In which the Intrepid Explorer Introduces Himself and Explains the Nature of his Expedition

On a sunny and unseasonably warm morning in March, the phone on my desk at work rang. I was
sipping my coffee and reading my email, and thinking about what I had to do to make sure that
everything was in order before I left that afternoon for a flight to Baltimore to attend an
optoelectronics trade show. I hoped the call was from an engineer I was waiting to hear from,
and that he was calling to tell me he was about to email the story on chillers or CCD cameras or
whatever it was he was supposed to be writing for me.

It wasn't. It was the director of human resources, asking me to come up to her office. Now, I'd
never been called to her office before, and I had no idea what it was about. When I entered, she
and the publisher greeted me, sat me down, and stared at me for a few seconds. "Oh, no!" I
thought. "They've been keeping track of my web use and they're going to complain about the porn
I've been downloading." The calmer, more rational side of my brain stepped in to point out that I
had not been downloading porn, had never in fact done anything more unrelated to work on the
computer than check a movie listing or read a New York Times column. I waited.

The news came swiftly. The company had assessed its needs in light of the falling volume of ad
revenue and decided they had one more associate editor on the magazine than they needed. (I
later learned that they also decided they could do without the chief editor and a person in
marketing as well.) So if I would be so kind as to gather my things and place them in the box that
would be delivered to my desk while I met with an "outplacement counselor," they would be sure
to mail me my severance pay.

Long story short -- unencumbered by a job or any responsibilities, I'm going to Australia.

Email me here

What's coming

So the plan is to update this site with information about my adventures and/or misadventures. Also, if I can actually get photos out of this digital camera and onto the Internet, I'll put those there as well. This should get me out of writing postcards.

Updates will happen when I get around to it, and barring any technical difficulties, hangovers, or the having of something better to do.

UPDATE

Sept. 3: It's father's day in Australia. It's also apparently been spring for two days. How they figure that one out, I have no idea. Anyway, I've added a page about climbing the Sydney Harbor Bridge, and put a couple photos on the Uluru page.

Day One

Random photos

Bondi Beach

Bridge Climb

Uluru

Alice Springs

NOTE: This silly Tripod site-building thing will not allow me to name the new pages. Ignore the "New Page Title" links at the top of the page and use these instead.

I'm way ahead of you

Fourteen hours ahead, in fact, assuming you're on the East Coast of the US and I'm in Sydney. If you're not, and you can't do the calculation in your head, try this site:

this site.

Addendum, Sept. 3: Actually, now the difference is 15 hours. New South Wales and Victoria have gone to daylight savings time early, so there will be plenty of evening light for their Olympic guests. Queensland, South Australia, the Northern Territory, and Western Australia have not. Who knows what Tasmania does. Additionally, the middle part of the country is normally half an hour, not a full hour, behind the east coast. The upshot is I took a 45-minute flight from Adelaide to Melbourne and got there 2 1/2 hours later. I am now missing an hour of my life and I don't know where to make it up.

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