for your viewing pleasure, see i'm always thinking about your needs, dear reader

this week, we have watched into the wild and the secret of the grain.

i won't bother rhapsodising.

just see them.

now.




hafsia herzi in the secret of the grain. french with english subtitles.







scene from into the wild. screenplay and direction by sean penn. always a good start in my opinion.

yes i am mostly happy, yes i am mostly content, but leaving scotland broke this lassie's heart

so about a year ago we were in scotland. i had never been and always, always wanted to go. yeah, edinburgh was nice, a beautiful city, rah rah.
but the country-side. och, the country-side.
we drove up from edinburgh to loch ness, and stayed in a little bed and breakfast right on the lake. we did a boat trip, and it snowed while we were out there. they had this piped music on the boat, and it was all scottish reels and the like. i loved it, and my heart was bursting and even though it was so fucking freezing and everyone else went inside, i had to stay on deck and watch the dark waters, and the clouds and really, my heart was bursting with happiness.
princess gave her teddy, oscar, a surname. we became clan mc donald and got him a beer-can kilt. we ate haggis, we ate fish and chips. we drove to the isle of skye and i saw a sign that took me back to childhood, with my dad insisting i stay up late, at about the age of 8, and watch the best movie of all time - brigadoon.
as we drove, i played a cd of bagpipes that i had found in a shop in edinburgh. i wore my tartan scarf which had cost about 200 fucking dollars. cashmere. and i sang oh you take the high road, and i'll take the low road, and i'll be in scotland afore ye! and never will i see my true love's face again on the bonny bonny banks of loch lomond! over and over and i was driving everyone mental.
but i didn't care, because my heart was bursting with happiness.
we got to loch lomond, i pulled over, and said i'd just be a minute. i scrabbled down the banks, sat beside the lake, hearing the water lapping and just amazed that i was there. after about 3 minutes, voices, and next thing i knew, there were the three kids, plus oscar the teddy, joining me and ruining my moment. but i'd had it. i'd had my moment.

loch lomond

memorial to the mcdonald massacre, or was it the campbell massacre. anyway, it was really significant to oscar.

sign on isle of skye.

eilean donan

breakfast at our b&b - loch ness

look at the scotch. can you see the nessie-shaped ice block? look more carefully.

the heart-bursting boat trip.

the boat.

there are lots of good things in my life, particularly a readerly-affair with hemingway at this moment.

but there's no scotland.

yes, i know, i know. time for something of substance.

while i've been going on orgiastically and self-indulgently about fabulous dictionaries and the like, and buying myself new season peonies at the market, and getting pissed off at the amount of bread we go through each week (4 loaves plus. doesn't include fancy-pant d.chirico loaf or two on the weekend), i am aware, dear readers, of the momentous unfolding happening over the seas, in the usa.

like most other people being vocal about it, i am thrilled that obama has won. new era, fresh start, first black president, victory for minorities; it's all fantastic. i'm guessing the kkk and other bovver-booted, shorn head nazi-typepeople are gathering in dark corners, plotting something. i do fear for barack.

and today in the paper, a small article caught my attention.

i am going to be watching this man closely:





it's rahm emanuel. first pick for chief of staff. a lot better looking than leo mc garry, and with a shit-eating grin that promises some good times. with clinton experience, that can only mean good in the oval office, and good on the hustlings. apparently he also swears alot, and can use his favourite expletive as a verb, adjective or subject, depending on the context. and this is his only flaw? i think not.

so, is it goodbye to "diva, whack-job" sarah palin? the george negus nightline show the other night had a commentator who suggested 2012 will be hillary vs sarah. quite serious he was.*




will mccain get a head reduction? i did like his gracious acceptance of defeat and his good wishes to the obamas, though. there was no evidence of the snark we get in australian politics, the bad loserish sour grapes crap.



i do feel they've got it quite in hand, we can all relax. what a handsome pair.



and back here, with mr rudd, i have to say i'm sick of seeing him with his arms around people, looking all matey matey. it gives me flashbacks to howard; small man, glasses, trying to be popular and "down-to-earth." while i'm ok with rudd thus far, and i think his handling of all things recessionistic/financial etc is pretty good [insert technical jargon here] i don't like the way he's picked up on howard's way of responding to issues using the expression "i think i can speak for the majority of australians when i say..."

i also didn't like the way he reacted in such a strong and personal way to the henson thing, and more recently didn't get what keating was on about re gallipoli. i got it - why couldn't our prime minister? am i smarter than him?

also, i heard george negus refer to barack as "the boy" during the program. not quite as bad as the bert newton slip way back when, but still, i cringed and i'm sure negus did too. and all the producers. and the panel sitting there. he would have been referring to obama's age, but it sounded bad.

Heaven, sheer heaven. A magnum opus of triviality and titbit.

One of my overseas, second-hand book purchases arrived today.



And thus i present to you, Brewer's Dictionary of Modern Phrase and Fable.

I couldn't find a picture of the elusive Rev/Dr. Brewer, but let's imagine maybe a man with a pipe, in 1864, carrying his manuscript to London publishing house Cassell, Petter and Galpin. He is a retired school master, and had already published a few books, titles such as Guide to Science, which have obviously been relegated to dusty shelves of yore.

But this reference work, oh, it is glorious.


As the intro says, the book (on its publication in 1870) "immediately found a wide market eager to learn from its 'improving' mix of linguistic, and general knowledge, and to revel in the pleasures that Dr Brewer's 'alms-basket of words' afforded to the casual browser. The dictionary not only sold 100,000 copies of its first edition, but remains very much alive and kicking 130 years and sixteen editions later."


I have realised that the book I am now proud owner of, is the modern version, and is a compilation stretching only from 1900.


Now I realise too that I need the earlier edition, the non-modern one.


Listen to this, again from the intro:


"Anecdotes testify to a character in which genial eccentricity allied with mild testiness of the habitually excellent scholar, and to working methods that bespeak the highest standards of industry and diligence. In Brewer's study at Edwinstowe Vicarage, there was... 'a long wooden box arrangement" with an open front 'divided into pigeon-holes lettered from A to Z in which were the slips of paper on which were written the notes he made and continued to make daily.'


Ah, a man after my own heart. While his filing system utilised a proper wooden box, with dividers, and mine was just lists on scraps of paper and slips of bits, all shoved anywhere and everywhere, I find it deliciously ironic that his book was on one of my lists, and his book was birthed from his lists on scraps and slips of bits.


Are you following me?


All right then, it's not that earth shattering. But I am just excited to present you some snippets from the dictionary. The man himself described his work as " 'a sweep-net of a book' drawing in 'curious or novel etymologies, pseudonyms and popular titles, local traditions and literary blunders, biographical and historical trifles too insignificant to find a place in books of higher pretention, but not too worthless to be worth knowing.' "


I give you, randomly, a list of entries on pp 88-89:


Bobbsey Twins
Bobby socks
Boche
Bodice-ripper
Bodmin Moor, Beast of.
Body, The.
Body art
Body bag
Body beautiful
Body blow
Bodybuilding
Body count
Body double
Body language
Bodyline bowling
Body piercing
Body popping
Body search
Body Shop
Body stocking
Boer War
Boffin
Bofors gun



and pp288-289:


Golden parachute
Golden Raspberry
Golden Ring of Russia
Golden Share
Golden Shot, The
Golden Triangle
Goldfinger
Goldfish bowl
Goldilocks
Goldwynisms*
Golfball
Golightly, Holly
Gollancz
Golliwog
Gollum


* "The US film producer Samuel Goldwyn (1882-1974) is credited with uttering a number of unwitting witticisms, often in the form of an absurdly mixed metaphor or a colourful contradiction. Some are undoubtedly apocryphal, but the following is a selection of the better known...


Include me out.
A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on.
In two words: im-possible.
Every director bites the hand that lays the golden egg.
Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist should have his head examined.
I had a monumental idea last night but I didn't like it.
Tell me, how do you love my picture?
We have all passed alot of water since then.
I'll give you a definite maybe.
We're overpaying him, but he's worth it.
I never liked you, and I always will.
Don't talk to me when I'm interrupting.
I may not always be right, but I'm never wrong.
The scene is dull. Tell him to put more life into his dying.
This book has too much plot and not enough story.
It's more than magnificent - it's mediocre.
A bachelor's life is no life for a single man.
Go see it and see for yourself why you shouldn't see it.
It's spreading like wildflowers!
If I could drop dead right now, I'd be the happiest man alive!
You've got to take the bull by the teeth.
This makes me so sore it gets my dandruff up.
When I want your opinion, I'll give it to you.
Colour television! Bah, I won't believe it until I see it in black and white.
I read part of it all the way through.
William? What kind of a name is that? Every Tom, Dick and Harry is called William.


I've just flicked through a few more pages - the diversity of topic is vast. Anything that has four pages of Second World War operational code names as well as referring to "Slick Willie", "the Comeback Kid" and "the Oral Office" in Bill Clinton entries is my type of tome.


God I love this sort of stuff.

Are You a Keira Lover or a Keira Hater?

Well, I thought I wouldn't be able to ever enjoy a Keira Knightley film. It's the lips I think. The pouting, it just gets to me. She'd ruined the movie about Dylan Thomas for me. The Pirates of Caribbean never worked for me. Atonement was alright but she just wasn't that great in it and I preferred the book. As usual.

Then, I allowed myself to be persuaded to see the Duchess against my better instincts. I'm happy to see virtually any movie, I just love films, in fact, the only film I've ever walked out of was Frances, just before the lobotomy scene. Even as a 12-year-old I sat through the coathanger-in-vagina scene in Sybil. Obviously not scarred at all by that memory.

My mum made me see it with her. I went in, thinking it might just be awful.

BUT I LOVED IT. And, I was surprised, she was good in it. The lips were not at all distracting for some reason. She was compelling. Of course, the character was compelling really. I left the cinema and it stayed with me, into the next day, and even the next. I kept thinking about her, and the story, and her hair.

I'd already bought the book that the movie is based on, and being a bit of a fusty old academic, I am just adoring the adherence to solid research, but also the author - Amanda Foreman - writes well. Oh, she does. So now, each night, I leave my body in the comfortable bed, and I wing my mind to Olde England, where the Duchess of Devonshire holds court at parties and balls, I read her letters to her mother, and her mother's letters to her, I read snippets of articles from newspapers. She even wrote a book called The Sylph, a type of roman-a-clef that was an admittedly thinly-veiled account of her life, married and social. I want to buy this book.

Did you know the Duchess was Princess Diana's great, great, great, great-aunt, or somesuch? I couldn't count the family tree generations properly, but she is from the Spencer family and her childhood home was Althorp (same as Diana's).

They had so many life parallels, these two women. Both married older men who were repressed or remote, witholding and cold. Both the husbands had mistresses when they got married, and continued on with them. Both the women became famous/notorious for their fashion leadership and innovation. And both made waves and impressions on society with their ventures into areas where young ladies of their society did not "venture" - for the Duchess it was politics and her support for the Whigs, for the Princess it was holding AIDS sufferers hands, and later landmines. Both became more famous and popular than their husbands, who were the original title holders. And both (possibly) had illegitimate children?

So now I go to the Duchess. It's wonderful. As is she.

And did I mention the hair?

"These hairstyles were labor-intensive and required cushions and wool, pomatum and powder, and an array of decorations. They were uncomfortable, they attracted insects and mice, and they could be fire hazards. "

xavier scandale

this from the school which has educated both mobster and high-level police spawn in their hallowed and scholarly halls.

"Our year level has always had a bit of a lust for wanton destruction with the types of guys who think car jumping is a fun pastime," one student wrote to the Herald-Sun.

The boy, who described himself as the King of Xavier, also accused the Jesuit school of being more interested in its appearance than caring for difficult students.

i had an idea for a story, of star-crossed lovers (fifi condello and max nixon) who fall in love, across the great divide of the classroom and their family backgrounds.

pure fiction, of course. but it would be great. don't steal my idea.

saturday stuff

first up, good morning good people. how was your coffee? your eggs?

i slept beautifully, partly i'm sure because 17 days of alcohol-free living will start to make you feel quite terrific once you've pushed through the days 15 and 16 desire to find wine and drink it.

the first thing i saw in the age today was the story about the horse, weekend hustler and harry, the kid who is the only person in the world who can enter the horse's box and not get bitten, kicked, stomped on. killed basically.*

i like stories like this.

the headline is "the little mate who softens a champion's heart" and the article tells us that:

harry is 5 years old

not only is he the only person who can get close to the horse without being attacked, he can also predict whether the horse will win or lose.

check these soothsayings:

young harry apparently said "yeah, dad, he'll win, he'll win" before every other race, except the turnbull where he told his father "he won't win today, dad."

the best quote is where young harry refers to weekend hussler as "the hussler". has harry been watching the apprentice and seinfeld? he said this to a jockey who (it seems, the article is unclear, thank god for the calls for proper grammar and english classes in schools again, all hail "clear thinking", long may it reign, etc.) failed to win on the horse "you're the one that murdered the hussler."

finally, we learn that harry has a knack for picking winners of other kinds, and helped turn his father's $100 down the pub into $900.

they'd better keep a close eye on the kid. the bookies might grab him, and take him out the back.

and hey, do you think this photo looks photoshopped? the line of the horse's nose against the boy's t-shirt looks unnatural. i reckon they've played with the photo, and the kid's standing 2 feet back. but they've put the hay in front of the horse's nostrils to make it look like they are close. looks wrong. hard to see in this pic, but in the paper (front page) it's clearer.



*

in other news, four of the books i ordered online HAVE ARRIVED. including, true grit. so it's very good.

i've often fantasised about owning a book shop. one of my favourite book shops is syber's books in chapel st, windsor. the woman in there seems cranky but she's nice, she has lots of cats lolling around, and her collection is wonderful. it's been on the tip of my tongue whilst in there, on occasion, while at the register as she tallies my erudite and expensive selection, to offer my services as book person/cat feeder/shelf tidier. sometimes, i'll tidy the shelves as i browse, hoping she'll notice and say, in her manly voice, "can i offer you a job?" or "i'm looking to get out of the biz. wanna take over, sweets?"

other people fantasise about sex with celebrities or the person opposite on the tram. i fantasise about owning a book shop.

*

stepmothering is a hard fucking motherfuck of a job. sometimes i really hate it, and if you want to find the best, easiest way of hating yourself and being self-critical and thinking you are indeed the el primao shit, be a stepmother. my husband's children are beautiful and gorgeous and fantastic kids - it's not them it's me. i can't emphasise this enough. they are wonderful, my husband is wonderful. i know in my heart of hearts i'm okay but i am very hard on myself because the pressure to not cause these delightful children any more pain is enormous.

sometimes it feels like a no-win situation but all i can do is my best. i think we'll be okay.

i can just try to be a mother to them, do my best to be loving, kind, positive, encouraging, supportive, affectionate. but sometimes fail and struggle and feel it's not good to pretend love when you're not feeling it. but still pick yourself up, try again the next day, realise it's not a finite relationship, it's ongoing and organic (like any relationship) and that there will never be a day when you can dust your hands off, wipe your brow and say "ok, good job, that's finished."

the only thing harder than being a mother, is being a stepmother - frankie, love my way.



ps - perseus, did you read article page 8?

* this is my artistic license. i think the words used were "nudged" and "butted" in addition to "bitten."

fuck foam - the emperor's got no clothes

i know i have touched on my hatred for "gastronomic" foam before.

and i know some people are creaming their jeans about ferran adrià's visit to australia.

i know his restaurant el bulli in spain is the current bee's knees eating spot, with a waiting list for 12 months or some rubbish.

but know this, chefs of the world:

restaurants where you have to eat in the dark, are bullshit.

restaurants where there are 84 courses, with matched wines, are bullshit.

restaurants with menus that list every single fucking ingredient including palm sugar, are bullshit.

restaurants which feature dishes blending ridiculous tastes and textures, are bullshit. i'm not saying i can't appreciate innovative when it works. but parmesan and banana? beetroot and chocolate?

come on.

restaurants which promote descriptions like this: crunchy dehydrated tomato flakes, of biological origin with an attractive bright orange colour. Crutomat does not add acidity and brings out the full flavour of the tomato, giving a fantastic texture to pastries or preparations. Available in elongated flakes. Keep in a cool dry place. Ingredients: 400 g Tomato Flakes: tomato flakes, corn starch, sugar are bullshit.

give me a good beef burgundy. give me a good soft poached egg. give me a good tasmanian or coffin bay oyster (not sydney rock.) give me a good medium-rare fillet steak. give me a good duck confit. give me a good chicken casserole. give me a good slice of beautifully grilled fish, with garlic and oil. give me good potato mash. give me good green beans. give me a good, simple salad, with oil, salt and lemon. give me a good slice of bread, with real butter. give me a good souffle. give me a good cheesecake. give me a good bombe alaska (oh, mirka, here you excel.)

give me good service, but not hovery, obsequious, poncey, naffness.

give me the feeling of your geniune enjoyment of your job, not the feeling that you wish you were at home with beers and a pizza in front of australian idol.

don't flirt with me, i won't like it and neither will my husband. but i can flirt with you, and you and he can cope with that.

don't ever, ever fucking raise your eyebrow at my choice of wine, or wanting something that you think doesn't go with something else.

and don't use the words "foam", "froth", "clouds", "molecular", "spray", "frozen air" or "acqueous" when you want me to eat something on your menu. "smoke" is also dodgy when used as a noun.

follow these instructions and you will have, in me, a happy customer.

thank you.

i know he looks like he's wearing clothes. that's just the illusion.

there is a god

i have to take back all my atheistic ramblings, my offensive, sacrilegious and impious views, all my scathing attacks on organised religion.
for, you see, it turns out there is a god.
and this is the evidence of his goodliness.
(i always need some sort of hard proof to believe in anything.)
apols. to my believing christianic/judaic/islamic monotheistic friends.
my non-believing christianic/judaic/islamic/atheist bookish friends - good isn't it?

what a gorgeous, balmy night

i'm loving it, the warmth and the cool breeze off the beach is divine as well. we've had a lovely weekend.

i'm feeling very sorry for the lapthornes - their worst nightmare has come true. i fear my last post was a little flippant or something, but it wasn't meant like that. at least they have some peace now, maybe, or at least her father can bring her home. it's so sad, and touching, that he wouldn't leave without her. so hard for his wife to be here, and him there, and for them not to be able to hold each other and cry together. so, so hard. sometimes i get scared that something bad will happen to princess. i remember reading an article about the port arthur massacre, it was a couple of years afterward. maybe around the anniversary. and the mother of a young girl who was killed there was interviewed. i'll never forget the mother saying that she just doesn't want to live without her daughter, and that losing her was a blow from which she would never recover. at the time, princess was little, and i looked at her intently and hugged her close, and there was a great rush of fear, of catastrophe, of how i knew i wouldn't be able to survive something happening to her. it's beyond imagining.

to brighter things: yesterday was a riot of 10-year-old boys at the biggest slot car racing in australia. i was the only chick there, and if you want to blend in, along with having some testicles and a bit of a large tummy, you need a trucker's cap. nice. they raced and raced for an hour. i spent my time putting the cars that crashed back onto the tracks. the purple and the red ones stacked the most.

today saw us ending up down at the beach with the gigi for a paddle/swim. she's taken to chasing seagulls. as they are flying. i am worried she will either swim out to sea or take off along the beach to williamstown, and i wouldn't be able to get her back. then we had hot chips at street cafe.

i'm not drinking at the moment. while not officially doing ocsober, my self-imposed period of abstinence has indeed coincided with this noble month. i'm not fund-raising, merely trying to do some mindfulness-raising, and also looking to my health. and feeling fucking mighty about it too.

the other thing, today i bought diablo cody's book candy girl. i don't know if you've read any of her stuff. i know people were divided on juno. i liked it, mostly for michael cera's fabulous yellow shorts. but the acting was ace, the storyline, while simple, still held some unanticipated turns (always a plus for me, can't STAND predictable) and overall it was a nice little movie. how patronising. don't mean to be.

HOWEVER, i had read about diablo cody before the release of the movie and tracked her down online, finding her now-defunct blog, thrilling to her relationship breakup with the guy she'd met online (in some chat forum about the beach boys, and more specifically brian wilson) ooops this is a really long sentence, take a breath, maybe stop here. I found her myspace page which she now blogs from, and followed her through the end of filming juno, in the lead up to the release, through her book signings and appearances at stores in america (for her book candy girl, which is a 12-month memoir of her time spent as a stripper when she was 24).

now stop there. before you start saying things like "fuck off, i read memoirs of a geisha, there's been so much shit about hookers and strippers and junkies with their rememories" don't think diablo is like any of them. she's much more than belle de jour or whatever her name is.

this dame is smart. she is really, really smart and really funny.

go find her myspace and old blog and and you'll see what i mean.

she came along for me around the time ms fits finished. she is my replacement for ms fits (as is another blog of australians but i'm not going to talk about them here. i don't want it ruined for myself. it's all i need at the moment in the way of blogging. that blog and diablo. and a little bit of a certain poetess who has long dark hair.)

so, to my last item on tonight's agenda.

you know the diaries? my bad '80s diaries? well, i've just read ahead about six to seven volumes and pretty shortly, it all gets alot more interesting. in the sex, drugs and rock n' roll way. which is really great, and i tell you, for nights last week i couldn't sleep before 2am, it was unputtdownable and i'd lived it. (my bad memory also meant it was like i was reading parts of it for the first time - my theory is that because i wrote it all down, i allowed myself to relax and forget it. hell, there's a part where i say i bought blue boots. if anyone had asked me before reading that whether i'd ever owned blue boots, i would have said "shut the fuck up!")

ANYWAY, my dilemma is thusly. in terms of ethics, i have been shaving off names and using initials etc. i think now that things are to get a little more interesting i need to not include certain things. so while i've been fairly non-censoring (seriously, apart from just leaving out boring stuff*, and people's names, it's all been in there). but shortly, young melba is to meet the man who deflowers her, introduces her to certain illicit substances, and this is after about 10 months of solid band-going, where i would sleep at 4am and wake at 1-2pm. also, up until now, the blatherings of a young girl about adam ant are tame and it could have been any of heaps writing this shit. soon, there's stuff that might identify me were people to put things together.

the other thing is that clokes, although i read out stuff to him, i'm not sure whether this project is a good idea now we are about to get a little more adult, and move away from adam ant towards people like joe strummer.

i need to think more about it. i don't want to dilute this project (as it's become) but i need to be sensible about it.

your thoughts?

hope you had a good weekend.




* shut up. i know someone's laughing about this. i know some of it - HELL, ALOT OF IT - is boring so far. well, what i'm talking about is ultra ultra boring.

my current obsession

the latest thing that has me incredibly pre-occupied is the missing australian britt lapthorne.

i'm not sure why i am so interested. sure, it's a sad story, her family are beside themselves, so i guess imagining their pain and distress makes me feel really strongly about it, but usually it's stories about children who set me off in this way.

i've been thinking about it more today, and i think one reason why i am so interested in it is that i was once her.

i backpacked on my own overseas for a period, meeting up with great people, and having a wonderful time, from greece, to turkey, to israel, to egypt and beyond. while i was older than her (25), i probably wasn't that much smarter. i've done some stupid things (not saying she has) and i've been drunk in foreign places and fraternised with local men (also, not saying she has). jesus, i ended up marrying one.

i've been on the back of a motorbike in bali, driven by a local, both of us pissed on indonesian palm wine. i've been in dahab, south sinai, where everyone was smoking dope, except me, though i did drink. i kissed a kurdish boy in eastern turkey, also while drunk, in a hotel corridor. i've been driven in cars by strangers, met up with people who dialled the wrong number and wanted to take me for a drink, had eyeballs with strangers who i met on cb radio. that was back in the '80s.

all i'm saying is that friends and family would have probably called me sensible, even back then.

and all i'm saying is this is no reflection on britt - i'm just marvelling that i made it through.

here's what i think's going to happen, unfortunately. my reasonings are based on experience in turkey, when my mother was diagnosed with cancer while we were living there. it went from the doctor saying he was pretty sure it wouldn't be cancer, to stringing us along for days beyond when he would have reasonably had the pathology results. i had to push and push and chase for the result, and then be told on christmas night (once, he perhaps thought, we had enjoyed our christmas day, didn't need to spoil that seasonal joy with some bad news about cancer) finally, that yes, she did have cancer. there were no hard feelings, it was just unfortunate, and i really believe that he didn't want to be the bearer of bad news. i wonder if there is a similar cultural thing going on it croatia.

my gut feeling is that the body found recently will be britt. they've said it's too decomposed to be her, that it was highly unlikely (at the same time, notice, maintaining there was still a small chance, ie they couldn't completely rule out that it was her, needed to do dna tests etc) and now there are whispers that they got it wrong with another body found in water previously - that they thought it was an older body than it turned out to be. there are also whispers now that the body they found is of britt's height, has blonde hair and is female.

this is their way of letting the family down gently, not that there is such a possibility. their reasoning is that by saying it's not her, they are being kind to the family, letting them have hope for a little bit longer (all the while knowing or suspecting it will turn to despair). this type of thinking is culturally opposite to the way we operate here. it's similar in japan - traditionally they would outright lie to the dying cancer patient, or whatever, and only tell the family the true diagnosis/prognosis. and everyone would keep it a secret from the one person who ought to know.

it's a similar way of thinking - build up to the truth by a series of lies.

of course, as has been mentioned by britt's father, there are other elements to this story, which is becoming increasingly bizarre.

- the serbian nationalist with tattoos over his body being sent by the afp to help

- the report of the mother of the hostel owner trying to mail an australian passport from the post office the day britt disappeared

- the original baffling question of why people travelling/partying with her, left the day she disappeared, knowing she hadn't come back to the hostel

- why her mobile phone was found in her room, with a call made from it to the hostel owner's phone

- have we heard anything about the cctv footage? i'm smelling a cover-up.

and most freakishly for me, why did one of the friends she was travelling with leave a comment on britt's facebook page saying something along the lines of "that picture with you and the cake is the favourite one of mine :)" TWO DAYS AFTER BRITT DISAPPEARED.

that's weird.

and the whole thing is just awful for the family. i feel for her mother and her father so much.

i think we'll be learning very soon that they've found her, and at least her family can have some peace. they'll be able to bring her home but i don't think they'll ever find out what really happened to her.

well, talk about bad

in the comments section in the post below, perseus makes some good comments re geelong.

the wheels fell off, and now everything feels like it's back to normal.

you see, THIS is the normal state of existence for a geelong supporter. failure, crushing disappointment and depression. the 2007 premiership was an aberration, it's clear now to me. THAT was abnormal, THIS is normal. cats supporters wouldn't have known themselves the last twelve months. people would have been making all sorts of bad business/financial/romantic decisions. with the centre of their world so skewed, it would have been hard to keep upright.

but, now it's all ok. only now can a geelong supporter move on and start to make rallying comments that often include the phrase "next year". [my dad would hate to think i was kind of rubbishing them here. but i'm not. not really. dad's tried to find this blog - i wouldn't give him the url, mainly because i've called him a cunt on here a couple of times.]

i do feel sorry for gary ablett. what an awful week for him. watching him after the game, i think in that moment he realised what his old man went through all those times. when he'd come off the ground, and young gary and nathan were there, maybe saying things like "why couldn't you just win, dad?", and gary senior saying "you just wouldn't understand, son."

well, now i think he understands.

not taking anything away from hawthorn. they played well, they saw an opportunity and took it. good on them.

there was an ugly letter in the paper yesterday about the sunday appearance at kardinia park of some of the players, who wouldn't engage with the crowd, who looked hangdog and embarrassed to be there. half of me wants to say, well so they should/would. the other half agrees with the writter of the letter who made the point they are professional sportsmen, and need to give something to the fans even if they might not be feeling up to it. i agree with that.

but apart from that, all is well in my world.

manicure is good. pedicure is fantastic. yes, ms batville was right - as smooth as a baby's bum.

we are back home from the beach, the weather is gorgeous. i'm up to date with washing, i worked alot on my story while away (no internet will do that, you know. no internet = increased productivity.)

kids go back to school monday, i wonder if i'll be as busy this term?

also, for those interested i have almost finished the people of the book. commenters who said was awful are absolutely correct. i am finding it fucking atrocious. the writing is bad, particularly the contemporary voice. awful. i haven't yet identified the kebab sex, can someone please let me know if it's earlier in the book? maybe it's yet to come, as the story comes to a climax? there has been a lot of bad sex, and i can't believe the lesbian sex in the harem. so poorly done. so cliched. just awful.

having said all that, i am not struggling through it, i'm reading it and i will finish it.

on a brighter note, i read a david sedaris while away, short stories (articles) and chuckled and grinned my way through it. fabulous. will be buying another of his to offset the next brooks book. if there is another. i am determined to read one more to make a decision about her.

stay tuned - more bad '80s diary, it's been a while.

gone fishing

what? you think i don't fish?

day 2 of the holidays

1. yesterday was good. i wrote a lot. i'm working on the opus i have been working on very sporadically since 1999.

i.

will.

finish.

it.

2. the brownlows were boring, boring, boring. i knew they would be, but i had to see for myself. first and last time i watch them.

3. i was going for richo. what a spunk. WHAT A SPUNK!

4. there was one girl that i saw in a shocker frock. it was a backless number, red with black lace that looked like tatts all along the top of her rump. she was a little heavy for that frock, if you ask moi.

5. highlight was strauchanie. i love him. he is the funniest. he is the best.

6. today was good until i found headlice in 2 of the 3 children. well, the hairdresser found them. so i am up to my elbows in cheap hair conditioner and it's so fucking awful. maybe i need a glass of wine now.

7. we are going to the movies tonight. the boys will see wall-e, and us girls will see something called wild child. sounds... great. no really. the girls are pumped.

8. i am still enjoying the geraldine brooks book. next one will be the people of the book, i think. is this a good choice or should i go back to the beginning and read in chrono order?

9. i'm having a manicure tomorrow. it's just so decadent. i've never been a manicure person, but i am trying to be now. they just do it so much better than a nut trying to do it at home.

10. i'm realising some new visitors to this blog are, like, really young. i'm wondering where they've come from, and why they read. it's nice, but i don't really get it. i'm so boring to anyone who's hip.

11. i haven't managed any writing today, but plan to get back to it tomorrow.

12. go cats.

ode to geelong and other sundry matters

in the old blogging days, there used to be regular haiku around these here parts.

last night, while at the mcg, i was finding it hard to concentrate on the game. i was reminiscing in a blasphemous way about the geelong footy of the late '80s and early to mid '90s, about how it seemed more exciting (a certain ablett factor?), more thrilling, more watchable.

it was a beautiful, balmy night. i have never been at a night game in short sleeves before. the showers held off, and i was more enamoured by the circumstances than the game.

we were sitting near a lot of dog fans, and while i don't begrudge success for certain victorian teams (western bulldogs, st kilda, even hawthorn) it was a little annoying when they were chanting their bulldogs thang.

i took photos of my old man with his little spiral notebook, jotting down the scores at the end of each quarter. that's another difference to the old days. back then, he had his quad-colour bic biro, and each colour represented a quarter, and he would meticulously record not only the goals and behinds, but at which minute mark they occurred. he would have those notebooks somewhere, i'm sure. but now the game's too quick, i guess, for him to keep doing that. you blink and you miss something. but still, gary the younger is a joy to watch. the way his speed bursts out of him.

the only real negative of the night were the seagulls. at first, they were lovely; circling high in the dark sky well above the grandstand's roof line. but then, later in the game, they had descended and were either in flocks just above the players where the ball's trajectory followed, or in clusters on the ground. i just don't get why they do a night final. well, i do. but it's wrong.

the person who invents some kind of inaudible sound system which to gulls is a banshee wail, and scares them off - you know, like shop keepers install outside their doors to keep teenagers away at night - will be a wealthy, wealthy person.

haiku for the cats

my nirvana is tapas
at movida, yum
before the finals game.

gulls flying at night
in the black mcg sky
full of poesy.

the balmy night air
soothes my soul for the present
yet i am disturbed.

for i know that soon
i will have to join the crowd
and decide a course.

do i catch the tram
from the seething, close platform?
or do i walk on?

i walk towards lights
my boots are not well-fitting
i struggle on, yeah.

i come to the stop
i have to wait for my tram
it does take an age.

i wait at the stop
wearing my hat of victoire
soon i will be home.

i collapse a'bed
my balls of feet are flaming
yet again, shoe shit.

the cats have won, true
but should i have stayed at home?
and watched from plump couch?

bordello-red couch
so comfy and inviting
no shoes necessaire.


* * *



to other matters. i am a list person. i can't help it. and probably my list with the greatest longevity is one i've had going for maybe 20 years or so. it's a list not on one piece of paper, but on many bits. scraps of envelopes, post it notes that have lost their stick or been torn carefully in half, bits of newspaper white-space.

this list is of books that have been recommended to me, that i have seen in medical clinics all over the place, or that i have seen in book shops but not bought for one reason or another. books i have read about in articles, in reviews, in interviews with authors i admire, or more recently online.

all are books that i want. books that i can't even remember why i want them; while sometimes there is the isbn and publisher details, sometimes they are just a title and author floating in space, without any note about what it was that made me write it down.

this is my list, going back years:

goodbye to all that - robert graves

brewer's doctionary of modern phrase and fable - adrian room

an imaginary life - david malouf

cherishing our daughters - how parents can raise girls to become confident women - evelyn bassoff

the historian - elizabeth kostova.

vampire story set in istanbul.

a passionate marriage - jonathan schnarch?

libby/elizabeth southall - book about being in the tsunami. (heard her interviewed on radio - she also lost her daughter a few years before in a tragic way, the girl catching the tram in melbourne to dance class in prahran, and her "friend" killed her through jealousy. what a life for this poor woman. loses her 16 year old daughter, then survives the tsunami. there is no god.)

maranatha et in arcadia ego - by a bunch of holy grail researchers.

i LOVE holy grail stuff.

food - a history, by felipe fernandez-armesto

the boy with the striped pyjamas - someone boyne?

animal speakL the spiritual and magical powers of creatures great and small - ted andrews

god on a harley - joan laidig brady

chapters - candice carpenter

a woman of substance - barbara taylor bradford

the enigma of japanese power - karel van wolferen

the holographic universe - michael talbot/tolbert. also noted here the celestine prophecy - this is a really old note.

ogilvy on advertising - david ogilvy

blonde - joyce carol oates

falling angel - william hjortsberg (this is the book that the old movie angel heart was based on, according to the credits of the movie. this is one of my oldest leads that i've tried and failed to find.)

the power of gold: the history of an obsession - peter l. bernstein

as i lay dying - william faulkner

a fine and private place - brian matthews

isabelle the navigator - luke davies

reading the muslim mind - obviously i would have been interested in reading this when i was married to a muslim mind, and trying to work it the fuck out.

turkey unveiled: ataturk and after - nicole and hugh pope

how to really love your child - dr ross campbell

sasameyuki - junichiro tanizaki

shayou - osamu dazai

oriental carpet design: a guide to traditional motifs, patterns and symbols - prj ford

norwegian wood - haruki murakami

women and sex - nawal saadawi

embraced by the light - betty eade

the physician - noah gordon

the perfumed garden - william heinemann (i may have managed to get this one, can't remember)

la nuit du serail - prince michael of greece (another i have tried to find, and failed.)

in the name of a dead princess - nora someone.

life in istanbul at the time of suleyman the magnificent - robert montran

the koran - a abdulla yusuf ali (i have managed to find this one)

women of sand and myrrh - hanan al-shayk (i think i have this one)

honour and shame: women in modern iraq - sana al-khayyat

beyond the veil: male-female dynamics in muslim society - fatima mernissi

two queens of baghdad - nabia abbott

aisha - the beloved of mohamma - nadia abbott

sultana - prince michael of greece

price of honour - jan goodwin (i think i have this one)

ayesha - james morier

anastasia: the riddle of anna anderson - peter kurth

millennium: a history of the last thousand years - felipe fernandez-armesto

snowdon, the biography


sub lists

the books list is the longest, and it is my life's work to try and acquire them all. now with modern technology and a credit card, it might be easier. also, i've just gone through the places where all the separate lists have been languishing these many years, and put them all together. into one big list in a plastic pocket. and i will work through it, and try to find them.

but sublists have emerged: songs that either must be ones i can sing for karaoke or ones i want to dance to at my 50th birthday party?

is this love - whitesnake

i was made for loving you - kiss

sweet dreams - eurythmics

modern girl - james freud

tusk - fleedwood mac

videos:

into the wild, with sean penn

secrets and lies - rec by "me moom" and watched recently. really good, pretty depressing.

if only - recommended by a student at an english school

drowning mona - bette midler

LOSER

happy texas

a simple twist of faith

the road home

whatever it takes - teen movie

catwalk

georgia

doco - taxi to the dark side

yol (the road) and the herd - by yilmaz guney

* * *

one final, last scrap of paper that i have carried with me since 1994. in ukrainian, the name and address of a young girl i met at a pension we were staying at in marmaris, turkey. she was 11, and she was so beautiful. long, blonde hair, nut-brown skin from the turkish sun, long-limbed and friendly. we "made friends" even though i was a woman and she a girl. she was staying there with her mother, and also her brother. she told me one day, in halting english, that she had a sickness, and pointed to her throat. i slowly worked out that she had become sick from chernobyl, and after marmaris that year, we exchanged letters between australia and ukraine a few times.

now, all these years later, i wonder if she still walks the earth. i can't throw away that piece of paper.

just thinking about her makes me teary. sweet katya.

note to self

if you'd like to be asked back to a school to teach, don't spray with your saliva the vice principal's face at recess when you're talking to him.

it doesn't matter how emphatic you are being.

also note to parents of melbourne. if your shit of a kid is having "social problems" at school, you turning up at school, standing at the fence and glaring at his aggressors is not going to help. in fact it's FUCKING INAPPROPRIATE.

get a brain parents. i know none of us is perfect, but jeez.

shoe update

the blister is healing. i wore high heels to a wedding saturday night. i bought new shoes last week. they are beautiful. and the following is required viewing. i think i've posted this before, but really. it is worth revisiting. enjoy.

the baguette baton and actor with footy

this happened to me in the space of about 5 mins in fitzroy st.

1. i waved away a man who approached me on the street, saying "excuse me, miss..."

"i don't give money, and i don't talk to people on the street" i interrupted, not stopping.

2. then, walking in the other direction after buying what i wanted he came towards me, made a beeline, and offered me a slim, french stick in a white paper bag.

"i just bought it" he said "do you want it?"

"i don't want it, thanks" i said.

so he gave it to a man passing by who was a bit toothless and really chuffed. he turned up grey street saying he was going to give it to [unintelligble mutterings]

3. joel edgerton walked towards me in a baseball cap, shorts and funny shoes, holding a yellow sherrin. i strode past, after the baguette incident, thinking before i realised who it was coming towards me, he looks a bit strange even for st kilda, but it's nice he's carrying a footy. oh, boys and their balls... especially at this time of year.

we locked eyes as i passed and i realised who it was.

god i love my life sometimes.

blister is heeling. heh.

finally, i have tidied up beside the bed

books that have been moved from their little piles on the floor next to my place of sleeping:


as yet unread -

rohinton mistry such a long journey

eric clapton the autobiography

brothers grimm complete fairy tales

germaine greer the change: women, ageing and the menopause


read -

mark seymour thirteen tonne theory

naomi wolf promiscuities


read already but is talking to me again -

tim winton the riders


dipped into -

his holiness the dalai lama the essence of happiness

the dalai lama's book of wisdom

cormac mc carthy blood meridian

charles bukowski the most beautiful woman in town and other stories


books i have left beside the bed in one pile:

gregory david roberts shantaram

a.b. facey a fortunate life

nancy friday the power of beauty

geraldine brooks year of wonders

buddhism for mothers by i can't be bothered going back in there to see.


the one that i've been reading mostly recently is the nancy friday one. this was interrupted by reading the twilight series, in tandem with princess. i've also been reading the papers, magazines, that trashy kind of stuff. and going in and out of a fortunate life and shantaram.

it's like i can't settle down and read happily like i used to. i feel i'm in between books, and it's a disturbing feelings. i can't be happy enough if i haven't got a book that calls me from the other room. and happy enough is all i am hoping for, really. it's all anyone can hope for. forget blissful. forget great, or wonderful. if you can be happy enough, you're doing pretty damn well i reckon.

tonight i am looking forward to starting year of wonders. i hope it keeps me. i feel like i'm kind of going off fiction - well, not going off but i feel i've almost had my fill. does that sound crazy? i turn towards non-fiction, because fiction seems to disappoint these days as much as it delights.

must go and sew some buttons back onto a cushion. it probably won't end well.

love from,

slightly jaded reader with sore feet

x

yes, it's girly whinge time

i was never meant to wear shoes, i'm sure of it. uggs and thongs work best for me. no backs to rub against my heels with the thongs, and big space between ugg boot backs and my heels.

the disadvantages are: thongs let my feet get filthy in summer. uggs stink.

and neither are suitable, professional wear.

today i wore some flats that killed* me when i first wore them. and then the next time. and then the next time. but the next time they seemed a little better. i even wore them yesterday teaching. on my feet all day, doing yard duty, etc. and no new rubbings.

but today, when i am at an area in chadstone shopping centre furthest away from where the car was parked, all of a sudden, a huge, fucking welt on the side of my heel. i swear, it measures about 1.5cm and there is a circular flap of skin that is hanging, and underneath it's all slippery and juicy and weepy.

why? why me?

i think i was a cave girl originally, and therefore i am just not made for shoes. uggs are really just the modern-day equivalent of animal skins wrapped around a foot and tied on with a leather strip, but without the leather strip; thongs are just bare feet but with a rubber bit at the bottom so you don't cut yourself with all the glass lying around st kilda.

shoes hate me. but i love them.

feel very sorry for me.

thank you.


* killed = created great, weeping blisters

three things

1. postscript to post about daniel chirico and his fine, prettily-dressed bread servant-girls/baristettes:

do you think you could get them to wear some gloves? is there something about latex that just doesn't go with those whimsical sundresses and oh, how about the accents. there are uk accents, a european, /franch/ accent. ok, the bread is to die for, the girls are all spunky daniel, i get it, BUT THEY NEED TO PUT SOMETHING OVER THEIR HANDS WHEN THEY PICK UP THE FUCKING BREAD.

they have tongs for the patisserie section. i can see why tongs don't work for any bread product bigger than a bagel.

but you know what. just cause they're pretty, and wearing nice frocks, and have nice hair-dos DOESN'T MAKE THEIR LILY-WHITE HANDS ANY CLEANER THAN THE DUDE WORKING THE DELI AT IGA DOWN THE ROAD.

we all pick our noses, or rub, or scratch near there. we all go to the toilet, we all shit, we all piss, we all cough, and fart and have GERMS ON OUR HANDS. they're handling money, for chrissakes. isn't there some research saying money is the dirtiest stuff in the world? or that hands are? put them together and you've got a bacteria-festooned bunch of digits.

i'm pretty sure that they used to use a square of wax paper a la baker's delight or whichever declasse bread shop it is. one of those (baker's delight/brumby's) does and one doesn't. or didn't.

but chirico's - they need some paper squares. really. it was fucking packed in there this morning at 7.30am. maybe it slows them down using paper squares - and i tell you, they could learn a briskness tip or two from brumby's/baker's delight.

2. sorry number one turned into such a whinge. it was a real poppy moment. anyone who gets that reference gets a gold star. and anyone who can guess whose voice i had in my head while writing it gets TWO gold stars.

number 2 is short. i've thought of something else we did as kids that i wouldn't like to know my kids were doing. we used to get hold of matches and "smoke" them. this is how you smoke a match - you light the match, you breath in the stuff that comes out at the moment of ignition, and then you breathe out smoke. i don't think i did it that often, but it scares me that i did it at all.

3. RIP killer kowalski. reading his obit the other day brought back all the big wrestling names to me. mario milano with his blue shorts. killer carl cox. brute bernard. we used to love watching it as kids, and my grandmother loved it too, and would watch it in her fancy-pants toorak villa, where all the tones were lilac in the lounge room. my memories of the wrestling are blended with memories of the world of sport, with lou richards and the big guy with a rich voice- name? jack dyer? - sparring, and talk of huttons hams, and patra orange juice (big guy with rich voice would make the patra orange juice sound delicious, the way he said it, sounded juicy, and he'd always use fricative force with the P of patra). there were handballing competitions, and letters in, and guests, and i think i used to watch it to see whether the man i loved peter mc kenna would be on. oh, how i loved him, with my weedy 9- or 10-year-old girl-brain.

so that's it, this fine, nay glorious, melbourne morning. this weekend for us is quietist, but with large, italian festivities tomorrow for father's day at the in-laws. there will be food a-plenty as is the custom, and then we will roll home and hopefully not miss too much of the geelong v st kilda game.

go cats.

ps thoughts are with a certain someone who is entertaining lady-guests at his house this weekend. i hope it goes well P.

am i going to regret vowing that i would still be blogging when i'm 80?

but this is all i've got today:

1. brendan fevola apparently has taken the moral high ground saying that he doesn't care what the afl think about him because they can't even spell his name properly. and this makes them the tools, and him not a tool for having a plastic tool hanging out the front of his boxer shorts, or some such nonsense.*

2. parents of melbourne - do your children's teachers, nay the whole of society, a favour. please. will you fucking tell your brats NO and stick to it? just occasionally would help i think. draw some lines, place some limits, have some intestinal fortitude, they won't hate you, you won't damage them, they won't die from disappointment. really they won't. and hearing the word "no" won't make them explode either. if you don't let them rule you and the household, then they won't think they can rule teachers and school. thanks.*

3. is there any kind of sadder dream than the one where it's you and a famous person, getting on really well in a mates way. there's not necessarily kissing, or sex, or even flirting (though sometimes there be). but the dreams where you are having a great time, laughing, chatting, and they are so comfortable with you and they like you, and you are not a freaky stalker in their eyes.

this was my dream, this morning, with jamie oliver.

4. regarding number 2 above. you parents are responsible for me pulling out the old grey goose, whacking 4, COUNT THEM FOUR, olives on a toothpick, and cleaning a martini glass on a thursday evening. i hope you're happy.

* sounds like i am already 80

hope you are travelling well.

go cats.

monday musings

1. people who try to say that long day-care for children of any age is beneficial for them (the kids), and "doing good things" for the child are idiots and should shut up. day care is necessary, and it may not do any harm, but show me a mother who would still put their kid in long-day care from the age of 6 weeks for the good of the child, and not for financial or work reasons, and i'll show you a liar. (p4 the age)

2. breastfeeding - the idea that decreasing breastfeeding will result in higher illness and hospitalisations amongst deprived children who might be raised on formula amuses me. (also p4 the age). anecdotally, i've observed that kids who were breastfed for longer than mine and more successfully, tend to get sicker, more often, than her. i said it was anecdotal, so shut up.

3. sarah palin's husband is known as "first dude" in alaska, and their children are called willow, piper, track, bristol and trig.

4. what benefit are school concerts where the kids have to practise and practise, schoolwork gets neglected, they are exhausted, mothers are exhausted having to sew costumes or find costumes or buy costumes. then stage the performance on a tuesday night, so everyone is up until 11pm, knackered for the next day. everyone's sick - with three kids i haven't had a week in the last month where they've all been at school, every day. it's ferocious out there, with very evil bugs moving around, infecting our young, and our teachers, and parents. but re the concerts, i just don't get it. it's out of control. it should be reined in. i'm sick of it. and let's face it, the only people who think it's cute and/or enjoyable are the parents themselves. which means you have to sit through every other year level of interminable songs and "acts".

5. so it's 1st of september and therefore spring technically. it's cold and breezy and i am sick of this weather. it's really pushed me to the limits this year. i'm one of those people who enjoys the variety of melbourne's weather - i like the changing seasons. but this year, i've struggled. shut up, i'm not getting old.

6. i'm getting old. saturday night saw me out with a single girlfriend. while she had eyes flitting around, checking out all the boys, i was nursing a bucket of diet coke and wishing i could be home with my book. while she was trying to flirt, and failing, i was thinking fuck, what am i doing here? i even said it to her. can we get a video and go back to your place?, i whined. she just looked at me. look around, i said. everyone is young. this is their domain. we don't belong here. do you see any people our age?

she said it's ok for you, you're married.

and i tell you, i am glad. but even when i was single i didn't do all that shit. it's horrible and i hate it and i was so glad to get away from there and i'm never doing it again. i even said to her you're out with the wrong person.

blah.

UPDATE. tell me, it's insane isn't it to spend $140 on a brush for a dog? even if it is the gigi and the brush is called the furminator and promises to strip out her undercoat so much that it won't shed all over the house?

call me mental, i've already bought it.

crying now.

any excuse

to look at this picture again.

today, we learn that:

1. it's not a wig. it's a hair system.

2. this hair system has been traced to a specific hair restoration service in melbourne.

3. this hair system languished in a box along with 20 to 30 other old-style hair systems of various shapes, hairs, colours and sizes.

4. this hair system was the lucky piece that was pulled out for tony. just think what else we could have been treated to had it been another hair system.

5. this hair system is well-travelled. bonnie doon? ocean-going yacht? athens.

6. though well-travelled and much publicised after tony's arrest, this hair system has been described by a hair expert as "so old and disgusting that nobody would purchase [it]"

7. purana detectives have many statements from hair restoration and wig experts who have identified the hair system.

8. the serial number had been removed from the hair system, obviously in an effort to stymie identification. there was no other explanation for this, the serial number is not easily removed, it doesn't fall or wash off.

9. the hair system used by tony was usually fixed onto the client's head with tape or glue. glue.

glue.

glue.

10. finally an explanation for the bad styling of the hair system. in addition to it having been put on hastily and sideways? or perhaps moved out of place by athens police as they did that caring hand-on-head, make-sure-you-don't-hit-your-head-on-the-police-car-roof thing. or perhaps shifted as he was beaten up in the cells. but in addition to that sideways movement, we learn the hair system was long and unstyled. after being glued/stuck onto the client's head it would be cut and styled.

while i was truly interested to read about this, excuse me now while i resume living my life.

have a good weekend.

ps i have bought on rage and i am reading it.

pps talk about giving pedants a bad name. all those twits writing into the age this week about mis-used apostrophes, dangling modifiers (oh, chortle, chortle), oh, let me spell grammer wrong, and be really funny and witty and the like. it's embarrassing.

free-range kids

on the radio this afternoon i heard a snippet of a segment where they were asking people to call in with things that they'd done as a kid that they'd never let their kids do.

all types rang in, but my personal favourite was the guy who said they would reverse the handle-bars on their malvern star bikes, load each with a firecracker, nick the old man's cigar cause it "wouldn't go out in the wind" and go and terrorise the neighbourhood with these mini rocket launchers.

this was the 70s, he said, when you could get firecrackers legally, and obviously could swipe a cigar here and there.

it made me think about things we did as kids that i wouldn't let my kids do.

be free-range for a start. it's a shame that we can't just let them roam around the way we did. i'm sure in the country kids do have these freedoms still. we used to be able to go out to play and be home by a certain time. and that was just after school. on the weekends, it was only mealtimes that we had to be back for - you could be gone for hours.

we'd visit friends, hang out at the park, take up residence in trees for half a day, go to the shops, buy lollies, play sport, ride bikes around the neighbourhood, play tennis on the street, hopscotch on the street. i remember being sprung outside in the gutter making a dam in the rainwater just after i'd come out from hospital with my tonsils out.

these days i have to consciously create situations where the kids go out without me, where they are pushing away from the home, and on their own learning how to handle things. this includes taking the dog for a walk, going to the milk bar and more recently, catching public transport to school and back when i'm working. but i know where they are, and what they're doing. and that's not free-ranging.

naturestrips, gutters, roofs, trees, fences, gates, garages, construction sites, parks, streets, empty schools: these were our domains.

pocket-knives, old cigarette packets, bikes, old prams/pushers, rocks, stones, wood stakes, billy-carts, roller-skates, scooters, skateboards: these were our tools.

some of the things i did when i was younger, that i wouldn't want my kids doing:

* playing hide and seek/chasey where the house roof wasn't out of bounds

* making petrol bombs and throwing them down a tunnel "to get the bats"

* buying a pack of cigarettes and then smoking them while in a tree

* stacking a scooter at the bottom of vears road hill. the end of the scooter's handle made an imprint on my stomach - a white circle that stayed there for years.

what about you?

what did you do as a kid that you wouldn't let your kid do now.

sunday night, after the game

well, the cats beat north, but what a dodgy, weird game with bizarre umpiring and decisions i just didn't understand. and a new nemesis presents himself to replace barry hall - north's number 31, david someone? i do so enjoy having someone to hate.

and the geelong skies remained dry - the clouds were threatening but we didn't suffer any rain. there was no wind, so while we didn't have the sunburningness of a couple of years ago, it was fine.

chinese last night was ok. it gets very busy in there, it has to be the most exotic restaurant for miles, and the only chinese place, so i guess all from everywhere go there on a saturday night. princess had fried ice cream for the first time. she had exactly the same questions about it as i did when i was her age.

doesn't the ice cream melt?

saturday we all lay about reading. princess is re-reading the last of the twilight series, you know, teenage vampire, wereworld, human tale. she read the entire 4 books within 10 days. and is re-reading the last one. for the 3rd time. it was only released 2 weeks ago. mad, i tell you. i thought i was a voracious reader.

so there we all were - my dad, my daughter and me. dad reading a new james bond written by some dude other than ian fleming. of course.

it's not half bad, he said.

me flicking between the 3rd vampire/werewolf/humanoid girl love triangle book and a couple of abba books i picked up at the 2nd hand book shop down there, and the papers.

and princess with her love story.

we didn't go to the beach. we didn't go for a walk. we didn't go for a horseride.

we read. and read. and read.

dad and i caught steve hooker's fabulous pole-vaulting on friday night. and last night i went to bed at 8, and to sleep at 9. pathetic i know. woke up at 10am this morning and ate breakfast out again.

oh, to not cook. it's divine.

but to my friday night, earlier.

i went in to the town hall to hear and see germaine. first, there were the age book awards - one to don watson who i have to say in his speech used quite a few swanky words, tim winton who was suitably down-to-earth and humble and normal, and an eccentric old poetess, with witch hair and stooped physique who was really interesting and different.

and then we settled down for the main course. the place was filled with ageing hippy women, with steel-grey in their hair, yet smart haircuts. there were also younger chicks, and a few men. i'm convinced i was sitting behind the actress who played bogan janelle on neighbours. she really didn't look like a bogan.

germaine swept onto the stage in a dramatic black cape, with legs up to there. she's so tall.

i'm not going to go through the whole thing, but she was all of the following: brilliant, fast-talking, learned, scholarly, boring (she did tend to go off into lengthy quotations of obscure shakespeare passages, and i would go to the bahamas for a minute), funny, self-deprecating, moved, natural, pithy, bitchy (a couple of swipes at the murdoch paper), restrained, goofy, provocative, humble.

but at all times she was sincere. and so invested in what she was saying, so passionate.

and i don't think you could say she was formally charming, because there were gaps in her presentation where she was a bit awkward, a bit at a loss. her charm is in her naturalness and her at times gawkiness. she certainly wasn't polished, though she was competent. she spoke so well, not reading verbatim, she probably just had notes scrawled, i wonder. she was dramatic and i wondered whether she either had ever acted, to aspired to.

these are the things that stand out:

* at one stage toward the end, there was a popping sound, like a car backfiring or something. she immediately spread out her arms and said "i've been shot!" the whole place cracked up, i couldn't stop laughing, it was such a gleeful laugh. she said "not that i'm expecting to be shot!" for her to make such a quick gag, so spontaneously was telling. it showed us that she is fully aware of the enmity that she produces in others. and possibly it crosses her mind that some nutter might take her out. but almost as quickly she wanted to show that she wasn't scared, wasn't vulnerable.

* at the end she was given a bunch of flowers. people were clapping and cheering, some standing up. she stood there and accepted the applause, also she looked very closely at the flowers, peering into the base of the bunch, digging around with her fingers. what was she doing? was she checking they were moist at the bottom? was there a card down there? i couldn't see but it was proof to me she is so in the moment, and not scared of being curious and herself. she allowed herself to be distracted by the flowers, even though there were 2,000 people clapping her.

* she ran over time. she would have talked all night. she didn't seem to have a watch, made a comment about there being no clock ("as usual in these places"). she took questions. she wasn't in a hurry to get out of there. she wasn't precious.

so it was a real privilege for me. i didn't catch up with AOF but we were both there, and texted each other after. i had to race off to drive down the beach.

what a fabulous weekend.

more germaine whimsy

and yes, it shall be whimsy. while it makes me a little nervous to just write a non-edited, unplanned piece on this topic, this woman - for it is indeed the week of the greer - i am just going to write my feelings out, and anybody who wants to be picky and neg me and say it's ill-structured, rambling and incoherent, can just bugger off. this is my blog, and i'll be incoherent if i want to.

the last time i did a week on someone, it was david hicks. back when i had hours of university master-avoiding that needed to be done every day. it was a requirement of full-time study, it was in the course guidelines.

i have no such excuses now, dear reader. i am working rather more than i would choose, but enjoying earning money for the first time, properly and regularly, in more years than i care to say. and while i like to say this is the week of germaine, i am aware that i haven't posted all week.
so, to germaine. or more precisely, this article which appeared last saturday in the age.

i've picked a bone with traceeeee before, over peter garrett's suiting up and seeming to forget all his old song lyrics. i'm sure it was her that wrote an article saying something like "leave him alone, he's gonna work it from the inside."

still waiting on that one, trace.

but to the latest. the headline is greer's latest rage more glib than lib.

i know that sub-editors write the headlines, so that's not traceeeee's fault, but the headline does announce the tone that she embraces in her article.

what does glib mean anyway? according to one source, it's any of the following:

smooth and slippery; speaking or spoken in a smooth manner; easily fluent; careless; insincere.

so it's a negative word, it seems, something suspect and something not altogether pleasant. exactly how many see greer it seems.

my reading of the hutchinson article made me think that she had missed the point. while she admits to being fascinated with the greer, and sees herself as benefitting from the social swathe the female eunuch cut through the world at that time, and the resonance since, she then goes on to methodically attempt to undermine germaine, and to cast her as suspect - geographically, politically and feministically.

she talks about the new essay on rage, particularly on aboriginal male rage. hutchison implies that germaine is wrong in thinking, from her lovely, far-away english residence, that indigenous men are self-destructing out of rage, and not grief. hutchison says that germaine was not at the sorry day in canberra, and obviously the broadcast that she watched in her lovely, far-away english residence didn't show all the aboriginal people who attended. hutchison was there, she saw that the indigenous people there were in the background, under trees, not pushing themselves to the front. so germaine must be wrong in thinking the aboriginal men were absent. ah, point scored. i haven't read the rage essay yet, so i don't know exactly what trace is referring to. but it's clear she thinks she scored over germaine about this. i'm also not sure why it's important for people to try to bring this woman down. to try to prove her wrong. and to try and cut her legs out from under her.

but going back to the rage vs grief thing - they aren't separate. they can and do co-exist. it could be argued that you can't have one without the other. what does rage come from, and how does it differ from anger. what are the degrees on the continuum. i need to read the essay to try to understand better. but back to the sorry day, perhaps on that day people showed their grief - grief is far more socially acceptable than rage. but surely the rage is there, in all of them (us?). to show rage at the sorry day would have been to show poor manners, lack of dignity, lack of good-heart. i don't know, but i guess that indigenous people like everyone else would pride themselves on their collective good-heart and their dignity.

hutchison then goes on to talk about the joanna murray-smith thing, where germaine called her "an insane reactionary who held feminism in contempt." again she tries to score points, saying the she knows that murray-smith's family are left-wing inellectuals, her mother taught hutchison english, and her father was "revered in literary intellectual circles." well, being literary, or left-wing doesn't automatically exclude a person from being an insane reactionary and anti-feminist. are all these states of being mutually exclusive? i think not.

but as usual, germaine has made her controversial comment, just a few words, and we don't know the context, she hasn't offered an explanation for it, we don't know what question she was asked to respond to. nothing. but it has to be noted that murray-smith has been criticised by other people for being right-wing and anti-feminist, eg. Alison Croggan, see article.

this is what really gets up people's noses about germaine as well. she doesn't give herself to us. she doesn't lay herself bare. we don't know anything about her. maybe in the past she was very open about her own personal experiences, couched within her writing on certain topics; sexuality, gender issues, menopause, father-daughter relationships. but in the media at large, she gives them nothing about herself. i have no idea if she's ever been married, ever been pregnant, ever had a lesbian tryst, ever been depressed, ever driven drunk, ever taken drugs, ever stalked anyone, ever plagiarised anything.

to me, she has never fallen. she has never done an insipid new idea interview. she doesn't give permission to bigraphers, but will call them parasites. why don't they create something for themselves, she wonders. why don't they get a life?

on the question and answer show last week, germaine was insulted most shockingly by the murdoch paper man. he called her old. someone whispered sotto voce that it was below the belt, perhaps it was carr. germaine threw out a facial reaction but nothing else. she doesn't seem to be affected by people trying to tear her down.
you have to admire the woman for that, if nothing else.
the whole traceeeee article just seemed to me a set-up for tearing greer down. scoring points.
oooh, look at me. i spat on germaine greer!

this was the big, green, slimy slagging at greer from hutchison, who said: "while her observations about the cultural and social crisis in aboriginal australia are astute, her cause-and-effect arguments fail spectacularly."

but where's the detail in your argument, traceeeee? you can't make a statement like that and then just leave your readers hanging. where's your proof?

at the end of the article, hutchison is getting quite bitchy, always a sure sign of someone who is desperately trying to make a point and has nothing of real substance to rely on.

"But it didn't stop Greer flying off in a rage - yes, rage - about [Murray-Smith]"

i don't know that greer has either said rage is a bad thing, or something that she doesn't feel. are you trying to highlight some sort of irony there, hutchison, by referring to geer flying off in a rage?

but finally, traceeeee writes that greer's closing comment "if i was more animal and less pseudo intellectual i'd be a much happier person" was profoundly sad and confronting to the feminist ideals she "trumpeted all those years ago."

sad? did you not see germaine's full cheek with quite a bit of tongue in it? i think she meant it literally, but she was also being funny, she was being self-deprecating and i understand what she meant. i wish i was a little more animal too. i wish i didn't analyse anything and everything, try to understand everything, get affected by everything. i wish i could just let things be, feel things, not have to work so damn hard every single day to exist without imploding.

and how on earth is that confronting - do you mean contradictory - to any feminist ideals? we all are animals, really. why can't i be a person who wants to be more in touch with my primal stuff, less living in my head, but also wants to choose about whether i wear lipstick, remove my body hair, wear what i like. it's all about choices, and choosing to react in a certain way when i realise that some things i can choose, some things i can't. and that's about it.