Good lord, this job has its weird moments. I've just spent 45 minutes digging through a university handbook from 1970, trying to work out whether the Anatomy class taken by Fine Arts diploma students in 1970 is the Med school one, or their own art-based version. The 1970 handbook is... quaint. And somehow far more Oxbridge than the current snappy, market-oriented one. Also, layout not so much. As an encore, I shall now go to a meeting in order to squabble about venues for orientation, since there aren't actually enough large ones to go round. Expanding the university with ever-larger hordes of students is all very well, but the infrastructure is straining at the seams.

By way of distraction from the oddities of university admin, I stumbled today across the delirious and unlikely existence of the planet Nibiru and its apocalyptic intentions for the Earth in December 2012 when it disengages its apparently extremely efficient cloaking devices as it bumbles portentously through our skies. I have every intention of going to see Roland Emmerich's 2012 as soon as it opens, secure in the knowledge that it will be an entirely loud, dreadful, pointless, anti-scientific and badly-scripted collection of nonsense which will nonetheless make me extremely happy with images of large-scale cataclysm. It is a revelation to me, however, as well as a solid dose of fuel for my beliefs about the fundamental stupidity of the human race, that there are apparently vast seething masses of people out there who actually believe this shit. It's not only their touching faith in the infallibility of the ancient Mayan calendar that floors me, it's their unmatched ability to create conspiracy theories about cover-ups as an antidote to all this inconvenient science debunking the myths. Oh, and their worrying tendency to accept viral marketing campaigns for clearly stupidly OTT Hollywood blockbusters as the gospel truth.

The paranoid delusion is at such levels that NASA has a FAQ page about Nibiru and 2010. The Bad Astronomy page is also interesting for its pithy deconstruction of kooky spiritualists and pervy alien-fanciers. Charm these voices of reason never so patiently and rationally, however, that particular deaf adder has its tail in its ears and its head buried under a significantly-carved Sumerian rock, and is moreover shouting "LA LA LA CAN'T HEAR YOU!" at the top of its voice. I think I like disaster movies so much because the general apocalyptic devastation seems to me to be no more than we deserve.

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about the live-action film version of Where The Wild Things Are (trailer here, I'd be interest to know what you Sendak-fan witterers think). Possible pros: it's live-action rather than CGI, it's not being directed by Stephen Spielberg, the trailer features my favourite Arcade Fire song, it's Spike Jonze. Possible cons: they're making a film of a beloved book, which by all the rules is doomed; I'm not sure it'll survive independently of Maurice Sendak's incredible artwork; the Wild Things talk; it's Spike Jonze. I shall content myself with the mantra Alan Moore occasionally mouths (post James Cain) but never quite got behind: Even If The Film Turns Out Crap The Book's Still On My Shelf.

In other news, Elizabeth Bear's cat talks in alliterative skaldic verse. Apparently. And, appropos of nothing, tonight I initiate jo&stv into the mysteries of lasagne-construction. They have to swear an oath, and get the tattoo, and everything. Also, we're going to watch Wanted.

Last Night I Dreamed: a confused journey to Mars, which was unexpectedly terraformed and growing forests and vast fields of vegetables. I think Venus may have been as well, only the fields were all on raised platforms held up by giant pillars, so the excessive moisture could drain out of the soil. Much of the dream was taken up with preventing atmospheric sabotage, and with the whinging of the spaceships full of farm workers who didn't like the long commute.