University of South Australia - Graduation December 20th 2006 -

TADA! Here I am! I DID IT!!! I had a wonderful day...Vince and I had a really peaceful morning drinking coffee and chatting with Jacinta and her kids (where we are staying in Adelaide). It was incredibly hot, we were feeling pretty warm by 9am and I knew wearing the robes was going to be a mission.

Once I got down to the Adelaide Festival Centre (you can see this on the net) I got rushed downstairs to the robing room, gotten into my gear and the rehearsal began. Because doctoral graduands sit on the stage we have to be walked through the whole prodecure. I was pretty excited, and a bit nervous, the international graduations (I was an international scholar) are a big deal and people come from all over the world to attend. But it was SO much fun, and my friend Sacha graduated with me which I didn't know was going to happen.

Get through the rehearsal and then back downstairs to wait, even with the A/C blasting we were still incredibly hot, it was about 40C by this time (2pm) and I reckon the higher the degree the heavier the robes, and the hotter.

The ceremony went smoothly, I managed to walk across the stage without a problem, dig the bare feet in sandals! Some of my colleagues were in pantyhose and closed toed shoes!!! Mental! Too hot!!! Afterward we went to the Lyric room for drinks with the rest of the academics at UniSA and then Vince and I went out to the Apothecary (a flash wine bar) for a bottle of very good wine and a cigar. So all in all an excellent and very worthwhile day.

We are very very excited Vince and I, its been a wonderful visit back to Adelaide, closure of the Phd and Marie and I have been making plans for the publication of my doctorate and applications for a post-doctoral fellowship!

Jacinta's 5 year old son Joa asked to see my doctorate and when I showed him he said "how long did it take you to do that Mim?" and when I told him he said "and all you got is a piece of paper??" He then remarked that it looked very much like his certificates he gets at kindy, only bigger. I thought that was the cutest thing I had heard in a while, and a good shot of perspective after all the 20th Century Fox stuff...:)


MERRY CHRISTMAS TO EVERYONE!

Vince and I...he is unfortunately missing the top of his head...Tim took the picture, but he looks pretty pleased eh? I managed to make it through the ceremony without crying, but he didn't...he was so thrilled and came running across the hall to meet me when the ceremony was over, it was very very nice. He also bought me some beautiful graduation presents, chief of which was an engraved fountain pen, its just lovely and one I will have for the rest of my life. Will come in handy once I start my post doctoral fellowship...

Phew! This robe is HEAVY!

Myself and Marie Brennan, Dean of Education, Arts and Social Sciences at UniSA and my principal PhD supervisor. This was taken at the drinks afterward, Marie kept her robes on until I made my way to the Lyric Room where the drinks were being held and then promptly shed her robes, as did I (HOT HOT HOT) and we got stuck into some champagne...:)

Sitting down (look for green on top) and trying to not sweat to death in 40C heat, and very heavy robes. It was air-conditioned in the festival theatre, but it was so hot that the AC was having a hard time keeping up...add the spotlights on us to the mix and it was WARM.

You can tell its me by the flash of green in the front of my gown...these are hard to see but they are neat in that it gives the audience perspective of what it all looked like..

This is a bit hard to see but I am standing in front of the Chancellor, you can see the back of my gown and hood down my back...I have a proper photo coming from UniSA of me standing in front of the chancellor accepting my PhD.

Friday, December 22nd - Mim's 41st Birthday Party - Adelaide Australia

It had been very very hot the last couple of days and it finally cooled off a bit for my birthday. For which I was very grateful. These are some of my Aussie friends who were kind enough to come to the shin-dig and it got fairly wild and wooly. Jacinta (who is who I am staying with) made me an icecream birthday cake that was loaded with over-proof chartreuse from her father's stocks when he had a store. Needless to say she heaved the whole bottle in and everyone was fairly off their face by the time it was eaten. I went to bed, slept for 9.5 hours and woke up feeling great, which considering the amount of alcohol consumed was pretty darn fortuitious...one of the best parties ever...

Vince cleaning prior to our departure for Adelaide...it certainly makes for a nice change from prior experience :)

This is our Christmas tree, it is not a real one of course, my green heart can't stand cutting one down...even if it comes for an Xmas tree farm :)

These are my tomatoes against the side of our sleepout - hopefully they aren't all dead by the time I get home!

THis is a picture that hangs in my kitchen, its of Mt.Taranaki. Alot of New Zealand art work is done in very bright colours. The light here is so amazing that the countryside often looks like its in 'bas-relief'...its amazing really.

This is what the lawn looked like...

We had a HUGE thunderstorm. It was hailing so hard when we got off the train from work last week it was hurting to walk through it. And it stayed on the ground as well, the next morning it was frozen solid to everything, we also, as you can tell had a cold snap