How many parties do they want?

While the rest of us toil away, estates are enjoying yet another party! It's not all fun though, apparently there's some major betting scandal going on.

Are ISD trying to infect their own PCs?

Yes indeed that's the way it looks anyway.
F Secure web traffic scanning detects a Trojan downloader by the name of JS.Kazmet.e.
It appears first time you visit the staff page each session at, http://in.beds.ac.uk/
Is it real or is it just a "false positive" by F Secure?
I think we should be told.

Let it snow, let it snow!

Let it snow, let it snow!
As the snow continues across the university's region the campuses are starting to resemble ghost towns.
Many are taking days off as annual leave or working from home, mind you how a groundsman works from home is anybodys' guess!

Where's the bus?

Where's the bus?
We waited ages for the bus, nothing came! The staff party was a disaster, the majority were from Luton. They didn't have far to go! We didn't even win the raffle!

Panic stations!

As the Christmas party on Friday approaches, panic is setting in!
Is this because people think that the snow will prevent them getting
there, or that the snow will not be a problem giving them no excuse
not to go?
Or are they worried that they maybe the a target for "The Insider"?

Back from lunch.

Well we are finally back from the insiders' Christmas lunch,
sorry we weren't able to invite any of you but for obvious reasons we couldn't!
Never mind Friday sees the staff party at Luton, we will all be there,
hope you will too!
See you all then.

More authors on this blog.

We are now up to three regular authors on this blog.

Caesar joins us from Luton.

Complainants.

Complaints have been received from 3 anonymous individuals all claiming that the post "First time contributor" is not what happened at all and that they could not have been close enough to hear what was being said. If they had been, somebody in the group would have identified  them as being a member of staff.
Well if these individuals would like to tell us the truth and how they know it's the truth, we will willingly publish the information. However I should first direct you to the disclaimer on the right. 

Hacked!

It seems somebody has no sense of humour and attempted to hack this blog and in doing so deleted all of the content!

Fortunately we had all of the posts backed up.

So we are back.

Commodo operor non nuntius per magnus populus! Vos mos non lucror.

First time contributor

Yes we have received a first time post by somebody calling themselves "Dipsy the twin with the smaller moustache", sounds all very cryptic!
They go on to say, " I was in my usual hostelry having a lunchtime libation, when who walks in but the Bedford Facilities team. Apparently they had come for their Christmas lunch. Well the whole proceedings were disappointingly sedate, with no drunkenness or debauchery! Actually the highlight of the whole event seems to be when one of the porters made an attempt at complaining about his meal. This complaint turned into farce as the Polish waitress could not understand his "Mockney" estuary drawl!"
Thanks for that Dipsy, please keep these contributions coming in.

Thank you all very much.

We at the "insiders view" have done many blogs between us over the years but we have to say this is our most prolific to date! You have all contributed to well over 900  hits on the blog  since last Thursday! 
This makes us the most popular of all the Universitys' blogs (approved or otherwise!) to date and that has to say something ( the offical university blog has only two posts in three years!!)! It's been said that some people are upset that they haven't had a mention as yet. We'll as we have said before we are only a smalll team and we can't cover everything!
However if you have something to contribute, post a comment at the end of this post, nobody will know who you are unless you give your name. Come on don't be shy, join in!  

Getting ready for the Christmas party.

Today's the day of the Bedford Facilities' Christmas lunch, below we see three members of staff just getting ready to go to Dick's Diner for a festive spread.
Left is SW, JB and JT. Work out who is who yourselves.

Ignorance is Bliss

The old oriental proverb of the three wise monkeys admonishes us to hear no evil, see no evil and speak no evil. 
Well this could describe the heads of 3 departments but which one is which?
Hang on, it's just been pointed out that these 3 could also be the girls on the main switchboard!

A ghost at Putteridge Bury.

Further to the previous post, we have been informed that there is also a ghost at Putteridge Bury.
George Sowerby who took over the estate in 1868 was killed by an  Egyptian stag in the park.
Apparently he can be seen chasing stags on his horse.

A ghost at Polhill campus?

We have been made aware of reports about the sightings of a ghost at the Polhill campus.

The sightings have been made by students at Liberty Park over recent months.

The spectre, who appears to be bothering nobody, has been seen wandering across the sports field in the earlyhours and mostly when foggy conditions prevail. 

It's thought that this is the spirit of one Thomas Laxton who's family had a large orchard on the site until 1957.

It is presumed that he is unhappy with the use his old land is being put to!

Thomas Laxton was a plant breeder who introduced many new varieties of strawberries, and worked with Charles Darwin in experiments on peas.

The nursery that he founded, carried on by his descendants for many generations,

became famous for the apple varieties that it introduced.

Thomas was born 1830 in Tinwell, near Stamford, Lincolnshire. He began his work as a plant breeder in 1865, interested mostly in peas and strawberries. He started his plant breeding in Stamford, then later moved his operations to orchards and fields in Bedford, Bedfordshire and in nearby Girtford in Sandy, Bedfordshire. He consulted with Charles Darwin on pea-breeding experiments. Laxton was, in fact, close to the genetic discoveries that Gregor Johann Mendel would make around the same time.

In 1872, Thomas began producing new strawberry varieties. He himself would introduce seventeen varieties in all, including King of the Earlies (1888), Noble (1884), and Royal Sovereign (1892.) He died in 1893.

The business was carried on successfully by sons and grandsons, who adjusted the name of the business to Laxton Bros (Laxton Brothers.). The business had 140 acres for trials and growing, and a shop in Bedford at 63 High Street. Most of the apple varieties that came out under the Laxton name came out under their watch, and they introduced a further 47 varieties of strawberries. In 1897, the company put out a book called The Strawberry Manual (published by Hulatt & Richardson.). In 1937, Winston Churchill ordered raspberry plants from them for his Chartwell estate in Westerham, Kent, at a cost of £2 13s 7d.

In 1957, both the store and the nursery business were closed. The orchards have all been built over now. It's not certain what happened to the assets and the intellectual rights: they may have been merged with another nursery at the time called Laxton & Bunyard Nurseries Ltd that still existed in Brampton, Huntingdon (Cambridgeshire) as of 1969.

Admiral Dawn T Levy

We understand that many of you are asking who this Admiral Dawn T Levy is, well it's not a real person.
No in fact its a anagram of some members of staffs' names. we'll give you a clue or two, there's no female names and you should get at least four out of it.
It should be said that you can use any of the vowels multiple times but not the consonants.
If you don't know what a vowel or a consonant is you really are working in the wrong industry!

Happy puzzling! 

Treat your staff for Christmas.

The secretary of one of the heads of department was recently spotted in Poundland in the Arndale Luton. She was purchasing a box of 30 Christmas cards (you know the ones, only 5 different designs in the box), imitation after 8 mints and some cheesy puffs. Our roving reporter asked what they were for and she replied that her boss had given her £10 and told her to get the cards and something to treat the departments' staff with for Christmas!
Bah Humbug!! Talk about Scrooge!
Well if you work in an office with more than 5 staff and 2  of  you get the same design of card, then you know who we are talking about.
By the way, please don't eat to many of those cheap imitation after 8's with the cheesy puffs, you will be sick.

Contributors needed.

We have just been informed that our main Luton based correspondent has unexpectedly been called home and won't be able to contribute until early February 2010.
If you would like to contribute to this blog, anonymously of course then post your contribution using the comments link below this post. Don't worry nobody else will see your contribution until we post it.

It's getting cold outside!

With the temperatures plummeting outside and the University eager to save money on energy bills, drastic solutions are needing to stop staff feeling the cold.
Some of the girls in Bedford registry have come up with a unique solution to keep temperatures (and pulses) high!

New Student Union bar at Bedford.

For sometime now UBSU have been lobbying for a new student bar for Bedford.
We at the "Insiders view" can now reveal that this has now been approved and monies put in place!
The fixtures have already been ordered, here is scoop preview.

The location of this bar is going to be P0.57.

Staff calender, an update.

Firts of all an apology,  information that we had previously received about this subject was wholly inaccurate.
In now appears that it will take the form of looking back at the history of the University.

The hunt is on!

We have reports coming in from our undercover agents that some members of staff are not seeing this blog in the spirit that it was meant and are trying to uncover who we are.

To this end ISD (InSufficient Data) are reported to have put their best team of agents, under the command of Admiral Dawn T Levy, on the case. They would be better off using their time on more urgent issues, such as who is going to re-image all the PC's. 

The Insider awards for 2009

With the students' cross campus variety show taking place this evening, we at the the Insiders view thought we would present a few awards of our own.

First off is our award for the best running joke of the year.

This goes  Scientia, for the joke that is the staff timetable.

Scientias'   resource scheduling solution, "Syllabus Plus" was to be the panacea to the university's timetabling problems. Instead of mitigating the problems it only served to augment them!

Staff are frequently heard asking their students which room their tutorials are in today. If you see a spare slot on the timetable for the room you wish to use, send Timetabling a email, wait for the confirmation then check the timetable and you will see nothing showing. You will continue to make plans for your use of the room safe in the knowledge that you have the confirmation email.Only when you get to the room you find that it's been double or even triple booked!

It's a bad joke and if it wasn't so serious we'd all be laughing, never the less it's the longest running joke so it wins the award.

The next Award is for services to the disadvantaged.
The sport and recreation department. ASC earn this award for their continued support to a refugee from the film "Deliverance", yes that refugee is Miguel Rice who is allowed to feel at home in wide open sports fields of the university. Well done all at ASC.

Miguel himself also wins an award, this one is for services to information.
As the university's resident old woman and gossip Miguel provides a invaluable service ensuring staff get the latest in news and gossip. Without Miguel we would be lost.
One of Miguel's favourite saying, being a country boy is, "I bet you can squeal like a pig. Weeeeeeee!



The next award is for major contribution to covering your arse under the auspices of health and safety and also the promotion of unnecessary training programs.
Yes step forward Annie Closh. Annie who is health and safety advisor based at Unfairview house has single handedly brought the private sector training companies out of the recession by arranging over (according to Miguel Rice!) 230 training sessions at the university in 2009 alone. Money well spent?

The truth is out there.

 A mystery solved.
Over the last five years the Bedford campus had suffered sporadic, mysterious unexplained losses of equipment.
It was most baffling, nobody could provide a tangible answer as to what  was causing this.
Now we have the answer! Professor John Lydon (P.I.L, OBE) of the British space institute tells us about it,
"Yes, it was an "Astral Stargate". This is a type of temporal disturbance that is caused by an anomaly in the fabric of space. Inanimate objects such as university equipment are literally sucked into another dimension by it. It maybe that there is an alternate Bedfordshire university out there that is benefiting  from an excess of equipment! It now appears that this anomaly has moved to Borras Norway, where they are suffering similar problems. We find no indication that it would return to the Bedford campus area."

.

Construction works continue on both Luton and Bedford campuses.

The university is proud of the strides it has made to provide local jobs for local people in it's redevelopement works at Luton.(The unions are looking into claims of racism!)

Meanwhile the team above are doing wonders on the infill project at the Bedford campus.

More hierarchy

Steve Bush is the estates Manager and "Bovine silage" director.
Steve was born to a Blackpool boarding house landlady, who when asked about his father always replied "He's away, away on business!", Steve never met him!
Steve is a practising misogynist ,fifth Dan black belt, but don't hold that against him as he's rather good at it, he
never misses the opportunity to put a woman down, biblically speaking of course!

Steve's also into "bikes" and some are of the motorised variety, he actually owns a Yamaha YZF R1 that he uses on "nice" days, the rest of the time he travels to work in Nicholle's Clio.
"Big" Steve  Bush, is also a leader in male fashion, he is a subscriber and big spender with "The Chap Magazine" where he purchases most of his clothes. Steve likes to run his department on the principle of the old British Raj, everyone has their place.Yes even the "Boys"  can deal with the car parks and as long as the woman are on their knees, cleaning of course, then he's happy!
Steve has recently told his wife that he wishes he was more like Tiger Woods, she's thinks he means he's hoping to improve his Golf handicap!
Never one to be put off by a lack of education, Steve has  maneuvered himself into a position (cue funny handshakes and masonic jiggary pokery) that would be the envy of most people with any common sense ! 

Christmas parties.

The Christmas party season is upon us. So much so that there is now more parties to attend than there are working days left, never mind I suppose you can take a day off in lieu later!
Don't forget if you are due to be at work on the day of the staff party, you are expected to attended, your students will understand when you cancel that crucial lecture!

Making the most of Bedford.

When De Montfort (DMU) university of Leicester could no longer contain themselves with the prospect of making millions from the peppercorn fee that they had paid to the Bedforshire county council years before, they negotiated a merger of their Bedford campus with the then university of Luton.
Even though Bedford provided courses that Leicester wasn't accredited with the gamble was well worth it, Luton Universitys' standings in the league table were dismal to say the least, a merger with one of the country's top teacher training sites would be in the least be a coup for all at Luton!
DMU proposed building works that would compensate the new university of Bedfordshire for the lose of it's lucrative Lansdown site ( how many millions have the developers lost in the recession?), it didn't really work out. The new high profile campus centre was reduced in height by by one floor on the grounds of cost. This is a building that owes more to B&Q than the Savoy theatre, the windows are so badly crafted that they are falling out of their frames, Bedford maintenance staff have reportedly had to screw most shut on H&S grounds! Neither Luton or DMU want to know!

From the outside it looks good but!!

Let's first look at the hierarchy of the university of "Bedfordshire". I'm sure that if the hierarchy could have got away with it the uni would have been called "The Lutonshire University" as they only seem interested in the Luton campuses. Les Ebdon seems a really nice guy, maybe the token "liberal" amongst a sea of conservatism.

Les Ebdon

Then of course we have the deputy vice chancellor of the university, Rolland Farley who used to work for C&A!  Well with their record of destroying the clothing industry in the UK, only surpassed by Marks and Spencers, what qualifications does that give him?
This is a man who says much but says nothing. In fact he frequently denies ever saying anything at all and because he rarely puts words into script, it's hard to prove otherwise! Mind you what would you expect from somebody who previously found it acceptable to bring the rag trade to it's knees? He'll do it again to this university! His strap line now appears to be " I won't let the right to a good education stand in the way of making money!" People like this have no thought for the person on the street, it's all about money. His!

Rolland Farley

Then we have Professor Andrew Slade, Pro Vice Chancellor for Research and Enterprise.
Andrew, formerly of the university of Sunderland said when joining UoB,
“My appointment reflects the University’s commitment to taking research and enterprise forward. I will be working with colleagues to maximise opportunities in these areas in the wake of the Sainsbury Review, which recognises the contribution of cuttings-edge research, and the importance of knowledge transfer with the business community.”
(Actually he looks a bit like a film star! Alright perhaps a short one, could be Alan Ladd or Brad Pitt!! I also hear he plays a mean game of rounders!) but seriously Andrew is a really nice guy.

Andrew Slade