Hurled into the abyss

Bar a few minor hurdles (e.g. is subsistence £20 or £25 per day? which value was used in the signed-off budget???) and some "last-minute" heavy editing of the bonus sections (objectives, beneficiaries) with TRA, the proposal was completed and fired into the abyss a whole 23 hours early. I just have to sit back now with my fingers crossed.

Well, I say "sit back", but I'm already involved in finishing off a further proposal. No rest for the wicked, apparently. This one I'm a contract mercenary on, though I've played a much larger role in its formation than I have on previous standard proposals. There are issues though: it only part funds me, so that should make for some interesting financial contortions if it's funded; our observational colleagues have trimmed back our original ambitions to what they think is actually do-able (well, do-able on 30% funding!). This trimming makes it a whole lot less interesting in a way, but since I wouldn't be doing the donkey work in the lab, I can hardly complain. Instead, I now have to focus more on modelling a coastal time-series station - should be fun given that I've only ever been open-ocean up till now (and have avoided coastal locales like the plague they are).

Anyway, that's the proposal update for now. More will doubtless follow after their assessments ...