Recently, as we perused, with much admiration, Ezra Gloppened's recent publication "Goo! : Butter Churns and their Role in the Peasants' Revolt", I ventured to ask if the Professor had ever considered an alternative career. "I haven't always been attracted to the academic life," the Professor admitted. "Many years ago, I did spend some time on the road with my band The Inadequate Zarf. Ah, happy days! Except for the less happy days, which, come to think of it, was most of them." I was unsure about the veracity of this statement until I chanced upon a copy of The Inadequate Zarf’s classic album "Physalis In My Pocket" in a bric-a-brac sale at the Sandford Spence Schultz Home for Fractious Umpires. My favourite track is, without doubt, "Ruckus In The Olfaction Department", featuring the Professor's solo on bass harmonica, an instrument of which he has little or no knowledge.
As I have previously implied , the Professor is the world's leading authority on the cycling tour that the eminent author and madeleine enthusiast Marcel Proust undertook in the county of Norfolk. In the course of a peer review of the Professor's recent paper on the subject (‘An analysis and critique of the Burnham Overy Staithe off-break bowling technique in volume three of “À La Recherche du Temps Perdu”’) a number of scoundrels masquerading as eminent academics or members of the MCC have questioned the reliability of evidence relating to this pedal-based activity. The Professor would never sink low enough to enter into discussion on this point but, on his behalf, I offer a picture taken from the North Creake Gazette. It purports to show Proust playing cards with 2 Merchant Bankers, a Passing Sailor and a Marchioness just outside of Mundesley. I rest my case. Actually, I rarely carry a case for fear that I may forget where I rested it.
The following notes may shed some light on an obscure but significant period in the Professor's life. Following disagreements with the senior staff at Trewellard University (reportedly involving the efficacy of deploying a leg slip), the Professor left to become Artist Out of Residence at Aston Botterell. It was here that the Professor created the ground-breaking performance art piece "Make Mine A Double". This site-specific piece at the local brewery lasted for nearly three months and involved many contemporary dance troupes, the postman, community volunteers, passing dog-walkers and 18 chickens. The local press enthusiastically described the event as "taking place". To this day, the Professor refuses to explain the piece more fully save to say that "The meaning is subjective, yet the subjective has meaning. And the eggs came in very useful." Shortly after this performance, the professor left to take up the post of Directeur Sportif of the cycling tea
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