I've been away from the blog for a while, mostly because life has just made things too busy - I'm lucky to even check my mail, let alone write a blog entry. Work, renovations, and as you might have guessed - I'm pregnant again - this time we're adding a boy to the Rynne family clan - due around the beginning of December!

Anyway, I was happy to let the blog just sit until I was ready to start up again, but unfortunately, spammers have ruined that great plan, and have just been caning my site, and consequently my email, and so I have now disabled comments.

Apologies to any die-hard readers (I doubt there are any left) who may have wanted to leave legitimate comments, but until I have time to start monitoring the site comments (or spammers finally get shut out of the internet once and for all) will remain disabled.

I guess this day was inevitable...it's been coming for, oh about 9 months now. I have officially joined the ranks of the non-employed - in fact I've been out of work for over a week now. The 15th December marked the end of my pre-parenthood working career, and it's been very strange. I feel very guilty about not going to work, especially with Tim still going off every day, and me not able to do anything more than lumber around the house all big and clumsy.

Anyway, we have finally finished preparing our nursery and got through Christmas, so now we are just in waiting mode. Technically we still have about 8 or 9 days to go, but apparently babies are notoriously bad about not showing up on time, so we are trying to be prepared for anything.

Hopefully I will still find some time to keep my head somewhat familiar with work - that seems far less scary than the great unknown which is having a baby!

On Friday night, Tim & I went to see the U2 Vertigo concert. All I can say is "wow". U2 haven't forgotten how to perform live, and I wasn't disappointed.

It's been quite some time since I went to a concert, and honestly, the last big, outdoor concert I went to was probably last time U2 were here for their Zooropa tour back in the early 90s. I mean, I've been to indoor concerts, and concert festivals, but there really just aren't that many bands anymore which can pull off an outdoor stadium concert on their own. U2 still know how to "bring it". The concert was great - described by a friend as "high tech - low tech". It didn't have as many of the bells & whistles as Zooropa, but the use of screens & lighting was fabulous, especially for those of us at the back.

We bought these tickets last year, for the concert which was originally scheduled for March this year - long before I was pregnant. Luckily, I anticipated that I was old at least, and we opted for seats, rather than the general admission tickets. Although I was watching the mosh-pit jealously at several points during the show, I have to admit that at 32wks pregnant, I was certainly grateful for the seat!

Best of all - it was almost a "best of" tour, with songs from just about every U2 album making it into the line-up. Given Bono's political fervour, it was also pleasantly mostly about the music, with only a couple of interruptions for political messages. Obviously the "Make Poverty History" was pushed, along with a new "CoExist" message - an attempt to encourage religious coexistance (Muslim, Jew & Christian only - I guess all the other religions are considered to already coexist?), but both messages were tied neatly into songs, so it was handled pretty well.

One fun thing to note - although the tickets clearly said "no cameras or recording devices", as soon as the band came on, you could clearly see the tell-tale white lights of mobile phone screens/cameras lighting up the stadium. This was welcomed, and acknowledged, by the band during the "Make Poverty History" portion by turing all the lights off and getting everyone to hold their phones up to create a "Milky Way". It was pretty amazing actually - I guess holding up the cigarette lighter at concerts has been replaced with technology!

As if it's not enough that we finally have proof that Americans killed Phar Lap, now they've gone and banned our national icon, and favourite food, Vegemite.

From a country which has no problem with selling guns at the local department store, it's hard to see what's so scary about Vegemite that would cause it to be banned. The dangerous ingredient - folate. Yes, that's the same folate that is encouraged for women, particularly pregnant women to help avoid having babies with neural tube defects. Apparently, a technicality exists that only allows folate to be added to breads and cereals, and Vegemite breaks this all-important rule.

The real problem, of course, is that this rule is now being enforced, even on unsuspecting Aussie travellers, very few of who depart our shores without a tube or jar of our beloved breakfast spread. I can safely say that over the last 12 years or so I have travelled to 15 countries across the Pacific, Asia, Europe and North America and have always carried Vegemite. Quite frankly, when I lived in the US a few years ago Vegemite and Australian chocolate was all that got me through - so my sympathies go out to the ex-pats now living in the USA.

In November last year I wrote a post asking the question "Does IBM(Lotus) Australia still
exist?". Although it's taken almost a year, that question was answered last night, and
happily it appears the answer is "yes".

Last night was the reincarnation of a Sydney Lotus User Group - to be maybe dubbed "Lotus
Energizers" (as SLUG or SNUG just don't cut it!). The turnout was huge (standing room
only), probably in no small part due to the fact that Ed Brill was the key speaker.

Although I know Ed has made trips to Australia a few times in recent years, I can't
remember the last time we had a quality US Lotus/IBM speaker available to the general
community as opposed to specific customers/business partners - probably since the last
Lotus Fusion conference around 5 years ago.

The numbers in the room meant that the session didn't really have a "user group" feel to
it, but the presentations from both Jonathan Stern and Ed were excellent. In addition to
some of the traditional marketing/sales figure stuff, we got a great feel for some of the
things coming up - 7.02 and Hannover specifically, along with a quick demo of Hannover. I
think it was a nice balance between future developments which are good to know, but too
far away to be practical, and real here-and-now features, particularly to a room where
only a handful were on Notes 7.

Technical info aside, the most positive outcome of the night was the buzz in the room.
People came out of business hours, to an out of the city location, and didn't rush off
immediately afterwards. Sure, there was beer (well, not for me), but there did seem a
real feel in the air that people were very keen to try to (re)create a local Lotus
community. This was also backed up by the strong message that IBM are committing to
increase their presence in the market. The committment from Jonathan was:
- to host regular events
- to increase PR
- to increase advertising (although no committment to out-market m$ft which would be a
futile effort anyway)
- to increase customer contact (which sounded like a revival of the old days I referred
to in my post above - regular visits to customers to see how things are going).

Another positive was the feedback form provided which asked, among other things, about
the interest in bringing back Lotus Fusion or something similar. I would be surprised if
they don't get a near perfect "Yes" result for this. Hopefully we will see some
interesting developments in the next 12 - 18 months. The positive sign that this may
actually happen is that the next event is already being prepared - a visit from Mike
Rhonin towards the end of October.

So, overall, it was a good night, with the promise of more to come.