Milo, not a care in the world, he is a gorgeous cat

The Hipster in a beenie

Orson Wells goes to Aldi

Chickens street art, very cool

Did I Feel Like A Visitor?

I woke up at 6.30am and was wide awake. I tossed and turned until 7am, when I asked Sam if he was getting out of bed? Yes, sure, I woke him up, I thought he was getting up anyway. He said he wasn’t getting out of bed until 7.30am and he thanked me for waking him up.

“Yeah, good onya,” said Sam.

Buddy has been sleeping with us the last few nights, as it has been really cold outside, and he seemed to be very comfortable stretched out with half the bed, while I hung onto a sliver of mattress on my side of the bed.

I got up and pulled on my track pants and hoodie, just at the same time I heard Andy heading downstairs. It was early and I didn’t feel like being social, nothing against Andy, it’s just if I am getting up early, I want to enjoy the early morning on my own, the solitude, the quiet, the peace, the stillness, of my own time. I lay back down in bed in my track pants and hoodie fully expecting to continue to toss and turn.

I woke again at 8.15am, just as Sam got out of the shower. “Nice, isn’t,” I said, I’m sure with a huge grin.

Sam bought me breakfast in bed, telling me that I needed to do stuff and not spend the day in bed.

“You need to get back into your exercise routine again,” said Sam. “You are getting…”

“What?”

“You know.”

“No I don’t.”

“Yes, you do?”

“Don’t beat around the bush…”

“Fat!” said Sam.

“Like a dagger to the heart, Brutus…”

“You are getting fat!”

“I’m am now bleeding from the wounds you have inflicted.”

“Don’t be dramatic…”

“I am chocking on my own blood. Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle! I thought you loved me?”

He kissed me on the forehead. “Don’t stay in bed all day.”

Buddy lay on one side of me. Fluff on the other. Milo lay across my legs. I wrote my pig story. (It is on my fictional blog, there is a link below, FletcherSatchel) It is coming very slowly, glacial, but it is coming. Bit by bit, every little piece is dragged from me, if you look closely you can just about see the scars in my skin. Inspiration is in a bit short supply, at the moment, I don’t know why? I was explaining it to someone at Rachel’s party the other day. One person laughed, the other tuned out. I wondered if I was boring? Maybe I am. Note to self, nobody wants to hear about your pig story. Sad, but true.

I watched a YouTube clip on the Bristol Fighter, when I couldn’t think of more pig story to write. (That is a car, not a plane)

Jill messaged me at 11.30am to ask if I was awake? Awake? She messaged me at 11.11am, as if I’d still be asleep at that time.

I’m awake, I replied. Still in bed, but certainly awake. Did I feel like a visitor?

Did I feel like a visitor?

I laughed to myself. Did I ever feel like a visitor? Ha ha. Sure, I replied. I forced myself. I can’t spend my days in bed writing, can I? No, I can’t. I must say yes to friends when they ask.

I extricated myself out from under 2 dogs and a cat, they weren’t moving for anybody and scampered into the shower. (I don’t think I had a shower yesterday? Lovely, isn’t it. My part towards saving the planet, well, that’s my story)

Sam, Jill and I went to Arcadia for lunch. In Gertrude Street. I think we are becoming quite the regulars. I ate beef vindaloo. Sam ate lasagne. Jill ate a burger, despite her, um, err, ah, how do I put this diplomatically? If I said Pritikin? Would that be enough?

Sam went back to work. His new job is a couple of minutes walk from home.


Jill talked me into accompanying her to the servo to check her oil and coolant. Did I want to accompany her, not particularly, but I kept that to myself. Apparently, girls still can’t do such things. Shouldn’t they be able to do this by now? Her car is over due for a service, which was the reason for the, apparent, urgency. I tried to explain that there is no substitute for a service, but I am not sure if I was being successful. I put oil in, it needed it. Jill insisted on buying coolant too, despite neither of us, really, knowing how to tell if her car needed it. She has a plastic bottle that has pink liquid, not the usual green, with two lines and some sort of hieroglyphics. What it meant neither of us knew? I’d read the manual, by the time we got back to my place. 

“It has to be at the top line,” I said as I stepped from the car…

“Okay,” she said.

“But your engine has to be cold.”

“Oh.”

I closed he passenger side door. “Look in the morning.”

“Oh… but.” I could see she wanted to get me to do it, but a cold engine is a divine thing. Besides, I had more YouTube to watch and bed to get back to.

“First thing in the morning.” Buddy needed to lie down next to me in the big bed.

“I see,” she said. She curled her lip like Dame Edna, knowing there was nothing more to be said.

The afternoon was progressing fast and I had many hours to waste before Sam got home and started to organise me yet again.

Mitch was heading out to work when I got home. His aftershave lingers in the house long after he has gone. The front hallway smells of him, he has the room closest to the front door. It is quite nice, as far as after shaves go, so I am not complaining. He must be doing the arvo shift. I think I’ll always think of him as aftershave man. Everything about him must smell of the scent, even his undies, I’d guess.

Leonard flushed the toilet 5 times while he was in the bathroom having a shower. Why, you ask? Why I ask? Why would anyone need to flush the toilet 5 times? No idea. What is the problem with the toilet, I wanted to ask?

Andy is really vague, but then again, he smokes a lot of pot. Every night. Sam thought I’d be sucked back into the pot smoking vortex, but not as yet. Ha ha, Sam. So little faith.

I lit a fire early. I felt cold around 4pm. I’m guessing, I don’t need to specify that exactly, hey. I wouldn’t light a fire if I was feeling hot. It was just the time, I don’t usually light fires until dinner time.

I’ve still got a headache from my neck. Too much computer, Sam would say. And I am afraid he is right. Too much looking down at my laptop in bed. Too much sitting at my coffee table and writing on my computer. But, what are you going to do?

I lay in front of the fire with my big, orange cushion and listened to Gerald Levert’s last album. The Teddy Bear. It was peaceful, I dozed off, nearly, not quite, nearly. Buddy and me. Then Sam came home.

Another day down. A count down till when? What am I going to do with myself?

David Is In The South Of France, How's This For Bloody Beautiful

Just Gorgeous

Some client of David's

holiday chateau

in the South of France

talk about beautiful

A Pot Of Succulents Is Cheaper Than Getting The Roof Repaired

I planted the succulents in an old bowl that I dragged out of the back of the kitchen cupboard. I got out my trusty drill and drilled a hole in the bottom of the bowl. The succulents that Sam put in the dish on the kitchen bench a week ago. The bits that fell off the pots on the balcony when we were cleaning out the attic so we could put all of the junk from Leonard's room into storage. Our new house mate. Yep, we now have 3 housemates.

Sam asked me if I was going back to work any time soon, to which I answered no. I don't know if I am kidding myself, but I now have money saved and I don't have any debts, so I am now going to try and write... yes, go on say it, a novel. How long have I been putting it off? Too long.

"If you are not going back to work..."

"No, I am not..."

"Then I am renting out the spare room."

So Sam advertised our spare room and now we have a third house mate. Leonard moved in a week ago. He is the silent housemate. He is the shadow, the one that nobody ever sees. In fact, I don't even think Mitch has met him and he has lived here for a week, so far.

Not that I am complaining, I think it is preferable if I don't see them. It was different when I lived with friends, Shane, David, Tim and Nicholas, Aby Austin, Kim Wild, but these are not living arrangements for friends. I've had enough of the corporate world, smarmy, egocentric, wannabes all vying for their own glory, usually at the expense of somebody else, all wrapped up in some bullshit about team building and best practice and performance reviews. Well, you know what, I don't want it any more. And while I didn't want to have housemates, wouldn't have gone down the housemate path, it isn't so bad.

So, the succulents were in the bowl that sits on the kitchen bench where the roof leaks. (I must get up there and start squirting around some more silicone) I've had 2 professional roof plumbers out to fix it and they have only made it worse. I have since been up there and I have nearly stopped it. But, nearly isn't quite good enough, now is it. Oh and winter is here. The funny thing is now that it doesn't leak all the time, just when the rain is at its heaviest. Anything other than a deluge and no leak, appears to be no leak. So, I have nearly got it, there is just one more spot, obviously. I am assuming that if I can't see it leaking then it is not leaking... I hope. So, the best assurance against the leak has been the stainless steel bowl we keep on the kitchen bench. Sam casually threw the succulent pieces into it the other day, which kind of gave the bowl a reason for being on the bench. And I kind of liked the open style of the stainless steel bowl, so I dug around in the back of the kitchen cupboard and found an old desert bowl on which all the glaze had washed thin. I got out my trusty drill and trusty masonry bit and bingo the bowl had a hole and then it was filled with the plant pieces. Lovely. And then I put the newly planted pot back into the stainless steel bowl, and it kind of now looks like it has a reason to be there.

A pot of succulents is cheaper than getting the roof repaired.

The novel, well, that is going to take a bit longer.

"Oh no, not that damn novel," I can hear my friends say. Actually, truthfully, they wouldn't say anything, not really. None of them think I am ever going to write it. It would be more of a whimper from them, if anything, rather than any kind of out loud protest. I give myself too much credit, no really I do.

Of course, I don't really believe I can do it either, not deep down, not really. But that is just my insecurities talking and I am not ever giving up the idea of writing it. No, I will forever entertain the idea. I believe it is possible. I believe I could do it, well, maybe, kind of. Well, you know, in this big, bad world anything is possible, even likely…

Fuck me, if Tony Abbott can be elected to Prime Minister, after all of the lies he told, I can write a fucking story, lets face it. If Donald Trump can be elected to President, with the crap that spews forth from his mouth, I can write a fucking story. If England can vote to leave Europe, when as a country they are, were, doing really well, I can write a fucking story. If a bear can take a crap in the woods…

So, first things first, I have to get my reading back on track. I’m really not enjoying 1984, I’m really not remembering it either. I’ll give it a bit more time. But I am not getting lost in it, I am always aware that it is a struggle.

Then I am going to write some short stories and see if one of them naturally evolves.

Then there are the two, or three, partially written novels that I have, but I feel least inclined. Oh who knows.

I do know one thing, I have very few excuses left not to write it.

My house is full of plants, I'm not sure I could live any other way

The Most Important Thing Is Honesty. Once You Can Fake That, You’ve Got It Made

We came home from Victoria Street and then went into town, to return the iPad case, of course. It is all a part of Sam's shopping modus de operandi, buy something one day, return it the next. It keeps the world turning… or, at least, I think that is the reason.

We walked into town to Myer. The sun was shining by early afternoon. It was nice. I still laugh at the people standing at the little red man at the lights at the crossing with not a car in sight, and yet they still stand there. I never know why? We’ve all become so conservative, so nanny-state products that when Sam and I dare to cross on the “red man” sometimes, if you listen closely, you can hear “them” inhale at our audacity.

Live a little people. Jay-walk, smoke a joint, cheat on your taxes, leave the job you hate with no job to go to, life is just too short.

Straight to Myer, down Little Bourke Street, in the back door, being back door kind of boys. Laugh, that always reminds me of Catherine Tate’s Derek.

I took charge of the lift buttons, on the way up and on the way down. I am still a lift nazi, clearly. Too many years spent in corporate building with big egos trying to run the lifts to suit themselves. It has had a bad influence on me, a lasting one, one I don’t seem to be able to get over. Any of the slow, or the lame, I close those lift doors right in their faces. Oh, there have just been too many times. Floating into a lift in dribs and drabs.

“Hold that lift, hold that lift, I must get on that lift!”

But there are 5 more lifts.

"Oh, is this lift going up” dither, dither... “oh, really” dither, dither... “sorry."

Get Out!

Or the idiot who keeps pushing the lift button when the full lift’s doors are trying to close.

Closing… open. Closing… open. Closing… open.

Or my very favourite, "I just need to finish this call," they said with their arm in the lift doorway holding up any number of people without a care.

Um, excuse me?

Come on people, pay attention, otherwise there is always another lift. All Aboard.

Sam got the Aesop hand lotion from the ground floor at Myer. He always lathers it on and then wipes it all over my hands to dispose of the excess.

We headed to Emporium, after Myer, because Sam didn't like the hoodie that I wore into the city. My favourite oversized, old, blue...

“What’s wrong with it?” I looked down at what I was wearing. Sure it is old, but I would call it comfortable.

"It is disgusting," said Sam. "You look like you are down on your luck."

Disgusting? I wouldn’t have called it disgusting, I thought is was fashionably off trend – or is that a contradiction? – you know, setting trends not following them? (Northern Suburbs Work Wear) Still, I guess it doesn’t matter so much what I think if Sam thinks it is disgusting. I looked down at what I was wearing again. Disgusting seemed a little harsh. But… um… as I said, it didn’t really matter what I thought, so much, as I wasn’t looking at me, I was looking away from disgusting.

We went to Uniglow in Emporium. But first we got Aesop hand lotion from the dispensers outside the Aesop shop. Again, Sam wiped the excess over my hands. He tells me it is lovely, I grin and bare it. I tried on hoodies, but despite the fact that I seem to wear them all the time, lately, they are not really me. I looked at the jumpers, merino V-neck. I wanted the charcoal, or the dark blue, but no they had none of those colours left, as they were on sale. This brave new consuming world never seems to have the colours you want, and we all just accept it. So, I got navy blue and red.

We saw Anton, Rachel's son, shopping in UniGlo. He's lovely, he’s always been a gorgeous boy. He was an angelic child, and now he is a handsome 21 year old/22 year old. Rachel is deservedly proud of him, as she is of all her 4 children. Anton is a sweet boy, always, seemingly, interested in what you are doing and what you have to say. I'm sure he is interested, he’s a nice lad, but even if he's not, as Groucho Marx said, The most important thing is honesty. Once you can fake that, you’ve got it made. He's a really nice boy.

I changed into the red jumper out side Uniglow. I did a twirl and Sam just looked at me. "Are you doing that for me?"

"Sure am," I said. "Better?" I asked.

"Yes, much," he said.

"Anything to alleviate your embarrassment."

"Very funny," Sam said.

“I looked disgusting, I think was the expression.”

He just let that hang in the air seemingly without a need for a correction.

I find I often walk with my arm through Sam's. I never hold his hand, I am not a hand holder, but I often link my arm through his. We are nearly always chatting away, even when we were walking up Lonsdale Street toward home, me pointing out the newest Lamborghini driving up the street, Sam telling me what the latest gadget is. Or we are joking with each other. Eating curry samosas, or arguing about getting one. I’m always the pro-samosa, Sam is the one against, if anyone is going to be against, that is. But often it is just a yes, yes snack man, like me. Green tea ice cream. Egg tart. Pork bun. 75 pieces of KFC for $5. Whatever? Or we are being judgemental about the people we see, you know, laughing and pointing. It is usually my judgement, but Sam can be too. I have had a, some might say, negative effect on him. I’d say, I’ve taken that sweet boy and rounded him out. Discreetly, of course. We never want to hurt anyone's feeling, we just want to amuse each other. Snigger so only the other one can see. Our world, lost in it. It is a lovely place to be. It is a nice state. We don’t really need anyone else in it, we are naturally just a team of two.

At The Shops

Strapped into her chair, missing a leg. The next time I complain about life... oh, yes, I know I'm a serial offender... just show me this photo

Victoria Street, buying groceries.

We walked down to Victoria Street, the sun was shinning, the sky was blue. We ate Thai for lunch. We remembered the green bags, or is it that I forget the green bags and Sam always remembers them.

Maybe that is true. It seemed to be easier carrying the food home in the green bags, you can sling them over your shoulder.

Why Do We Have To Do All That Driving To Do The Shopping?

Pink rose as we walked into town together, Sam and I, lovely and delicate. 

We went out for lunch with Sam’s ex, Brian, and his new boyfriend Mark. Brian drove. Out to the suburbs to the “latest” place. Brian always knows where the “latest” food place is happening. It was nice, sure. I’m not sure how anyone can be bothered staying in “the know” quite so keenly, but maybe that is just because I am a lazy arse. Maybe? It is not like collecting under age pornography, or sniffing glue, it is, essentially, a good thing, no it is. I’m just being perpendicular. The food was okay, I guess that is why I am being so flip, as the food is always okay. The latest foodie must taste so often is okay food charged at twice the price of the same food served some where else not deemed as trendy. If I was taken to gastronomique delights every time, if it was Heston Blumenthal magical, I could really get into it, but so often it just isn’t. It so often seems as though some first year out marketing major has blah, blah, blah’d on about it and the crowds have followed unquestioningly.

Oh listen to me… or, maybe you shouldn’t.

We were home early afternoon, as we were left standing in the middle of our street watching the back of Brian’s car drive away. The afternoon was warm and sunny, Winter warm, kind of comforting, if you could get out of the cold wind, out of the shadows and into the actual rays of the sunshine, then it is nice. I looked at Sam, he looked at me. It was nice standing there, him and I. (He’s lovely, my Sam)

Sam wanted to do something. “What should we do?”

Sam made many suggestions, but made no decisions. “Oh, let’s go to Highpoint and then go and shop in Footscray,” he said.

“What are we going to do at Highpoint?”

“Go to Myer and buy a (2nd) new case for my iPad,” said Sam. (How many iPads and how many iPad cases does that make?) “And window shop.” (Oh, my very favourite)

“And why are we going to Footscray?”

“To do grocery shopping.”

“At the market?”

“At the market.”

“Why do we have to do all that driving to get an iPad case and some veggies?”

“Because…”

“I don’t want to do all that driving…”

“Oh come on…”

“We live within walking distance of the CBD…”

“It is fun…”

“Maybe for you.”

“Don’t you want to see other places, do other things…”

“See other shopping centres, deal with all of the idiots involved in that…”

“We might see some new thing that we must have.”

“Get your licence,” I said. “Then you can drive us all over Melbourne, on the off chance of getting some funky new home ware.”

“Really?” said Sam.

“I don’t want to drive all over Melbourne,” I said. “You get your licence and I will be happily chauffeured all over Melbourne just like you are…”

“I see…”

We walked into town.

We went to chemist warehouse, where I can only have one of my prescription dispensed now a days. I was cross. Why? Nobody knows. Seemingly govt policy. Some sort of budget cutting measure. So now I have to go every 20 days to get my pills, (essentially, heartburn, I have a wonky cap thing to the top of my stomach, so acid leaks out and burns my oesophagus). But my pills aren’t habit forming. Nobody is going to melt them down and dry them out and sell them to children at the school gate. (not that I’d really care if they did, let the parents deal with that) Nobody is going to inject them, or sell them on the black market. So what is the problem? I used to get the whole script dispensed, then I’d have them in the cupboard and I wouldn’t run out. Buying them one box at a time, I always run out and end up with pain in my chest. Stupid Liberal Govt, literally, gives me a pain in my chest. I must get more scripts so I can get more pills dispensed. If I doctor shop with the 3 doctors that I know and get 3 scripts I could, at least, get 3 boxes instead of one box.

Idiot Liberal government is trying to destroy Medicare. (I know, it is the PBS, but it doesn’t hurt to mention it)

We walked to Myer. Sam bought an iPad case.

And Then I Made Banana Cake

And then I made banana cake in the afternoon. I iced it and all. Cream cheese icing. Lovely.

1984, continued...

Well, apparently, copies of 1984 in second hand book shops are hard to come by, apparently, they fly off the shelves. "Bugger it!" I thought there would be a whole slew of them covered in dust clogging up book shops, it being an old book, and all. People mustn't be as stupid as I give them credit for? I thought everyone below 30 had had their attention span reduced to that of a gold fish, 30 seconds, or less, and unless it has an "on" switch, and lit up, they didn't know what the hell it was, maybe I was wrong? Curious? Can 20 year olds recognise an actual book on sight? Interesting. Anyway, I must admit, I only tried those second hand bookshops within a radius of home, in the inner suburbs, (the only Green's lower house seat in the country) however, it was the same story at each.

Annoying, I thought.

So, I thought to myself, Christian, don't be such a wimp, you have a copy, sure the spine is broken and it is falling apart, it has seen better days, any idiot can see that, but, you know since George Orwell died in abject poverty, never seeing a cent from his writing, it seemed kind of appropriate. (my poor, destitute paperback)

So, I sat down to read. The sun had come out by the afternoon, so I sat in my wicker chair on my back veranda and read. Lovely.

Big Brother is watching you.

Sound like any era you know of?

Of course, my next door neighbour decided to have an, actual, conversation with somebody in her back yard, which, I must admit, I found disturbing. That is to say, it disturbed my reading, it didn't bring me mental anguish, you understand. Well, it did, but the kind that made me lose track of the sentence I was reading and not the type they may have provoked me to drive a truck into a crowd. What was she thinking? Get a phone, and a set of ear plugs and tune out to the world like everybody else, you crazy woman. Get on the tele-screen and stop being ridiculous.

Anyway, being the good Virgo that I am, I found it all too irritating to have to re-position the pages every time I turned one. I juggled them as best as I could, however, it took me away from the story too often. The chance of disappearing into the narrative, letting the world fade away around me, letting all the stupidity of 2016 release from my brain, was just too hard when the pages slipped every which way. "Fuck it," I said out loud. Not conducive to suddenly being 100 pages down, now was it. "Grrrrr!" I tired again. "Where is your stickability?" Damn! It was no good. It was like having a fly buzzing around, or tap dripping, it never went away.

So what to do?

What to do, indeed? I scoured my bookshelf for a second copy? It was possible. I found 3 copies of Charlotte's Web, the first book I ever read. (The second book I ever read was Wind in The Willows,  there were 2 copies of that, closely followed by Winnie the Pooh, which my gorgeous Aunty May used to read to me, when I wasn't reading it myself) I found 2 copies of David Malouf's Johnno, a book I am fairly sure I haven't even read once. I found a copy of all of George Orwell's other novels, but not a second copy of 1984.

So what to do?

The copy I had was, of course, all complete. All it needed was a bit of glue on the spine. (You know, like most of us) Maybe some tape... I was transported instantly back to being a kid, being a teenager, covering my books. Repairing my books. Making do. I got out my magic tape and taped it all back together again. It doesn't fit back together very well, as we all know, taping up a book is never very successful, like rebuilding a life, it is never quite the same as it once was. It is certainly a hunchback of a book now, I didn't quite get the one middle page that had come completely adrift from its binding back into perfect position, but, at least now, I can read it without it falling to pieces with every page turn.

My mum Lottie would be pleased. I can hear her now, "Don't buy another copy of a book you already have, ridiculous, don't waste your money."

Anyway, that's all, back to George.

Trickle Down Economics and the Liberal Party Business Tax Cuts

The Liberal Party economic platform is classic trickle down economics that claims greater business profits leads to jobs and growth for everyone. The Liberal Party company tax cuts to business would be passed on in more jobs and more employment. The business tax cuts would go to the 4 big banks. What profit did the Commonwealth Bank make last year? Approx 4 billion dollars.

The Commonwealth Bank closed its large branch in Smith Street just recently and replaced it with a smaller branch in which the tellers have been replaced with machines. That is right, the Commonwealth Bank in Smith Street no longer has tellers at all, just machines. That is what trickle down economics is doing for the banking sector. If business makes more profits it shares it out amongst the people? It is simply bullshit.

1984

The houseguest (Mark, my exboyfriend) hs departed for parts... um... er... known, the boyfriend is at the salt mines, chip, chip, chip. Patricia Highsmith amused me for a day with her wonderful little stories, but such a quick read. So, time to get my nose buried in another book. What to read? 

I was inspired by a question on QI the other night. The audience was asked to put up their hands as to who has read 1984? Apparently, people say they have read it when they haven’t. Then the audience was asked to put up their hands who had lied about reading 1984? I thought to myself, it has been so long since I have read it, can I even really remember it? 

So, I scuttled off down to my book shelf and found my copy. I looked at the publish date and it said 1981, so I reckon that was probably when I read it last. Dear me, how many years ago was that? So tucked up in bed with Buddy on one side and Fluff (we're dog sitting for friends, have I mentioned that?) on the other, I opened to the first page. The problem being that my copy is falling to pieces, all the pages have come lose and are slipping out as I hold it up. I can’t read like that. So, it looks like a trip to the second hand book shop is now in order. Damn it!

My little pink veedub... you know the tune, sing along

Fun in a Sidecar

I want to ride in a sidecar before I die, fresh air in the hair, a cool breeze blowing on my face. I reckon that would be a lot of fun. Don’t you think? I guess it is a romantic idea, but what is wrong with romantic ideas? We all need a little more romance. Ultimately, I’d like it to be around Europe, with Sam, but as Sam doesn’t drive, it would have to be me behind the wheel, er, handlebars, um, in the driver’s seat. I must teach Sam to drive. Of course, that would be a car and a motorbike would be a completely other thing… so, I’m guessing, that the sidecar thing, with Sam, is never going to happen. Pity. Sad face. It would be such fun. Such fun.

Goggles, helmet, a leather jacket, I can almost feel the bugs in my teeth already. Glorious.

Don't be a Clown

Don't be a clown, don't act the fool. Says who? Who is to judge? Where does such thinking lead? To a world where we take ourselves too seriously? Laughter is out of fashion in these uncertain times.

Fight against the seriousness... where did all the humour go? Rage against, rage against... mutiny it is, if you are not doing what is right for the country. Un-country-ian. Wrapped in a Country Flag.

Mutiny doesn't sound so bad, when it is a mutiny of clowns. Big feet, painted faces, curly wigs, striped onesies, walking the plank. Toot, toot, sounds the horn.

Can you imagine? 

Collected from Clown Alley, where they laze about and smoke cigarettes and drink beer and tell lurid jokes. Cranky clowns, not wanting to tell humorous stories any more, not feeling funny in this more and more and serious world. 

"The fun has gone out of it," said Happy.

"The conservative politicians have divided this world into rich and poor, for their mates, with their lies, and their alibis," said Lucky.

"I don't like children any more," said Magic. "Not since the mother's have given them the world to control."

First thing in the morning, the clowns were rounded up with cattle prods by the politicians who think they are entitled to be the moral police, because they would no longer dance to the tune of the conservative monkey men. They are forced onto boats in Clown Harbour and taken out to where Clown Bay is the deepest. Pushed out onto planks and made to tell their last joke before they are pushed one by one from the end of the plank. Clowns famously can't swim. Nya, Nya, Nya-Nya, Nya.

There goes Happy and Lucky and Magic too.

The Coulrophiliasts would be cheering from the shore line.

Everyone's favourite heart attack venue, the local food court

Bowie was that - Ru Paul

I talk about the sweet, sensitive souls, the people who are my tribe, you know? And how hard it is to navigate your heart in this plane, in this linear, basic, mediocre, hypocritical world. To find those beacons of light in that darkness is such a gift.

Bowie was that.

- RuPaul

Small, fluffy dog

We are dog sitting a small fluffy dog for a friend. She is kind of sweet, for a small, fluffy dog. I shall call her Fluffy.

And while Buddy is cool with her, Milo wants to kill her. I'm not sure what his problem is, as we have dog sat before and while he's been a bit miffed initially, that is about it and he has been fine  with it pretty quickly. In no time the 3 of them are sitting together at the kitchen door waiting for their food. This time, however, he is not giving in. He keeps running after Fluffy hissing and spitting, with the attitude of a jungle mercenary. I'm not sure if he'd do Fluffy any, actual, damage, but it is concerning.

Milo is bigger than Fluffy. And Fluffy is the full disaster. She lives in an apartment, she has only ever pissed and crapped on a fake grass mat on the balcony of a high rise and she has an owner who is dirtphobic, so Fluffy is never allowed to play in the dirt and if, by chance, she does get a paw muddy she is bathed immediately and blow dried and perfumed. So, you know, there is a lot for Milo to be judgemental about. I'm wondering if he is confused, because Fluffy doesn't smell like anything the animal kingdom has ever produced.

We were told that Fluffy has never had a real bone and she is only to be given the completely factory manufactured treats with which she came. The first morning she was here, I let her out the back and she'd been out there for a while, so I went out to see what she was doing. She had found one of Buddy's bones and was happily munching away on it, so I left her to it. Sometime later she came back inside with bone scum smeared right across her furry mouth smelling like dead cow. I laughed. About time you were a real dog, I thought. I laughed. What would your owner think?

I Don't Want More Choices, I Just Want Better Options

I suggested we go to the movies last week, when Sam, and I, were at a loose end. Sam said, "Wait until Tuesday."

I invited Jill to come to the movies too, she's always up for it. True to form, Jill has an massage at 11am and an appointment in the city at 4pm. What time does that leave for a movie?

So, it comes down to Victoria Gardens, or the Jam factory. The movie selection was abysmal, what was it the choice between Finding Dory, or Mike and Steve need brains... er... dates.

I was just in the shower, and getting ready when I had a moment to myself and I thought, what was supposed to be a spur of the moment thing to fill in a few hours, last week, has become a highly organised and scheduled event to a movie that I really have no interest in seeing. How did this happen?

It is somewhat of a metaphor for modern life, I chuckled to myself. Capitalism gives us more and more choices, but due to cost restraints and manufacturing economies of scale, and the shareholders profits, more and more they are choices that none of us really want. It is a brave new world. Indeed.

Bring on the shit movie and the shit food and the crap seats and a good fucken time will be had by all.

I love Fitzroy architecture

Sam is home

Sam is home. He has been home since the beginning of July. 

I told you he got retrenched. Second time. It is the way of the world now. Don't think you have any security in your job now a days, because you don't. All those extra hours you put in won't protect you when the axe comes. I have never understood why we all do those extra hours, you don't see your employer giving away legal advice for nothing, or your tech company doing software for gratis, now do you? The moral basis for business has evaporated, if business ever had a moral basis? (Good old days? Nyer.) Now, business would chop its mother into small, gruesome pieces and sell those pieces as a cancer cure-all, if that is what it took to survive.

So Sam starts his new job in a week. He has been distracting me, I haven't had time to myself to write anything. Sam likes to keep me busy doing stuff. You know, you must "do" keep on "doing" because you know that is what life is all about. So we have been "doing" house things and driving to the country to visit friends, all very lovely, and with my seal of approval - even if it meant I had to move my lazy arse out the door.

We were going to go to Tokyo. And then we were going to go to Bali. Then it was New Zealand. You know, get away. Take a holiday. But, I find my fear of flying has come back. I never was scared of flying, I rather loved it, but then I was young. Then, when I was coming home from living in London for an extended period, all of those plane crashes happened. I booked my ticket to return to Aus and it seemed to be the trigger for a multitude of plane crashes, so much so that by the time I was getting on the plane to fly home just before Xmas it was foremost on my mind. Then it just developed from there like a virus. And for quite a few years I was the sweaty palmed, ashen white, nervous flier. Then some years after that, I remember I was flying to the Gold Coast on my own and I just decided that I was sick of all the wasted energy it took to be scared of flying. I used to drive up to the country late on Friday nights, accelerating up to 130, 140 kph once I'd got onto the back roads, never once worrying about my safety and it occurred to me as that Gold Coast bound plane taxied out to the run way, if I could drive like that with never a care, I could relax and let the pilot do his thing without being scared. And for the longest time I flew places without being scared at all.

But with all of these planes being blown up by radical muslims and being shot down by the Russians, and being carelessly lost by the Malaysians, my fear of flying has crept back and now I am like scared again. So, I wasn't so keen to fly anywhere. Poor Sam.

So he has kept my busy while he is off work.

Anyway, I'll write something in a week.

Sam and Buddy walking along Jackson Creek in the afternoon, yesterday in Gisborne on our drive into the country to catch up with a friend and to get out of the house.

A Cry for Help

So we lanced the Queensland political boil, yet again, and out spurted Pauline Puss, just as rancid as it has always been.

The sad, racist, hateful, ignorant, fool that she is, is back. And nothing has changed, she is still spewing the same old poison she did twenty years ago. She still has no idea that she is the problem and not the solution.

She is the living embodiment of what the lack of education, and therefore cuts to education, can produce. As are most of her supporters, I assume. We really need to put billions more into education, if we don't want people like this spreading their ignorance in future.

We also need to listen to the cry for help. People are clearly hurting, if they would follow the fool who is Pauline Hanson so easily.  What they are really afraid of are not Muslims, but the loss of jobs and the loss of stability in their lives. Abbott and fatboy Hocky so smugly destroyed the car industry, something, amongst other things, that gave people jobs and security. That is the real problem, Liberal's non-existant trickle down economics that in all reality only favours the rich and leaves the poor looking for messiahs in all the wrong people.

We need to accept, despite how they express their concerns, people do have valid reasons to be concerned. In the last 20 years Australia has become one of the least protected markets in the world. However, the prosperity promised as result of these changes never arrived. Instead services and businesses have shrunk and vanished. Lives have been whittled away by neo-liberal economics and globalisation from the Right; and shifts in worldview and social justice from the Left. This is a group of people who are no longer at the centre of Australia’s life, and they have been left to fend for themselves without any help to transition or understand the change. They feel justifiably marginalised…

The Liberal governments are doing nothing to help the working class, because most of them have no idea what it means to be working class.

We need to put billions more into jobs, rather than pretending that our free trade agreements will help anyone other than the rich.

The blood on the hands of property developers hanging over Fitzroy as it is destroyed by yet another ugly, high rise building development built by fat, ugly men, no doubt with very small penis', who live in suburbs a long, long way away.

The road is paved with gold leading to the stairway to retail nirvana  heaven where people can, at least, feel as though they are worth something

Wonder woman with her tits out

Oh, it is "that" sort of day

Oh, it is "that" sort of day, the kind where one is greatful that one doesn't have to venture outside.  Brrrrr!

I've lit the fire, in front of which the bulldog is comfortably stretched out and Sam and I are laptops at twenty paces, oh, um, 3 paces, I just measured it out, on either side of the coffee table, as the rain falls tinkly on the tin roof.

And the morning drifts away, all overcast and closed in around us.

Then, seemingly, in no time at all, Sam is behind the pasta machine making us lunch. He bought a pasta machine the other day, he's wanted one for the longest time. I told him that the chefs I'd known had only ever used one of those silver, manual type machines, but Sam wouldn't listen. He wanted electric. He wanted fully automatic. He wanted a machine that would do all the work. I perused the cooking, expecting olives and anchovies and tomatoes and oregano, but instead I saw green and garlic and chilli and meat, which, apparently is called Chinese Italian fusion, veggie and beef pasta. Lovely. My tummy is all a flutter with gastric juices in anticipation.
The pasta was great.

The cat is curled on the rug on the couch.

The carpenters are playing. Rainy days and Mondays and all of that.

It rained all day. Sometimes it rained hard, smashing into the roof crash bang, crash, crash, crash, until you think the spouts are going to overflow and water is going to leak into the house. The sun never really came out, just grey all day. We didn't leave the house. I kind of love those days, who cares if you stay in doors all day.

We listened to music. I wrote. Sam studied up on programming, as he starts a new job in 2 weeks. He got retrenched, for the second time. But he got a new job in a week, the first job, and as it turned out, the only job he went for. Clever him.

I'm still feeling allergic to work. I tell people I am on long service leave... which I am. Shrug. I'd rather be broke doing something I love, than be rich and be unhappy. Of course, being both is the trick.

How can I live without you?

John Winston Howard

Mr Sheen

People seem to think that John Howard was a great prime minister, he has been mythologised into someone with legendary status, however that was not always true of him, he was very nearly a huge failure.

Paul Keating once labelled his attempt at a come back as, “Lazarus with a triple bypass.” Against all the odds, John Howard is heading for a place in Australia's political pantheon not far behind his hero, Robert Menzies.

However, he presided over such a period of boom, really, he lucked into times of plenty, like Australia never seen, that I am sure you could have put up Spot the dog to run the country during that period, and Spot the dog would have been thought of as just as great.

Poor little Malcolm

Turnbull had to be coaxed out of hiding by assurances that he’d actually won the election. His car was bought around sometime after midnight, as he cried, "I want my mummy, I want my mummy," as Lucy picked up the dummy from the floor near by, and held him to her breast coo'ing, "Mummy is here. Mummy is here," as she dried the tears from his cheeks, and changed him into his "big pants" before he went out in public.

Voting Day

Voting Day, time for a sausage, and time to stand in line, and to stand in the line, and to stand in the line, to mark off your numbers on the green ballot paper for the person you least detest. Sad really. Such an indictment on the Western World.

And the pollies around the world are too self focused to see that the people are turning against them, and on them. Have a good look at what has been going on over the last few years.

Never the less, today is the day to vote out the lies and deceit and the right wing nut jobbery of Tony Abbott and the Abbott/Turnbull Govt. Time to vote out the wishy washy Malcolm Turnbull, the man, so it would seem, would sell his mother down the river at a chance at being Prime Monster.

Remember, a vote for Turnbull is a vote for Abbott

Vote for marriage equality

Vote for Medicare

Vote for a better education for all

Vote “no” to greater inequality

Vote for meaningful action on climate change

Vote out the lies of the past three years

Vote Labor

Truffles Turnbull