Our friend Rob just moved from Austin, where he lived for many years, to Chile to write code for a telescope. This is exciting for him, but sort of sad for those of us left in Texas. Or it would be, but for the whole “living in the future” thing. See, we here at Heathen Central won’t really notice Rob’s absence except under some very specific circumstances. He and his wife have an Austin-based VOIP telephone number that rings in his house in South America, and he still surfaces on iChat just like he did when he was in Austin, complete with the voice chat option.

When would we notice? If we went to Austin, in which case they would be unable to meet us for dinner without substantial notice and cost, or if we decided to visit Chile, in which case their location would be very, very convenient indeed.