Well, it's the last day of Movember, and as you can see the mo is in full effect and looking pretty full. We're heading to the Mo Gala tonight and tomorrow I will very happilly shave it off and return to my Mo-less existence.

Thanks to Katie, Mum, Ben, Mike, Chris, Adrian, Matt, Nat, Keri and Craig for donating- together you contributed $488 for men's health. Big claps to you!

Speaking of victories:

I win! I have now completed the first draft of my third novel. Please read it! Just a disclaimer for those that do/have read it: I know it's a bit odd. It was really more of an experiment for me than anything else. I just found that in my previous nano entires I was extremely plot-heavy, and didn't take much time to really describe environments, or people or thoughts. My favourite literary discovery of last year was Ian McEwan, who I've been very inspired by, and I wanted to, well, not mimic him exactly, but certainly be more like him where I could. So I thought it might be an interesting experiment to write a book that wasn't about people doing things, but rather about trying to evoke the feeling of being somewhere, or try capture small moments completely.

Unlike The Trusted Professions, which I always intended to be the first and last draft and never be changed, warts and all, I will take some time with this one to edit and improve it. I think it really went off the rails in Chapter 18, I originally wanted Cammie to actually fall for Anthony, but when it came to it I just found I didn't have it in my to convincingly write that- and I found, as I wroet it, that there was something pleasingly cyclical about the idea that, wheras he seemed to want to change her life by dying, she might sacrifice her life to save his. That's a sort of love, I suppose. I also originally wanted to be vague about when exactly Alison visited Cammie- before or after the spider incident. I thought it might be fun to play with the idea that Cammie was testing his honesty with the spiders, but that you could read it both ways, if you wanted to. However again, when it came to it, I couldn't make that idea work right away so went with the easy option. As it is, the timeline seems screwy. So there's a lot to work on and improve, so any suggestions would be welcome- don't worry, I won't be offended! I am my greatest critic.

Thanks to all.

It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life?daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.

-Victor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

Remember: It's not a lie, if you believe it.

- George Costanza

Funnel-web spiders are medium-to-large robust spiders that tend to be dark or black in colour. These spiders measure up to 5 cm. They have stout legs and prominent fang-bearing chelicerae that deliver a neurotoxic venom. The common name derives from the funnel-like entrance to silk-lined subterranean burrows built by both males and females. The Sydney funnel-web spider (A robustus) is responsible for most reported envenomations and the only confirmed deaths in humans. However, bites from other funnel-web spiders, particularly the northern tree spider, Hadronyche formidabilis, are likely to cause serious envenomation syndromes and are potentially deadly if untreated.

- Excerpt from Funnel-web spider bite: a systematic review of recorded clinical cases, Medical Journal of Australia

Married in White, you have chosen right. Married in Grey, you will go far away, Married in Black, you will wish yourself back, Married in Red, you will wish yourself dead, Married in Green, ashamed to be seen, Married in Blue, you will always be true, Married in Pearl, you will live in a whirl, Married in Yellow, ashamed of your fellow, Married in Brown, you will live in the town, Married in Pink, your spirit will sink.

- Old English rhyme

Fear is an emotion that makes us blind. How many things are we afraid of? We're afraid to turn off the lights when our hands are wet. We're afraid to stick a knife into the toaster to get the stuck English muffin without unplugging it first. We're afraid of what the doctor may tell us when the physical exam is over; when the airplane suddenly takes a great unearthly lurch in midair. We're afraid that the oil may run out, that the good air will run out, the good water, the good life. When the daughter promised to be in by eleven and it's now quarter past twelve and sleet is spatting against the window like dry sand, we sit and pretend to watch Johnny Carson and look occasionally at the mute telephone and we feel the emotion that makes us blind, the emotion that makes a stealthy ruin of the thinking process.

- Stephen King, Night Shift

Most people reach a point in their lives, some at eighteen and some at 88, when they ask, 'Work, buy consume, die: is that all there is?' Each time someone asks such a question the market shudders, because if there is more to life than earning and consuming the odds are that when people realise it they will devote less time to paid work and consume less.

-Clive Hamilton, Affluenza

I can't tell if a straw ever saved a drowning man, but I know that a mere glance is enough to make despair pause. For in truth we who are creatures of impulse are not creatures of despair.

- Joseph Conrad, Chance

Not much new Mo news to report. All is proceeding according to plan. Some people have asked if I am going to keep the Mo past Movember 30th. My answer is this Venn diagram:






Tomorrow is election day here in Australia. I can't vote, but there's definitely something in the air. Everyone is excited, like they're all going to personally change the world tomorrow. Feels good. I'm going to a party where they are going to have a John Howard piñata. Should be fun.

What's the worst part of the job?

"Skydiving suicides."

Skydiving suicides?

"Yeah these nutters come on board the plane wanting to top themselves. Bloody ridiculous. They just jump out of the plane and never pull the bloody rip cord. Some of them get out of their harnesses before they hit the ground. Other ones wait till the chute is pulled, then cut the cords one by one and fall from there. Worse than that are the ones that change their mind at the last minute. One joker I was jumping with refused to pull, looked like he was going to go el splatto, but then he pulls it at the last second. Must have smacked the ocean at a fair clip. Maybe he drowned. I never saw him again, anyway, but he didn?t ask for his money back I can tell you that much! Fuckin' bastards."

- Interview with Hildy McVeigh, Australian Skydiver Magazine, August edition