Colin Warren: the blog

This time in a fortnight we’ll be in Salerno, southern Italy. Maybe I’ll be saying: “Ciao Italia, siamo sentire a visitare. Dov’è il posto migliore per comprare un caffè e una pizza?” and maybe not… Anyway, it’s not long now, and there’s still a bit to do before we go. We did manage to get some travel insurance (with a 30% discount) this weekend which rests the mind a little. Things are coming together though, and I’m sure we’ll be all set to go in time.

We headed up the highway early to spend the day in Melbourne today. Through the fog and went to St. John’s Lutheran, Southgate for their Cantata Service on Pentecost Sunday. The tall buildings were shrouded in fog and it was chilly on the way in, but we were treated to some wonderful organ music and then cello, oboe, violin and tenor voice. A very special service. Then off to the Jewish museum to see the ‘Superheros & Schlemiels: Jews & Comic Art’ exhibition. It was interesting to see where some of the roots of the graphic novel have come from. Then it was back in the city, something to eat, and then off to the Atrium at the NGV Federation Square for the ‘Emerging Writers Festival’. Lots of writers to talk to, and all their books, pamphlets, zines, postcards, buttons etc. to check out. Finally, we went out to the South Melbourne Market to talk to the suitcase man about a bag we need to bring back, as well as pick up some flowers, check out the books and get a couple of dim sims. A great day, with beautiful sunny weather in the afternoon (but still cool in the shade). Enjoyed checking on the Cats beating Essendon on the way home between some nice music on ABC Classic FM…

Phew, I’m tired now, but it’s good to get now and then and follow up on some things you’ve been keen to see. Initially I thought it might be a pain to lose the day being out and about, but it was worth the change of scenery and being able to experience some new things. I was particularly struck by the creativity that people have. Either stemming from the need to tell a story that’s in their head, or the need to write down (or draw), to ‘get out’, whatever they need to for their own sanity. Sometimes I think writing is like self therapy - necessary for peace of mind and to be able to face the next day etc. (Oh wait, I’m writing this now…) Anyway, I believe it’s important for us to be creative - that’s how we’re made. My philosophy on this is, if we can’t ‘make’ things, we get unhealthy. What do you think?

Oh, and before I forget, a couple more movie recommendations. We watched a couple of good ‘art house’ movies this weekend. Firstly, ‘Tricks’ a Polish film (subtitled) about a boy who’s looking for his father, and ‘The Grocer’s Son’ (also subtitled), a French film set in Provence, about a son who goes home (from the city) to look after his sick father’s business. Worth the time to watch.

It’s May already and winter is fast approaching along with the middle of the year. We’ll be into June soon enough and that’s just fine because it means time for a break. Holiday break that is.

Yes, looking forward to spending some time in Italy, Croatia and France during June/July. Planning for this trip is well under way and the itinerary is coming together. I’ll be blogging of course, so bookmark this: http://colinwarren.net/europa. There’ll be insightful commentary of our experiences as well as evocative images of the sights we encounter.

I’ll be posting up an itinerary and have created a Google map of the route we will be taking. We’ve some interesting places to see and amazing accommodation to go with it, but more on that on the travel blog.

At 9:15 pm. the kookaburras pause near us and do their thing where the joke’s on us. A quick cackle of raucous laughter and chuckling, and they’re on their way (they’ll be back in the morning). The evening noise begins and the animals in the trees are cracking in the bark. Koalas grunting and squealing, maybe an owl and an occaisional Sugar Glider. The end of the day is forced upon you with the daylight fading to darkness (accompanied by a brilliant view of the starts) and a special type of tiredness will ensure a good sleep.

The dawn chorus is amazing. Well, it starts before dawn at 5:30 and goes right through till 8:30. So much whistling, chirping, squawking, tweeting, and warbling.

Late in the after noon a mother koala with baby on it’s back climbs down a tree and wanders across ground near us. I jump for the camera and head them off and take a few photos. They are preoccupied with scrounging away on a couple of old stumps, eating soft bark by the look of it. The baby jumps of mum’s back and has a frolic on it’s own and comes closer to where I’m kneeling to take photos on their level. The baby sees me and suddenly it’s walking towards me and climbing my leg! Yikes… It’s too close to take photos of (had the 70-300mm zoom on) so I called Wendy to come and grab the camera for some photos. It’s all pretty amazing and I’m not keen on having the thing climb any higher, they have huge claws and I don’t want an eye out or a split ear. I had to walk around a bit for it to realise I wasn’t a stationary tree, and it climbed down and went back to mother who by this time was coming closer to see what baby was up to.

The rest of the day is reading books, brewing coffee on the fire, and cooking dinner.

The great thing about all this is that you close all those doors in your brain that are open to the rooms of ideas, work, family, church, problems, jobs to do, etc. It’s very nice having something else to do. Well, there is nothing to do, well at least it doesn’t feel like it. The only things that need to be done are those required to survive, or maintain and cater for a (reasonably comfortable) existence. Things like keeping the fire going, eating and drinking, etc. Then there’s the things you do when you’re reading, talking, walking, and maybe some chores like mowing, cutting wood etc. And the day turns into night, and then day again. Just like that. <found a lovely short video animation that reflects this cycle but from a different perspective. Check it out at website for Solar.>

I suppose the point is, that we need a break now and then to keep it real and grounded, to pause and look around and enjoy the simple things. Let’s do it again soon.

Dear reader, it’s been a while, the postings haven’t been very regular, and it is that dreamy, lazy time between years, but I thought I’d better make start on my blog for 2009. Hopefully with this beginning I’ll feel like I making some headway. 

On the home front, we’ve had a great holiday with two weeks down on Cape Otway. Nice weather and great to spend time with the family - had the boys down, Dad & Emmy (who had done a bit of a road trip and driven down from Qld), brother Andy and family, as well as Trynda, James & Samuel. Enjoyed sitting around in the bush and relaxing. I even managed to read a couple of (largish) novels - Snow Crash by Neal Stepheson and Matter by Iain M Banks, both science fiction. Also trips to the beach (picnic at Blanket Bay for Christmas day), walks through the forest and some hard yakka cleaning up around the place. Came back to go to work and then went back to the bush for weekend to chat to a tree lopper as we’re getting closer to building and need to clear a few more trees. Don’t really like doing this, but we need to make way for a house and make sure nothing will fall on it later. Highlights obviously the weather, food, drink, books and company, as well as spotting a couple of Twany Frogmouths hunting in the dark - very cool. Overall and excellent adventure and good for the soul.

 

And now it’s mid January already! I’m finding that a little difficult to comprehend but it’s true. I’ve been back at work for two weeks and gradually getting up to speed. There aren’t a lot of people around (it’s good time for academics to get their recreation leave entitlements down) and students don’t come back on campus till second week of March. Well, that’s not completely true. We’re running a Tri-semester 3 (instead of a Summer semester) and have quite a few students doing that but they are mostly off campus. Things for me so far have meant getting ready for Tri-semester 1 and covering the fort till other support staff come back from leave. So, been dealing with some business and catching up with people after the break. Looking forward to doing some writing and research this year and thinking about a research question that might sustain me during the time it would take to do a PhD…

So, that’s fairly up to date with a fair bit of computer tinkering over this weekend. New operating systems on three laptops and restoring software applications and data. Wendy’s HDD failed and I needed to go to 10.5 and then Reubs wanted to as well. I suppose we’ll find out the week what we still need to do when things don’t work or we can’t find something. Oh, and we’re saying goodbye to Ash as he heads back to Europe for a while (at least 9 Months). He be heading to France (Lyon) to catch up with Pip who is studying there. It will be cold. We might be heading over that way too, and spend some Euros on the continent later in the year - we’ll see how things pan out.

hello dear reader, once again it’s been a while since I’ve written a missive. In thinking why I haven’t been as consistent as I’d like to be with my writing, I’ve realised that I just haven’t made it a priority. True, I’ve been distracted by other things, work, home, extra curricular activities, conferences, church, and did i say work? Oh, and I do seem to be writing (well, interacting more like it) with twitter and a couple of online forums at work. So, I suppose my contributions in other fields/shperes have taken the time that I might have otherwise spent in writing my personal blog. …and to honest, I have been writing my professional blog either.

I have been having a good time though. While it’s all a bit crazy and I wonder when I’m going to be able to get everything done, I’m not stressed. I’m enjoying everything. I’m keeping up with the exercise (on the stationary bike) and watching my DVD series’ (Deadwood’s finished and I’ve started on The West Wing) and getting a lot out of the other things I’m doing. Research projects at work (in between the operational day-to-day) are fun and I’m looking forward to developments as I start writing things up…

On the R & R front it’s been pretty quite but have seen a few good films lately (The Band Arrives & When did you last see your father?, both worth watching), dropped into the Art gallery and Library and I’m slowly reading a book of short stories by Marukami.

I haven’t had much time to think about planning stuff for Christmas and New Year but events look like they’ll determine that for me, and I’ll be more than happy to go along with them. As long as I get a bit of a break and can sit still for a bit and chill, I’ll be happy. Maybe I’ll get to write a little more frequently between now and ‘09 so that I can measure the rush to the end of ‘08 though regular reflection.

Have finally caught up with a back log of blogs posts and noticed that I’d missed Mark’s commitment to ‘let it grow’. Mark registered with the Official Movember website and is accepting donations for his attempts at creating a ‘Cricekter’s Mo’ at this link. The idea of the excuse to ‘grow a mo’ is to raise funds and awareness for men’s health . Go on, donate a few bucks, youll be so glad you did.

I’ve been in Northern NSW and Southern QLD for nearly a week and have been enjoying the different climate and environment. Being near the coast and seeing the surf and beach has been nice. There’s been a fair bit of rain but I haven’t been caught in any downpour and I actually enjoy the rain - particularly when it doesn’t happen all that often. The little town of Mooloolaba is turning into a mini Surfers Paradise and I’ve heard that rapid growth is a concern as government infrastructure struggles to keep up. It is a nice place with a large marina on the river/water behind the beach, but I’m not sure of all the 10-12 story apartments all along the beach front. It is a tourist based economy and most of the people around are here to relax and have a good time - I suppose that provides some sort of vibe, but it doesn’t really reflect what the town is like. Maybe a couple of weeks to discover the place would give better idea of the local culture.

I’ve been at the conference yesterday and enjoyed lunch outside on a beautiful day at the Sunshine Coast TAFE campus. Lots of people to meet and talk to, and the presentations and case study stories have provided a catalyst for further thinking about the integration of technology into learning and teaching. Last night was the conference diner and today the final day before heading back to Brisbane for the weekend.

I’m heading off to Queensland again this week for more birthday celebrations and a conference and really looking forward to 10 days away. Apparently the weather’s really nice up there (do you think I can take the word of those who live there - wouldn’t they be biased?) so looking forward to wearing shorts and T-shirts.

It will be nice to catch up with family again and do some chilling (sitting around talking, eating and drinking) and enjoying the sub-tropical climate. Some bush and beach will be perfect and I’ve got a novel to plough my way through when peace and quiet are in order…

The conference is about Learning Technologies and hosted by Sunshine Coast TAFE in Mooloolaba. Looking forward to learning things, meeting & networking with new people, catching up with twitter friends and looking out for inspiration and new ideas. I’ll probably write more about this on my other (professional) blog.

So, after another couple of hours on Jetstar and a chapter or two of a book (or may even talk to fellow passengers) I’ll be hopefully into relax mode for a little while.

A quick post as I need to report some recent celebrations of achievement. They may not be all that significant in the great scheme of things, but for a proud dad, they’re worth talking about.

Our sons are now young men and following their individual paths and doing great things. We went to see a play that Son #1 wrote, produced and directed! Yes, very impressive, and good fun. A light hearted (but underneath some serious issues) look at consumption and consumer behaviors. He also played a part in Melbourne Model: The Musical, a production put on by creative arts students. He’s also getting close to submitting his honours thesis which will set him up for future academic endeavour.

Son #2 has been part of a team setting up the annual Industry Placement Exhibition for Design students - we went along to the opening and saw an amazing range of quality work. He’s very busy with his work at the design company and learning a lots as well as meeting lots of people.

Son #3 has completed another practical round for his nursing degree and is doing well with that. He also won an award for his Swing dancing and you may see him pop up in a future dancing competition. He’s also been able to confirm his faith in God and that’s a wonderful thing.

To see your children doing well in what they want to do, is a comfort in that they are able to follow their own bliss and be successful in that. Well done boys.

Dear reader,

My lack of blog posts over the past month has been playing on my mind and I’ve made a commitment to write something this evening if only to convince myself that I’ve still got something to say. I suppose there’s been a few reasons for not getting to the keyboard and jotting some reflections, but I won’t go into them here other than to allude to them in the next few hundred words.

It’s not that there’s been anything to report, and I definitely have not been sitting back doing nothing…I’ve been busy with work and church business. lots of operational activities that make demands on my attention and require time spent ploughing through them. Not that it’s not rewarding - it’s just that these activities do take time away from things that maybe I’d rather be doing (and that might be more useful and important in the long) but I’m glad that I’m still learning a lot through the experiences.

I recall the last thing I was trying to do after my last post was to upgrade the MacJournal software I use to write my blogs and wondering how to get it to automatically upload photos with the post. I spent some time (quite frustrating) trying to get this set up with out success and to the extent that I’ve not ben keen to try again since - not that I won’t ever, I’ll just need a clear head and some time.

Anyway, also during September I’ve been to Brisbane and back and enjoyed catching up with family and particularly celebrating Father’s Day (and his 75th birthday) with my Dad. It was nice to be present for the festivities.

I’ve also attended a couple of funerals and while they are generally sad affairs we were able give thanks and celebrate their lives. There is some comfort (and joy) in knowing that we go to a better place (by far), but for those left behind there is loss and grieving.

Work is going well and my research project is underway - had to learn how to develop an online survey and get 250 invitations out to participants. So far it looks like there will be some good data to examine and hopefully a worthwhile article (or two). I’ll be very interested in the responses and will be talking to a couple of colleague (wiser than me) about what to do with the information.

On the recreational side - I haven’t had any holidays (did survive a couple of bouts of illness - flu and cold) but I’ve managed to finish a novel by Haruki Murakami and also caught up with a couple of movies: Wanted and Wall-E. Nothing to really rave about, but not a waste of time either. I reckon it is important to keep some balance in your life by dipping into some pieces of fiction, be they books or film. My next project is to read Watchmen, a graphic novel (soon to be released movie) that’s been around for a while, but a classic. I find that reading/watching this stuff enlarges my view of the human condition and how our society/culture shapes it. Some scary stuff, and while enlightening, also often not enough of a response - like, it’s too hard to suggest solutions so let’s just get commercial.

OK, before I break into a full-on rant, I’ll stop and hit the ‘Send to Blog’ button. Take care, & be nice.