Rumours of my marsupial-instigated demise have been greatly exaggerated. My absence from the North American conferences was simply a case of financial necessity.

It's expensive to attend these events (especially when coming from Australia) and I usually cross-subsidize those costs by delivering training to corporate clients between the two conferences and sometimes by accepting sponsorships for the free talks I give wherever I go.

That was the plan again this year...until a major corporate client cancelled 2.5 weeks of training at the last moment. That left such a deep hole in my travel budget that I simply couldn't afford to go ahead with the trip, and instead had to look for work here in Australia (since the corporate training/sponsorship is also what feeds my family while I'm working on Perl 6 development).

As I've indicated elsewhere, I was very disappointed not to get to these two events, and I certainly intend to get back to both of them next year.

Meanwhile (thanks to the extraordinary generosity of a single private donor, who--frustratingly--insists on remaining anonymous) I will be speaking at YAPC Europe in Vienna next month.

Damian