01. Hooray! All the main bits of my trip to Hawaii are booked (now it’s just the really fun stuff to organise – restaurants, snorkeling, diving, and some sightseeing).
02. It’s lovely to have dinner with old friends (where did the last 32 years go?) but even lovelier to get a text message after dinner from one saying that she ‘loves us all to bits’. Tell your friends you love them.
03. This week’s MIFF movies – Triangle of Sadness (hilarious and weird); Palm Trees and Powerlines (grim); 107 Mothers (heartbreaking).
04. New puzzles with a German theme – this and this.
05. For a sport that requires few accessories, I have an insane amount of swimming gear. This zip-up Turkish towel is the best, and new bathers (because: Hawaii).
06. Watched: The Dry (SBS) – perfect combo of happy and sad; and watching S3 of My Brilliant Friend.
07. Australia’s Favourite Tree finals (alas, my picks in the first round of voting didn’t make it – the Huon Pine and Old Man Banksia). Have gone for the faithful River Red Gum in the final.
08. On the topic of trees, the bark of what I think is a Spotted Gum (spotted on a walk by the Yarra). Isn’t it beautiful?
