thoughts for wednesday

i've been carrying around an old envelope with points 2 - 4 below noted on it. must blog about them so i can throw the envelope away. i'm hoping none of the kids has inspected it too closely. you'll see what i mean.

anyway, first:

1. this is vlado taneski, a journalist in macedonia who reported on a series of rape-murders of old women, and then was arrested because in his articles he revealed details that the police had not made public.

he has been found dead in his jail cell. this is what the police spokesman had to say:

"he committed suicide. he put his head in a pail full of water. it is unclear how none of his cellmates or guards noticed."

you see what he did there?

2. cate blanchette's ukrainian accent in the latest indiana jones movie was flawless apart from her pronunciation of "jones" "know" and all other similarly rhyming words. it was too anglo, too flat, too nasal. it should have been more russian, pronouncing "jones" more as "johns" and "know" to rhyme with "cot" instead of "coat". it was distracting, and disturbing to me that i can do a better russian accent than cate blanchette.

3. i've always wondered what the lyrics to frankie goes to hollywood's relax means:

relax, don't do it, when you want to go to it,

relax, don't do it, when you want to come.

is it just me? there seems to be some sort of contradiction there. i checked on the internet, and there is talk of it referring to not using a condom when you want to come, to not coming to prolong the pleasure in a tantric way.

gah, i still don't get it.

4. er, somewhat related. i had no idea that there were so many different names for sexual stuff. i had no idea that the act of fisting was so varied and established. and that it's referred to in lots of songs, paintings through the ages, and it's like it's been around for ages, and it's not just a recent thing. i really didn't think that i was naive, but there is still stuff out there that shocks me. i mean the maine lobster? my god.

5. can i leave it there? no, let's have something nice to sweeten up the atmosphere.

these are my favourite flowers:

there's one i can't think of the name, nor find a picture. it's a bulb i think. it smells sweet and fills the room. it's white. it's common. it's cheap. can anyone remind me what it's called? the blooms are all bunched together at the top of the stem. it's scent is my favourite.

oh, to have a garden filled with these flowers. to have a peppercorn tree, lying under its shade. a rug. a book. a crisp apple. a warm, lilting breeze.

join me?

*****************************

UPDATE: the flower i was thinking of was erlicheer. thanks kittiminx.

I CHALLENGE YOU TO WATCH THIS AND NOT CRY

it's so beautiful: the music, the lion, the dudes.
thanks to audrey, i cried helplessly about 4 times today, which is a lot more than usual.
if you are not crying right now, you have a stone for a heart. and i hate you.*
* not really. i don't hate you. i feel sorry for you, you stone-hearted shell of a human.

[2012 note - seems like the video has gone. it was the one with the lion Christian and the two dudes who raised him from a cub they bought in Harrods? in swinging London]

foodish thoughts for today

1. i am so tired of seeing gordon ramsay's ugly mug everywhere i look.

2. take note racv club: i hereby declare a war on any dish with a menu description including the word "foam". it's not cool, it's so over, it's so common, it's not distinctive, it sounds REVOLTING, it does not tempt me, it puts me off. face it, when el bulli did it, it was "fresh, innovative and different." though i wouldn't have ordered a dish with foam then. now everyone else, including the racv club, is jumping on the old foam bandwagon, it just reeks of desperation and pathetic derivation.

[starts lobby group called "fuck foam, let's get back to real food"]

3. unless you order a la carte at di stasio, the staff will rush you along in quite a rude manner. won't go there again on principle.

4. at mirka's you can go and sit at the bar and have a coffee and one of their divine bombe glacees.

5. baked beans on rice with some cheese on top (and for moi, sea salt and cracked pepper) is a perfectly acceptable sunday night meal.

6. making traditional italian sausages is a somewhat erotically charged activity and weird when you "do it" with your in-laws.

7. 40+ kilos of pig meat MAKES A LOT OF SALAMIS.

8. aldi fruit is shit.

9. eating "potato jewels" from aldi, then south melbourne market dim sims, then 1/2 doz coffin bay oysters from south aus, is possibly the strangest meal i've had on a friday night for a while.

10. vegemite toast is just not the same without butter.

and isn't the weather glorious? love, love, love how the city looks, and the sky behind it, as we drive around the lake to msac on a monday night.

must. take. camera. next. week.

it's official

it's not porn. it's art. and it's rated pg.



but even so, i don't want to put the whole picture here.

why not? i'm not sure. i don't find it offensive - my god, i have a daughter and we've always been very relaxed with nudity around the house, as were my parents, and i think she's beautiful. there's something, though, about the power, the potential, of a child, a girl child, turning into a woman. as a mother i think it's lovely and gorgeous and natural. but i know there are people who take that admiration too far, and change it into something sick. maybe my reticence is about what people might think about me putting the whole picture here, and that people might judge me for doing that. i know my intentions are pure, but others don't. much like bill henson, perhaps?



in the main, this is why, i think, that charges couldn't be laid against bill henson:


pornography:

1 : the depiction of erotic behavior (as in pictures or writing) intended to cause sexual excitement 2 : material (as books or a photograph) that depicts erotic behavior and is intended to cause sexual excitement.



i don't believe that the photos are intended to cause sexual excitement. that's not to say that they wouldn't for some people. but then we've all heard about paedophiles using department store clothing catalogues and other advertising print matter as "stimulation material".


i feel slightly wrong putting the following interaction in the same post as the above - can groups of words be tainted by association? i feel weird even including my daughter in a post where i've talked about paedophilia - but i give you the conversation i had in the car this morning with my 11 year old daughter.





[radio news - story about world-wide child pornography arrests]





princess: what are they talking about?





mg: um it's about people who have downloaded photos of children that are inappropriate and show abuse, the police have arrested a lot of those people.





princess: gross!





mg: yes, it's a real problem. [goes off on tangent about how maybe it's like people addicted to gambling/drugs/alcohol and the compulsion to do it.]*





princess: i think being addicted to drugs is better than doing that. the children wouldn't want that, and at least with drugs you're not hurting other people.**





mg: yes, you're right there, though the effects on family and friends of drug addicts happen, it can affect everyone around you. if you're addicted to drugs.





princess: yeah...





mg: did you hear the story about the artist, the photographer who had some photos taken away from the gallery by the police-





princess: oh yeah!





mg: i just didn't want, these two stories are different. you know, the people who abuse children, the ones who were arrested for downloading pictures, and the bill henson artist who took photos.





princess: what were the photos of?





mg: well, he takes photos of landscapes, buildings and people. with the people, they are all ages, and sometimes they are clothed and sometimes they are naked.





princess: ew.





mg: remember when we went to all the galleries last year, in florence and paris, we saw so many naked humans, statues, remember david, he was so huge? with his huge penis? and all the naked cherubs and angels-





princess: the top of the vatican ceiling? heaps and heaps of naked-





mg: right!





princess: yeah, in the old days it wasn't a bad thing.





mg: even all those religious paintings we saw, with all the gold and crosses and jesuses, and he was often naked except for a little piece of material across his lap-





princess: yeah!





mg: right. so it's been like this for hundreds of years, the naked body is a natural thing, ok we don't walk around in public in the nude, but the body is beautiful and natural and normal.





princess: mmm [sounding doubtful. she's only 11]





mg: anyway, the photos that caused the problem were of a 13 year old girl and she's naked and in one you can see her little breasts, buds you know, and she has her hands in front of her private parts.





princess: did her parents- she would have given permission-





mg: yeah, and her parents did too.





princess: she would have had to sign forms and all that. the police can't say anything. it's her choice. and her parents said yes.





mg: i think a 13 year old would be able to give permission. especially a 13 year old who is willing to pose for a nude photo, that girl would probably be pretty mature and smart.





princess: yeah, at that age, girls are wanting to get more identity.





mg: what about at 11?





princess: i would never do that, gross, but at 11 you just want to fit in, not be different. at 13, you are being more different.





mg: mmm.





princess: so, now they've made a big deal about it and made everyone look at the photos? before it would have just been in the gallery and not many people would have even known about them.





mg: yeah, maybe the girl now is upset about it.





princess: maybe, i'd be mad at the police. anyway it's ART, definitely!









* this is the only parallel i can think of that allows my brain to process the idea of people gaining sexual gratification from viewing child pornography, that it becomes an obsession and a compulsion they can't control.





** look, she's only 11, no matter how smart she is.

when i was very young

i knew this family. back then, they looked like any other kids but they were called lady emma, lord alexander* and boppy. don't ask me about the boppy thing; he was the youngest, he was fat and that's what people called him.

their mother was lady mary montagu, aka mad mary as the geelong'ites used to refer to her. behind her back, or in front of her, i don't know.

one summer all of the following things happened:

1. i went to the circus with them twice. the first time, there was a bit where they got a volunteer from the audience, put the kid on top of one of the circus horses, tied a "safety" harness around his waist, which was attached to a rope, which then was fed up through a metal hook at the top of the tent above the sawdust ring. they got the horse to go around faster and faster and the kid got scared, from memory, but then the punchline was that they pulled the kid off the horse, hoisting him up by the rope around his waist. then the clowns ran on and "helped" him down to safety and in the process "accidentally" dacked the kid, so there he was in his undies, with the audience laughing at him.

nice. anyway, we left the circus, talking about how mean it was and what bastards they were and then boppy hatched a plan. we would go to another show, he would volunteer to be the sucker kid, it would all unfold as before, except when his dacks got pulled off, he would be wearing his bathers underneath, and the joke would be on the clowns. geddit? genius. we thought we were so smart, we were going to have the last laugh. on clowns, for godsake. ashton's circus clowns. real clowns!

so, we went to another show. boppy had his red speedos underneath. he was out of his seat and running down to volunteer before they'd even really selected him from the crowd. he was up on the horse, beaming fatly. it all went to plan, they hoisted him up, he was ready, he put up a show of fighting them a bit when they dacked him, but then he stood up, so pleased with himself -

ha, you fuckers, i'm wearing my bathers, nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah!

except he didn't say that. that's just what we were all thinking, us who were in on it.

except, only problem was the clowns didn't realise. the bathers just looked like red jocks. the crowd didn't realise our victory either. so poor boppy still got laughed at, and came sheepishly back to his seat, calling out to no one and everyone they're my bathers! BATHERS!

2. i went around to their beach house one day to watch television. there were no parents there that i remember. i was probably about 10 or 11. emma was a little younger? boppy about 8. and alex was a bit older than me. say 12.

we sat in the lounge room, i don't remember who else was there, but i do remember alex took off all of his clothes, was lolling about, moving about the room, bending over in front of the tv to change the channel, so i got a really good look at his arse and balls. and i just sat there and didn't know what to do. so, i just pretended there was nothing wrong with him being nude and walking around like that, and posing.

so, there you go. next thing, his son is one of michael jackson's alleged victims.

* Alexander Charles David Francis George Edward Wiliam Kimble Drogo Montagu

can someone please explain

why can't this man have nuclear capability?
when all these people do:









APJ Abdul Kalam - India













George W Bush - United States












Hu Jintao - China














Jacques Chirac - France












Pervez Musharraf - Pakistan














Tony Blair - United Kingdom













Vladimir Putin - Russia (don't you just love him, he's so, I don't know - moody)

It's not confirmed that Israel does, but let's think that they do. Most probably.

So why can't Kim Jong-Il have some big guns?

It's the sunglasses, isn't it?

And also the fact that he's a freako and a film nut. Not that there's anything wrong with the film nut part.

And appeared in Team America too.

That must be it.