Attending the tennis on what may be the hottest day in Victoria's recorded history. Wish me luck! #ausopen

A tennis tournament is a brutal thing. 128 people come to it full of hope, 127 of them go home stewing after a loss. And for half of the 128, that loss was their *only* match. #ausopen

40 degree day on Melbourne. Set up my beach shelter in the backyard. Not to sit in! Goal: protect some of the lawn from being scorched to death. Three tins of beans in each corner; it holds quite well.

At the tennis. Sakkari match was blink-and-you-will-miss-it!! #ausopen

Just saw a TV ad about an "over 50s community"... Couldn't help but think that's outdated. Women are turning 50 while their kids are still in primary, men probably even moreso.

Adam Mastroianni on the merits of reading and writing.

107 years of NO. #greenland

Say what you want about tennis, but the tournament structure? Where 64 matches happen simultaneously and 64 players go home, miserable and winless, before you have a chance to notice them and without a single chance at redemption? That is *not* optimised for TV. #ausopen

you can use bluesky to only follow angry american political accounts. or, you can diversify:

Today I learned for the first time the hypothesis that the end of cigarette smoking is behind the rise in adult ADHD diagnoses. Nicotine tickles the brain in a way not unlike Ritalin and back in the day, people would've chain-smoked their way to some sort of stability. 🚬 Everything has a reaction!

The University of Melbourne is getting off X! (Via Faculty of Science Dean's Circular)

This paper is part of a huge surge forward in scientific understanding of disease. We have gone from not knowing EBV causes MS to unlocking **how** EBV causes MS, *like that*. 1/2

I would like Australia to send some helicopters, and the SAS, and maybe a boat, to Operation Arctic Endurance.

This paper is part of a huge surge forward in scientific understanding of disease. We have gone from not knowing EBV causes MS to unlocking **how** EBV causes MS, *like that*. 1/2

Tree frog came into the backyard. For a kid from Victoria, coastal NSW is like the jungle!

Tree frog came into the backyard. For a kid from Victoria, coastal NSW is like the jungle!

UPDATE: New Bluesky signups in Christmas Day are on pace to exceed 100,000 for the first time since the fallout of "Liberation Day" Japanese users are not done with their mass exodus yet. bskycheck.com

In the hazy interstice between Christmas and New Year, as the sun baked the earth outside, they played long games of "wheel chair race!" in Officeworks. (Apologies to the staff there.)

Suzuki Jimmy has a waiting list for this exact reason.

A year in the life of a B787-9: we tracked Qantas's B787-9 VH-ZNA Great Southern Land through 2025. She's had quite a ride: 🔴472 sectors, incl 5 charters & 7 positioning flights, covering 2.6m nm & avg 5568nm/sector 🔴10 day transit in HKG for heavy maintenance, so she averaged 1.3 sectors/day

I'm reading this weird book, and it contains a big word-of-mouth marketing paradox. Not sure how they resolve this. Will report back when I finish the book.

I wrote a comedic piece about England's cricket performance destroying our summer economy's mianstay. But it's getting beyond a joke now. 🫣https://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/australian-economy/england-cricket-losses-cost-australian-economy-millions/news-story/7988d317497695b5ad41a60d6bca53a6

Here's how Questacon's rubber is going, in case you are wondering. They put it in this funnel in the 1980s to prove it is a liquid. When I first saw it as a kid only a little had dripped down. First pic is this week, second pic is 2023.

Just read The Poppy Wars by RF Kuang. 50% amazing; 50% what? No! Wikipedia tells me she wrote it age 19, which makes perfect sense.

If you like sliver moons in a sky full of colour graduations I recommend an immediate skygaze

There's not just one kind of reading. You don't use AI for furthering your nuanced understanding of a topic you care deeply about, you use it like you use Wikipedia.... 1/2

Mercilessly funny. Particularly liked the line about the English squad probably being back in the hotel pool by day four, engaging in bitter recriminations #TheAshes

Cricket's risk-reward balance could be improved, imo, with this crazy idea: A four should be worth three. A six would be worth seven. #theashes

I wrote a comedic piece about England's cricket performance destroying our summer economy's mianstay. But it's getting beyond a joke now. 🫣https://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/australian-economy/england-cricket-losses-cost-australian-economy-millions/news-story/7988d317497695b5ad41a60d6bca53a6

Bondi is sadly unlikely to be the last hate crime against Jewish people. Post Gaza I expect further hate-fuelled terrorism in Europe, the middle East, and especially in America. Will make things worse for jews, for Muslims, and for freedoms of all kinds in western countries.

This early take was delivered in anger and so might have been dumb. However, it was not.

I visited Substack Notes over the weekend and it felt, not vibrant, not buzzing, not busy. but definitely smart and interesting ... It's a possible successor. I'm not convinced this place has the diversity we need.

Gehry's reaction against efficient forms that tesselate was ... fine. But excessive and indulgent architecture for fancy museums doesn't scale. Make cubic forms cool: that's the actual challenge in arhcitecture.

ASIO. If you work for this organisation hang your head in shame. You failed us dreadfully yesterday. Nobody talks about them because of the secrecy but we are spending billions to stop this from happening. And it didn't work. #auspol

Everyone says they only make sequels and cartoons and superhero movies these days. But I just watched 'Ballad of a Small Player' on Netflix. A feature length movie about Buddhist theology starring Colin Farrell set in Macau, it's not a winner on paper! Credit to Netflix for making it. 1/2

Dear @albomp.bsky.social, Please indulge me a bit of a story… When I was 14, I was living in a regional town where you were nobody if you didn’t play for the right footy club, wear the right surf gear, get invited to the right parties, and generally follow the right crowd.

They asked my date of birth and said I'd need to do some sort of confirmation process. I haven't done it, but I do still seem to be on here.

I was really looking forward to #theashes but England? England are ruining it.

My book club read so many books about WWII we needed a new rule: no more books set in WWII. The problem is Musk has never read *any* books about it.

Been a brutal start to "summer" here in Melbourne. Rained a lot today and didn't crack 20. Has me looking wistfully at Sydney's weather data....

Whenever you see the words "flying taxi" being spouted remember to substitute "road-legal helicopter" to fully grasp how stupid the idea is.

Putting lights on your Christmas tree, it just offers less value at a latitude where it is light until 9pm and then again at 530am! 🎄🌞

Putting lights on your Christmas tree, it just offers less value at a latitude where it is light until 9pm and then again at 530am! 🎄🌞

In the first six months of 2020, I put on about 8 kilos: - Had a brand new baby; - Kid wouldn't gain weight and maternal care was reduced; - the house we shared a wall with got knocked down and rebuilt, loudly; - my dad got cancer and nearly died post-op... 1/2

Television review: The Residence on Netflix is a very good murder mystery. 4.5/5. 🔪🦜🔍

I have never cared much about #formula1 #f1 but you cannot deny its recent inroads into the mainstream. People think and talk about it now. A marketing masterclass! 🏎️

Interesting article here about Deartment of Defence reorganisation. But I want to point out that some of the anger about defence procurement is misplaced. 1/3 www.theage.com.au/politics/fed...

@profanity.accountant and me?

I have Australia's most open-minded 5 year old.

I have Australia's most open-minded 5 year old.