Twos-Day

Well it is 22-2-22 - depending on your favoured dating system.

It also happens to fall on a Tuesday.

Matt Parker from Stand-up Maths devised an epic collaboration between various educational YouTubers - 22 of them, in fact.

The journey starts with a video on Matt’s own channel.

While continuing on his own channel, the saga then forks out to a video on Steve Mould’s Shorts channel and my own Numberphile2 channel.

It’s deliciously convoluted but great fun - the material on Numberphile2 is totally different to what is happening on Stand-Up Maths.

Various people share a story or factoid relating to the number two.

Well done to Matt and his team, including editor Alex Genn-Bash.

And if you enjoyed it, perhaps make a donation to WaterAid!?

Investiture at Windsor Castle

In January I wrote about the Medal of the Order of Australia - you can read about it here.

The citation says it is “for services to broadcast and online media”.

Because I live in the UK, it was not possible to receive the medal in my homeland.

Instead - about nine months later - I received it from Prince Charles at Windsor Castle.

Below is a video about the medal on the Objectivity channel - it includes footage from the investiture.

You can also hear more detail during this episode of the Unmade Podcast.

97: The Investiture of Dr Brady Haran OAM by HRH The Prince of Wales
The Unmade Podcast
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Brady Haran and OAM Medal

Medal of the Order of Australia

This Australia Day I was fortunate to receive the Medal of the Order of Australia.

medal-pic.jpg

The citation says it is “for services to broadcast and online media”.

It was a big surprise when the notification arrived last month and I feel very honoured.

(The initial email went to my junk folder and I thought it may be a prank!)

Despite living in the UK for many years now, I’m immensely proud to be Australian.

If you’d like to hear more, I talk about the award in the latest episode of The Unmade Podcast (sometimes seriously, sometimes jokingly).

71: Australia Day
The Unmade Podcast
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I do not have the physical medal yet.

The investiture ceremonies take place in a few months and I’m not sure I’ll be able to travel back to Australia in the current environment.

I’d just like to mention (if not by name) the hundreds of people who help make my videos and podcasts. I’m under no illusion that my work is a solo effort.

And also thanks to the people who watch the videos and listen to the podcasts - I wouldn’t be able to make them if there was not such a loyal and engaged audience.

The Sofa Shop

The Sofa Shop was an Adelaide store with a jingle that was played A LOT on TV and radio when I was growing up.

Many years later, on The Unmade Podcast, light-hearted memories of the jingle became something of a running joke.

When The Sofa Shop finally closed in recent times, this was a major development on our podcast.

In the subsequent months, podcast listeners starting making their own renditions of the jingle and we featured them on the show.

We have a list of many of them here, so do have a listen.

During a trip to Adelaide earlier this year, I tracked down the jingle’s composer (Quentin Eyres) and singer (Carmine Scalsi) for a couple of interviews.

But then we went further, and got Quentin and Carmine back in the studio for this grand finale.

Is "The Lecture" Dead?

The forced closure of most university facilities has, in some minds, ignited debate about the future of “traditional lectures”.

I spoke with professors Phil Moriarty and Mike Merrifield - both from the University of Nottingham School of Physics.

They had different views:

You can also watch the full length interviews with each of them. Here’s Mike Merrifield:

And here’s the long version with Phil:

Both have also written articles in the past - you can read Mike here and Phil here.

Comet NEOWISE

Here a few photos I took of Comet NEOWISE, which recently visited our part of the neighbourhood. Also a couple of space station pictures.