Christmas Parties

 1 December, 2025, Nedlands, WA 6009

Its Monday night, and a big week ahead with lots of work meetings and deadlines, and continued uncertainty (still no news on the grant).

Last weekend got off to a big start. On Friday afternoon we had the faculty Xmas gathering (the first of many Christmas parties in this period), which was fun, although I only stayed a few hours. In between drinks, I got a chance to flag with the business manager Thomas that FOWI's budget is unsustainable! 

Karina, Marylene, and moi

This is Ilker and I (he is one of my PhD students)

Some of the Future of Work folks

Then that evening we had dinner at Elena's. Elena is a somewhat right-winged friend who is heavily involved in politics (she is the partner of journalist Paul Kelly) and who prides herself on erudite philosophical musings. There were two other couples there, Dale and Paul, and Dave and Cathy (I think these were the names). We stayed far too late and ended up in a rather strange argument because one of the women and Elena had a weird obsession with breastfeeding until the baby is at least 18 months and women staying home to look after kids in the first three years. Of course this sort of thing is red rag to a bull for me! Normally I enjoy a good gender-role argument but this just wound me up. The next morning I thought of all the points I should have made - one of the main ones being that there must be a million ways in which your actions as a parent affect your kids, with breasfeeding being a tiny and minor drop in that bucket. I guess its really about these women believing in traditional gender roles with feeding being a useful way to justify that position.

Anyway we were so late home, and I then couldnt sleep (still thinking of arguments), so I didnt get up for my usual swimming at 545am, although I did make it to pilates at 10am. Thereafter I spend the day in the studio putting together my large bird and making another one. We had nothing on on Saturday night -  halleluhia! I was so happy to stay home!

This is my bird

Here it is again. I'm now making one to go with
it as I think two will look good

The only thing I had on Sunday was a "sound sauna". I booked this as one of Mark's music friends was involved in it and Mark suggested it. I had absolutely no idea what it was, having booked it in a rush without much thought. It turned out to be a sauna in a re-purposed shipping container overlooking Bather's Beach in Fremantle. The sea-facing side of the container was a huge window and there was music and occasional speaking piped into the room. 

The first ten minutes were a form of torture as my mind was compiling lists of what I needed to be doing and/or what I wanted to be doing. Gradually by focusing on watching the waves and the birds, I got my mind to slow down. By then I was boiling hot so I went out for a dip in the bay. I did this cycle (sauna, swim) about four times and at the end of the hour I was a convert... I felt revitalised! It reminded me of the value of being instead of doing.  

This is the shipping container/ sauna.

Bather's Beach in Freo that the sauna looked over

One of the voices we heard in the sauna was an older woman talking about her childhood. She grew up on the edge of a small country town so described catching yabbies in the creek and inventing games. Right in front of us were four teenage boys who were throwing mud at each other, burying themselves in the sand, and fishing. I started thinking about all the things we did on the farm as kids. Like driving around the paddocks with tin behind the car and a kid sitting on the tin, or swimming in the water tank, or riding to pony club, or riding around verandah on our bikes with chalk used to create roads and incredibly complex rules aboout overtaking and the like. Very priviledged to have had this childhood compared to today's kids, many of whom are screen zombies.

One thing I am finding is that writing this blog makes me take photos when I normally wouldnt. Like our nice Design for Care Christmas celebration below, at Arian's apartment. Lovely evening, although it was a bit hectic as squashed between delivering a keynote to/ having drinks with the Emeritus Professors of UWA/ Curtin and dinner with Mark/ Andrew Neal.

Celebrating and catching up, Design for Care team

More of the team