Chapter 36: University, Third Year (Part 1)

Back in Classes

March - May, 1978

I woke up refreshed and excited about the start of the new semester; once I had finished breakfast, and packed my notes and papers for the day’s lectures in my backpack, it was on my bike for the quick ride across to the campus. The first two sessions were the introductory lecture for Numerical Analysis, and a tutorial session; it looked to be pretty interesting (at least for a mathematics subject), the material that we would cover seemed quite interesting. The lecturer, Doctor Opie, appeared to be pretty easy-going, (not like the crazed Doctor Noussair from one of the pure maths subjects last year), and my tutor was Doctor Felicity (Flick) Dewar, who I had as a lecturer in my first year.

Then it was down to the Computer Science lab, for the first session with Professor Thomas. As I entered the room, I said hello to Michelle; she thanked me for getting her the tickets to our gigs at Crystal over the weekend. I told her that she was welcome any time, and also to the Saturday afternoon rehearsal sessions; I made no mention of her staying overnight with Greg ... I took my seat at the large conference table in the meeting room; some of the others were already there. I knew most of them; they were mainly some of the postgraduate students, but there were several of the lecturers from various departments in the Electrical Engineering school.

Alonzo – I mean, Professor Thomas – came in, and sat at the head of the table. He introduced himself to the class, telling us about his background, both academic and work experience. Then he outlined what we would be covering in the class, and how he would be running each session.

“Most of what we will be learning is pretty cutting edge stuff; technologies being researched at some other universities, or at various research centres around the world,” he said. “So, there’s not a textbook written that includes everything; in fact, I haven’t determined all of the material that we will discuss; it all depends on what new research emerges during the course of the year.

“So, our gatherings here won’t take the format of a traditional lecture, where I will stand out the front, and impart my knowledge to you. Instead, as I’ve probably already told all of you, each week I will assign a reading assignment for the next week’s classes; I’ll provide copies of research papers, or similar material, and we will discuss it in great detail. I will expect you each to come up with some thoughts, on why you think the design or invention is good, bad, or indifferent; how it might be used, and what improvements there might be.

“I will make sure everyone gets a chance to participate; the rules are that when someone is speaking, no one else interrupts, and you treat each person’s comments with respect and professional courtesy. If you disagree with someone’s ideas; I will expect you to have positive comments; explain your own reasons, but there’s to be no personal criticisms. I’m sure if we all abide by those rules, we will all get a lot from this class.”

He then explained how he would assess each person in the class; it would be a contribution of our participation in the weekly discussions, along with a few written assignments that would be given throughout the year, and a final exam. Depending on whether he could get appropriate equipment, there may be some practical ‘laboratory’ exercises, and our contribution to those would also be assessed.

With those formalities out of the way, he asked us to discuss the first reading assignment, the ‘Ethernet’ design papers that came from XEROX PARC. As luck would have it, I was the first person he asked to provide comments. I looked through my notes, and decided the best comments to raise were on implementing in across a large area.

“My initial thoughts were pretty positive,” I said. “The cabling and associated hardware is common, off-the-shelf communications items. I’m not sure how reliably that claimed 10 Mbps throughput could be sustained, particular where a large number of devices share the cable; as the number of collisions goes up, and retransmissions have to occur, more and more of that bandwidth gets taken away from actual ‘useful’ packets. I tried to think of how one might implement such a network in a real world environment; say, within this building, or across part or all of the University campus, and I had a few thoughts.”

“Go on; your point about effective throughput is a good one,” he said.

“Well, the design topology appears to be a single, continuous cable run, but if we looked at this building, with four floors, each in a t shape, what would be better if there was a way to run a main backbone, connecting each floor near where the elevators are at this end, and from that point, have a cable running in several directions. If there could be some hubs, and from those, run the network in a multi-legged star shape, that might be more useful.”

That generated lots of comments from the others; that pretty much took the rest of the time for the class. He then handed out the reading material for next week’s class; a new proposed protocol that would replace the ‘NCP’ protocol that was used in ARPANET.

“We’ll continue our discussions on Ethernet for the rest of the week,” he told us. “Next week we will talk about this protocol; I may well have more material for you all later this week.”

As we left the room, he pulled me to one side, and thanked me for my contributions.

“I know I probably put you under some pressure, asking you to go first,” he said. “But I was pretty sure that among all the people in the class, you would have come up with some interesting and thought-provoking comments, and you proved me correct. Thanks again, Will.”

After lunch, it was the first lecture for Computer Systems II, with Doctor Lions; after the preliminary remarks about the course, and what we would cover, it was right into the background to the development of UNIX; we would be studying the Operating System in great detail in the course as an example of what a computer operating system should do. The text books included a full copy of the source code of the operating system, along with his detailed notes explaining it, or, as he titled it a ‘commentary’.

It was good being back at University; as much as I enjoyed the summer break, with trips to Melbourne, touring around the State, and all of the other stuff; it was all pretty hectic. I much preferred being back in the daily routine; lectures and study, knowing what was going to be happening each day, and what the next week would have in store. Classes were really good; interesting, informative, and I looked forward to most of them – even Economics was interesting. Actually, the tutor we had for economics was a smoker; and when he went to write on the blackboard in the tutorial room, it was always interesting to see if he would stick the piece of chalk in his mouth, and try to write on the board with his cigarette.

Our Friday and Saturday night gigs at Crystal were also good; Tracy fitted well into the group; we played to a packed house every night. On Friday nights, when we returned from Crystal, I spent the night with Jillian and Allison in their room; much to Jillian’s delight. We still hadn’t found time for me to spend a Saturday morning with Jillian, but we kept trying to make time for that. Sunday was still the relaxation day; sailing with Lori. It didn’t appear that we would be able to repeat last year’s racing success on ‘Koolong’, but we were in line for at least one series win.

Everyone seemed to be quickly setting back into the routine of studying; the only real change in the living arrangements came near the end of March, when Michelle moved into share Greg’s room. That came as no great surprise to anyone; and the resident that was most pleased with that arrangement (after Greg, himself) was Fred, the cat. Somehow he adopted Michelle as his companion; each evening he would curl up on her desktop or her lap; and she would make sure he was fed and regularly fuss over him. She would often take over the morning ‘egg duty’ from Wendy; Fred had found himself another human slave to attend to his every need.

Having a lighter class load was certainly a benefit; each day I had extra free time in the afternoon after lectures. Most days I stayed at the University until just after 4:00; I would work in the terminal lab on some programming assignments; or find a quiet corner of the library to read though some papers, update my lecture notes, or work on assignments. It meant that most evenings, I didn’t have to spend much time studying. Having the extra time to spend in the terminal lab was good, particular for Ken Robinson’s Programming Languages course; as well as learning about the formal structure of programming languages, Backus-Naur form, Chomsky classifications and other theoretical aspects, the main project for the semester was writing a compiler for a subset of the ‘C’ language.

The first stage of the compiler project was writing the code to read in each input line, and parse it into the various elements. One of my classmates in the Computer Networking class; who had done the subject two years previously, gave me a good tip.

“Don’t limit your input line to only 80 characters,” he said. “Ken Robinson’s a sneaky bastard; he caught quite a few of us out with that. Of course, he said ‘I didn’t specify anywhere how long each line could be.’ I would write your program to cater for line of at least 256 characters.”

That was just one of the advantages of doing Alonzo’s graduate level class; I found that I got to know a number of the other academic staff, and I felt that being able to discuss the reading material we were given each week helped me to organize my thoughts and present arguments in a logical, reasoned way. I became good friends with a number of the graduate students; Claude Sammut, David Carrington and Chris Maltby in particular. I felt that I could hold my own with them, in fact with all of the others in the class; it made me think that I wasn’t deluding myself that I could have a career in research and academia. All I needed to do was to graduate, and get into a research program. That would be the main determinant; whether the University would have the funding to maintain the fairly extensive research programs that it had been doing until now; given that much of the grants and funding for the University came from the Federal Government, with the abolition of University fees early in the Whitlam years. Reports that had been coming through the Party on possibly Federal government directions were not promising.

In fact, the current Federal government was looking to dramatically cut the public sector and government spending in general. There had already been a shift of resources from the public to the private sector; cuts in many government programs. The new Federal Treasurer, John Howard (an avowed ‘free trade’ economic rationalist took a personal dislike to much of the social policies of the Labor movement; including unionism, and free market economics in general. While he and Fraser maintained control of the Federal government; the prospects for increased funding of the tertiary sector looked decidedly grim.

At the start of the third week back at Uni; during dinnertime Mary Beth told us that Alberts were planning on releasing the ‘Cold Hearted Woman’ album, and the associated single at a function next Thursday evening. They had arranged to use the Crystal Ballroom, and we would need to prepare a short set to highlight some of the songs. After the success of our summer tours, Mary Beth had become our official manager, taking over many of those responsibilities from Lori. She had a knack for it; with her accounting knowledge she set up some journals to record all of the group’s income and expenditure; she had a full inventory of all of the equipment; instruments, sound, lighting, electrical and other gear.

She maintained what she called her ‘ledgers’, using phrases like ‘asset management’ and ‘depreciation allowances’; things which I had no understanding of, but she had covered in the accounting subjects of her degree. I suspect Lori was more than happy to hand over all that book-keeping responsibility to her older sister; Lori really didn’t enjoy that side of managing the group and the associated company. Mary Beth also had full records of each gig we performed; dates, locations, attendee numbers, costs and revenues. With the inventory records, which included everyone’s personal equipment, as well as group-owned items, she could quickly come up with a list of required equipment for any type of gig; from a small folk-music performance at the Weeds by a few of us, to a full blown outdoor mega-event.

She also had things set up properly as a ‘group employer’ with the Tax Office, and started deducting income tax from our monthly payments, so as in her words ‘we wouldn’t get a rude shock come tax time’. I personally wondered whether all of the organization and paperwork she maintained was really necessary, but she told us that should the Tax Office decide to conduct a full blown tax audit on our accounts, having all of this information with evidence, receipts, and everything at hand would keep them satisfied.

Regarding the album release party, Mary Beth told us that the event would be starting at five on Thursday afternoon; Ted Albert wanted us to play for half an hour to forty-five minutes; including ‘Cold Hearted Woman’, and some of the other new tracks, and to finish off with ‘Promised Land’. We would have a couple of nights to get ready for the performance.

“Tracy will need to get her stage outfit, too,” Allison said. “Will we have time to go over tonight and get things for her? What to you reckon, Trace, do you want to come over tonight and get your sexy clothes?”

After dinner, Allison, Jillian, Mary Beth, Tracy and I piled into my car, and we made our way across to ‘Kinkz’ and to have Charlie fit Tracy with her stage clothes. Charlie greeted Allison; who he still called by her old stage name of ‘Alli-Cat’ with kisses on both cheeks. He gushed over Tracy when we told him what outfits she would need; he looked at her from all sides.

“Size 34 D, I think,” he said to one of his assistants. “Get some of those tops in that size.”

“I’ve always worn a 36-C bra,” Tracy said.

“And they have probably never fitted you properly,” Charlie said. “Get your top and bra off, and I’ll measure you properly...”

“You should trust his judgement,” Allison said. “Charlie has been fitting clothes to women of all sizes for years; he can tell at a glance just what bust size a woman is.”

Not surprisingly, when Charlie actually measured Tracy with his tape measure, her bust size was, in fact, 34-C; Charlie explained that he would use one of his special ‘falsies’ to make Tracy’s breasts look larger and rounder, filling out the top to a D-cup size.

“Your breasts are actually a ‘C and a half’,” he said. “So if you wear a 36-C, it’s not going to cause a big problem, but the bra just won’t feel as comfortable as it should, and you will have to have the shoulder straps pulled a little tighter than normal. If you try a 34-D size, it will be far more comfortable for you; and you can always slip a pair of those silicone inserts in under each boob to make them fill the cups properly.”

Tracy posed in front of the big three-way mirrors in the fitting area, she raised her arms up above her head, and turned around to look at herself from every angle. She then reached down, and adjusted her boobs in the bra, sliding the thin inserts in under each breast.

“Wow! I love how it gives me those extra curves,” she said. “I mean, I’ve never been tiny, but I LOVE how my boobs look in this! I never realized just what a difference a single cup size would make.”

“Now put one of the tops on; and you should try the skirt on as well,” Charlie said.

“My God, I’ve never worn a skirt this short!” Tracy exclaimed. “I will have to make sure I wear clean undies with this on; as my mother would say, ‘you’re showing everyone what you had for breakfast’. I never understood what that meant, or why she said it, but ... damn, it leaves nothing to the imagination!”

She spun around in front of the mirrors, looking at how the skirt would flare up as she moved.

“I like it; it makes me feel very sexy somehow,” she said. “What else will I need?”

Charlie got the boots after measuring her foot size; with her full outfit on, Tracy stood up on the small stage and moved around, strutting as if she was performing.

“What size inserts did you get for her, Charlie?” Allison asked.

“Just the regular ones,” he replied. “If you want, we could super-size her, not that she really needs the extra padding in there, but we can try it and we can see.”

Charlie returned with the larger inserts, and put them inside the bra. All of a sudden Tracy was transformed into the image of a very busty pinup woman. She looked at herself in the mirrors, cupping her hands around her breasts as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“Damn! I’ve got a massive set of tits!” she exclaimed. “I’ve never seen them this big, this round! You’re a guy, Will, what do you think? Is it too much?”

“There can never be too much of a good thing,” I said. “I think, if you like how you look with the super-size inserts in, then go for it. Personally, you look really sexy like that.”

It was decided; Tracy would get the larger inserts as well; along with two bras and tops, two of the short skirts, and the boots. On the way home, the girls talked about how something as simple as a well-designed outfit changed their self-confidence, and Allison said how it’s all a matter of a person’s mental approach. She told Tracy about her experiences doing stripping and dancing at the Eros; how she could easily have let herself think of herself as just a sex object, just exposing her body for the entertainment of the clients.

“It was an eye-opening experience for me,” she said. “Before I went on stage for the first time, one of the other dancers told me how to think of what I was doing as empowering, how I could get the whole audience under my power. She was right; I felt like everyone in that theatre was wanting to see my body, and I controlled just what they would see, when they would see it, if they could touch ... it was amazing.”

“I guess that’s something for me to learn about, if I’m ever asked to do any topless or nude scenes,” Tracy said.

When we got home, Lori told me that I should come home directly after my last lecture tomorrow; she had something planned for me with her and Megan. She told me to make sure I had a few rolls of film; and to have some sturdy walking shoes to wear. Despite all my questions, she wouldn’t tell me any more about what she had planned; I would have to be patient and wait to see what was in store for us.

Knowing that Lori was planning something special made the day drag out; the morning was all Programming Languages and Compiling; normally a subject that I enjoyed. The same with the lecture after lunch; I couldn’t wait for Doctor Lions’ lecture on process isolation to finish, so I could get home and discover what fun the rest of the day would bring. When I got home, I put my camera equipment into my backpack and strapped the tripod to the side of the bag. By the time I had got changed – Lori had ‘thoughtfully’ put some clothes out for me to wear, next to my camera equipment – she and Megan had arrived home. They got changed quickly; I noticed that despite Lori setting out some shorts and a tee shirt for me; she and Megan both wore short skirts.

Once we were in the car, Lori directed me to drive to Watson’s Bay; however she didn’t tell me to stop at the hotel, but to continue along the back streets towards Camp Cove. We found a place to park in one of the side streets, I grabbed my backpack, and we started walking along the footpath that lead around South Head. When we reached the steps at the top of Lady Jane Beach, I thought she might suggest we go down to check out the nude beach, but we continued along the cliff top walk. We soon reached the ocean side of the headland, and she led us through some low trees to where the old gun emplacements were located. The sandstone structures were quite overgrown, but it was easy to see how the original defences had been laid out. Although the guns were no longer mounted in the gun pits; there was an entrance cut into the rock, no doubt leading into to old ammunition storage areas.

“Okay, this looks as good a place as any to start,” Lori said. “Will, set your camera and tripod over there; we don’t want to be shooting into the sun. Then get your shorts lowered, and sit on the concrete step...”

I did as she told me; once the camera was in place, she checked the image through the viewfinder.

“Now, down on that step; Megan, you can go first, I think you’ll need to get him prepared for what we have planned.”

Megan quickly knelt in front of me, and started sucking my cock, licking around my knob and caressing my balls. It didn’t take long before I was hard; Lori directed Megan so that she wasn’t obscuring the shots from the camera.

“Now, the chances of anyone coming here are pretty slim, but ... you never know,” she said to us. “Megan, if you remain dressed, but take off your panties, and just straddle Will. I will try to get some good shots from above. Wait a sec, Megan, just pull your skirt up, so I can get some shots from behind as you lower yourself down.”

Lori crouched down behind Megan, and as Megan lowered herself on my prick, I could hear the sound of the camera taking photos. Megan smiled at me, and kissed me on the lips as she let my prick fill her wet cunt.

“Your cock always feels so good inside me,” she said softly. “And I love fucking out here in the open, with the sun on our bodies. I guess we can’t be completely naked, but ... damn, this is so sexy!”

“I wish you were topless,” I said to her. “I love sucking your boobs as you fuck me!”

Lori must have heard me, because she pulled Megan’s top up, and removed her bra, leaving her breasts exposed. I held her shoulders, and started sucking on a breast as Megan rode up and down. All the while Lori kept taking photos; and eventually she told me to stop sucking Megan’s breasts, and for Megan to lean right back, so she could get some pictures from in between us, showing her pussy sliding up and down on my shaft. I put my arms around Megan’s lower back, so that she could lean right back without fear of falling off.

Lori got a few photos from above, showing my prick sliding into Megan’s cunt; then she moved out of the way so Megan could resume riding me, and I sucked on her tits again. She was rubbing herself, and it didn’t take long before she came; moaning and shaking as she did. When she had finished coming, she got off me, and with some tissues wiped around her pussy, pulled her top down and straightened her skirt. Looking at her, it was impossible to tell that she had just fucked me out in the open.

“Your turn now, Lori,” Megan said. “What if you stand there, leaning on that parapet, and have Will fuck you from behind? You can just flip the back of your skirt up...”

Lori handed the camera to Megan, and we took our places against the wall of the gun emplacement. With Lori leaning against the stone wall, her arse was pointed towards me, and I pulled the back of her skirt up and over her backside. All I needed to do was unzip the fly of my shorts, pull my erect prick out, and moved behind her. I held Lori’s hips while Megan guided me into Lori’s waiting cunt; she told me to pause with just my knob inside while she took a few photos, including some close ups; I’m sure when Ros developed and printed them, they would show Lori’s wet lips sliding around my shaft.

“Now fuck me, fuck me good and hard!” Lori instructed. “I want to feel your cock ramming into me, and then come and spurt inside my cunt.”

As I pumped in and out, Megan found a position underneath us to get a good angle of the action; I pushed my legs a bit wider apart, so that she could get in close for some good shots.

“Try to keep things under control, Lori,” Megan instructed, “I don’t think Will’s camera is waterproof. No big squirts or gushing when you come, okay?”

“Fuck off, don’t be so rude!” Lori exclaimed, in between pants. “I’m not ... I’m not the one who squirts ... or leaks when she comes ... unlike someone else ... I could mention.”

“That was only once,” Megan replied. “And only because I had too many wines to drink ... besides, you didn’t complain at the time! Neither did Tracy, as I recall! At least I’m not as bad as my sister!”

I wondered what the episode regarding Megan was that Lori was referring to; I would have to ask her later. I concentrated on fucking her; looking over her shoulders I could see the deep blue of the ocean; it was really an incredibly scenic location. As I thrust into her, Lori braced herself against the stone wall; and she would grunt softly each time my prick rammed home into the top of her cunt. Before long, I was on the verge of coming; I gripped her hips tightly, and rammed my cock all the way into her as my first spurt exploded inside her. Lori cried out, moaning loudly as I continued coming inside her; she pushed back hard each time I spurted inside her.

“Oh wow!” she exclaimed, “That was some fuck. I really needed that; I could feel each spurt as you pumped into me.”

“I got some great photos, too,” Megan said. “I can’t wait to see how they will come out, once Ros develops the film.”

“It is a really scenic location, too,” I said. “A great view of the ocean, where did you hear about this?”

“Those guys who took us up to the bridge,” Lori said. “There’s lots more of these old abandoned gun emplacements; some on Middle Head, and some on North Head. These just seemed to be the closest.”

We straightened up our clothing, and walked back to the car. When we got back home, Tracy asked were we had gone, and was amazed when Megan told us what we had done on South Head.

“You mean, you were all out there in the open? What if someone had walked past you? I mean, it sounds exciting and all that, but isn’t it really risky?”

“Well, it was a calculated risk; we made sure we weren’t completely naked, and if we saw someone coming, we could quickly make ourselves look decent,” Lori said. “But that’s half the excitement; that’s what makes doing that such a turn on.”

Megan and Lori explained to Tracy the history of our having sex in semi-public places; how we started on the train late in the night; well, how Lori and I continued that with the Bridge climb. Others did similar; Mary Beth and Murph out on Pinchgut; Allison and Jillian at Mrs. Macquarie’s chair.

“You should try it with Will one time, Tracy,” Lori suggested.

“Well ... I don’t know ... it does sound fun,” she replied. “I’ll have to think of someplace. What are the rules, does it have to be outdoors, or on a train? I know of some of the historic buildings around the city that might have a suitable location. I assume it doesn’t count if you are in a locked office, or something as private as that?”

“Well, we haven’t really formalized the rules,” Lori said. “Apart from don’t get caught, that is. I guess if there’s a slight possibility of someone seeing you, then it counts. What’s more important is that it’s somewhere ‘different’; somewhere recognizable as around Sydney. What did you have in mind?”

“Well, a couple of months back, I was in a TV show that was set back around the turn of the century, and we had some scenes filmed in the old Minister for Lands office in the old Lands Department Building. They’ve restored the office to how it would have looked back then, and the scene I was playing had me being a woman seeking divorce from her abusive husband, and I was visiting my attorney; whose office was set up in that room.

“During breaks in filming, we were shown around the building; it’s a really fascinating place, there’s even an observatory in a tower at the front of the building; no telescope in it though. Plus at the back there’s a fancy clock tower, I was thinking maybe we could get up in that tower; if we look like typical office workers, we can walk around the building, and no one would ask questions.”

I let the three of them talk about potential locations; I decided to have a shower, and then it was time to rehearse for the album launch.

Cold Hearted Woman is Released

March 23rd, 1978

By 4:30 on the Thursday afternoon we were all set up on the stage at Crystal; Tracy was wearing her new stage outfit; complete with the largest inserts in place, and she was looking particularly busty. Even Rachel had put her largest implants, she didn’t want to be outdone by Tracy. We had done a quick sound check; Murph made sure the ‘Cold Hearted Woman’ backdrop was in place at the back of the stage, all that was needed was the attendees.

The room started to fill as people arrived; I saw a few that I knew, Bob Hudson and Marius Webb from Double Jay, so I went over to talk with them. They asked about the album, and whether I had written any of the songs on it.

“No, I can’t compose for shit,” I said, “my mind just doesn’t seem to work that way. I made a few suggestions, some of the instrumental breaks, but some of the others are far better at writing music than I am. But Lori is our main lyricist; she can really write a mean set of lyrics; she and Mandy have done the lyrics on all of the new songs on the album.”