Secret Night Time Inter-Caribbean Death Flight

I have a flight simulator game. I like to play in real time so I usually create short flights. I like to create a scenario for my flights. In one I try to smuggle opium in an old DC-3 from Papua New Guinea across the Torres Straights to Darwin, Australia. I’m not sure how it got to PNG in the first place. I don’t ask questions.

The other night I flew from Cape Canaveral, FLA to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba in an F4 Phantom. They go close to mach II so it didn’t take too long, I left an hour before dawn on a storming morning and arrived just after sun-up.

I was on a secret mission from the REAL government. The one run by former Nazis who recorded their brain waves on magnetic tape and now control the US and parts of Quebec through the power grid, from a central computer. It is not located at Cape Canaveral, it’s somewhere else. I don’t ask questions. (Mt. Rushmore)

I flew through storms, navigating my way down the west coast of Florida and over the dark seas. The lights of Key West flickered below and then were gone. I was left with my thoughts, cruising along at 12,000 feet while lightning flashed on my right and the cresting sun began to bore an orange hole in sooty storm clouds to my left.

I didn’t want to go down there. I’m not really a fan of nazi-computer-brain-controlled governments. Their record on tax concessions is laughable and they tend to be evil domineering overlords. Nobody needs that.

But hey, the job was worth fifty bucks and I needed cash. Wanted to buy a sandwich later and though I doubted it would come to $50, I don’t like to be caught short. I could want cake. Lord, I hoped not.

And then air traffic control came on, switch to Guantanamo Approach, runway nine miles south west, and there it was at my 1-o-clock, that dirty dry outpost on the tip of Castro’s mad little island. A twisted parody of normality, the US meets Lord Of The Flies. My stomach began to knot and memories flooded back. From last time. From what happened last time and for what I was going to have to do this time. This time there would be no mistakes, no slips, no betrayal. Flaps down, gear down, twelve hundred feet, three miles from Destiny.

And then I stalled and crashed. That game is fucking hard.

How to make a partical accelerator from folded paper

“Oh sure, she’ll work. It WILL work but you should hook it up the proper way.”

I explained, again, that the stupid phone company only offers stupid wireless internet which requires I use their stupid modem which uses stupid USB and NOTHING ELSE to connect to a computer and therefore I cannot connect the new wireless router in the manner depicted by the helpful diagram on the box, indeed the very same way yon salesman espouses.

“Why don’t you just plug the laptops in with a cable?” He held up a cable. “This’ll plug right into that router, no problem”

I pointed out that then the wireless LAN would not actually be wireless.

“But that would work alright.”

I know it will work, that’s what I do now. The fact I am in your store trying valiantly to purchase a wireless router implies I do not wish to have a cable connection. I got a box full of wired routers and modems, I’m quite ok in that area, it’s the wireless I seek. No wires. Computers talk-talk through air. Wires all gone.

One hundred and ninety eight dollars. Mull that over while repeating the phrase “Oh, she’ll work alright…”

The laptops detect the router. Check. The router detects the server. Check. The server detects the internet. Check.

However the server is absolutely fucking oblivious there is any other router or any other computers on the network. It’s little network map shows just itself sitting their smugly guarding access to the stupid phone company’s stupid modem and the internet beyond.

So now the laptops can talk to each other, but not to the server and not to the internet. Big whoop, I could do that with bluetooth.

I bet they didn’t have these kinds of problem in the thirties. You bought yourself a radio weighing approximately seventy five pounds, plugged her in and boom, there’s a jazz quartet, or news about polio.

And bluetooth meant something else entirely. I mean, it must have. Maybe it described a lazy person who ate blueberries all day. I’m pretty sure Teddy Roosevelt never used the term, so it probably wasn’t that popular except in the blueberry belt. Or in areas adjacent to the blueberry belt to describe those within the blueberry belt.

Anyway, my router does not work.

. xcc-p

I created a monster. Of steel and wheels and tiny jewels, to walk in my place, to steal small things and bring them to me. He rolls his limbs across the country side, solar powered by day and determined by night. Looking for silver-light junk and interesting sights. And he’ll radio-rescue them, if conditions are right.

My monster can climb trees to reach the second floor. He can pick locks or break down doors. Guaranteed not to leave marks upon the floor. My monster does what monsters are for.

He makes a faint whirring noise.

I created a monster with no blood or shoes, he has no heart and nothing to lose. He finds me things, tells me things too. He brought me this, but nothing to do. So he went back out to bring back you.

screens of pain

Don’t let the screen door hit you on the way out. If you let it, it will just keep doing it. Don’t let it, discourage it. Speak sharply to it, make eye contact. Try to appear taller.

Either that or disconnect the spring at the top.

This also works with threatening dogs, except the spring part, dogs have no springs. That’s threatening, not committed. You can tell from the eyes. A dog that has made up its mind to attack does not bark and is looking where he plans to go. If a dog is looking you in the eye it’s because he’s worried what you might do. When he stops looking it’s because he doesn’t care. That’s a committed dog.

Screen doors lack the ability to form such commitment. They are never sure, confident. You might slam them, which is bad for them. Also they are usually fixed to a door frame or other solid object which means they are more opportunist than predator. Hyenas of the home. This is why the screen door usually strikes from behind. Unless it is of the sliding variety in which case it tries to clip you from the side if it senses you are drunk or wounded. Or stupid.

And so it is, with a summer storm rolling in, Jessie the Dog who is afraid of nothing except thunder came up against the cunning tactics of the screen door - blocking her path, standing between the devil thunder and the safety of the space in the laundry room between the freezer and the wall. And, like a lion harried by nipping hyenas, when she decided to take on the screen with all her doggy force it was of little contest.

The carnage is difficult to imagine. The lower panel of screen in tatters, the upper panel grieving. Mosquitoes calling to their kin “the walls have fallen, the humans are ours.”

And now the storm breaks, the wind whips, the temperature drops and the rain begins to smash down, stripping the newly blossomed Jacaranda flowers from the trees.

So I don’t care because I’m closing the doors and windows anyway. Stupid dog can stay out there. Tomorrow I will repair the screen to confound and puzzle the mosquitoes (“no really, you could get right inside, where they live. They have pay TV”) but the screen will not care. Will not be grateful.

This is why I tell you not to let it hit you on the way out, give it no quarter, cut it no slack. Be firm with it, don’t take any shit, but don’t slam it. That’s bad for them.

a damn good rodgering

War

(huh)

What is it good for?

Settling political disputes.

(good God, y’all)

Say it again.



Wait till we get some more planets. Then we’ll have some wars, boy.

Mars is like Earth Lite® - most of the gravity without the annoying oxygen-rich atmosphere or embarrassing liquid water.

There are no fish on Mars. I’m certain of it. Now.

I hear India is planning to land a million men on the moon. I stole that one out of the newspaper. A column by one of those urbane metro-sexual types. Urbane, it’s a word, not urban, not ghetto, urbane. Like the people in an F. Scott Fitzgerald gig. Like an RAF Group Captain in a 1950’s British war movie named Rodger. Steady-on, Rodger.

Did you know, between 1939 and 1945 very few babies born in England were named Heinrich Himmler? Quite a few Rodgers though.

And they all went on to be RAF Group Captains.

“Rodger, whatever’s the matter?”

“Oh Dick we’ll never find the target in this bally fog! Sorry, …I didn’t mean to lose control.

“Quite alright considering the circumstances old man. Now, let's see how much scotch we can drink in 20 minutes.”

I stole the scotch line too. From an urbane comedian. So it’s ok because it’s in context or something.

Whatever. There’s still no fucking fish on Mars.

(huh)

Say it again.

why I like economic disasters

Now here’s something you don’t see everyday. While the US and England and the rest are tossing buckets of money at their failing banks, the Australian government is hucking it at the people. Everybody with kids is getting $1000 for each kid, retired folks are getting $2000 each just for being old. If you are buying your first home the government will slip you a cool 21K.

Young childless renters get fuck all.

The hope is we’ll spend the money on plasma TVs and fast food to stimulate the retail sector in time for Christmas.

Meanwhile I have become a smoker who is bothered by cigarette smoke. Fate having yet another little ironic dig at my expense. I swear cigarette smoke, in anything less than a class 3 gale, will stream directly into my nearest eye. Even in wind you can see the smoke fighting, resisting, trying to return to complete its mission to annoy me ceaselessly.

I was going to say annoy the living shit out of me. But I have no idea what living shit is. Doesn’t sound like something one would want within one. You’d think you’d want it annoyed out of you. But I can’t speak for everyone.

I'd rather be a ten year old cheerleader than a GWB

Last year P4’s cheerleading team won state and got 4th at nationals. This year they got 6th at state and won the nationals. Obviously the judges at these things are drunkards.

Meanwhile,

Sara Palin reminds me of the female villain on Kim Possible. At least I could see her going that way after a time. Some long black rubber gloves, crazy goggles…

What’s-his-name, the guy she’s running with, he’s looking more and more like Hank Hill’s dad.



Obama worries me too. He fits the profile in US politics for getting shot at. He should try to stand behind Sara Palin if possible.

And poor old GWB, what a time he’s had. Squeaked in by a whisker through some mighty dodgy election shenanigans and Inherited the Kingdom of Clinton, booming economy, all the soldiers on their own side, blowjobs in the Oval Office, and what happened? It all fell to shit on him, poor bastard.

9/11, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay naked prisoner stacking, Iraq, more Afghanistan, an anthrax scare, more Iraq, and to top it all off, the end of Free-market Capitalism and one of the corner-stones of US foreign policy in the most spectacular economic disaster yet seen. And of course more Iraq and Afghanistan.

It certainly wasn’t all his fault, for some of it he was just lucky. Yup, Clinton spent his two terms playing bad saxophone, eating Big Macs and inventing new uses for cigars while all GWB's cigars exploded in his face.

(muted trumpet)

Kevin The Brave

Well, sports fans better fill you in on recent events:

Wall Street fell apart.

SJ lost his job.

Wall Street got better.

SJ got another job.

Wall Street fell down again.

SJ got another, other job.

Wall Street ran away and joined the navy where it realized it could love other men without being a homo.

SJ finds itself with a better, easier, less stressful job closer to home and for more money. Hell, I save at least $80/week on fuel. And possibly a second, sub-contract job which pays even better. We shall see. As Jutratest once wisely said, God has a plan. By God he meant Alyssa Milano. He’s had a thing for her since Who’s The Boss.

However my old company - which did not crash and burn but rather trundled along like a garbage truck on fire rolling down a gentle slope until it just stopped there, smoking slightly – still owes me close to ten grand in unpaid wages and other benefits which I am not likely to ever see.

Maybe GWB could bail me out. I hear he’s giving away money. The Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, is in New York at the moment going around agreeing with people and delivering speeches to a half empty UN gathering. He’s all for the bail-out. It’s not his money. Hell you could buy Australia for 800 billion if you threw in some free steak knives.

What do you expect from a leader named ‘Kevin’? Kevin The Brave, that’s him. Firmly on the side of GWB or Popular Opinion, whichever is easiest.

I’m sorry I called you sports fans earlier. Maybe you hate sports. Perhaps you prefer the term enthusiast. I shouldn’t assume.

with joy on my shirt

Mother koala on the road tonight, little wee baby on its back. Baby kangaroos hopping across the road in the mornings, sparrows trying to nest here in the laboratory. The government declared spring began on September 1st and damn it if the critters didn’t listen. Marsupials are very civic minded.

Real team players, the pouched ones. They delegate well and work cohesively as a pro-active unit within their defined roles. That’s not to say they enjoy role-playing. For that they need to be forced. It’s hard to get them to wear the boots.

There is a little cafe in the village run by a lovely women whom I have known for some years. She will not wear the boots either, however she has a burger named after me, which I think is a far better endorsement on one’s character than any medal or parchment paper. It is a bacon-cheese-mushroom burger by the way, which Australians think I invented. It had not occurred to them to combine these ingredients before since none of them are pickled beet-root.

And now it has been announced P3 will be working there part-time. Oh joy doth burst from my heart and runneth down my shirt. P3’s first job only five minutes from home, with someone I know, who cooks great lasagne and names burgers after me.

Yes government-declared spring has sprung, the light is clearer. The air is warmer. I smell mushrooms.

Salted Hippies

To drum up a little interest in the blog I’ll be offering $5 for every comment left from now until the end of the year. To receive your prize simply send a S.A.S.E for each comment, along with a money order for $11.95 to cover shipping and handling in US, Canadian, Australian or one of the other good dollars, and I’ll send you five crisp Zimbabwean dollars by registered mail.

Ahhh Zimbabwean dollars, as plentiful as grains of sand, but not hardly as useful. You can’t drop Zimbabwean dollars one at a time on ants to make them think their god is punishing them by making it rain boulders. They don’t fall straight. Ants are not afraid of them. They have no concept of currency. Ants are like hippies, mindless robotic hippies with too many legs.

You throw a Zimbabwean dollar at a hippy, see if they care. Fuckers.

Now you got me all riled up about the hippies. Only thing worse than a hippy is a French hippy. Stinky French hippies, can’t stand them.

I got some McDonalds french fries the other day, I’m going somewhere with this, and there was no salt on them. I’m not one of those salt-people that has to put salt on everything, but man, McDonalds fries without salt taste really bad. Not like fries without salt, more like socks without salt.

Which is ironic because they only way to get rid of stinky, sock-like, French hippies is to pour salt on them, one grain at a time, which makes them think their god is punishing them by making it rain tiny boulders.

The wheel turns.

f O o l

I’m nobody’s fool. I am an independent.

The Olympics is on. Men are running and jumping, huffing and puffing, exchanging precious oxygen for evil CO2. The Olympics is ruining the planet. Also the Special Olympics at a lesser, albeit just as valid, rate. Last night they ran the 400m relay combined hurdles, heat 2, and sea levels rose half an inch. We need to find an alternative to coal-burning athletes.

What we need is an engine that runs on CO2 or rhetoric. A rhetorical engine.

What if we could lead hypothetical lives? You could ring up work and say “hey, if I was to come in today, what do you suppose I’d be doing” and they’d say “well, you know same old stuff, except we are having a staff BBQ at lunch because Tanya is leaving on Thursday, but she actually has Thursday’s off and she has clients Wednesday so we’re doing it today.” And you could reply “well let’s just say I came in and all that happened and you paid me a bonus”

You know, it would go on like that for a while but neither of you would know how to end it and you’d be trapped in a hypothetical discussion forever and our naïve dreams that a hypothetical society of hope and freedom where we have the freedom to hope will be crushed by it’s very enslavement of us in that cruel irony fate reserves for the worst of sinners and bus drivers.

I am an independent fool. I fought a battle with myself in the 1700’s. There is a flag, embassies in all major cities, the money is hard to copy.

I am an independent fool and if I close my eyes you cannot see me.

Why not to have girls:

SJ: Here, pose for a photo to email grandma (click)
P4: How was that? Was it sexy enough?
SJ: (!) There will be no being sexy at ten years old. Or twenty.
P4: Probably by then I won’t be able to help it.

Also I was thinking, as you do, about what fairytale character I might want to be if I was forced into such a situation. You know in Snow White, the Woodsman guy that lets her go instead of chopping of her head like the evil step-queen-witch said? I’d be that guy.

He said “look I’ll let you go but I’ll need to chop off your finger or something to show the old lady. I need this job until I get my firewood business up and running. And whatever you do, stay away from those freak-ass dwarves.”

And then you don’t hear from him again. His story-obligation is over. And, because he’s technically a Good Guy, he gets more royalties than, say, the evil mirror. It’s a union thing.

even megalomaniacs get the blues

That girl on the radio, if you should drive down there, if you should head on down there to destroy her, make sure you go in style. If you're gonna make your way down, through the gates of hell, you can’t take the Corolla or the Jeep Wagoneer. No. If you’re going through hell on a radio death mission you got two choices of transport my young sir. You got your flaming 1974 Gran Torrino wagon, flat black with the back doors welded shut and the rear window stuck down, that’s number one, then you got your flaming death cycle which looks like Batman’s Bat Cycle except the speedometer is in kilometres and it’s flaming. But not like the Bat Out Of Hell Meatloaf flaming bat cycle, that one was just made up. Some artist made that one up. Meatloaf was too busy making up songs which feel like someone poking you in the chest, songs which bring the roaring and make you want to head downtown, 3 miles past hell, to destroy the radio girl.

She uses too much inflection. She is her own Doppler effect. If an air-raid siren could read an ad for Sleep City Warehouse they wouldn’t need her. Like a fat worm doing the Soul-Train chug-a-chug into your brain. Oops there goes the left side, better head out.

Take the Torrino, on second thought, it’s chilly out there. I taped over the window, it should hold, and when you go through hell don’t forget to toss out a silver dollar so’s they keep the gates open for you. I’ll wait for your call, the signal it’s been done, or you can text me. Or, if the radio girl wins, if she warbles you down, sets up a harmonic resonance within your molecular structure, reducing you to a pool of burst-cell ruptured bio-mass at her feet, well then don’t worry about it, I'll get by.

But I fooled them, I did have the rabies.

One government agency won’t accept the letter another government agency gave me to prove I’m a legal resident of this country. “This letter is from 2004”, they said, “you’ll need to get another one.” I pointed out that I was granted permanent residency in 2004, so it makes sense the letter is dated as such. Let’s listen….

“Hmmf. Do you have your passport with you?”

“No, it’s expired anyway.”

“You don’t have a current passport?”

“No, do you?”

“I don’t need one.”

“Do I?”

“Uh, well, if you plan to travel overseas you do.”

“And you don’t?”

“Everyone does. But I’m not travelling.”

“I’m just on my way home from work.”

“Do you own any property here in Australia?

“Better, I own property right here in town.”

She keeps flipping my driver’s license over in her hands, “What’s this address on the back? Is this your property, the address on the front, or the one on the back?”

“Both.”

“But you can’t have two addresses on your license.”

“The one on the back is the stick-on change of address label they gave me when I moved. You have to put that on.”

“So you… so this one on the back is yours then.”

“No, well yes. Both are mine.”

“You live in two houses?”

“No I live in the one on the back.”

“But… you still own the other one, on the uh (flip) front, is that it?”

“That’s it.”

“Well we need a tax notice or something like that to prove you own property. Would you suppose you might have something like that?”

“I’m sure I would have something like that. I got one last month.”

“And we’ll need a new letter from Immigration.”

“But why? I’m already in your system, you just didn’t send me a new [Medicare] card when my last one expired.”

“Why have you waited until now, your last card expired two years ago?”

“I didn’t need to see a doctor until now. And now it looks like I can’t.”

“Since it’s been more than six months you have to re-apply. We need a new letter from Immigration.”

“But I never applied in the first place, you just started issuing me cards. Then you stopped. Well not you. You know. Them.”

“If it was less than six months…”

“Ok so if it was less than six months you would accept the letter dated 2004 but now you want a new letter, saying exactly the same thing, but dated recently because some letters degrade into forgeries over time?”

She unconsciously began to finger the paper of the letter and told me all about the six month thing again and it was clear all was lost. I now have to leave this mildly irritating example of bureaucracy, a tiny local office with a staff of two, and enter the maw of the beast that is the mighty Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs in Sydney. DIMA must hire a lot of the people it processes because every time I call there I get someone who can’t speak fucking English and knows nothing of Australia except their neighbourhood in bloody Redfern (Sydney). I once had to call 4 different times until I got someone who could give me a list of doctors in my (non Sydney) area certified to give me a medical exam for my immigration application, make sure I don’t have the TB or the rabies.

“I live on the North Coast, not Sydney, is there anyone up around here?”

“There’s one in Parramatta…”

Parramatta is to Sydney what Oakland is to San Francisco except there’s no collapsible bridge. Parra-fucking-matta would have saved me 20 minutes off a 6 hour drive.

No I’m not looking forward to this. Also this damn letter is going to cost $100 according to the website. But the nice thing about bureaucracies is that they’re like slot machines, same dollar – different pictures. I might just go try my luck at a different medicare office, I hear the one on the other side of town is paying out…

Seige Weapon Of Mass Destruction

Here's a little something I knocked up over in the lab on the weekend. Something to keep the barbarians away from the gate.

TLASITSH

Sydney got itself one of those Apple stores. People lined up over night to be one of the first admitted to the white palace of Apple. The temple of Apple, crafted from pure white. Not white coloured materials, white. A large block of solid white was airlifted into place and craftsmen in dark goggles carved a store out of it. Reporters cruised the line talking to the freezing geeks when suddenly word spread one fellow had come all the way from America for the opening! Well sir they found him and said “Sir we understand you came all the way from America to be here” and the man said in fluent American “Uh, no. I came from Brisbane.” And the shaken reporter said hopefully “But you are American though right?” and the man said “No, Canadian actually… from Brisbane. Sorry.” But the reporter wasn’t beat and reminded us that, even if no Americans were there, it was still the Largest- Apple- Store- In- The- Southern- Hemisphere. So there.

They depend on that a lot here. Australia has the tallest wooden train trestle in the Southern hemisphere, the largest uranium mine, the biggest sheep station, the most fucked up version of English. Lots of stuff.

It’s a crafty move. What else have you got this side of the equator? South Africa? Brazil? The rest of the countries are what they call ‘developing’. It’s like at school kids don’t ‘fail’ anymore, now they are just marked ‘yet to achieve’. The rest of the hemisphere is ocean except for Antarctica which, as far as I know, has no wooden train trestles at all. Perhaps further inland but I doubt it.

I’m quite sure some Aussies don’t actually believe in the northern hemisphere at all. A mystical land where they have Christmas in the winter and there’s a country where almost all the people speak French. French! Maybe in books written by artsy people from Melbourne, but not for real.

It’s the same inferiority-compensation that Canadians are good at. America may have the world’s strongest economy (well it used to be), the most powerful armed forces, the latest in technology but Canada, Canada has the world’s longest coastline you know. Yeah.

But they know it’s lame and that’s why Canadians are apologising for not being Americans in front of The Largest Apple Store In The Southern Hemisphere.

the further adventures of Muleshoes

That’s something nobody saw coming. Globalization has been heavily protested, often violently, for years. Fears of a world where a few mega-corporations control what we consume, how we live. Sort of an Orwellian Big Brother but with attractive packaging and a catchy slogan. Those are the concerns but of course things never work out the way we predict otherwise, according to 1950’s estimates, we should all be flying around in atomic-powered Cadillac’s by now.

Seems people around the world are starting to get a tad upset over fuel prices and governments and corporations are getting nervous. Of course in a global economy you also have global-size consumers and those consumers are not used to taking shit from business. When you get a whole country-full pissed off it has a lot more power than some guy sending back his soup (never send food back, are you mental? I’ve worked in kitchens). If you get several countries pissed off, well, I’m not sure anybody knows just what would happen. Business does not like uncertainty. Governments do not like uncertainty. Some dogs do not like thunder.

Just to complete the list.

In Greece the residents of the island of Lesbos are in court trying to get women-who-prefer-to-do-their-own-carpentry to stop calling themselves Lesbians. Except the gay residents of the island which are of course already Lesbians, like everybody else living there. Even the children are little bright-eyed Lesbians, learning Lesbian history in their little Lesbian schools. There’s even a Lesbian McDonalds, but anybody can go.

Make up your own fillet-o-fish jokes.

The best my spell check could come up with for McLesbos was ‘muleshoes’. I dunno either, I guess like horseshoes but stockier and sterile.

Sounds like the indigenous sidekick in a 50’s matinee western.

“Train come soon.”

“Good job Muleshoes, how can you tell? Subtle vibrations on the tracks?”

“No. Is almost four-o-clock. Dickhead.”

Ahhh Muleshoes, you’re the greatest.

Gitmo awarded Best Offshore Military Torture Prison by Shackle Magazine.

I know a guy who’s one of those big time TV writers. Family-values type drama with a serrated edge, that’s his bag. If he wrote the Brady Bunch it would be much the same except Mike Brady would have a colostomy bag because their old dog chewed out his small intestine while he lay passed out for nine days after putting out a Valium® fire and inhaling the fumes. Valium is quite flammable. They used to fire the old trans-Atlantic steam ships on raw valium if they were attempting a record crossing. The practice was halted after the Titanic fell asleep (it’s the fumes are the problem) and hit an ice-berg.

But me, I don’t write like that. I don’t have any stories, can’t think of any. Not the kind with traditional subjects like people and places, a plot. I could write about a bucket handle, or an ant’s left back leg, or the particular odour of a particular winter afternoon in 1988 (light, clear, a little like soap). And two pages is getting wordy for those sorts of things. How anyone writes a whole novel or play or TV series or progressive rock concept album, I cannot grasp.

If you make it short enough and obscure enough you can call it a poem. I’ve written hundreds of poems, but I don’t get poetry. Can’t read other’s poetry, it’s like hearing someone describe to you their dream. It’s only interesting to them. I read a poem once in university called “Ode To A Grecian Urn”, pretty straightforward, you’d think, obviously the guy had a thing for pottery. But no, turns out it’s not about Grecian urns at all. No, it’s all symbolic and shit.

So who knows what the fuck it means except the guy who wrote it and maybe not him either. A lot of poets were opium addicts or homosexuals, both of which can be prone to absentmindedness. This is also the reason they don’t get to be president. Ok, that’s not true. There are other reasons too. When you call up Gitmo to see how the torture’s going, you don’t want any flowery bullshit, you want facts and figures. Save the iambic pentameter for when you got to explain wars and such.

I wish I was a gangsta rapper
I wish I was a hip-hop star
I wish I was a short sharp jab
That went a bit too far

I would cast my head in gold
I would cast my feet in clay
I would catch me all them sinners
Come round on judgement day

I wish I was a bill collector
High on life and rum
An inter-dimensional corrector
Doer of things un-done

All the world could follow
My antics on TV
Watch me fix the fixers
Balanced on my knee

Until I grew weary
Indistinguishable from insane
Encouraging bacteria
To feed upon my brain

I wish I was a gangsta rapper
In a gold plated car
A super techno DJ
Admired from afar

Not (going to be) Easy Being Green

If the earth was a business, if it were to be managed properly, you’d kill off all the animals that you couldn’t eat, experiment on, or ride for amusement. You’d wipe out the forests and plant food crops. You’d take money spent on weapons and reality TV and use it instead to create ways to regulate the environment. You’d look into mining the moon, cold fusion, nano-construction, that sort of gear.

You do that and things should tick right along. And you’ll have to, eventually.

What else can there be? Eventually we’ll all be standing shoulder to shoulder in a living museum where we can’t touch anything or it might go extinct and with better and better medicine we’ll get to stand there a long time, while more and more of us keep popping up. Something’s got to give. It’s simple physics.

There isn’t room for everything.

Should we do the noble thing and kill ourselves off to save the planet? Mass cullings every century, or generation. Our entire species becoming Jesus? It’s only purpose to constantly sacrifice itself to save the world. Caretakers of a garden, nurturing and aiding the other species and then throwing ourselves into the sea or maybe a volcano. Which ever was handy. Maybe the bodies would have to be shot into space, as burying or burning them would contaminate the garden. Rocket powered Ascension to Eden. Go Jesus Go.

Heavy.

Ah, well that won’t happen for a little while yet. Not my problem. Every age had it’s problems. The Middle Ages had that pesky Black Death, the Thirties had the Depression and the future will have the Jesus thing. My only problem is the price of diesel fuel. Not that bad really. Probably won’t die from it. Now and then there’s a lull I guess.

magma

I dreamed the centre of the earth was accessible to all for a small fee and we went down there one Sunday morning, my sweetie and me. They put you on a sort of fire-proof roller coaster except it doesn’t go up and down, just down. And there’s a bar. Umbrella drinks are popular. They are fire-proof umbrellas for safety.

And we got to sit at the front and my sweetie turned to me and said “we get to sit at the front” and I nodded. I thought it was odd there were windshield wipers, but I’m no geologist. Neither is she. Not anymore.

A man in a blue cap, he also had pants, took our tickets and we were soon under way. When we reached 10 thousand leagues under the surface a pleasing female voice told us to put on our 10 thousand league glasses for safety and to help extinguish our individuality. It says about the glasses right on the ticket so you got to wear them. My dreams are strict. I got arrested once in my dream and couldn’t make bail. I did thirty days. Everyone thought I was in a coma.

After about three hours we pulled into Earth Central which is just what you’d imagine: a vast ball of molten rock and iron, but more commercial. You can’t get out or anything cause of the molten-ness but you are allowed to take non-flash photography. Sweetie took a picture but it just came out red.

And then we climbed the ladder back to the surface which took most of the afternoon, and found our car had been broken into. The portal to the centre of the earth is in a bad area, as you would expect. They took all our change and a Kleenex box full of raw opium we had been saving but I didn’t call the cops. I didn’t need any more trouble from them. I can’t face another coma.

Stickening Situation

More in our series of foods I have never eaten:

28) Coal.

Now tonight’s episode. The truck was making a funny ‘worp worp’ sound and I was worried it might be the differential. Turned out to be a stick stuck up in the suspension, rubbing on the inside of the wheel, and I was relieved. The next day the truck developed a melodic ‘fffffffwiiiiiing’ sound, a bit like brakes, and I was again worried about costly repairs. I hate doing brakes. But it was another stick, other side this time, jammed way up there above the back axel and rubbing at the inside of the tire. And I was again relieved at the simple nature of the problem.

Except now I think people are sticking sticks, someone stuck a stick, how are sticks getting up there?

Do I need stick guards? Can you get them this time of year?

I saw a documentary once and these apes, chimps I think, or possibly Frenchmen, were just sort of sitting around and this really mental one with an erection came screeching out of the bush brandishing a big stick and causing a general ruckus.

That’s another way sticks can be a problem.

I used to go around picking up all the sticks on the lawn, but now I just mow them over. It’s not good for the mower but it was made in USA and if it breaks they give you another one free. As long as you’re not a terrorist, the friend of a terrorist or be able to spell terrorist, then there is a small shipping and handling fee.

I tell you one thing, that fucking monkey was a terrorist. Running around like that with his woody and his stick, scaring all the other chimps. Someone could lose an eye. Nobody loves a one eyed chimp. Or Frenchman. Could have been Frenchmen. You know, the more I think about it…

I’m worried the French have found my compound and are taking the sticks off my lawn and jamming them up under my truck, causing it to make odd sounds. Almost like they’re trying to communicate with me.

What can they want? Cheese? I have no cheese. Not much. Shit.

US channeled top secret Burma footage, hogs to self

Hey what’s the deal? I’m watching The News Hour With Jim Lehrer, hosted by a woman who is not Jim Lehrer, and they have a report from Burma which is also Myanmar, and the non-Jim lady warns it may contain ‘images of a disturbing nature’ and suddenly I get a blue screen with the words VIDEO FOR THIS REPORT RESTRICTED while the audio continues to run in the background. SBS, the network airing it here, apparently, found it too disturbing for Aussies.

What the hell was in it, that is ok to air in America but not Australia? Australia where nudity and swearing in the media is common and R-rated films are shown un-cut on TV. Australia where there is an ad depicting two gentlemen playing a piano duet with their erect penises (peni?)...

And then there's America where I’m not sure if they’re allowed to say ‘shit’ yet on network TV, where Janet Jackson’s nipple threatened to bring about the end of days, where people go to the bathroom or washroom but never the toilet. What the hell could be ok for America but not Australia?

WHAT WAS IT?

I must know. Ok, what are the facts:

1) The only people who don’t want bad pictures coming out of Burma is the government of Burma.

2) Australia is sort of close to Burma geographically, kind of, if you sort of tilt your head.

3) Slugs have two different types of slime – one for clinging to things, and one for traveling.

No. I still can’t work it out.

give

Every day countless marijuana seedlings die from neglect. Lack of adequate nutrients and life-giving sunlight leave others stunted and spindly. Some, sadly, go to seed.

But there’s good news, it doesn’t have to be this way! That’s right, for only 38 cents per day, less than the cost of a pack of rolling papers, you can sponsor a seedling or clone and know you’re helping a plant that might never have had a chance. A chance to grow and learn and contribute and, eventually, produce some really filthy buds.

For just 38 cents per day, less than the cost of a reasonable doughnut, you’ll be providing your plant the best in liquid nutrients and mineral salts. Your plant will attend daily grow sessions where it will have full access to 800 watts of UV-balanced halogen lighting and the latest in temperature and humidity control. You’ll receive letters and photos from your plant keeping you informed of its progress and of any adventures it may have had. Your plant will address you as Sally if you wish.

And eventually we’ll cut the light back and your little pal will begin to bud. What a proud moment for you both, and you’ll be right there with pictures and crude drawings sent to you by your plant. Once the buds are full and thick, resin-coated and sparkly-like, we’ll pick them and dry them to perfection. Then we’ll smoke them and send you pictures of us smoking them or a short description.

But don’t worry, your 38 cents per day doesn’t stop there. If you loved your plant enough and it was really filthy, then we’ll take a clone of it and grow another! And you can keep sending us money. Only 38 cents per day*

*based on $1387.00 ten year membership payable in advance. Void in Utah.

Canbera, City of Buildings

Name a country who’s capital city is not a sea-port or on a large river with access to the sea. London, Paris, Moscow, Washington, all have sea access. Yes, yes there’s Geneva, Lassa and the capitals of a few other land-locked countries where they had no choice, but by and large, and I use that term without fully understanding it (by what? large what?), given the option, most countries have their capital city near the sea or on a major river. Usually this is because those cities traditionally had more trade and hence became larger and it was a logical progression to become the capital.

Australia built it’s capital city specifically to be the capital. Sydney wanted to be boss and Melbourne wanted to be boss so to solve the dispute they built a new city just to spite everybody, and they stuck it in the mountains 300km from the sea, or anywhere else. That’ll show them, they said, whoever they were. The Prime Minister has a residence there of course, nice big sandstone mansion, fully staffed with staff and empty of anyone else. The Prime Minister lives in Sydney. And the rest of the politicians of course live in their electorates so it’s a city of bureaucrats and museums. I believe the bureaucracy museum is located there.

The National War Museum is there and they say it takes three days to see it properly. Aussies like their wars, well not the getting-shot-at parts, just the ra-ra and hip-ho parts. They look good in those hats. Every year, on Anzac Day, thousands of young Aussies travel to Gallipoli, Turkey to honour the Diggers who fought and died in WWI in Australia’s most celebrated battle by getting honourably shit-faced and respectfully littering the site with empty beer cans. Turkey is rather good about it and puts out Porta-Potties for them each year. Australia lost that battle, by the way. It is Australia’s Alamo, except in this case they were the Mexicans and them in the fort won. Also Davey Crocket was called Dazza.

It did not happen in India

Crikey she’s cold out there tonight.

I might let her in.

Big news today not, as you so often find with these stories, from India but in fact from Austria, also known as Germany Lite. Now I only heard the bare jist of it on the wireless and I don’t want to go prejudicing my already-formed opinion by checking any facts but it seems some dude (dudenkauf) kept his own grown-up daughter prisoner in his cellar for twenty-odd years and, yes you knew it was coming, sired seven children by her, six of which survived to be rescued recently.

Talk at work turned to what one does with these children now? The consensus seemed to be give them some shoes and send them on there way.

“Off you go then. What? Oh that, that’s the Sun, generally a good thing, goes away at night, rises in the…what? Night? Ok, you better sit down, there’s a few things we need to go over.”

Lots to cover there… photographs don’t steal your soul, for example. At least it’s never been proven. What if you had your photo taken more than once? Would the subsequent images have no soul-content? Perhaps it’s spread evenly, in a constantly changing average, which would be a messy system, lot’s of paperwork but who am I to question the workings of the universe?

And that’s what they will teach these kids, don’t think too much about it because it’s a pretty flimsy story to begin with and doesn’t really bear up to scrutiny. Whether we stem from an omnipotent force or the blind-fool luck of a few chemicals joining up to do the DNA tango, not one bit of this thing makes sense and never, ever, will.

Luckily there is cannabis for those having trouble swallowing it. What if you took a picture of the people on Soul Train? Would you get really good soul-content then? These people who believe in soul-stealing photography – would they pay for pictures of their enemies? Mercenary photographers raiding camps, snapping pictures in multi-burst mode, taking portraits of the men, snapshots of the women and children, anything caught in the frame. God, the colour saturation.

Anyway, I’m sure the Austrians have systems in place for this sort of thing. They’re a competent people.

Twat. It's fun, and easy to say.

I saw a show with a guy who was flogging his new invention, little strobe lights which would be set into the street, along the centre line, to warn of school zones and the like. Each little unit had it’s own solar panel for re-charging and the units could be controlled wirelessly to flash at appropriate times. The panel of judges consisted of an engineer, a designer and an architect and they questioned the inventor as follows:

Engineer: Are they sturdy enough to withstand being run over by cars?

Inventor: Yes, they use the same housing as aircraft runway lights.

Designer: Would they still be visible in bright sunlight?

Inventor: Yes, they are easily seen in bright sunlight.

Architect: Do you worry people might come and smash them with a sledgehammer? Or spray-paint them black?

Inventor: What the fuck are you sniffing? Are you too stupid to come up with a technical question of your own? Hit them with a fucking hammer? “Greta go and git my big hammer. Them shiny things is out there again.”

Go and button your cardigan, you big Nancy.

Ok that last answer was me. Architects are twats. I think his name was Brendan. I have other proof.

in my day

What do you suppose will happen in 40 years or so when the retirement villages are full of pot smoking, heavy-metal-listening old dudes and grannies who forego the traditional secret nip of cooking sherry for half an E and a couple of bongs before their evening walk? Will the hospital staff, all born in like 2020 or some other crazy futuristic-seeming year, tut-tut them? Will the 2050’s be like the 1950’s except oddly reversed? Gangs of 80 year old men stealing hubcaps and smoking cigarettes behind the bowling alley? Will they cry things like “What’s to be done about senior delinquency?” and “who will save the aged of today from the cruel grip of Satan” and “what they need is a good whooping and an honest day’s work” and “in my day we had to push buttons to make the microwave come on” and “what’s the capital of Belgium?”

There’s some old people live around here. A lot of them. They listen to late night TV compilations like Summer Of Love, Rock and Roll Gold and Classic AM Radio B Sides of 1972-73. There’s a reason Leo Sayer is back on tour.

Another thing they do is write letters to the local paper explaining how daylight savings time is really just the Government conditioning the masses to robotically respond to all commands. Today it’s set your clocks back an hour, tomorrow they’ve got you harvesting baby organs to render for oil. Precious baby-oil.

It’s so obvious.

Too obvious.

Precisely what they want you to think. Distract you from the real issue. Which is the Government is stealing time and selling it to alien civilizations who’s time is up. That’s how the Government affords that flashy car it drives up and down the street at all hours.

Damn Government needs a good whooping and an honest day’s work.

Don't make eye contact

I went downstairs to the showroom and was confronted by three women and Gay Colleague*, sitting around the reception desk looking slightly mischievous. Women in groups make me nervous, especially when they look at you like you are a good example of whatever it was they were just talking about which is invariably either men in general or men in particular.

SJ: How are you ladies?
*general snickering*
GC: What do you mean ladies? You mean me?
SJ: Look GC you were perched up on that desk like the head girl at the slumber party.
GC: Fair enough. (turns to New Girl**) You see what I have to put up with? All the abuse. Horrible, he is.
NG: *smiles uncertainly*
GC: NG is going to start riding with us in the mornings ok?
SJ: Sure, if she can stand the horribleness.
GC: Hmm. Good point. Can you?
NG: Continues to smile aimlessly, certain this is a joke, not positive though.
SJ: Good answer. You appear wise.

At this point it is best to carry on your way before you talk yourself into a corner. People are watching, the receptionist is gearing up to say something, a sales dude stops on his way to do sales… no best to get going. Let them discuss it among themselves.

*his actual name, with an asterisk
**also her real name, no relation.

Ode To A Sales Dude:

Oh Sales Dude Sales Dude
Go and do your sales
With your voodoo markup secret language code
And blonde-tipped hair

Go in your car your
Mobile Sales Unit full
Of blue-tooth mumbo jumbo
And sales literature

of course

Oh Sales Dude Sales Dude
Just fuck off.

Purgastralia

The spiders told me. Always spinning their shit where I walk like they know my times. Strong as 10 pound test line, across the path, feel it stretch then WRAP itself around your head. In the morning, or evening, across the doorway out the back where I smoke, on all my paths. In my car. Silken lines want to wrap me up and the spiders thereby told me

this isn’t Australia. It is a bizaro-world, alternate-reality, sun-drenched purgatory that looks like Australia.

I put this to Mrs. Joe, a (supposed) natural born Aussie, and she only shrugged and said “well. yeah.” and went back to sorting bills.

I mean, you get on a plane with a ticket to Australia, with stops in Hawaii and Fiji and you just sort of expect they’d tell you if it was actually a flight to Purgatory with stops in Hawaii and Fiji. “Attention passengers, please confirm your tickets are for Purgatory not Australia because a lot of people get them mixed up.”

I imagine they have the same wildlife. Hopping things, biting things, spiders. They both have enchanted forests and bauxite mines. They don’t like Paul Hogan much, they don’t know who Bob Barker is. You can’t explain Happy Gilmore to them.

So of course, they must be one and the same.

Purgastralia, where everything’s either poisonous or has a pouch, light switches go the wrong way, bills require sorting, and spiders have the ambitious aim of capturing humans for some seedy purpose not yet determined. I can only assume they wish to devour me, or make me their bitch. Their, uh, spider-bitch… oh dear, I don’t like the sound of that.

I hadn’t thought of that.

Woe, what hath become of me? How cometh I to be in this beguiling spider-land? Oh what foul sin have I committed? Where doth we keep yon bug spray? Also, who puteth the ice-creameth backeth empty excepteth for one dried-upeth spoonful?

Release me.

remember kids, hitting yourself in the face with a hammer is for losers. Every time.

Things I found out today:

1) Paint, even super epoxy enamel (black) does not stick to nylon. Why did I think it would? It certainly does not.

That’s all.

One thing I was wondering while I watched paint not stick was if the guy at the ball bearing factory, the little thing that rattles around when you shake a spray can is a ball bearing, this kid at school cut one open once and that’s what it was, I wonder if the guy at the ball bearing factory, who’s job was to check the ball bearings for defects, like dents or devil horns, ever suggested to his boss that all the defective ball bearings could be marketed to the spray can industry as Paint Grade Ball Bearings and they could then double the price, and if he did suggest that did he get a raise or did his boss just look at him blankly and back quietly out the door to ring the Authorities? I forgot to say the ball bearing inspector was screaming and waving a sack of ball bearings (not Paint Grade™, good ones) over his head at the time.

That sort of job would get to you.

Things I will find out tomorrow:

1) Will clear lacquer stick to nylon?
2) Will super epoxy enamel (black) stick to clear lacquer?

Try to get some sleep, I’m handling it.

Volcanic kittens and the war on telephone poles

Just chatting volcanos with P4. Volcanos are hot, the boiling point of rock being probably greater than the boiling point of water, which as we know is pretty hot already. Then we wondered if boiling alcohol would burn you if, for some reason, someone boiled a pot of alcohol and threw it on you. Perhaps in revenge for something, but still, it would be an odd thing to do. We didn’t know the boiling point of alcohol though, so we worked out in our heads 1/7 + 1/8 which we took to be 15/56ths. All things considered, it was the best we could do.

One of our cats did an amazing thing. It issued forth 6 more cats, but smaller. Now there are 8 cats. P4 wonders if she has told the father yet. SJ remembers saying something like “yes, I guess you can get another cat, if you absolutely must, but TWO is the limit and don’t get a female.” Eight.

What’s the father going to do? Bring over ½ a mouse now and then and take the kits to McDonalds? Of course not, feline paternity laws are lacking at best.

To prove a point I went outside, cut off the top bud from my marijuana plant which is grown for purely ornamental reasons (good feng-shui, or however the fuck you call it), cut it up right there and then and smoked it in my little brass pipe given to me by my lovely wife whom, as you know, I hardly ever think of strangling. Smoked it wet and green. And you know what? I got as stoned as I do from that shit they try to sell here for 3 bills an ounce.

Illidge if you say one fucking word about what you get back in Canada I’ll…be depressed. And then you’ll be sorry. Bastard.

Bloody fascists. Government pamphlets implying pot causes schizophrenia, use hydroponic equipment and you’re classed as a drug-lab for fuck sake. I never heard of anyone smoking a joint then… doing anything, really. Maybe draw a doodle, or play a video game. But I know a guy (Illidge) who, when drinking vodka, picks fights with telephone poles. Hasn’t beat one yet, far as I know.

That’ll do for now.

Hark

Been withdrawn lately, not playing with the other bloggers. See that list over there –> that’s 22* kinds of cool there. All different, all great little blogs. And I haven’t even visited any of them in months. I bet they’re mad at me, or worse indifferent. But maybe not. Not Exxy anyway. If I lived in LA I’d have to take up drinking again just so I could hang with Exxy. Mr Wood lives there too and I believe Exile is driving distance. What I mean is the people listed there are not going to be ripped to shreds by baboons long since gone mad, for they are actual real proper people who make sense, not like the myriad of God’s little jokes that you see walking around everywhere. Often they are shirtless and almost always they can’t see outside the box. It’s a small box. They sort of have to scrunch down in there. Fish in a bowl, a water-box, constantly devouring each other and shitting each other back out. Then swimming around in it and never once considering, not even secretly by themselves in the little castle, calling the situation anything but normal.

Those people listed there are not like that, is what I’m saying.

Haven’t even been to my secret favourite blog where I selfishly lurk and rarely comment because the writer’s wit intimidates me with its brilliance. And because I rip him off a lot. But what can I do, now I’ve got the Baboon Compound up and running I just don’t have much time, or rather I have a greater choice of what to do in my spare time.

For example, out in the lab, I made a little gizmo from old VCR parts powered by the solar panel from a garden light. With the magic of gear reduction that little solar panel can run a little motor which will lift 15 pounds. Takes it about ten minutes, being gear reduced until the final shaft turns at about 2 RPM.

What does it do? Well sir it lifts a weight about 4 feet then drops it, then winds it up again. Over and over. Why? Attach it to a pump handle and every ten minutes it would lift 15 pounds of water four feet or a pound of water sixty feet. Over a sunny day that’s half a ton of water lifted (four feet). Not bad for a solar panel from a $5 garden light.

I used to put some of my writing on Helium, but they deleted most of it because, let’s see, it wasn’t ‘family content’. Funny all the ones that mentioned GWB, well made fun of him actually, were deleted. Oh and the poem, which I point out was rated #7 out of 738 by voters, because it said ‘fuck’. I assure you it was in context and relevant to the tone of the poem. Shakespeare said ‘fuck’ all the time, except in Elizabethan English it was pronounced ‘hark’, but nobody censors old Bill do they? Nah, he was a harking genius.


Maybe I should move to LA and take up an ether addiction.


* I haven’t actually counted

troubles

The man was hunting deer. He was not wandering the forest with a gun, as would appear in the absence of any deer or even tracks thereof, he was hunting deer. To admit otherwise would make him feel foolish and so he continued walking softly through the snow-lit night, searching for tracks and wondering if he would be able to shoot a deer should one appear. In a way that would make him feel more foolish. He hadn’t decided and it troubled him. Of course deer are good at sensing trouble. They know to walk on the Southern slopes where the snow is thin and on rocky ground where tracks can only be smelled and to avoid trouble. So the man walked alone with his rifle and his thoughts as the moon set behind the trees and the snow took on a bluish glow. The forest gave him a wide berth and watched him pass from the safety of painted shadows.

He didn’t feel cold, although he supposed he was, he wasn’t hungry although he carried food, and soon he found he had forgotten about tracks altogether until he came across his own, left there an hour and a half before. He realized then that he had let the terrain guide him, walking wherever was easiest with little thought to direction, and the crafty mountains had quietly turned him around and tried to expel him. This also troubled him. He had hoped this trip would clear him of troubles, a romantic notion he saw now. And he felt foolish and frustrated and did not at first see the deer, standing still as stone on the edge of a clearing across the valley, not one hundred yards away.

He unslung the rifle, still undecided and troubled over his own doubt. He unslung the rifle because all the reasons for and against balanced exactly and when that happens it is always better to do a thing and know for sure. He crouched behind a fallen tree and lay the rifle barrel across the trunk. The buck had not moved and for a moment he thought it was only a remarkable shadow until it gave a low snort and he saw the steam rise from its muzzle. He sighted the rifle and slowed his breath and though his troubles did not leave him, they stepped aside for a moment. His breathing stopped and his heart slowed and on the third interval he took his shot the way a man steps off a high ledge into black water.

The buck continued to stand perfectly still and the man’s troubles prepared to rage back in at him, twice as mean at having been deferred pointlessly. Then the buck dropped to one knee, turning its head in his direction, though it is doubtful he could be seen behind his log. It stayed that way a while longer then its remaining legs folded slowly under it and the short, sharp puffs of steam stopped coming from its muzzle. The rifle shot continued to echo through the night as the man tested his water and found there were no rocks waiting to crack him open, and the troubles were less sure of themselves and stayed away to discuss it. And still the rifle shot echoed.

The man became aware the sound was growing, reverberating from the mountainsides and coming, it seemed, from all directions. No longer a forlorn echo making futile copies of itself, but a growing roar, a deep shriek following close behind, and the man was confused. His troubles deserted him in cowardice and he looked about franticly for the source of the hellish noise and now there were other sounds, sharp cracks from his left and when he turned that way a glaring light bore down on him from above.

Japan Air 595, a charter flight full of corporate secretaries bound for Banff and a mountain holiday, came down on him dragging one wing, already on fire, through the tree tops as its pilots tried to regain control to the end. Its gleaming alloy belly passed over him in an instant which did not seem to pass, so that he could see the rivets in its panels. It disappeared from his sight in a roaring cloud of snow and smashed branches and sank into the valley, clearing a swath through the trees, and for a micron of time everything was as before, the buck lived and his troubles were close by and familiar. Finally the rumbling pressure wave of the plane’s final impact rose up and passed over him, chasing the forgotten rifle shot down the valley until all was quiet again. The man could see across the valley but not into it and when he looked across it was as though nothing had changed at all. Except the deer was gone, the snow there unmarred.

He made his way down into the valley, following the trail of smashed trees, climbing and clawing his way. The air was sick with the smell of kerosene and hydraulic fluid. Some of the trees still stood and were hung with debris and the odd secretary, one still strapped in her seat, another completely naked except for her shoes. And when he looked around he saw they were on the ground too, all around him, mixed in with the shattered timber and the brightly coloured contents of 319 suitcases so that he could only see them one at a time. A face, a hand, an arm pointing brokenly at him from under a pile of branches. The man sat down in the snow, the sun would come up soon.

They didn’t notice him at first as he didn’t move. He had left his rifle where he’d fired it and there was nothing else to indicate he wasn’t a passenger except that he was wearing boots and a heavy coat, but the searchers refused to notice this, as the thought of a single solitary survivor amidst the carnage appealed to them. They loaded him into a helicopter, obviously in shock as he would not speak, but otherwise remarkably unharmed. Surely a miracle. And the man was transported away from his troubles and he went on to another life and was not heard from again by anyone who had known him.

The searchers watched as the helicopter took him away and they thought to themselves surely this was proof of the unfathomableness of everything and possibly proof of God Himself. Perhaps it symbolized hope. But they weren’t sure and as the sun rose higher and the crows gathered they started to think it was a romantic notion and began to feel foolish and apprehensive. They took these troubles away with them like stones in their shoes.

wtf?

Why didn’t you just say that? Why did you hint and imply and confuse me with subtleties when you know my head is thick? The information inlet is covered in a fine screen to keep out insects and salesmen, only direct thoughts can get through. Tone of voice is repelled likewise subtle body language. I’m not looking, I’m not listening, I’m just absorbing information. And with you it’s like trying to catch bits of confetti dropped in a river. What the hell does that have to do with it, I’m thinking, and damn there goes some more confetti way over the other side. Couldn’t you just put it in a box or plastic bag and hand it to me? Why need it be so thoroughly dispersed?

And why, when it’s my turn and I hand you my confetti neatly wrapped and sorted by colour with an EZ-Open™ flap, do you fling it all up in the air and go chasing after it? Why do you make everything harder than it needs to be?

a² + b² = c²

is Pythagoras’ famous theorem. It describes the relationship between the hypotenuse of a right triangle and its remaining 2 sides. It does not mean Pythagoras favored triangles over the humble square or the noble circle. He was not mandating a triangular world (how would the tides work?), he was not on the payroll of any large triangle manufacturing conglomerate. There was no ulterior motive.

None. It’s just a fact. Go figure.

Do not try to read my body language, tone of voice, facial expression nor should you seek any sub-text. There is none. There are no lines to read between, tone means nothing (however volume has significance) and this is just what gravity does to my face when I’m not using it.

SO (f) HAVE (u) A (c) NICE (k) DAY (o) YOU (f) HEAR? (f)

I mean that.

Can't help it

That last one sorta sucked. That’s what I get for stealing a joke. Actually on the radio they had a comedian and people could call in with jokes they’d written and somebody called in and mentioned that whistles are not actually clean, as part of a longer list of the did-you-ever-notice-? variety. There was no joke, just the concept of whistles not really being clean. I wrote the joke. I should not have written the joke. Jerry Seinfeld should have written the joke.

Jerry Seinfeld hardly ever jokes about lesbians. Americans are not allowed to. I, however, can’t help it. They are very interesting. Also I am afraid of them for they are awesome to behold with great and terrible wrath. Like Vikings. Vikings dressed like flannel-clad homeboys, or possibly in a nice white shirt with bolero string tie. I wonder if they sell special boob-strapping tape…

I’m doing it again.

P4: Hey dad dinner’s ready and I made it.
SJ: No way! You have to be at least 10 years old to make dinner.
P4: Uh, I am 10, remember?
SJ: No way man. You’re 8. When you were three we told you you were five. We wanted to start you in school early, ‘cause you’re so clever, so we lied. You are definitely 8.
P4: Then how come I’m tallest girl in my class?
SJ: Wait I got that wrong, you’re 11. You were dumb so we started you a year late. Yeah, that’s right.
P4: I’ve seen my birth certificate.
SJ: Which one?
P4: uh…
SJ: How old are you?
P4: Eight. Grrr, TEN!
SJ: Ten? You should have made dinner.
P4: I already told... I am 10. I made dinner. Ten. Dinner. Made.
SJ: Right, let's go then.

and it was very very good.

Give a little whistle

What does clean as a whistle mean? Coated in spit and pocket lint? Moldy old coagulated spit, festering forth germs like a North Korean breeder reactor within the dark dank bowels of the common whistle. A whistle kept in the sweat-crusted front pocket of an ex-jock PE teacher or hung between the non-descript breasts of a lesbian women’s volleyball coach.

Clean like that?

Ha ha remember that lesbian women’s volleyball coach in Porky’s? She had a whistle. You could go right ahead and dunk that sucker in a cup of hot water, make yourself a nice cup-a-spit. If you could get it off her that is, and if I remember my history that requires cunning, speed, timing and sticking your dick through a hole in a wall.

Not really the best bait for a lesbian. Just makes them angrier.

I’d let her keep the whistle, if I were you. Or at least offer to clean it for her.

worse, not better

What’s an unruly mob? A mob with irregular edges? Mob is bomb spelled backward incorrectly, that’s spooky. Unruly spelled backwards makes no sense whatsoever, like a Brittany life-choice or doing calculus on peyote.

Actually you probably could do calculus on peyote as long as nobody interrupted you by existing. You should NOT host a world-wide satellite link-up for Peace In Our Time with Bob Geldof, the Foo Fighters, special guest stars Dick Clark and P. Diddy, the Foo Fighters, Little Richard and the Foo Fighters on peyote.

The Foo Fighters suck.

In WWII American Navy pilots reported seeing little Dave Groels flying around over the Pacific and they called them Foo Fighters, which is Navy lingo for lame.

I Think.

Dave Groel was a drummer before he was lame. So was Dave Clark and he’s probably dead by now. David Lee Roth is not a drummer and is not dead though he sometimes threatens to be lame.

It’s confusing, I know. Worse on Peyote.

crack could beat up heroin, but heroin wouldn't care

7pm on a Thursday and it isn’t the first time. 7pm Thursday was invented over ONE HUNDERED years ago. Nobody knows who invented it, though some suspect monks or clock-makers. Maybe mildly retarded children, bless them.

That’s all I have to say about it. I may do a pantomime later if there’s time.

Life is a pantomime (with talking) and nobody knows the moves. Freestyle pantomime. Word.

Maybe if crack addicts put their crack in a tin can with a label that said “SPINICH – product of Honduras” and they whipped it out and cracked-on just in time to save their skinny crack girlfriend from certain train-running-over (!) by tearing up the tracks in a crack-fuelled frenzy maybe then people would be more understanding because they saved a precious life with crack and only wrecked one train. You can’t do that with heroin. Not cracky enough.

Cracky is not a word, apparently. Got a red squiggly line under it. There is no poetic license setting. Curse you cold and sterile future-world with your micro-chips and plastic tables!

I was thinking those people with that genetic mutation that makes them be covered in long silky hair from head to toe will do pretty good if there is suddenly an ice age. They don’t panic easily. Also they are hairy. Duh.

"Crabs got me where I am today" - Alaskan fisherman declared America's Next Top Model

All that guff back in 2000, everything was New Millennium this and New Millennium that. Try our new New Millennium french fries, exactly like the old ones except we’re selling them in the New fucking Millennium. Y2K was a complete disappointment, nothing important crashed, telecommunications ticked along, air travel continued unabated, toilet paper continued to come in regular or scented. Some people had to get new cheques issued that didn’t have “19__” in the date section but with teams of printers working round the clock this was soon rectified and old ladies were once again free to hold up check-out lines as they stubbornly continued to assert their right not to use an ATM card. 2000 was a complete non-event.

And here we are most way to 2010 already, ploughing headlong into a brave new world, one with iPods. A world where everybody gets a turn to be on TV, movie stars, hotel heiresses, Alaskan crab fishermen, George Bush, they let anybody on these days. The next pop-star/ model/ crab fisherman/ president of the united states is only a vote away, call now, only fifty cents. Hell, even Fiddy Cent is on TV and from what I can see he’s got all the charisma of dog turd with a bow on it. When you have nothing else, look stolid. Or guest-host Saturday Night Live, that’s still on. And still crap. That’s why.

But I put this injector cleaner stuff in my truck and it’s running really good now, so there’s that. Here’s to butoxyethanol!

Happy New Year.

SJ