Things happening fast

I'm cooking up a storm at the moment with my Phd and various other projects on the boil.

On the recruitment front for my PhD research, I received a positive phone call from the Head of IT of a Sydney council I met the other day. He asked me if I will make a presentation to all the Council Managers in three weeks time to try to gain their support for my project and let them know what is involved. I'm very nervous about this but it's a positive development.

I attended a very inspiring seminar series last Thursday put on by CCR, the research centre where I'm studying my PhD. It was titled "Container Technologies" and involved eleven presenters giving five minute summaries of the papers that will make up an anthology of recent works on the topic. I really enjoyed the presentations and it stimulated my thinking on ways of approaching a broad topic such as human-technology relations and how an approach like this might/could inform my project on office technologies and the development of the modern office.

My querelent tendencies have been in full throttle since the beginning of the year and I've made a note to myself to go easy on the various campaigns I've got going for fear they will consume all my time. My recent letter to my local MP Carmel Tebbutt on same sex relationships and children was forwarded by Ms Tebbutt to the Minister for Community Services and the Attorney-General's office for comment. I have received replies from both Departments forwarded to me by Carmel stating that a detailed response will be provided shortly in response to the issues I have raised. I feel quite buoyed by the outcome since I didn't really expect my letter to go any further than Carmel's desk.

My campaign to replace the four lost gums on our street with similar trees has resulted in a street petition and I have received a very good response from my neighbours with almost all of them signing in support of the campaign. I'm sure I am going to be added to some Labour register of troublesome civilians/querelents/swinging voters/lesbians/activists/tree huggers.