THE SEARCH is on for a politically-minded couple who outfitted everyone at their wedding in pro-Gillard, anti-Abbott T-shirts, pictured above. Staff of the Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House are itching to know more about the shirts, which bear a cartoon of Julia Gillard's face and the words ''Go Julia!'' on the front, and an image of a buck-toothed, rabbit-eared Tony Abbott on the back. According to the museum, in 2010, shortly before the federal election, a visitor to the museum who was wearing one of the shirts handed it over when a staff member asked if it could be added to the collection. The shirts had been made for a wedding and all guests at a ceremony at the Old Parliament House gardens were to wear them. No one has responded to an appeal for more information on the museum's blog that calls for details on who designed the shirt, how many copies were made and how many still exist. Senior historian at the museum, Libby Stewart, said it wasn't possible to track down the wedding party using records of the ceremony as they were under the NCA's jurisdiction and unlikely to be accessible for privacy reasons. ''We found it interesting someone had done this for a wedding. They obviously have strong political opinions,'' she said. ''We found it astounding they felt so strongly they wanted to show support of Gillard at their wedding.'' The museum, always even-handed, also had plenty of material from the anti-Gillard. If you can help with the search, contact 6270 8222.
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Brodtmann's message
EAST Timorese women planning to stand for election in their country in June will get a g'day from Gai Brodtmann. The Member for Canberra has just filmed a message of support for the women to stand for election in the 2012 Parliamentary elections. Australian Labor International is conducting a multi-party training course for women candidates and at this course in Dili in early March, 20 women will hear her words of wisdom. ''Don't be afraid to speak out and take advantage of every opportunity. And make sure you define who you are and what you want to achieve,'' she said. ''Women bring a different perspective to issues and policymaking. Standing for election means we can advocate and argue for our issues and policies at every level of government and civil society.''
Dickens' Women app
SPECIAL captioning for patrons with hearing difficulties at the Canberra Theatre Centre for Miriam Margolyes' one woman show Dickens' Women will be a world first. Margolyes is said to be passionate about ensuring everyone can enjoy Dickens and those who struggle with hearing will be able to use the GoTheatrical app on iPhones to make sure they catch every word. The captioned session of Dickens' Women will be on February 25 at 2pm. The text on the app will match up with what Margolyes is saying at any given moment because it will be fed in live by a technician listening to the show from Adelaide and inputting text from a pre-submitted script. GoTheatrical is to be rolled out nationwide by theatres that choose to use it. To keep users of the app from distracting other theatregoers, the app only shows coloured text against a black screen and reminds app users to switch their phone to silent. GoTheatrical can be bought for $1.99 at the App Store.
Rowling trending topic
TWITTER users into tales of wizard school took to expressing gratitude for the author they think is most magical yesterday. The phrase ''Thank you J.K. Rowling'' was a trending topic for several hours, with fiction fans posting tweets such as ''1,090,739 words. 3363 pages. 199 chapters 17 hours & 13 minutes. 8 movies. 7 books. 1 legend. Thank you J.K. Rowling,'' from user ''Harry Potter things''. ''Half Blood Princess'' gushed, ''Thank you J.K. Rowling, for the magical story that we'll carry with us for the rest of our lives.'' And ''Students of Hogwarts'' tweeted, ''Thank You J.K. Rowling for showing unlimited life lessons.''
