Becstarr : It's a go-slow and I think I like it

Saw off the Tarlings with an early start for the big drive up to Bellingen, and after that big rush of departure, everything suddenly fell quiet. Spent the day getting used to going slower (soon I may even stop apologising for it!) and was happy to have made it to lunch with Ann, Rob and baby Bella (almost crawling now) and to Mum's for dinner with extended family guests. I could have easily fallen asleep at 3pm but it's good to spend Christmas in at least a little bit of a crowd!

Becstarr : Nailhold until last hour of workity work

Gritted teeth and held on til last hour of workity work at 3:30 on 21/12. Work requests in til last few hours. Productivity ragged but made it across the line and staved off a an incipient argument with a colleague. I am slowly learning just to let some things go.... especially when I'm about to go on two weeks of holidays!

Pub as usual with SJ and Al, no Petto but plus Bez & Shoshe, Dan & Dante, and MD and JT. Hooray! Festivities continued with Matt, Liz and the girls for dinner in Chinatown. Note to self: LEAVE OUT some of the details when explaining things to kids, e.g. why it's important to stand behind the yellow line on the train station. Don't illustrate with the interesting story about the autistic kid who was playing on the tracks a few weeks ago. Their imaginations are very vivid!

Shoshe: Still here

I went to Spirit and Opportunity's second (Mars year) birthday party! :) It was very cool. We had carrot cake, cider and champagne, and the folks at JPL had cake and organic milk (apparently they weren't allowed to have alcohol). The rovers didn't get anything special for their birthdays as far as I know, but one of the models in the MER conference room had an "I am 2" badge, which was very cute.

Our friend Owen from Sydney visited us this weekend, which was awesome. My parents were up to, for my mom's art opening in a "nearby" town (2 hours away). On Saturday we went to my classmate's pumpkin carving party, and Owen carved his first pumpkin. B's becoming a pumpkin carving pro :) I finished grading my students' papers over the weekend, but didn't get any other work done :(

And on Friday night, we watched Stephen Colbert perform live.

Becstarr: Fullmoonfulldayfullnight

Building, building, building cases all day - apart from when getting video-Skype to work on our new lappies with Ross. A must when siblings are off OS as of Sunday!

After work with SJ and Yen Li, we found the D&S was awash with the cries of "down, down, down!" and crowded full of end-of-year-ing ugrads (I couldn't place where from though; maybe Architecture?). Walked with SJ up to Newtown to find Joel entertaining Matt of Ulladulla (up for tomorrow's regatta) at a tree-shadowed table in the Courtie front yard. Doy Tao for dinner and a full-moon walk home to Redfern.