Some days are fuck me beautiful. They rise all cool and misty with the moon hanging pale in the damp pale sky and your heart's all gooey with it. When I'm in love with the world or want to be I'm out the house before the sun rises and head to my mother father sister brother ocean, boots on and scarf round my neck, though my thumping blood's heating me just fine and I like the way my skin prickles with the cold, because it's closer to my lover the world.

Today I had to endure the spine tingling horror of a 3.5 online training to be allowed to supervise a state wide assessment at the school at which I do relief teaching.I had to listen to 15 minutes of her reading through what was coming up for the next 3 hours - which seemed to necessitate her reading slowly from the slides I was already given. Why couldn't they just give a document to us and say 'please read through the agenda so you are aware of what to expect from the afternoon'.

Have I told you I'm a bit of a rebel? Tell me black, and I'll probably choose white. Ah, I'm not that bad, but I really hate convention. I have to understand I feel a particular way, because I'm really reluctant to let emotion guide my life, probably because I'm an emotional person, and I'm rebelling against that too.

Chances are, unless you're Australian, you wouldn't have heard of a blue banded bee. Everyone imagines the honey bee as the most important pollinator, but truth be told, if we're attracting such creatures to the garden, you should be getting excited if a blue banded bee arrives. Amegilla cingulate has a unique buzz pollination method, vibrating flowers to release pollen that other bees can't access. So they're great at shaking out tightly held pollen from tomatoes and eggplatns, as well as vibrant banksia and grevillea (Aussie natives).

I'm mostly okay now, nine months on, like I've given birth to a new version of myself, or the world has been birthed anew without my father in it. Oh, I know he's there with me, all the time, ra ra ra, though I call bullshit on that, because any Dad-like presence is just my mind forming tricks. The closest I get to his is-ness is in my dreams, where my neural networks form him into something much less ethereal, much less distracted. It's rare though, this dream father. I never know when to expect him, but settle immediately into being with him, rather than the initial suprise he'd turned up in my dreamscape.

If there's one thing that Land Rover really messed up, it's making a bulkhead or a firewall that collects water and is prone to rust. Whilst these cars do last - there's examples from the late 40's and '50's still on the road - because they're largely made of aluminium, the chassis and bulkhead are notorious for not lasting well at all. It's the first thing you check when you buy one.