Turns out several of the consultants I’ve worked with over the past few weeks (including the scary one) actually collaborated on a key text in neuroanaesthesia! A bit embarrassing that I clearly didn’t do my homework. Lucky it’s the regs that have been getting the grilling and not me. And if I’d brought a copy along I could have got them to sign it. But actually one of the authors told me today that at 56 quid it was hopelessly overpriced – I told him I was going to buy a copy anyway and when he insisted it wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on, I said that was OK because I was buying it on kindle. Nice man. In fact, the vast majority of people have been very kind to me and a delight to work with.
Plan before phase two of my sabbatical is to read up on my subject beforehand so that I can do a better job of pretending to be clever.