Absenteeism

I've been away from the computer practically all week so forgive me for this late entry. It has been a busy couple of weeks for me and I still have couple of busy ones to go. Mostly it has been work-related - lots of interviews and plenty of words to type up - but I've also been flitting about after hours, like I went to a freelance event and to Govinda's to see Sicko.

Last weekend I went to the This Is Not Art Festival in Newcastle, a festival I've always been too old for, largely because I'm not the bohemian bon vivant type and tend to bed myself at around midnight. It was three days of panels, performances and peeved audience members, which you can read all about here.

This week I went with Sir to see Howl's Moving Castle at Cinema Paris (ironically the complex showing the bulk of the Reel Asia film festival). I missed seeing it when it was released a couple of years ago because I was overseas and the only place that was still showing it was Finland but it was, of course, subtitled in Finnish not English so I would have been rather lost. Believe it or not, Sir and I were the only two in the cinema!

On Friday Ness left RA so I went to her farewell, which was held in the office. They drank from a case of Cooper's left by an anonymous donor Unfortunately I had arranged to give blood the next morning so I put myself off the alcohol. Instead, I brought a cinnamon bun and a cherry pie for consumption. Saw a bunch of people I haven't seen in a while like Sibylla, Jess and Hinto (Hinto was in China when I was made redundant so I hadn't said goodbye to him).

It petered out at around 7:30 so I went to the Union Hotel to eat a big bloody steak in preparation for blood donation. While I was there the Australia vs India ODI was playing on Foxtel so I hung around a while nursing a cranberry juice (to increase absorption of iron) while Australia polished off the Indians, two great wickets coming from Mitchell Johnson (who I've not seen play before) and Stuart Clark, both of whom bowled their respective wickets popping middle stump out of the ground.

Giving blood went well, my haemoglobin is up to 125 (minimum is 120) though next time I'm not coming in at 8:10, which is a good 20 mins before I would usually leave the house for work. Also got my hair cut and popped in at Vinnies but didn't find anything good. Later on Sir and I went back to Chatswood to see Death at a Funeral (which I already saw at the Sydney Film Festival), which she loved as well. I spent the night reading the paper instead of writing.

In other news, there seems to be a large infestation of moths in our apartment. Well, they're everywhere at night, really, but we only care about the ones that flutter around in our apartment. I spent a good deal of Wednesday with my moth catching tools (a plastic bag and a disposable cake box) trying to relocate the dozen or so that found themselves in our kitchen. Over the past few days, I've relocated at least a dozen more.

I've just hung sachets of cotton balls dipped in juniper and lavender oil (as per the 'natural' repellent) along my window opening but Sir refuses to even open her window. She blames my open window for the presence of the moths but to be honest I've been sitting here all day and have not seen any fly in (the gap is about 5cm x 30cm) but still found five in the kitchen. So they're coming from somewhere else. Besides, I'd rather breathe fresh air and put up with a couple of moths than lock myself in a stuffy room.

Um, what else? I'm going to Hobart tomorrow for the AIPM conference. Should be a bit of fun. Cold down there, though - while it was 34 degrees up here midweek, it was about 10 degrees down there - brr! Hmm, I have to pack so I'll catch you later...