I think I mentioned this at some point in the steaming mound of words I dropped here a few weeks ago.

In the interest of honest reporting, I need to mention at this point that said night ended up consisting of more than just ‘a few drinks’. I mention this as it may colour your opinion of what happened when I attempted to leave. I maintain that it was just my usual clumsiness, choosing the worst possible moment to manifest itself as a spectacular entrance to a public house.

The door that led back into the bar from the balcony had – for no justifiable reason – a threshold about four inches high. I forgot this. I tripped spectacularly, cried ‘OOP!’ and fell with a resounding thud onto the floor right in the middle of the pub. There isn’t really a way of explaining to people in a bar at 1am – especially not the security guard who asks if one is going to be alright getting down the stairs – that really, it was just the threshold, I’m not drunk.

I gathered my bags and dignity and, walking with far too much poise and a far too deliberate gait, successfully made my way down the stairs.

Now you know.

You might also be interested to know that our work Christmas party, which I’m pretty sure was also mentioned in that steaming wordpile, was themed ‘Tales from the Sea’. My friend and I went as the Titanic.

I’m the arse. We actually put hanging moss on my propeller before we went in.

Unfortunately my jacket lifted when I raised my arm to salute for this photo -- but at least you can see that we had fun deciding where to split the word ‘Titanic’.

My thoughts, they jump. Not from one interesting idea to another, but from one sinking rock in the boggy marshland of my mind to the next. Here’s the next bog rock.

The other evening as I was making my way home from a birthday celebration near the harbour, I passed, among the many people making their way from one club to another, a girl wearing a ridiculously short skirt and ridiculously high shoes. Neither is necessarily a problem on its own, but only if you are able to carry it off. This lass could not. Her shoes were so ludicrous that she couldn’t bend her knees when she walked, and the resulting totter (somewhat reminiscent of what might happen if you put toilet roll tubes on a cat’s legs) immediately earnt my scorn. I’m sure she would have been devastated to know that, if she’d only removed her phone from her earhole for a moment to notice my withering stare.

All I could think was: Honey, if you have to walk as though you got halfway through taking a shit when the phone rang, you have no business wearing those shoes.

Oh and a miscellaneous word of advice for you, if you’re ever in Sydney: if there are trackworks on the railway lines, NEVER take a trackworks bus. Just don't. I think a unicorn dies every time someone says 'trackworks'.

The other afternoon I came home to find that a spider of unknown heredity had built a multilayered fortress of a web across the door to the garage. All right, the main part of the lair was well above head height, but the guylines came down all over the place and I was too scared to risk going under it all in case I disturbed one of the lines and had this beast land on me (she was swinging somewhat tenuously up there). OK, I’ve looked it up -- the spider was one of these:

If you're using a standard laptop right now, that image should be pretty close to life-size. I've never seen one of these spiders get so big. I'm pretty sure this thing was taking Shelob's lunch money at school. She has a row of dried-up victims on display like heads on spikes. (How do you tell a spider that once your food’s off, you’re supposed to throw it away? Lady, that’s just unhygienic.) Just like in this photo, there was a tiny male running around on the other side of the web, occasionally dashing in to share the feast and then dashing away again. Presumably after dark he gets about in a pair of leather arseless chaps and she whips him. Just the impression I got. Anyway, in the meanwhile I was standing there staring with fascination tinged with impatience, thinking: God dammit I just want to get the lawnmower out.

I’ve destroyed the web twice now. I’m afraid that if I do that a third time, she’ll be waiting for me behind the bike sheds at recess.

I have this hilariously awkward relationship with one of my colleagues. I don’t know if he finds it hilarious, but it’s definitely awkward and frankly, after nearly four years, bizarre. The thing is, I know that I’m socially inept at the best of times, and I do tend to wield my social skills like a four-year-old wields a fire hose, but I have managed to fall into step, so to speak, with pretty much everyone else I work with. This guy is now the last man standing -- after nearly four years, I still haven’t worked out what it is that I’m supposed to do make it Not Awkward. I’m like a monkey with a straw, prodding it and looking through it but not quite managing to get it working. Really, I’m not asking for BFF status here; just Not Awkward would do. Occasionally (with alcohol), we do manage to converse and it works rather well, but then it’s as though that rapport turns back into a pumpkin after midnight, and at work the next day one or both of us goes from ‘EVERYBODY DO THE MICHIGAN RAAAAG’ to just … ribbit. I have to assume it’s me.

The other day he came over to pass on some tidbit of information and remarked on the stack of food-related paraphernalia on my desk, including a tub of margarine and a squeezy bottle of honey. As a bit of background: we produce a popular book at Books O’Reilly that features bees on the cover and, in an attempt at lightening the mood, Captain Impenetrable asked whether I was working on that book (because of the honey on my desk, see -- amusingly, we both knew I wasn’t working on that book at all, ha ha). I responded, ‘Oh, yes. I smear myself in honey whenever I think of that book.’

And now I’m going to add that one to my little black book of things that don’t make situations Not Awkward.

Things that made me happy this week:

* My amazing colleagues who supported me during a minor work-related meltdown I had a few days ago.

* The fact that Jesus was a ninja. OH YES HE WAS.

* My little nephew, Jai (who currently pronounces his own name as ‘Guy’), who desperately wants to go up in an aeroplane: he points up at the clouds, looks at you earnestly and says ‘Guy up sky?’ OMG ADORABLE.

* The ceiling fan in my bedroom talking to me. Wait, hear me out here. It recently developed a slight creak that varies according to the speed we have it set to. The other night, on the slow setting, the squeaks and clacks were coming out as ‘lamington, lamington, lamington’. My favourite dessert! I may not be able to develop any kind of rapport with fellow humans, but me and my ceiling fan are friends forever!