Dace is going on an excursion at school to the Far Away Tree tomorrow, so they’ve been instructing the kids about what to do if they happen to encounter a snake — freeze and wait until it moves on, is the preferred course of action, in case you’re wondering — which Dace assures us he can do very well, because that’s what T-rexes do, and he’s been practicing being a Tyrannosaurus Rex (like all six year old boys the world over, he’s going through a dinosaur phase at the moment.).

Teaching kids out here about snakes is as important as teaching kids who live near the ocean how to swim. When I worked at the Alice Springs Youth Centre, at least 3 times a year we’d have to get the Parks and Wildlife Rangers in to remove a brown snake from the skate bowl, before we could let the kids into skate.

Anyway, since Dace’s school is some way out of town, surrounded by untamed bushland, rather than rolling playing fields, such instruction is essential. Of the ten top venomous snakes in the world, eight of them live around here, including the Inland Taipan (a single bite contains enough venom to kill 100 adult humans.), which is the most venomous snake in the world, and the common brown snake (which is called common because it is very common), which comes a close second. According to the CSIRO, there are 1050 species of reptiles and frogs in with 169 of these occurring in the southern half of the Northern Territory, and a goodly propoion of them with either kill you or land you in hospital.

You’ll sleep better tonight now you know that, won’t you?

Pretty much everyone who’s lived here for a while, has a snake tale to tell. I had a cat once, named Lumpy, when we lived in Tenant Creek, who would catch baby brown snakes and bring them home as presents — often still alive. None of this girlie ‘catching rats and mice’ for our moggies. They breed ‘em tough in the Territory. The look-mum-I-brought-you-a-snake-becaue-I-love-you routine happened so often, and because the kids were just toddlers at the time, I got into the habit of keeping a hammer near the front door, so I could bash Lumpy’s presents to death before one of the kids picked them up and started to play with them.

Still, I’d rather deal with snakes than sharks — one of the many reasons I live thousands from klms from an ocean. In fact, I don’t get the whole human fascination with the sea at all. As far as I’m concerned our ancestors climbed out of the primordial oceans for a damn good reason and I see no reason to buck several million years of evolution by trying to return to it.

Besides, on land, we humans are right at the top of the food chain. In the ocean, we’re way down there with the plankton. I’ll stay here in the desert, thanks, with my venomous snakes, scorpions and, spiders …

After all, I have a hammer and I’m not afraid to use it.

Seeing X-men: The Last Stand the other night set me to thinking about my own superpowers. I have two. The first — my ability to find a car-park anywhere, anytime I want it — is quite useful. The second is much more uncontrollable… and far more sinister. I am a walking Electro Magnetic Pulse.

I kid you not. I could be one of the X-men. No electrical appliance is safe around me. Nothing lasts its guaranteed lifespan if I own it (this is not — as some cynics have suggested — because I deliberately break them so I can buy new ones). I have to own a prepaid mobile phone because no phone has ever lasted me longer than the account plan. I can crash computers just by sitting down in front of them. The electricians working on my house had an argument with me that went on for days, while they insisted a hallway light that I’ve been using for 6 years couldn’t possibly be functioning because it wasn't wired up to anything.

I have walked past checkouts and had them suddenly shut down. The last two cars I owned developed inexplicable electrical faults that it took months to find.

I have a computer network at home that nobody can get connected and working properly despite the fact that I’ve had some seriously heavy-duty experts scratching their heads over it, and all the computers talk to each other just fine when I'm not there.

My cable TV box developed a transmission fault that Austar had never seen before and every now and again, for no apparent reason, the lights in my house will go out and come back on as soon as the electrician arrives… although that could be a poltergeist the electricians left behind in revenge for that whole “I don’t care if it’s not wired up to anything, the damn things works!” argument we had, and they’re recouping their losses through after-hours call out fees.

Today, however, I surpassed myself. Not only did I learn that since I starting work at the Tang Council, if they plug in the Coke vending machine in the workshop, selected computers will turn themselves off and the printers will all go off line, but I set the railway signals off.

I swear this is true… I was just sitting there, minding my own business, at the major intersection in Alice Springs where the Stuart Highway, the Alice to Darwin rail line and the road to the Western McDonnell Ranges converge. All I was doing was waiting for the traffic lights to change when suddenly, the rail signals started up. Of course, there’s no sign of a train. It’s Tuesday night and everyone knows the train isn’t due until Friday… but those lights were going ding-ding-ding like there’s no tomorrow and nothing’s happening…

Finally, after about 10 minutes with the traffic banked up halfway to Ti Tree, the police arrived to sort out everything out until the signals could be shut down manually.

And if you think that’s odd… this is the third time the signals have gone off and there’s no train coming while I’m waiting at the lights.

My children have suggested that I should find a way to use this power for the forces of good, but there’s a little evil overlord inside me rubbing his hands with glee, trying to figure out how to channel this power so it works on ATMs and slot machines…

Today the builders came back and finished off my new laundry. This job was started on the 26^th January. They assured me it would take 2 weeks. By Alice Springs standards this is a great job. My friend’s new kitchen took 8 months.

Of course, now the laundry is done, I’m starting to get the renovating bug, again. This is a disease that infects me periodically, usually bought on by too much idle time on my hands, which means I start watching shows on the Lifestyle Channel like Changing Rooms, and Renovation Rescue.

This would probably not be so bad if I wasn't surrounded by people who feed my renovation fantasies by saying “why don’t you…?”, or “you know what would look really cool?”, followed by some hideously expensive suggestion that invariably involves even more gadgets I don’t need.

Firstborn, who has lots of ideas about decorating and only a two bedroom apartment to put them into practice — is particularly bad for this. She eggs me on, I’m sure, just to see what her grand ideas will look like, without any of the worry of what it cost or whether it was a good idea or not.

So, whilst admiring our last little bit of wood panelling as it was nailed into place, we got talking about the next project. Or rather, Firstborn and the builders were discussing it. I was just nodding and saying OK to everything than involved appliances.

Among the many things my design committee decided were “must have” items in my new kitchen were an internet fridge (you know, the one’s with a flat screen TV in the door) and refrigerated wine cellar, because for some reason, everyone thinks I’m a wino. Just because I have lots of wine in the house, as I frequently point out, it doesn't make me a wino. If I was a wino, the wine rack would empty occasionally, wouldn’t it, ergo... I wouldn’t have lots of wine in the house?

Anyway, I let them rattle on because they were having so much fun. Truth is, I’ll get the kitchen done when I have the time. Between proofreading Medalon, Treason Keep and Harshini, finishing the Gods of Amyrantha and the next two books in the Tide Lords series, the line edit of The Immortal Prince, which is due back any day, working at Tangenteyre Council and going to Tennant Creek every month, I figure that’s about Christmas 2038…

Word count: 57,968

For some reason, on a Sunday afternoons lately, my house turns into the town square, there seems to be so many people coming and going. By three o’clock I had four separate lots of visitors all turn up at pretty much the same time — that’s four grownups and five kids under six — two of them trying to scam/guilt/beg/and or bribe me into babysitting. In a fairly straightforward game of “first in, best dressed” Firstborn won by a hair, by asking me to mind Dace so she could go to the movies a split second before another friend was about to beg the same favour. LOL

But too many friends aside — could I have a better problem — I did have a successful day before the invasion began. I got another chapter of Gods of Amyrantha done. (Killed a king and queen today — always a good way to work up an appetite, I say.)

My little assistant came in today, too, so we got even more of the receipts done and had Hungry Jacks’ for lunch which she thought was just the coolest thing ever... my, they’re so easy to please at that age…

On the down side, a parcel turned up yesterday with the typeset copies for the new Australian editions of Medalon and Treason Keep for my perusal, proofreading and approval.

Oh god… now I have to read them again.

You might think this is an odd statement from the author of these works, but with Medalon in particular, I have read it so many times I can almost recite it by heart.

• First there were the countless readings during the three years it took me to write it.
• Then there was the rewrites.
• Then the structural edit.
• Then the line edit.
• Then the three typeset proofreads.
• Then it got published and I had to read in book form just to make sure it was real.
• And then we sold it to the US. And they had to translate it into “American English” for the hardcover edition. So we had another line edit.
• Then another three proofreads.
• And then the US publishers sold it to the UK. And they had to translate it back into “English English” for the UK edition. Again with the line edits.
• And the multiple proofreads
• And then the US paperback was due out and they wanted another two proofreads (one before and one after the corrections were made)
• And then I had to write the prequel series… so I had to read the whole damn series again before I started and at least twice during the writing of Wolfblade, Warrior and Warlord, to make sure I kept the stories straight.

And then HarperCollins says” let’s re-release the Demon Child Trilogy with new covers to match the Hythrun Chronicles.

Oh goodie, says I, like an idiot. Can I fix a couple of little things?

No problem, says my patient and ever supportive editor. How many changes did you want to make?

Er…438…

Never fear, they are tiny, niggly little things that have irked me (and only me) since Medalon was first published. They are now fixed and nobody but me will even notice.

Which kinda makes me wonder why I bothered…

Word count: 56,542

Totally wasted the day today… I did start out with the best of intentions, but ended up doing very little. Still, I suppose we all need days where nothing much happens…

But then I started thinking about it and decided quite a bit happened.

Firstly, Thirdborn rang from Melbourne to tell me he has a new job. He is 24 years old and has a perfect record — he’s got every job he's ever had an interview for. Smug little bugger.

This was followed by a call from my travel buddy who lives in Bendigo. We’ve been tossing up where to go or what to do for our next holiday for about 2 years now. Suggestions have ranged from next year’s Worldcon in Tokyo to an Antarctic cruise.

Finally, we decided today that we’re going to drive across the Nullabor Plain from Port Augusta to Perth (2000 klms of nothing) in November — just because we can — shop till we drop in Perth, and then come home in style on the Indian Pacific train in a first-class sleeper. The Trans-Australian railway line holds the record for the longest straight section of railway in the world (478 km), and the road contains the longest straight surfaced road in Australia, too (146.6 km).Think of the idiotic stats I’ll be able to accumulate for that trip! I’ll actually get two of the world's great train journeys out of it, because I’m going to tick another journey off my list, while I’m at it, and take the Ghan from Alice to Adelaide to meet up with my friend there.

So… having decided I wasn't getting much else done, after The Indulged One went home (yes, Dace actually went home) I went to the movies and saw both X-men III and Capote. A super-hero and a culture fix in one night! I’ll write the reviews up in the next day or so. They were both good movies, although for entirely different reasons.

And then finally, the big event of the day…

Stevie the Cat figured out (after almost a year) how to wash her back paws without rolling onto her back and trying to catch her leg as it flaps around.

This was a watershed moment for Stevie. It all came about because I was scratching her behind the ear and I stopped, and she was obviously still itchy so she had to scratch it herself with her back paw and then she halted — mid-scratch — stared at her paw with the dawning light of realisation, and suddenly began licking it. I swear, you could see her mind going “oh, my god… I can reach it from here!”!

I’m a bit sorry Stevie has had this epiphany. It was and endless source of entertainment, watching her try to clean those back paws. But all is not lost. She still runs to the loo every time it’s flushed and stands on her hind legs with her front paws on the seat so she can watch the water going down the drain.

Who needs television when you've got a cat like Stevie?