So this year I haven't done the "book a billion films and don't go home ever for two whole weeks" thing, which is my usual caper for the Melbourne International Film Festival. I have scaled down my filmgoing due to:

a) financial disincentives, namely poverty

b) health related disincentives, namely scurvy

c) mental health related disincentives, namely insanity

d) film related disincentives, namely the quality of the films last year interesting me less than they have in past years.

If one scales back, of course, the cinematic grass appears a whole lot greener, so to those peeps who find themselves bamboozled by the scale of things and don't know how to scale back, here be my advice:

1. See all Japanese live-action films that are only shown once. They will never be seen again and they are nearly always brilliant (special mention goes to their naturalistic dramas in which two people will, for example, converse on the nature of gravity while a giant twig grows slowly out of the side of one of their thighs). So far, the Japanese Film Rule has never lost me a customer.

2. See any documentary on any topic that interests you or potentially might interest you. The doccos are usually good and often on interesting topics. Sometimes, doccos are more interesting than their topics imply.

3. See, where possible: Korean, Iranian, Icelandic or American indie films that won't get distribution.

4. If you like story, avoid films described as "bleak" or "meandering". If you enjoy cinematography, book online and take popcorn.

5. Become a member. Skip the queue.

If you're going to the film festival on a full pass, may I suggest the following:

1. You know that V8 vegetable juice? Secure an intravenous drip on a pole.

Sometimes having three different jobs means they're in competition with each other. Sometimes though, when you're in regional Victoria organising a free legal information program, you meet the head of a local community group and you've just met a character who's going in a play.

I'm in Wangaratta. There's a character storm over here. Clearing late this afternoon.

In the library when you are trying to write and someone is talking extremely loudly and it turns out to be the librarian, it is best to listen to:

1. Rachmaninov

2. The superman theme

3. My friend Liam

It is surprising how quickly the librarian becomes an actor in a wordless drama of my own making. Huzzah! Thwarted by music!

In both my "day jobs", I have excellent views. Not of the sea, or the mountains, or the city, but of other people. Something I know about people: they never look up.   It's amazing what people will do when they think nobody is watching them. They will, I happen to know:   1. Pick their noses. 2. Engage in the purchase and/or supply of quantities of drugs and/or totally innocent goods in small packages that require sales to be made on street corners from old Ford Falcons. 3. Yank their undies out of uncomfortable places. 4. Argue. 5. Talk to themselves.   It's this last one that's my favourite. I do that. Look up, people.   I promise, a writer is buiding you into a script.

Sign in a mountaineering shop in the middle of the city: Now Is The Winter of Our Discount Tents.

Hands up if you have an arts degree and you work in retail.

Definitely worth it.

Weekends are for resting, aren't they.

That's what I figure. So I go away for a nice break and I usually find myself naturally coming to write the odd thing.

On the weekends when I fight the relaxation and decide to work, I find myself sitting inside with my laptop looking out the window at people who are not fighting their desire to have a proper weekend full of relaxing and walking about aimlessly in parks.

This weekend, I intend to relax but am aware that there is a hidden intent to write. Does this count? I am trying to psych myself into the right mindset. Whatever that might be.

Have a good one.

On the side of my bottle of carbonated water, a description of the springs from which the water is sourced:

"Often under snow in winter, the area is surrounded by huge granite boulders unique in the Australian bush. It is a haven for wildlife including the native platypus."

A platypus, this is what they are telling me, weed in my drink.