I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! I had a great time, got some great presents, ate too much food, you know how it goes. New Years should be nice, but I’m looking forward to some downtime afterward and then getting going with the next year - looks like it should be a good one!

Did the Bridge Climb yesterday, with Tim, Trang’s siter’s boyfriend. It was AWESOME! The gear, the views, all of it rocked. To get the full spiel, at least ten or twenty minutes worth, ask me about it next time you see me. Thanks to everyone who contributed towards the group present, and most especially to Trang, who organised the whole thing. Another excellent gift on her part.

I’m not sure if I mentioned it here, but I got an email a while ago from a guy who’d read one of my papers, and was very interested in what I’d written. I was fooling around on google looking for pages that link to me, and found this page. Scroll down to just above the references to see the bit he quotes from me. The author of the paper is actually a professor of military history at the National War College in Washington DC. Yay me!

I had an excellent birthday weekend - from sleep in and Dinner at Kelly’s Steakhouse on Saturday to a lovely BBQ afternoon yesterday, it was a great weekend all around. Thanks to everyone who contributed to the group present - it was excellent! I’m looking at when I can organise a screening for everyone, stay tuned.

Biggest thanks of all go to Trang, who organised the group present, took me out to dinner, and has also organised a bridge climb for me for my birthday. Yay Trang!

Returning to your regular blog:
Now this is irony. (Link via MetaFilter) Enron’s code of ethics.

Earth As Art is a collection of satellite photos chosen for their aesthetic appeal, to showcase how beautiful the Earth is from orbit. Particularly poignant is The Optimist, which is, well, you should see for yourself. (Link from MetaFilter)

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems that Ross Gittins’ articles are getting better and better. From his denunciation of television to his explanation of why there’s more the the WTO and the ‘rich get richer, poor get poorer’ story than it would seem, he’s always arguing in a lucid fashion that the story behind whatever he’s talking about is more complex than people would have you believe. His latest article is an analysis of the Victorian election of last weekend. It’s an interesting analysis - one I don’t entirely agree with, but interesting nonetheless. It’s nice to be able to read at least one columnist in the opinion section of the Herald that’s not just a moudling of events to support the columnist’s political and moral concerns. (cf Miranda Devine, whose recent articles are exemplified in Tough measures are our rights, or Paddy McGuinness, responsible for Rent-a-mob tarnishes victims of the Bali bombs, amongst other corroded invective.)

Well, I’m back from Melbourne, where Trang and I had a spectacularly good weekend. We did most of the Melbourney stuff - Chapel St, Bridge Rd, lots of cafes, the casino briefly. With the exception of the casino, it was all good. A wonderful way to show Trang how I feel about her.

In less mushy news, I found this link today - to the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Project. It’s a public info page on NASA’s project to search for new methods of propulsion. I got there via these links at Ars Technica.

Update: I forgot, there’s this as well. All I can say is ‘How?!’