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tcpipToday was Rick Barker's memorial service at the Melbourne Unitarian Church. A small number turned out from his three main areas of activity; people involved at the Unitarians, the various philosophy groups organised by David Miller, and his RPG friends. I guess if I had some contacts there could have been some people from his tramway historical groups and the like. His family in New Zealand were also present, albeit in a virtual sense, as the service was livestreamed via Youtube. First time I've tried this and it seems to be relatively painless. Might do it for future classes, meetings etc. On-topic with the Unitarians, I am giving an address there Sunday week on "Religious Freedoms and Religious Charities", somewhat inspired by the events around a certain rugby player.
It is appropriate, given Rick's participation in RPGs, and RuneQuest in Glorantha in particular, that mention is made of another major announcement this week; that RuneQuest Glorantha Con Down Under IV will be held on the weekend of November 23-24, with (and this is the first public notification) with Jason Durall as the international guest of honour. The main issue at the moment is determining exactly where and for how long the Con will run. Our two options are a long single-day Con at the Kensington Town Hall, or a two-day Con at the University of Melbourne. I forsee a poll of the people to determine the outcome; the RPG Review Cooperative, if nothing else, is democratic.
I neglected to mention that recently I received my last pre-thesis graded assignment for my MSc degree; it was a Distinction grade, and whilst this is good in a formal sense, I am rather annoyed by it, because it was an experiment on my part. Despite all the advertising for critical thinking and independent research, when I did this on the last assignment I was harshly punished for not following the playbook, despite having better outcomes. This time I followed the expectations, avoiding indepndent research, and was rewarded. It's just plain academic laziness that leads to such results. Apropos this week received my grade for the one course for the GradDip in Economics that I'm taking; a couple of percentage points short of a Distinction; it will do for now.
It is appropriate, given Rick's participation in RPGs, and RuneQuest in Glorantha in particular, that mention is made of another major announcement this week; that RuneQuest Glorantha Con Down Under IV will be held on the weekend of November 23-24, with (and this is the first public notification) with Jason Durall as the international guest of honour. The main issue at the moment is determining exactly where and for how long the Con will run. Our two options are a long single-day Con at the Kensington Town Hall, or a two-day Con at the University of Melbourne. I forsee a poll of the people to determine the outcome; the RPG Review Cooperative, if nothing else, is democratic.
I neglected to mention that recently I received my last pre-thesis graded assignment for my MSc degree; it was a Distinction grade, and whilst this is good in a formal sense, I am rather annoyed by it, because it was an experiment on my part. Despite all the advertising for critical thinking and independent research, when I did this on the last assignment I was harshly punished for not following the playbook, despite having better outcomes. This time I followed the expectations, avoiding indepndent research, and was rewarded. It's just plain academic laziness that leads to such results. Apropos this week received my grade for the one course for the GradDip in Economics that I'm taking; a couple of percentage points short of a Distinction; it will do for now.
