It is that time of the year again. I am not here only to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, but also to provide an Event Report for 1996. This task has been put to me for quality and objectivity assurance. That is what they told me anyway. But all of us know that Rob and Hild are just (pretending to be) so busy at this time of the year.

Looking back they were busier earlier on. The year had not grown very old before they decided to take on a new hobby. Unlike most other new hobbies this one seems to have lasted for almost 12 months now. They took to the streets hunting down the ultimate components to build their own computer! Now, some of you may find this thought exciting and challenging, whereas most of us find it totally ridiculous. After all, we do have specialists for this particular task - assembling computers and handing them to us in an operable condition. Apparently this latter point is of some doubt to Rob and Hild, thereby encouraging some DIY. So they gathered the bits one by one: motherboard, pentium chip, RAM chips, video card, hard disk, power pack, box, modem and a lot of nuts, bolts and cables. Using spare parts from an old and battered Norwegian 386 they finally ended up with something at least looking like a desktop computer. All the left-over nuts, bolts and cables did not seem to bother them at all. However, against all odds, the computer spoke to them from the word go. In the thrill Rob and Hild named it 'Peter the Pentium' and the modem was named 'Felicity the Faxmodem'. Together they joined the other mechanical instruments here with: 'Archie the Answering-machine' and 'Frank the Fridge'. Since that day 'Peter the Pentium' has behaved himself well, apart from a mid-year personality crisis. This was easily solved by the provision of more brains (RAM chips and CD-Rom) and vocal cords (Sound card with loud speakers). Hild can now enjoy working along with Loose Windscreen singing in the background.

In spite of this extra incentive to stay in Perth, Hild found that she desperately needed a break from bush-living. So she packed her little portable 'work station' and jumped on a plane heading towards Europe. It was not easy leaving Rob behind, but she is getting (too?) good at it now. She went straight to Manchester to hassle her supervisor a bit. He had escaped Perth 6 months earlier - hoping for some peace and quiet, but that was over an hour after Hild landed. Morning, noon and nights were spent working very hard on her PhD project. Not that she is particularly eager or conscientious, it was more a lack of better things to do. However, she did take all possibilities to visit "long-lost" relatives in the area. There were trips ranging between the Lake District and Chester. Apart from the social gains, Hild has later told me - in confidence - that all those long hours at the University of Manchester may not have mounted to much. Things did not really start to happen (work wise) until she packed up and went to Newcastle for a conference. There she was exposed to the whole range of UK agricultural economists. If you are (un)lucky, she may reveal some juicy stories involving unnamed individuals from the encounter in the East! Hild claims that the necessity to suppress their real names is important in case she has to ask one of them for a job in the future.

While all this was going on in the North, Rob was wondering on his own in the South. By making sure he or 'Archie' was at the phone every time Hild decided to call him he gave the impression of always being at home. I know, and all of you will suspect, that this was not entirely true. At least we know that rugby training every Tuesday and Thursday is a must, and so are the Saturday rugby games in and around Perth. However, nasty rumours tell me that he also spent more than the average amount of time with rugby-guys. Hild put a stopper to that as soon as she got back, but 3 months later was a long time. He was also spotted wondering around an avocado farm, come winery, come holiday resort, 30 minutes north of Perth (Carabooda). I can not vouch for this, but it would not surprise me if it was true. If you confront him he will obviously claim that he was working.....yeah right!

Well, Mr and Mrs Potter (as some like to call them) managed to geographically coordinate their lives so that they could meet at Rygnestad for the Easter celebration. They had ample chances to visit those that wanted a visit - and a few more. On top of that they experience the start of lamming season and were fed according to Norwegian Standards (Read: Plenty of food). Hardly a day passes by now when they don't tell endless tales of their time at Rygnestad. The only think friends can cling to down here are pictures and long descriptions from Rob and Hild - often with extended use of arms and legs. Friends with large eyes listen carefully to stories of snow, skiing, snow-scooter driving, hunting dogs, sheep dogs, babies, new houses, old houses and house extensions. It is, of course, little that any outsiders can comprehend from these foreign and extravagant words, but that does not stop Rob and Hild. Things get even worse when stories of sheep rearing and lambing at Rygnestad are being told. The numbers of listeners often decrease rapidly then. Such incomprehensible stories are way too much for citizens of a country where - if they maintained a representative majority, 70% of the Parliament would be of the Merino breed......

After such exciting times at Rygnestad the time had come to break camp. This was also where the geographically coordinated part of 1996 ended. Rob zoomed off to Wokingham outside London to visit parents, siblings and so on. Hild, on the other hand, had to get off in Copenhagen - here we go again with more work (in fact it is more like studies, but she insists on calling it work - even if it is unpaid...). Rob had a beautiful week with lots of fun in 'not-so-sunny-Wokingham'. It is always a great day when 'the baby' comes home from Oz so people where lining up to greet him and talk to him - but even more so listen to him! Yes, because they would not have a choice in that situation. Rob does not rest until everybody within 200 m radius knows how things work in Oz. He claims that it is his duty to keep the world informed on these issues (even if the world really does not care). As would be expected, time flew for the Potter-Klan. The time ran out and it was about time to head South. According to first-hand information Rob had to get back to duties in the lab and on the rugby pitch - on the other hand it may have been to get away from Hild who was getting ready to come across the Channel. Hild had lived in hotels in the centre of Copenhagen. She claims that it was fun and rewarding in many ways. The area around the hotel was rather dodgy, but with trainers and a huge rucksack one is quite safe..... Various offers of the odd 'restricted substance' almost threw Mrs Hild, but with a broad Norwegian dialect mixed with Aussie expressions took care of that. After two weeks begging for data at various Danish institutions she (and them) had had enough. She had so much data that it has lead to buying a bigger computer! (That is at least what she tells everybody).

Now it was Hild's turn to challenge the Potter-Klan in Wokingham, but Rob had already got away. This did not stop Hild. She took some time off to go shopping in London, of course. What came as a bit of a shock to everybody was that she did not buy anything at all. Evil rumours tell that she did not have any money left (When I have confronted Hild on this issue there has been no answer, just a quick excuse and some mumbling about being late and off she was). Five days with chatting and social get-togethers flew by, and suddenly she was back in Perth. For the first time in 2.5 years Hild had organised the Euro-trip at the wrong time of the year. She came back to Perth in May - just in time for the first day of winter....great...

The winter disappeared in a fog of lab work, computer work/play and French course. It was quite confusing for a while when Rob and Hild decided to keep the weekdays English, the weekends Norwegian and the evenings French. Believe me when I say that it was not pretty. As expected it did not last many hours and they went straight back to English. Even if the knowledge of French did not increase after several months of not-so-hard work, they do have some nice stories to keep the conversation at parties going. Fun things happen when one mixes languages, as when Rob mixes Norwegian and French. While trying to refer to a piece of clothing on a fellow student Rob asked if the person had a 'slips' on. This may not be too funny but using 'slips' in the French sentence does get funny when 'slips' means 'a tie' in Norwegian and 'underwear' in French...oops...never mind. There was a lot of laughing and a bright red French student (not Rob). Also not unexpected, Rob and Hild ended their French classes soon after this episode and the search for new uncharted territories started......

The next victim of Mr and Mrs Potter was the PDA (Perth Diving Academy). Apparently there was a deal saying that if Rob came with Hild to French, Hild had to come with Rob to do SCUBA diving. And off they went. First they breezed through the medical test and the first day of theory. Just then Hild started thinking that she had not seen any people at 20 meters below the sea level before, and there was probably a reason for this. In the hunt for an explanation she came to the conclusion that it was best to grab a hold of the pool wall at 0 meters and never let go. Most people that saw the hullabaloo believe that she was frightened and scared stiff, but Hild emphasises that such words do not exist in her dictionary. Rob, on the other hand, steamed on with the theory test, diving in the pool and in the ocean. He even had to sit at the bottom of the ocean and take all the diving equipment off and put it back on again. According to Hild this only strengthened her opinion that this was madness. I am still not sure what happened, but after 6 weeks Hild showed up at PDA again and finished her SCUBA diving course as if nothing had happened. It is not obvious, but something must have happened as she suddenly could picture herself with mask, air and finns at the bottom of the ocean. It was a grand day for Hild when she got the diving certificate. But the word is that PDA are planning to sue for damages due to the fingernail marks in the pool. Knowing Hild she will just laugh at such feeble threats.

As both of them now have the diving certificate they are often to be found out in the ocean. Rottnest is the place to be outside Perth in the Indian Ocean. You can now find them there between 0 and -20 meters. From what I have heard, there is a problem since the PDA forgot to teach them how to navigate under water. At several occasions up has become down and forwards become backwards - the whole issue is very confusing. Hild has now adopted the tactics saying that you should go down into the water close to the anchor chain - and do not let go of it! (remember the pool wall). She claims that this is better than nothing.

In between diving and a little work/studies they have had time for some Christmas preparation. The freezer is now full of smoked lamb (no they did not prepare that), Norwegian lefse for the Norwegian Christmas dinner and Norwegian Hardanger brau for afters. All this they have done while waiting for the occasional Christmas drop-in. Ann Kristin and Alvaro have found some time to visit Perth just before and during Christmas. Word has it that they will drop in on Rob and Hild for dinner one day. The same is expected when Martin, Jackie and Sophie come down from 'not-so-sunny-Wokingham'. Thus, Christmas in Mill Point Road 1996 will see a Norwegian dinner celebration on the 24th and an English dinner celebration on the 25th. Since the temperatures will lie around the 30 mark (celsius) some adjustments to the dinner temperatures will have to be done (cold soup and cold turkey - Yum!?). The good thing is that Hild and Rob have now got a temporarily installed dishwasher in Mill Point Road. The machine is called Nina and is originally from Bergen. She is on loan till the middle of January. She has just been rebuilt from being a mediocre 'sheep-finding-machine'. Ouch! Ouch! I have just been told, right over the knuckles, that the last sentence should not say 'mediocre' but 'extremely good and useful' - sorry!

As you can see the year has been filled with computer building, travel, rugby, diving and cooking. I have seen all this with my own eyes, and I guess that the same thing - with a few changes - is going to happen in 1997 too. So, I hope that your year has been just as fun and exciting as Hild and Rob's. We also hope that your Christmas celebration will not suffer too much since they can not be with you. Personally I am just recharging my batteries and hoping that this will finally be the year when I get a proper Christmas bath - but the chances of that happening are minute (statistically speaking).