What I've been up to lately

- Watching Deadwood. I love a good Western.

- Reading...just finished Runaway, a book of short stories by Alice Munro, all set in Canada, all featuring women. Some I really enjoyed, some left me a feeling a bit empty.

- Listening...Big Boi (a.k.a 1/2 of Outkast) is touring to promote his recent album and I went to the Melbourne show last weekend- super fun! He took the stage with another lead rapper, a DJ, a guitarist, and two trumpeters dressed in matching Adidas jumpsuits and played a few of his new songs and a lot of older Outkast tracks.

- Hosting! Kris and Rodd came down to Sydney a couple of weeks ago for a weekend visit. Kris already provided a detailed account but I will cover the highlights:

We attended a Rubik's Cube Tournament (as spectators, not participants). As one would expect, the majority of the contestants were nerdy boys, most of them teenagers. We caught the blindfold round...the time starts when the contestants receive a scrambled cube. They look at it, try to memorize the pattern and the required moves, and when they're ready, the blindfold goes on and they attempt to solve the cube from memory. Holy shit, right? There were a couple of kids who finished in under 40 seconds, which was pretty amazing. I had no idea such a competition existed.

We took a jaunt down to one of my favorite spots in Victoria, the Mornington Peninsula. We drank wine at a winery, beer at a brewery, and ate cheese at a cheesery. And we spent the night in a lighthouse keeper's cottage! It was windy. And then we played Settlers of Catan by the fire as we drank our wine purchases. I had a great time, and now I guess I owe them a trip up to Sydney.