Why I didn't Get Invited To The 2020 Summit

Ladies and Gentlemen, Citizens of Australia, thank you for the opportunity to address the historic conclave that is Australia's 2020 summit.

Upon this occasion delegates such as yourself and myself were invited to table proposals pertinent to improving Australia, in particular the Australian way of life, and the lot of the Australian people. In accepting the honour of making a recommendation I had a very hard look at Australia, it's environs, it's hopes, dreams and its place in the world, so that now I feel I can fully address one of the premier problems confronting Australian society.

Ladies and Gentlemen, why can Australia, as a nation, not find the droids it is looking for?
It is not that Australia's droid-searching apparatus is deficient. It is not that it's personnel are incapable, nor is our equipment faulty. I have thoroughly reviewed all aspects of the recent Tatooine-wide search for droids and cannot find a single report of incompetance.

And yet the evidence is incontrovertible: we failed to find the droids.
There are those in Australian society today, in particular the pundits in the media who doubt that our search was as thorough as it could have been. To those people I say this: if the door is locked, it is imperative that you move on to the next door. This is logical: if the door is locked for you, it would obviously have been locked for the droids you're looking for, and thus they cannot have passed through to the other side.

Additionally there are those who claim that our landspeeder roadblocks were simply staffed by incompetent, weak-minded fools. I have personally interviewed all staff involved and I can assure you that any droids seen  WERE NOT the droids we were looking for, that the citizens COULD go about their business, and that the officers acted in full cognizance when telling all traffic to move along.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I hereby charge this task to this august body, comprised as it is of some of the finest thinkers, sportsmen and entertainers in this fair land, please, please help us to find the droids we are looking for, and in doing so let us, as a nation, move on and find some measure, however small, of closure.

Thank you.

Belvedere! Come here boy!

Last week a friend of mine complained that he had become a statistic when through no fault of his own he found himself blogging in a coffee shop. Well, I believe I may be able to top that.

Today is Wish Day in honour of the Make A Wish Foundation, and I find myself blogging from my desk at work decked out in complete Confederate Army battle-dress. Only a Private, of course. I will admit that i'm struggling to think of a reason why anyone would actually WISH to be a Confederate, but truth be told it was just an excuse to buy the hat...

...and make disparaging remarks about Yankees.

On The Set Of Star Wars: The TV Series

Good morning everyone, thank you for answering our call in the newspaper for extras today. I realise that some of you have travelled very far to be here today, especially those who took the 5 hour drive up from Adelaide. Don't worry about your cars, we'll have some of the locals park them for you properly later. We weren't really expecting this many, that's all.

Now, first things first: could I have the men on my left and the women on my right please? No, women on the right. WOMEN right, men left.

...
Are there any women here?
...
Alllllrighty. In that case, could I have all the men under 40 on my left, and all the men over 40 on my right?
...
Right then, could I have everyone who bought their own costumes to my left, and everyone who needs to go to wardrobe on my right.

...
Oh for fu..fine. Light side to the left, dark side to the right. What's that? Yes, i'll let props know that you've bought your own lightsaber. No, I don't need to see it now, thank you.

Now that we've sorted that out, there are some rules we need to get through. As you may be aware Lucasfilm is very conscious of security leaks regarding plot and characters. To that end could all of you who have brought your laptops please return them to your cars. Wait, I didn't say everyone return to your cars...oh, it appears that I did.

My Favorite Australian Similies

1. Busy as a blue-arsed fly.
2. All over the shop like a mad woman's knitting.
3. Silly as a hat full of arseholes.
4. Mad as a cut snake.
5. Lonely as a bastard on Fathers Day.
6. Ugly as a bag full of spanners.

You Might Be A Bogan Jedi If...

You use your lightsaber to take the cap off of a VB.
That "disturbance in the Force" was just last night's baked beans.
The inside of your house looks more like Dagobah than the outside.
You call your young apprentice Fucknuckle.
The Force isn't the only thing that runs in your family.
You call Jimmy Barnes "master".
Your landspeeder has the spoiler off of a late model Commodore.
 You have ever used a lightsaber to light your farts.
Your Jedi robe is camouflage colored.
At least one wing of your X-Wing is in undercoat.
You can't see anything wrong with how Yoda talks.
You have ever had your R2 unit use its arc welding torch to open a tough iced coffee carton.
You jump-start your lightsaber off a car battery.
You have ever beaten up Han Solo for lookin' at your sister.
You count B.O. as a Jedi power.
You have a Z-95 Headhunter up on blocks around the front of your house.

Compassion For The Less Fortunate.

If there's a section of society that I just don't 'get', it's amputees. Let's face it, how many times have you heard the phrase 'as busy as a one-armed paper-hanger in a gale', or 'as busy as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest'?

For crying out loud, are they all thick or something? If you've only got one arm *why* are you trying to put up wallpaper at all, let alone when it's quite windy??? I mean, anyone can see that's a recipe for disaster. Ditto the arse-kicking. Someone is going to get hurt and i'd lay odds it's going to be you, Hopalong.

I just don't understand. Is it a cry for help? Is it some macho thing to prove that they're just as capable as normal people? That's just wierd. I'm not saying that if you've lost a limb in some sort of ghastly fashion that you shouldn't be able to pursue the career of your choice but for goodness sake be a bit sensible please. I find the whole concept rather distateful, as a matter of fact.

Right, that's sorted that. Next post: Wealthy, Easily Shocked Socialites Who Choose Laurel and Hardy As Their Piano Removalists.

Random Doobings

"Papa."
"Grumpy."
"Um. Sporty."
"Smurfette."
"Sassette."
"Ooh. Brainy."
"Vanity."
One rainy afternoon, Captain Doobie and Goodtime Slim were entertaining themselves by having a contest to see how many smurfs they could name. Goodtime Slim, the last to speak felt (somewhat justifiably) that he had just won, and he waited eagerly for Captain Doobie's reply.

"Chachi."
"Aha!" Goodtime Slim cried, leaping out of his chair and pointing, "got you! Chachi wasn't a smurf."
Captain Doobie looked hurt. "Yes he was."
"No he wasn't. That was Happy Days."
"No," replied Captain Doobie seriously, "they weren't all happy days. Remember that time that Richie lost all his money to Gargamel and Papa Smurf (Tom Bosley) had to go and get it back?"

Faced with this blatant cross-mojonation of pop-culture references Goodtime Slim's head exploded, and he had to have a cup of tea and a lie down.

Holden in April-Fool's Day Controversy

ELIZABETH: Car maker Holden has today admitted that its entire output since 1948 has been an April Fool's Day joke gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Whichever Seppo is currently the chairman of Holden admitted in a press conference held today that General Motors had originally been contacted by the Chifley government in 1947 to begin work on an April Fools Day prank for the upcoming year. Unfortunately, due to the post-war lack of irony in the Australian economy, lower-echelons of General Motors staff had interpreted the memo calling for local production literally, and while no-one was looking a factory was transplanted from Detroit to produce the last-year's Buick.

"It appears to have been a paperwork error initially," the anonymous-faced American lazily drawled, "then several of the office wags began to make quite an effort to ensure that no-one found out. In the end, they managed to keep it going for 61 years."

The error was only discovered when a filing cabinet was moved in GM's Dearborn global HQ, revealing a small door which enabled people to enter Larry Perkins' head for a period of 15 minutes.

Industry writers have expressed amazement at the magnitude of the prank. "I was totally fooled," commented Ged Bulmer, Editor of Wheels Magazine, "I mean, I know that their output since 1978 has been completely pissweak, but I thought it was just a temporary slump they were going through." Toyota CEO Konnichiwa Ohigazamus expressed similar concerns, noting however that "with the benefit of foresight it explains the VN, doesn't it?"

Ford executives were unavailable for comment, and all efforts to reach them on the 13 1/2 floor of the Geelong plant have so far met with failure.

It's Arrived!

Oh, excellent. I recieved my copy of the much-anticipated "Freedomnomics" today, and I opened a random page to see that the author is quoting Ben Stein, 'noted Actor and Economist'. As you may be aware, Ben Stein is currently embroiled in the PZ Myers/Richard Dawkins 'Expelled' controversy.

All signs point towards the book being both stimulating and educational, but probably not in the way that the author intended. Full review soon.

On Cravats

Recently, as a joke, I purchased a cravat from a secondhand clothing shop. My intention was to wear it to work instead of a tie for a bit of a laugh.

I've since bought a second, and am eagerly awaiting the chance to buy more. Far from just being a laugh, the cravat turned out to be an excellent tie substitute, allowing me to keep my top button undone while still wearing a 'tie' around my neck. It's more comfortable, easier to affix and I think it adds an element of grandeur to the office. Indeed, i'm wearing it as I type this right now, and I think we'd all agree that the tone of the blog has been raised considerably.

The only downside is that I suspect my nickname here at work has become 'Thurston Powell the Third'.

The Perils of Intergalactic Travel

"Where are we now?" whined Captain Doobie.
Goodtime Slim poked his head up over the top of the Gregory's he was consulting. "Hoth," he replied, in a sullen tone, which Captain Doobie completely ignored, preferring to look out of the viewport instead.

"Why is it all white then?"
"Because it's an ice planet, that's why."
Captain Doobie leaned back in the copilot's seat. "Wierd," he remarked idly, twiddling his thumbs.
Goodtime Slim put down the Gregory's and fiddled with the knobs on the dashboard, trying to look as though he knew what he was doing. "Why is it wierd?" he sighed.

"Because it is. I mean, where I come from we have...I don't know, a bit of desert here, some ice up near the poles, that sort of thing."

Goodtime Slim fixed him with a particularly icy stare. "And your point is?"
"A bit of moderation, is what i'm asking for," Captain Doobie told him snippily, "That planet down there is just being greedy, that's all."

Arthur C Clarke

Dammit, it seems like i'm writing these every couple of weeks these days.

Arthur C Clarke, the grand old man of science fiction has died, aged 90, in Sri Lanka.

Of all of the old sci-fi writers from the Golden Age, Clarke was always one of my favorites. Not always consistent in his larger books '(2001', 'Rendezvous with Rama') to which he had the disarming habit of writing sequels far past the use-by date of the concept, my favorite books of Clarkes were his small 'once-offs'. In these you always got the sense that he'd had an idea for a piece of technology and wanted to introduce the reader to it. 'The Gardens Of Paradise', 'The Ghost From Grand Banks', 'Prelude To Space', all written to highlight a technology more than to tell a story.

Also a delight was his 'technical' writing, by which I mean his collections of essays such as 'Spring 1984: A Choice Of Futures', and 'Greetings, Carbon-Based Bipeds!' in which he displayed a rare wit and a capacity to involve the reader. Few of his contemporaries shared this ability, but most notably Asimov had it, and I think that says something.

As a postscript, I remember an anecdote that Clarke told in which, when he was the Treasurer of the British Interplanetary Society (1938) he recieved a letter from George Bernard Shaw who wished to join because "he thought it was time he looked into the matter". At the time, George Bernard Shaw was 97, and I for one am glad to see that Arthur C Clarke took this lesson to heart, and never stopped learning, right up until the end.

Arthur C Clarke, we're missing you already.

Exciting New Trends In Sideburns

1. Sausages.
As the name suggests, these are 'burns which curve. Beginning vertically at the ear, they sweep majestically away from the jaw-line, becoming horizontal towards the upper lip, culminating in a rounded point.

2. The Lightning Strike.
A 30's art-deco look, these begin at the ear, initially maintaining the standard 'burn line until they dogleg, then come to a point, resembling nothing so much as their namesake.

3. Hot Eggs In Bed.
Today the trend is away from straight. In much the same way as Sausages, Hot Eggs In Bed follow a curved path down from the ear then back up, with the effect being essentially a big hairy egg leaning with the small pointy end at the top of the ear.

4. Zulus At Dawn
A 'burn in honor of the Battle of Roark's Drift. Victorian England is the look here chaps, so start growing! One of the newer freeform 'burn categories.

5. The Gentleman's Excuse-Me.
Perhaps the most daring of all new-wave 'burn styles, this is a standard rectangular (or "Johnnyboy") 'burn, the hairs of which have been grown significantly longer than that style generally dictates, then waxed to a horizontal point.

Random Doobings

"But you're not a psychiatrist."
"I am!"
"Alright then, prove it."
"Do you want to root your mum?"
"No!"
"Good. Now piss off."

Random Doobings

"What do you think of Ague?"
It would be an understatement to say that this question took Goodtime Slim by surprise. He was slumped on the couch, where he'd fallen asleep whilst watching a particularly dry episode of The Smurfs. He was awoken by Captain Doobie's query and had to collect his thoughts before he could speak.

"Huh?"
Captain Doobie plonked himself down into his easy chair. "Should I go for Ague or Pleurisy?"
"What are you talking about?"
Captain Doobie shot him a whithering look. "Please. I'm trying to decide which of these old-timey diseases to catch," he told him.

Goodtime Slim was totally lost. "Why Ague or Pleurisy? Why not Dropsy?"
"Ooh!" cried Captain Doobie excitedly, scribbling it down in his notebook, "that's a good one!"
Goodtime Slim thought it was time to Sort Things Out. He found himself doing this a lot. Speaking slowly and clearly, he asked, "Why do you want to catch an old disease that no-one's ever heard of?"

Captain Doobie snorted in derision, made a complicated clicking motion with his fingers and peered down his nose at his housemate. "Because it's cool," was his reply.

"Cool?"
"Yes. Think about it: it's not just a virus, it's a retrovirus!"

Freedomnomics

Sometimes life is unintentionally hilarious. For example, on Amazon there's a new book out called "Freedomnomics". It's a 'response' to Stephen Levitt's "Freakonomics", and attempts to refute many of the findings of that book.

I will not comment further until i've read the book, but I will say that as a trained economist I found 'Freakonomics' to be generally correct, and I find it difficult to imagine how it could be found lacking, but I will read 'Freedomnomics' and decide for myself.

However, I should point out that I only discovered 'Freedomnomics' while on an Amazon search for Dostoyevsky's 'Crime and Punishment', and that in the little section on what other customer's bought, 'Freedomnomics' is in such illustrious company as 'A New Look At The Causes of the Great Depression', 'More Guns, Less Crime', 'Straight Shooting: Firearms, Economics and Public Policy', and "Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left".

Until I read the book, I will leave that to speak for itself.

Thought For The Day

There are few things more troubling in this world than a porcine gait.

The Power Of Books

As an author (humiliatingly as-yet-unplublished though I may be) I occasionally am reminded of just why I like books so much.

During my formative years I was very much into all things military. I was lucky that both my school library and the local Noarlunga Library had a very wide selection of the books of Leo Kessler. Leo Kessler's books (particularly his long-running series: SS Battalion Wotan) were pulp, pure and unadulterated. Kessler (a pseudonym of Charles Whiting) had fought in WW2, then became an author and wrote novels which from his wartime experiences held a ring of truth, something sadly lacking in similar authors such as Sven Hassel.

Before his death late last year Kessler/Whiting wrote more than 350 books, all of them thin, cheap and of dubious artistic merit. They were, however, fun. My favorites will always remain the SS Batallion Wotan series. Loosely based upon the real-life SS Wiking Batallion, Wotan was the WW2 equivalent of Harry Flashman, although in a more serious vein. Wotan served on every concievable front during WW2, and were then recruited by the French for Foreign Legion duties well into the 1950s. While as in real life the characters changed, one man remained. Though his commanding officer may have started as Major Geier in Poland, became Kuno Von Dodenburg during Barbarossa and ended as Karl Shirmer in the trackless deserts of Algeria, Sergeant Schulze and his overactive 'fart-cannon' lived on. Flunkies like Corporal Matz, White Lightning, Pansy Petersen and Spider-Arse came and went, but through it all Sergeant Schulze WAS Wotan.

In all there were about 40 SS Batallion Wotan books, and recently I had the pleasure of stumbling across one in a secondhand store that I had never before read, "Schirmer's Death Legion", which leads me to the point of this post. Reading the book, it became obvious that it was the last of the WOTANs. Set in Algeria in 1953 during the rebellion, it became obvious that Kessler intended for this to be WOTAN's last stand. Once I realised this, something incredible happened. I've always considered the WOTAN books to be trash but i've been reading them since I was about 13, which means that Sgt Schulze and the rest have been a part of my life for (saints preserve us) 18 years now. So when it became obvious that this was the last hurrah, the book became a real heart-pumping page-turner as I almost shouted "Don't you dare kill off Schulze, you bastard!" while reading it in the middle of Nandos. I was late to my theatre show because I had to finish it, I couldn't put it down until it was over. It seems amazing to me that something so pulp could elicit such a stong reaction, and I guess i'm forced now to re-evaluate the 'artistic merit' of the series. It taught me something about the impact of books. Whether they're well written or poorly scribbled, even the most violent and blatantly venal can lodge there in your heart and stay put forever.

Oh, and I suppose you'll want to know whether Schulze died in the end. Tough luck. I'll leave that to you to find out :o)

Random Doobings

Captain Doobie surveyed Goodtime Slim's handiwork with a critical eye.
Ooooookayyy," he said, trying to sound knowledgeable, "we've got the dips, the jatz, the little carrot sticks, the drinks are in the fridge, and...hang on."

He turned to Goodtime Slim and pointed at the coffee table accusingly. "What's this?"
Godtime Slim lookerd around him. "Sweets," he replied.
"Yes," said Captain Doobie slowly, as if he was talking to someone who was mentally retarded, "What sort of sweets are they?"

"Um, Anzac biscuits."
"Anzac biscuits and...?"
"Um, Turkish Delight."
Captain Doobie threw up his hands to the heavens. "What on earth are you doing?" he cried, "we can't let them eat that! Can you imagine what will happen in their stomachs?"

"Each well-chewed morsel will slowly digest?" asked Goodtime Slim, nonplussed by all the theatrics.
"No, you fool, it'll be the Dardanelles campaign all over again!"
"Crap."
"Oh really? Then why are those two Anzac buscuits currently kicking the shit out of that bit of Turkish Delight that accidentally fell off the plate?"

Goodtime Slim was forced to admit that in this instance there seemed to be no logical explanation.

How Stuff Works

Today is the 15th of February. Every 15th of February Candlemas is celebrated throughout Eastern Europe and it's affilliates. But exactly what is Candlemas, and why is it so important?

Well, i'm glad you asked.

Candlemas came about as a direct result of the bubonic plague, or Black Death of the 1300s. Prior to this Europe had experienced two centuries of unparallelled mild weather, due to the Smurf's defeat of Gargamel at the Battle of Gargamel's Castle (1076AD) which resulted in the lifting of sullen rainclouds which had heretofore covered the entire continent. This mild weather combined with the realisation that cattle could be eaten instead of cattle dung (as had previously been the belief) led to a population explosion. This in turn led to a flowering of education and an increase in literacy. The newly literate population combined with a well-fed peasantry meant that candles (which at the time were composed entirely of ear-wax) were more and more plentiful, but also more and more in demand.

The onset of the Black Death in the 1300s did not kill populations indiscriminately. The dearth of farm labourers in it's aftermath pushed food production to it's lowest ever recorded rate. Scholars, by virtue of their more solitary existence, were more numerous amongst the survivors. The high demand for candles combined with an extremely malnourished population (who produced no ear-wax and hence, no candles) caused the price of candles to skyrocket. Patriarch Antiolopoulos Nicodemus of Constantinople took drastic steps and stockpiled all of the available candles in the land, parcelling them out to those scholars most in need. As the effects of the Black death wore off candle output rose such that the mass of available candles in Eastern Europe reached it's previous nadir within a century. When this was realised the church was able to sell off it's remaining stockpile and buy a speedboat. Ever since, the day of the selloff (February 15th) has been celebrated as 'Candlemas'.