Navigating the Intersections of Faith, Knowledge, and Reason.
There are a lot of opportunities for travel for research, including library and museum access, conferences, fellowship opportunities, and other connections. Often, research travel means jet-lagged during presentations, interviews, and networking. Sometimes it means getting creative with packing heavy books. But, there is lots of opportunity for fun and enjoyable moments, you just got to know where to look.
This week I am traveling through Texas. On Wednesday, I flew into Austin and visited with family a couple days. Then, on Friday, I arrived in San Antonio for an annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) and the Institute of Biblical Research (IBR). This conference is a great time to connect with…
Working from home definitely has some perks, but it can be stifling to the creative writing process. So, I am extremely fortunate to have been offered a place to stay a few nights to focus on my writing projects. As you know, if you are following my blog, I planned a mini-writing retreat with a…
More than one year has passed since we were all confined to our homes to decrease the rate of infection for the global COVID-19 pandemic. At the beginning of all this, I suspected it would be a writer’s paradise. Sitting in my homemade workspace office, which for me was a personalized cloffice about 2 meters…
I boarded a plane in Seattle yesterday afternoon and arrived in London early this morning after a 10-hour flight. The first day It is always hard to walk away from the hotel on the first day. With only a few hours sleep and a stolen eight hours of night time, I am so tired! Today,…
Years of traveling has made me a very efficient packer. I use packing cubes to sort my clothing. When I first arrive, I like to have a single outfit ready to change into after a very long flight. Packing cubes makes it easy to grab necessities, even when I have to check my suitcase at…
Traveling from Oregon to Denver, CO for SBLAAR18 conference. I always look forward to gettin away from my daily routine and exploring a new city for a few days. And, of course, the company and subject matter is always intriguing. The conference was held at the Denver Convention Center (being held up any a large…
My final Oxford adventure was to visit a coffee roaster a few blocks south of my AirBnB in East Oxford. It was called “The Missing Bean” and delivered a fine cup of coffee. I enjoyed it quite well. My walk back to pick up my luggage was sidetracked by an incredible old cemetery where the…
Having rushed around the last few days to see the major attractions of the city, I spent Thursday in a more leisurely manner. Here is near Addison’s Walk at Magdalene college. For years I have been struck by the story C. S. Lewis tells in a letter to a friend, since published, about how a…
Famously this library has appeared in a number of films, including Harry Potter (more to come on that). It houses the book that inspired J. R. R. Tolkien’s Red Book of Westmarch about the Lord of the Rings, The Red Book of Hergest. It is also the main study library of Oxford. The old building,…
Museum hopping this afternoon. First to the Ashmolean Museum for some cuneiform and ancient Near Eastern culture, including the Sumerian King list, some Persian tiles, and Assyrian reliefs. The Natural History Museum Where Charles Darwin argued for his Origins work in 1860. Dino’s and the Extinct Dodo Emma’s elephant (who is traveling with me) discovered…