Two hours notice was all I got to perform some of my writing at Tapas Café in town. One of their performers chickened out at the last minute and why the Writers' Centre picked me remains a mystery.
It was a boost to my career as a writer, but it was a pretty awful experience. I was surrounded by established authors, all on average 20 years older than me, and was served octopus for dinner. The idea of sucking on something that can suck back wasn't appetising.
I also had the misfortune of being first up, and read my work quickly to avoid boring the audience. Apparently this wasn't the right thing to do - one woman went on and on for 40 minutes or more. Kristie and I resorted to talking in sign language to keep amused.
The night did pay well, even though I was obviously an amateur. No bragging here.

Temp work at Legal & General insurance took up most of the last six weeks. I was only meant to be at the Adelaide office for two weeks because they were moving to new premises, but it didn't work that way.
Legal & General have centralised to Sydney, and what was an office of nearly 100 over two floors was reduced down to five staff. They were actually doing twice the amount of business since the shake-up. They own SGIC

now, and are one of the major life insurance agencies worldwide.
Anyway, head-office kept delaying the move, contracts had to be signed, and I didn't know if I was going to be there from one week to the next.
But it was fun, the people were friendly, and I haven't enjoyed working this much for ages.

Book Bound

Working in town made it easy to keep an eye on the sales of my books.
I recently made a larger style of book as a test run, but at double the price it just sat there for weeks.
People seem tired of the same old things the shop ask me to make - spiders, pentagrams, crosses. They aren't selling as quickly as they did. Still, I've made over 30 books for this shop now, and sales do slow down in September.
I have half a dozen boring orders to fill, but they sent a sword for use on another large book, which should look good.

The Dragon book continues to progress with the purchase of a dry oiled kangaroo skin (which cost me a mint). Because the front piece is already made and the spine can only be a certain width because the emu leather is only so wide, I have to make the cover first before I know what size paper to order. This is the reverse of how I normally make a book, so it's quite tricky.

Talk about feeling left behind. Bec applied for a short 'career' position with Social Security in Canberra. She was a little afraid to leave, but from what we've heard she's enjoying it.
Her husband Riff has been a little lonely, but has kept busy moving furniture during house renovations, and celebrating the grand final. Funny how some celebrating looks like porridge.
It was really dangerous in Adelaide that weekend. All the louts had flags and balloons and people hanging out of their cars. Adelaide's obsession with football is scary.
We saw The Tempest with Riff before he left for Canberra. It was performed by the Bell Shakespeare Company and was great. They put some of the lines to music and it worked really well. Caliban the monstrous slave had a pierced nipple and tribal tattoos on his torso - perfect for that character.
Riff and Bec will be back in time for the baby.