The architecture of happiness

Cardboard is the new black. First year students from the Department of Architecture at Monash University transform cardboard into amazing structures at Artplay on Birrarung Marr. Perhaps Shigeru Ban's proposed cardboard cathedral for Christchurch is the way to go...

He who wants honey should tolerate bee stings

I have always maintained that stories only happen to those who can tell them. Kate Mcghie can tell a story. And she can cook. She has a fascination with Morocco which has led her to 29 journey's worth of adventures and stories and ideas about Moroccan food. Donkeys and spice sellers and children in olive jars listening to roof-top stories. The evening cooking class was indeed a culinary journey through Morocco.

Needless to say, I now have a tagine and I'm not afraid to use it.

Cycles

Away from it all...or almost. 49 Year 9 students cycling and camping along the rail trail from Bright to Myrtleford to Beechworth. Beautiful colours, wide open spaces, smell of wood-fires, kookaburras, kangaroos, time to think, to smile, to breathe.

Bumping in

All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts


The weekend before the play and we are finally in the theatre, treading the boards, tripping over electrical cords, negotiating new furniture and props, freezing in the wings and wondering whether we will actually succeed in pulling it all together on Tuesday for opening night.

<<Pyjama pour 6>> is its French name, "Don't Dress for Dinner" in English. There are six in
the cast. The story is that my husband, Bernard, and I are in our country house for the weekend and Bernard has invited his friend, Robert to come....I am delighted at this, because I am having an affair with Robert. But Bernard's reason for inviting him is because he too is having an affair...with a model from Paris and so he wants her to come away for the weekend and has invited Robert to come to act
as Brigitte's partner. Robert doesn't want a bar of it because of his liaison with me, so he protests, but eventually is worn down and bullied into it. Bernard and I go off to get groceries and whie we are away 'Brigitte' arrives, but it is the wrong Brigitte...this one is the maid who is coming to work for the weekend. Robert gets them mixed up and tells the maid she has to pretend to be his lover...which she
agrees to for 500 francs extra. I then get all snippy to learn that my lover has a girlfriend and then Brigitte the model turns up and has to pretend to be the maid to fit in with Bernard and Robert's mess. Then finally Brigitte the maid's husband turns up and all...well virtually all is revealed.

Completely ludicrous farce. Fun to act, but with Act 1 lasting 80 minutes and Act 2, 45 minutes, it's a lot of French farce for one small fish to retain...