January 1996
After a couple years' of absence from the snow, we decided it was
time to strap on the planks, and visit the highest places in
Australia. So after a pleasant sojourn with our friend Christina in
Canberra, we hit the slopes at Thredbo on a crisp September spring
afternoon. The day was warm, and the snow was melting fast, so we
headed for the only patch of snow left in Australia, on the main range
around Mount Kosciusko. On the way back, unfortunately, disaster
struck. In a big way! While traversing a slope not more than 500
metres from the top of the chairlift, Kim attempted a triple
somersault with a backflip, and ended up performing an elegant head
plant. Unfortunately, her left ski, having a mind of its own decided
to do a right hand twist, and her left knee gave up the struggle with
an elongated tearing sound. In the meantime, Russell rushed to her
aid, which also involved a deftly executed head plant (but without any
of the aforementioned dire consequences). Having ascertained that Kim
was unable to walk even one metre, let alone five hundred, (not
difficult given that Kim could barely stand and shock and nausea were
setting in) Russell gallantly stripped off his outer gear down to
T-shirt and shorts, and positioned Kim onto his wet weather jacket to
avoid hypothermia. Whilst it had been warm and sunny, the sun was
setting fast by this stage, and the air gets cold quickly. Not to
mention that Kim was in a lot of pain and being left alone on an
increasingly dark and forbidding mountain. Russell set off for the
chairlift, with Kim's skis tucked under his arms (ie after he had
retrieved one run away ski that had slithered down the slope but which
had fortunately come to a halt not too far away).
Russell found that the ski resort was packing up for the day, but eventually found one of the first aid people to go out on a skidoo (like a motorbike on skis) to pick up Kim. He gave explicit directions as to where to find Kim, and even offered to ride on the skidoo to point out where Kim was.
However, the driver refused this last help, and took off in a flurry of snow. The time passed... Becoming worried, Russell asked the chairlift operator to contact the skidoo driver on the two way radio. He said that the driver had found Kim and was bringing her in. More time passed... Eventually the skidoo driver appeared over the hill, furrowing the snow at a rate of knots - Russell's heart sank as he realised Kim could not have been on the back with it going at that speed. The driver hadn't located Kim, and had gone nearly all the way to Mount Kosciusko looking for her. As for Kim - the slope where she lay had by now been plunged into darkness. Kim had had the heart-breaking experience of having been able to see the skidoo driver as he passed about 200 metres below her and been unable to attract his attention. She then had to wait in the cold and in pain listening for his return, only for him to pass again and not even look in her direction or hear her frantic four fingered whistles. These are normally very attraction seeking but at this stage obviously the driver of the skidoo could not hear it above the loud whirr of his motor! Upon his return, Russell ascertained that this driver seemed totally unconcerned about Kim being left out on the mountain and was more concerned with getting the key back so that his staff could knock off work! Earlier, when Russell had requested his assistance, the driver had debated whether or not that particular part of the mountain came under his jurisdiction or that of National Parks. So while Kim was up on the mountain waiting to be rescued here was this guy debating demarcation lines! One wonders how hard he really tried to find Kim on his lap of the mountain.
Russell found another skidoo driver, and this time went with the driver to point out Kim. Although she was wearing a bright red jacket and had on a bright yellow hat (I know definitely not colour coordinated!), by this stage she was indistinguishable from all the other rocks and smudges on the slope. However the skidoo driver (who had better eyesight than Russell's), could see Kim waving, and so set off to pick her up.
The ordeal was far from over. Shortly after Kim managed to lever herself on to the skidoo, and not 50 meters from where she had been immobilised for about an hour and a quarter, the skidoo was bogged in a drift of snow. Kim had to yet again lever herself off the skidoo and stand on one leg as the skidoo driver tried to dig the front wheel out. Fortunately some other late cross country skiers winnowed up to the spot and gave the driver a hand digging the skidoo out. Kim had to lever herself back on to the skidoo again and the driver took off at a terrifyingly fast pace anxious not to get bogged again. The journey was definitely not soothing to the nerves. Eventually the skidoo arrived at the top of the chairlift, much to the relief of Russell. By this time, the chairlift operator had well and truly knocked off work, and so Kim had to endure a hair raising descent by skidoo in near darkness over rocks, ice and mush. Russell had to make his way down on foot, or for a significant portion of the descent sliding down on his bum, as it was too steep and slippery to stand. At the bottom, Kim was left to wait, sitting on an upturned milk crate, for the doctor to return to the clinic. There was little he could do that night so he merely strapped up the knee and gave Kim Panadeine Forte to get her through the night. Oh and he did say to Kim that he thought ``you have completely stuffed your knee but we'd better leave that to a specialist''
After a night spent in bed, spaced out on painkillers, Kim emerged the following morning to be presented with the ``Boali Lodge Skiing Award'', given to those who fall in pursuit of the sport. It was a cross country stock, to be used as a crutch for getting around the lodge. Kim looked at the wooden stock and exclaimed ``But that's Russell's. He lost it here two years ago!''. Needless to say, the stock was serving a vital function in the lodge, so the lodge manager was reluctant to return it to its other half, and besides, Russell had only just bought a new pair of stocks to replace his the day before. Wouldn't you know it!.
After a none too comfortable return to Sydney, a visit to an orthopaedic specialist was arranged, and initially the prognosis was that she might not need an operation. The orthopaedic specialist was able to ascertain that the interior medial (collateral) ligament had torn away from the bone, but stated that this can heal itself after a few weeks or so of the knee being immobilised. It was thought that the anterior cruciate ligament was alright. If this had been torn, then full knee reconstruction was inevitable. When, even after a month of physiotherapy, the knee was still not bending properly (Kim managed to get up to 65 degree movement, with 135 degrees being the normal range), it was decided ultimately that the knee would have to be operated on. The surgeon discovered that not only had the knee bled internally and created quite a lot of scar tissue, which was limiting the movement, but also the meniscus had been torn, and needed trimming, and that the anterior cruciate ligament had nearly been severed.
If all this sounds painful, cheer up. Take a panadol, and wash it down with some leftover brandy from Christmas, because it gets worse. Two major events hit the computing industry this year, as measured by column centimetres in the newspapers, or news items on TV. The first occurred when Bill Gates, as in Microsoft, declared the PC operating system (called MSDOS aka MSDOG) obsolete, (although it is rumoured that happened much earlier) and released on an unsuspecting world a new operating system called Windows 95. Russell thinks that refers to year in which it was released, rather than the version number, although he could be mistaken! The trouble was, there are already a number of new (and some not quite so new) operating systems for PCs, including Windows NT, OS/2 Warp, Netware, Unixware Solaris, Linux and FreeBSD. And this is just the PC world. The Distributed Systems Group also look after the (thankfully more staid) worlds of Macintoshes, Sparcs, RS6000s, Silicon Graphics, Vaxes, Alphas as well as mixture of other odds and sods. It is all enough to make your dedicated computer support person file for long service leave!
The other major computer event of the year, was the discovery of the Internet by the mass media. The ``Information Goat Track'' was mistaken by some to be the ``Information Superhighway'' that Al Gore (American Vice-President) said would be a good idea for America. The resulting world-wide traffic jam has made the Internet useless in the afternoons, presumably as Americans get home from work, switch on their modems and go out in search of ``kewl'' information. Nevertheless, the result of this exposure is that now everyone seems to have an email address. So for the first time, the CCSS now includes Russell's email address (see front page).
So what does all this have to do with Russell's work you may well ask? At the beginning of the year, Russell inherited 14 staff (this has since extended to 20 staff under his control) from a combination of the old VMS, Unix, PC and Macintosh support groups. With vast differences in computing cultures between these groups, and in particular speaking completely different languages (or jargon if you prefer), quite a bit of time was spent thrashing out what we meant when we talked to each other. Initially he thought that if everyone in the group each learned to cope with 2 or 3 different operating systems, the ground would be covered, with a bit of overlap on the most important systems.
Then the next bombshell hit. Each of the faculties of the university (who are, after all, our clients) wanted their own support personnel from the Academic Computing Support Unit to work exclusively within the faculty. The number of staff allocated was to be decided according to a formula called WEFTSU ( Weighted Effective Full Time Student Unit - obviously ineffective students don't count!) - Never mind that some faculties received 0.7 people, and others 1.2. This meant that everyone was rapidly shunted out into the faculties, and had to become Jack or Jill (or both) of all trades. The challenge for the coming year is to convince the Faculties that there is some value in having their support personnel as part of a University wide team, and in having any kind of central coordination in computing at all.
On the scientific front, Russell has found it hard to keep up the research due to the new managerial responsibilities. However, he has managed to reproduce and extend the results on evolution he obtained for the Rockhampton conference in 1994. He presented these results at a conference in Canberra in November, during which time he stayed with friends Sue, Scott and Hannah. Interestingly enough, the work has implications for economics, and so he will be presenting a paper at a conference on ``Economics, Evolution and Complex Systems'' in February. He is also looking forward to a trip to Japan for the ``Fifth Artificial Life Conference'' in July.
July and August saw the summer holidays of our Hong Kong based nephew
and niece, Blair and Chaanah. Their time in primary school in Hong
Kong (given they started at age 4) is rapidly drawing to an end,
and so their parents decided it was time to seriously consider
prospective high schools in Sydney. They arrived here with their mother,
Maggie, ahead of their father, Greg. So keen were
they to get into the act, they dug out Greg's and Kim's
old school uniforms (see photo), and were seen on a number of evenings
coming down the stairs to dinner chanting the school songs (taught to
them, perhaps to the chagrin of all others present, by Aunty
Kim). Blair and Chaanah also brought with them some of their favourite
CDROMs (computer games) - Uncle Russell borrowed a CDROM drive from work,
and in trying to attach it to the computer, found out the hard way why
MSDOS is called MSDOG! Aunty Kim and Uncle Russell got quite into the
computer gaming spirit and got quite good at Captain Keen!
Meanwhile, Greg was delayed in his arrival into Australia by having to attend an important conference in Connecticut, which by all reports seemed to have been conducted between the 18th and 19th holes. Upon arrival he was immediately whisked off to Jervis Bay on the South Coast of New South Wales. Pat Sands, handyperson and friend of the family, had kindly offered us the use of his holiday house in Jervis Bay, so we had a pleasant couple of days in the area from whence we climbed Pigeonhouse mountain and Greg, Maggie, Blair and Chaanah went on a dolphin watching cruise to celebrate Blair's tenth birthday.
In the meantime, Kim, pursuant to Greg's request, had organised a gathering in the Hunter valley to celebrate Maggie's birthday, somewhat belatedly in Australia. After much sleuth work Kim tracked down just the spot, which we would have all to ourselves and able to accommodate and feed twenty people. And so it came to pass that people descended from far and wide to the ``Woolshed Hill Estate'' which boasted tennis courts, a swimming pool (admittedly not too useful at that time of the year) and a nine hole golf course (of the non too refined type), which wound its way through the paddocks, over dams and through the odd tree or two. The owners offered Gwen the use of their ride-on lawnmower to navigate through the paddocks but she chose instead to take up Brett's offer to act as chauffeur and drive through the opened gates. Mind you she only did this once. Once she saw the calibre of the players (read hackers) she decided on future rounds of golf that she would persevere and walk the course. It was that or return to Sydney in a newly redecorated Honda Accord! Anyway, suffice it to say that a round of golf was almost de rigueur before settling down to quaff a few of the Hunter Valley's finest (read wines). On occasions however we did forego the golf, but not the wines. To celebrate the birthday the owners of the Woolshed Hill Estate prepared a gourmet dinner in their new guests only dining room. Only minutes before we were due to ascend (a short stroll up the hill to the dining room) we encountered an electricity blackout. A short flurry and brief chaos soon saw us with candles ablaze and a romantic setting for the dinner for 16 people. Thank goodness for gas cooking! We enjoyed the candlelight effect so much that when the lights did return we opted to continue with the candles for light. The following day a number of others descended on the property for a catered barbecue which included amongst other things platefuls of oysters fresh from the owner's oyster farm.
It was then down to the farm, where we stayed in the new 5 bedroom cedar-lined guest accommodation, Brandywine Lodge. This is the much refurbished Woodhenge built by the Mouldens, who used to be business partners with Russell's parents. Small blue wrens pecking at their own reflections in the windows was a common morning occurrence. Fortunately, (more so for the birds than anyone else) they generally did so after nine o'clock in the morning so it was quite pleasant. Rolling out of bed and strolling downhill to the farm tearooms for morning smoko (coffee and cake) was the order of a few of our days here. Then, as the mood took us we would generally partake of lunch and a wine tasting or two at some nearby vineyards before polishing off the left over winetastings over dinner in the evening. All rather hard to take, especially for our waistlines (Kim thinks more damaging for Russell's than her own). At least one of us brought back a few extra kilos, and that's not talking about the luggage!
During the year, Kim had spontaneously taken Russell on a guided tour of her childhood home in Maroubra, Sydney. This set Russell to thinking that, while in WA, it was about time to visit ``the old country'', where he grew up, and to show Kim the lay of the land. Given that this was in a remote part of Western Australia, as you can imagine, this required a bit more organisation than visiting Maroubra. Munglinup, where Russell grew up, lies about 600km from Perth, and a similar distance from the family farm, Rivendell. Esperance, the closest significant town (with an airport), is over 100km east from Munglinup. And so after a week at the farm we set off on what we dubbed the ``Roots Tour''. You could hardly call Munglinup a town. There is only one general store cum service station (but it does advertise cappuccinos!). Munglinup doesn't even boast a hotel - it never has. But it does now have a few street signs to delineate the gaggle of houses that constitute Munglinup. Russell informs me that these street signs are new. And it still has the primary school where Russell got his initial educational grounding. Nowadays it has only about 30 pupils from preschool to end of primary but in Russell's day it boasted around 80 pupils, and at least on one occasion it reached the century mark!
Kim's introduction to Munglinup was a bit of a shock
to the system but she soon got over that and with the warmth of Pat
and Rei (pronounced Ray) Floan (Konrad's parents) she actually grew to
really like the place. Actually it was more the people I think. But
the landscape had a certain charm about it with its flat scrubland
permitting uninterrupted views across the plains to the horizon. It
was quite an exciting time to visit the Floans in that there were
substantial bushfires in the district. In fact the Conservation and
Land Management group, who were coordinating the control of the fires,
was stationed in a couple of caravans on the Floans' property. And,
given that Konrad was there helping to fight the fires we got to see
him a second time. He certainly looked different this time round -
with grubby face and smoke matted hair! It was amazing how he was able
to restore some semblance of order after a shower!
Pat and Rei were wonderful hosts. Kim felt very much a family friend. While in Munglinup we were pleased to be able also to catch up with Pat and Rei's eldest daughter, Astrid, her husband Kevin and their three small daughters. On a separate visit we also managed to catch up with Karla (Pat and Rei's youngest daughter) and her husband Simon and their two daughters, on their ten thousand acre property. The size of the properties in the area was quite awe inspiring.
But of course one of other reasons for coming to Munglinup was to revisit Merri Merri, the 2000 acre property which Russell's parents, Pete and Lu, developed and where Russell grew up. The property was purchased twelve years ago by a German couple, Brigitte and Willhelm Wallerfeld who are still in residence and who were happy for us to visit. We had a pleasant morning with them over coffee and muffins and with Russell commenting on the changes and on those areas that were still the same. He was able to tell the Wallerfelds a few anecdotes of his own. We rambled over the property with Russell showing Kim the river where he and his brothers and father had built a tightrope like jetty and a greasy pole (a pole above water which, when faced with an interloper, the object of which is to knock the opponent off the pole into the water). This river was also where the (in)famous regattas took place. They haven't, we gathered, occurred since the Standishes departure but there was a glimmer of hope, as Russell waxed lyrical about them, that they might be re-instituted by the Wallerfelds. Anyway our visit and re-visit respectively was quite a special time for both of us.
And so we returned to Rivendell stopping off overnight at a charming location in Denmark. We did however have to endure what promised to be a long and bone jarring journey from Denmark back to Rivendell as the car gave every impression of falling apart at the seams if we attempted to go over 60 kms an hour. Fortunately the bone rattling part of the journey was less in duration than it had earlier indicated and we were able to return in a relatively normal fashion.
One of the special events that took place while we were at Rivendell
was the opening of the new room at the tearooms with its polished
floorboards and high ceilinged windows overlooking the cottage gardens
to the verdant tree studded hill opposite and catering to 70 customers
at a time. In addition to this we were pleased to be able to celebrate
a cut out party for the staff at Rivendell (for the uninitiated,
of which I was one, as it was explained to me the cut out party
was/is the term used in shearing circles to signify the end of the
shearing season). (And perhaps a time to hit the booze?) Well we hit
the booze a plenty on this as on numerous other occasions at
Rivendell. We seemed to be forever consuming the leftover amounts from
the days wine tastings. We simpered (not too loudly) that we would
have to return to the East to be hung out to dry! We certainly didn't
complain at all when we discovered on our doorstep a dozen bottles of
Rivendell's finest which Mark and Wendy had considerately freighted to
us as an early Christmas present. Perhaps they thought we would be
suffering withdrawal symptoms by this time! But for us the best part
of this journey to the West was the time that we were able to spend
with all members of the family, something that unfortunately we don't
get to do too often given the 4000 kms of land mass that separates us.
Our house at Clontarf in Sydney has presented fewer difficulties over the year than Canberra. We had a change of tenants in September (the first batch staying just under two years) and experienced no delay in re-renting. Now we just have the usual maintenance problems that are part and parcel of home ownership.
While it was good to see the departure of such uncooperative workers, their departure and that of another (on promotion to Canberra) left a gaping hole in terms of the experience levels in the section. And Kim was still feeling pretty green herself. In addition to this Kim had, following her visits to the Melbourne and Brisbane offices at the end of the previous year, proposed a new structure for the larger states. This was approved and she then had the task of implementing it. This was a total reorganisation of levels and duties. It involved a great deal of industrial democracy, re-deployment of at least one staff member and a fairly large recruitment exercise to fill the new and the newly vacated positions. All this when the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, before whom we take our cases, was demanding that its rigorous deadlines were to be met. Kim recruited three new advocates (interestingly one of the difficult three, the remaining one, secured one of these positions - no prejudice there and he at least had a few months more experience in the area than Kim!). She then recruited three new Assistant Advocates. Anyone who has been involved in public sector recruitment will know just how demanding and time consuming this is. She was just about to go through the process of recruiting the third set of three - three administrative assistants and thereby make up three sets of (ideally) self managing teams - when it was determined that her area was to become part of the NSW state office (although situated in the NSW office her area was outposted to NSW from the national office in Canberra) and the NSW office then issued a recruitment freeze. The Admin positions went on hold. As I write I am still unable to permanently fill these (they are filled but only on a temporary basis) and there are still negotiations going on as to how best to effect the changeover of my area from National to State office.
If that wasn't enough to deal with one of the newly appointed advocates had been allowed to attend College of Law (you will recall I did this a few years back - an essential element if one is to be admitted as a solicitor) and I had therefore had to fill her position with a replacement and then, two of my staff announced that they were leaving - one of them because he had secured a promotion elsewhere, the other to go to Perth where his wife had been transferred. Anyone who knows how much time you have to invest in training new staff and getting them up to speed and how you then have to rely on them will understand how I felt. Especially as there was an external recruitment freeze on. Once again I had to go through a recruitment process. Because of the recruitment freeze I was only able to ask for expressions of interest from within the organisation. There weren't too many takers (the positions require quite specialised skills and most people would find it too difficult, or daunting to have a face a stern faced set of Tribunal members). I had to lobby hard and convince senior management who in turn had to convince the unions that I had simply exhausted all possibilities for internal recruitment and that I needed to advertise externally. I succeeded in this and in fact in the last week before Christmas I was, once again, recruiting assistant advocates.
So just when you are probably beginning to think that Kim and her area were settling down to some degree of stability, Kim decided to apply (an application thrown in at the last minute and without even having time to obtain referee endorsement) for SWIM ( Senior Women in Management), and, then, was selected! SWIM is a developmental program run by the Australian Public Service, in which those selected undertake placements, of their own choosing, during a 9 month period, in 2 or 3 different organisations, in either the public or the private sector. In between those placements there are a series of one week residential and non residential courses in which you get to meet the other participants. There are 30 participants selected nationally each year and hence it is considered to be quite selective. Participants are supposed to be achieving a level higher than the level they are currently employed at and are considered suitable for training to take on broad responsibility in their areas or those in which they end up. Clearly it is quite an innovative development program in which one is expected to negotiate placements in fairly challenging positions. The beauty of this program is that it enables one to test one's wings in a number of new areas without being stuck there if doesn't end up being all that it was cut out to be. At the time of writing Kim has little idea of exactly where or in what capacity these placements will take place but she is assured by the organisers that she should not choose an area too soon or before having a chance to discuss these at an orientation seminar in late February. Nevertheless the process of choice is a fairly daunting task. The scope is so broad. One wants to choose wisely. In Sydney? Interstate? Overseas? In which organisations? Purely management? How to maintain a link with the law? etc. Kim does indeed enjoy her current job and at least has the security of knowing that she will be able to return to it if that is her desire at the end of the program (although she is told that about 80% of past participants have not returned to the same position). The organisation will have to find a replacement for her till the end of the year.
So it's onward, onward, to yet another change (What, more? I hear you say). Life is a never ending source of constant change and new opportunities (with that, my brief expose on philosophy, I will leave you pondering the future until the next newsletter).
Oh one last thing. Just so you don't leave thinking that the year was
all work and no play (if you did erroneously get that impression) (and
to explain the photo of us together) we did manage to find time to
dress up in our finery. Here we are pictured at the Port Jackson Ball
in Sydney to which we were invited and attended with our friend Denis
Wright.
Some of our number have been unceremoniously struck off the circulation list this year due to continued minor and major communications infringements such as not writing, telephoning or making personal contact in some form. Looks like you have hung in there (so far). Have a great year ahead.