Dawkins couldn’t get a word in at his own talk, and everything devolved from there.
Robyn Williams is the world’s foremost expert on evolution. Or that’s what it seemed like at Friday night’s discussion, when an uncharacteristically meek Richard Dawkins was swamped by the motor-mouthed, name-dropping, painfully star-struck Radio National host.
The audience – naively under the impression that they were attending a Richard Dawkins lecture – soon realised that the Oxford Don was merely an entree to the main event: Williams, Williams, Williams! In over an hour of 100% structure-free rambling, Williams managed to sabotage all potentially interesting avenues by waxing lyrical about anything – absolutely anything – inhabiting his brain at that moment. Williams on his “mate” Andrew Denton. Williams on how Christians made him mad. Williams on... well, any old crap. There was the odd little chirp from Dawkins, but this was Williams’ night and he wasn’t about to let anyone forget it – least of all an audience who paid to see someone else.
This might not have been a problem if Williams possessed any interviewing skills. However, he proved to be not only appallingly egotistical, but also incapable of asking questions that made sense. They twisted. They turned. They collapsed inward like black holes with self-esteem issues. To make things worse, RW was clueless about most of the audience’s level of background knowledge. Those who expected to hear Dawkins explain evolution’s magnificence with the aid of illuminating examples were instead treated to RW’s screeds about the origins of “messenger RNA” and other esoterica. It was needlessly arcane, but who cared? That awfully clever Robyn Williams chap understood it all perfectly!
To quote a typically incisive RW question: “How did you get through last year, Darwin’s year? Did you get through that alright?” (Subtext: “ol’ buddy ol’ pal?”) RW became so toxically unbearable after a while that I started wondering about totally irrelevant stuff: what’s “self-replicating molecule” in sign language? Where did Dawkins get that snappy suit (Saville Row, surely)? How long did it take to build that kick-arse pipe organ? And (most urgently): when, oh when, will RW shut up for five bloody seconds?
What Dawkins did manage to say was very entertaining, especially when unfairly taken out of context (which he fortunately didn’t have time to provide): “When you cross a male with a female, you don’t get a hermaphrodite”; “If you wanted to breed champion high jumpers, you could do it”; “There might come a time where you can cross a Labradoodle and a Labradoodle and get another Labradoodle”; “God made the venomous eastern groin groper”; “If you had 100 St. Bernards and 100 Chihuahuas, I don’t think you’d see any interbreeding”. Glorious as all this was, I was hoping that Dawkins would get the chance to become more than a surrealist quote generator. But nope.
The closest the night came to a real discussion was when Dawkins tried to come up with an evolutionary explanation for homosexuality. According to Dawkins, homosexuality might have come about because cavemen might have needed some guys who were really crap at hunting to guard the women without wanting to shag them. (This was about as plausible on the stage as it is on the page.)
It was left to question time to salvage the night’s entertainment value, and there were a couple of doozies. My favourite preamble was: “I’m going to ask you a question that I don’t want you to take the wrong way. The question is about giraffes.” The man then asked what we’ve all been dying to know, namely: Why are some giraffes’ necks longer than others? Doesn’t that mean that the cute little giraffes can’t reach the treetops? And doesn’t that therefore disprove evolution? (Ha! Checkmate!) Dawkins despatched the hapless guy by lobbing the following grenade: “There will always be some height of tree that, if you were a little bit taller, you could reach; and if you were a little bit shorter, you couldn’t.”
Damn straight, Richard. That’s what we pay you for!
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Mossad Little Story
Scene: Deep inside a top-secret Mossad training camp, a LEADER is talking to two SOLDIERS.
SOLDIER #1: ...it’s just not working anymore. People recognise me when I go down the street. I buy a litre of milk and the guy at the counter’s, like ‘hey, did ya whack Mohammed whatsisname yet?’
SOLDIER #2: Yeah – I thought we were meant to be, you know, a secret assassination service.
SOLDIER #1: And whose idea was that nude Mossad calendar, anyway? I can’t face my mother-in-law after that. She keeps glancing at my –
LEADER: Sorry, sorry. We were running low on funds and –
SOLDIER #2: It’s the principle of the thing. I shot a guy in an elevator last week and he made kissy-faces at me before he hit the floor in a pool of his own blood. It was embarrassing for both of us. And my daughter only sold ten packets in the Mossad lamington drive. Who thinks of this stuff?
SOLDIER #1: Yeah. We’re just not as secret as we used to be. I was out with my wife in Tel Aviv last month seeing Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Mossad!, and –
SOLDIER #2: Oh, cool – how was it?
SOLDER #1: Great. Steve Martin did an awesome Netanyahu. But Omar Sharif as Arafat? Ham. Anyway, the whole cast clapped me at the end. I was stage-whispering: “secret service! secret service, remember?” – but they just weren’t listening. I’m telling ya: fame’s a double-edged –
LEADER: Ok, ok, point taken. We’ve got a whole raft of new tactics to implement, and –
SOLDIER #2: Don’t give me that management talk. I thought the whole deal was going to be, like, all exciting espionage-type stuff, with grappling hooks and all. This is nothing like that Spielberg movie: there were no porta-loos in that. This is the worst training camp ever.
LEADER: Just listen. This is the next generation of disguises. How would you feel about becoming a citizen of a country so utterly insignificant that most of the world is utterly unaware of its existence?
SOLDIER #1: Canada?
LEADER: Better, much better. Somewhere a million miles from bugger-all. [He upends a cardboard box on the desk. The contents spill out, including two Akubras, two Driza-bones and two pairs of R M Williams boots. The two soldiers gaze in awe.]
SOLDIER #2: That is just –
SOLIDER #1: Brilliant. Utter brilliance. Where did you get all this stuff?
LEADER: Someone left them in the storeroom of their Parliament House for some reason. [Shrugs]. Here are your passports.
SOLDIER #1: Awesome, that’s – wait. You stole me a woman’s passport? Oh, for f**k’s sake.
LEADER: Look, it’s not like we can go in to the airport cafe and say “Oh hello, I’m a Mossad agent, can I please have a soy latte and some passports, please?” Always such ungratefulness!
[Soldiers look at each other in utter disgust.]
LEADER: We can change the photos later, or you could grow your hair a bit
SOLDIER #2: I always thought you’d look good with tits anyway. [Sniggers. SOLDIER #1 punches him.]
LEADER: We thought very carefully about this. It’s a country with worldwide cultural invisibility: the perfect crime. It’s incredible, actually – their Minister for the Arts used to be a rock star! [All laugh]
SOLDIER #1: But that’s impossible. Surely they have, you know, a national cuisine or something?
LEADER: Nup. They ripped it off...wait for it...the English! [LEADER and SOLDIERS erupt into laughter for 5-10 minutes.] No, quieten down, boys, I’m serious. It took them one hundred and fifty years to realise how badly English food sucked.
SOLDIER #2: So what did they do then?
LEADER: They ripped it off everyone else – including us.
SOLDIER #1: The bastards. So how do they talk? Do we need to learn how to speak like them, too?
LEADER: I have taken the liberty of learning their, um, ‘dialect’. [Looks at sheet] Please listen to the following sample sentence and repeat. “Daryl went to a B&S in his lowered Torana. Met a sheila and got a root. Drank shitloads of tinnies and had a prang. Pigs went ballistic. It was a total balls-up.”
SOLDIER #2: And that refers to – ?
LEADER: Mating, gustatory and legal mores.
SOLDIER #1: Wow. I really don’t think I could learn that much in such a short –
SOLDIER #2 [looking at the sheet]: Belt up, mate. Cop it on the chin.
LEADER: That’s the spirit! Soldier #1, why can’t you be more like soldier #2?
SOLDIER #1: There’s something that bugs me about this.
LEADER: Yes?
SOLDIER #1: Aren’t they sort of our...allies? I mean, don’t they just say ‘go for it!’, whatever we do?
LEADER: Yeah, so?
SOLDIER #1: So, why are we stealing their passports and all? Isn’t that, well, mean?
LEADER: Don’t worry: their Government won’t do anything about it.
SOLDIER #1 Ok. [Looking at sheet, speaking hesitantly]: Blood-y...rip-per?
LEADER: That’s the spirit!
SOLDIER #1: ...it’s just not working anymore. People recognise me when I go down the street. I buy a litre of milk and the guy at the counter’s, like ‘hey, did ya whack Mohammed whatsisname yet?’
SOLDIER #2: Yeah – I thought we were meant to be, you know, a secret assassination service.
SOLDIER #1: And whose idea was that nude Mossad calendar, anyway? I can’t face my mother-in-law after that. She keeps glancing at my –
LEADER: Sorry, sorry. We were running low on funds and –
SOLDIER #2: It’s the principle of the thing. I shot a guy in an elevator last week and he made kissy-faces at me before he hit the floor in a pool of his own blood. It was embarrassing for both of us. And my daughter only sold ten packets in the Mossad lamington drive. Who thinks of this stuff?
SOLDIER #1: Yeah. We’re just not as secret as we used to be. I was out with my wife in Tel Aviv last month seeing Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Mossad!, and –
SOLDIER #2: Oh, cool – how was it?
SOLDER #1: Great. Steve Martin did an awesome Netanyahu. But Omar Sharif as Arafat? Ham. Anyway, the whole cast clapped me at the end. I was stage-whispering: “secret service! secret service, remember?” – but they just weren’t listening. I’m telling ya: fame’s a double-edged –
LEADER: Ok, ok, point taken. We’ve got a whole raft of new tactics to implement, and –
SOLDIER #2: Don’t give me that management talk. I thought the whole deal was going to be, like, all exciting espionage-type stuff, with grappling hooks and all. This is nothing like that Spielberg movie: there were no porta-loos in that. This is the worst training camp ever.
LEADER: Just listen. This is the next generation of disguises. How would you feel about becoming a citizen of a country so utterly insignificant that most of the world is utterly unaware of its existence?
SOLDIER #1: Canada?
LEADER: Better, much better. Somewhere a million miles from bugger-all. [He upends a cardboard box on the desk. The contents spill out, including two Akubras, two Driza-bones and two pairs of R M Williams boots. The two soldiers gaze in awe.]
SOLDIER #2: That is just –
SOLIDER #1: Brilliant. Utter brilliance. Where did you get all this stuff?
LEADER: Someone left them in the storeroom of their Parliament House for some reason. [Shrugs]. Here are your passports.
SOLDIER #1: Awesome, that’s – wait. You stole me a woman’s passport? Oh, for f**k’s sake.
LEADER: Look, it’s not like we can go in to the airport cafe and say “Oh hello, I’m a Mossad agent, can I please have a soy latte and some passports, please?” Always such ungratefulness!
[Soldiers look at each other in utter disgust.]
LEADER: We can change the photos later, or you could grow your hair a bit
SOLDIER #2: I always thought you’d look good with tits anyway. [Sniggers. SOLDIER #1 punches him.]
LEADER: We thought very carefully about this. It’s a country with worldwide cultural invisibility: the perfect crime. It’s incredible, actually – their Minister for the Arts used to be a rock star! [All laugh]
SOLDIER #1: But that’s impossible. Surely they have, you know, a national cuisine or something?
LEADER: Nup. They ripped it off...wait for it...the English! [LEADER and SOLDIERS erupt into laughter for 5-10 minutes.] No, quieten down, boys, I’m serious. It took them one hundred and fifty years to realise how badly English food sucked.
SOLDIER #2: So what did they do then?
LEADER: They ripped it off everyone else – including us.
SOLDIER #1: The bastards. So how do they talk? Do we need to learn how to speak like them, too?
LEADER: I have taken the liberty of learning their, um, ‘dialect’. [Looks at sheet] Please listen to the following sample sentence and repeat. “Daryl went to a B&S in his lowered Torana. Met a sheila and got a root. Drank shitloads of tinnies and had a prang. Pigs went ballistic. It was a total balls-up.”
SOLDIER #2: And that refers to – ?
LEADER: Mating, gustatory and legal mores.
SOLDIER #1: Wow. I really don’t think I could learn that much in such a short –
SOLDIER #2 [looking at the sheet]: Belt up, mate. Cop it on the chin.
LEADER: That’s the spirit! Soldier #1, why can’t you be more like soldier #2?
SOLDIER #1: There’s something that bugs me about this.
LEADER: Yes?
SOLDIER #1: Aren’t they sort of our...allies? I mean, don’t they just say ‘go for it!’, whatever we do?
LEADER: Yeah, so?
SOLDIER #1: So, why are we stealing their passports and all? Isn’t that, well, mean?
LEADER: Don’t worry: their Government won’t do anything about it.
SOLDIER #1 Ok. [Looking at sheet, speaking hesitantly]: Blood-y...rip-per?
LEADER: That’s the spirit!
The ASIO Connection
Scene: KEVIN RUDD is delivering a press release about the new refugee measures.
RUDD: ...and so it’s ‘no more Mr. Nice Guy’. These imposters don’t stand a chance. We’ll throw the book at them. This is our finest hour. [Pause] Alrighty then, folks! [Cheerfully] Any questions?
REPORTER 1: Mr Rudd, do you really think it’s appropriate sending ASIO crack forces to spy on defenceless people who desperately need our help?
RUDD: More than appropriate. It’s fantastic.
REPORTER 1: What do you mean, ‘fantastic’?
RUDD: For the economy. This will cost the taxpayer an absolute bucketload.
REPORTER 1: But...isn’t that a bad thing?
RUDD: No: it’s all part of the stimulus.
REPORTER 1: How does that work, exactly?
RUDD: We throw stacks of your money at useless stuff. The more useless the better!
REPORTER 1: Yes, but...
RUDD: And that gives us stacks more money to buy lots more useless stuff from other countries. And then they buy even more useless stuff from us. Round we go! It’s a great system – have you not read Keynes? [Pause] Oh, you simply must. Hilarious guy! [Chuckles, then quickly assumes sober face] For further details, I refer you to my essay in –
REPORTER 1: Uh, that’s ok, thanks.
RUDD: Anyone else?
REPORTER 2: But isn’t the whole motion highly unethical?
RUDD: Everything that we do is ethical. [Smiles benevolently while interlocking fingers together in ‘joining’ motion.] Absolutely everything. We’re the ALP: the party of the people. Of you and me. Us.
REPORTER 2: The more cynical among us would say that you’re trying to repeat Howard’s trick of demonising refugees for your own political gain.
RUDD: Well, that simply isn’t true. I don’t even like cricket.
REPORTER 2: Does the phrase, “We decide the people who come into this country and the circumstances in which we come” ring a bell?
RUDD: This is totally different. Gee whiz, folks!
REPORTER 2: So why ASIO?
RUDD: They are among our greatest Australians. [Under breath]: Those reffos should be grateful. [Aloud]: We look forward to a co-synergetic relationship evolving between these two valuable communities.
REPORTER 2: Are you worried about the fact that ASIO are notoriously inept?
RUDD: I have no idea what you’re talking about.
[The meeting is interrupted by an ASIO operative descending from the ceiling on a rope. He is wearing a burglar’s mask and a black-and-white striped shirt.]
ASIO OPERATIVE: K-man! [Attempts complicated secret handshake, which is rebuffed by a frostily unreceptive RUDD.] Whaddaya think of the new uniform? [Modestly] Designed by moi, natch.
RUDD: Roger, this is not an appropriate time.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Sorry. Could you offer your advice on a...certain departmental matter?
RUDD: Well, I suppose this might be a good opportunity to discuss this complex new policy at a valuable public forum.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Totally. I have, uh, several alternative policy outcomes I would like you to examine.
RUDD: Well, ok. As long as it’s strictly related.
ASIO OPERATIVE: [Excitedly opening a packet of false moustaches]. Oh, I love this. This is awesome.
RUDD: I don’t see how this is –
ASIO OPERATIVE: Ok. Ok. Which one do you like the best? [Rapidly puts on each moustache in turn.] Curly? Bushy? Straight? Hitler? Strongman? Walrus?
RUDD: You’re wearing fake moustaches on board refugee boats?
ASIO OPERATIVE [nervously]: Yeah. [Long pause.] Uh, isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing? [Pause.] Does that mean we have to ditch the tea-towels as well?
RUDD [hurriedly]: What have you found out?
ASIO OPERATIVE: So far, our reconnaissance missions have revealed lots and lots of important facts.
RUDD: Facts? What facts?
ASIO OPERATIVE [changing subject]: Hey, look: my pen turns into a flick-knife. Cool, eh?
RUDD: Please. Discuss your findings to the gallery.
ASIO OPERATIVE: OK. All on the QT, mind.
RUDD: Of course.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Well – for starters, they’re pretty skinny.
RUDD: Whom?
ASIO OPERATIVE: The terrorists, of course!
RUDD: Refugees. Call them refugees, Steven.
ASIO OPERATIVE: You said that they would blow the place sky-high if we let ‘em off the boat.
RUDD: That’s enough. What else?
ASIO OPERATIVE: A lot have scary beards. And a high proportion of them seem to come from...
RUDD [eagerly]: Yes?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Overseas.
RUDD: ‘Most’?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Well, some of them were from Australia. [Long pause] Actually, now I think about it, all the ones from Australia were ASIO operatives.
RUDD: Anything else?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Yes. Something very important. There’s a serious problem at Christmas Island.
RUDD: A riot?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Worse. Much worse.
RUDD: How could it be worse?
ASIO OPERATIVE [in stage whisper]: Santa’s gone missing. [Long silence]. There is a Santa, isn’t there? [Longer silence].
RUDD: Well...
ASIO OPERATIVE [crestfallen]: Worst. Day. Ever. [He shimmies up the rope and disappears into ceiling cavity, leaving RUDD alone on stage.]
RUDD: ...and so it’s ‘no more Mr. Nice Guy’. These imposters don’t stand a chance. We’ll throw the book at them. This is our finest hour. [Pause] Alrighty then, folks! [Cheerfully] Any questions?
REPORTER 1: Mr Rudd, do you really think it’s appropriate sending ASIO crack forces to spy on defenceless people who desperately need our help?
RUDD: More than appropriate. It’s fantastic.
REPORTER 1: What do you mean, ‘fantastic’?
RUDD: For the economy. This will cost the taxpayer an absolute bucketload.
REPORTER 1: But...isn’t that a bad thing?
RUDD: No: it’s all part of the stimulus.
REPORTER 1: How does that work, exactly?
RUDD: We throw stacks of your money at useless stuff. The more useless the better!
REPORTER 1: Yes, but...
RUDD: And that gives us stacks more money to buy lots more useless stuff from other countries. And then they buy even more useless stuff from us. Round we go! It’s a great system – have you not read Keynes? [Pause] Oh, you simply must. Hilarious guy! [Chuckles, then quickly assumes sober face] For further details, I refer you to my essay in –
REPORTER 1: Uh, that’s ok, thanks.
RUDD: Anyone else?
REPORTER 2: But isn’t the whole motion highly unethical?
RUDD: Everything that we do is ethical. [Smiles benevolently while interlocking fingers together in ‘joining’ motion.] Absolutely everything. We’re the ALP: the party of the people. Of you and me. Us.
REPORTER 2: The more cynical among us would say that you’re trying to repeat Howard’s trick of demonising refugees for your own political gain.
RUDD: Well, that simply isn’t true. I don’t even like cricket.
REPORTER 2: Does the phrase, “We decide the people who come into this country and the circumstances in which we come” ring a bell?
RUDD: This is totally different. Gee whiz, folks!
REPORTER 2: So why ASIO?
RUDD: They are among our greatest Australians. [Under breath]: Those reffos should be grateful. [Aloud]: We look forward to a co-synergetic relationship evolving between these two valuable communities.
REPORTER 2: Are you worried about the fact that ASIO are notoriously inept?
RUDD: I have no idea what you’re talking about.
[The meeting is interrupted by an ASIO operative descending from the ceiling on a rope. He is wearing a burglar’s mask and a black-and-white striped shirt.]
ASIO OPERATIVE: K-man! [Attempts complicated secret handshake, which is rebuffed by a frostily unreceptive RUDD.] Whaddaya think of the new uniform? [Modestly] Designed by moi, natch.
RUDD: Roger, this is not an appropriate time.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Sorry. Could you offer your advice on a...certain departmental matter?
RUDD: Well, I suppose this might be a good opportunity to discuss this complex new policy at a valuable public forum.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Totally. I have, uh, several alternative policy outcomes I would like you to examine.
RUDD: Well, ok. As long as it’s strictly related.
ASIO OPERATIVE: [Excitedly opening a packet of false moustaches]. Oh, I love this. This is awesome.
RUDD: I don’t see how this is –
ASIO OPERATIVE: Ok. Ok. Which one do you like the best? [Rapidly puts on each moustache in turn.] Curly? Bushy? Straight? Hitler? Strongman? Walrus?
RUDD: You’re wearing fake moustaches on board refugee boats?
ASIO OPERATIVE [nervously]: Yeah. [Long pause.] Uh, isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing? [Pause.] Does that mean we have to ditch the tea-towels as well?
RUDD [hurriedly]: What have you found out?
ASIO OPERATIVE: So far, our reconnaissance missions have revealed lots and lots of important facts.
RUDD: Facts? What facts?
ASIO OPERATIVE [changing subject]: Hey, look: my pen turns into a flick-knife. Cool, eh?
RUDD: Please. Discuss your findings to the gallery.
ASIO OPERATIVE: OK. All on the QT, mind.
RUDD: Of course.
ASIO OPERATIVE: Well – for starters, they’re pretty skinny.
RUDD: Whom?
ASIO OPERATIVE: The terrorists, of course!
RUDD: Refugees. Call them refugees, Steven.
ASIO OPERATIVE: You said that they would blow the place sky-high if we let ‘em off the boat.
RUDD: That’s enough. What else?
ASIO OPERATIVE: A lot have scary beards. And a high proportion of them seem to come from...
RUDD [eagerly]: Yes?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Overseas.
RUDD: ‘Most’?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Well, some of them were from Australia. [Long pause] Actually, now I think about it, all the ones from Australia were ASIO operatives.
RUDD: Anything else?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Yes. Something very important. There’s a serious problem at Christmas Island.
RUDD: A riot?
ASIO OPERATIVE: Worse. Much worse.
RUDD: How could it be worse?
ASIO OPERATIVE [in stage whisper]: Santa’s gone missing. [Long silence]. There is a Santa, isn’t there? [Longer silence].
RUDD: Well...
ASIO OPERATIVE [crestfallen]: Worst. Day. Ever. [He shimmies up the rope and disappears into ceiling cavity, leaving RUDD alone on stage.]
Cabinet Reshuffle
Scene: A Liberal Party ‘cabinet reshuffle’ meeting. In attendance are ABBOT, BISHOP and JOYCE.
ABBOTT: Now, we’re all here to talk openly. This isn’t the Labor Party, you know, where the leader –
JOYCE: – Shut up, Tony.
ABBOTT: Sorry, Barnaby.
JOYCE: This meeting is eye-poppingly redundant, a point which I will demonstrate by popping my eyes out of their sockets and subsequently reinserting them. I am – quite literally – gobsmacked that such a ridiculous meeting is occurring right now.
ABBOTT: I don’t think you mean literally –
JOYCE: – Enough, college boy. Not all our mummies were flush enough to send us to Ye Olde Oxford Towne. [Sniggers bitterly].
ABBOTT: Barnaby, Julie has something important she wants to say. First, though, Julie, could you be a dear and iron this –
BISHOP: No, Tony. [Glares at him with utterly inhuman coldness and ferocious intensity.] I. Wish. To. Speak.
ABBOTT [wincing]: Meee-owww!
BISHOP: What has recently occurred is deeply unfair.
ABBOTT [in a professional tone]: Now we’re making progress. Why, Julia?
BISHOP: Because Barnaby gets to be Finance spokesman and I don’t.
ABBOTT [patronisingly, soothingly]: But you’re Deputy Leader, Julia. That’s the second most important position in the whole wide world. What more do you want? You’d get to be leader of the party if I ever went under a....truck.
[There is total silence. Abbott’s face turns ashen as he contemplates this possible future.] Of course, you could choose a more, well, ‘traditional’ portfolio.
BISHOP [sulkily]: Like what, Tony?
ABBOTT: Well, you could be minister for whaling prohibition, for example.
BISHOP: We don’t have a minister for whaling prohibition.
ABBOTT: We can make one! [Quietly]: That’d stop the sun from shining out of Bob Brown’s –
JOYCE [seething]: – The only proper place for a whale is in a fucking tuna can.
ABBOTT [agitated]: Barnaby, please. At least try to cooperate.
JOYCE [muttering]: Chowing down on those giant useless grey water-loving bastards is pretty much the only thing the Japs’ve done right since WWII.
ABBOTT: That’s enough. You just can’t say things like that anymore.
JOYCE: You thought it was piss-funny before –
ABBOTT: – I became leader. Julie?
BISHOP: Barnaby doesn’t know the first thing about economics.
JOYCE: I was an accountant before I came to this dump, Julie. You might not have heard of us: we eff about with bloody complicated numbers all day and make ‘em add up, whether they like it or not.
BISHOP: Running a country’s economy isn’t like running a household budget, Barnaby.
JOYCE: Too right it is! When my kids waste their pocket money on crap, I send ‘em to their rooms. So when Kev pisses my money away on total crap, I –
ABBOTT: Not total crap, Barnaby: climate change is total crap, remember. Except when we’re speaking in public. Then it’s –
JOYCE [mockingly]: – ‘the greatest human challenge of our time’, yeah. I read your brown paper about it.
ABBOTT [incensed]: It was a white paper, Barnaby.
JOYCE: Not after I wiped my arse on it. [Laughs uproariously while vigorously nudging Abbott.] Your Uncle Kevvie won’t let you say stuff like that anymore, Tony Boy, will ‘e? That mongrel’s got yer balls pickled in a jar beside his –
BISHOP: – I really don’t appreciate that kind of hyper-masculine language, Barnaby. And besides, we’ve both seen plenty of Tony’s –
ABBOTT [flustered]: – That’s quite enough from both of you. Julie, Barnaby knows plenty about economics: watch this. Now, Barnaby, if you have 5 oranges and I take 3 oranges, how many oranges do you have?
JOYCE: Hands off my fucking oranges, you grasping Bolshevik bastard.
ABBOTT [wearily]: It’s only a theoretical problem, Barnaby. We discussed this, remember? Nobody’s going to take your oranges.
JOYCE: You’re just like the other mob. Bleeding me white. Sucking me dry. Taking my oranges and giving them to Japanese refugees.
ABBOTT: Our refugees don’t come from –
JOYCE: Whose side are you on, anyway? All I know is my oranges are gone and now I’m bloody hungry. I know the other mob are saying that I can’t tell my squillions from my zillions. Fine. The important thing is, they’re both bloody big numbers, and there’s one thing I do know.
ABBOTT: Oh? What’s that?
JOYCE: Ten hap’orth farthings’ worth of bloody oranges won’t cover more than three pissteenths of a bushel of twice-fathomed acreage. Not within a bee’s franger – especially when the barometer’s dropped clean under threescore bars!
[ABBOTT and BISHOP glance at each other worriedly].
JOYCE: That’s real maths. For real men. Bloody metric system made everyone soft in the head. Kids don’t know how to count without taking their electric arithmicators out of their baggy pockets. Pants down round their arses of course. As usual.
BISHOP: This is what I’m talking about, Tony. Barnaby clearly presents us with a PR liability.
ABBOTT [grave]: Julia.
BISHOP: Yes, Tony?
ABBOTT: Do you remember when you were finance minister?
BISHOP: Oh, yes. I learned...so much that week.
ABBOTT: Yes. But what did you actually achieve?
BISHOP [fishing crumpled diagram out of pocket]: I educated the public about the fiscal benefits of the Laffer Curve.
JOYCE: Pointy-headed crap –
ABBOTT: Give it a chance, Barnaby. [Hesitantly]. Ah yes, the ‘Laffer Curve’. Remind me, Julia?
BISHOP [increasingly confident]: Well, the ‘Laffer Curve’ is a mathematical formulation that dictates the inverse relation between taxation and revenue.
ABBOTT [intrigued, despite himself]: The inverse relation?
BISHOP [in schoolmarmish tone]: Yes. You see, Tony, if you tax rich people, they get angry.
ABBOTT: Ah.
BISHOP: And if you give all the rich people’s money to lazy poor people, they get even lazier!
ABBOTT: Right-oh. [To self]: All single mothers, no doubt.
BISHOP: The rich get too angry to make the money. The poor get too lazy to do the work. And we get –
JOYCE: – screwed, I’ll bet. Bloody poor can’t get lazier than they are already, if you ask me. Sponging little parasite Whitlamites sitting in their raggedy jackets drinking Chai Teas off scummy little saucers –
ABBOTT: Shhh, Barnaby. Go on, Julie. What’s the alternative to taxing the rich?
BISHOP [beaming]: We must let the magnificent businesspeople of this nation replenish the coffers of plenty with their overflowing bounty of beneficent public generosity and charity.
ABBOTT: So we stop taxing them?
BISHOP: Yes.
ABBOTT: And we’ll get lots of money out of this?
BISHOP: Oh, lots. It’s all been worked out by people in America!
ABBOTT: What about the poor?
BISHOP: The Laffer Curve will instil them with the cleansing desire to be absolutely all that they can be!
ABBOTT: By taking away their food stamps?
BISHOP: Of course, Tony. The Laffer Curve therefore increases State revenue as well as delivering the priceless gifts of spiritual and moral victory to the less ‘achievement-inclined’ among us.
ABBOTT: Now that’s the kind of Christian charity I can relate to. You’re re-hired, Julie. [Long pause.] Barnaby?
JOYCE [awkwardly]: Yes?
ABBOTT: Give me back my wallet.
ABBOTT: Now, we’re all here to talk openly. This isn’t the Labor Party, you know, where the leader –
JOYCE: – Shut up, Tony.
ABBOTT: Sorry, Barnaby.
JOYCE: This meeting is eye-poppingly redundant, a point which I will demonstrate by popping my eyes out of their sockets and subsequently reinserting them. I am – quite literally – gobsmacked that such a ridiculous meeting is occurring right now.
ABBOTT: I don’t think you mean literally –
JOYCE: – Enough, college boy. Not all our mummies were flush enough to send us to Ye Olde Oxford Towne. [Sniggers bitterly].
ABBOTT: Barnaby, Julie has something important she wants to say. First, though, Julie, could you be a dear and iron this –
BISHOP: No, Tony. [Glares at him with utterly inhuman coldness and ferocious intensity.] I. Wish. To. Speak.
ABBOTT [wincing]: Meee-owww!
BISHOP: What has recently occurred is deeply unfair.
ABBOTT [in a professional tone]: Now we’re making progress. Why, Julia?
BISHOP: Because Barnaby gets to be Finance spokesman and I don’t.
ABBOTT [patronisingly, soothingly]: But you’re Deputy Leader, Julia. That’s the second most important position in the whole wide world. What more do you want? You’d get to be leader of the party if I ever went under a....truck.
[There is total silence. Abbott’s face turns ashen as he contemplates this possible future.] Of course, you could choose a more, well, ‘traditional’ portfolio.
BISHOP [sulkily]: Like what, Tony?
ABBOTT: Well, you could be minister for whaling prohibition, for example.
BISHOP: We don’t have a minister for whaling prohibition.
ABBOTT: We can make one! [Quietly]: That’d stop the sun from shining out of Bob Brown’s –
JOYCE [seething]: – The only proper place for a whale is in a fucking tuna can.
ABBOTT [agitated]: Barnaby, please. At least try to cooperate.
JOYCE [muttering]: Chowing down on those giant useless grey water-loving bastards is pretty much the only thing the Japs’ve done right since WWII.
ABBOTT: That’s enough. You just can’t say things like that anymore.
JOYCE: You thought it was piss-funny before –
ABBOTT: – I became leader. Julie?
BISHOP: Barnaby doesn’t know the first thing about economics.
JOYCE: I was an accountant before I came to this dump, Julie. You might not have heard of us: we eff about with bloody complicated numbers all day and make ‘em add up, whether they like it or not.
BISHOP: Running a country’s economy isn’t like running a household budget, Barnaby.
JOYCE: Too right it is! When my kids waste their pocket money on crap, I send ‘em to their rooms. So when Kev pisses my money away on total crap, I –
ABBOTT: Not total crap, Barnaby: climate change is total crap, remember. Except when we’re speaking in public. Then it’s –
JOYCE [mockingly]: – ‘the greatest human challenge of our time’, yeah. I read your brown paper about it.
ABBOTT [incensed]: It was a white paper, Barnaby.
JOYCE: Not after I wiped my arse on it. [Laughs uproariously while vigorously nudging Abbott.] Your Uncle Kevvie won’t let you say stuff like that anymore, Tony Boy, will ‘e? That mongrel’s got yer balls pickled in a jar beside his –
BISHOP: – I really don’t appreciate that kind of hyper-masculine language, Barnaby. And besides, we’ve both seen plenty of Tony’s –
ABBOTT [flustered]: – That’s quite enough from both of you. Julie, Barnaby knows plenty about economics: watch this. Now, Barnaby, if you have 5 oranges and I take 3 oranges, how many oranges do you have?
JOYCE: Hands off my fucking oranges, you grasping Bolshevik bastard.
ABBOTT [wearily]: It’s only a theoretical problem, Barnaby. We discussed this, remember? Nobody’s going to take your oranges.
JOYCE: You’re just like the other mob. Bleeding me white. Sucking me dry. Taking my oranges and giving them to Japanese refugees.
ABBOTT: Our refugees don’t come from –
JOYCE: Whose side are you on, anyway? All I know is my oranges are gone and now I’m bloody hungry. I know the other mob are saying that I can’t tell my squillions from my zillions. Fine. The important thing is, they’re both bloody big numbers, and there’s one thing I do know.
ABBOTT: Oh? What’s that?
JOYCE: Ten hap’orth farthings’ worth of bloody oranges won’t cover more than three pissteenths of a bushel of twice-fathomed acreage. Not within a bee’s franger – especially when the barometer’s dropped clean under threescore bars!
[ABBOTT and BISHOP glance at each other worriedly].
JOYCE: That’s real maths. For real men. Bloody metric system made everyone soft in the head. Kids don’t know how to count without taking their electric arithmicators out of their baggy pockets. Pants down round their arses of course. As usual.
BISHOP: This is what I’m talking about, Tony. Barnaby clearly presents us with a PR liability.
ABBOTT [grave]: Julia.
BISHOP: Yes, Tony?
ABBOTT: Do you remember when you were finance minister?
BISHOP: Oh, yes. I learned...so much that week.
ABBOTT: Yes. But what did you actually achieve?
BISHOP [fishing crumpled diagram out of pocket]: I educated the public about the fiscal benefits of the Laffer Curve.
JOYCE: Pointy-headed crap –
ABBOTT: Give it a chance, Barnaby. [Hesitantly]. Ah yes, the ‘Laffer Curve’. Remind me, Julia?
BISHOP [increasingly confident]: Well, the ‘Laffer Curve’ is a mathematical formulation that dictates the inverse relation between taxation and revenue.
ABBOTT [intrigued, despite himself]: The inverse relation?
BISHOP [in schoolmarmish tone]: Yes. You see, Tony, if you tax rich people, they get angry.
ABBOTT: Ah.
BISHOP: And if you give all the rich people’s money to lazy poor people, they get even lazier!
ABBOTT: Right-oh. [To self]: All single mothers, no doubt.
BISHOP: The rich get too angry to make the money. The poor get too lazy to do the work. And we get –
JOYCE: – screwed, I’ll bet. Bloody poor can’t get lazier than they are already, if you ask me. Sponging little parasite Whitlamites sitting in their raggedy jackets drinking Chai Teas off scummy little saucers –
ABBOTT: Shhh, Barnaby. Go on, Julie. What’s the alternative to taxing the rich?
BISHOP [beaming]: We must let the magnificent businesspeople of this nation replenish the coffers of plenty with their overflowing bounty of beneficent public generosity and charity.
ABBOTT: So we stop taxing them?
BISHOP: Yes.
ABBOTT: And we’ll get lots of money out of this?
BISHOP: Oh, lots. It’s all been worked out by people in America!
ABBOTT: What about the poor?
BISHOP: The Laffer Curve will instil them with the cleansing desire to be absolutely all that they can be!
ABBOTT: By taking away their food stamps?
BISHOP: Of course, Tony. The Laffer Curve therefore increases State revenue as well as delivering the priceless gifts of spiritual and moral victory to the less ‘achievement-inclined’ among us.
ABBOTT: Now that’s the kind of Christian charity I can relate to. You’re re-hired, Julie. [Long pause.] Barnaby?
JOYCE [awkwardly]: Yes?
ABBOTT: Give me back my wallet.
Monday, February 8, 2010
They stole my invention.
It's happened to all of us. You're innocently watching TV, walking past a shop, or reading the paper, when you notice something that looks really cool. It does the thing that you have always wanted to do, in the best possible way. This is fantastic for the world, fantastic for everyone! Hooray!
And yet it's not fantastic for quite everyone, is it? Because you have been storing this vision - now inexplicably made flesh - inside the 'to be invented' sector of your brain ever since you were twelve. Just planning, sequestering it away essentially. You were sitting on a gold mine, to be opened up when you had a lazy couple of grand to swing the plan into action.
And now Fischer and Paykel, or Sony, or whichever upstart you care to name, has gone and somehow excavated your brain contents when you were sleeping and fed the output into their Inventomatic-3000. Because here it is. Your invention. Your Golden Ticket to the nerdy version of Euro Disney.
This happened to me last week when walking through Myer's electronics department. I was looking for something I didn't need, when I was confronted with something I needed even less: I had to have it. But it was...
A Risotto Machine.
No, hear me out. [Guards: cover all exits and bolt doors]. The risotto machine that I invented when I was about 16 consisted of a paddle-type contraption that was designed to constantly stir the rice, evenly and thoroughly. Suspended above the rice was a drip-feed contraption that would gradually release the stock into the rice. Seeping, stirring. Seeping, stirring. So simple, yet so profound.
The Sunbeam Risotto maker - $99 decimal point ninety bloody five bucks - had all of these things. It's criminal and wrong. The company obviously had a complex network of spies in my high school quadrangle, listening to my every brilliant utterance.
I feel like the guy who invented the phone before Alexander Bell: Elisha Gray. After years of inventing, he went down to the patent office with his 'personal electrical dual-way voice communicator', or whatever he called his phone, one arvo.
Gray: 'I would like to patent my personal electrical dual-way voice communicator, please.'
Receptionist: 'Sorry, Mr. Gray, some guy patented one of those this morning.'
Gray: That's a jolly shame. Oh well, bye-bye!
Actually, that's not what he really said. This risotto's for you, Elisha!
And yet it's not fantastic for quite everyone, is it? Because you have been storing this vision - now inexplicably made flesh - inside the 'to be invented' sector of your brain ever since you were twelve. Just planning, sequestering it away essentially. You were sitting on a gold mine, to be opened up when you had a lazy couple of grand to swing the plan into action.
And now Fischer and Paykel, or Sony, or whichever upstart you care to name, has gone and somehow excavated your brain contents when you were sleeping and fed the output into their Inventomatic-3000. Because here it is. Your invention. Your Golden Ticket to the nerdy version of Euro Disney.
This happened to me last week when walking through Myer's electronics department. I was looking for something I didn't need, when I was confronted with something I needed even less: I had to have it. But it was...
A Risotto Machine.
No, hear me out. [Guards: cover all exits and bolt doors]. The risotto machine that I invented when I was about 16 consisted of a paddle-type contraption that was designed to constantly stir the rice, evenly and thoroughly. Suspended above the rice was a drip-feed contraption that would gradually release the stock into the rice. Seeping, stirring. Seeping, stirring. So simple, yet so profound.
The Sunbeam Risotto maker - $99 decimal point ninety bloody five bucks - had all of these things. It's criminal and wrong. The company obviously had a complex network of spies in my high school quadrangle, listening to my every brilliant utterance.
I feel like the guy who invented the phone before Alexander Bell: Elisha Gray. After years of inventing, he went down to the patent office with his 'personal electrical dual-way voice communicator', or whatever he called his phone, one arvo.
Gray: 'I would like to patent my personal electrical dual-way voice communicator, please.'
Receptionist: 'Sorry, Mr. Gray, some guy patented one of those this morning.'
Gray: That's a jolly shame. Oh well, bye-bye!
Actually, that's not what he really said. This risotto's for you, Elisha!
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Out of key?
Figuring out whether most bands are playing out of key is a science. It's not difficult to detect when, say, The Living End or - well, insert post-1970s-band-that-I've-never-heard-of-here - drop a semi-semitone on a hangover.
But AC/DC are different. Not because of the backing - there are few things more unambiguous than the perfect E-major in-keyness of Malcolm Young every day of his adult life. Rather, because of the vocalist - or 'vocalist' - Brian Johnston.
I know this is not the first time that this blog has raised the spectre of a band more associated with Triple-M listening, Hooters-frequenting, Bacon-Busting subscribers* than with vegetarian nerds with macho dreams. Who still watch 'Thriller' on a regular basis. But still.
Procrastinating for a few hours like I generally do on Sunday nights, I noticed that The Australian's website contained footage of AC/DC's 'Black Ice' tour, recorded in Auckland last week. The exerpt was 'Rock n' Roll Train' - another piece frequently discussed on the blog.
So, what was wrong with the performance? For the first 10 seconds, I couldn't put my finger on it. The performance sounded like two songs playing at the same time. Then I realised that the problem was with the singing: Brian started off in no key at all, then gradually moved up to something approaching the 'correct' key.
The most disturbing part of the whole experience was the fact that Brian's unusually heightened musical ineptitude creating a kind of Brechtian alienation effect - that is, it enabled me to sit back and listen to AC/DC with my ears and brain instead of my testicles for a change. Figuratively speaking.
They are all alarmingly old. And ugly. Has anyone else noticed this before?
What's more, as Robert Forster said in The Monthly a while back: a 50-year-old Angus looks quite strange in school uniform.
It's all sacrilege, I know it is, but it was only temporary!
The other members suddenly (and temporarily!) looked like geriatric old men who had wandered into a film casting session for the 'Rock Band: AC/DC' computer game. Cliff Williams, the bass player, was caked in makeup. Phil Rudd, the drummer, looked as if he was trying to remember where he put his slippers. The fact that there is a gigantic mass of the world's population - including, and especially me! - who loved these odd little old men totally mystified me in that brief instant.
But then I listened to an awesome version of 'War Machine' in Berlin on YouTube, which made it all better. That lurching, 30-second thicket of self-realisation was quickly banished.
*i.e. the restaurant, not the actual biological formations. (Apologies for Mark Dapin for the use of asterisks: sometimes it's the only symbol that will do).
But AC/DC are different. Not because of the backing - there are few things more unambiguous than the perfect E-major in-keyness of Malcolm Young every day of his adult life. Rather, because of the vocalist - or 'vocalist' - Brian Johnston.
I know this is not the first time that this blog has raised the spectre of a band more associated with Triple-M listening, Hooters-frequenting, Bacon-Busting subscribers* than with vegetarian nerds with macho dreams. Who still watch 'Thriller' on a regular basis. But still.
Procrastinating for a few hours like I generally do on Sunday nights, I noticed that The Australian's website contained footage of AC/DC's 'Black Ice' tour, recorded in Auckland last week. The exerpt was 'Rock n' Roll Train' - another piece frequently discussed on the blog.
So, what was wrong with the performance? For the first 10 seconds, I couldn't put my finger on it. The performance sounded like two songs playing at the same time. Then I realised that the problem was with the singing: Brian started off in no key at all, then gradually moved up to something approaching the 'correct' key.
The most disturbing part of the whole experience was the fact that Brian's unusually heightened musical ineptitude creating a kind of Brechtian alienation effect - that is, it enabled me to sit back and listen to AC/DC with my ears and brain instead of my testicles for a change. Figuratively speaking.
They are all alarmingly old. And ugly. Has anyone else noticed this before?
What's more, as Robert Forster said in The Monthly a while back: a 50-year-old Angus looks quite strange in school uniform.
It's all sacrilege, I know it is, but it was only temporary!
The other members suddenly (and temporarily!) looked like geriatric old men who had wandered into a film casting session for the 'Rock Band: AC/DC' computer game. Cliff Williams, the bass player, was caked in makeup. Phil Rudd, the drummer, looked as if he was trying to remember where he put his slippers. The fact that there is a gigantic mass of the world's population - including, and especially me! - who loved these odd little old men totally mystified me in that brief instant.
But then I listened to an awesome version of 'War Machine' in Berlin on YouTube, which made it all better. That lurching, 30-second thicket of self-realisation was quickly banished.
*i.e. the restaurant, not the actual biological formations. (Apologies for Mark Dapin for the use of asterisks: sometimes it's the only symbol that will do).
Sunday, January 17, 2010
World's Gayest T-shirt
The escalators at Flinders Street Station now seem to be my primary Human Folly Observation Point. I'm not sure whether this is because so many people use the escalators, or whether there is something about Flinders Street that makes people act oddly. Nevertheless, it is indubitably true.
Yesterday, as I was about to catch a train, I noticed a man (approximate age: 50) at the top of the escalator wearing a pink T-shirt. There's nothing unusual about that. Case closed.
Or is there?
The back of the man's pink t-shirt was decorated with a large love heart, including an arrow pointing to the wearer's right. Inside the heart were written the following words:
"I love this man with all my heart".
This meant, of course, that anyone standing next to Mr. Pink t-shirt wearer - willing or no - would be temporarily thrust into the shoes of his beloved.
I thought I was the only one who noticed the t-shirt. However, a man ahead of me (who was in a hurry) noticed it too. Although Hurrying Man desperately wanted to catch a train that was just about to leave the platform below, the only available position on the crowded escalator was the one right next to Mr. Pink t-shirt.
Hurrying Man, realising that he had just been forced to assume a position for which he considered himself unsuited, tried to diagonally push ahead of Mr. Pink to escape the t-shirt's accusatory motto. But his passage forward was blocked, and he was forced back beside his newfound true love.
Hurrying Man's next - and brilliant - move was to move backward. Although this would place him further away from the train, it would also put a dampener on the situation's incipient homoeroticism. But it was no good: by this stage, there were a bank of people behind Hurrying Man, preventing an easy escape from ManLove's granite-carved, accusatory message.
For the rest of the escalator trip (all this, miraculously, happened at lightning speed!), Hurrying Man assumed the posture of a laboratory rat in a cage who had suffered repeated electric shocks. That is, he demonstrated behaviour that Psychologists have termed 'learned helplessness' - the name given to the despondent and submissive behaviour that develops in lab rats after they realise there is nothing they can do to evade randomly-administered punishment.
I am not sure whether Pink T-shirt man was aware of all this, or whether he was completely oblivious. However, it was worth it to see Hurrying Man being hoisted out of his comfort zone for 15 delightful seconds.
Yesterday, as I was about to catch a train, I noticed a man (approximate age: 50) at the top of the escalator wearing a pink T-shirt. There's nothing unusual about that. Case closed.
Or is there?
The back of the man's pink t-shirt was decorated with a large love heart, including an arrow pointing to the wearer's right. Inside the heart were written the following words:
"I love this man with all my heart".
This meant, of course, that anyone standing next to Mr. Pink t-shirt wearer - willing or no - would be temporarily thrust into the shoes of his beloved.
I thought I was the only one who noticed the t-shirt. However, a man ahead of me (who was in a hurry) noticed it too. Although Hurrying Man desperately wanted to catch a train that was just about to leave the platform below, the only available position on the crowded escalator was the one right next to Mr. Pink t-shirt.
Hurrying Man, realising that he had just been forced to assume a position for which he considered himself unsuited, tried to diagonally push ahead of Mr. Pink to escape the t-shirt's accusatory motto. But his passage forward was blocked, and he was forced back beside his newfound true love.
Hurrying Man's next - and brilliant - move was to move backward. Although this would place him further away from the train, it would also put a dampener on the situation's incipient homoeroticism. But it was no good: by this stage, there were a bank of people behind Hurrying Man, preventing an easy escape from ManLove's granite-carved, accusatory message.
For the rest of the escalator trip (all this, miraculously, happened at lightning speed!), Hurrying Man assumed the posture of a laboratory rat in a cage who had suffered repeated electric shocks. That is, he demonstrated behaviour that Psychologists have termed 'learned helplessness' - the name given to the despondent and submissive behaviour that develops in lab rats after they realise there is nothing they can do to evade randomly-administered punishment.
I am not sure whether Pink T-shirt man was aware of all this, or whether he was completely oblivious. However, it was worth it to see Hurrying Man being hoisted out of his comfort zone for 15 delightful seconds.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
The Bicycle Thief
If you are lucky enough to be in possession of my brain - and I don't mean in a 'jar beside the bed' sense, so don't get any ideas - you may have the unique experience of losing and regaining your faith in humanity on a rapidfire basis. Let me explain.
Nothing makes me more upset than theft. When you leave something somewhere with a reasonable degree of security, I think you have a right to expect it to be there when you get back.
Imagine my disappointment, therefore, on Tuesday afternoon. On getting to Yarraville Station after work, I went to unlock my bike, only to find that it had vanished. This unexpected event allowed me to tap the deep, dark reservoir of cynicism that I generally try to keep a lid on in order to function relatively normally. Some of the questions I asked (silently) of the world were:
- why are people so dishonest? I'm not dishonest, so why is everyone else?
- why did the bike lock company make such a shitty lock? Is it just something that looks tough but is designed to crumble in a real conflict situation, like Mr. T?
- is the bike lock company more or less culpable than the thief himself?
- why did the thief spend so much time sawing a huge lock off a crappy bike? Does he hate me personally?
- does he in fact know me?
- and what's happening to Yarraville, anyhow? Last time I looked, it was a shiny, newly-gentrified yuppie paradise. What's with the horrific (bike-related) crime rate?
I brought up all of these issues to anyone who would listen over the next week. Uniform reaction: disappointment in humanity. When someone else shares your disappointment in humanity, it's - well, how can I put it? - really quite a lovely and satisfying feeling. It almost makes getting the thing stolen in the first place worthwhile.
My parents, all things considered, were very sympathetic. Inured by now to my habit of, well, losing stuff, they almost seemed pleased that I had something stolen for real this time. Walking through Yarraville with Mum and Dad, lamenting my misfortune to the tune of soothing parental tut-tutting, I saw something chained to a No Standing sign that looked familiar.
"Why, that bike is just like the one that was stolen!" I thought, amazed at the coincidence. "And the helmet is the exact same colour as..."
Oh.
Nothing makes me more upset than theft. When you leave something somewhere with a reasonable degree of security, I think you have a right to expect it to be there when you get back.
Imagine my disappointment, therefore, on Tuesday afternoon. On getting to Yarraville Station after work, I went to unlock my bike, only to find that it had vanished. This unexpected event allowed me to tap the deep, dark reservoir of cynicism that I generally try to keep a lid on in order to function relatively normally. Some of the questions I asked (silently) of the world were:
- why are people so dishonest? I'm not dishonest, so why is everyone else?
- why did the bike lock company make such a shitty lock? Is it just something that looks tough but is designed to crumble in a real conflict situation, like Mr. T?
- is the bike lock company more or less culpable than the thief himself?
- why did the thief spend so much time sawing a huge lock off a crappy bike? Does he hate me personally?
- does he in fact know me?
- and what's happening to Yarraville, anyhow? Last time I looked, it was a shiny, newly-gentrified yuppie paradise. What's with the horrific (bike-related) crime rate?
I brought up all of these issues to anyone who would listen over the next week. Uniform reaction: disappointment in humanity. When someone else shares your disappointment in humanity, it's - well, how can I put it? - really quite a lovely and satisfying feeling. It almost makes getting the thing stolen in the first place worthwhile.
My parents, all things considered, were very sympathetic. Inured by now to my habit of, well, losing stuff, they almost seemed pleased that I had something stolen for real this time. Walking through Yarraville with Mum and Dad, lamenting my misfortune to the tune of soothing parental tut-tutting, I saw something chained to a No Standing sign that looked familiar.
"Why, that bike is just like the one that was stolen!" I thought, amazed at the coincidence. "And the helmet is the exact same colour as..."
Oh.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Where's My AM Radio?
I recently purchased an MP3 player from Dick Smith. Being a cheapskate who is convinced that the Apple Corporation ranks at the very bottom of the bottom-feeders (despite its talent for making lovely shiny things), I purchased a series of inadequate MP3 players until I found this one. It's perfect and it only costs $40. Oh, it's not cool - Dick Smith is never cool - but it is sleek and compact and mine.
It has everything: except, I just found out, an AM Radio. Being at least 10 years' out of touch in terms of musical matters, the main radio station I listen to is Radio National. It rends my heart to write those words, but there you are. Becoming one's parents is never a pleasant process.
So, I am now wondering - why do MP3 players lack AM radios? Although a significant proportion of people who purchase these items are 'cool', an equally significant minority - namely, me - are not. And I bet Dick Smith, of all people, spends a large part of his radio-listening quota listening to Radio National.
As far as I can tell, it would not cost anything extra to include an AM receiver with all MP3 players, as AM radios are more low-tech than FM ones. (And they're both pretty darn low-tech these days). Is this a conspiracy to drive us all into the arms of FM, whose main benefits seem to be Hamish & Andy (admittedly divine) and RRR blues Marathons?
It has everything: except, I just found out, an AM Radio. Being at least 10 years' out of touch in terms of musical matters, the main radio station I listen to is Radio National. It rends my heart to write those words, but there you are. Becoming one's parents is never a pleasant process.
So, I am now wondering - why do MP3 players lack AM radios? Although a significant proportion of people who purchase these items are 'cool', an equally significant minority - namely, me - are not. And I bet Dick Smith, of all people, spends a large part of his radio-listening quota listening to Radio National.
As far as I can tell, it would not cost anything extra to include an AM receiver with all MP3 players, as AM radios are more low-tech than FM ones. (And they're both pretty darn low-tech these days). Is this a conspiracy to drive us all into the arms of FM, whose main benefits seem to be Hamish & Andy (admittedly divine) and RRR blues Marathons?
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