Is This The Right Planet?

I was reminded the other day of the time a stranger wandered into my home. There was a knock at the door (odd because we live in a security building and you have to buzz the intercom to get through the main door) so I opened it. Someone I had never seen before walked right in, talking, looking down at the floor. He wandered right into the middle of the room while The Dreaded One and I looked at each other and wondered who the hell he was and what the hell he was doing in our home. He stopped talking, looked up and around the room. He looked at each of us, then said, "Is this the right place?" I said, "No. I don't think it is." He looked a little confused, turned and left, muttering that he thought this was the place. I closed the door and The Dreaded One and I just looked at other, wondered what had just happened, then started to laugh.

I just remembered that weird little episode because someone just walked into the shop and started talking at me. Said it's ages since she'd seen me and asked how business was going. She started checking out the clothes in a very business like way. I managed to keep up my end of the conversation while wondering who the fuck she was. Then she started telling me that she was flustered because she had just met the lead singer of a band she had once photographed. She fanned her face with a hand and said she was on a bit of a high because of the lead singer. Eventually she left, saying that she is going to LA but she will keep in touch.

I still have no idea who she is.

Oracles & Glands

God I'm crap. As shitty as I'm feeling I know I'm not going to stop this blog. I'm going to start a dark one, but this one's about light, I think.

I'm listening to Kolliope's Oracles & Glands, and I love it and it's just got the most positive things to say. The last couple of months have been lacking in music (the week of psytrance at Soulclipse aside), but holy crap I like it. Do you ever get that thing when music really gets in there? When it gets in there and makes you go ahh yes, now I get it? This album makes me feel grateful for all the beauty I've seen. Like there is only good in the world. Highlights? Rainbow's Daughter is playing right now, and it's sublime. But True Value will come on shortly, and the one about Tabernacling With My Soul... hmm... Always The Arms is on now. These guys are so good.

I'm playing it loud and it's excellent music for a clear and golden Sunday morning, but I am very amused by the fact that The Dreaded One was so keen to go to a doof today, and she was going to set her alarm last night but said "Oh you usually wake up early, just wake me up." I woke up early, woke her up, but she's still asleep. I kissed her tenderly on the cheek and she punched me in the face and said (in essence) "Fuck off you fucking ridiculous piece of shit." So I guess the doof's not a happening thing.

Listen to Oracles & Glands. It's exquisite.

George Loves Johnny

Wrote the first theatre review in months today, and it felt gooood. Hopefully there will be a lot more of that kind of thing, because I like getting free tickets and I like being paid to tell people what I think of stuff, even if, ultimately, it does feel a little bit odd. It's not like I've got a degree in theatre crtiticsm. In fact it's not like I've got a degree in anything. It's a bit baffling that I'm in a position to tell people what I think about anything at all. But you know, bring it on. The mag was happy that I did it at short notice, so provided they like the review I should get more work from them. I need work. I have no work.

I stuffed up the job interview the other day. It was pretty funny. I sent an intro letter in, and the reason the guy asked me in was because I was the only applicant to send a letter in without a resume, and he wanted to meet the kind of person who applies for a job without sending in a resume. I don't know, I just didn't feel like sending a resume because the previous phase of my work life rarely rarely has anything to do with the current one. At least until this magazine writing thing started. So I just gave him a rundown of my writing credits, which look more substantial once I write them down than I ever think they are, and he decided to get me in. I was in the top five of over a hundred applicants, but I stuffed up somehow. It was probably the poncho I was wearing. I guess you can take the dress-with-individuality thing too far.

Oh - I did my first stint on the set of All Saints the other day too. It's a popular drama I have never seen and I was in a bar scene. We had to mill about looking like bar people but without making any noise. You have to look at people and mime talking and laughing and being all conversational, and it's a crack up. Everyone gets the giggles because it's all so silly. I totally enjoyed it and would really like to do more. It would be fun to speak on telly too.

And finally, I'd just like to wrap up this post by asking what the fuck is wrong with people? Why are people so goddamned stupid? First there was the woman in front of me at the automatic cash-card teller who waited patiently in line and didn't start looking for her wallet in her back pack until it was her turn at the machine. She rummaged and eventually found it and then carefully took her card out, put the wallet back in her back pack, put her back pack on the front of her, erm, person, THEN got around to doing the transaction. AND she got a fucking printout of her statement before getting on with it. Fuck!

Then there was this absolute amoeba of a person who walked through the turnstile at the supermarket... almost. Seriously, he stopped just on the other side of it and wrote a fucking text message. Wot? Fuck man, I'm the biggest text junkie around, but that is just downright retarded.

But worst of all, I'm watching the news and that fuckwit George Dubbya Bush is standing there with his girlfriend, our Australian Prime Minister John Howard (who really needs to shut up as far as declaring the allegiance of the Australian people to Bush's psychotic international policies), and he's making some lame-arsed attempt at being funny. He's doing some cheesy routine to show what good mates him and his sidekick are, making jokey insults about his hair and his looks... fuck off!

So I wanna know - why are people so goddamned stupid?

Laughbawl

Crap. Now I can't find the camera. Have the tubey thing, just no camera. Okay. I was going to post a picture of La Rambla in Barcelona, but you're going to have to use your imagination. Actually, I'll help you... close your eyes... not yet, after the next bit because I am about to use the magic of words to put an exotic image in your mind... to see La Rambla, close your eyes (not yet!)... and think of a sunny day in Barcelona, and, like, a really big mall with lots of people, mostly Spanish, in it. Now close your eyes. Ahh yairs...

How cool is that? I bet you thought you were actually in Spain... oh, you have to open your eyes now.

Anyway.

A magazine called up to ask me to go to the theatre tonight to review a comedy play about death, which is right up my alley. That made me happy because free theatre tickets are back on the agenda. Then another magazine emailed to say they weren't sure how my humour column was going to fit in with their mag, and I replied with, "No worries re the column. I have a couple of other magazines for that kind of stuff, so no drama. I was actually a little surprised that you expressed interest in a humour column in the first place. Few editors think outside the square at all."

Few editors think outside the square at all. Hmm.

I sent it and realised that even I'm not sure what to make of it. They said the nice thing about keeping me in mind for future stories, but I'm guessing that especially after my response, I won't be hearing from them. Lucky they didn't see what I had been going to send... it had words like "cocksucking", "spaz", "mutant" and "evolutionary conundrum" in it.

Also, have you ever laughed and cried at the same time? Not that dribbly romantic comedy laughcry that girls do, a full on belly laughbawl. It can be done. And it is strange. That's what I've heard anyway.

Regarding My Previous Post

Yes. Well. I had just finished a late shift working at a catering job, was pretty hyped, drank to wind down and... the bit where I say I should sleep now? I should have slept before posting. I didn't even explain that yes, the picture of the "mainly purple dog magically caught in the branches of a forest tree" (bloody hell I impress me) was in fact taken at a party (you probably deduced that fact all by yourself) just outside of Brighton. Weirdest damn party I've been to in ages. We drove for about an hour, parked in a very British suburban street, and set off on foot. There was a clearing and some music that was quite good, although the generator was too close and too loud. Some sloppy twat who appeared to have hammered himself on a cocktail of booze, acid and ketamine tried to convince me that we were mates 'from the long weekend.' He was funny, persistent and annoying, with the funny evaporating pretty quickly. He tried to hassle a couple of the others and I really started to get the shits, but he stumbled off into the dark undergrowth. You could tell where he was by the falling over sounds.

It was a small party with some regular doofers as well as some lads in track suits who asked everyone if they were selling any 'class A's'. I loved that - they didn't give a shit, they just wanted anything so long as it was illegal and it was going put them on their arses.

At some point we noticed the dog up in the tree and thought it was the giggliest thing ever, probably because of our recent escapades with a real Owen The Penguin. More about Owen later. (Cue sinister laughter).

And mentioning Bird with the straw in her hair baffles even me. How could you have possibly seen any of the photos I've not yet posted? I dunno.

Erm... I was going to post another photo of something, but The Dreaded One has done something with the tubey pluggy thing that sucks the photos out of the camera. So just, you know, talk amongst yourselves for a bit. I'll be back with a pretty Spanish picture soon...

Oh yeah - I went to a job interview today.

No Animals Were hurt In the Blogging of This thing.

Right. so. It's like this... I'm a little drunk right now... just the ususla drunk, but I think I should warn yo. Because Bloogging under the influence is not the ideal thing of doing stuff./

I looked throughb my photos of the recent trip and fuck man, that was amazing. I love the places I went to and the art and the architecture, but I dunno. That fucking pier at Brighton and Bird with that straw in her hair which youve probably not sen yet... and this pic is of a purple and white but mainly purple dog somehow magically caught in the branches of a forest tree... and it's not a real purpke dog btw.

Anyway, it was a weird party, but Brighton was way cool and it's weird to mis a place as much as I miss Paris. And I'm not happy about the missing peopele bit. Something should be done to rectify the thing.

I should probably sleep now.

Nighty night.

Loins Of Anger (or... It's God's Shout)

I feel a little bit silly. The post below about me being The Emperor and introducing public donging by fluffy toys because nothing has been going my way? Job applications that have been ignored and the magazine that said they would be stoked to have me on board but weren't returning my calls? And the one I didn't mention about the only living person I want to write fiction with deciding that my contribution to our first writing exercise made her "loins angry" (seriously - her words, not mine). I was just generally feeling a bit sorry for myself because God wasn't offering to shout me the next round.

Anyway, I sat down to write a poor-me blarp to... who I like to think of as... Loins Of Anger, and as my finger tips came into contact with the keyboard my phone rang. It was the head of a television company I'd written to asking for a job as some sort of writer, part time because I need something reliable at the moment, and he said congratulations on being the first person in about a hundred to write the kind of intro letter I'm interested in and would I like to come in for an interview next Tuesday.

THEN Men's Health, who I am writing another feature for (fun one about tattoos) and who had asked me to give them a call which naturally made me think they were taking the story away from me... they returned my call and everything is peachy and they are keen to help me out and everything is peachier than an orchard.

AND I was informed by The Dreaded One that there was an email that I had somehow overlooked since Tuesday from the magazine who had previously claimed to be stoked to have me on board saying that they were still dead keen to get me on board and they had a couple of writing jobs for me right now if I was interested and could I please give them a call. How had I missed that one?

And just to reinforce the fact that God had in fact offered to shout the next round, the extras agency I've signed up with but haven't had photos done for yet called to ask if I want to be in some popular drama for a day. Small job, but being on telly can be fun. Haven't done it in ages.

So. There you go. Pays to make threats about public dongings with fluffy toys to all who dare to stir my wrath.

Also, this is one of the funniest things I have ever read. Courtesy of and via Piehole, who is also extraordinarily funny. Check out her site if you haven't already.

"Oi! God! Make it a double, and make it snappy!"

A Berserker In Barcelona

Looking through the photos from the trip I've realised that I was a little obssessed with architecture. There are all these perfectly framed shots of mosques and turrets and gothic churches and the Familia Sagrada (my god that place was amazing) and the wreck of West Pier in Brighton and temples in Bangkok... all of which would probably bore you shitless. (And I'm quite capable of doing that without the assistance of pictures).

So here is this one. Speaking of obssession, I'd like to draw your attention to the speed at which The Dreaded One's hand is moving. Holy crap, I've never seen anything like it. This was at an awesome market just off La Rambla in Barcelona (that's right, I've had enough of posting pics of Turkey, and we do have a lot to get through, kiddies), and it was awesome... oh, I said that already. Ok, so the food in Turkey was pretty bland, and The Dreaded One and I do like good food, so we went a little nuts when we arrived in Spain. We had been in Barcelona all of about 15 seconds when we found this huge market and spent hours in there drooling at the vast array of gourmet produce. But then The Dreaded One spotted this candy stand and look out. Seriously, she shoulder barged her way in there, dragged small crying children out of the way, tipped a wheel chair dude over, used an old guy's walking stick to beat off the few remaining stragglers and filled that bag up before I knew what all the commotion was about. It was like the battle scene in Braveheart. Poor fools. They should have known better than to get between The Dreaded One and her lollies.

Pretty damn funny that there was such a mind-blowing selection of cheeses and meats and exotic fruit and veg and crusty breads and - gourmands that we are - all we walked out with was a bag of impossibly bright candy. I think The Dreaded One is the only person I know who chooses her food to coordinate with her hair.

It's All Gone Pete Dong

Since returning from overseas (have I mentioned my overseas trip?) something has happened. Or rather, nothing has happened. Prior to leaving I was feeling positive because everyone seemed to want me to write for them. One mag even said "Dude - we would be stoked to get you on board." NOW however, no one is returning my calls or emails. What happened? What did I do?

One of the many things I would do if I were a Roman emperor is round up all the fuckers who previously displayed enthusiasm and promised open arms but who are now avoiding me and I'd have them beheaded... actually that's a bit harsh. Beheading is for primitives. I would have them, erm, donged. Public dongings would be in order. Not vicious dongings, just humiliating ones... and not all that humiliating either. Unless being publicly donged with fluffy toys is considered humiliating... which it wouldn't be if I were The Emperor. In fact public donging with fluffy toys would be considered an honour, if I were Emperor Maximus Quickus... wait on, that defeats the whole fucking point...

On a separate note, does anyone know if Picasso really did utter Modigliani's name on his death bed?

Grumpy V The Gladiatrix

I have made myself unfeasibly grumpy about people who dance to supermarket music. They irritate me beyond belief. What do they think they are doing? It's shit music in a shit place where you go to buy food, toilet paper and things to dilute the vodka with, not a fucking nightclub. I mean, I'm glad they're in a happy state of mind and everything, but seriously, fuck off! Stop drawing attention to yourself in such an embarrassing manner. And okay, so you know the words to Woman In Love by Barbara Streisand, but you really need to keep that kind of shit to yourself. It's just not the kind of thing normal, well-adjusted people like to announce to the world.

My mood improved, however, when I stumbled across an astonishing piece of information. I was writing my travel piece about Turkey and was looking for stuff about Ephesus, and I saw the words 'Female' and 'Gladiator' in the same sentence. Whoa. Who can resist that combination of words? Not me. Chick gladiators? I'm there. Apparently there's plenty of evidence to suggest that there were in fact female gladiators and that they were a big drawcard at many gladiatorial events. They even found the grave of one in London in 2000. Dead cool or what? But get this - sometimes instead of fighting other gladiatrices, they had to fight dwarfs. I have to stop now because it just doesn't get better than chick gladiators doing battle with dwarfs. There's a lot of stuff I would have done if I was a Roman Emperor, but I really doubt that I would have had the... the vision to think of pitting female gladiators against dwarfs. Now that is the work of a great mind.

What I couldn't find in all my reading is who won? Who wins out of a dwarf and a gladiatrix? Were there famous dwarf gladiators revered throuhgout the ancient world for their ability to whoop bitch arses? I must continue my research...

Goddesses, Doormats and Gladiators

Three things I discovered yesterday. First up - Picasso was an arsehole. I guess that's common knowledge, but I'd never read much about him, just assumed that anyone who created such amazing art and loved so many amazing women must be full of passion and... I just bestowed upon him all these good traits, and he was actually a card-carrying nobhead. He actually said "For me, women are either goddesses or doormats." Twat. I mean, people generally are like that - either worthy or not worthy (and it's mostly not worthy) - but you don't say it out loud. He is so off my dream dinner party guestlist. This woman, however, can sit at the head of the table, and we can bitch all night long about what a contemptible twat Picasso was. In any case, I think what Picasso meant was "women are goddesses until a younger one comes along, then I treat them like doormats." The relationship between Picasso and Dora Maar (hmm... Dora Maar almost sounds like it could be Spanish for doormat) has all the ingredients of a great and tragic love story. A movie should be made focusing on their relationship.

The second thing I discovered yesterday was that the extras agency I visited thnks that the facial hair I've grown so fond of makes me look a little camp. I thought it made me look like a gladiator. Like, hello? Since when have gladiators ever been considered camp? Oh... since about forever. At least since the fifties when they were making all those swords and sandals movies. Fuck - that scene in Spartacus when Tony Curtis looked into Kirk Douglas' eyes and, somehow managing not to giggle, said in a manly tone, "I love you Spartacus." And Kirk Douglas - also managing not to giggle - replied, "And... I love you." So, now that I think about it, I'm not so into this gladiator thing. Poofs one and all. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

And the third thing I discovered is that vanilla vodka mixed with Saxby's Ginger Beer is the most exquisitely delicious drink... fucking hell, maybe I am turning into a gladiator... I'd better make like Picasso and shag a goddess.

Grumpy & Happy

The bottom photo (which is meant to be at the top... grrr... why can't I get this right) is me at the top bit of the Bosphorus with The Black Sea in the background. I feel a child-like awe whenever I find myself at far flung places like this. I mean, this is Istanbul, The Bosphorus from high school Greek and Roman history studies, and here is me! Standing right there! Freezing my nuts off! With that daggy little tour group sticker stuck to my hoodie! What a twat!

About that tour... if you're ever there and you want to do a tour of the Bosphorus, take the public ferry. It's cheap and you see everything you need to see. We took the advice of the hotel manager and paid more to take a guided tour, and because numbers were down we ended up not on the private tour boat, but on a public fucking ferry, wearing our daggy little tour group stickers. It was interesting enough, but we could have caught the ferry ourselves and loitered near the tour guide to hear about what we were looking at. Oh yeah - I got really grumpy about all this and didn't talk to anyone else on the tour. Everyone on these tours gets so polite and you get one or two people who start making naff little jokes to show off their local knowledge and it's quite painful and made me vow to never go on another tour as long as I live (we were to go on two more before the trip was over... but I swear, never again). Anyway, this other tour member dude decided we were going to be friends. He sidled up alongside, totally ignoring the poisonous vibes and the don't-fucking-dare-talk-to-me body language I was wrapped in, and and he dares to fucking talk to me. He asks what I do, I tell him, he says oh really without a shred of interest, then ear-bashes me about his life as a soldier boy, and how he's based in Syria or somewhere, and how he's on leave, and how cheap beer and aftershave is in Turkey (weirdly, it's slipped my mind but he told me the actual price of aftershave in both places... ???), and how he loves the sound of random land-mines in the morning, and bleh bleh bleh. It was interesting enough, although I will never understand people in the armed forces who say they want to get closer to real action. Are they mad? This is life dude - get back to me on this when you've had your legs blown off. I guess I was too preoccupied with my child-like awe at being somewhere so exotic and so far away from home to get into talk of the appeal of war.

Anyway, the stupid tour ended up back in Istanbul with a visit to some relatives of the tour guide who owned a spice shop in the spice markets near The Grand Bazaar, and if I hadn't been grumpy prior to this (which I was) I sure as hell was grumpy now because at the conclusion of the tour guide's little speech in the shop ("And now, my friends, you are free to purchase whatever you like."), the staff closed in on us to make us buy shit. I bailed. Had to shoulder my way through them and wait fuming outside. (To clear this up, I get grumpy, but I'm usually amused at the same time, so it wasn't all bad). Later The Dreaded One told me that the staff had been asking what was wrong with me. What? Because I didn't want to buy some fucking spices?

The second image is of The Dreaded One at Soulclipse (six day psytrance dance festival for the total solar eclipse, for anyone who doesn't know). This was the day after the torrential downpour, hours after Eskimo blew me away, hours after I accidentally slurped some liquid acid off the back of my hand, and a short time after my head cleared somewhat. Crazy morning, laughs all over the place with strangers and friends, purple sky and people everywhere with rainbow trails billowing behind them... I really don't know what I was thinking when taking the acid because it's not my kind of thing. In fact when it really started to nail my sorry arse I said to The Dreaded One, "I can't believe you let me do that, I really can't. You know what I'm like with acid."

Anyway, the sky cleared and went back to being regular sky blue (the pine trees still looked like peacock feathers for some time) and the day was brilliant, the vibe something I've never experienced before, and really, this picture of The Dreaded One neatly captures the happiness we were feeling. There were thousands of people excitedly getting ready for the eclipse, probably less than an hour away here, everyone wearing these silly looking viewing glasses, everyone making preparations to experience the event in their own way. One of the best days ever.

Ruins, Rain, Ruins

Slide show! And the theme tonight? Ruins, Rain And More Ruins.

The first is some of the ruins at Ephesus, just outside of Selcuk. This was a whole ancient city in really good shape (given that it is dated at about 2,000 BC), with a stadium for 10,000, roads and paths, and columns and all manner of ruiny stuff. Wandered around for half a day picturing myself wearing a toga and commanding my minions to do miniony stuff. The figure in the white toga... white Tshirt is me looking up at the library facade going faaaaarck.

Next... bugger, they're in the wrong order. There was a brief shower on the second day at Soulclipse and after my prophetic announcement that it was just a light shower that would blow over, the whole site got dumped on with more rain than I think I've ever seen in one hour. The grounds became a swamp, tents were flooded... ours was okay in spite of the water being several centimetres up the fly. It had hailed so the water was freezing on bare feet. Had this exchange with a random punter just outside our tent:

Punter: FARCK MAAAAN!!! HOW COLD ARE YOUR FEET?
Me: FUCKING COLD! LIKE, THEY'RE THE COLDEST THINGS EVER!
Punter: FUGGIN' COLD HUH? HUH?
Me: FREEZING!
Punter: I CAN'T FEEL MY FEET, MAN!
Me: ME NEITHER! THINK I'M WALKING ON STUMPS!
Punter: WOOOO HOOOO!
Me: YEEEEAAAHH!

Not really sure what that was about, but we were pretty excited about how cold our feet were.

Then the stage collapsed. Well it collapsed during the downpour. I like this one because of the cute little sign. Hope you can read it. Several days later the stage had been rebuilt and the sound system was awesome. Pretty impressive going by The Indigo Kids. Sure, it shouldn't have gone down in the first place, but look at that pile of scrap. You wouldn't think they could have got it back up, but they did.

Routine Schmootine

I've really gone and done it this time. There is something about being back home, and being a weekday morning that has just made me realise that I really have no regular job. I mean, I know I quit and everything, and I know I have been unemployed for about seven weeks now, but I was lying there on the couch (unable to get back to sleep from about 2am) thinking that normally I'd return from a holiday to that same old routine that was nearly driving me insane. Right about now, I was thinking, I'd be having a shower and feeling sick at the thought of going to my office to do the same old thing, but now... there is no routine. That is so weird. And I have a feeling I might just get into this. Maybe the working week will be like when I was away and I'd wake up smiling with the infinite possibilities the day might bring. It's what I've always wanted. Lack of structure. Hello, my future.

What is also weird is that I have to organise a bunch of interviews with people with tattoos for a feature for a mag. Before the magazine commissioned me to do the story, I was at an outdoor party down the south coast and there was a Buddhist monk who was dancing as though it was causing him inner pain. It was pretty funny. He looked amazing, shaved head, robes etc. He took his shirt off and had the most intricate tattoos on his shoulders and upper arms, and, far too late, I realised he would have been a perfect subject for the story. I didn't really entertain any real thought of tracking him down because the party had been so far away and he could have come from anywhere.

Anyway, I went to a club in the city the other night and I was dancing away, eyes closed, smiling to myself, and when I opened my eyes who should I find standing right next to me doing his Dance Of Inner Angst? Unbelievable. If this story cooperates any more I'll wake up to find that it's written itself.

So now I have a biker/tattooist, a tribal hippie type, a monk, and a bald saxophone player (who I have yet to tell that is is going to be in the story). I have a couple more types to collect, as well as a psychologist, and the story will be underway. I also had a nibble from a weekend paper about travel writing, so I'm going to do something amusing about Turkey. And then there's the humorous arts column. And I'm feeling the need to write fiction again. Lots to do.

I hope I can make this freelance thing work because I never want routine again. Routine makes me cranky. Then again, maybe it's the kind of routine. I'm sitting here in the shop (okay, I lied, I do have a regular part time job working in my shop, three partners splitting the week to suit our needs) and I'm listening to Nathan Fake's Drowning In A Sea Of Love for the third time in a row. It's pretty and sad, shimmering musical melancholy, and for some reason it has reminded me of sitting with this person, working on her magazine. We dropped the usual abusive banter to get this thing done, and it struck me that although I've never understood the concept of collaborative writing, she is the only person I'd like to write something with. Weird huh.

The reality, of course, is that sitting down to write something with her each day is only a cosy routine as long as it stays on the inside of my head; two days in and we'd be thumping the shit out of each other and calling each other a spaz...

Anyway, Nathan Fake's Drowning In A Sea Of Love. It'll take you to strange and beautiful places.

The Magic Atmosphere

Well. Back home. Weird couple of days getting here. Not sure what I thought of Bangkok. The humidity after the northern hemisphere was a real pain, and it was dirty and smelly and there were so many beggars and glorious architecture and sensational food, some of which I would later realise I really shouldn't have eaten.

Anyway, there is far too much to write about now and I am recovering from diabolical food poisoning (hit about an hour after arriving home... thank God it didn't start at the beginning of the nine hour flight from hell with its wriggly kids and the flappy bingo wings woman sitting next to me) as well as my first real taste of jet lag. After little sleep for days, a reluctant and painful visit to the doctor, some form of recovery and finally passing out on the couch, I woke at what could have been any dark hour of any day thinking, "Should ask reception if they have reliable internet connection here."

Anyway, apologies for the lack of fresh posts. There will be colourful pics and amusing anecdotes about the trip coming up. Meanwhile, this sign was at the grand ruins at a place called Ephesus in Turkey. The ruins were awesome, but you know, so is this sign for the pay toilet. Oh those wacky Turks.

It's A Circus

There's millions of stuff that I want to tell you about, like all the things that make Brighton so interesting (but not those fucking starlings that are supposed to be such an awesome sight when the make their way into the sky from the ruins of the pier each night but there's no point getting excited and spending each night shivering on the pebbly beach in pants-wetting anticipation of this much-talked about event because you might just be finally told that the little fuckers are in Africa this time of year. Innit.) but although I am on holiday I have to help a friend get her magazine of the ground. First issue and there have been sub editors kidnappped by aliens or something and so I have agreed to help out. So I am about to get stuck into a pile of stuff that needs to be edited. But that's fine because, you know, I like this friend a lot and am prepared to sacrifice my holiday time to help her out and am just generally more than happy to do whatever I can for her because I think so highly of her.

So I hope that while I sit here on this grey morning... alone in this rambling and empty house, poring through this mountainous pile of copy, my brain splitting with the attention to detail that I am forcing it to apply... I hope while I am doing all of this, she is enjoying her trapese class.

No kidding - I have been left with instructions while she and The Dreaded One have justleft for a trapese class.

Right. Saint Quick had better get cracking...

The Gypsy Thing

So here´s the thing. I was thinking about this bonking like bunny rabbits things and suddenly had this picture of Bugs Bunny doing Jessica Rabbit, and it´s not like that at all. The Dreaded One has variously described my, erm, technique as being that of a wild stallion, a grizzly bear and a marrauding Viking. Just the other day she told me (and I quote) "Oh Quick... every time you love me up I feel like I´ve been conquered by Genghis Kahn, or ravaged by Thor, Norse god of thunder." So there you have it.

Anyway, we´ve accidentally gone upmarket, staying at this swish place called Eden Roc Resort (they were aplaying Abba when we arrived... unbelievable). Now we have to somehow make ou way to Lloret de Mar. No busses directly from here but there might be a boat.

I like this gypsy thing.

Can You Hear The Drums Fernando.

No time. Machine is gobbling money. But we made our way to Figueres and saw the Dali museum. Amazing. Picked a place on the Costa Brava called Gwixols (it´s actually Sant Feliu de Guixols) and are going there this afternoon.

Had suckling pig and fleshy white asparagus and Rioja in a bustling tapas bar where no one spoke English the other night and felt like I was in heaven. Woke up in the morning and wrote this:

Delicate breath slows
Warm light, smell of skin, of hair
The twitch of a dream.

But there are two sides to the coin...

Geez her breath pongs bad
Light in my eyes, frigging bells
My arm has gone numb.

Nah, first one was reall. Magical last morning in Barcelona. The bells, the noise of the street, the memory of so much good food the night before... then I woke her up and we fucked like bunny rabbits.

They are playing Abba 24 hours a day at this place. That is not on. I´m going to Gwixols.

It´s Easter After All...

One of the basic writing rools is show, don´t tell. But Given that I have limited time, I can´t show rather than tell. Today was just glorious. You have been told. Went to Tibidabo which takes its name from the story about the devil taking Jesus to a high place somewhere and telling him that if he bows down before him, all he can see will be his. I dunno... cute story and all, but The Dreaded One and I took some very smooth Rioja, cheese, cured hammy stuff, pickled olives and other assorted bits, found a secluded spot with a stunning vista and had about the most perfect picnic you can imagine in view of an awesome Jesusie church much like the one on top of the hill at Monte Matre in Paris.

Then, amongst the pine needles and pine cones and the breeze whistling through the leaves on the trees, we nuded up and fucked like bunny rabbits.

Get Lost

Look, just stop whatever you are doing and come to Barcelona. I don´t know whether it´s normally this good or whether it´s just such a relief after Turkey, but the food and the wine and the art... perhaps I died from the beer in Turkey (which I have oh-so wittily re-christened Spewborg... nyuk nyuk nyuk) and have gone to heaven.

Last night after the Miro gallery The Dreaded One and I headed home, making our way through the narrow cobble stone streets in the Gothic Quarter, and we did what we do best; we got lost. I thought I had it nailed in this city but there were shops. Really cool shops. And little market things and ooh look at that uber cool tapas bar over there and someone said something about a minimal techno club with free drinks and holy mother of Christ we got lost.

At least we have stopped arguing about which of us got us lost now. Before it was ¨But I said we were going in the right direction and you said we have to hang a left."

"The fuck I did. I said all along we were going in the wrong direction.¨

"Well why didn´t you do something about it?"

"Because I didn´t know if you were holding the map upsidedown or not, because you´re always doing the upside down map thing."

Now it´s just "Think we´re lost."

"Again."

"Yeah, but if you´re going to get lost in a city, Barcelona´s the place to do it."

"Totally. How cool is THAT bar!"

"Want to go in?"

"Okay."

We´re just going to chill today. Going to the Picasso gallery, maybe back to Park Guelle to find the two blue fish mosaic Gaudi made for me, maybe back to the gothic church to wonder if everyone is going to be a bit embrarrassed if this whole God thing isn´t a real thing, because fuck they´ve thrown some money at it and dedicated their lives to it... and then we´re just going to check out the shops some more. (Have found a couple of good suppliers for the shop). Right... lunch beckons... ooh - look at that uber cool tapas bar over there. Want to go in? Okay...

I Heart Barcelona

Right. Operation Sell Everything We Own And Move To Barcelona is underway. Seriously, how cool can a city get?

Yesterday... I amḿ not a big fan of the phrase "Love your work", but if I bumped into Gaudi tomorrow (unlikely given that the silly fucker was looking the wrong way when he crossed the road and got whacked by a tram) I would totally say, "Dude. DUDE! Love your work." The guy is amazing. I wandered, amazed, from the Temple of the Sagredo Familia completely amazed. And almost got whacked by a bus.

Went to the Garden Guelle which is a park where you can see Gaudi stuff and, if you are The Dreaded One and me,sit and picnic. Sir Lunchalot has returned. We said okay letś grab a takeaway thing and some wine and go picnic. One and a half hours later (I kid you not) we realised that we had been searching for the perefect drinking vessels. We trauled the souvenir joints looking for an appropriate cup or glass. What is wrong with us?

Anyway, yesterday was Gaudi, today was Miro. Holy crap, there is too much good art. I never want to wash my eyes. I think Gaudi was genius, Miro an aesthete. Both have contributed serious stuff to us mere mortals.

And food... after the gastronomic wasteland that was Turkey, Barcelona is superb. And the people are cool. Thinking about a holiday or escape from reality? Skip Turkey (as amazing as it is) and come to Barcelona.

Ola

Am in Barcelona now. Usually it takes a day or two to find the good parts and real vibe of a new city, but this place made friends immediately. The Bath Alone Ians love their food and wine and it´s just generally a more wonderfully stylish and civilised vibe than that of Turkey. Turkey is a wonderful place, but overall I only have bad things to say about the Turkish people and the culture of ripping off the visitors. And I am going to say lots about that. The Turkish hospitality thing has got to be the biggest fraud going.

However my contempt for the Turkish rip off culture reached new levels of silliness on the last night in Antalya. We had to go to bed early because we had to get up so early, and there was a slice of blinding light shining through one side of the window on my side of the room. I got up, yanked the curtain across and a blinding slice of light was now lying across the other side of my bed. I yanked the too small curtain back and forth a few more times. Then, standing naked on top of the mini fridge, palms up in baffled exaspertion, I ranted... "Pleats! It´s the fucking pleats! There are far far too many pleats and they are making the curtain too small for the window! What the fuck is wrong with these people that they put too many pleats in the curtains? Fuck!¨

The Dreaded One was watching passively from her bed, looking positively angelic all wrapped in her snuggly pillow and blankets. "Ÿou´re a very angry man," she observed informatively.

I climbed down from the fridge and went angrily to sleep.

Calmer & Karma In Antalya

How to fuck wıth a local's head: when you recıeve the bıll you tell them that they have neglected to ınclude the cost of your bottle of wıne. I thought that bastard was goıng to shıt hıs pants and fall over dead. They thınk that rıppıng people off ıs such a vırtue that they just don't get that kınd of thing. Mind you, The Dreaded One was all 'Ooh cool. Quıck, Quıck, let's run away before they realise.' But I was all 'No, Dreaded One, that would not be cool, would ıt. That would not be good karma. Man.' I just thought that the wıne would have to be accounted for and that it would have to come out of his wages and that although İ am out of work, ıt still was probably worth more to him than it was to me. İn hindsight, however, we should run left without paying for the wine. Locked horns with more of the money snaffling bastards later in the day, and karma is a fraud. Grab all you can and take every bastard for a ride is my new philosophy. Antalya ıs more stunnıng than a stunning thing. İ was just not expectıng thıs level of breathtakıngness. Sydney most beautiful harbour in the world? Pffft. Pıcs later when İ have time to scratch myself. After a boat cruıse today (wooooheeee was I grumpy to start with) we have eaten and drunk and looked ın awe and grown even darker shades of golden tan ın the sun, then gone hotel poolside for more sunbathing ın spite of everyone saying that it was not going top be beach weather. Downside? We leave for Barcelona AT 3FUGGINGAM. That's 3am İN THE MORNİNG! Still, İ'm having such a seriously good time with all this travel caper that İ really don't want to return to my old nıne-to-five existence... oh, wait on - İ'm not. Oh... bought post cards but didn't brıng anyone's addresses. Have to use the stamps up so we're sending postcards to random Turkısh addresses selected from the phone book. If you want a postcard from Spaın, leave me your address and İ'll see if I can do it.

Back From Soulclipse

Not sure why that last post started halfway down the page.

Anyway, back ın Antalya after six or so days of Soulclipse.

Bad bits: complete shitfight getting the shuttle bus from the airport to the site. Hundreds and hundreds of people were waiting at about 2pm on whatever day ıt was, then one silly little shuttle bus turned up, filled up and took off on the hour and a half journey (three hours round trıp), and that appeared to be that. Needless to say, people were goıng ballıstıc. The ones of us who were chilling were getting concerned about just how long thıs was going to take. Eventually The Dreaded One's hair made frıends with some people, she suggested hirıng one of the many idle mini buses to take some of us and an Israeli guy called Cory dıd the hardcore bargainıng thıng wıth a taxi and got one to take five of us all the way for three Euro more than ıt would have cost us ın the bus (turns out there were traffıc jams ın the natıonal park and the rest of the buses were caught up in them.

Had to change to buses half way, saw a car accıdent on the way ın and it transpired that the head ındentation ın the window was caused by an Australian friend's head. He sustained broken rıbs. He's fine now.

Mud. Lots of mud. Set up camp. Found out that the local stall holders were charging whatever they could and that were were probably goıng to run out of money.

Beer was so aweful that ıt was ımpossible to get drunk.

Raın. This made more mud than İ have ever seen (and İ have seen a lot of mud). It also made the main stage - nearing completion - collaps ın a tangled mess that was almost comıcal.

Toilets. 10 000 - 15 000 people. Too few toilets. Use your ımagination.

Good bits: In spite of all of this, it was the best fucking party İ have been to in my life. No questıon.

Eskimo's 5am set. I said to The Dreaded One, 'I have never had a favourite DJ before. İ have one now.' That guy ıs just unbeliveably good.

Too much good psytrance. Lıterally. I stıll ache and we had to leave a day early because there was too much of it and it beat us into submissıon.

Eye candy. Too many serıously trıbal, earthy, gorgeous looking peple. Much yum.

The eclıpse. After a partıcularly funny mısadventure wıth some LA (more about that later), my head and vısıon cleared and after all the raın the day was the most stunningly clear imagınable, the landscape wıth it's rugged mountaıns (some snow-capped) and volcanıc outcrops, the vıbe of the people somethıng I haven't experienced before... many times İ mumbled somethıng about best day ever, and what did İ do to deserve all thıs. İ'll go into detail later, but İ later found that İ was far alone from fluctuating between tears and laughter, all accompanied by relentless goosebump action.

There was much much more, but this place, Antalya, has a serıously stunning harbour wıth the clearest water and more of those snow capped mountains in the background, it's T-shırt warm and there are all these restaurants on the harbour's edge just begging to be patronised. And I have mıssed good food, good beer and good wine (think İ've actually lost weight). So İ2m outa here.

Back later.

Dummy Spitting İn Turkey

Gee, sorry about all the typos. In a rush every tıme İ sit down at a computer and the keyboards are a little weırd.

Well. Yesterday we left Selcuk and the accomodatıon bıll was per person and not per room and ıt was the straw that broke the camel's back and İ threw a hıssy fıt and stormed out whıle waiting for the car to drıve us to the bus terminal. Was pretty funny. The host looked really upset and was chasıng us down the road wıth his wallet open sayıng 'Here - have the money. Money ıs not ımportant - you are ımportant.' Oh yeah? Well how about beıng upfront about what shıt costs?

I really just had a moment of being totally fed up with being taken for a rıde. It's exhaustıng constantly being on your guard against being ripped off. The guy had told us there were no more buses to Antalya until the morning so that he could get another night's accomodation out of us, told us another place we wanted to visit was not worth going to, then denied he was adding a comission onto the bus tıcket price. Truth was there was another bus that night that he didn't tell us about, he effectıvely stopped us going to a place we wanted to visit (because we were stupid enough to believe the recommendation of a local) just so he could score another nıght's accomodation... seriously uncool stuff. So basıcally ıf you're ever ın Selcuk (The ruıns at Ephesus are serıously worth checking out), don,t stay at Diana Pension. He wanted us to tell all our friends about his place, so there you have ıt.

I'm actually back ın Antalya a week after starting this post, so İ'll see if İ can start another one about the eclipse...

Freestylın'

You are not addıng comments. Do I gotta get all standover agaın wıth Owen The Penguın? ('Oh Mıssah Quıck - plız don hurt me no more . They don won you to hurt me no more.'). Say somethıng goddamnıt.

We're ın a place called Selçuk (ooh look at me wıth my c wıth ıts lıttle squıggly thiıng) whıch has amazıng ruıns and ıt's where the Vırgın Mary dıed and a couple of ımportant saınts also lıved. Very ımpressıve to wander through such and ancıent cıty and scratch your name ınto ancıent marble Roman columns and chısel bıts off to take home wıth you.

Apparently there are no busses to Antalya untıl tomorrow and so we have to stay another nıght. Imagıne that!

Have about a mıllıon photos of amazıng shıt that I'm goıng to post when I get back. Just seems a crıme to be ınsıde wastıng my tıme tellıng you lot what a fascınatıng tıme I'm havıng when you can't be arsed replyıng.

Excuse me whıle I freetyle a bıt...

Fırm stool ın Istanbul,
I rule!
Fırst tıme I wore my back pack
I broke my back!
I'm a brother wıth a wack back
I'm the fool from Istanbul.

Okay. So you get the ıdea. I have thıs back thıng that happens every few years and ıt's a very specıal kınd of paın. Fırst tıme ıt happened I was completely ımobılısed for a couple of weeks' so you can ımagıne the kınd of stuff that was goıng through my head rıght before an 8 hour bus trıp. But Voltaren and vodka and kıckıng paın ın ıts bıtch ass and all ıs sweet.

Also, there was no hot water yesterday so I had my fırst cold shower. It ıs not hot here... ıt's very cold, so cold shower = not good. That sound you could hear was my ınner warrıor squealıng lıke a pussy. Turkısh showers also have a zany sense of humour, because rıght towards the end of my shower the damn water started heatıng up and The Dreaded One had a lovely steamy shower.

Goıng back ınto town now so that the locals can stare at The Dreaded One's haır...

hellohscuzemıh

Man, I really wısh I had more tıme to sıt here and wrıte about thıs place. Istanbul ıs amazıng and I have enjoyed ıt so much. Wanderıng awe-struck through palaces and mosques and laughıng wıth the locals (now that I am used to them), ıt,s just a wonderful place. They pressure you to buy stuff, but ıf you look there ıs usually a smırk not to far away, and ıt's a lovely thıng to make a comment ın reply to somethıng they have saıd that makes them smıle. Then a sort of barıer ıs broken and ıt,s a nıce moment. Last nıght, wanderıng lost ın the streets for the thousandth tıme, a lıttle gırl trıed to sell me a packet of tıssues. I don,t lıke kıds, but I was happy and lost and just enjoyıng ıt all, and we shared a moment where she was ınsıstıng that I buy these tıssues, and I was sayıng no, and she was sayıng yes, and thıs went on and on untıl both of us were laughıng. Really cute kıd. The grown ups are equally charmıng.

There really ıs too much to go ınto now. I woke up thıs mornıng at 6am (The Dreaded One and I have been walkıng for 8 hours or more each day and are tıred early) wıth the call to prayer resonatıng, and İ was wrıtıng ın my head. I am feelıng the need to wrıte ıt all down soon.

As the days go on more and more Soulclıpse people are arrıvıng, and random strangers ın the streets are askıng ıf we are goıng to Soulclıpse. Funny to be recognısed as a type. Weırdly, very few of the locals know about the eclıpse. They all appear to be wonderıng why all these dreadlocked weırdos are ın town.

And thıs afternoon we bumped ınto the fırst of the Australıan contıngent goıng to the party. Sooo funny to see a fuck-about frıend and some others from Byron Bay/Tenterfıeld way wıthout knowıng they were goıng to be here.

Rıght. Babblıng now. I wıll be more coherent later. It,s just that the trıp from the aırport to the hotel was quıte depressıng (so many run down areas) and our luggage went mıssıng and I wasn,t understandıng the appeal of Turkey, but now I totally get ıt. And I feel alıve and lıke I,m lıvıng and I just thınk you all should quıt your jobs and go somewhere strange.

I recommend gettıng lost ın Istanbul and wanderıng strange, cobble stoned streets wıth the sound of Islam ın your ears and the smell of coal smoke ın you nostrıls, ears protected from the ıcy aır by the lambswool cap you,ve just bought from a peddler at the water,s edge.

I have been mıstaken for an Enlısh man, a French man and a Ger man today. I also called ınto a barber to have my head shaved and had my ears trımmed wıth tıny flame throwers and my neck crunched and eyeballs massaged. Way. Cool.

Most lıkely wıll make one more post tomorrow and then be out of actıon for a week and a half when we reach Spaın.

Rıght. Headıng out to get lost agaın.

Merhaba

İ am im istanbul. Weırd.

It was a very movıng tıme at the aırport. Sayıng goodbye ıs always hard. Stıll, we bıd our luggage farewell and boarded our flıght and our luggage boarded ıts flıght. It went to Sıngapore and we came to Turkey. Lookıng forward to hookıng up at some tıme ın the future, because I dıdn,t buy $200 worth of underpants to spend thıs long wearıng the same paır. I really really want to change my clothes and just generally have my stuff.

Istanbul ıs strange. Some of the palaces and mosques are amazıng. We spent the entıre day wanderıng and checkıng stuff out and tellıng the locals that no we don,t want a guıde/hıstory lesson/Persıan rug/meal ın theır restaurant/souvenır cırcumcısıon dress. They are pushy, but ın a polıte way and you just have to laugh and ınsıst you really don,t want whatever they are peddlıng.

Off to see more stuff today. The contrast between the opulence of the past and some of the neglected areas ıs beyong comprehensıon.

Also, there are cats and dogs everywhere. No kıddıng, everywhere.

Have just had word that our luggage ıs on ıts way. Woo hoo.

Shıney Le Faı from Loonaloop called to say bon voyage and told me that sıx days at the eclıpse festıval wıthout hot water ıs goıng to put me ın touch wıth my ınner warrıor. Personally I,d be more than happy to trade my ınner warrıor for a hot bath and a fresh paır of underpants...

Undies, Happy Goths & Dead Friends

Wow. Serious countdownage -The Dreaded One and I are flying out of Sydney on Friday for Turkey. For some reason, this made me go out and purchase almost $200 worth of underpants. I now have lots of underpants. Really nice ones. And I think it's perfectly normal behaviour, prior to flying halfway around the planet to experience three minutes of night time in the middle of the day, to buy lots of underpants.

What was weird about my day of underpants-shopping is that some goths were having a picnic in Hyde Park, and they were doing really random things, like playing with a ball and skipping with a skipping rope. I don't know about you, but that was the first time in my life I had ever seen a skipping goth. It was very odd.

Also odd... a good friend disappeared on me. She does this often, but this was for longer than usual, and I did what I do, which is to start to wonder if she was dead. She leads the kind of life where dead is not that remote a possibility. She knows about a million intersting people, some of them very interesting. She hadn't replied to any text messages or emails, so I assumed that she must be dead. But months after vanishing she called me up, and man was I happy to hear from her. The first thing she asked me, after how are you, was "Did you think I was dead?" I told her yes, but I didn't tell her that I actually googled her name to see if her death had been newsworthy.

I haven't got the full story yet, but she went to New Zealand and somehow also went all around the world - Honduras, Spain, LA... kind of person she is. I am very happy she is not dead. Hoping we catch up before I (love saying this bit) fly out to Turkey. And Spain. And the UK. And Bangkok. With lots of underpants.

Big Things

Last night I watched a documentary on all the big things around Australia, and I was a little embarrassed by how many of them I've been to. Mind you, for a while there The Dreaded One and I were collecting photos of them.

I can say I have been to The Big Banana way too many times... actually I've only ever been inside it once, the rest of the time I've just driven past, always grateful that someone thought to write "The Big Banana" on it. Otherwise millions of tourists would have driven by wondering what it was. The Big Yellow Thing? The Big... oh maybe it is best they labelled it.

Anyway, there is also the Big Pineapple (pointy), The Big Prawn (scary), The Big Oyster (weird), The Big Trout (scaly), The Big Merino (wooly, horny and very testically), The Big Potato (See? The Big Potato wasn't labeled and we all thought it was The Big Rabbit Pellet), and The Little Ayers Rock (reddy). The last one doesn't technically qualify as a big thing, except that I think it went into bankruptcy, thereby making it The Big Mistake.

I have been to Tamworth but somehow didn't see The Big Guitar, and a friend kindly sent a postcard of The Big Earthworm from Victoria. It seems there are plenty of Big Things yet to see.

As REM said, "Oooh life, it's bigger, it's bigger than you and you are not me..." Which makes a LOT more sense than Big Things.

Groovy Shoes

Holy crap. Two weeks from now we'll be in Istanbul. How weird is that?

Also, I will be unemployed. But the glossie that I did a feature for last month has commissioned me to write another feature. Apparently, I rock. Yeah.

Also also, The Dreaded one and I went to the tent place to buy a tent and sleeping bags today, and I walked out with shoes. No tent, just shoes. They are groovy shoes. We do have to get the tent thing sorted though. Shoes are all well and good, but the Soulclipse Festival is a six day party, and a tent is reasonably important.

However, they are very groovy shoes. Groovy shoes make me happy.

I have to go and eat lasagne now. What are you eating for your next meal?

I Heart Doof

Just got back from a weekend away at a bush party called Regrowth. It's a combined psytrance dance party and tree planting event, three hour's drive away at the most amazing location. It's kind of at the edge of a pointy bit (not the correct geographical terminology, I'm sure) jutting out into a huge valley. If you stand in the one spot and spin in a circle and for almost 360 you see nothing but sweeping valley views and rolling hills. No sign of mankind at all for as far as you can see.

We got there at about 9pm on Saturday night and the centre piece on the dance floor was best I've seen. Huge UV string artworks all around the perimeter, the DJ booth a pyramid with psychedelic projections on it (at one point someone had a camera that projected real-time images of the party onto the pyramid), and four totem like poles in the middle (pictured) which, in the heat of the following day, became a mist shower to cool us down. Above it all were colourful banners and streamers billowing in the breeze. Very pretty stuff. Needless to say, the sound system was awesome.

Partied all night, partied on into the day, planted a few trees... interesting experience when you're in full flight party mode, and you've just wandered up without thinking about shoes, and at first you ignore the few spiky bits in the grass and dirt, and before you know it you've made your way into some really heavy nettle and there's no way out but to finish planting the trees you have... at one point I inherited a garbage bin full of mulch and became Mulch Boy, following the calls for "Mulch!" all over the damn place... My feet were really hurting but I had to keep lugging this goddamn bin full of mulch over this vicious ground, the stony parts of which were incredibly hot. All for these scrawny little damn treelets. It was a LOT more painful than I could have expected, and I really started to resent those who had declined the chance to help out and were still dancing away to some amazing music under the mist maker. Bastards. Why hadn't I told my inner hippie to shut the fuck up? Funny thing was that when our friend came around earlier, nursing the little sappling, in the addled mess that was my mind, I initially thought he was offering us a gift, which is why I said "Sure, why not?" just before he said "You want to plants some trees?" I'll have to ask The Dreaded One if she thought the same.

Anyway, it got to a point where I had planted my trees and distributed as much mulch as I could - the hole diggers and tree-putter-inners weren't going fast enough and I had to put shoes on because the nettles and hot ground were too much. I couldn't believe how far up the hill we had all moved, and there was a lot more prickly ground to cover to get back to my shoes, and no other way to do it but do it. I swear it was worse than walking over a field of broken glass and hot coals; a lesser man would have cried the tears of a baby. Wimp.

I still have bristly things in my feet. Those little trees had better grow up into a the kind of dense forest that will make Mulch Boy proud.

I suspect The Dreaded One and I were the only ones who had not thought to bring shoes to the planting. Some people even had gloves and sun protection... at least we made the right decision in leaving our glasses of wine back at the dance floor and not taking them to the planting. "Oh darling - do me a favour and put down that tree and top me up will you? Feeling rather parched, what with all rugged outdoors stuff and whatnot."

The rest of the day was just a perfect doof day. Honestly, looking around at everyone dancing to such gorgeous music and laughing with each other whilst surrounded by such stunning natural beauty, I just felt sorry for people who haven't experienced this kind of thing. I hadn't wanted to go initially, but The Dreaded One had been looking forward to it because it's our birthdays, so I went thinking that it was going to pull me out of my mood, and man, it did that. Sure, you have to put in the effort to get there, and getting back can be a drag, and you get dirty and the car gets dusty, and it can be a pain in the arse if you look at the negatives, but they're just part of what is, overall, a magical experience.

We decided we were not going to straighten up enough for the drive back, so we found a good site and set the tent up, me whining like a bitch because I would have been perfectly fine in the car, but ooh noo, The Princess wanted a bed with sheets and and pillows and so we had to set up the royal marquee (she doesn't read the blog, so I can say such things with no threat of reprisal). Thing was, of course, that she was right; sleeping in the car is a form of sleep depriving- torture, sleeping stretched out in our little tent is 5 star luxury by comparison.

We danced some more, the party thinned, we helped the guys with a little packing, they offered us food, we talked and then returned to the tent. The music kept going for a while, then the night fell quiet, the kind of empty quiet you just don't hear in the city. So peaceful.

Doof does good things for the soul. Less good for the soles.

The Wisdom Of Grumpy

That last post was a little bizarre. I wonder if the comments conversation will continue. I think the word 'boobs' was the most frequently used, which was unexpected to say the least.

I got a letter today in response to my recent column (two posts below) Effectively, this guy was late to a job interview, sat in the waiting room reading the column in the mag, then decided that I was making a good point and that he was sick of working for the man, and to hell with it all he'll just walk out. He just left without telling them and spent the day wandering around town in bare feet and now never wants to work again. He said, "I'm sick of being a sheep and bending over to be fisted, then kissing the hand that feeds me."

Like... I wasn't making a point. How... he read a very silly column by someone who calls themself 'Grumpy' and made a reasonably large life decision based on that. And he thanked me. Whoa. Too big.

And I thought threatening to kill a fluffy penguin called Owen unless people talked to me was retarded.

Chirping For Mercy

Aaaaaawwwww... isn't he the cutest damn thing you ever saw? The way he's just standing there being so fluffy, going "Brrrr" and keeping himself warm by thinking about what it must be like for tropical penguins who can lie on sandy beaches sipping gin and tonics... but not until they're all grown up and of legal age n' shit, but still, he can just feel that tropical sun beating down, can hear those steel drums, feel that warm summer breeze gently ruffling his feathers, hear the chink of the ice cubes in his glass as the waves roll and hiss onto the sundrenched sand. Look at his little squinty eyes... really - have you ever seen anything more adorable in your life?

The point is, not enough of you are leaving comments. I want more comment action, and if I don't see it immediately, this little guy gets it. I am not fucking about here. You leave here without leaving a comment and I'm going to start with his wings... or whatever they are. Those flipperry wingy things on the side. I will do him slowly and painfully and it will be on your shoulders. I will make this little fucker scream for mercy... squawk for mercy? I don't know. Do they chirp? They're some kinda bird, surely they chirp... but is it possible to chirp for mercy? Bah. Whatever. I'll have the bastard mooing for mercy. By the time I've finished with him he'll be speaking Swahili. "Noo, noo, missuh Quick, prease don bend mah flippery wingy things no more. Dey good people. Dey don mean to upset you fo' not leavin' none comments." And then I'm going to get really angry because nothing pisses me off more than a penguin who uses double negatives in a bad Swahili accent.

Anyway. Your choice. Leave comments and the bird lives to see his old age in the tropics. Leave without saying anything... and yeah, no more mister nice guy. No more mooing Swahili penguin with flippery wingy things.

At the time of posting, my counter is at 10032. Arms are folded. Foot is tapping. Comments please...

Update On The Twat Of The Year Award

I decided not to go with the arrogant approach with the new mag. I called and was very polite (obviously) and the ed was very nice and it appears that I will get the column as well as commissioned arts writing, reviews, interviews etc. Yay me! Yay them! Yay being nice! It's all still got to happen, of course, but this is very good news.

And the new new editor of the mag in Queensland I write a column for wrote this morning to say they really like my Grumpy column and can I send a few extras to cover while I'm away. And this guy has asked me to write a story for the mag he works for. Fuck, man, I just feel so loved.

All positive vibes, much needed too. Below is my most recent column for the mag I'm about to leave. I've not been overly confident of late.


Well gang – in a few short weeks I’ll be traipsing (vaguely) down the 3D stairwell for the last time. For a job I scored by accident, it’s been three and a half years of more fun than I thought I could have at a desk. Funny thing is, when I tell people I’m leaving the first thing they invariably ask is “Why?” I don’t know, I tell them, it’s just time; life is bendy and I have to check out what’s around the corner. The second thing they ask is, “What are you going to do?” I’m going to pray that the god of freelance writing smiles favourably upon me. The third thing they say – without fail – is, “Don’t worry – something will turn up.” Really? Really? How do they know this? I really wanna know where this unshakable optimism comes from, because I want some of it. I want a lot of it now. Being the sorry sack of neuroses that I am at the moment, I’m not at all sure something will turn up. I’m wracked with self-doubt because I don’t know what it is that I do. Do you know how lame that sounds? Flash bar, spunky chick: “So what is it you do, Grumpy?” “Erm, I’m not really sure.” Right now I’m so apprehensive about the future I feel like Woody Allen trapped in the body of, I dunno, Hugh Jackman? Okay, so that’s a slight exaggeration... I’m not quite as neurotic as Woody Allen. Nevertheless. I gaze into my crystal ball and I see windscreen washer guy. I’ve replaced lying in bed at night clutching the sheets with white knuckles, staring wide-eyed into the darkness and thinking, “Oh God we’re all going to die” with lying in bed at night clutching the sheets with white knuckles, staring wide-eyed into the darkness and thinking “I don’t know what I do.” Right now, that great Ozzie sentiment, “She’ll be right” never sounded more ridiculous. Will she? How do they know she’ll be right? What if she’s not right? What if they’re wrong? What if I relax my grip on my sheets and stop being so bug-eyed because I think she’ll be right, and she just isn’t?

Still, I’ve never really done the blind optimism thing before. Maybe I should kick my inner Woody Allen in the arse and tell him to fuck off. Maybe, after all, she will be right. Maybe something actually will turn up.

And if not, maybe I’ll see you at the local intersection. “Need your window cleaned?”

Grumpy

Dumb Things To Swear At

A crack in the footpath: "Woopsfuck!"

A mosquito: "Cop that, fucker. Hahaha."

One of those flies that reeeeeally wants to hang out with your face: "Piiiiiss OFF!"

A cutting-in-front-of-you moron in another car when you have all the windows wound up and there's zero chance they're ever going to hear you: "OH THAT'S FUCKING BRILLIANT, YOU ARROGANT SACK OF SHIT. WHERE DID THAT GET YOU? YEAH, LOOK, OOOH - A WHOLE CAR SPACE AHEAD IN TIME. FUCKING FUCKWAD!"

That same fly: "Seriously - fuck off prick."

DJ Sasha when his 'Involver' CD skips and goes nangnangnangnangnangnang: "Gah! Arsehole!"

A dog that barks at you as you leave the shopping centre and makes your sphincter twitch: "Fucking dickhead!"

An elevator that's maybe 15 floors below and just doing what it's been told to do: "Come on come on! I haven't got all fucking day!"

Man who buzz door two week later and say, 'Is there a Luca?': "No fucking Luca!"

I think I need to chill out a bit.

Dear Editor...

Someone called Gab said of my previous post that she... could be a he I guess... liked my treat 'em mean and keep 'em keen approach. So fuck it, I've drafted my follow up letter to the arts mag. You reckon this will win them over?

"Dear... oh, your name seems to have slipped my (rather awesome) mind for the time being. Anyway, thing is, been busy taking care of real business , as opposed to gigs like yours that are offering the kind of pocket money I find it difficult not to giggle and point at, and as a result scratching my balls has taken greater priority than dumbing down and packaging my Wilde-esque wit for the benefit of your dull readership.

You'll be thrilled to know, however, that my balls have been sufficiently scratched and I now have the few minutes required to dash off what is for me the mental equivalent of navel lint that you appear to find so mentally challenging and ultimately - once your feeble little mind has convinced itself you have a grasp of - rewarding.

I... *stifles yawn*... trust you will make enough of the fact that I am deeming it (ahem) worthy of my contributing to your pathetic little rag and have attached my latest press shot for the cover of your... presti... your... quaint little publication. (Did I neglect to mention that I am fabulously hot? I assumed you'd heard).

Dispense with the effusive gratitude because really, sweetie, it makes my skin crawl. Just do what has to be done to make this happen.

Regards, of sorts,

Quick."

Your thoughts?

"And The Winner Of The Twat Of The Year Award Goes Tooooo..."

Me: Huh? What's that?

Computer: It's an email message in your 'save as draft' folder.

Me: But it's to that arts magazine I was pestering about contributing to. I had them interested in a regular humorous column. I sent something else to them the other day to see if they were still interested. I can't remember where we were at with that.

Computer: The answer is probably in that email. Why don't you open it?

Me: (opening draft email) Doo dee doo de doo. Tum tee tumtumtum... Oh no...

Computer: Wassup? Bad news?

Me: Oh crap. Why am I so stupid? God I can't believe I did this.

Computer: Whatwhatwhat? Tell me tell me tell me. The suspense is killing me.

Me: Fucking twat. They gave me the green light. They gave me their rates. They asked what the first column was going to be about...

Computer: That's great news, dude. Congrats. You should look really happy - not like you've just dropped a load in your panties.

Me: The email is dated November 28. My reply is, "Thanks Caroline. That's great. I'll..."

Computer: Whoa. Dude. That's all? You didn't finish writing the email?

Me: No. That's it. That's all. I obviously got distracted with work that day, then I told my employers I was quitting, then I went on a road trip, and I totally forgot about it.

Computer: Total bummer, man. That's really got to suck arse. Hehehe... man, you should see the look on your face. Classic.

"Do You Actually Know Who I Am?"

I can't believe I really said that phrase on Friday night. In a club. To a really famous DJ. A guy called Groove Terminator.

Before I started working for the mag, I was in a club one night and a guy asked me if I was a DJ. If I'm in a certain mood I'll often make stuff up just to see what happens, and although I told him I wasn't a DJ, I wondered what could have happened if I had answered yes. I asked him why he had asked and apparently his friend was convinced that I was Groove Terminator. His friend must have been off his head because I don't look like GT at all. Especially not after the swimming pool/chlorine incident that turned my hair green.

Later on I kept thinking about this, and what could have happened if I had says yes, I am GT. I started writing a story about it called Being Groove Terminator in which I got myself into all sorts of trouble by impersonating GT, someone in the club pointing out that GT was here, the whole club having mass delusion that I was GT and requesting that I do a set... The story goes totally leftfield and I actually become GT. The people in the story are all real life characters, Like The Dreaded One, the guy who asked the question who became a friend in the end etc. I wrote an installment a week and got myself into more and more trouble and just didn't know where I was going with it. It was a fun way to write, and the story - when it finally came out - was popular (at least in the local clubbing scene).

But before it came out, I was telling my hairdresser friend about it and how I was doing it in installments (at the time I was actually sending it out with a corporate newsletter thing... Just started with a few lines and got longer due to popular demand). Anyway, the hairdresser asked if she could be put in the story, so I said yeah sure, and put her in the next installment. She also said her boyfriend worked in the same studio as GT and did I want her to pass on the story when it was finished. Again I said yeah sure.

The story finished at around 5,000 words and I gave it to the hairdresser and forgot about it.

Then one night I was sitting at the computer writing and the phone rang. There was a guy on the line who was still sort of chuckling and there were other people in the background laughing. Turns out the caller was Nigel Tucker, Groove Terminator's manager. He said they were all laughing at the story and could they put it up on GT's website. I said yeah sure.

Maybe a year after that I got the job at the magazine and through the year went along to the Dance Music Awards. I literally bumped into GT and thought fuck it, I'll introduce myself. He remembered the story and said it was very funny... Quite flattering because he is a very funny guy. And I don't know, I just like that story because of its series of coincidences. It just felt like a complete and rounded story all stemming from that one random enquiry.

I've met GT a few times since then and we've chatted and it's all quite normal. But I hadn't seen him in maybe 12 months (think he's based in LA now), and there he was in the club the other night, so I decided to say hello. He said "Hello mate, how are you?" with a friendly smile, and we started to chat. But neurotic Quick took over and I convinced myself that he he was being polite and pretending he knew who I was while going through his memory trying to think of who the hell I might be. Hell, I do that all the time. So I stopped mid-sentence at one point to say, "Do you actually know who I am?"

He laughed and said yes of course, and I must have sounded like the world's biggest twat. It didn't come out at all like it was meant to.

My advice - under no circumstances should the phrase "Do you actually know who I am?" be said, no matter what the intention. Some phrases have powers far too strong for us mere mortals.

Valentine's Day Is Killing Romance

Each week in the mag we run a debate. One week argues one side, the next week argues the Otherside. The curent topic is 'Valentine's Day Is Keeping Romance Alive.' I am arguing the case against...

(Some of you may recognise the opening, but hell, why not use the day to day moments that would otherwise be lost?)


Sitting at the edge of the harbour soaking up the kind of clear summer day that only Sydney can serve up – as well as soaking up a fair amount of un-oaked chardonnay – the conversation turned to funerals and the kind of send off we are going to give each other.

“Funerals are a bloody great waste of money, aren’t they?” I observed, apropos of nothing at all.

My girlfriend didn’t bat an eyelid; she’s quite used to this sort of thing. “So if I go first, what kind of funeral are you going to give me?” she asked.

“Dunno. Nothing fancy. Hadn’t really given it much thought.”

“You’re not going to do anything nice? Just put me in a cardboard box and dispose of me?”

“Well what kind of funeral do you want me to organise for you?”

“I want you to put in the effort and come up with something nice.”

Hmm. I put in the effort and eventually came up with a doof in her favourite doof location. A kind of death doof with fire twirlers and mushrooms and friends stomping in the dust... She seemed pleased with this, so I asked about my funeral. “I did you,” I told her, “now you do me.”

“You do your own funeral,” she told me. “You were originally going to put me in a cardboard box. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a cardboard box for you.”

“Can it be a nude funeral?” I asked hopefully.

“You want to be buried in the nude? Okay.”

“Yeah, but I want all the guests to be in the nude too.”

She gave me The Look. “Weirdo.”

“And on pogo sticks. Nude and on pogo sticks and I will be a happy corpse-in-a-box.”

The Look was accompanied by a slow shake of the head. “You really are quite peculiar.”

My mind frequently leaps about like a cane toad with a fire cracker up its bum, which was why the funeral conversation lead me to other ‘special occasions’ that are overrated, like Valentine's Day. Nay, Valentine’s Day is not just overrated, it’s a bona fide crime against romance. It’s got its talons around romance’s throat and it’s not letting go; it’s choking the life out of it.

Last week’s writer made the point that modern life is too busy and no one has time to be truly romantic; that Valentine’s Day “is the one day where husbands can make up for a year of neglect and wives can be swept off their feet all over again…”

Trouble is, that’s not real romance. It’s many things - token romance, guilt romance, get-it-over-and-done-with romance - but it’s not real romance.

I do agree with last week’s writer that our lives are full and that it’s difficult to find the time and energy for seemingly frivolous things like romance, but the answer to that is not to designate a date in the calendar and pretend for a day that we’re romantic. The answer is to stop being so fucking lazy.

Sure, it’s a push-button, remote-control, instant-gratification world that we cram full of clutter, useless information and gym memberships, a world in which we sure don’t feel lazy because we’re so goddamn busy. Problem is, we’re keeping ourselves busy with unimportant stuff at the expense of the good stuff.

We love a fad diet, don’t we? Fad diets pop up every now and then, they appear to make sense, everyone jumps on the bandwagon and makes another obnoxious American rich. But just as suddenly as it appeared, the fad diet disappears again because in spite of what we want to believe, the old fashioned rules of diet and fitness hold true; food is fuel, exercise burns up as much fuel as your body requires. Consuming fuel + sitting on arse = Fat City.

In the same way it just doesn’t work to neglect the one you’re supposed to love all year and ‘make up for it’ with a token gesture on a designated day.

Valentine's Day is turning us into unimaginative, romantically flaccid, drones. Valentine's Day whispers sweet nothing in our ear all year long. “Do nothing,” VD whispers. “Don’t worry about being spontaneously romantic. Don’t act on that urge to show your love on a whim, wait for me, leave it until February 14 and behave like all the other romantically flaccid drones.”

The true romantics understand this. We are hard at work all year round. We’re the ones keeping romance alive, not this fraud of a day that steals all the glory. We are the ones upholding the noble tradition of true romance. True romance is being original. Romance is not a fistful of roses on February 14; romance is taking her to lunch on a whim on a nondescript Sunday. Romance is gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes while the sunlight skips and twinkles on the water... and planning the details of each other's funeral.

Grumpy

Luka And The Invisible Light Shoes

In the previous post I referred to an analogy that a writer friend made about writing being like robbing a bank. Sometimes with humorous observation pieces it's more like someone else robbing the bank and handing you the loot.

This will be my next Acid Tongue column. It happened to me today. I love it when people do dumb shit. The light shoe lady was in and out of the shop for ages and was quite funny, in a really annoying way, but the column has to be a max of 400ish words, so here tis. Hope you enjoy...

I appeared to have a bit of a credibility problem over the weekend. Someone started buzzing my front door at 4am. I ignored it for as long as I could, but they were so persistent that I thought there was a faint chance that it was someone I knew and not a confused piss-head neighbour. "Is that Luka?" came the unsure query through the handset. I don’t know, maybe I'm too fussy but I just think if you’re buzzing someone’s door at 4am you’d better be fucking sure you’ve got the right number. No it's not Luka, I told them, wrong number. "But I was after Luka." No Luka, go away. "Oh... No Luka?" What part of ‘No Luka’ was he not understanding? There is no Luka, I insisted, do not buzz this number again or I will come down there and make your fingers broken. Then later in the day a woman wandered into the shop I work in on the weekends wanting to look at the shoes we have with the lights built in that flash when you walk. Umm... wot? I assured her that we have some wacky shoes, but none with lights in them that flash when you walk. "My brother, he work in shop next door, he tell me you have shoes with lights that flash when you walk. I want to see these shoes." She had a stupid half-smile of expectation on her face as she looked around the shop. I told her, really, we don’t have any flashing light shoes - why would I lie about such a thing? She brushed by me and homed in on all the shoes that looked like they might possibly have flashy lights built into them. Whatever. I left her to it. After a while she gave up and left, only to return with her brother from the shop next door. He stood at the door and pointed towards the rear of the shop as though that was where we keep the shoes with the flashing lights in them. She marched back in, determined to get to the bottom of this and continued to look for these non-existent flashing light shoes. Like... if I had such shoes in stock, and someone came in and wanted to buy them, why would I hide them? Why the hell did she believe her brother – who was either living in a fantasy world or (more likely) sending her on a wild goose chase to get her out of his hair for a bit – over me?

Fuck me you humans can be weird.

Grumpy

Cosmic Harmony

I told a writer friend today that I was thinking of attempting a novel again, and he said something that quite amused me (he is one of the funniest writers I know - fresh, subversive and always coming up with the unexpected). He said something like, "Wow. I wouldn't have the staying power to write a novel. Magazine articles are like robbing banks - you get in, you take what you need, and you get out as fast as you can."

Perfect.

Some years ago I was determined to be a novelist. I wrote a couple of full length manuscripts and sent them off to every slush pile in town. On two separate occassions I received calls from the head honchos of large publishers. One was Hodder & Stoughton, the other was Random Century (now House, I think, although I could have that back to front).

I met the Hodder guy in a pub in Balmain. I still remember it clearly because his assistant had told me over the phone that this was very unusual because "Bert doesn't meet many unpublished authors". Typically, I was late for the meeting and disorganised and as nervous as hell. I took public transport and caught the wrong bus, changed to the right one, it got caught up in heavy traffic, I got off to walk and and hope to flag a cab down only to eventually see the bus I had been on finally make it through the traffic snarl and disappear into the distance... I eventually made it to the pub in Balmain, carrying my thick manuscript prominently because that was how Bert was going to recognise me. We shook hands and said the things you say, and I realised with a mixture of horror and amusement that I was so nervous that my mouth had dried and my smile had over-stayed its welcome; my top lip was stuck to my dry teeth. I actually had to use my finger to kill the smile. I must have looked totally creepy.

We talked and in the end he said to keep in touch because he was curious to see what my next manuscript was going to be like.

The second meeting was memorable because the publisher and the freelance editor who had recommended the manuscript were both there in a plush office overlooking Lavender Bay, just around from the Milson's Point end of The Harbour Bridge. Stunning view. We sat and talked and one of the things the publisher said was that the voice of the main character was wrong and that teenage boys would not talk or think like that, and "I should know."

That 'I should know' stuck with me because she was in her 50s and obviously believed that having kids of her own meant she knew teenagers inside and out. Erm, hello? Have you been a male teenager? No? Didn't think so. But guess what? I have.

That moment passed without me saying anything, and after a while I felt detatched from the scene because the publisher and editor started talking to each other about the story as though I wasn't there, then they mentioned a couple of incidents in the story, and suddenly the two of them were falling about the place nominating what they thought were the funniest scenes, doing that thing of trying to wave the other's laughter quiet and saying, "No no - what about when Davey helps the girlfriend's mother in the kitchen and he diligently shells all the snow peas..."

It just felt so strange to see other people laughing at my writing, right there in front of me. It was probably the first time I had seen other people laughing at my stuff.

Anyway, I couldn't go back and re-write those stories, I wrote another particularly messy novel - feedback was that it had its moments but that I lacked discipline and focus. In the end I realised that like my friend, I liked robbing literary banks and eventually wasn't too bad at it.

I won a national award for a short story called Remembering Argos, then had a few more stories published in a variety of magazines (I had been shortlisted and published in an anthology before the competition win with a story called The Funniest Man In The World Tells A Funny Story and had had a couple of others published in other anthologies too, so it's not like the win was the start of anything).

Then I largely gave up on fiction. Part of the reason was because after the competition win and having made it into respected magazines and journals, part of me said okay, I've proved my point; I have what it takes. Part of me was tired of the rejection... oh yeah - Argos was rejected for four years. Each time it came back, always accompanied with praise, I'd sit down to re-write, only to make it through the story without changing anything. I'd end up just sending it off again, it was rejected again and again, then out of the blue it won first prize in a national competition attracting more than a thousand entries. Go figure. So yeah, if it sounds like I've had moderate success, you should take a look at the volumes of rejection letters and correspondence I have.

And another reason I gave up on fiction (almost completely) was that I started clubbing and soon after landed a job as an editor and staff writer with a clubbing magazine. Never worked in an office before that, I am untrained and uneducated and have no qualifications. I didn't really know a lot about music or magazines at that stage, and it was just a steep learning curve that chewed up a lot of my energy. It also gave me plenty of opportunity to write silly stuff that amused me, so I had an outlet.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because yesterday as I was walking home, the idea for a novel came to me, and I feel like it's time I gave it another shot. I was wondering how to channel the time and enjoyment I get out of banging out all this blog stuff, and it just came to me. Is there some kind of cosmic harmony in the fact that I decided to quit the magazine, and so soon after I have the urge to tackle a novel again? Who knows.

As with the more ponderous posts on this blog, it's really for me to sort my thoughts out. It's like therapy (which I am in need of sometimes). In fact even the amusing stuff is my therapy. You think I write it for you? Pfft.

But I do hope you enjoy my therapy, whoever you are.

Funny stuff in the next post.

Be nice to each other.