This morning someone rang my mobile asking for what sounded like Peter Andre.

I can see where someone might find similarities between me and a sixpacksome, ugly-model-impregnating hasbeen of nineties pop, but I had to point out to them that they had the wrong number.

They seemed really affronted, as if they thought I might just be pretending not to be Peter Andre for my own malicious purposes. They were reluctant to hang up the call, even though my call display showed they were ringing from Sydney at a peak time.

Perhaps I should have sung “Mysterious Girl” at them. That would have not only proven my not-Peter-Andre status once and for all, but also gotten them off the line quick smart.

In other personalish milestone news, my sister Elise gave birth to her third child (and second daughter) on Monday. Mum and bub are both doing well. Bub has been named Harriet, which I was a bit dubious about at first, but it’s growing on me now and I think it will suit her. She’s actually a cute newborn, too, which is a surprise; most of the ones I’ve seen looked like squishy, irritable pink cabbages.

I am excited; I love being an auntie and I’m kickarse at it. When not interrogating my 3-year-old nephew as to his communist leanings, I can be found teaching them interesting new noises to piss off Mummy and Daddy, inadvertently teaching them interesting new four-letter words, and dispensing wizzy-dizzies until just before the point where little tummies start bringing up their lunch.

You wish you had me in your life to look after your sproglings.

Dear Irritating Man From Last Night,

I’m sorry, sonny Jim, but I don’t think you quite understand the concept of the strip club. The idea is that you go there, pay your money, buy a beer, and for a brief fleeting moment of your sorry existence, you get to pretend you’re in a world where you have a chance in hell of scoring with the scantily-clad women therein. Wave some money around and that dream just might become a reality, provided you keep your hands to yourself (or find an even dodgier establishment).

The idea is not to sit cradling your beer and to ignore all the naked flesh in order to check out and chortle over the fully-clothed girls playing pool nearby. No, sorry, it isn’t. Really. And yes, my game of pool is hilariously bad, I am the first to admit that; it’s so bad that I can’t even claim to be playing badly as a ploy to trick stupid people into playing with me for money, and then winning. I think it’ s funny too, and I wouldn’t have minded if you were having a giggle at my mad skillz.

It didn’t seem that you were, however, and let me point this out to you: the clothing-deficient ladies are there for your entertainment, provided you keep paying for them to be (because for one thing, there’s still no base wage for sex entertainment such as stripping or prostitution, grumble grumble union time). The fully-clothed ladies who are drinking and playing pool and talking to their pet straight dude and POINTEDLY IGNORING YOU are not: they are there for their entertainment, and also for the free cigars and finger food they were promised, which never really surfaced. They’re still pissed about that, by the way.

You’re not going to get very far by making nasty, sleazy little comments to your mates that are just almost audible to us, and let us know exactly what you’re saying. I’m not even sure what you’d be attempting to do: we don’t scare easily and we’re not interested in you. My advice is that you just relax, accept that sometimes girls come to strip clubs for other reasons than employment, and that some of them play pool very badly. Also, they’re quite happy with a cue in their hand and some of them read a lot about Vlad Tepes as a teenager and are prone to sudden fits of violent temper, if you catch my drift. Just a word to the wise.

Yours sincerely,

Aimee, the girl with a lot more balls than you

I’ve just had a short story of mine, “Down in the Park”, accepted for publication in Ultimate Lesbian Erotica 2006, which will be out through Alyson in December. Those of you who attended Lustre’s launch last December may have hazy memories of me reading it.

I am, naturally, very excited. It’s been a while since I’ve had anything anthologized (possibly because it’s been a while since I’ve submitted anything for publication), and this particular story has always been a pet favourite of mine out of my erotica, even though the couple of times I’ve sent it out to play it’s come home with its shoelaces undone snivelling about the other stories kicking sand in its face, so to speak.

I just signed the contract over dinner, and then hastily wiped small smears of refried bean off it. It seems that, much like drinking and driving, burritoing and writing isn’t a good idea.