The fun never ends at the Snail Shell. Today I bought a new vacuum cleaner. (And not before time because the dust bunnies at home are roughly the size of small cattle. It's the island effect, you know. In isolation, animals get smaller or bigger.) Buying a vacuum cleaner is not that easy. The sales person asks questions that you can't answer, such as "what sort do you have now?" I wanted to ask if I looked like someone who would know the brand and model of her vacuum cleaner but decided to refrain because I wasn't going to enjoy the answer, whatever it was.

Anyway, I am now the less than proud owner of new house cleaning equipment. Didn't I say that the fun never ends?

And to reinforce that notion, let me tell you about Friday. This was the plan. Before I went to Corio Bay on the great infaunal bivalve hunt, I had to drop off the Daewoo at the garage to get a roadworthy certificate for it. The garage is about 3 km away. Not very far. I thought I'd take the car in nice and early and then walk back home because, frankly, I need the exercise. Then I could drive into work in my Ford and head out from there.

But it didn't quite work that way. I was so anxious about work that I forgot about the roadworthy test. By the time I remembered, it was no longer nice and early. I couldn't risk missing the appointment (it had taken a fortnight to get a booking), so I leapt into the Daewoo and hurtled drove sedately down to the garage.

I was going to get a taxi back. But I figured that a cab driver would never be able to find the garage, which had a very discreet frontage. So, I thought I’d walk along the main street until I found an obvious landmark or major intersection and call a taxi to pick me up from there. Unfortunately, the area I was wandering through wasn't the best place to loiter. Every time I arrived at a suitable corner, disreputable-looking people were hanging around them. Possibly waiting for taxis, but probably not. So I kept walking.

By the time I got to somewhere more salubrious I was almost home. And running very, very late. Still, I had a decent walk. And we got down to Corio on time.