It’s official. One of my clients – Fractal Technologies – has been acquired by Runge, a Brisbane-based global mining services company that offers mining consultancy and software. All the Fractal staff and contractors (including me) are now part of Runge. I’ve been contracting 2 days a week to Fractal for the past 2.5 years, and Runge are happy to have me continue under the same circumstances, and are OK with me working remotely for them. Contracts have all been signed.
No doubt my role in Runge will become more evident over time; for now, I’ll continue doing what I was doing at Fractal until told otherwise! I’m expecting to go to Perth next week to meet the Global Communications Manager, but there’s a possibility that I may have to go to Brisbane instead.
It’s all good!
Update (3 July): More likely I’ll be going to Brisbane next week…
Second update (4 July): Brisbane flights and accommodation are now booked. And I’ve been able to get a points upgrade to Business Class on the return flight on Qantas. Unfortunately, the flight over is on VirginBlue via Sydney, so it will be a long haul. However, I haven’t flown VirginBlue before, so it will be interesting to see how it compares with Qantas. The other staff fly over on Sunday; I couldn’t get on that flight so will be going on Monday, which means an early rise Monday morning to drive 3-4 hrs to Perth, then hang around the airport for the 3-4 hour flight to Sydney, then wait in Sydney an hour or two for the I-don’t-know-how-long flight to Brisbane.
Rhonda Bracey: At Random 
Sydney-Brisbane is typically shorter than Bris-Sydney. It should be about 1hr 20m-1hr 30m. Just make sure you have $$$ for any food, headsets, whatever you might want on your VirginBlue flights!