Lev Lafayette's journal

As the EoY approaches I have found myself entertained with pretty much a week of pre-Xmas feasts. Starting last Wednesday was an EoY event for the Business Services Division at The Timber Yard, with several hundred people in attendance. I don't particularly like the venue at all, and the food was equivalent fare. It included the worst gnocchi I've had in my life, and this is from someone who rates that as a favourite dish. That Friday, Liana F., visited and I responded with "Filipino Night", which included a sweet potato and rice flour gnocchi in response, and a rather delicious chocolate biko. The following night I was taken out by Alison B. to Renee H.'s annual Midsummer Eve party, where there were some sixty people, many from the old Melbourne goth crowd. A special highlight was the individual expression of gratitude and wishes for the coming year. The day after that I had James N, Liana F., and Erica H., over for dinner after getting my hair shortened by James; all of us from the Perth goth scene of the later 1980s and all of us having haircuts from James (including his own). The day after that it was a visit to Anthony L., and Robin M., for more plotting for the great South Pacific venture of early next year.

Liana F., and I have also managed to sneak away for a couple of days to Phillip Island, staying at the perfectly reasonable Amaroo Park in Cowes. It was a pretty relaxing couple of days and included a beachside picnic, a bit of a dip in the ocean, a visit to the string of opportunity shops nearby (I picked up a small collection of Tintin books), a visit to the koala conservation reserve, and visits to Nobbies Point and Cape Woolamai. Apart from the aforementioned koalas, we spent some time in the company of some swamp wallabies, the famous Cape Barren geese, and a multitude of other birdlife. With the parade sold out, the only penguin we chanced upon was a youngster who had come out of its breeding box at Nobbies Point and had promptly learned an evolutionary lesson about coming out whilst the seagulls were still awake; "nature, red in tooth and claw", as Tennyson observed.

Officially I am on leave for the rest of the year, and I have done well so far not to even glance at the system or my work emails. However, I do have one more activity for tomorrow, to chair a delayed tech-talk and do a write-up of the activities of the Cultural Working Group which I have chaired for the past couple of years. Of course, when I am not working my nose is buried in research and as a result, I have made quite a reasonable start to my master's research project on "Climate Change Impacts, Adaption, and Finances for Developing Pacific Island Countries". The bulk of the findings will be conducted, of course, after the trip in the Pacific itself. But I have made a pretty good start on the aims, geography, demographics, methodology, and methods. I optimistically assigned myself the possibility of completing a draft by the end of the year. More realistically, I will complete more than half the content. But that is more than good enough.

First three days of this week were pretty much entirely taken up with the HPC and Linux courses for the RMIT SPACE research centre. They were a good group and worked well through the material, however I understand that they are working through their own parallel program and in that regard they certainly have their work cut out for them. A planned three-day course at La Trobe University has been delayed given us a moment's respite to get our ISO 9001:2008 audit in order which has been sadly neglected somewhat.

Took two days off for the end of the week and went to the Gippsland South region with caseopaya. We stayed at the thoroughly functional Inverloch Cabins. It's a pleasant town whose main feature is some rather impressive beaches. Nearby we also visited the very impressive Wonthaggi State Coal Mine heritage centre which included quite an extensive underground tour. It was also a short trip to Phillip Island, a place perhaps most famous for it's evening Penguin Parade and Nobbies which is well worth the visit. There was certainly plenty of wildlife; apart from the aforementioned penguins there were numerous Cape Barren Geese with goslings about along with the occasional wallaby. Needless to say, picked up a few unique Ingress visits and hacks and had a chat with one of the agents from the opposing faction on the island, which is one of their strongholds.

Managed to get home in time last night to rush out the door to play in the regular fortnightly session of Eclipse Phase and finish off the Chain Reaction scenario, which really hasn't grappled with the technological and social changes of a transhumanist future. In other gaming news, updated my reviews from the Pirates issue of RPG Review and copied them to the RPG.net site. Currently working on some reviews for "dead and undead" themed games, mainly White Wolf line (obviously) but also with zombie apocalypse settings such as All Flesh Must Be Eaten. Also interested in exploring the strangely neglected subject of undead in 7th Sea.