Ben - Skool Egen

Student: How do I make blue?
Me: ...Blue.
Student: *sigh* Blue and what else?
Me: ...No, seriously: blue.

Me: ...and so the platypus made Tiddilick laugh, and all the waters came pouring back out...
Student: Did the animals drink the water?
Me: They sure did.
Student: Ew, yuk! They'll get frog germs!

Me: Who knows what this word is?
Student: (gasps) But that's illegal!
Me: Uh, no, this is the other kind of pot. You know, the sort you cook food in.

Anna : Finding my feet ...

Phew! After a stressful couple of months things are starting to settle down. I'm walking without a limp, pantry is full of food again and I'm starting to be able to answer questions at work! This included a very successful meeting yesterday with a big wig : "We need to do this and this!" / "Well we have this plan for that, that plan for this and of course I'll keep you in the loop."

Also! Have become the go-to girl for the Faculty of Arts web comments form and this means I get spam messages such as the following :

"uncertificated fullface undermarshal buddhistical humhum searing whipcraft thyreoitis"

Becstarr : Nice try, but no cigar

Sorry ppls, the US Federal Police stoled your presents. It was worth a try though! And interesting to see the pleece in action. No cavity searches either - bonus!

YL - Bernard Black is my hero

Well my current attitude is "No Time Wasters". Which mostly applies to work. It makes me impatient with people dont who appear to try to do their job properly because they prevent me from doing my job properly. I take my job seriously.

Also, just because I am fairly low down on the rung ... does not mean I will allow myself to be harassed/bullied. If you are nice to me, I will be nice to you.

And surely after being accused thrice in one morning that "we" (team) have not done a specific job, then when I ring to say I have visible proof in front of me that said job was done 2 days ago when I said it was done ... you could apologise?

*shakes head* sheesh.

Kit says: You-Are-Here

The electronic topo maps have arrived from the gps shop! I can't wait to try them out. *Finally* If this works, I 'll have a map with a little arrow on it that says: you-are-here.

Dan: Back in Oz

I'm back home, and somewhat less bleary-eyed than expected (a two hour nap this morning helped somewhat). It's great to see Jen & the kids, and they all seemhappy to have me back (though Elora seems a little confused by it all).

Bought a pile o' lego for me, a sack o' fancy wool for Jen, and many Galactic Heroes for the kids. I'll post some details of my trip on my blog or something. Not entirely excited about returning to work tomorrow.

Kit rates location, location

I booked a motel for a work visit to site. The criteria considered were:
1. Number of geocaches nearby for a quick 'fix'
2. In-house restaurant (for bleary eyed breakfasts)
3. Price.

Anna : Winter Magic, Here Comes the Sun

Spent the weekend in Katoomba and traffic jams! An hour in a line of cars to get out of Burwood shopping centre and another 40 minutes in a jam on the highway on the way back to the city after a horrific accident. Combine this with the ongoing blinker fuse problem and little Baruma is in my bad books.

But Winter Magic was fun!*



* Though they say you haven't really been to Winter Magic unless you wake up with a hangover (YAY!)

Ben - Moor Skool

Student: How come those eggs are different?
Me: I'm glad you noticed that. Frogs lay eggs in clumps; toads lay eggs in long strands.
Other student: Also, there are whales at the South Pole! They eat little animals!
Me: Uh... yes.

Me: Why aren't you in your classroom?
Student: I don't want to go.
Me: That's not a good enough reason.
Student: Oh. Okay, then.
Me: Holy crap, that worked?

Me: Hey! Hey! What did I tell you about running with those scissors?
Student: Sor-ry Mist-er Hil-ton!
(exit student, skipping)

YL - question/advice

Would you go out/spend time with someone who didn't want a romantic relationship but thought you were great, awesome and intellectually stimulating?

Wouldn't doing that interfere with your allocation of time/resources for other things which contributed to your life goals? Wouldn't that also interfere with you meeting someone else actually suitable cos you're always spending time with this one guy?

I'm puzzled. My reflex answer is clear. But I am questioning it.

Becstarr : Change of pace

As a counterpoint to the intensity of La Habana, we've come out for a few days to Cayo Largo del Sur in the Canary Islands. The sea is turquoise and warm and the pressure on my Spanish has eased. The change of pace is most welcome. Time to relax!

Iguana-catamaran trip this afternoon. Looking forward to it!

We're coming to Australia!

We've booked our tickets - we'll be coming home for three weeks in Autumn (that's spring to you guys).

Can't wait to see everyone again!

Kit says Hey You!

Hey You! Yeah, you're an engineer, right? Well, have I got just the job for you. You can review my all civil, earthworks and drainage designs despite not knowing the difference between a lead pipe and a block of concrete. Yeah!

Guy - Reports Done!

Hrm, with the past month being sleep-work-sleep-work I've just recently rejoined the land of the living. I've decided that the way that my co-workers do things and organise their workload is stupid and I'm going to change it starting next term. Otherwise the kids are still cute and some are slowly coming along as evil super-geniuses and criminal masterminds.

Ben - Skool

Teacher: Okay, so eight plus...
Student: One?
Teacher: Eight plus four.
Student: Noooooooo!

Student: I can't read.
Me: What does this say?
Student: (dismissively) Oh, I can read that.

What else... a bird flew into the classroom and couldn't get out; so a student suggested that he lure it out by pretending to be a caterpillar.

Kit questions environmental credentials

The people in the environmental group here at work have managed to kill two plants on their desk. How does one manage to kill a cactus?

Becstarr : One last licuado!

Our bags are packed for a 4:50am wake-up tomorrow - we opted for an early start from airy San Cristobal rather than head back to Tuxtla for the night. Tomorrow is the big hop: San Cristobal - Tuxtla, thence Mexico City, and finally Havana, Cuba by 4:10pm if all runs according to plan.

San Cristobal has been great. Apart from hummingbird-watching, we managed to get out to two of the local villages, San Juan Chamula and Zincanatan. Both are peopled primarily with the indigenous Tzotzil Mayans, who have blended Catholicism and native beliefs (principles of Mayan medicine, etc) to make for saome interesting church practices, which involve pine needles, soda, many candles and flower petals, eggs, fireworks.... and more that I´m sure we didn´t see or have any clue about.

Heading out for a last Margarita and licuado (juice / smoothie) now. I hope Cuba´s are as good!

Shoshe - baby woodchucks and A BEAR! And rabid classmates.

Today I got to see some of the baby woodchucks that live by my office! They're cute and about half-size, and hide under parked cars when they're scared. They seem to have a cloaking device -- one minute you see them under a parked car, the next minute they're gone. Cute little woodchucks!

Also, there's apparently a bear on campus. A black bear -- they're small for bears, but they're still big. One of the bus drivers saw it on the street that's a block away from me, but I'm not sure how far down the street it was, so I don't know if it was actually several blocks away or just one. Some joggers saw it a few blocks further down a few days ago. And (another?) one was spotted downtown.

And one of my classmates is taking the rabies vaccine. It's 6 or 7 shots, though now they're in your limbs instead of the old horribly painful ones in the abdomen (it would cost about $1000 if it wasn't for the student health plan!). He found a bat in his room the other morning. The health centre said he was the third person that day to start the rabies vaccine.

Dan - nearly half way through WWDC

... and my brain is full! I need to go away and sit down for a week in front of a computer for a week and code before sitting through any more of these sessions. I can see what I'd work on, but my brain is exploding with undigested material.

Went down to Fisherman's wharf last night after I finished for the day, standing on the step of the cable car. Was very pleasant, with a gorgeous sunset over alcatraz and the Golden Gate bridge.

Lastly, american servings of food are enormous. Vast. Could feed small villages in most parts of the world. Pretty much every meal I've bought I've not been able to finish, and many of them I've taken the leftovers and gotten a whole second meal out of. And I'm no slouch when it comes to wolfing dwn my tucker. It's frightening.

Jen - Torrents rock

Yay. Finally got the new Lego Indiana Jones and played the first level this evening, but only after doing the dishes and putting out the garbage.

11 more sleeps until Dan comes home.