have just finished reading a preview copy of The Early Kozminskys by Tangea Tansley; it never ceases to amaze me how many great stories are built into the fabric of the city. and you can still go and gawp at the jewels in Kozminsky's jewellery story today in Bourke Street, 160 years after the Kozminskys got into the business (though there are different owners now.)

Another Melbourne story that caught my eye this week was in yesterday's Sunday Age, revealing that although Port Philip Bay formed about 10,000 years ago, there was a period about 1000 years ago when the Heads were blocked and it largely dried up, forming a marshy hunting ground. It was flooded when the blockage was breached by a storm or earthquake (tsunami?), filling the bay very quickly. which explains why stories about the flooding are still so strong in indigenous culture; they only had to be passed down tens of generations, not hundreds.

and been meaning to get to this, for novelty value: the Public Records Office's exhibition of might-have-been Melbourne landmarks. some seriously weird stuff.

Finally, I'm back on the library trail; talking at Brunswick Library, corner Sydney and Moreland Roads, next Wednesday the 18th of May, from - well, I think it's 7.30 but may be 7.45...:)

so I was looking up this event, billed in The Age as "a Melway of song", and I also came across http://www.stoppingallstationsexcepteastrichmond.blogspot.com/...is there anything that we can't name after a daggy Melbourne suburb?

"the four seaons woven into one -
and that one season a perpetual spring,
Gives life and cheerfulness all around."


The greatest inconvenience, the new comer feels, is the dreadful hot winds which blow for short periods through the three summer months...

- George Henry Haydon, Five Years' Experience in Australia Felix, London, 1846.

Really good event @ St Kilda library last night - about 20 people came along, which is a perfect number for everyone getting to have a say. Quite a few people who'd come to Melbourne from elsewhere; they had a different pov about the city to those who'd grown up here, perhaps a little less averse to change?

And thanks to Gwen from a volunteer group at the SLV. They read and index the old Argus papers - a valuable job - and she brought a cool little editorial (or letter, I'm not sure) from the 1899 edition, waxing lyrical about the brave new city of Melbourne, its extent, its importance to the colony and its beauty - and bemoaning change, in this case the incipient addition of ugly plumbing with the coming of a universal sewerage scheme. classic stuff.

very grateful to Nick and Alistair from the library too, who set me up and stayed after closing to finish things off. :)

so Oprah has seen our city and will take back to the US a series of images...probably, yes, predictable, but also iconic, like the view of Flinders Street seen from Fed Square.

funnily and unlike some, I don't mind us spending squillions ($3 million) to get her and her acolytes over here. I figure it's likely to pay off in tourism...got to be better and more positive than Tiger Woods. and no, I don't watch Oprah. or Tiger.

want to argue with me? well get on down to the St Kilda Library, Carlisle Street, at 6.30 this Thursday the 16th: I'll be there, talking about the book, Melbourne and, I hope, your favourite images/books/films/shows about Melbourne.

another review:

"If you are looking for a quirky gift for the ultimate Melbournian this Christmas, pick up a copy of When We Think About Melbourne: The imagination of a city. Jenny Sinclair’s book explores what makes Melbourne unique, why we are such an ‘it’ city and what our collective imagination can create.....

The chapter on Melbourne’s souvenirs also managed to bring a smile to my face – who amongst us doesn’t have a Melbourne tea towel lingering at the bottom of a drawer somewhere?"

The Only Melbourne website has reviewed the book...I feel like I should be sending them a bottle of wine, it's so kind...

so we will have a new government. and with it, a whole new set of policies about everything from roads to the arts. fingers crossed for the city...

have just booked in to speak at the St Kilda Library in Carlisle Street on Thursday 16 December from 6.30 pm. Quite close to Christmas, but an easy to get to location for the St Kilda types; I'll be focussing on the St Kilda-related elements of the book, particularly photography, and talking about the cultural landscape of the suburb generally.