(diaryland) October 01, 2012 - 2:27 p.m.

I spent Friday under a battered pink umbrella in the botanical gardens.

Since I'm scared of lightning, this wasn't cool.

What a nadir of weather that day was. It was the only time my study buddy and I could get one of the two ipads in the entire faculty to do a walking tour worth 10% of our marks.

Right at the end, we found a woozy duckling in the cold and it died on the reception desk at a veterinarian's office.

It was a shit day.

Last week, I mostly watched the investigation of the Jill Meagher murder unfold. The night after it happened, before I'd heard about it, I walked by myself down a side street in Northcote. Melbourne doesn't usually seem scary at night. Daniel and I have gone up and down the street where she went missing many a time at night.

I remember one night, though, out in the suburbs, I was walking to my car. A guy was lit by a street lamp, and I could see him go into a front yard and hide behind some bushes. When I got a bit closer, he came out and said, "Excuse me."

At the time, I had a car that needed a key to unlock it. I unlocked that mofo fast, leapt in, and drove away.

But still, it didn't feel as scary as it should have.