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Today I broke up my obsessive reading with more eating, as James and I headed down to the Taste Of Tasmania to sample it’s wares.

We had wild mushroom tempura from the Huon Valley, stout which had been brewed with whole oysters, goat curry and raspberry panna cotta. The stout was my favorite, but I couldn’t help being super sceptical and really searching for the fishy taste at the end of every mouthful. Thankfully it wasn’t there - oysters and I don’t have a fabulous track record, and I prefer to keep my distance where possible.

It’s been the first day of really gorgeous weather, and finally felt like what you’d expect around Christmas time. I’d assumed we’d be swimming pretty much every day, but earlier this week we walked the dogs on the beach and I relived my childhood by playing with sea anemones in a rock pool. It’s no exaggeration to say the water was subzero at best, and even Miss M with her inherited Tasmanian constitution would be hard pressed to keep breathing once she was submerged.

So the reading continues, with a Steven King pulp fiction novel James gave me for Christmas. Yesterday I read Michael Connolly’s latest Bosch book “Echo Park” which was so good I couldn’t put it down until it was done. I still have another Patricia Cornwall to go, but they’re so repetitive I don’t know if I can put myself through a fifth one. Probably I can though …

Today I’m loving: the necklace Paul (the stallholder next to my dad at Salamanca) gave me this morning. I’ll post a picture in a couple of days.

Here’s a list of what I’ve been up to in the last few days, in no particular order:

Sleeping - even during the day!

Eating (so nothing’s really changed)

Reading - the Patricia Cornwell books I’ve previously referred to. Today I’m up to the third, and this afternoon I’m going in search of “Trace”, which I’m yet to read.

Watching cricket. A Christmas tradition in our house, often followed by sleeping.

Sitting in front of fires, because it’s bloody freezing!

Doing no exercise at all, except a few strolls through the bush with two naughty dogs in tow.

Today I’m loving: all of the above

Santa didn’t let Miss M down, and as hoped, a fabulous new bike awaited her when she went downstairs this morning. My neighbour (keeper of the bike until last night) described it as a Bollywood bike, which is exactly right - a fab melange of colours, with handlebar streamers, a white and silver seat and every accessory a cool young girl might want.

This afternoon we went to the school to practice riding, and thanks to Dave, fabulous carpenter and general go to guy for Finbar neighbourhood house, I now know the secret to learning to ride, which is basically forget my own fears, and encourage Miss M to go fast and hold on as little as possible (I mean me holding on, not her). So within minutes, she was moving under her own steam for at least fifteen seconds at a time before almost crashing into the basketball hoops.

I think teaching spinning has warped me a little (!), because I became obsessed about setting the bike up properly, and kept measuring hip height and trying to work out whether her leg had only a five degree bend at full extension. Not the way to go, and on Dave’s advice, I lowered the seat, which made all the difference. Although I wasn’t really doing that much, I’m trashed from concentrating so hard and bending over at a weird angle.

Now I just have to pack for tomorrow, and steel myself to get up at 4.30am. Hmmm.

Happy Christmas to everyone, and hopefully you’ll come back for more in ‘07.

Today I’m loving: my fabulous Spanish shifting spanner, which was a gift from Harry and Mieke. It’s got great heft!

Not sure if it counts so much, since I don’t usually work on Saturday, but this is the official first day of my ELEVEN day holiday! I know I may have mentioned this several times over the last few posts, but hey, it’s cool, alright?

After Miss M was lavished with enough gifts for thirty children last night, I’m feeling a little nervous about the limited amount of presents I’m giving her. Her main present is a bike, which is from Santa, so I can’t even claim any resulting kudos. Especially tragic because I put the damn thing together with my own two hands, with only the merest amount of help from Harry, my neighbour, whose tools I had to borrow, being without my own shifting spanner.

I do have a closed ring shifter, which is so shiny and gorgeous I love using it, but it’s only taken out when my bike has a puncture, which hasn’t happened for many months now. It’s a classic good/bad situation, because there was a stage where I had eight punctures in a two week period, and got so good at changing them I could have been on Lance Armstrong’s support crew.

I’m somewhat proud of my bike assembly because I’d assumed only the front wheel I needed attaching, so imagine my surprise (and extreme use of profanity) as I pulled it out of the box to find the handlebars (and pole), seat (and pole), wheel, brakes, pedals and brake pads all needed assembly/adjusting. My first thought was to take a quick trip to the bike shop the next day and pay them to do my dirty work, but after reading the instructions (something I’ve only recently started doing in any circumstance), it seemed although I had limited experience with vehicle assembly, I could still do it myself. I was also buoyed by my desire to become James Bond, because let’s face it, 007 could knock up a bike (or possibly some other things) in a nanosecond.

So now the bike is next door, waiting for Miss M to fall asleep tonight so I can bring it over and leave it downstairs for her to find tomorrow, because we’re leaving so early on Christmas morning she won’t have time to play with it if we do it on the official Santa date. She also asked very politely if Santa would mind coming early, and since she’s assigned him extremely omnipotent qualities, I figure I should follow through. Let’s hope she doesn’t read this post, as the jig will totally be up …

This evening I’m going to try and recreate the most fantastic toasted sandwich I ate for breakfast yesterday, which came from Red Tongue in Fitzroy, #12 on the Turkish pide list. I’ve bought a melange of mushrooms, including oyster, which are only second to pine on my favorite funghi list. The only change I’m going to make is adding some sumac, my favorite spice of the year. Now Miss M is going to have a bath, and I’m going to make coffee and relax.

Today I’m loving: how many of my clients gave me chocolate for Christmas. And that sandwich!

The last couple of weeks I’ve found it increasingly hard to do all the things I’ve planned. I haven’t posted as regularly as normal (maybe you subscribers are sighing with gratitude at not being inundated with emails!), this week I haven’t reviewed the weekly mags, and let’s not even talk about the advent activities!

This may have something to do with the year of six day weeks, early starts coupled with late finishes, almost one hundred k’s a week on my bike (my odometer says I’ve done nearly 4,500 k’s this year - disturbing!), not to mention the whole marriage breakup thing. Being a mother to the superb Miss M also has its moments, full of energy and mania as she is.

Now I’m officially on holiday - so I’ve decided I’ll still write posts, but reviews are on hold ’til the second week of January, when I’m back at work (but I might slip in a Cleo/Cosmo review tomorrow). I have to admit I’m a bit freaked out by the idea of time off, but it’s trauma of the type I can deal with.

Tonight I went to Miss M’s father’s family’s early Christmas celebrations. I was a last minute inclusion, and I wasn’t sure about how people would feel about me being there, so it was a little nerve wracking. However I was welcomed by everyone, which was lovely. Tonight Miss M is staying away, but is being dropped off tomorrow morning, and will stay with me for many days, which is possibly the best Christmas present I could get.

Today I’m loving: the awesome massager thing Miss M’s uncle and aunt gave me, which looks like some kind of throne for a mouse, but is the best thing ever

So next year I’ve decided I want to be James Bond - but only the Daniel Craig version. Definitely cooler than Connery - and any other Bond pretenders afterwards.

All I need to do is learn to drive, and somehow procure an incredibly sexy 1960’s Astin Martin, find some form of hand to hand combat to protect me against machetes, knives - really any form of weapon, and become an awesome poker player. Throw in some amazing clothes and a cool dry wit, and I’m pretty much there.

Still, there’s one area where Mr Bond lacks skills which I possess - CPR. That guy doesn’t know what he’s doing as far as compressions and EAR go - no wonder his girlfriend couldn’t be revived. Still, it’s a small complaint, and he did seem to be feeling up her boobs while he was doing the CPR, so maybe he had other things in mind.

I give it 8.5/10, with points only taken off for a somewhat confusing plot, and an annoying Bond girl - the Italian one was far better, but of course that meant she was doomed. Also top marks for an asthmatic villain who cried tears of blood.

When I was leaving the cinema, I walked past two ushers who were in discussion with a man who’d just seen the film. Here’s how their exchange went, and I swear it’s true, and has only been edited because you wouldn’t believe me if I kept it going for as long as it did.

Man: It’s his first mission … the one where he starts out

Usher 1: Yeah, it’s pretty cool

Man: Yeah, it’s his first mission, he’s just starting out

Usher 2: Daniel Craig’s a really good Bond.

Man: What’s so great is he’s just starting out … on his first mission

The 2 ushers exchange a look, and busy themselves with some torn tickets. The man doesn’t seem to care.

Man: Bond … James Bond. It was the first book, you know? His first mission, where it all starts.

About then I realised I couldn’t keep pretending to send a text message, as he could clearly go on all night, so I left the poor ushers to get out of it themselves. Suckers!

Today I’m loving: my poor hot animals, who look so cute when they’re all tuckered out

If we thought the smell of smoke was bad last week, today has been truly unbelievable. Last night I was lying in bed, and had to check downstairs to make sure something wasn’t burning the house down. Riding into work today the usual daylight that’s around at 5.40am was hidden under a thick blanket of grey, and even now the sky is totally covered.

Because a couple of the squash courts at Hunt’s are being upgraded, some of the windows downstairs were left open so the tradies could carry their giant sheets of cladding through, so after about an hour, the gym was full of smoke as well. Quite surreal, and hard on the eyes. I can only imagine what it must be like where the fires actually are.

Things are really starting to wind down at work. A couple of my clients have headed off on holidays, and I have only two and a half hours of work tomorrow, and two on Friday, then bam, I’m out of there.

This year I’ve given Christmas cards to my clients for the first time ever. I’m not really a card sender/giver, but it’s a nice thing to do for people you like. Today I was given presents by nearly everyone, which kind of trumped my cards, groovy though they may have been. Even Miss M scored a rather large gift, which she’s desperate to open.

So the year rolls on. I think tomorrow afternoon I’m going to see Casino Royale, and check out the new James Bond, who appears rather hunky, and although Sean Connery will always be the quintessential Bond for me, I’m prepared to be diverted.

Today I’m loving: my gorgeous friend Jade, who I can have coffee with for four and a half hours and not even notice the time!

It’s official. My daughter is a horse whisperer, and though I’ve never read the book or seen the film, I’d wager she’s more interesting than both of them.

You may have read some of my other posts referring to the horses who live by the river when they’re not pulling carriages in the city. Miss M likes to assign them girls names, though their anatomy clearly indicates they’re boys. So we visit Stella, Coffee, Chocolate (though these last two names could be unisex) and their friends when we walk Mr Dog. The horses are mercurial in their affections, sometimes trotting over, other times ignoring us completely.

Miss M decided to take matters into her own hands a couple of weeks ago and get their attention with a loud whinny (not sure of correct spelling, but you know what I mean). I was ready to scoff, and also to ask her to keep the volume down, but every horse in that place came trotting over to the fence to be patted. Miss M was rightly pleased with her efforts.

A few days later, there were five horses at the park. They were nibbling at blackberry bushes, hanging out, and weren’t interested in us at all. Again, Miss M let fly with her crazy loud horse cry, and they all came obediently over. If only I’d had a video camera, I think I’d make a fortune from Australia’s Funniest Home Videos. We had celery for them too, but since most of them spat it straight out, I know that wasn’t what attracted them. The only one who ate it was Eater - Stella’s ever hungry “sister”.

Now Miss M is convinced she can talk to every animal, like some sort of modern day Henry Higgins - or is it Doctor Doolittle? Perhaps she could teach horses to speak with correct grammar and hybridise both characters.

Today I’m loving: three days ’til holidays!

Here is a string of unrelated items.

Earlier this week I got my first spam comments on this site. If that doesn’t make a girl feel accepted, I don’t know what does.

I have to make a decision about whether to rent or buy a new property next year, since Maya’s father has agreed to buy out my share of this house. Good news, but scary - especially when looking at properties in Richmond and seeing prices of either.

Someone found this site by googling “manamana muppets”, which I think is great.

Miss M only has four more days of being a grade two.

Max found a tennis ball this morning on his walk, and we practiced bowling a la cricketing with it. I discovered it’s hard to get a run up with an eager dog darting in front of your legs.

Last night we went out for dinner to a friend’s house, and hundreds of bats flew overhead, which was amazing - so black and silent - and plentiful!

In twenty minutes we’re going to my aunt’s house for a Christmas get together. So I’d better start getting ready.

Today I’m loving: hearing from my crazy friend Pete yesterday for the first time in months.

I’ve just finished working out with Steve for the first time in two weeks. We’re still training for “endurance” (aka “pain”), which entailed me doing sumo squats holding a 42.5kg dumbbell, hamstring curls (burny) and working to fatigue with sets of 11kg dumbbell press on a fitball. The idea behind these was to do keep doing sets of 12 reps until I couldn’t get through a full set any more.

A smarter person might have faked fatigue a little earlier to save themselves agony tomorrow. I, on the other hand, got to my fifth set, made it to nine reps, and failed on the last three. Towards the end, I heard someone breathing so loudly the whole gym was looking to see who it was - tragically, ce moi. Mixed with the breathing was something resembling grunting, and I could see Steve trying to muffle his laughter while he helped me with the last couple of presses. Still, I think the grunting breather laughs last, as there were a lot of guys in there with smaller guns than mine.

So now I’m hot, and I need to eat something, which might have to be prawn dumpling soup, the perfect after workout meal, if you ignore the fact I almost always burn my mouth while eating it. But first I need a shower!

Today I’m loving: a late start tomorrow.