Sometimes it's easy to forget that Melbourne is a city of some four million inhabitants. All of the outer suburbs - and to be honest most of the inner ones - are unknown territory for me. On my mental map of the place, what lies beyond a twenty minute tram ride from the CBD reads "There Be Dragons". What's more, this terra incognita doesn't interest me either. I grew up in suburbia, and from my experiences of the commuter-infested areas of cities around the world there is little to tell one suburb in one country from another on a continent thousands of miles distant, except perhaps climate.

That is why I'm so glad to be living pretty much slap bang in the centre of Melbourne, where the unique flavour of this city is at its most accessible. For instance, I doubt that by popping in to some faceless suburban pub I would have ended up chatting to the curator of the National Gallery of Victoria (apparently their exhibition of Dutch Masters is a must-see) - unless he happened to live there, I suppose, but what are the chances of that?

Of course, big cities play host to big shows. The other week Rainnie & I went to see Tap Dogs, the world-famous Australian all-male tap dancing show where the dancers are presented as gruff workmen on a building site, stomping about in work boots, before proceeding to dazzle the audience with their fantastic footwork. It was magic! The show was splendid, with a mesmerising musical backing thick with primal drumbeats and sampled industrial sounds.

And it was a lights & smells show too; my favourite sketch was the sychronised showers of sparks flying up from sanders to left and right, with the guys dancing down the centre of the stage oblivious of the heat. Rainnie, being a blacksmith and with a background in welding, also very much enjoyed this part of the show. I disagree slightly when she says molten metal has a "lovely" smell, but it's certainly a strong one and evocative of the macho builders' environment that Tap Dogs seeks to create on stage. I think this new testosterone-driven take on the hitherto effete art of tapdancing has successfully brought it back from obscurity.

When the show drew to a close, I realised that for the duration of the performance it had been as if we had stepped outside of time. Spectacle had followed spectacle, and the audience was hungry for more, but all good things must come to an end. It was a long while before humdrum reality finally made itself felt once more - long enough anyway for us to get to Chocolate Buddha on Federation Square and meet up with Rainnie's girlfriend Claire for a coffee. And even then the world was not quite back to normal: despite the freezing cold and despite being sat outside, we had to take off a couple of layers of clothes (Melbourne's all about layers) as we sweltered under the heat of the most effective standing gas heaters I have ever experienced.

On a completely different note, I used my umbrella for pretty much the first time since I moved to Melbourne the other day. I emerged from my house, the aromas of fresh coffee and toast & marmalade still tickling my nose, into a dark, grey, drizzly morning. As the day progressed, there were only very occasional scraps of blue sky discernible between the banks of cloud overhead. Walking home through the city I felt very much the office worker, battling through crowds of like-minded people swarming to their houses or the railway station, repeatedly hoisting my umbrella up at jaunty angles so as to avoid entanglements with passers-by.

Fiona & I headed out for a drink this evening, despite the bitter cold, and we ended up chatting with an ex-Australian Navy signalman who is now working in the insurance industry. It was interesting to hear of the difficulties he is having adjusting to civilian life. It was also interesting to hear how he, as an Australian born Greek (how very Melbourne), was treated by "real" Greeks when he visited Greece a year or so ago. It was a prime example of the cultural dilemma of the immigrant: speaking perfect Greek, but using Anglo expressions (simple things like 'please' and 'excuse me'), he was regarded with suspicion by everyone he met, to the extent that in the end he had to be even more brusque than the natives just to be accepted.

I couldn't help noticing while talking with Stavros (no, really, that's his name) that he had the most amazing prehensile eyebrows. It got to the point where I almost lost the thread of his conversation because I was so engrossed in the display of emotions emanating from his forehead. His right eyebrow in particular held my attention; it was a little more eloquent than its brother, and could easily have won a medal in gymnastics. That Stavros had been a signalman in the Navy seemed appropriate somehow: he could have just attached the flags to his face and thought the messages to people!

And that's about that for now.

How cool is this: I got thrown out of a shop yesterday! For no reason!

I was with Rainnie, looking for a particular item of clothing for her friend Claire's birthday this week, and it was a fraught afternoon; only in winter-clothing-obsessed Melbourne could it ever be hard to buy a short-sleeved teeshirt!

But anyway, after hours (no, really) of searching Rainnie thought she had found the exact one she wanted. But no! It was only in men's sizes. We asked the shop owner if he had them in women's, and he said no, so Rainnie asked for the phone number of his supplier, and he got all cagey, and then he tried to snatch the teeshirt from her hands, so she said "Charming!", at which point he blew up and accused us of pawing his goods with greasy fingers and being disreputable and he threw us out!!!

I've never been ejected from a shop in all my life. It was so cool! And without even having shoplifted or flashed another customer or anything. Wow. (Cos I've always got away with it in the past, clearly.)

What else is new? Well, the weather is back to being blue-skied and still, which has made for some sumptuous sunrises and sunsets, not to mention hot afternoons - but only when sitting in a very protected spot. Like, say, the windowsill of Kate's room in my house, with my feet stretched out on our dilapidated balcony, a tasty cup of coffee with organic milk (at long last, I've found a milk that doesn't taste of chemicals) in one hand and a book (currently 100 selected O Henry stories) in the other.

I walked through Fitzroy Gardens on Sunday afternoon, seeing as it was such a pleasant sunny day. Truly, Melbourne is blessed with some delightful parks - and they're pretty damn central too. This one is just to the east of the town centre, behind the Parliament, and just to the north of the hallowed Melbourne Cricket Ground. Lots of old trees, winding pathways, and little fountains dotted here and there. And beyond the park is a lovely residential area on a little hill, with turn-of-the-century posh terraces that remind me of the Georgian bits of Dublin or Kensal Green and the occasional converted church.

And most excitingly of all, I'm finally feeling completely well again, after weeks of lingering coldy coughy sore-throaty tonsilitis and crap. Long may my good health continue! Because everyone is so happy not to have a miserable moaning me in their face.