The Centre of Everything

Background: Piet's research group is recognised as a centre of excellence. This is an excerpt from the chapter 'Conference Centre' from the book DLC34. 

“Professor Malone - Professor Allard would like to set up a meeting with you sometime today.”

“OK. I’m free late in the morning.”

I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong. I may have forgotten, but I’m pretty sure my eyes are crossed & teas dotted. I’m all a-quiver with anticipation. Well, not really. I wonder if Maddie’s buying me lunch? That’s gotten to the point where it needs an appointment.

I arrived punctually-ish & raised an eyebrow at Pip, who waved me in, then stopped me & handed me a brown-paper-wrapped package about the size of a pen-box. It’s unusual for her to not have anything to say, but I guess I’m not getting an explanation on this side of the door. I’d say she’s giving me her poker face, but then I’d have to try to explain just how many variations on poker face she’s perfected & how I can recognise at least ten distinct ones. This is one of my favourite “I’m not telling & you’re not going to work out how I feel about it” faces, which I think I’ve catalogued as number 3.

“Well, you’ve done it now,” Maddie stated when I got inside.

“I have?”

“All that hard work & then this. Go on, open it.”

There it was. The fruits of my labours.

Centre for Streaming Media

“It’s bigger than I thought.”

“No - it’s still just your office. That’s why we moved you, remember?”

Well, it had been explained to me at the time that the move was compensation for ‘accepting’ the promotion. No-one had said it was because I would be housing a Centre of Excellence in there along with all my junk.

“You definitely look like you need a hug. Come here.”

She came to me. Maddie’s never hugged me in her office. I’m sure I’ve offered to hug her, though.

“You have no idea how proud I am - not just of you, but for the whole department.”

“I didn’t realise …”

“& that’s why it’s so special, Pete. You just keep doing your thing. It’s working for all of us.”

“You’re getting kudos out of this, aren’t you?”

“You bet your sweet … ahem. Yes. We’re on the map, Pete, just by being known for something other than teaching teachers. This little piece of … plastic, plus your conference, means we’re not just pulling in dollars, but eyeballs. Isn’t that what your research is all about anyway?”

I thought about it.

“Stats!”

“What?”

“Collaboration with someone in Stats. We need to prove that there’s a correlation in audience movement, & I have no idea how to do that.”

“Exactly. Do it, Pete. Make it a mission for the new Centre.”

Well, it’s real mission is to create a conference, apparently, & to attract more of a live audience than Flixnet itself.

“Collaboration!” I not-quite-shouted as I entered the room formerly merely my office, but now housing the staff of the Centre for Streaming Media.

“Professor?”

She’s becoming harder to scare. I guess she expects big things when I storm into the room all pink & excitable.

I waved the new label at her. There’s no way to affix it to the door mind you - a small oversight. The door already has my name & Serena’s. I guess I’ll have to ask Pip how to get hold of … Building Maintenance? There’s that nice overweight bald chap in light grey overalls that never seem to be dirty. He’d be my choice of go-to - someone who knows how to stay out of trouble.

“Are we moving?”

“No, we’re just rebranding - you & I - we’re expanding in the minds of others.”

“Very good, Professor. Should I get some glue?”

She’s very practical, you have to admit. She’s handling the door-tag as if there are care instructions on the back in very fine print.

“Heavens no - we have professionals for handling glue. I think they do it with screws, anyway, machinery & all the advantages of a toolbox. Hardware! Ask Pip Hodge. As our first act of independence, we’ll get our own man to attach the label.”

“Independence?”

She was genuinely horrified.

“OK, so that’s a little extreme - I just meant in terms of not relying solely on Department resources. I have to tell Bianca!”

I was gone again, of course. I should have taken my new trophy with me. Surely some kind of paperwork is involved, too, like a Declaration or a Protest or some such. I’ll make a note in my diary to work on it. Remember this day! I feel quite revolutionary, to be honest, & I want to ride down the corridors at midday shouting “The Centre for Streaming Media is coming!” or perhaps something a little less bewildering or even more successful than Paul Revere, who I was told was the least effective of several riders sent out that night - I promise I won’t even get lost walking in a straight line. Poetry is the key - Paul Revere & Santa owe their myths to poetry. We could do that - The Rhyme of the Streaming Media. Coleridge be damned.

I have to ring Cindy!

Should I tell Bianca first? I mean, she’s more involved - she’s in it! - but Cindy’s reaction will be more satisfying, even if I’ll have to spend half the night explaining to her what it means. It probably means that I’ll have to spend half the day trying to work out what it means so that I can make some sense to her. I suspect I may not be making sense for a while, so I’ll work my way up to that half-day window, at which point I’ll be so worked up that I’ll need a nap.

“Congratulations, Piet,” & Sylvia is passing me, because I seem to have come to a standstill, overrun by the enemy.

“Oh! Thank you.”

It’s wonderful how I could well be the last to know of my good fortune. Everybody else just seems to know that these things will happen. Maybe it was in their day-book.

Bianca’s not home. How disappointing. She’s probably doing something silly like teaching. I should have known her schedule. Actually, no, she can keep that private. Now what? Should I hunt down my faithful students? They’ll be thrilled! Well, Tas might. She should be. It will look good on her thesis. One of these days, I’ll have to ask her what she’s going to do when she completes that thesis. It’s been ages since we’ve had that conversation - like when she had that blip & had to retreat before the onslaught of personal issues.

Marnie’s here. That’s disappointing … well, more so that she’s here but Tas isn’t. My current state would allow for less disappointment if Marnie wasn’t the only one here, but probably equates to her not being here either. Would Candace count? She’s got no history of the pain & trouble I haven’t actually gone through.

“Hey, Marnie - “ & I have to stop myself from sounding like an excitable schoolboy, just because it’s Marnie. “We’ve just been approved as a Centre of Excellence.”

Note how I dropped the exclamation mark I would have used if it had been almost anyone else. I’d planned to use one, but I’ll save it for someone more appreciative of emotional statements.

“Oh?”

At least she used a rising inflexion. Sometimes, it’s hard to differentiate Marnie’s questions from her usual disinterested interlocutions.

We need a logo! It’s like a flag, but less windswept or likely to be torn from your dying fingers. It’s defendable by patents! You need an army of lawyers to breach that defence.

I could get Robyn to work on something. I could even pay her, or promise to feed her or look after her children - pay her, I suspect. The other things should just be done without expectation of reward.

Stationery! I mustn’t be (in the commonly misspelled homonym). 

I could get a new diary with the logo stamped on the front - in gold (embossing). Cindy could print stuff. I need a new business card. Should I also get new cards through the Department? Probably. I need to talk to Pip about how to do that. I only just got the new ones for my promotion. Do they charge you extra if you get new ones again within the year? To improve is to change, so to be perfect is to change often. I might be able to squeeze the budget out of the research funding. That makes sense - we’ve made enough of a name for ourselves by getting the research grant that we can afford to use the grant money to announce the fact that we got lucky. I’ll work on the phrasing. Spin. We can afford a little spin, just as long as the centri...whichever force doesn’t send us off in the wrong direction. Centripetal - going off on a tangent.

Where am I going?

Oh dear. I seem to have left the building (without a spangled jumpsuit) with quite possibly the intention of shouting to the world (not being comfortable with shouting from a rooftop, you understand, assuming that I could even get access without a crowbar or my friend in maintenance). It’s actually not a pleasant day. I should at least have an umbrella from which to shout under. The alternative is that I beat a hasty retreat to the comfort of my office & contemplate the christening of this new venture with something other than thick mist purporting to be raindrops falling on my head. It’s my parade, dammit!

“I was not sure if you had gone somewhere, Professor.”

“I’m not sure, either, Serena. I’m back now, so it probably doesn’t matter.”

I wonder if any of this will make sense tomorrow?

Associate Professor P G Malone, Director of the Centre for Streaming Media.

No, I doubt if it will.