Amazing Australians

Here are four Australians that are amazing, in my opinion.

Chris Lilley - Creator of Summer Heights High (which was picked up in the States by HBO) and several other Australian series. Amazingly creative in his writing, but on top of that I think he is maybe the best actor I've ever seen. He completely inhabits his roles like no one else I know, so much so that he can even play a schoolgirl and pull it off. Here's a sample, but be warned, lots of colourful language... clip

Terrence Tao - Mathematician. More than that, he's a mathematician's mathematician. A child prodigy, he's now at a level where other mathematicians compete to interest him in their problems. I read his blog but to be honest, don't understand much. Thankfully he sometimes writes simpler stuff for dilettantes like myself. He may be the best mathematician working today (though he would probably tell you that non-working mathematician is tops).

Tommy Emmanuel - Australia is also home to maybe the top acoustic guitar player in the world as well. I'm not usually a blues fan, but this clip is typical. My hands hurt just watching.

Tim Minchin - Comedian usually situated at a piano, and with eye makeup and no shoes. Marjorie might disagree with me here; we first saw him a couple years back and he was decidedly unfunny. But I've seen some of his recent work and it's amazingly clever. Some samples (be warned, plenty of off-colour language here as well): Storm, Taboo, If I Didn't Have You.

Home invader

Today's wildlife rescue. Got trapped in our house but just hopped on my finger when I tried to rescue him and didn't want to let go.

BTW, that's not snow on the ground - our backyard tree is dumping pollen like mad right now.