Yes, it's another diary entry!

Shocking, I know, three diary entries in nearly as many days, but I’ve actually got a bit of time to breathe this weekend, not having to worry that I should be spending every spare moment on study.

We spent last night listening to Radio Shropshire. That might seem like a bit of an odd thing to do, given that we’re quite a long way from Shropshire, but they have a regular Friday morning (for them, late Friday night for us) slot where they talk about Bookcrossing. It started off with just a small item about Bookcrossing on their morning programme, but the two presenters were so taken by the idea that they turned it into a regular thing. And as they have a live feed of their show on their website, it has also turned into a regular thing that bookcrossers from all over the world tune in and listen to the show, send emails to the presenters, and chat together in a thread on the Bookcrossing forums (here’s this week’s) while listening. No matter how much I take the internet for granted, there’s still something seriously surreal about chatting online to people in Australia and Europe and all over the world, and knowing they’re listening to exactly the same radio station as me!

The presenters (JimOnTheRadio and Laneycakes) are obviously reading along with the threads while doing their show, because they’re always saying hi to various bookcrossers who have commented in the thread (leading to shrees of "He said me!" from everyone who gets a mention, and sulks from anyone who doesn’t ), and last night MrPloppy’s discussion of toilet attendants (you had to be there) almost made JimOn (as he tends to be called around the forums) lose his professional demeanour and start laughing… There was lots of hilarity in our household last night while listening, because lytteltonwitch had come over to listen with us (because she’s only got dialup, which isn’t great for listening to streaming audio), so she was logged in to Bookcrossing on one computer, and MrPloppy and I were logged in on the other (on two separate browsers, so we just had to switch windows to swap from one account to the other), and we were having a conversation via the forums (despite all being in the same room – technology is much more fun than that whole boring talking to someone in person thing!) Loads of fun and lots of giggles, anyway. Lytteltonwitch brought a book over for me too: A Thousand Country Roads by Robert James Walker… oh, and a large bag of unregistered books – she’s been cleaning out her garage again

Otakuu was in Christchurch today, and there was a charity booksale on in Riccarton, so I met lytteltonwitch and her there. They had a sign saying "Fill a bag for $5" – obviously they hadn’t counted on bookcrossers turning up, because we are experts at cramming books into bags to get the best possible value for money out of such deals. I managed to get 30 books into one bag without even trying. Hmm, that’s 16c a book – not too bad! After we’d had our fill at the sale, we retired to a nearby Starbucks to chat. I released Psycho Cat by Derek Hansen in the cafe, and managed to convince lytteltonwitch to take home Sun Dog by Monique Roffey.

The copy of The Actresses that I released in the Town Hall on Wednesday night has been caught already! Only an anonymous finder, but they’re going to re-release it in Rangiora. I got another exciting anonymous finder journal entry for Monsoon, which was one of the books we labelled in the backpackers in Dunedin. It’s now in Lancashire, having travelled via Rome!

Currently reading: Cuentos en español, and The Winner’s Enclosure by Anne Caulfield