So, on Sunday I was sitting in Rita's kitchen having cups of tea with Yianni and talking about whether it's legal to send a human head through the mail, and then today I've been working at Radio National organising a story about how the Smithsonian has decided to start a hip hop collection. On Friday, I'm organising a whole lot of performers to wander around central Melbourne in late May, dressed as judges and telling lawyer jokes. And to think I find it difficult describing to people what I do for a living.

You know how google does targeted advertisements? I'm sure my profile goes like this: "We've done several search profiles and we're not sure what the hell is going on. Web user seems to have a lot of time on hands. Web user may be dangerous".

In the past, strictly work-related, I've searched for:

1. "Neighbours plot lines," when researching for the book I helped write about the history of the TV show neighbours. (Of particular note here is the rather specialised research I did about the episode that featured a dream sequence where Bouncer the dog dreams he's getting married to a sheep dog called Rosie, who saved him in a previous episode from certain death in a perilous storm water drain incident). Seriously.

2. "Boy bands" and particularly "the sexual and gender politics of boy bands" (there is an excellent PHD thesis somewhere online about this)... all in aid of some research I was doing for the Molloy Boy film, BoyTown. It was interesting how many boy band lyrics involved sheltering people from inclement weather. Also much use of the phrase "my girl" in film clips unpopulated by females of any kind.

3. "News Stories: sexually aroused animals". Yes, yes. It's true. I worked in commercial radio.

Now shoosh. I'm going outside into the sunshine. Thankfully, you don't have to type "breath of fresh air" into google. It just happens.

In a move that is sure to surprise anyone who has ever watched me count change, I have been immersing myself in maths lately.

As you may know, I'm directing Penny Tangey's Comedy Festival show, which is called Kathy Smith Goes to Maths Camp and which is at the stage now where I have gone so far as to actually refer to Penny as Kathy and Kathy as Penny.

The show is all about Kathy Smith's adventures to Year Nine Concentrated Extended Acceleration Camp. She grapples with complex numbers, puberty (and, frankly, fashion) and she does the kind of maths that looks like rock art or hieroglyphics. In fact, watching Kathy doing maths proves the theory that watching someone doing what they love is fascinating, even if you don't understand a blind word of what they're talking about, which is what got me through some of my law subjects at university. It's also why I can have a crush on the entire cast of The West Wing without being entirely sure what a tariff is.

In other maths-themed news, I saw Proof last night, which used to be a play and is now a film. I don't entirely agree with this review but speaking of people who are good at things, read Anthony Lane (who doesn't actually come out and say Kathy Smith Goes to Maths Camp is better than Proof but I think we all know where he stands).

And last but not least, here's some maths music to get you through your Friday. I personally recommend The Number Rumba.

Am I taking this maths thing too far?

So the Commonwealth Games is starting in my home town today. Some of you will be wondering what that is. Sounds kind of like a really lucrative computer game. Nay, it's like an Olympics for people who still believe in the Queen. So far, a couple of kids have escaped from a youth detention centre (conveniently located just up the road) and have actually been caught climbing the fence into the Games Village. The papers are also reporting what has become known as a "groping incident". See how the word "incident" makes the word "groping" look like a grown-up word? In court, it's called "indecent assault", but they've simpled it up for us. Good on them.

In other news, Melbourne is also home to the sickest production company in Australia. Rita and I have been fighting off fevers all weekend and we're running out of time to do our cast and crew screening before the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. This may not be a problem if Yianni keeps missing his plane home to Melbourne, though.

In case he does come home, check out his gigs at: Butterfly Club (South Melbourne) on 29 March, The Local (St Kilda) on April 3, and Glitch Bar (North Fitzroy) on April 9. Most gigs start at about eight, but email us if you want to know more. His Comedy Festival show is shaping up to be quite something.

Meanwhile, Kathy Smith (aka Penny Tangey), is playing in Geelong on April 7 and 8 and you can now book for her show at the Festival.

Paul, otherwise known as Superman, who built this website, is playing with Brendan Welch at the Rob Roy in Fitzroy on Friday March 17. Doors open at eight.

Also, don't forget to see the scantily clad Tim Stitz at La Mama before Sunday 26 March.

So, there you go, while the Commonwealth Games deals with groping incidents and escapees clambering over fences, the Standing There Productions kids are going for gold. Go team!

The Commonwealth Games is starting next week in Melbourne. The Commonwealth Games and a festival called Moomba, and there's the Port Fairy Folk Festival this weekend and then after the Commonwealth Games there's the Grand Prix and then there's the Comedy Festival (see below) and then there's Law Week (starring yours truly behind the scenes). There's the Melbourne Arts Festival, the Fringe Festival, the Melbourne International Film Festival, and there's also this little thing we in Melbourne like to call the footy season. After that it's Christmas.

We're trying to organise a cast and crew screening of our film. How does next August suit everyone?

Well, the film year is really kicking in. Tropfest was in the news this week for more than just the usual "would you believe young people make films using their home computers" angle. Sensational claims and counter-claims about lying and cheating, cancelled festivals and drenched celebrities... it's all very tinsel town. Funny that the boring, plodding world of unfunded and underexposed short films suddenly becomes a cute news story for half a day. And then Thorpie gets a "mystery illness". Talk about a headline from heaven.

The same is true about the comedy festival. I was looking at the program the other day (don't bother - the best shows will be advertised right here. I have a feeling they'll be Kathy Smith Goes to Maths Camp, Yianni's Head, and anything involving Lawrence Leung or Sammy J) when it
suddenly struck me that most comedians spend the whole rest of the year doing gigs in pubs, trying to amuse half-pissed barflies who are attempting to pick each other up before last drinks. Then suddenly there's a festival in their honour. From poor and unrewarded to "Here, have the town hall".

You've just got to love the way the world works sometimes.

Working in the law world a little lately, I've been reminded of the concept of "status". The legal system of course is very hierarchical (a concept which contradicts almost every central theme of the Western Legal System, except for maybe the central theme of the enormous pay cheque).

I've always thought the legal system's status structure is enormously open to parody. Someone pops a wig on and suddenly everyone's shouting at him in a court room politely. Like in Parliament, when some bloke leans across to the other side of the house and spits, "Will the honourable member please go jump up himself with an armful of chairs".

But it's not like that in the art world. It's "everyone's presumed talentless until proven famous" or something. And then when you get famous everyone says "Yeah that's great. Well done. Man. What a dick".

So, the fact that we don't have a structured system of status in the arts means that we're completely confused whenever we come across status of any kind. So, famous comes to mean important, which means talented, which means arsehole.

I love my job.