So yesterday, after time in the lab, I got on a train to London for the only UK date on the current tour of one of my favourite bands. The Jazz Café is small; so there was I, half a lab’s length away from the talented, vibrant, soulful, funky, topical, funny, risk-taking, inventive (creative?) and mystifyingly sorely-neglected Living Colour. What is it with this country? So X-factor-ed into narcoleptic acceptance of homogenised celebrity that fast tracks to fame and fortune along the talent bypass. (Well okay, yes, ‘in my opinion’; I just happen to think Living Colour has got it.)

So, there was I, after a morning in work, on a train drafting a more serious blog piece that I’m not sure I should post, taking in Guinness and atmosphere in a few Camden pubs, before howling my head off to great songs, so agog and gaping at superb musicianship that I was completely oblivious to yesterday’s great British sporting triumph. So, I was delighted when I caught up with the news this morning. Talent, application and determination; the overcoming of recent setbacks to prove to be the best (at least for now); the single- and high-minded pursuit of a goal. And I wonder, because of a refusal to court the celebrity ticket, that Britain doesn’t fully appreciate either what a true star it has here – one who would have made a great scientist. Perhaps.