This is a crack up.

On Saturday we (Mitch - My uncle, and Non/Lee - My Grandmother) went up to Gresford for lunch, and then wandered around a local wholesale nursery. The weather was mostly overcast, but I got a few decent shots.

The colour in this lichen growing on a tree trunk was pretty interesting - at first it seemed fairly dull - but fiddling with the colours (a little bit) produced some interesting results. And, yes, the leaves really are purple

This is apparently holly - but I’m not so certain. The red/green contrast is interesting, as is the light shining through the veins in the leaf.

Just a field mushroom growing under a tree - Mitch kicked over the better ones before I could stop him.

(Edited for Clarity)

A few weeks back I asked work to pay for my entry to TechEd 2007 in Queensland, under the understanding that I’d cover all the other costs.

Just for reference, here’s a Summary of Costs (Estimate):
- Accommodation (6 Nights): $1,080
- Flights & Transfers: $650
- Food & Drink: $660

Non-Conference Costs Total: $2,390
TechEd Conference-Only Cost: $1,500 approx, inc GST. (Less for the company rate)

Today (Tuesday) I got word back that they wouldn’t come to the party.  So, now I have to consider whether I can afford the additional cost of the TechEd entry on my own. 

Man, I should have had this before I went to Italy. 

From Italy from the Inside (via Roberto D’Angelo’s MSDN Blog)

Microsoft have, thankfully, changed their decision not to include the Expression suite available to MSDN Subscribers.

Soma announced that Expression Web is available now to all MSDN Premium subscribers.

“I am pleased to say that we will be making Expression Web available starting today to all MSDN Premium subscribers.  We will also make Expression Blend available to MSDN Premium subscribers shortly after the Expression Studio release later in Q2 2007. Expression Blend and Expression Web are intended to help creative professionals collaborate with developers to create rich user experiences for the Web, Windows Vista applications and beyond, which means we need to make sure both tools are readily available to our developer community.”

Thanks to Frank ArringtonArrigo for mentioning it.

Note: This seems to include MSDN Volume Licence subscribers too, since I’ve got it in my list.  Find it in your Subscriber Downloads page, under Developer Tools -> Expression Web -> Expression Web (English).

Edit: Sorry for futzing your name Frank!

No, this isn’t a late April Fools Day joke - there was an earthquake off the Solomon Islands at about 6:40AM this morning, measuring approximately 8.1 on the Richter Scale.

Don’t start panicking yet though: The revised estimate now says that any tsunami would now be “between 10 and 20cm”.

Work has taken it seriously enough though - we got an official warning (given how close we are to Newcastle Harbor), and advised not to leave the building without notifying a warden.

Official Tsunami Warnings: NSW, Queensland.  General Warning.

Australian Government Bureau of Meteorology: Australian Tsunami Alert Service (ATAS).

Image Credits:
Photo #147691 “Defying the Waves” by rpcsilva - c/- stock.xchng
_MG_4505 - By William Hughes