I have long been of the opinion that nerd is the new black.

Watching somebody doing whatever it is they are good at is a very powerful thing. Whether they are drawing, swimming, fixing a car radio, or working through a maths problem... the nerdy obsession is somehow transformed into poetry.

The further the subject of the nerdy obsession is from my own experience, the more impressed I find I am. For instance, watching someone do a maths problem or riding a skateboard or doing yo-yo tricks or remembering poetry or doing any number of the vast oceans-worth of things I can't manage, is much more impressive to me than watching someone else throwing a frisbee or being, you know, good at grammar and spelling and that.

Anyway, for various reasons, I went to a gaming convention on the weekend. Computer gaming. A nerd convention. A geek festival. A scene out of The Simpsons featuring a thousand comic book guys.

I have enough material to write a novel.

I think from now on I am going to go to conventions. At least while my arm is broken, I can claim it on tax as research. Any recommendations, let me know. There is a sci fi convention and a wetlands convention, which I am hoping are sharing the same venue, but my search continues... The more obscure the better.

Last night I saw The Devil Wears Prada. It was a film that rang many bells for me, because it is about being a small fish in an industry that thinks it's important. It's also about working for arseholes, so yay for that.

It's a very silly film that makes you realise how much Sex in The City has to answer for, with pretty people prancing about drinking coffees and being shocked by changes in their own behaviour ("It was then that I realised..." etc). However, it has a sense of humour about its (very predictable) self, and what more can we ask from Hollywood fashion movies?

Speaking of pretty people swanning about thinking they're more important than they are, I'm off now to the Shed Warming for the Melbourne Arts Festival.

This morning, the checkout lady in Piedemontes looked at me and burst into tears.

Quite quickly, she went from speaking Italian to the woman in the queue in front of me, to looking at me and getting all choked up and apologising into a tissue.

Now I'm worried about her and I want to take her one of the seven dollar bunches of Piedemontes roses. What happened? Did I remind her of someone? She was sixty or something and her manager was a seventeen-year-old in a tie. Did he look a little bit smug? I couldn't quite tell.

This one goes out to the checkout lady...

Oh Piedes checkout lady
You spoke in different tongues
You were clever with the register
And very good with sums

You smiled at your customers
You didn't think you'd cry
And when you did I got a shock
And now I wonder why.

What was it that made you sad?
Somebody at work?
Was it some obnoxious little prick,
Some Piedemontes jerk?

You turned the little lightbox off
That says "Register Three"
You put the closed sign on the bench
And all because of me

I'm sorry that I made you cry
I hope you're feeling better
If you'd like some jerk to cop it
I can write a nasty letter

I think perhaps it isn't that
I think it's something bad
So I hope you feel less lonely
And I hope you feel less sad

And I hope you have a donut
(You can get them free upstairs)
And in the chocolate lolly aisle
You stock some nice eclairs

There's nothing good on telly
But have a bath, it's total heaven
Meanwhile I promise next time
I'll stick to register seven.

Last week, on the way back from Manly beach to the ferry if you don't mind darling, I spotted a bookshop. I can sense bookshops, just like birds with which way South is.

Anyway. So the bookshop is called Desire Books and it has that warm orange glow that brings you across from the other side of the street to "just have a look". In the window, there was this display. There was a sign on the window that said, NAME THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THESE BOOKS AND WIN ONE OF THEM.

Now, let me say that when Tim recently held a trivia night, I couldn't answer the question about what "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" was the first sentence of. For someone who majored in English, that's not terribly impressive. So when I smugly told Stewart in Manly that I definitely knew what it was that linked the books in the display, I made him promise not to make me go in and say it to the guy in the bookshop.

So Stewart went in and said it to the guy in the bookshop. And - after some discussion regarding the expression of the answer and the terms of reference of the sign on the front window - it was deemed, graciously, to be correct. So then Stew, who had pretended to have thought of the answer himself, had to select a book from the collection.

So now I'm reading Anais Ninn.

And anyway the guy in the bookshop said he'd been doing the "Guess the connection" display in the front window for years. He said it was IMPOSSIBLE to think of new displays. I immediately thought of three or four very (I thought) witty and clever ones he never would have thought of, all of which he had done several variations of. So if you think of any, let me know. I'm making a list. And if you're in Manly, go there. It's a second-hand bookshop with first editions and gorgeous old hard back copies of books they don't really want to sell. It also has a table you can sit at, with copies of The Believer on it and tea cup stains in the wood.

Another reason to love Melbourne: yesterday I purchased two torsos made of plastic (one lovely lady and one hunk of man with a vineleaf covering his bits) for seven bucks fifty each. My next few costume parties just got a hell of a lot easier. Also, I got a single bed head with a light in it (dunno, but I'm sure it will be useful) for $2, a sun hat with half a (strange) sentence on it (fifty cents), a massive big bunch of fake daisies in a basket (free, sort of forced on me), an instamatic camera with film in it that had been taking photos of people's feet all day (fifty cents), and all because the ladies at the garage sale down the road had imbibed a significant quantity of wine. "Are you sure you don't want an orange doily and a small, dusty religious figure?" they asked as I left.

Also, went to the Writers' Festival, which was fun because it was opening and there were books and also many fabulous people (ie my friends).

Yay for the purple sky.

Things I like about Melbourne (having rather enjoyed myself outside of Melbourne and having briefly wondered today why I returned at all):

1. The fact that it was freezing and foggy all day but tonight you could wear a T shirt in the street.

2. The open contempt held by almost everyone for the "public" transport system.

3. There's always a festival.

4. The people in the Foodworks shop in Nicholson Street (previously Foodies), who have gorgeous accents, in which they pronounce things like "no worries" and "yeah, right", giving the lazy, surly confidence of the phrases a sharp, happy, politeness. Also, they laugh at my jokes.

5. No matter what time of day or night it is, people are sitting in cafes. A few years ago, when I first quit full-time work, I was astonished at how busy Brunswick Street was on a Monday. I developed a theory that fifty percent of Melbournians are freelance, unemployed, or the idle rich. I am currently two of these things, so I'd know. Pass me the caviar, Jeeves.

I loved my holiday, with the adventures and the hedonism and the lack of responsibility and the sun and the free time stretching away ahead of me. Melbourne is cold and I've spent all my money. It's good to be home.