Lunch with Sam Neill

just had lunch with Sam Neill. Ok, not really, but I did have lunch in his vicinity, at the same event he was at. That totally counts, right? 🙂  I was at one of those “free pizza for everyone!” welcome events for new students being given by the School of Humanities and Creative Arts (which CEISMIC sits on the edge of, so we get invited to their events), and as Neill is an alumnus of the school, and was on campus anyway giving a talk to Cinema Studies students, the Head of School invited him along to the event.
I suspect he missed out on the free pizza himself* because he spent the whole time being swarmed with students wanting to take selfies with him – which the marketing people (who were of course in attendance) were loving – free advertising for the university every time one of them gets posted to Twitter or Facebook!  The marketing people weren’t so impressed I think when the Head of School asked Neill to address the students, and, unprepared, he gave a rambling ranty (though totally entertaining) speech about how studying history protects you from stupid politicians and why we should get out of Iraq.  The students loved it, the marketing people looked like they were wondering whether they could get away with “accidentally” pulling the plug on the microphone…
*I wouldn’t feel too sorry for him – I’m sure he was being taken off to a much nicer lunch by the Head of School later.