Sunday, January 31, 2016

So, I Am Now Unemployed

Okay, so that didn't go so well. They didn't accept my counter offer, they didn't crumble under my bluff and I am now unemployed, it would seem. Hmmmm.

I held out for them to accept my larger salary, but no. Fatty gave me a long run down, by text, (Oh it is a modern world) why I was not being hardly done by, as I picked out Granny Smith Apples and Sam picked fish at the fish counter at Box Hill Central. 

Yes, I know, perhaps that was just a little too relaxed. Maybe, I should have held off until I put all of my focus into it, but no, I didn't do that. Oh well.

I thought I had it in the bag, but no. Funny, Kirin text me the other day to ask if I'd had my contract renewed. She said she'd heard that Fatty isn't coping well. I thought, maybe Fatty isn't, so, you know, she doesn't have time to train up somebody else. I thought "they'd" give in and give me the extra money. But, no.

Oh well.

I cleaned out my desk on Friday before I left work, in front of Fatty, I didn't try to hide anything. I had the weekend to think about my position, and I just knew it wasn't guaranteed to go my way. Somewhere around 3pm, I just started cleaning all the shit off my desk, putting stuff away, removing stuff to the security bin, or putting personal stuff in my bag.

This morning, lying in bed at 5am, I realised I'd left my procedure manual on my desk, the one I'd put together for my own use. The one with passwords and key websites and log ins to all sorts of things and exceptions and things that needed special treatment etc. My manual. I'd thought on Friday that I couldn't take that, but this morning I thought fuck it, I'm not going to make it easy for the next guy. So just before 7am - early enough so that I wouldn't run into anybody who was in working on the week end - I went into the office and got it. 

I can't be certain about this next fact, and I don't really care if I am not, but as I started off as a contractor, I was sent over to reception to get a security pass. The receptionist was new, and she pulled a pass out of a pile of passes and said, "You can use one of the spare passes," and she handed it to me. She didn't look at its serial number and she certainly didn't write it down. I just can't remember if it was ever replaced at any stage? We've had so many people working in our department and there has been so many security passes delivered to us, I just can't be certain if mine was ever replaced by a permanent one, but I don't think it ever was.

I pulled on my black hoodie and headed off, just because that is what I'd wear if I was heading out anywhere in my track pants, however, as I got closer to the office, I felt a chill in the air and I pulled the hood over my head, simply due to the morning breeze. As I got closer to the building, I felt a chill up my spine, what about the cameras? As it turned out, just because I am a black wearing kind of guy, I was dressed head to toe in black. I giggled to myself and pulled the front of the hood down further over my eyes, as I swiped my security pass over the reader. The doors slid open. So my pass was still working. Nyr! I guess that'd have to get IT to stop it, or, building security? I waved my pass over the reader in the lift and the floor button lit up. The doors closed and the lift started its ascent. I felt a certain chill of excitement.

The office was in darkness. I didn't put on any lights. I headed straight to my desk. I got the manual. The work I had on my desk ready to do Monday, I also slipped into my procedure manual to take with me. I picked up my folders of work to be done, work in progress and work completed and took them to the security bin and slid them all in. (So much for a paperless office) The huge wad of paperwork I was in the process of completing for that huge project, also found its way into the security bin. My hands were shaking, as I removed bulldog clips so as to fit the wads of paperwork through the security bin slot. I thought to myself, you'd need to get these ridiculous nerves under control if you were ever to be a corporate spy, or wanted to go into espionage. The superannuation project for the company staff, I took with me. 

I wasn't in the office more than 5 minutes and my work was done. I think I was out before 7am.

I contemplated heading down the stairs on my way out, but thought better of it and pressed the lift button. I strode through the foyer like I owned the place. I crossed over the deserted street out front. I pulled my hood off my head as I got to the other side of the street, as I did, I looked at the buildings facing me and thought, they are bound to have cameras, so I pulled my hood back on and down over my eyes. Maybe, that was a mistake, slipping my hood off too early. I kept the hood on then until I got home and in the front door.

Oh, that was fun. I might go and do it again next weekend. Ha ha.

I'm not, exactly, sure how legal it was and I don't really care. (I am not really sure why I say that, as I am still a current employee of the company who is in contract negotiations) Remember, that any files I removed, or put in the security bin are all still stored on the system electronically. Well, some of them are. (smile) I just removed my hard copy working files, for the most part. (smile) Yeah, okay, I removed passwords and references to all the things we use, sure, but only my hard copy records of them. All of that should be backed up somewhere, anyway. I just took, or removed, the stuff that I used personally. I didn't access the computer system, I didn't do anything like that. I'm not stupid.

Saturday, January 30, 2016

The Kransky Sisters

We went to see The Kransky Sisters Downstairs at 45. They were great. I love them. So funny. So off beat.

They are on until Sunday. I recommend that everyone to go and see them, if you like your entertainment interesting and unique.



Friday, January 29, 2016

I Might Be On Holidays From Monday

So, my contract runs out at the end of January. I'd kind of thought about it, but not really. I was aware of it, but hadn't given it much thought, to be honest.

So Fatty and I were suddenly in discussions about it. They weren't going to make me permanent, as they had suggested/promissed at the beginning of my contract, they were only offering me another 6 month contract. Apparently, all of our positions are up in the air, which was news to me.

I asked for a payrise, as I accepted a lower salary at the start of my current contract than I'd really wanted to accept. At the time, I thought to myself, what the hell I'll ask for more money when my contract is renewed.

The answer came back that they wouldn't agree to my full pay rise, but they would give me half of it. The only problem with that was that I should have started on the salary I was now asking for, and now my salary should be being increased more than that again. I already felt that I was compromising with the new salary I was asking for.

I told Fatty that I wanted the weekend to think about the offer. I was meant to have thought about it over night. (name of company) said they can’t go any higher with my pay due to the fact that they have to pay (my old company) the second instalment of the placement fee. There was a rather complicated 2 stage placement fee from my old company, which my new company was never that thrilled about. Half at the beginning of my current 6 month contract and the second half if they made me permanent at the end of that contract.


You know, I might have just accepted the lower offer and been done with it, if I didn’t know that the useless Rita the previous, to the previous, to the previous to me (Remember, I came in as the 3 person in 12 months to do my role, which was in crisis at the time) was getting more 3 years ago than I am asking for now. Fatty said that my contract ran out on Sunday and that she would try and extend it for a week with (my old company) so I could think about it. (my old company) came back with the answer that they wouldn’t extend, the decision had to be made if I was going permanent, or not? They want their placement fee. So, apparently, if my answer is no to the lesser salary, then I can’t, actually, come into work on Monday with (name of company).

“I’m not putting pressure on you, or anything,” said Fatty. “But no, legally we can’t allow you to work.”

Put pressure on, I laughed to myself. You mean that is it, the job is over, no long drawn out good byes. I laughed to myself, that it is how most of my jobs seem to finish anyway, maybe it was a sign. Put pressure on to make a decision, suddenly it all made sense. Done, out of here, I’m on holidays on Monday. Buddy and I can go to the dog park. Lovely. Put pressure on, giggle no, it is an incentive to say no.

Am I being stupid? Throwing away a good job over what amounts to be a few thousand dollars? A job that I regularly do 12 hour days to complete... hmmm.

Actually, since my mum died last year, the pressure to work is somewhat alleviated. I’ll inherit some money in the next few months, which is what is taking the pressure off, so I should hold out for what I want work wise.

I should hold out for what I want? Of course, historically, it has never worked in my favour, I'm not really good at that waiting game. I have never won those games of chicken. I don't know why? A friend told me that it is because I am too laid back. "You've got to go in hard and negotiate, if you want more."

I’m not sure how they would cope without me, especially with my knowledge walking out the door with no notice? Fatty is still asking me how things work. But, of course, nobody is indispensible and I am sure they would get through it.

Fatty hasn’t had a good start to the year. She is splitting up with her boyfriend and having to move house and all, and it is somewhat acrimonious and now this at work, all in the first month. It is not her, however, I really like her and I like working with her, she is one of the good ones.

Ironically, (laugh) now, I have thought about it all, I am going to be more disappointed if they agree to my salary, let’s face it, it is going to cost them more in the long run if they don’t. The idea of having nothing to worry about come Monday is very appealing.

In the afternoon, I packed up my desk. I cleaned out all the rubbish. I filed away all of the stuff I hadn’t filed as yet. I put all of my personal belongings into my bag. I wondered if Fatty noticed.

Right on 4.30pm, as I wanted to leave, I was wondering how I was going to avoid the deep and meaningful conversation on exit? Just as I was thinking about it, Fatty's phone rang and I heard that it was chatty Gary. Lovely I thought. I switched off my computer, picked up my bag, waved my fingers in the air and said, “Have a lovely weekend.”

Fatty asked Gary for a moment and said, “We’ll chat Monday?”

I said, “Yes.”

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Big airplane ride, small ideas discussed

So our boy Tony is going to talk to the far right christians of America, I assume, because they are paying him to do so. I have no idea really, but I assume it is because it is one of the few paying gigs he can get. Who else would pay, presumably, large sums of money, to such a reviled, and thoroughly disliked character as our failed Prime Minister Abbott, other than those of a similar flock?

Ah, the Christian Right, not content to believe in the big imaginary man in the sky themselves, they must make the rest of us believe in the myths and legends of cave men's ideas of truth too. I always thought that was odd, is odd, that the great big imaginings weren't enough for them to believe in, they have to take the rest of us all down the path of ignorance before they are truely happy.


The christian right, its like having Great Aunt Pauline sitting at the far end of the dinning room table, saying, "I don't like it, I just don't like it," to any ideas that originated in 1960, or since. You know, like a knee jerk reaction to anything in which Great Aunt Pauline wasn't raised as a child to believe. 

"It's just not right." That's pretty much all they have got, because the great big old book of 2000 years old stories told us so, just doesn't really cut it.

Somehow, attempting to make the rest of us believe in what they believe is preserving religious freedom. No irony acknowledged. Is it simply safety in numbers? Or is it, if you are choose to be ignorant of the modern world, you want to be surrounded by people who choose to be ignorant about the modern world? I guess it makes the backward-looking feel better about themselves, if we all gaze backwards together.




Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Australia Day

Stralya Day

Okay bogans, wrap yourselves up in that symbol of Australian racism and do your worst. It is better that it is out loud and proud in the public arena, it gives us something to push the therapists towards. 

Point the social workers to.

Some where to send the men with the nets.

Direct the officers with dogs.

Set up the trip wires for.

Fire the water cannons at.

That would make us happy? And kind of sad at the same time, thinking that any of this would be necessary.

I haven't read any reports of bogans misbehaving, however. I guess that is good. And bad too. It's always a good laugh. Eye opening to see how the "others" think, live their lives. Shake the head and chuckle and be thankful that I am not them... or near them.

Monday, January 25, 2016

Poor Buddy

I'm off to get Buddy, after he's had his nuts cut off today. Poor him. I dropped him off at 8.30am.

He walked out from the back looking quite okay, tongue out which he doesn't normally, but marching out with some bulldog attitude, so he looked pretty normal. The nurse and I sat on the floor, she said she adored him, as I gave him a kiss on the head. He cuddled up.

It all went well. "He is easy to deal with."

"He is pretty laid back."

"Yes, he is."

He can eat tonight. Keep him quiet. No jumping up. He should sleep inside tonight, so he doesn't get cold. No walking for a few days. He can eat a light meal. He should have his stitches out in 10 days, they will text me when that is due.

Dogs that are not de-sexed get prostate cancer at a higher rate than dogs that are not desexed.

I lifted him into the car.

When we got home, he just sat, with his head drooping further and further down like he was really tired.

Poor him.

Sunday, January 24, 2016

Lazy Sunday

Lazy Sunday. You've got to love a lazy Sunday. Chillout music is playing on the (um, er, ah... as I now only have a laptop and a speaker, what do you call it?) Innocence's Build is playing.

It was raining when I got up, don't you just love the fresh smell of rain in the mornings. Clean. New. Life begins again. The world is virginal, reborn. The sun is just starting to break through now. It is a little humid, but whose gonna listen if I complain?

Chicken salad for lunch. Yum. Does life get better?

Afternoon. 1pm. My how time flies.

Shower. The warm wet, feeling running over my skin.

Take the dog for a walk. Shorts. T-shirt. The last day that Buddy can go walking still with his nuts attached. Poor him. I grimace a little at the thought and wonder if we are doing the right thing. (Will it hurt?)

I have 2 more days off, after this one. Yay me. Luxury.

Monday to myself. Nothing to do. Except take Buddy for his date with destiny. 5 years old. What is that in human years? Men's years. 35. Imagine getting your balls cut off at 35? Poor him. It is meant to be good for his health, stop him getting all sorts of health issues when he's older.

What then? Australia Day, when we can all wait for the bogan boys to wrap themselves up in the Australian flag and beat their Southern Cross tattoo'd chests claiming to be the only true white inhabitants of Australia. Ah, the scamps. Bless. They should all be rounded up and taken hostage-style to a dungeon full of horny bears and leather queens and handed over. Hog-tied with an Australian flag everyone of them. Lets see how white you are after they are finished with you boys.

Maybe, we should give the bears and leather queens knives and the bogan boys could have their balls cut off to cure their behavioural issues? They could be wrapped up in Australia flag nappies while they heal. It's just a thought. (Perhaps, we could have their thumbs surgically attached to their bottom lips. Grin.) Ha, ha, I'd offer to do the pre-surgiacl swabs. Of course.

Chuckle. Oh, such amusing ideas. But back to Sunday. I can hear the shower running, it must be time for me to hustle myself and take Buddy for a walk. Sam will be pointing and telling me I am the most wicked of all, if I don't get a wriggle on.

Saturday, January 23, 2016

Friday, January 22, 2016

It's Too Hot, I'm Moving To Hobart

I couldn’t sleep, it was hot. The house was hot, despite having my balcony doors open and a fan pointed directly at us. I so wanted to sleep, I had a big day coming up. But, I tossed and turned and tossed and turned and I eventually gave in and got up at midnight and headed down stairs with my laptop. Sam said that I’d fallen asleep on the couch from 8pm, so I figured I was still way ahead. And, I quite like those moments alone in the dark, it is kind of bracing, you know, soul nourishing, like all the planetary energy focuses down on you and funnels its goodness through the top of your head, like an invisible twister, as though communication with the cosmos is only possible as a solitary entity alone with the invisible galactic shower of inspiration raining down, nobody to stop it, or distract its forces. There is freedom in the dark and quiet places.

Sometime after 1am, I headed to bed.

I woke up at 6.15am. I made coffee and muesli. I pissed around on my computer. I was in the shower at 7am. I was out the door at 7.20am. I was at work at 7.30am.

Sam took the day off. “I don’t feel well. I have a head ache.” It was really unusual for him, he never takes days off. I wondered if it had anything to do with him working late last night with the system crisis they had in the office?

Sam made an appointment for Buddy at the vet 8.30am Monday morning to have his nuts cuts off. He shouldn’t have turned into crazy dog last Wednesday with the 2 French Boys. One crazy moment too often, poor Buddy. It only happens when he gets too excited and you attempt to stop him from doing what he really wants to do. It is his only bad behaviour. He’s all bark and no bite, but people who see it for the first time don’t know that. And now, hopefully, it will be his last crazy moment. He’s so loving all the other times.

We got everything done and I left the office at 4pm. Clever me. Everyone who came before me struggled in this role, and I seem to be finding it easier and easier with the passing of time. I’m trying not to appear too cocky, also not trying to convey the idea that the people they had doing this role before me were inexperienced hence their various melt downs, as my 6 month contract is just about to be renewed with a permanent contract and I want a substantial pay rise.


Thursday, January 21, 2016

Room At The Inn

Two French boys came over with a view to renting our spare front room. Sam has decided to take matters into his own hands. We have a new housemate, Tuan, renting the smaller spare room, already, he moves in on the weekend.

Sam said that if he waited for me, which he claims he has been doing, that nothing would get done. My reply has always been that I didn’t really want new housemates, I am happy living just him and me. However, he thinks that if we have 3 spare rooms, we should rent out 2 and keep one for guests. I didn’t see it that way exactly. I have always lived with housemates, nearly all of them friends who have at varying times in their lives needed somewhere to live, and I kind of reckon I’m done.

However, saying that, I guess the money will be good.

One of the French boys looked a bit like my old Greek mate George, (who looks like Ted from How I Met Your Mother) the other was blonde and balding, but the blonde one was the sexier of the two. They both had on shorts and singlets and they were both strapping lads. (The blonde one's shorts hugged him in a very pleasing way) We let Buddy in to say hello and he got overly excited, of course. He tried to hump the dark-haired French boy. When we tried to put him out, Buddy not the French boy, he turned into snarling, biting, barking mental dog, as he does sometimes when you try to stop him doing something that he really wants to do. So, no surprise, the French boys didn’t want to take the room after that.

We laughed, afterwards, can you imagine what they thought? Those guys with the mental dog. I reckon I’d be left wondering if I’d been them.


When Sad Cows Come Mooing At Your Door

I got to work at 8am. Fat Guts Carol Brady was there and the new girl who took over from Obese Olwyn, Alphabet Woman. I headed to the air con controls and selected 21 degrees.

I had a million things to do. Eeeek!

Fatty had the day off. Oh, I don’t care, come to work, take the day off, please yourself. However, when we are trying to get everything finished two days earlier than normal due to the public holiday on Monday, it seemed like an odd choice of day to take off. Whatever?

I headed home for lunch. The sun shone down. I’ve been going home for lunch for the last week, it’s nice.

I got a stick and unblocked the drain on the corner, which Sam wouldn’t let me unblock in the morning. The muck moved and the water flowed.

The day flowed nicely. On my own, Fatty away, the hours ticked like a well oiled machine.

Then, in the afternoon, that Sad Cow Coleman turned up after lunch unexpectedly. She proceeded to talk loudly into her phone, as she always does, like Adolph Hitler at a pep rally. Doesn’t she have a desk somewhere else where she can sit, other than here, and bore the crap out of everyone around her? The whole side of my floor is vacant since we lost the other project and yet she came and sat right next to me and proceeded to talk loudly into her phone.

Oh she is tiresome. Aggressive and humourless. She makes Kanye West look frivolous. She’s a lawyer. I am sure I am allergic to lawyers.

Apparently, she got married recently. I told F that I was positive same sex marriages were still not legal in Australia. F tut-tutted. (I love that one, because if you say being called a lesbian is an insult you are being homophobic)

I was frantically busy, getting everything done. I had a mountain of work to do. Then, instead of concentrating, all I could hear was Sad Cow Coleman’s voice. Grrr! I put my headphones on, but it was hot and the sweat started to run down the sides of my head and, besides, I could still hear her talking over the music, and i thought to myself, this is ridiculous. So I took the headphones off and played the music, as F and I do on Fridays.

It was working, it drowned her out.

When Sad Cow Coleman had finished her call, she leant over the patrician she asked me if I had headphones I could use. I told her that I had them on but I was sweating so badly under the heat of them and the hot day and they were terribly uncomfortable.

“I am so busy right now that I can’t afford to be tuning into your phone call.”

“Well, this is just apart of shearing an open-plan office.”

“You talk very loudly into your phone,” I said.

“Well, that is just a part of running a remote project.”

(I was remembering the last time she came over and sat next to me, I heard her say to someone she was sitting over here so she didn’t get disturbed) So, I thought to myself, she can come and sit right next to me, she can talk as loud as she likes into her phone, because that is just a part of what she has to do and I should either put up with it, or put my headphones on so that she can just do as she pleases. That is the message I got from her.

I put my headphones back on. I don’t want to be arguing with her. I don't have time to waste being distracted by her. I noticed a bit later when I went to the toilet that she was using one of the quiet rooms. Yes, lets us not skip over this point, we have purpose built quiet rooms for people to talk on the phone, rather than subject everyone in the open plan office to loud phone calls. So that amounted to her conceding to my point.

I laughed (nervously) to myself. Why do unpleasant people bring out the passive aggressive in me? I felt a little ashamed of my behaviour, (A small chill ran up my spine when I thought about what I’d done) but not too much, as I had too much else to think about.


Wednesday, January 20, 2016

How's This For a Sexy Car

1955 Kaiser Manhattan


Such a cool looking car

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

Okay, let the air-conditioning wars begin

I got to work at 8am, there was nobody there, but the lights were on. I laugh to myself sometimes in the mornings when the lights are on but the floor is vacated, maybe a neutron bomb went off and I missed it and everyone is dead and I am left all alone at work. Ha ha. It was raining and I was probably too busy unblocking the drains with sticks to notice, or something.

Everyone is getting to the office later and later, now that Obese Olwyn has left and Fat Guts Carol Brady seems to be sleeping in now a days.

It's just me left of the Early Birdy Club.

Last week, it felt so hot in the office, on those really hot days. It must be really hot outside, I thought. But, upon investigation, the floor temperature was set to 25. 


"Oh, I see," I said to Fatty, "Let the aircon wars begin. 25 degrees indeed." 

The girls in the office say they are cold and yet Fatty, being a well padded girl and I (being a well padded girl, now a days, or a boy...) boil in our corner, so it is either us or them.

And the dial fiddling begins, "they" turn it up and I turn it down.
I am now checking intermittently throughout the day. I can live with 22 degrees, but I much prefer 21... but the chicks nipples go hard and crack at 21 degrees (age? I don't know. Chuckle, degrees) or some such thing. I have no idea. Their blood runs colder. The fat on their bodies, that they are always complaining about, doesn't insulate them as well. 

Monday, January 18, 2016


Banana cake anyone? But I have to warn those who want to eat my banana cake, I find it very difficult to differentiate between ripe bananas and rotten bananas. Where does ripe stop and rotten start, I ask you?


Sunday, January 17, 2016

Coming Out

Coming out to your parents gives you permission to live the rest of your life. It starts in its entirety, in its fullness after you have uttered those 2 faithful words. "I'm gay." You're an adult. A big boy, in long pants. "I don't like girls, I like arse play. This is me, like it or leave it."

It gives your mum a chance to fall in love with your boyfriend and your father an opportunity to get to know his new son.

Unless, of course, if your parents are christian bigots, or homophobes, or fuckwhits, (Christians, fuckwhits, who can tell the difference, I ask you) then it gives you permission to walk away. Ditch the bitches.

Having said that, from my experience, with all of my friends, all of our parents have accepted us being gay, they all eventually embrace it.


A guy comes out to his father. "Dad, I am gay."

His father looks at him long and hard, (no doubt remembering the school mate he fiddled with, or that first year uni boy he got drunk with and had his first up the shit shoot experience) then says, "Same rules as your sister, no boys in your bedroom."


Saturday, January 16, 2016

A Car Full of Ninjas

I don’t really care about the whole burqua, hijab, debate, whatever. I don’t really get it, what do you all care about what other people wear, I ask you? It seems to me that such clothing is making women second class citizens, showing that Islam is 100 years behind the West, but that is just me, and people are free to wear whatever they like. Strap a frozen turkey to your fucken head, if that’s what makes you feel good, I don’t give a shit. In fact, I think most people should wear the full burqa, then I wouldn’t have to deal with a lot of them. In fact, if you could fill the eye slits in and make them all as anonymous as Cousin It, I think it would be preferable.

We were driving down Smith Street the other day, the traffic was busy, there ware cars everywhere. As we neared Johnston Street, the traffic stopped. It was gridlock
 in both directions, momentarily, nobody was going anywhere, when a black Yaris made its move from a side street to my right. It was suddenly pushing through trying to squeeze in front of me, through the jumbled maze of cars blocking its way.

“Yeah, good onya sport,” I said out loud.

I looked over at the small, black hatchback, four faces, or what would be faces somewhere underneath the black material with eye slits, turned and looked at me in unison, like they were the Borg. It was like a car full of black ninjas turning their full power on me. I raised my hands in the air, as if to indicate I was saying, what are you doing? The faces stared at me, frozen in their glare. As the small hatchback lurched forward, the four heads turned in unison back to face in the direction the car was heading. She squeezed through with millimetres to spare on each front mudguard. I couldn’t help but being impressed with her driving skills, or is that her determination, or is that her pushiness? I don’t know, but I wished I’d had a camera. Of course, I did have a camera, I wished I’d thought to pick it up and capture the image.


The sight of them made me giggle. Michelangela, Donatella, Raelene and Leoni


Friday, January 15, 2016

Friggin

Why isn't friggin as offensive as fucking, they both mean the same thing, say the same thing. "You frigging moron."

How come you can say one and not the other? Aren't we all hearing the same thing, no matter what which word is said? "You fucking idiot."

That is the depth of modern stupidity. Sensibility with no substance.

That's the world today, perceived style over anything substantial. It's frigging mad. Fucking bad. Fall and die you cunntttry people. It's all shite. Shut the front door.

Smoke, don't smoke, but don't do it in front of my kids.

Call a tranny hacked to pieces, but don't say it so I can hear.

Don't say anything "they" don't like. Welcome to the 21st Century. Freedom of speech, naturally. As long as you say what "they" want you to say. Stick to the script, or "they" will arc up, write letters of complaint, deride you on the internet, I think it is called public shaming, and they'll write to your sponsors to stop you saying anything ever again, so "they" will only ever hear what they want to hear. Nice and clean, nothing out of place. Lucky old world.

Thursday, January 14, 2016

Alan Rickman

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

La Trobe Street

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Bowie

I liked what Jimmy Carr had to say, 

"We should look on the bright side, if the coolest man in the world has died, it must make us all relatively just that little bit cooler."

 

Monday, January 11, 2016

Life On Mars

It's a God-awful small affair
To the girl with the mousy hair
But her mummy is yelling no
And her daddy has told her to go

But her friend is nowhere to be seen
Now she walks through her sunken dream
To the seat with the clearest view
And she's hooked to the silver screen

But the film is a saddening bore
For she's lived it ten times or more
She could spit in the eyes of fools
As they ask her to focus on

Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man look at those cavemen go
It's the freakiest show
Take a look at the lawman
Beating up the wrong guy
Oh man wonder if he'll ever know
He's in the best selling show
Is there life on Mars?

It's on America's tortured brow
That Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow
Now the workers have struck for fame
'Cause Lennon's on sale again
See the mice in their million hordes
From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads
Rule Britannia is out of bounds
To my mother, my dog, and clowns
But the film is a saddening bore
'Cause I wrote it ten times or more
It's about to be writ again
As I ask you to focus on

Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man look at those cavemen go
It's the freakiest show
Take a look at the lawman
Beating up the wrong guy
Oh man wonder if he'll ever know
He's in the best selling show
Is there life on Mars?

Sunday, January 10, 2016

David Bowie

Friday, January 08, 2016

Comedy

Nothing is off limits, everything is open to comedy, there are no restrictions, or no no-go subjects. Everything feels better if you laugh at it.

Thursday, January 07, 2016

Stupid People With Dogs

Stupid people down the dog park yet again. We took Buddy and Floyd (he's staying for a few weeks). A couple turned up with a sandy coloured mutt and, maybe what was, an Italian Greyhound. I was doing perimeters of the park for exercise, when I saw both the mutt and the greyhound looking as though they were trying to bite Buddy. I changed the direction I was walking and headed over there. The two dogs seemed to bite at Buddy again, as I approached. I grabbed Buddy and checked the sides of his face, more for a show of strength than any real belief Buddy had been bitten. I checked where Floyd was, he was okay. I let Buddy go and the mutt and the greyhound had a go at him again.

Okay, that is enough. “Excuse me," I said to the couple, "but could you stop your dogs biting mine.”

“I’m sorry,” said the porridge-faced guy. Not sorry for what his dog’s had done, I got the impression that he was begging my pardon for questioning him.

“You dogs are attacking mine,” I said. “Either stop them doing it, or take them home.”

The bitch wife quickly put their dogs on leads. I don't really remember her, some rat-faced nonsense I suspect.


“I think you are being a bit precious,” said Dough-Face.

Precious? Really? “Either they stop biting my dog, or you take them home" I said. "They don’t belong here if they bite other dogs.”

“I don’t think you have any right to say what dogs can come here…”

“I do if your dogs are continually attacking mine.”

“They’ll sort it out,” the dough-faced guy said. He sighed, as though I was bugging him.

“They’ll sort it out. Of course dogs work it out,” I said. “However, there is a big difference between a growl and antisocial behaviour.

“All dogs…”

“My dogs don’t bite other dogs.”

The bitch wife let muttley and sharky off their leads again.

Now let’s just stop for a minute and think about the mentality of a woman who let’s her dogs free, as they are being accused of biting other dogs.

His greyhound circled again and looked as though it was going to bite again. The dough-faced owner kind of did the same, walked towards me, chest puffed out, adopting the tone of a silent killer.

“Listen mate, I don’t think you have any right…”

“I do when it is one of the criteria of using this park,” I said. “Your dog can only be in this park if it doesn’t bite other dogs. It is a requirement. That gives me the right.”

“My dog never bites other dogs.”

“Fantastic,” said Sam. He’d been listening to all of this, biting his lip. The greyhound circle again and looked as though it was going to bite Buddy again. “If it does it again,” said Sam. “I am whipping it with this.” Sam had Floyd’s silver chain lead in his hands.

I wanted to wait it out and make them leave, but Sam wanted to go. So we took Buddy and Floyd and left.


Ah, dog owners.

In another incident, we were walking passed outside tables at a pub, at which there was a couple with two small dogs. As we approached with Buddy and Floyd, the two small dogs went apoplectic, barking and growling, so we took a wide berth around them. Out of the corner of my eye, when the male owner couldn't get his dogs to shut up, he grabbed one of them by the snout with both hands and squeezed as tight as he could. Yep, that's the kind of training mate that has lead to your dogs being who they are today, I thought.

It's funny, or not, that people who try to intimidate end up with dogs that intimidate and aggressive owners end up with aggressive dogs.

Buddy and Floyd

Monday, January 04, 2016

I Have The Next Week Off

My boss, F, said to me, somewhere around the beginning of December, "You are having time off until the 11th of Jan, aren't you?"

No, I thought. I'm not.

A few weeks later, my boss, F, said to me, "You are having time off until the 11th, aren't you?"

No, I thought.

Then when we were finally getting around to talk about our Xmas leave, F said to me, "You are having until the 11th off, aren't you?"

"Yes," I said. "Yes, I am." What are you to do? I don't have to be told twice, or 3 times, as the case might be, not to come to work.

So, I have the next week off, just like that. Lovely. F's going back a week earlier than me, maybe she has something to prove, more likely she is just trying to be a fair manager. I don't know, I don't care really, I have a week off.

Sunday, January 03, 2016

Family Lunch

We had a family lunch with my auntie and uncle and cousins. Will (my brother) had organised it.

"Lunch Sunday," commanded Will, as he likes to do in the oldest child of the family manor. "Sometime after midday."

Roz was coming, of course. 

Some of my cousins would be there, but only 2 of the 12, oh, 5 of the twelve, if you count the 3 of us, so not such a good turn out, but a representative of all 3 families, at least.

It was all very quaint. My uncle and auntie are in their 80's now, so, I guess, you'd expect it to be quaint.

Sam came with me and met the family.

It was nice.

It was in place of a funeral for Lottie. She would have been pleased, as she told us not to spend a cent on a funeral for her. She was outraged when she finally came out of her grief for my father and caught up on some of the bills, when she saw the bill for dad's funeral.

"What on earth were you kids thinking when you agreed to pay that amount of money," Lottie said. "I was sure I had taught you better than that. Do not waste a cent on me when I go. For goodness sake."

So, we didn't. We all got together over lunch instead, as she would have wanted.

Saturday, January 02, 2016

A Week At Torquay

We drove home from a week down at Torquay, with no Internet. No dogs either, but that didn't stop Tully bringing Carl, the schnauzer,  because that's what Tully does. Oh well. It was nice being away, I read books on the deck. The beginning of the week it was too hot to go to the beach. The end of the week was too cold to go to the beach. I think that is a first, that I have gone to the beach and not gone to the beach. I got a beetle in my ear right on new year, I'm not sure what that says. It killed me when it tried to dig its way out. Fortunately, Sam got a lighter and the beetle followed the light out of my ear. It rained early our last morning, as though the universe had run out of the sun.