Hello again.

The most exciting news from my little world at the moment is that I have myself a new printer, which does a couple of things my old printer did not do, the most of important of which is that it prints things out for me.

I know! How novel.

So that means I've been writing more things, on account of how I can print them out. Now I have no excuse for not getting to that next phase and redrafting everything within an inch of its life. I have also been reading the book that I purchased in order to avoid reading Crime and Punishment , which means I now have to read Crime and Punishment , which I am sure will be excellent, but there's something about reading classic literature that makes me kind of dread the experience (having said that, I have enjoyed almost every "classic" work of literature I've read, pretty much without exception, so what all of this says about me I'm not sure. Possibly that I'm an idiot).

By the way, I would like to congratulate the second sentence in that last paragraph for its recent nomination in the Longest Sentence of the Year Awards. Richly deserved.

The book I've just finished, Blue Water , by A. Manette Ansay, was so different from Read This and Tell Me What It Says (her short story collection), and Vinegar Hill (the only other novel of hers that I've read) that I almost wondered if she was a different A. Manette Ansay from the one who came to our Boston College writing class and spoke gruffly about what made her a writer. I had thought then that she was a hero for the writer who just writes because she always wanted to. She didn't seem to be trying to match her work to a structural formula, and was quite happy to write about the tiny details and skip the big themes of life and death and love and whether or not forgiveness is possible in a small town (all of which are covered in this recent book). In fact, I think I had transformed Ansay - in my head - into a casually misanthropic, accidentally cutting-edge "fringe" writer. But, since being selected for Oprah's Book Club (having her print circulation multiply many tens of times over), she could hardly match that description and still be selling as many books as she is.

It's funny how an author can be mistaken for a genre. You read one book and you expect them all to be the same. I often find this confusing myself, when I write. I write something quite unlike something I've written before (which is necessary for my own sanity) and I find myself missing the "old" writing - trying to crowbar some of it in between the cracks of the new stuff. 'Tis a merry dance, this writing caper. I don't know why everyone isn't doing it.

Also, isn't behooved an excellent word?

Definition according to dictionary.com: to be necessary or proper for. eg: "It behooves you at least to try".

I think that last sentence alone - "it behooves you at least to try" - could form the sturdy basis for a character. Probably a British one.

Geraldine: But Boris, it just isn't possible. I mean, I've -

Boris: Oh for heavens sakes Geraldine. It behooves you at least to try.

(Boris storms out, in the direction of the Parlour room. Geraldine looks bereft and stares blankly through the bay windows).

Today I saw a headline in the papers that appeared to say "Government Provides Free Porn" but which actually when I looked closer I saw went for two lines rather than one and so on further inspection turned out to say "Government Provides Free Porn Filters".

If ever the people in layout should have a say over the sub-editors who write the headlines, it's moments like that don't you think? I've got a headline somewhere that I cut out of The Herald Sun one time that just says "INSERT HEADLINE HERE". You just know someone got fired for that one.

So anyway I saw Polanski's Oliver Twist last night. I said yesterday that I haven't read many classics. That is sadly true. Of the classics I have read, however, most of them have been Dickens. I've read Oliver Twist at least once (meaning once - and another time when I was "studying" it), I've seen the non-musical film version and the musical film version, and let's not forget that I played the role of the Artful Dodger in the grade six play (the only interpretation of the role I'm aware of that has included a top hat combined with a ponytail). So, in terms of knowing the story of Oliver Twist inside out, I'm probably only a fraction less well informed than the probably countless thousands who are currently writing a thesis on it. HOWEVER I did enjoy this interpretation. Ben Kingsley is really quite brilliant as Fagin, who is the key to the whole thing in my opinion - and the rest of the casting was pretty spot on. Dodger, though, should really have had a ponytail.

Then I went to Readings with the intention of buying a classic Russian novel or a Thomas Hardy or even a D H Lawrence. Needless to say I did nothing of the sort. I am now the proud new owner of the new A. Manette Ansay book. Manette Ansay spoke to my writing class when I was studying at Boston College and she was such a breath of fresh air amongst some of the more conservative influences (which were probably better for me than I thought they were at the time). Her website is here. I've never forgotten the class she spoke in and I've found it really hard to find her writing anywhere in Australia. Her book of short stories, Read This and Tell Me What It Says is just so damn good. The title short story is a corker. I'm looking forward to a weekend of reading punctuated by cups of tea. My favourite.

Writing's not hard.

Who said writing was hard? What idiot said that? Writing's excellent fun. As if you'd do anything else. Having fun with the writing today, which is typical because it's back to my other work tomorrow. Oh well. Round we go again.

Ironic that the person who showed me the following link is a producer, but Rita is a good producer and this story is about a bad producer. Producers are kind of like witches in that way. Some are wicked and some are nice and look after Judy Garland and help her get to the Emerald City when her house falls on their wicked counterparts. Anyway go here for a story about Richard E. Grant's producer, which I must admit I haven't listened to yet but I'm willing to bet it's worth a listen. Richard E. Grant, for those of you who don't know, is my boyfriend. Or to put it another way, we've never met but I quite liked him in a movie I saw once.

Now, in more important news.

Tim Stitz, who is leaving us on Monday to go to acting school in America, organised a trivia night last night to raise money for his plight. It was a most hilarious evening, and if you haven't seen Stitzy's Chinese Grandmother character, you reeeally have been missing out. The quiz itself was impossibly difficult for those of us who are ignorant in a range of areas, which I thought was rather unfair. Where were the questions like "Describe in general terms one of the articles you've read in the newspaper this week" or "Provide a Marxist critique of The O.C". What's with the yes/no answer bias at these things?

Anyway my friend Jeremy won the raffle. My other friend, Honor, won two tickets to the theatre. And what did I win? Well, I didn't win anything, but Stew won a myotherapy session with a hilarious friend of mine, and I paid for the raffle ticket that won it. So anyway that will be excellent when I get around to booking it.

So well done Timmeh. It was an excellent night although trivia depresses me because people think I read a lot and know about Literature. I know nothing. I hereby resolve to read one of the classics next. It's about time I got serious about this reading business.

Either that or I'm going to read this other (much breezier) book that I've had my eye on, and I'm going to not read the classics EVER and then tonight I will go and see Polanski's Oliver Twist and I will get all the Jane Austen books out on DVD and I will listen to an audio tape of Nabakov.

Writing is hard. It just is.

Maybe for some people it isn't. But for me, it's like being locked inside my own head and realising it isn't any different from the last time I was in there. Also, there's not enough room to move. And there aren't any windows.

Last night I finished Surely You're Joking Mr Feynman. Pretty funny book. He talks about writing actually. He's trying to decipher a paper written by a sociologist. It's complicated. He says:

'So I stopped - at random - and read the next sentence very carefully. I can't remember it precisely, but it was very close to this: "The individual member of the social community often receives his information via visual, symbolic channels." I went back and forth over it, and translated. You know what it means? "People read".'

I love the downright contempt he has for the arts.

Although, that's not entirely fair. He does desire to use art in order to translate science to people:

'I wanted very much to learn to draw, for a reason that I kept to myself: I wanted to convey an emotion I have about the beauty of the world... It's analogous to the feeling one has in religion that has to do with a god that controls everything in the whole universe: there's a generality aspect that you feel when you think about how things that appear so different and behave so differently are all run "behind the scenes" by the same organisation, the same physical laws. It's an appreciation of the mathematical beauty of nature, of how she works inside: a realisation that the phenomena we see result from the complexity of the inner workings between atoms; a feeling of how dramatic and wonderful it is.'

See? Told you he liked science.

Those atoms. They're beautiful things.

That's it from me. I've got to get out of this room.

Today I got into the writing thing a bit more. So much more in fact that I missed my tram to meet my friend for lunch and ended up being fifteen minutes late, which would have been surprising for said friend, who does not know me as intimately as most of my friends do, especially Standing There Producer Rita Walsh, who I have noticed has started leaving the house at about the time our meetings are due to start. This is, I assure myself, on account of my reliability. I am reliably around fifteen minutes late, counter-balanced by another, rather more useful characteristic, which is the number of pens I tend to carry on or about my person, in a range of colours and with a range of nibs. Everyone needs pens, people. Eventually, all of you smug bastards who arrive to things on time... Eventually you'll need to borrow one of my pens. Then let's see who wishes they'd stayed home maintaining their pen supply for that extra five minutes before they looked for their house keys for another ten minutes and then left the house, huh! Who's laughing NOW.

Rita, I realise this is a complete misrepresentation quite possibly besmirching your good name but you are more likely to forgive me than anyone else is, and I am taking advantage of that fact. On the internet. Oh yes I am.

So on the topic of me being a rewarding friend, my friend Michael sent me some excellent things in an email. Now, if I ever send excellent things to people in emails, I expect equally witty and well-considered replies, more or less immediately. Michael, on the other hand, received nothing.

Which was no surprise to Michael, who has known me for a much longer time than my lunch-time friend has. However, contrary to my declaration yesterday that everyone was fired, I have now re-hired Michael, who I credit now with thanks for providing the following excellent links:

For those of you who would like the inside story (as they say in the trash mags) on the Sydney Writers' Festival (which does not get enough coverage in the trash mags in my view)... then go here, and scroll down to the Writers' Festival posts, because Arnon Grunberg (who I've mentioned in posts on the Writers' Festival before) has certainly got a way with writing snipey things about people who make money writing books about time travel. And about people who think they're funny. And just about people generally.

And Oh. My. Lordy! For all you West Wing fans, go here. Michael, I know I just hired you, but you're re-hired. Absolutely cannot wait to see a full episode of this.

Also, and nobody sent this to me, I read it unaided in The New Yorker ... Check out this review of The Da Vinci Code, which I haven't seen but Anthony Lane is my favourite film reviewer and this is one of the rare reviews of his which is entirely, whole-heartedly, grumpy. Excellent.

I've been writing today. I haven't been writing anything good, but I've been typing things called words into things called sentences. Which is a start.

Also I read a bit more of Mr Feynman last night. He's a strange man but an excellent read.

More importantly, however, I am quite devastated to learn that Richard E Grant has been in the country and I have not taken up the opportunity to convince him to marry me.

I just about passed out the first time I saw him in Withnail and I. I could not believe any one person could be so entirely hilarious. The bit where Uncle Monty comes in and scares the crap out of him and he utters a line I cannot repeat here, I think is right up there among the funniest moments in film. As is cake and ale. As is the bit on the stairs where Paul McGhan asks him if he wants a cup of tea and he turns the word "no" into the most insulting thing in the English language. As is the bit where he's calling out the window at the school girls.

And yes, I have edited those highlights down.

Just think. He could have been mine.

Why did nobody tell me he was in the country?

You're all fired.

For reasons too humourous to mention, it was a public holiday yesterday. Which makes this last weekend a long weekend, which makes this week four days long.

So I took today off.

I've finished reading Tourism, which I had to finish on account of I started it.

Favourite bit: the bit where he tried scones, because it made me hungry...?

Then I read a book I thought I had already read, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, which it turns out I hadn't read and which made me cry. See here for a review and description.

Favourite bit: the bit where he pretends he's in space and "All I could see would be stars. And stars are the places where the molecules that life is made of were constructed billions of years ago. For example, all the iron in your blood which stops you being anaemic was made in a star".

... I love that bit because it describes so many different things and alludes to so many others and also it's about something really simple. Imagine getting the infinite universe, molecules, time, space, and the inside machinations of the human being all into the one paragraph.

Smart arse.

On Friday night, I went to see the new Pixar film, Cars, which (even though traditionally I'm a Pixar fan) I was sure I was not going to enjoy. Not only is it a movie about cars, called "Cars", starring a racing car and not starring a socially responsible environmental message or a commentary on how stupid racing car driving is (!), but even worse, it's animated cars! So, you know, little cars with huge eyes and expressive windscreen wipers and stuff. BORING! Also, clearly this is a targeted grab for merchandising bucks from small children annoying their exhausted parents.

Anyway, needless to say I laughed until I was snorting like a piglet.

Favourite bit: a hardened old four-wheel-drive teaches a bunch of SUVs from the city how to drive off-road. Also, I find it genuinely hilarious when bits fall off people's faces when they're shocked. It's an old Pixar trick, but my Lordy does it make me laugh.

But the highlight of my weekend was definitely the Belle and Sebastian gig on Saturday night. It was unspeakably good. Anyone who can get the expression "you couldn't act your way out of a wet paper bag" into a song is a friend of mine. Also, by God they're good musicians. For real fans (ie massive nerds) go here for hours of procrastinatorial fun.

Favourite bit: whole thing just brilliant. Cannot possibly pick one song because would be unfair to other songs. Who have feelings.

Lastly, I watched the soccer/football/frenzy of excitement last night as well.

Favourite bit: the bit where I found out that one of the Aussie blokes, Scott Chipperfield, used to be a bus driver who played soccer for "The Wollongong Wolves". Now he's running around on a soccer field in Germany, jumping onto piles of other blokes in celebration whenever someone gets a goal. The best part is, fans in the know have apparently been chanting "Hail to the Bus Driver" from the sidelines. Excellent work.

As a result of the above, I now want to be: a child again, a member of Belle and Sebastian, a soccer player, a voice in a Pixar film, possibly a bus driver, and a scientist (I've also been reading Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman).

You'll notice "writer" is not in there. It's a tad slow, the writing. Just a little bit slow.

There'll be a breaktrhough any moment, I'm sure.