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If you have a Ditmar vote to wield and you haven't read Tessa Kum's story 'Acception' (from Baggage - which is still my dream anthology, even after recent events) you might want to check this out: http://silence-without.blogspot.com/2011/03/acception-free-to-read.html

For anyone who missed on the development of the story, check back in her blog over the last couple of years or so. She has some amazing posts about how she pulled the story from her soul, agonising the whole way. My version of events isn't nearly as exciting. All I did was prod and occasionally say "This isn't there yet." Tessa put so much into this story on so many levels - I'm very pleased it's getting recognised.

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I know it's Quantum Poets day today, but we've had to skip a week. Some of the class was missing, and this is not the kind of thing that they can catch up in their own time, so the rest of us made a tactical decision to focus on learning how English has a natural rhythm and how understanding that can lead to the production of perfect iambic pentameters. This took a long time to sort, but it was a most excellent thing to do. It's one thing to give a perfect but theoretical explanation of the iambic pentameter, it's quite another to see students marking up text, their body language announcing boldly "I can do this."

We won't have any quantum physics the week after next, either, because we have an excursion to the National Portrait Gallery. Evil teacher will take over at that point, because there are so many potentially subversive exercises we can do at the National Portrait Gallery. None of them involve defacing art, you will be pleased to hear.

Anyhow, because of two skipped lessons and no diminution in enthusiasm, Quantum Poets will continue into next term.


PS Today's Women's History month post will be put up just as soon as it arrives in my in-box. If it doesn't arrive, I'm afraid you'll have to wait until tomorrow (I already have the post for tomorrow). I'll do you an index of all of them tomorrow, as well, so you can find your favourites or check up on ones you've missed.

PPS There is burning off in the ACT again. They always choose weeks when other things are happening and make my life challenging.

PPPS I'm 3/4 through my paid work for the week. If I'm not careful, I might mistake my existence for a normal one.

PPPPS I should ring my mother sometime.

PPPPPS My students were discussing whether it was a probability or a possibility that there would be rain today. I argued that there *would* be rain today ie that it was a certainty, though I wasn't willing to venture how much. I was right, of course. Or my weather sense was.

PPPPPPS It's too long since I last created a totally unreadable post using the power of the postscript.

PPPPPPPS Speaking of scripts, can anyone (offhand) think of the name of the script used in Northern France in standard Books of Hours in the very, very, very late thirteenth century? I've mislaid both my memory and my relevant reference books. All I can find is Cappelli.

PPPPPPPPS I have more review books! And I never sent the last reviews because life intervened, as life does. A whole bunch will be emailed on Friday, which will cause much astonishment at the far end.

PPPPPPPPPS I am so much in birthday countdown mode. Some of my oldest friends will be in town actually on my birthday (this is a surprise - normally people *leave* town on my birthday, it being a public holiday and all). They're there for the folk festival. I doubt Ernie and co will have time to drop round, Jared will try, and Marilla and my god-daughter have firmly promised. My god-daughter can now walk, and she holds my finger very trustingly. She has a lot to learn...

PPPPPPPPPPS I could see all my friends at once if I went to the folk festival. But it's folk festival now or food in the UK and food in the UK has to be a higher priority. Also, public transport in Canberra is truly unloveable on long weekends and this is the Easter/ANZAC Day/Gillian's birthday long weekend. Not much use paying for a ticket if I have to walk the twenty miles! (It may only be fifteen miles. Or ten. I refuse to check.)

PPPPPPPPPPPS I'm having a mini-folk festival at my place that whole weekend. I'm sorting CDs for it. CDs with friends playing are already on the playlist, and next up are my favourite folk bands. Some Medievalish stuff has already diluted the pure folkdom, also some jazz. Also Ofra Haza. If anyone's in town, not at the folk festival, feel free to demand coffee and maybe a bit of mild dancing. let me know in advance though, because my place is chockers with papers and drying washing and books that are stacking themselves in the most irrational fashion.

PPPPPPPPPPPPS Kaaron Warren's Dead Sea Fruits is still wandering around my loungeroom in a strange and desultory manner. Last time I saw it, it was on my big table, but today it's not to be seen at all. Next time I see Russell Farr I'm going to ask him how he created an ambulatory book. Also, how to get it to stay still long enough to be put away. I wonder if Ticonderoga Press sells chains for certain of its books? Or tethers?

PPPPPPPPPPPPPS I need to pull together my next BiblioBuffet round table interview. I need to send emails. I need to stop procrastinating.

PPPPPPPPPPPPPPS Ignore that last PS, I think I shall edit instead. I feel editorial. I won't edit this post, however. It is a perfect work of art.*


*In the sense that that 'perfectly annoying' is a facet of perfect.

Women's History Month: Jean Hollis Weber

My role in WEL Australia

None of the easily available information on the history of the Women's Electoral Lobby Australia mentions my role in setting up WEL's national office, though I'm sure it's well documented in the records held by the National Library.

(That's not a complaint, just an observation. Many women who contributed far more than I did aren't mentioned by name either, often by their own choice. But I thought I would take this opportunity to summarise my small contribution to women in Australia.)

I migrated to Australia in October 1974 and got a job in Townsville later that year. Fresh from feminist and environmentalist activism in California, I soon became involved with the Women's Refuge and the WEL group in Townsville. With WEL in Queensland and nationally, I could see distinct similarities to some groups I'd worked with in California: local groups served local needs very well, but lobbying at the state or federal level fell upon the groups in the capital cities. This resulted in a lot of work for the capital city groups and a lot of duplication of effort when local groups in, say, Townsville and Rockhampton wanted to lobby at the state level as well.

In 1976 or 1977, the National Conference was held in Brisbane, and I presented a proposal for a WEL National Office, to be based in Canberra. The proposal was based on a similar organisation that I had been involved with setting up in California under similar conditions. There was enthusiasm from some quarters (including women from several of the Queensland regional cities) and a lot of resistance from others. No decisions were made that year, but the seeds had been sown.

The 1978 National Conference decided to form a national office, employing a part-time National Co-ordinator, whose role was to liaise with WEL groups, other women's organisations, politicians and the media, to produce the National Bulletin, and to co-ordinate national WEL campaigns. Funds were raised and grants applied for.

By then I was living in Canberra. For several years I was the (unpaid) Secretary/Treasurer. The first National Co-ordinator, Maria De Leo, lived in my spare room for some time. This was convenient, since the Canberra Women's Centre was just around the corner from my house. Many of the early bulletins and other papers were printed on the duplicator in my garage.

The WEL National Office grew and developed during the exciting years of the early 1980s, leading up to the passage of the Sex Discrimination Act 1984. I remember the celebration across the street from Parliament House (the old one), where my role was uncorking bottles of champagne with great enthusiasm, sending corks flying over the crowd until advised that someone could get hurt and I should desist... which I did.

Later I moved to Sydney, where I was not much involved in WEL, having moved on to other things. At some point I turned over my collected papers and other memorabilia to the Jesse Street Library. Not long ago I found a few stray photos from those early days and was reminded of both the excitement and hopes of the times, and the fact that although much has changed since then, much has stayed the same. But that's a topic for a longer essay and another day.


Jean Hollis Weber is a science and technology editor and writer, now retired from the paid workforce but still active in volunteer work with open-source software (primarily OpenOffice.org, a free alternative to Microsoft Office). She also writes and self-publishes her own books, maintains several websites, publishes Lyn McConchie's Farming Daze books, and travels extensively. In her spare time, she reads science fiction and fantasy and is active in science fiction fandom.