An important post-sabbatical duty for profs, is writing a report of the activities that were undertaken. As I keep telling people, including, astonishingly, some professors: "A sabbatical is NOT a holiday!"

After my first two, year-long, sabbaticals in 1997 and 2004, I wrote boring memos to the Dean's office. My approach to reporting changed in 2006, after I received a Leiv Eiriksson mobility grant from the Norwegian Research Council  that required a written report.

I planned to write my report, about my months spent in Tromsø, during a ten-hour layover in Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, on the way home from Mongolia to Canada. Instead, I ended up sitting on the airport floor, playing about with the upgraded newsletter and poster templates in Pages. In the the process, I produced a very amateurish newsletter style of report.

I never did learn what the Norwegian funding agency made of this, but on the other hand, they didn't ask for the funds to be returned. The newsletter was useful in explaining my early research with long-time collaborator Gunhild Hoogensen, so I used the idea for my 2011-12 sabbatical report, and again, now for my latest report.

My current report has taken me months longer than normal to finish, mostly because I've been swamped with new and old work, during the six months after my sabbatical ended. But, here it is. I hope you enjoy reading about how one of us taxpayer-funded professors spent their sabbatical time.

Many of my activities from July 2017 to June 2018 have been the topic of blog posts, but not all of them. The exercise of writing a sabbatical report is a great way to look back and reflect, and realize just how much work there is to finish! Most notably a book chapter and a Conversation article.