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This afternoon, I went down to the book/CD clearance at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre (that's the place next to the casino, not the Exhibition Building), and spent more money than was sensible on CDs and books.

They had a lot of CDs (predominantly from various parts of Universal), and a lot of books (from all over the place), as well as things like PlayStation controllers and teddy bears.

CDs bought:

Pulp - We Love Life (for $10!)

The Clouds - Thunderhead (frogworth and gths kept going on about how brilliant they were; I wasn't sure what to get of theirs, but Thunderhead was $5 and the title sounded familiar)

Ian Brown - Music of the Spheres (songwriting with post-triphop overproduction; sort of like the last David Bridie only not quite as diverse in feel; oh, that and it's an actual Red Book CD)

A Camp (Nina Persson of the Cardigans' solo effort. I recall hearing tracks from it on Far And Wide and thinking it sounded interesting. Though on first listen the CD hasn't really grabbed me.)

and best-of compilations from The Beautiful South, Parliament (which is full of loops I've heard in dozens of other songs), Barry White and Burt Bacharach

I picked up a bunch of books including Justina Robson's Mappa Mundi and Pat Cadigan's Dervish is Digital (both on

frogworth's recommendation), Carl Hiaasen's Sick Puppy (I heard him compared to Brookmyre, and for $3.99 am willing to try him), J.G. Ballard's Super-Cannes, a travel guide to Europe from a few years ago, and a treatise on typography (Finer Points in the spacing and arrangement of Type, by Geoffrey Dowding, written in the 1950s; $2.99)

CDs I had considered buying but left behind when it came to the crunch: And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead -- Source Tags and Codes, Public Enemy -- Yo! Bumrush The Show, and that Crazy Penis album.

I think I'll manage to pay the rent this fortnight.