“We’ll need to see an implementation plan,” said the funder, “It seems like a complex project.”
“That’s fine. I feel a Gantt chart coming on,” I replied, perhaps unwisely.

This isn’t a Gantt chart, not in any detail: lots of intermediate stages are missing and there are few dependency links. However, (a.) it sets out the main bits of what the project team has to deliver in a more-comprehensible manner than the tables we’ve had so far, and (b.) it’s colourful, and therefore better. So I’m now feeling much better about next week’s project meeting.

Meanwhile, this sketch may turn out to be pivotal to the whole project. It’s… OK, it’s not at all clear what it represents. But it makes sense to me, and if I can find a day to play with cardboard and masking tape it might turn into something more recognisable. Perhaps even by the project meeting.

We’re also pretty firm, now, on the hardware platform we’re going to use for the project. We’ve had a Skype conversation with some delightful folks at a research institute in Luxembourg which was all very positive. That means we can roll our sleeves up and start building infrastructure and tools.

Pretty soon now we might even stop being quite so cryptic about everything. But not today.