, so it's not the same boat. But the boat I saw in the TV program was about 25 feet long, not all there, and it was in a sealed room with windows where it was being sprayed by jets of very hot water. In fact, the temperature in the room was so hot that the people had to wear special clothing just to go in there, and they couldn't stay long. This most definitely did not look like anybody's flag ship.

The TV show was probably over three years old, and included this boat story, but did not feature it.

My browser doesn't support css, but the web pages are still well done.

Interesting - I can't think of a boat that fits that description - I don't suppose you know when it dated from - I know they've recently found some interesting ones in Italy - and there are a few from the north of England - but I don't think the UK ones were treated in that way - and the Italian ones are pretty recent - I think (gets increasingly out of her depth - pretty difficult for a penguin )

Not sure I remember where it was found. It was either in a bog, or underwater somewhere on Earth, I think.