Lovely interview with Chen, including why she wanted to have a career in Antarctic research.

Fantastic concert earlier this week. Lucinda Williams joining Paul Kelly for Australian tour that landed at the intimate MyState Arena in Hobart. Wow. Many great reviews available online from opening concert in Perth say it better than I could.

Several days late, but a few pics from last weekend. Saturday morning Salamanca Market with a snow capped Kunanyi/Mt Wellington. And a full double rainbow over River Derwent on Sunday. Yeah, not bad, Hobart! Not very Spring-like, but I’ll take it!

What program dedicated to the review of new literary fiction starts off with the introduction line, “Books, books, books! We read “em so you don’t have to”?!?

I listened to the countdown before heading out for the evening around #24. Not disappointed by #INXS topping the #Australia #Hottest100! INXS is my favourite Aussie band, having been turned on to them as a young teen in 1982 with Shabooh Shoobah by my friend's punk sister. Onya, INXS! #music

This popped up in my feed and I immediately thought to myself, I know that illustration - that's @edoddridge.bsky.social! I know my @utas.edu.au #researchers. #UTAS

A wet day in Australia. Geography party game: pin the storm centre on #Tasmania.:

The engineer of the 'Cane Train taking care of business for the nation on the #T20 pitch. #Hurricanes

How do you weigh the ocean? An old one for the #geodesy fans here! I'd forgotten how nice this video is 🤩 @noc.ac.uk www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cdtn...

Great way to spend a rainy Saturday - Triple J Hottest 100 Australian Songs. I'm a late arrival, so, I'll hear lots of 'new to me' songs (e.g., 86-Gotye, 85-DMAs), and some I know (91-Whitlams, 89-Amyl and the Sniffers, 87-Gang of Youths). Rock on! #music #Australia www.abc.net.au/triplej/coun...

RIP Sir Guy Green. Sir Guy (he preferred just Guy) was a passionate champion of Antarctica and of the Antarctic Treaty System. As Governor of Tasmania he developed and promoted the Governor’s Forum on Antarctica. I will miss him as a wonderful colleague. www.abc.net.au/news/2025-07...

ABC’s Radio National Hour opened with story on legal definition of genocide and the war in Gaza. Next story about Tel Aviv Univ researchers’ discovery that moths listening to tomato plant can tell if it’s distressed. If they listen to Palestinians what do they hear? www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

I enjoy contemporary restagings of ‘classic’ works and this Carmen sounds well worth experiencing.

In Hobart this week? Want to know more about the enormous Denman Glacier in East Antarctica? 🌊 Come along to this special Island of Ideas event, featuring lead scientists from the #DMV: • 6:00pm - 7:45pm, Wed 23 July, 2025 • Sir Stanley Burbury Theatre @utas.edu.au Register here: bit.ly/3IEhroO

If you don’t want to form government why are you in politics

Labor's Dean Winter describes #TASpol election as "a resounding message that [Tasmanians] want their politicians to work together more collaboratively. ...[W]e need to figure this out. This will take leadership, it will take maturity, and it will take a willingness to work and seek common ground."

"Sunset Hour" My photographs of sunflowers are what I'm best known for & I'm proud to have this photograph displayed in the collection of University of Colorado Hospital 😀 Welcome to #Colorado folks! ❤️ #landcapephotography #landscape #nature #naturephotography #photography #BlueSkyArtShow

Honest question. How does the new HRA definition and the Special Envoy’s Plan to Combat #Antisemitism classify the sentiment below? Anti-#Israel? Certainly anti-Israeli army acts. Antisemitic? How it would be interpreted under the plan?

Listen to @rlhortle.bsky.social on Radio National Hour analyse Saturday’s #TASpol election. Excellent analysis of crappy situation for TAS. Deficits, poor health outcomes, housing shortage, the stadium only politicians want, and no distinction btwn major parties. www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

Wonderful to see gifted palawa musician Dewayne Everettsmith performing his music with #TasmanianSymphonyOrchestra. The #LutruwitaArtOrchestra was privileged to perform Muylatina Tapilti Nayri with Dewayne in Dec 2024, evoking the spirit, memory and energy of Country through site-inspired music.

Need a fun #music boost? Moonsquatch is a collab btwn Moon Hootch and Saxsquatch to produce a funky sax banger that mixes old school hip hop with street folk with driving electronic percussion. Get amongst it! #musicsky

How good has the #TourDeFrance been through 7 stages so far?!? Onya, #SBS, for brilliant coverage and streaming options. Amazing athletes, incredible teamwork and tech, stunning setting, one of biggest & best spectacles of #sport! Loving it! www.sbs.com.au/sport/tour-d...

A great band can play new #music and hook you right in! Wet Leg do just that with this #TinyDesk set. moisturizer released 11 July! I’m ready to get wet!

When my eldest was in year 12 in #Tasmania, they were unable to continue to study #French because no appropriate course was offered IN THE STATE and no approved online pathway to take a language course for credit. So, my student ceased language studies. www.campusreview.com.au/2025/07/why-...

Khaled Sabsabi, his controversial artwork and representation of AUS at Venice #Biennale is fascinating. Many who arguably know little about the Biennale, Sabsabi, his (or any other) #art now discussing. Creative AUS, Government, public engaged. Good result, yes? www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

I spent so much time in the #Texas Hill Country growing up. Ingram, Hunt, Kerrville, Utopia, Fredericksburg, Bandera, Leakey, Luckenbach, Lost Maples, Garner, Enchanted Rock, all the camps, Crider's.... It is difficult to read these stories with such vivid life memories associated there.

Just in case people have forgotten or are ignoring the proposed Hobart #stadium as not big deal, when you #vote, take these images with you. Proposed stadium is wrong project in wrong place. Reposting a story from 2 months ago. #taspol #nonewstadium #incompeTAS tasmaniantimes.com/2025/05/new-...

Ongoing revelations about #Tasmania TT-Line that runs the Bass Strait ferry service between VIC and TAS reveal depth of State Government incompetence. No surprise that company is now likely to require a taxpayer bailout of hundreds of millions of dollars. Another government created TAS money pit.

Covid on the increase in #Tasmania, along with flu. "The best thing people can do is stay up to date with vaccinations and stay home while unwell." Consistent message that vaccines are "a simple, safe and effective way to protect you and your family...." #vaccine #health

Some of Lutruwita (Tasmania)'s finest proponents of Persian music, dance and poetry join the Lutruwita Art Orchestra to present an epic fusion of music and culture, spanning jazz, Western classical, experimental art music and folk traditions. Info & tickets: www.theatreroyal.com.au/shows/nghmh-...

"The evidence is clear and publicly available: #Vaccines have dramatically reduced childhood illness, disability and death on a historic scale."

You won’t be disappointed by the exhibition ‘Our Stories: Contemporary Indigenous #Weaving’ at the Cairns #Art Gallery. There are works from Sonja Carmichael, Shirley Macnamara, Paula Savage & many other artists. The exhibition’s on until 14 Sept. See: www.cairnsartgallery.com.au/whats-on/exh...

Remember to block AI 'bands' on Spotify so you don't accidentally support this bullshit as Spotify pushes it into everyday playlists and suggested songs

Oy! Can't women, public servants, multicultural communities, dual citizens, immigrants, people living in inner cities, young people, students, and minority groups in general just take a joke?!? Buncha snowflakes, the lot of 'em!

Excellent article by @imas-utas.bsky.social researchers into extreme low Antarctic sea ice events having substantial impacts across physical, ecological, and societal systems: ocean warming & increased iceberg calving rates; habitat loss; logistical challenges for national Antarctic programs.

Mercury article states: new Spirit of Tasmania IV and V ferries expected to be operational by Oct 2026. How is that possible when Devponport berth scheduled for completion in Feb 2027? Spirit IV, to arrive in TAS in 2021, was completed in 2024, 3 yrs and hundreds of millons over budget. #incompeTAS

Congrats to Sarah Rhodes, artist and lecturer @utas.edu.au - awarded an ABC Top 5 residency, the peak program for emerging academic communicators. At ABC’s Southbank Melbourne studio, Sarah will learm with journos and producers and create a media piece for ABC online. www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

I am amazed by the capability of ASKAP to detect a radio burst that "consisted of an extremely bright pulse lasting a few billionths of a second, and two dimmer after-pulses, for a total duration of 30 nanoseconds." #physics #science #radiotelescope theconversation.com/a-strange-br...

There is no grester an investment a government can make than in the educaiton of its citizens.

Some solid recommendations in the Fig. And depressing stats in the Comment: "Gambling companies are no longer eligible for the R&D tax incentive, but they basically pocketed a year's worth of tax-payer funded collaboration between universities & industry." Wow. That's outrageous and typical.

Australia’s icebreaker RSV Nuyina completed its first marine science voyage this year, taking 60 scientists to one of the most unexplored remote parts of our planet: the Denman Glacier region 🌊 Join the voyage science leads at this special Island of Ideas event - Voyage to Antarctica’s Floodgates ⬇️

I am not fashionable. And I am completely engaged in this article, the people and their choices, and the statements made by their wardrobes in each instance. Respect for @antoinettelattouf.bsky.social has increased as I read this. You GO. I’m inspired. I’ll pay attention even though I’m hopeless!

More details on AUS Laureate projects. Our researchers are primary reason @utas.edu.au is #1 global uni for Climate Action (THE Impact Ranking). Diversity of research approaches: both will focus on Antarctica, with King from Geography, Planning, and Spatial Sciences, and Reading from Physics.

The “looking back” view from my office window today at @utas.edu.au. #ShowYourStripes for climate change awareness. The coloured stripes represent temperature change in Tasmania relative to average of 1961-2010 (deg C). Level 3 breezeway of Centenary for anyone on campus.

Congrats to @utas.edu.au Profs Matt King @deformedearth.bsky.social and Anya Reading, recognised as ARC Australian Laureate Fellows! Prof King's project: 'Tracking and predicting the evolution of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet' and Prof Reading's: 'The expedited discovery of subsurface Antarctica.'

Summary of analysis of Tasmanian migration and demographic trends by @lisadenny.bsky.social, an Adjunct Assoc Prof @utas.edu.au. What is state doing to retain crucial 30-34 yr old cohort? Crucial insights into the demography behind the population numbers.

YouTube added to banned social media sites for AUS youth under 16 yrs of age. While many platforms can claim educational applications, whether one agrees with ban or not it's logical to include if aim of legislation is to prevent exposure to harmful content. Implementation still problematic.

Is anyone in TAS Liberal and/or TAS Labor parties hoping to be elected to new State Parliament next month having similar revelations?

Future looks brighter for those with diabetes. Aspecthera Pty Ltd, a @utas.edu.au spinout, awarded $500k of fed funds to advance novel treatment for diabetic retinopathy (blindness). Eyedrops may one day replace current treatment - lifelong regular visits to ophthalmologist for injections into eye.

Today's column is on Tasmania, its tricky relationship with its natural beauty, national conservation laws and state election politicking.