A cat, a bat, many books and some babies

I've been very sad for the past few days. Xopher got back in town last night and it's very nice to have him home again, but still, very sad. I loved trash-talking Emily (something I got from Jimbo's habit of trash-talking his cats) but even with her weird standoffishness and all the effort involved in looking after her, I miss her a great deal.

In happier news, we (Meagan, Fiona, Dave, Simon, Jimbo) went to see Batman Begins last night and I really liked it.

- Batman Begins spoilers -

It was streets ahead of the previous ones in terms of plot and writing, but I think it was the least sexy Batman so far, in so much as there wasn't any overt costume fetishism. In the previous movies there was usually at least one person drooling over the costume itself. This costume lust was amazingly ubiquitous too, demonstrated by sidekicks, villains and definitely the love interest.

In contrast to the gothic extravagance of previous "outings", the overall vibe of this Batman was much more utilitarian: even his vengeance was unusually purposeful. This is not altogether a bad thing, but I do kind of miss the exhibitionist dark and sexy Batman.

Which is not to say it wasn't pretty: between Katie Holmes' nipples and the hot young doctor, there was much to ogle. 8)

- end spoilers -

I've been rather remiss in not blogging about my recent trip to Sydney in great detail, so here are some brief highlights:

- Stomping around Paddy's Markets with Emma-sensei.
We were standing in front of a huge display of stockings, and Emma-sensei mentioned that she'd recently decided that she really needed some fluoro-orange fishnet stockings. The complete stranger beside us picked up a pair from the display and handed them to Emma-sensei with a smile.

- Finding more books than ever in Kinokuniya.
Shopping for manga just keeps getting better: I continue to improve my understanding of the shelving system; I'm getting more confident about asking for help; I had a big list of authors and titles, and very supportive company. Emma-sensei carried around a basket for ages before admitting that she had only picked it up because she thought I might need two.

- Buying so many books in Kinokuniya that I broke their security procedures.
Emma-sensei had long achieved the coffee shop when I was still having books stacked, tags removed and bagged by two (2!) checkout boys. They decided not to bother stamping each book, because there were "just too many". So when the beeper at the exit went off, I had to patiently wait while the checkout boys came out and explained to the security guard that I had just bought "too many" books and that I was not actually stealing anything. *blush*. And for those playing the "how much money did she spend?" game, my 10% discount amounted to more than $30... Yay!

- Playing with Michael and Jo's baby.
Xopher, Emma-sensei and I stayed with Xopher's oldest brother and his partner and they were very nice. Little babies are cute, especially when their parents are cool enough not to be constantly shushing them or pulling things out of their hands. And Nils was named after the character in Platinum Grit as Xopher guessed (not Nils Bohr, which was my guess).

Overall it was a great trip, and I've got literally months of reading to do.

Oh, and in the happiest news I've heard in a very long time, ted is a dad! He's posted the first of hopefully many, many pictures of little ted aka Hanachan.

Emily, Defender of the Universe: 1987-2005

After a long battle with kidney problems and high blood pressure, we put Emily down today.


She was a cranky and weird cat, but she did have two special humans: Chris was her favourite minion, and Polly picked her out of all the kitties at the Refuge because she was staring at nothing and whining. Apparently she's always done that.


In the end what matters is who you love, and who loves you.

Irregular Correspondent

I do really mean to update this blog more often.

Fun at work: we asked a vendor to quote on a solution to a problem. They came back a few days after receiving the requirements and said it would take them 100 days to develop it and outlined their plan of attack.

I thought that their plan of attack sucked, and after consulting my superiors, rang them and talked them through my solution. They really hadn't thought of doing it like that, so they needed some time to reconsider, but there might be a "dramatic reduction" in the amount of time required.

They called back the next day and revised their estimation down to fifty days. o.O

Apparently, I have good ideas.

Fun at home: Getting very excited (obnoxiously excited, probably) about the trip to Sydney tomorrow. Even the thought of boarding the train before 7am cannot dampen my enthusiasm. There's a good chance that I'll buy a record number of Japanese manga from Kinokuniya. Then the real fun begins with trawling through China town for all the other bits and pieces.

Emma-sensei will add considerably to the experience. I expect she'll really help with the "I only remember what this anime is called in Chinese" discussions that I usually have with the nice people in the Chinese bootleg stores. I don't expect the discussions to go any faster, but they'll probably be more fun.

Fun with kitties: With the cold weather, my bed has become plagued by kitties who are super-snuggly. A few nights ago, in a moment of indolent stretching, Manson managed to reach out and gently scratch one of my eyes. Bad kitty. Word to the wise: by the time you flinch, the (minor) damage is done. Definite drawback of him wanting to sleep on my pillow.