01. It’s time for Melbourne’s winter arts festival, RISING.  We started with Swingers – it’s an art installation, with mini-golf as an added bonus. Such fun. The hole designed by Miranda July, Wave of Fortune, which finished with your ball landing in a ‘fortune’ was my favourite, closely followed by Soda Jerk’s ‘Algorithmic K-Hole and the Techno-Serfdom of Simulated Entrapment Under Slop Capitalism’ (which features the Teletubbies and scenes from Heathers).

02. Next was Marlon Williams, supported by Māori choir, Nga Mātai Pūrua. Williams sang many of the Te Reo Māori songs from his latest album, Te Whare Tīwekaweka. Not sure what it is about music featuring Pacific island rhythms, but it is deeply relaxing for me.

03. And the last event for this weekend was POV,  described as a ‘live docu-drama’, and honestly like nothing I’ve ever seen before – unrehearsed actors who were given a script and ‘directed’ on the spot by the filmmaker, who had rehearsed.

04. Saw two things at the ACMI Miranda July retrospective:

• Factual Works – three short films: an interview with July; a mini-documentary about an op-shop installation she did in a luxury London department store; and a music video clip.
• Kajillionaire – thoughts here.

05. Also watched this week: the documentary, Wilding (in cinemas) – brave and interesting, with a healthy acknowledgement of the privilege that allowed those involved to make the decisions that they have.

06. And watching: The New Look (Apple) – I feel a deep-dive into Chanel and her alliances during WWII is ahead.

07. Did we know that Hot Milk has been made into a movie?! Hoping it comes to Aus for the Melbourne International Film Festival in August.

08. Cooking: Thai coconut pumpkin soup (I had a spicy pumpkin soup in Cambodia that I’m still thinking about, so with cold weather here, I thought I’d try a few recipes – this one was good, although I’ll cut down the amount of curry paste next time, to allow for the flavour of the pumpkin to shine).

09. The Everything Croissant is on the June specials menu at Lune. It’s the best.

10. A perfect cocktail at Aru (named Moon Landing, it was made of black porter, ginger wine, orange, toasted dandelion root and Beechworth Fernet). It was served cold but was toasty and aromatic.