These are quite interesting times for me. After a long time (eleven years) I am selling my humble abode. Yesterday was the first open house and it went very well. It is all a bit nerve wracking and I am a little anxious about it, but the signs are good that a sale will eventuate. The plan is to buy a gorgeous little brick cottage in Newtown (see above). We haven't secured the place yet, but the signs are good. The prospective purchase will be a home that my beautiful partner and I can fill with great music, great art and lashings of love and warmth. Also, we will be in close vicinity to great food, pubs, music stores, cinemas and shopping of all descriptions. It is all very exciting, but we are not quite there yet.

Yesterday to unwind, we went to the Watters Gallery in East Sydney. We witnessed an exhibition of Recent Drawings by the great Australian artist James Gleeson. The one pictured was my favourite. It's full of terrific motion and glorious texture. This drawing, Drawing No. 166, has been sold for $5000, a bargain I would say. Unfortunately, Gleeson is in the closing stages of his life and we might not see much more work produced by this great artist. I can recommend this exhibition without hesitation.

To top off the day, we went to see The Savages. Things have been a little quiet on the film front lately, but I have been hanging out for this one. Sometimes the really good films take forever to find their way into cinemas down here and this was no exception. Happily, it was definitely worth the wait. It was a film of achingly real emotion, superbly acted and tenderly filmed. A sad and truthful story, it told the tale of John (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Wendy (Laura Linney) Savage. The sister and brother are called to look after their ailing father Lenny (Philip Bosco), who is suffering from dementia. After placing him in a nursing home, the film subtly and beautifully examines the relationship between the siblings and also their troubled past with their sometimes cantankerous father. Naturally Hoffman and Linney are just superb. They portray characters with such human frailty and pathos, that is impossible not to be impressed. This film is a realistic and cliche free examination of human behaviour. Stunningly good.