Saturday 13 December 2008

Geo Tie

Well, I'm definitely on a roll. We have cake, stamps and now tie. It'll be headscarves next (I think not).

I was up in London on Thursday for the annual Geomatics International Faculty Board meeting of the RICS. We have board meetings quarterly but it's only at Christmas that we scrape the cash together to fly in our colleagues from New Zealand, Hong Kong, Oman and Canada. It makes it the largest board meeting per year I chair and I hope I didn't scare anyone too much with my occasional moments of autocratic chairmanship. We had a tight schedule so I sometimes had to stop people and move things on. Perhaps I'm being harsh on myself. I got a round of applause at the end which was a first.

Following the meeting we had an evening lecture. Sir Martin Sweeting of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd gave a fascinating talk on small satellites.

I must confess I think of small satellites as something you can get in your living room; but Martin's idea is something you can pop in your shopping basket or even pocket. Nano and pico sized. Small but sweet.

I had the pleasure of sitting next to Martin for our dinner. We were celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Land Division of the RICS (don't panic, the hydro bit came along a tad later) and had gathered as many ex-presidents/chairs as we could. Some old, familiar faces mingled most happily with the new faculty board. We have a lot to learn from these 'giants' of surveying.

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