News update

On Friday I will be having a major operation. Well, all right, a minor operation. Actually I'm not even sure if I am allowed to call this an operation.

But anyway! I am having a mole removed. It is not a very large mole, or very visible, (even though it is on my face) but it is an annoyingly itchy mole. I had it checked in summer, and the doctor thought it was probably harmless but might not be, and if it was dangerous it wasn't VERY dangerous, and rather than doing a biopsy why not just whip it off? Easy, he said. But wait until autumn or winter. It's not good to do it now.

I tried to imagine why I wouldn't want to do it now if it was that easy, and he said I wouldn't be able to wash my hair for a week. That made sense. Not washing my hair for a week in summer would turn me into a smelly person.

So I'm doing it on Friday.

Also, at the end of the month I will be going to New Zealand for three weeks. This is not an exciting trip. It is a duty trip, to visit family and so on. But there will be some excitement towards the end, when I will catch a bit of the NZ International Arts Festival. That will be my reward for being good about the family stuff. And seeing friends (and SOME of family) will be fun.

I'm thinking of buying a new camera before the trip, a digital SLR. I've been arguing with The Man about it for weeks. When I say 'arguing,' I mean that I tell him all the reasons I should buy it, he listens and smiles, and then I tell him all the reasons I shouldn't waste my money, and he listens and smiles. It's very irritating of him, because he doesn't give anything away, but I think I might have talked myself into it. We will see how I feel when I actually have time to go shopping. I might suddenly decide I am being too extravagant. I had talked myself out of it entirely because of the NZ/yen exchange rate being so horrible, which would make my trip so much more expensive than it used to be, but then remembered that I have some money in my bank in NZ that I can use for the trip and suddenly the trip budget became cheaper.

This, of course, is something I could talk myself out of quite easily again, especially if I think about the last SLR I owned. It was a film camera, and I had it for about two months. I was learning how to use it, and took it with me on holiday, but about a week into my holiday I fell into a canal in China. The camera was around my neck at the time, and that was the end of my SLR experience.

If I keep away from Chinese canals it should be all right, shouldn't it? Somebody please tell me this is a good idea.