Little By Little [Annotated] [Active Links] The Cruise of the Flyaway

In was founded in Built in , it was the place at which Ned Kelly, who was hanged in , and notorious gangster, Squizzy Taylor. Under the program, there are daily tours, and a comprehensive display and exhibition held within the goal. The Callington Mill in Oatlands, Tasmania, right, is a local landmark.

It dates back to and was once the major flour mill in the region. The site was developed as a major attraction for visitors to the region. Quitting at any age will give you immediate benefits and reduce your chance of developing any type of smoking related illnesses. With planning and determination a person can quit and never smoke again. Tobacco smoke is toxic and contains more than chemicals.

At least 70 of these are known to cause cancer. Many chemicals from tobacco smoke pass through your lungs and pass into your bloodstream and are carried around in your body. Nicotine is the addictive drug in tobacco smoke that can make quitting difficult — but not impossible. INCREASE the risk not only of lung cancer but also many other types of cancer — including cancer of the mouth, throat, bladder, stomach and pancreas. CAN cause or contribute to many other health problems — blindness, osteoporosis, etc.

Tobacco smoke in the air comes from both the burning end of a cigarette and from the smoke breathed out by a smoker over family members, friends, co-workers, etc. This exposure to second-hand SHS can cause heart disease, lung cancer and increase breathing problems in non-smokers living or working with smokers. Children, too, exposed to SHS are more likely to suffer from health problems.

Good reasons to quit are simple: Breathing will improve within weeks; and food will smell and taste better. The Heide Gallery, in Heidelberg, Victoria. In the same area, which was the beginning of a strong tradition of Australian modern art, stands the famous Heidelberg School of the s. Enter the movers and shakers of the new venture in the s. This exhibition recreates the experimental display at a local newsagency at Heidelberg.

Sidney Nolan would try anything as long as he sold some of his work. The exhibition re-creates this remarkable but little-known venture. It brings together the surviving compositions which have been identified through photographs … taken at the time. In March , a mighty explosion took place in Australian magazine-land!

The controversial magazine Cleo was shutting up shop. When Cleo arrived in , it created excitement and pizazz in Australia. Her name was Sadie Gale and she had been on the stage since she was three years old. She even beat my father. She was a star in her own right. She retired when my sister, Milo, and I started high school and she thought that it was the right thing to do.

She decided to be our mum. Up to then she played soubrette roles and principal boys, and she was a very beautiful woman. She and my father would never encourage my sister or me to go into showbusiness. Dad was always aware, however, that it is probably one if the hardest businesses in the world. Friends and parents … would come home and see mum and dad studying scripts for a new show.

They would think that it was all fun and games. Show business is a very tough business. As far as father and mother were concerned, there is not a better business. Dad was pretty well liked. In fact, I would go so far as to say that everybody loved my dad. He was a soft touch, though. In those days he was being paid fairly well, and even though he made lots of money while he was working, he certainly did not die a wealthy man.

Yes, he definitely was a soft touch! People like Tilly DeVine thought he was a wonderful person. Then at the other end of the scale he had judges and people of the legal fraternity who were his friends.

On reflection , it was really a funny combination of people who would come to sit in the audience and listen to my father. Opposite, on the corner of Hunter and Phillip Streets, there was a hotel. Dad would happily flit from the Law back to the cut-throats and thieves without any problem. He was one of their mob and they were one of his mob! The funny part about it, though, Dad was very unsure of himself. He had to be constantly reassured by his colleagues and by my mother.

You know that sort of thing. He really was very unsure of himself and always wanted to do better. He was a professional through and through. Dad was a complete professional in every way. I was twenty-two years old when he died. I was just getting to know him as a man. Dad would discuss contracts or a show … and it was nice relationship to have.

That was so sad, because he died before I had a chance to really spend a lot of time with him as an adult — man to man. We were a very, very close family. I think my father was the best, no, the greatest comedian that Australia has ever produced. I say that with all sincerity. God bless you dad! My name is Sam Van-der Sluice. That might mean something to you!

What sort of man was Mo? Harry was born on February 15, , in Hindley Street, Adelaide. He was the son of a English Jewess and a Dutch Jewish cigarmaker. He had two brothers and four sisters. He started his showbusiness career when he was He used to sing in the gallery in a falsetto voice. Rene became Roy Rene. Later, a stage door keeper by the name of Bill Sadler claims that he, Sadler, gave him the name of Roy Rene Mo because of his moustache. The last three were stage names.

As far as the very early years of his showbusiness life was concerned, that is. We had a lovely life together. My father, my mother, my sister and I lived in a home at Kensington. It was a lovely home: I remember every time he used to swing into Cottenham Avenue, Kensington, where we lived. And it was a happy road.

He loved all the children and they loved him — despite his moustache! He was happiest when he was doing both — with his family and the stage. He could love them and yet hate them. The greatest thing that can happen to any performer is when they hear that round of applause. Or when they get that lovely belly laugh, which is so great. Her name was Sadie Gale and she had been on the stage since she was three years and four months old.

For many, many years, she was a star in her own right. Up to then she played soubrette roles and principal boys and she was a very beautiful woman. In fact, I think at eighty years, she still is a very beautiful woman. Living alone in retirement? Anne, who has been retired for five years, discovers that being alone is not the same as being lonely. While working and bringing up my children single-handed, there were many things that I had neglected.

Since then I have managed to make amends in some spheres. Her role was to become part of the tribe that went to evening classes in English, which might have annexes that flow from that. Anne took to writing for pleasure. Next, I turned to one of the loves of my youth — music. And no neighbour had yet complained about the few scales and five-finger exercises which I found necessary. If I do find myself getting a little depressed, I find playing my piano really lifts my blues!

No one can know this. In retirement, reduced bus and rail fares, visits to cinemas and theatres are a great boon. The numerous emails I receive, and the replying to them, gives me quite a kick. At year-old, our newest friend in the villa is skirting around the world for 12 months as a last hurrah. I look for Skype to catch up to my relatives and friends. Increasingly, you are one of the people who own their home.

This can be a great comfort to you that you are safe from rising rents. The mortgage is paid off and the house is yours. But then you find other problems arising. You are getting older. Maintenance on a house keeps rising. Even the routine decoration jobs are expensive. After a lifetime of working hard, the old habits die hard. Join the throng that are going the right way. As he looked over La-La-Land, from his front porch, he saw that every animal was leaping around. He thought he might try it again. He leapt so high he thought he would never come down. He plummeted down to earth and rolled all the way to the river.

With all that leaping around the Black Rabbit began to feel tired himself. He looked at the other animals and they were still leaping. I know La-La-Land like the back of my hand, but this is ridiculous. The rabbits were bright-eyed and full of smiling. Each rabbit was standing around the bush holding a piece of multi-coloured tape.

They emerged minutes later with a pile of school books, some wrap and string. And off to school went the four rabbits. I ran to meet them. And I joined in. All five of us were singing and dancing. Ben Hall was only young when he was shot by police. So Ben became the first bushranger to be outlawed. A week later, he was dead. At the age of 27, shot dead by police on the morning of May 6, He appealed to the tracker to finish him off but suddenly there was another hail of bullets and Hall was dead. There were 36 bullet wounds found in his body. Hall was born in In there was a spate of bushranging films to add to the drama already on display.

Both in television and movies the spectacle has never stopped. Two days later, at the Glaciarium, a large audience witnessed the first production of an Australia Biograph film. The picture presented a seamy side to the life of Ben Hall — the Notorious Bushranger. For John Vane, he did not lack exciting incidents, despite its conventional ending. Here is synopsis of the story: Beginning a downward career, John Vane bails up a Chinaman. Vane captured by police. Vane is then released by his sweetheart. Vane suffered from remorse and leaves the gang. Vane surrenders to Father McCarthy and is sentenced to 15 years.

Alcohol — moderation is the key word. How much can you drink? Large amounts depress the appetite and habitual heavy drinking will cause liver damage, leading to impaired digestion and detoxification of harmful substances in the body. This, in turn results, eventually in physical and mental deterioration. There is no simple no safe limit — it will not only vary between individuals, but on mood. And how much have food you have eaten. Is alcohol a problem? Experts agree that a person drinking more than six schooners a day or a bottle of wine, is running a risk. He or she will most likely send you to an organisation who will help you to stop drinking.

He did not want to meet anyone. He wanted to slumber. That was one of the fantastic things about La La Land. It was just magical. There were giant trees touching the sky, hills that flow into valleys, rivers that ran for ever and day. And there was daylight all the time. Then he heard in a noise in the background. Was it a sound? Was it a squeak? Actually, where am I? Are you some kind of rabbit. Let me introduce ourselves. My name is Edison Bilby and this is … hey, come out of that bush will you … this is Sandy Bilby. We are both at you service.

We come from Australia. It had been definitely proved by scientists that flies transmit over 30 different diseases — some of them could be deadly. People are apt to brush a fly away from their food mechanically; or flick a fly out of their cup on with no further thought … of drinking that cuppa; or eating a piece of bread that a fly has just walked over. Drastic efforts should be made to destroy flies and their larvae.

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All garbage should be incinerated or covered until removal. Manure in stables should be raked up daily and the heaps rammed down so hard that the great internal heat generated will kill any eggs. In the home, an approved exterminator should be sprayed. Not only does it kill flies, mosquitoes, moths, silverfish, fleas and cockroaches, but the housewife who sprays daily will protect her own health as well as the health and comfort of her family.

Both Sandy and I would be given as an official gift to William, Kate and baby Cambridge of the royal family when they come to Australia. And then it happened. We ran, and we ran and we ran until we dropped down exhausted. We were done in. We slept and nothing would disturb us. And then we ended up here. You find chocolate replicas in the shops. So there, there, there! Blackie gathered his wind. The bilbies would have been faster if they managed to keep up with Blackie. They were very, very tired instead.

If you have any chronic illness, it is important to see your doctor before you travel. The doctor may prescribe and supply an adequate supply of any specific items you might need to take with you. Os Mingay was a lucid writer and had a sense of humour. He was thoughtful and quick-witted; his mind was as sharp as a tack. He simply was an amazing character. Mingay was a radio pioneer in the early s. Eventually, he was to organise many of the historic wireless transmissions in Australia. By the s, he had become a highly skilled radio pioneer who had organised many of the historic wireless transmission in Australia.

An executive from radio station 2UW said: He is giving a series of lectures on wireless. He served as an AIF signalman in the Second World War and when he returned to Civvy Street he continued with his publishing venture, which he had set up in Mingay was a lucid writer. He had a sense of humour, and was quick-witted and thoughtful, and he had a mind as sharp as a tack.

He could be rather pugnacious, too, if he ever got himself into a corner. Mingay patterned his weekly on Time magazine, of which he was a great admirer. He was dedicated to quality reporting and Time-style layout, simple and unadorned. His Observations column was compulsive reading, even by the office boy. The august editor J.

Squire, of the New Statesman and later, London Mercury, described of his fellow scribe, thus: The company celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary in It was a euphoric years. The Anniversary issue of his great weekly -- a thick, spiral-bound edition -- which was appropriately printed in silver ink. I joined Mingay Publishing Company and did my cadetship in When I left five years later, he wished me luck.

As I entered the building that day in , which I recall, was next door to a cigarette shop, there were about 20 steps to the first floor. The building was just like it belonged to a newspaper of that period. I remember well all the newspapers I went to over the years. All that I heard was lots of talking and the clicking of typewriters. For five years, I must have gone up and down those steps umpteen dozen times. I got in the front door and the phone rang. Squires must think the four crooks are going to explode, thought Knight.

They just as well might, you know, he thought. Four murderers with guns are down there for a reason, he thought again. Knight ran the story through his head. He could be a bastard at times, thought Knight. Knight gleefully put his hatted figure on the unmade bed. He then went to sleep. In no time at all, he was awake. Fortunately, the science team was led by an "all star" crew today, including Steve Squyres as Geology Science Theme Lead. I have been working for Steve as science lead for the Microscopic imager, the close-up camera on the MER instrument arms.

The Opportunity mission continues to be operated from the floor above the one where the MSL team has been working, so I reminded him that upstairs he's still my boss. It was great to have such expert support today, and we put together a good plan. Mid-way through the planning process we learned that the SAM instrument checkout planned for Sol 14 would have to be spread over two Sols because the successful completion of the first part of the checkout would have to be confirmed by analyzing the results on Earth before the second part could start.

To avoid having to spend an extra sol to get this done, we scrambled to move the first part of the checkout into the Sol 13 plan. I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say that it was not easy. We handed the new plan off to the second shift, and hope that they will be able to implement it. It was exhilarating and I'm glad I had the opportunity to serve the project in this role, but I'm also glad to have a break for a few days. I'm hoping to get more sleep tonight and to catch up on all the other work that has been piling up over the past week.

I'm also looking forward to having more time to analyze the data we have received from MSL and attend the Science Discussion meeting, which always conflict with tactical planning meetings. Having completed the SOWG Chair shifts assigned to me over the past 4 days, I didn't have to get up before dawn this morning.

Fortunately, everything we planned yesterday worked well, and the ChemCam team was ecstatic about the results: What a great day for the ChemCam team! I was hoping to spend more time looking at RMI data and catching up on other work today, but ended up having to prepare a presentation on the plan for characterization of the Mastcam cameras. We didn't have time to fully test all of the capabilities of Mastcam before launch too much other testing to do , so we'll have to take a bunch of Mastcam images of Mars to determine how best to focus the cameras and compress the data, among other things.

The Principal Investigator of Mastcam, Mike Malin, has not been feeling well, so fellow team member Jim Bell and I volunteered to prepare and give a presentation at the daily "science discussion" meeting this afternoon. Jim is more familiar with the Mastcam experiment than I, but he was on shift as Science Uplink Representative today and couldn't attend the science discussion. So I gave the presentation and answered a few questions about how and when the Mastcam characterization will be done, hopefully in the next few days.

As described in the article, the outlook for Astrogeology is not very good, but the article is accompanied by a picture of me smiling happily.

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So a few of my colleagues asked my why I was smiling. The picture was taken while I was in Flagstaff last Monday, and apparently the photographer didn't know how it would be used, because he asked me to smile as I recalled the recent successful landing of MSL. I guess he should have take some pictures of me looking depressed just in case, but I'm hopeful that Congress will recognize that the Mars program is a source of great national pride and restore NASA's Planetary Science budget.

Anyway, I'm enjoying being involved in an exciting rover mission while I can. The MSL mission continues to go very well, with the first movement of the rover wheels planned for tomorrow. The tactical operations team continues to take on more challenges, planning more and more scientific observations each day. I spent most of the day on strategic planning of the Mastcam characterization sequences, trying to figure out how best to fit them in among the other activities planned for the next few sols.

This was a refreshing change from my previous focus on tactical operations, but all of this work is interesting. InSight, a mission to explore the interior of Mars using a seismometer, will keep at least a few engineers and scientists busy, avoiding further layoffs.

This was especially good news to me because I was concerned that the engineering expertise at JPL that enabled the successful Mars Pathfinder, Mars Exploration Rover, MSL, and other missions could have been lost if more layoffs were necessary. Once these engineers are lost to other companies, it would be nearly impossible to get them back at JPL in the future. Not only would may of them put down roots in other places, many private companies pay engineers more than they are paid at JPL.

First the bad news: The REMS meteorology experiment team confirmed that two out of 3 wind sensors on one of the two booms on the remote sensing mast are permanently damaged and cannot be used. They are getting good wind data from the other boom and are working on getting as much information as possible from the one working sensor on the other boom.

The most likely explanation for the damage is that the descent rockets threw dirt up on the top of MSL during landing, but it will be a while before we can take pictures using the camera on the arm to confirm this. The other sad news is that one of the leaders of the engineering team, Jake Matijevic passed away last weekend.

I enjoyed every interaction I had with him, and along with the rest of the MSL team will miss his contributions to the latest, most ambitious rover project. And now the good news: More cheers and applause today as MSL successfully deployed its arm and wiggled its wheels in preparation for its first drive. The first drive was planned today, and everyone is anxious to see the results tomorrow morning.

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It will be a short 3 m drive, then a turn in place followed by another short drive, intended to check out the mobility system. If all goes well, we will be able to plan a longer up to 10 m drive next. After the drive is complete, the rover will take a bunch of images to determine exactly where it ended up, and to allow more observations to be targeted from the new location. ChemCam continues to work well, returning data of better quality than expected. More cheers today when the rover planners drivers reported that the first MSL drive went perfectly. It wouldn't be much of a rover mission if we couldn't drive, so this was very good news.

I feel extremely fortunate to be involved in yet another successful Mars rover mission--we are now 4 for 4 Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity , with 2 rovers still active. I spent most of the day continuing to work Mastcam characterization sequences into the near-term plan. In addition to the daily tactical work, many people are focused on planning what the rover will do for the next week or so. I've been representing the Mastcam team's interests in these strategic planning discussions and meetings, and despite numerous constraints and evolving scientific goals, it has been going fairly well.

But it struck me today that it is a bit strange that I have been so focused on Mastcam. To explain, I must first summarize how I got involved in the first place: In , many teams of scientists were preparing proposals in response to NASA's announcement of an opportunity to develop, test and operate instruments for the MSL mission. The company was founded by Mike Malin after he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship "genius grant" in In addition to consolidating the design and test efforts at MSSS, the 3 science teams were merged into one big team.

While I didn't foresee my recent heavy involvement in Mastcam planning, I was happy to contribute to the team effort. I recognized the importance of getting the Mastcam characterization data needed to improve the quality of the images as soon as possible, and jumped right in. Hopefully this effort will pay off--we expect the first results of the focus and stereo tests tomorrow morning.

Watching this, with the audio from the mission support area dubbed in, brought a tear to my eye. The significance of landing successfully on Mars using an entirely new, incredibly complex system, is still sinking in. I am very fortunate to be involved in such an endeavor. The MARDI team has started reprocessing the raw images onboard the rover to return higher-quality versions. Of course, it will take a while to transmit all of these larger images to Earth, but the results will be much better than the images we have on the ground today.

This is possible because each of the color cameras has its own memory module that is used to store raw uncompressed images as they are acquired. The raw images can therefore be reprocessed as desired and then queued up for transmission. This is obviously a nice capability to have, but the MSL team is still learning how to best take advantage of it. As the performance of the radio link to the Mars orbiters continues to improve, data are being received at an unprecedented rate, so we are reprocessing color camera images to take advantage of the better data rate.

We've started getting Mastcam characterization data on the ground, and the key focus test data have allowed us to modify the command sequences sent to acquire more characterization data with the focus quality needed to make use of them. It's nice to see my recent efforts paying off, but of course it takes many people working very hard to make it happen.

Today we planned a sequence of images intended to determine how well we can measure the topography of the surface far from the rover using "long-baseline stereo. Our brains interpret the information from both eyes to tell how far away objects are, and cameras can be used to do the same thing. The distance between our eyes, or the "baseline" between cameras limits the distance at which this method works. The longer the baseline, or the greater the distance between cameras, the better the ability to measure distance.

So our plan is to take pictures of Mt. Sharp, many kilometers from the rover, before and after moving the rover about 10 m. In order for this experiment to yield useful results, the camera must be properly focused. So it was good to receive some of the data from the focus test in time to plan this next experiment.

A different song is played at the beginning of each Martian day sol as the daily bundle of commands are sent to the rover. I'm not sure who picks the song each day, but this is a tradition that extends back to previous Mars landers. For example, here's a video to go along with today's wake-up song. It's great that people are taking the time to put together such videos, and I hope they are fun for the public.

We were glad to see this capability demonstrated on Mars, because we would like to use it a lot in the future. The laser is focused on a spot less than 1 mm across, and the chemistry of rocks and soils is commonly variable on the millimeter scale. So multiple samples are needed to properly characterize the elemental composition of each target, and the laser rasters will be useful in this regard. The SAM atmospheric sample test ran to completion, verifying that many parts of this complicated instrument are working well.

This was the last SAM characterization test planned, and the team applauded the achievement of this milestone. Now SAM is ready to acquire and measure a sample of the Martian atmosphere. I was sorry to hear today that Neil Armstrong, the first person to walk on the Moon, passed away. I plan to take a day off tomorrow, before I begin a string of tactical shifts on Monday. We had a scare this morning when the Sol 21 data we expected to receive through the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter MRO was not received on time.

Just as we were starting to put together contingency plans for Sol 22, most of the data were received from MRO 1. Happily, the Sol 21 drive 4. It was encouraging that the team was able to recover from the 1. Overall, the tactical team has gotten much better at putting together complex plans, so we are able to include more and more activities each day. The rover drivers are ready to test more advanced driving techniques and software, but we stayed put today to finish the last of the Mastcam characterization activities the second half of the long-baseline stereo experiment.

So we had more room for new science observations in today's plan than we have before, which was a challenge for the science team. Lots of good ideas were brought forward by the various science theme groups, including ChemCam measurement of rocks and soil, images of the sun and sky to look for clouds, even neutron spectrometer measurements of hydrogen up to 0. When the usual weather and radiation "background" observations were included, there was a lot to prioritize and fit in. But we did a pretty good job of fitting in everything we could.

Unfortunately, there were enough little problems with recent ChemCam activities that we had to delete most of the ChemCam stuff from today's plan. On the brighter side, removing them gave the second shift crew much more confidence that they could get their job done in time to send the commands to the rover. And we continue to learn how to do our jobs better and get more science from MSL. The highlight of the Sol 24 plan is to test some of the software that will allow the rover to avoid obstacles automatically.

If the test, involving taking images and processing them onboard the rover, is successful the rover will drive farther toward our goal, called Glenelg. This location will have a good view of the intersection of 3 different terrain types, where we should be able to study the relationships between these geologic units and therefore interpret their history. But to get there quickly we will need to use the "autonomous navigation" that we are starting to check out. After the drive, we have some time for science observations, which were the focus of the science team's efforts today.

It was my last shift as SOWG Chair for a few weeks, and went more smoothly than yesterday's planning. The biggest problem today was that the data volume expected to be relayed by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in time to plan Sol 25 is very small, probably not enough to return the images we need to plan another drive. Hopefully we will get more data through MRO than expected, and we prioritized the various data products accordingly.

If we don't get at least one stereo pair of images of the terrain in front of the rover after the drive, we will have to stay put for a sol. Obviously, this wouldn't be a problem, but we would like get to Glenelg soon, and it is about m away. We received confirmation that the last of the Mastcam characterization data were acquired, so we were able to plan new Mastcam observations today.

This was a relief to the science team, and especially to me, as fitting it all in to the plans over the past week required a lot of planning. As predicted, we didn't receive enough data through MRO today to allow us to plan another drive. So while we wait for the images taken after the Sol 24 drive to arrive, we planned a bunch of images to be taken on Sol MAHLI is on the end of the instrument arm, which has not been checked out on Mars yet, so we can't use that camera yet.

Eventually we hope to use MARDI to take images as MSL drives, but that won't be possible until the next version of the rover's software is uploaded and installed. So my job today was to find the best time to take such an image. The rover planners drivers didn't have much to do today, so I asked Matt Heverly, the rover mobility lead, to help me figure out whether this image would be in shadow or sunlight. Using this information, Matt modeled the shadow of the rover in the fancy software the rover planners use to build drive and arm sequences, developed at JPL.

We had planned a MARDI image on the afternoon of Sol 24 when the surface under the camera was fully shadowed, but didn't know whether it was successfully acquired because it was taken after MRO flew over MSL and received a burst of data from the rover. I thought that it would be interesting to see what the surface looks like when fully illuminated by the sun, and Matt's modeling showed that the surface would be in sunlight after 4: Before that time, the rover would shadow the surface, but later the sunlight would pass under the rover for about an hour before sunset.

So I suggested adding this observation to the plan at low priority, and the Geology theme lead agreed to include it. Because it didn't conflict with any other suggestions from the science team, it was included in the final plan that was submitted to the second-shift uplink planning team! So my work paid off and I look forward to seeing both the shadowed and sunlit images of the same spot.

The best news today was that analysis of more detailed ChemCam engineering data showed that the problems noted a few sols ago were very minor and now completely understood, so the instrument can now be used again! While we suspected that the problem was not serious, it was very nice to receive confirmation. We finally received the images needed to plan the next drive, so the Sol 26 plan includes a checkout of the "visual odometry" software that will be used by the rover to precisely determine how far it has moved using images taken during the drive.

Once the data from this and previous driving tests are received and analyzed, all of the rover mobility software will be validated. Of course we are hoping that all goes well, as visual odometry will allow MSL to approach targets accurately enough to put them in the "workspace" of the arm. Even if the rover slips in sand or on a steep slope, it will be able to automatically account for any slip and get where we want to go.

This will save lots of time in the future. The tactical team's workday always starts in the afternoon at Gale, when the rover sends data to the orbiters as they fly overhead. We then work all Mars night to analyze and understand the data MSL has sent to us, then plan what we want the rover to do the next day in time to send the commands the following Mars morning. So today the first shift came in to work in the Earth afternoon, and the second shift will work through the Earth night, finishing up as the sun is rising in Pasadena.

Because Mars' day is about 40 minutes longer than an Earth day, our workday will begin later and later in Pacific time. The Sol 26 drive went well, and the images taken after the drive showed some interesting outcrops right in front of the rover. The focus of the Sol 27 plan is primarily the first sampling of Mars' atmosphere by the big SAM instrument, so there wasn't much time to do anything else. Now that ChemCam is working again, the top priority is to acquire better observations of its calibration target, and 77 minutes were allocated to do that. But when we saw the new outcrop target, the science team wanted to take pictures and zap it with ChemCam's laser.

So Steve Squyres, the Mineralogy Science Theme Group Lead for today, asked the Tactical Uplink Lead Pauline Hwang whether she would be willing to consider adding more time to the plan for additional scientific observations. Steve's plea was well enough received that Pauline agreed to give the science team 40 more minutes to work with. There was much rejoicing, and Mastcam and ChemCam observations of the outcrop were added to the plan.

When I left JPL a couple hours ago, it appeared that they would be approved and included in the commands to be sent to MSL early tomorrow morning. I wasn't scheduled in a tactical role today, but I couldn't resist spending most of my day at JPL. MSL mission operations are just too much fun to miss! Because I didn't have to focus on today's planning as much, I was able to catch up on some other tasks, including processing new MARDI images to determine how much they can be compressed and still preserve the details needed for geologic interpretation.

I had been meaning to get this done long ago, but was too busy with other work. So far it looks like we will be able to reduce the size of these images without significantly degrading them. We must make the most of the precious bits we receive from MSL through the Mars orbiters, so I need to complete this analysis soon. I was planning to stay on "Mars time" while in Flagstaff this week, but it would have meant less time with my family, so I haven't been sleeping very late. This has allowed me to call in to Mars Exploration Rover planning meetings at 9 AM and catch up with what Opportunity has been doing.

After over 8 years roving on Mars, Opportunity is exploring the rim of a km diameter crater that shows evidence from orbit of clay minerals that were probably formed during a more Earth-like period in Martian history. I'm the science lead for the Microscopic Imager MI , the close-up camera like a geologist's hand lens on the end of Opportunity's instrument arm. The rover is now investigating an outcrop that is unlike any we have seen before. The MI just acquired a 2x2 mosaic of images of this outcrop. The abundant spherules seen in these images are generally smaller than the hematite concretions found on the Meridiani plains by Opportunity, and broken ones show more internal structure than the concretions.

So they don't appear to be the same kind of concretions, but more data are needed to understand this rock. Today we are finalizing a plan that includes brushing the dust off of this outcrop, taking 4 more MI images to confirm that the brushing worked, and placing the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer on the brushed spot to get elemental chemical information. There are other interesting outcrops in the vicinity of the rover, including some brighter ones that may contain more clay.

I will be working graveyard shift, but could drop in on Opportunity planning meetings after my MSL shift if I'm not exhausted. With so much rover activity on Mars these days, it will be difficult to sleep! My next shift starts at 9: I walked in during a science team meeting regarding "data management" which sounds boring but is very important to the team. In addition to the rover computer's ability to adjust the priority of various data products to be sent to Earth, each of the color cameras includes an 8 gigabyte buffer for storing raw images.

So we can acquire panoramic mosaics of many images and return only small "thumbnail" versions of each image while storing the full-resolution images in the camera buffer.

Once we have looked at the thumbnails, we can return just the full images of most interest. Obviously this is a nice capability to have, but it means we have to do more work to keep track of the data onboard the rover. His instrument has been working well, and he wanted to discuss the results of the RMI compression testing I mentioned last week. We were both too tired to have the conversation then, and agreed to talk later.

But I summarized my conclusion that, while the test data in hand are useful in determining the optimum compression parameters, more test data are needed. Meanwhile, the focus of near-term rover activities will be checkout of the arm. Over a month into the mission, there are still cheers at JPL when first-time activities are completed successfully. Last night, the latest successes included the first Chemin X-ray diffraction pattern of an empty sample cell , and the first MAHLI image with its dust cover open.

So there was some concern that the dust raised by the landing rockets had gotten under the cover onto MAHLI's optics. The beautifully clear MAHLI image received yesterday showed that any such dust contamination was insignificant, and that the camera is ready to go. So the Sol 34 plan included many MAHLI images of calibration and other targets on the rover, as part of a thorough checkout of the arm pointing. The checkout includes a mosaic of MAHLI images looking under the rover, to look for any signs of damage incurred during landing.

The camera, which can focus at distances from 2 cm to infinity, is working perfectly! It also took pictures of its calibration target , which includes a Lincoln penny. Unfortunately, ChemCam suffered a command error on Sol 34 and was shut down by the rover computer. This also prevented the rest of the planned remote sensing observations from being acquired that sol, and the remote sensing mast RSM from being used on Sol So the Sol 35 plan was rather simple, including more APXS integration on its calibration target followed by retraction of the arm. Even though we couldn't use the RSM, we could still plan a test of Mastcam's video capability, as it doesn't matter where the cameras are pointed for this test.

We are all hoping that recovery from the ChemCam error will be rapid, and that we will be able to use it and the rest of the instruments on the RSM tomorrow. The checkout of the MSL arm continues to go well: The Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer returned its first data, of its calibration target on the side of the rover. I was busy last night planning a bunch of MAHLI images to be taken as part of the verification that the arm can be accurately placed over the inlets for Chemin and SAM, the mineralogy and organic chemistry instruments.

I also helped plan Mastcam "sky flats," images of the sky to be used in measuring the variations in response of the camera detectors across their field of view. Taking pictures of the sky is one of the techniques used by astronomers to "flat field" their instruments, typically during evening twilight before a night of observing through a telescope. It's a bit more difficult to use this technique for the MSL cameras, as their fields of view are much larger than typical observatory instruments, and more of the variations in brightness across the sky are visible.

To allow the shape of the sky brightness variations to be measured, we planned a small mosaic of images around a central image that will be corrected for these variations. Right after these were approved for the Sol 36 plan, I remembered that the Navcams can be calibrated using the Mastcam observations, so I asked if they could be included at the last minute.

Fortunately, the leaders of the planning team agreed to add them! Fortunately, I won't have this problem for long, as the MSL work day will keep shifting later. Tonight my shift starts just before midnight and ends at By then the traffic should have cleared somewhat The ChemCam instrument was confirmed to be safe, but will not be used again until Friday to give the ChemCam team a chance to rest and regroup. The team met at the end of the planning day 7: By the time of this meeting I had been up all night, so I was pretty tired but it was a good meeting, and kept me off the freeway until rush hour traffic cleared a bit.

We were also able to plan one image at exactly the same time of day as one taken on Sol 32, to look for changes on the surface due to winds. So I sat down with one of the rover planners to look at how much the rover shadows the MARDI field of view at various times of day. I always enjoy working with the rover planners because their visualization tools are so COOL.

They allow a model of the rover to be placed on the 3-D terrain derived from stereo images and illuminated by a fake sun. So we planned a couple images in the late afternoon and one earlier to span the range of illumination. Based on the preliminary results of the compression testing I've been doing, I recommended more compression of the fully-illuminated images, to reduce data volume without sacrificing image quality.

Details in shadows are more difficult to preserve when the image is compressed, so we left the partly-shadowed image at the default minimal compression. Although I'm not staffed in a tactical role for a few days, I plan to stay involved in tactical operations on Mars time, as shifting between Earth and Mars time is difficult these days. With the successful execution of the last of the MSL arm checkout activities , the characterization phase is complete!

Many first-time activities still lie ahead like drilling, scooping, and delivering samples to the mineralogy and organic chemistry instruments , but the major capabilities of the rover have been demonstrated. So after spending over a week in the same place to complete the characterization, the Sol 38 plan included a meter drive toward the east. The near-term goal is "Glenelg," still a few hundred meters away few hundred meters away.

Images taken from orbit show that Glenelg is at the junction of 3 different terrain types, the brightest of which may be ancient lakebed sediments. It will take several sols to get to Glenelg, and we are hoping that the driving goes well. The drive went as planned, and left MSL next to a nice outcrop During the drive the DAN instrument monitored neutrons coming up from the subsurface and noticed significant variations along the way.

It's not known at least to me what causes these variations, but possibilities include hydrated minerals, water ice unlikely? Another drive is planned for Sol 39 about 20 meters this time , so a bunch of images of the outcrop were planned before the drive. Unfortunately, we aren't expecting to get much data through the orbiters tomorrow, so we probably won't see these images for a while. Worse, we may not get enough Navcam images after the Sol 39 drive to plan more observations in the new location. The amount of data that can be relayed to the orbiters depends on how high in the sky they pass over MSL, which varies a lot day to day.

Therefore, telemetry rates are set low to ensure that we get at least some data while characterizing the radio link with the instruments turned on. The instruments are resuming scientific data collection after the hiatus for MSL. Once again, the drive went well, and we are 20 meters closer to Glenelg, our near-term goal.

The terrain surrounding the rover at the end of the Sol 39 drive is not as interesting as the previous location, so we didn't plan many observations besides those needed to support drive planning. But the plan included some ChemCam observations, as the instrument team is now ready to resume tactical planning.

The Sol 40 drive will be a bit longer, over 30 meters, and should get us to a low ridge that will give us a better view of the terrain ahead. I was reminded again today how diverse the MSL team is. Okay, white males make up the majority of the team, but women serve in many of the most important roles, including Mission Manager, Deputy Project Scientist, Tactical Uplink Lead mostly women , and Science Theme Lead. Most impressive is the number of team members from foreign countries, including Spain, Russia, and France, for whom English is a second or third language.

They are required to understand all of the team discussions and respond to questions in English, despite the highly technical nature of the subject matter. Some of the engineering jargon is unfamiliar to many of us who are native English speakers! Once again the drive went well and we planned another drive on Sol The terrain is relatively featureless in this area, so we are focusing imaging plans on distant targets. We are on a relatively high plateau so the views toward the rim of Gale crater are better than they were from the landing site.

The path to Glenelg is mostly slightly downhill from here, so the distant views are as good as they will get for a while. The amount of time we have to plan each sol's activities is a bit shorter than usual these days due to unusually long delays in relaying the data from MSL through the Mars orbiters. So we are not able to plan as many scientific observations, but are still able to drive each sol.

ChemCam is working well and returning good data again. The Sol 41 drive went well, but we are still on relatively featureless terrain. We planned another drive for Sol 42, and a huge Mastcam mosaic from the new position. It is pointed toward Glenelg and the surrounding area, and will be used to identify interesting targets for future investigations.

Another first-time activity was completed on Sol Active neutron spectrometry during the drive. These data will allow variations in hydrogen most likely in hydrated, or water-rich minerals within about 1 meter of the surface to be measured in greater detail. Such variations have already been detected between the places the rover has stopped. Our work schedule is getting closer to normal workday hours, with first shift starting around 4 AM these days.

By the end of September our schedule will be close to that of most Earthlings in California! A couple of transits of Mars' moon across the face of the sun were observed by Mastcam. These are similar to solar eclipses on Earth, but because the Martian moons are so much smaller than Earth's moon, they do not completely block the sun. But they are still fun to watch and scientifically useful, as they allow the position of the moons to be determined and their orbits to be precisely updated. The rate of change of the moon's orbits is affected by the interior structure of Mars, so in a way the transits are geophysical observations.

On the morning of Sol 44, the rover will wake up early to look for frost or fog before dawn, then take a big Mastcam panorama toward the northwest while the lighting is good. Once again, the rover planners drivers displayed their ability to position MSL accurately, leaving the rover right where we wanted. The Sol 44 plan included Mastcam color imaging of " Jake Matijevic" that will be used to decide whether this rock is suitable for the long-anticipated arm activities. The rock was named after a pioneering JPL robotics expert who played a major role in the development and operation of the Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, and MSL rovers.

I am lucky to have known Jake; we met during preparations for the Mars Pathfinder and Sojourner mission in the mids. He would have loved to see how well MSL is doing. We all celebrated the Mastcam images of the Phobos transit. I've enjoyed astronomy since I was a child, but astronomical observations from the surface of Mars are a special treat! Similar observations have been made from the Spirt and Opportunity rovers, but the new Mastcam images have much higher resolution.

At a press conference at the Venice Film Festival , Kidman addressed the controversy saying, "It wasn't that I wanted to make a film where I kiss a year-old boy. I wanted to make a film where you understand love". That same year she appeared in the black comedy -science-fiction film The Stepford Wives , a remake of the film of the same name. Kidman appeared in the lead role as Joanna Eberhart, a successful producer.

The film, directed by Frank Oz , was critically panned and a commercial failure. Also that year, she starred in Bewitched , based on the s TV sitcom of the same name , opposite Will Ferrell. Neither film fared well in the United States, with box office sales falling well short of the production costs, but both films performed well internationally.

In conjunction with her success in the film industry, Kidman became the face of the Chanel No. She starred in a campaign of television and print ads with Rodrigo Santoro , directed by Moulin Rouge! The three-minute commercial produced for Chanel No. Both Kidman and Downey Jr. In , she starred in the science-fiction movie The Invasion directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel , a remake of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers that proved a critical and commercial failure. She then starred in the fantasy-adventure, The Golden Compass , playing the villainous Marisa Coulter.

In , she reunited with Moulin Rouge! Kidman played opposite Hugh Jackman as an Englishwoman feeling overwhelmed by the continent. The acting was praised and the movie was a box office success worldwide. Kidman, whose screen time was brief compared to the other actresses, performed the musical number "Unusual Way" alongside Day-Lewis. The film, directed by Philip Kaufman , [71] began shooting in March , with an air date scheduled for In the film, she portrayed death row groupie Charlotte Bless, and performed sex scenes that she claims not to have remembered until seeing the finished film.

In April she was selected as a member of the main competition jury at the Cannes Film Festival. In , Kidman starred in the biopic, Grace of Monaco in the title role that chronicles the crisis, in which Charles de Gaulle blockaded the tiny principality, angered by Monaco's status as a tax haven for wealthy French subjects and Kelly's contemplating a Hollywood return to star in Alfred Hitchcock 's Marnie. Opening out of competition at the Cannes Film Festival , the film received largely negative reviews.

For the first time since her eyebrows turned into solid marble arches, the Australian Oscar winner is truly terrific". On 23 January, she starred in the Australian-Irish drama-thriller Strangerland , which opened at the Sundance Film Festival to a "rapturous" audience response to Kidman's performance. Other projects include the biographical drama Queen of the Desert , alongside James Franco , with Kidman portraying the lead role of traveller, writer, archaeologist, explorer, cartographer and political officer Gertrude Bell and Genius alongside Colin Firth and Guy Pearce.

She starred as British scientist Rosalind Franklin in the production from 5 September to 21 November , directed by Michael Grandage. Kidman and the play earned "glowing reviews". In , Kidman's performance in Lion earned rave reviews, as well as nominations for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress , her fourth nomination overall, and her eleventh Golden Globe nomination, among others.

She portrayed Sue, the adoptive mother of Saroo Brierley , an Indian boy who was separated from his birth family, a role she felt connected to as she herself is the mother of adopted children. It's as good as anything she's done in the last decade. Kidman garnered critical acclaim for her performance, with Matthew Jacobs of The Huffington Post stating that she "delivered a career-defining performance". She is controlled and in control, unflappable. Her genteel manners and femininity co-exist easily with her toughness.

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Kidman starred in two dramas, the crime thriller Destroyer and the coming-of-age drama Boy Erased. In the former, she played a detective troubled by a case for two decades. A Memoir , and features Russell Crowe and Kidman as socially conservative parents who send their son played by Lucas Hedges to a gay conversion program. Richard Lawson of Vanity Fair credited all three performers for "elevating the fairly standard-issue material to poignant highs. She has finished filming her supporting role as Mrs. Kidman has been married twice: She has four children: The couple adopted a daughter, Isabella Jane born , [] and a son, Connor Anthony born To me, he was just Tom, but to everybody else, he is huge.

But he was lovely to me and I loved him. I still love him. Both denied the allegations, and Kidman won an undisclosed sum from the British tabloids that published the story.

Nicole Kidman - Wikipedia

In a Vanity Fair interview, Kidman revealed that she had been secretly engaged to someone prior to her present relationship to New Zealand-Australian country singer Keith Urban , [] whom she met at G'Day LA , an event honouring Australians, in January Following criticism of The Golden Compass by Catholic leaders [] as anti-Catholic , [] Kidman told Entertainment Weekly that the Catholic Church is part of her "essence", and that her religious beliefs would prevent her from taking a role in a film she perceived as anti-Catholic.

Kidman has donated to U. In the Australia Day Honours , Kidman was appointed Companion of Order of Australia AC for "service to the performing arts as an acclaimed motion picture performer, to health care through contributions to improve medical treatment for women and children and advocacy for cancer research, to youth as a principal supporter of young performing artists, and to humanitarian causes in Australia and internationally".

In the beginning of , Kidman appeared in a series of postage stamps featuring Australian actors. In , Kidman became the brand ambassador for Etihad Airways. Kidman supports the Nashville Predators , being seen and photographed almost nightly throughout the season. Additionally, she supports the Sydney Swans in the Australian Football League and once served as a club ambassador. Kidman's discography [] consists of one spoken word album , one extended play , three singles , three music videos, ten other appearances, a number of unreleased tracks, and two tribute songs recorded by various artists.

Kidman, primarily known in the field of acting, entered the music industry in the s after recording a number of tracks for the soundtrack album to Baz Luhrmann 's motion picture Moulin Rouge!

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The composition became the eighth-highest selling single by an Australian artist for that year, [] being certified Gold by Australian Recording Industry Association , [] while reaching on the UK Singles Chart at number twenty-seven. The track, recorded as a duet with English singer-songwriter Robbie Williams , was issued on 14 December , by Chrysalis Records as the lead single of his fourth studio album Swing When You're Winning. The song peaked at No. Volume 2 by Rok Lok Records.

In , she and Nicolle Gaylon sung backing vocals on her husband, country music singer Keith Urban 's song " Female ". In , she was given the American Cinematheque Award. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Honolulu , Hawaii , U. This section needs to be updated. Please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. List of awards and nominations received by Nicole Kidman. Retrieved 27 October Archived from the original on 16 October Retrieved 25 March Retrieved 22 October Archived from the original on 27 April Retrieved 11 February Nicole Kidman's father's legacy of nurture".

The Sydney Morning Herald. The New York Times. Retrieved 9 December Retrieved 12 September Archived from the original on 7 May Retrieved 11 January Episode 3 - BBC". Retrieved 10 May Nicole Kidman, Citadel Press, , p. Archived from the original on 10 November Retrieved 9 November Archived from the original on 22 June Talent Develop Quote from Talk magazine.

Retrieved 26 March Nicole withdrew from all acting jobs and enrolled on a massage course so that she could relieve her mother's suffering with physical therapy.