Comedy traffic schools for road offenders: this is only the abstract, but it proves my point: Ameicans need everything sugar coated.

I seem to have transferred my occasional bloggy impulses onto Facebook. which is a pity because my life is so interesting right now. not.
it's all insane levels of exercise, trying to get the book finished and the occasional jailbreak to the beach for a quick surf.

in America, you can't get more than 145 miles from a Big Mac.

it's been raining upstream. Really raining. The Yarra is, for a change, swollen and powerful-looking. Along the stretch I ride beside in Kew, the water now swirls around the branches that once leaned over the surface, reaching down. I suppose the banks, long dry, are being undercut and some trees will fall. The river is broader and faster-moving. And because of the soil washing down from upstream and from the banks, it's browner. Usually it's a kind of faded khaki, but now it's a deep, rich brown. I wonder if we could change its label from "the river that flows upside down" to "the river of chocolate." That should drag the tourists in...

the first in what may be a series of unfunny pieces rejected by the New Yorker's Shouts and Murmurs column:

''Quality journalism is not cheap…The digital revolution has opened many new and inexpensive distribution channels, but it has not made content free. We intend to charge for all our news web sites”
- Rupert Murdoch




Dear Mr Rupert Murdoch,
I wish to offer my views on the August 25, 2010 edition of your e-newspaper, which, as I am your paying customer, you will no doubt be interested to hear.
As you yourself have pointed out, quality journalism is not cheap. Having calculated my $25 annual subscription as costing upward of 6.84 cents a day, I would expect a better service from you than I can obtain elsewhere for free.
Therefore, some points:
First: there is far too much violence in your electronic publication. I am not paying to read endless descriptions of beheadings, ritual canings, invasions of small nations by slightly less small nations, general exploding of ordinance, etc. I find these reports somewhat distressing, and I would expect your service to reduce their occurrence to a more manageable frequency, say one a fortnight. That should be sufficient.
Second: not enough goldfish. I could find only one brief report today concerning the Sixteenth National Championship of Goldfish Scooping in Japan. As a confirmed goldfish fancier, and, again, your paying customer, I would expect at least a feature article on the winner along with profiles of leading competitors, their tactics for scooping up fish, their training regimes, breeds of fish used and so on, in addition to the somewhat cursory video you have provided. I can recommend a well-qualified Japanese-speaking piscatory reporter if you are in need of a stringer. You have a whole year until next August, which you could devote to setting up a proper Japanese Goldfish Bureau to cover the Seventeenth National Championship of Goldfish Scooping, and it is my view that this is the kind of innovation which will have subscribers flocking to your service. What, after all, is the Internet for if not top-notch journalism on events of compelling global interest such as this?
Third: Sex. As I’m sure a businessman of your stature will understand, you are operating in a very competitive market when you venture on the Internet, and I’m sorry to have to inform you that I could get better, and dare I say more personalised, content from a camgirl in India than is currently being provided by your web sites, and far cheaper too. If you value my business, you will attend to this aspect of your service without delay. I understand that you are coming from behind on this part of your online offering, but surely the owner of the London Sun can find some pretty girls somewhere? Again, if you need help, I can direct you to a number of sites operating in this area which I believe are highly profitable, some of which are even legal in some states of America. As you so perspicaciously point out, good content does not have to be free; people are willing to pay for the quality stuff.
Fourth: Where, I would like to know, is the curling? You call that sports coverage?
Fifth: International politics. Please, no. I invite you to go online and look around. Do you see anyone blogging about the proceedings of the Economic and Financial Committee (EFC) Sub-Committee on EU Government Bills and Bonds Markets, let alone tweeting on the topic of the stormy love life of its chairman, Jens Thomsen, Deputy Governor of the Danish Central Bank? Thought not. Replace this segment with some Brangelina gossip and trust me, no one will miss the politics.
After all, Mr Murdoch, the customer (that’s me…unless someone else has signed up to your e-newspaper since last week) is always right. Right?

and Sedaris went to lunch at Lake House...

I can't believe this is only the SECOND googld result for "eu subcommittee boring".

surely it should be #1?

dog cloning:

"I think 99 percent of the time people should get their pets from shelters," he told AFP.

"But can we agree though that one percent of the time if you have a one in a million dog and you have the money to pay for it, you should be able to go to either a breeder or a clone."

....this man can clone a large mammal, but seems to lose out a bit on the maths front....

sorry, did I miss something? it's June 4, 2009 and the Chinese Government is complaining about how Chinese students are treated in Australia?

surely today is Chinese-authorities-should-jut-shut-up-day?

just to demonstrate that pathetic fandom still exists after 40...I have to blog this...Tim Minchin called me a genius!
yes, he may have meant it in a slightly sarcastic way...but all the same...

I bought tickets to his Comedy Festival shows way back in November last year. this was so early that I scored front row, centre, seats. Then disaster struck: we tried about six babysitters and couldn't find ANYONE to sit with our kid for a lousy 3 hours. I then tried about six friends: no one was free to come with me. I then stood outside the Forum trying to GIVE the ticket away, but there were not people who were there alone, or none who would admit to it.

so I went in and sat down with an empty seat beside me.

sure enough, after Tim bounced onstage and did the opening number, he looked down.

"Where's that person?" he demanded. The girl on the other side of the empty seat shifted uncomfortably. I thought of a couple of things to say but they were very lame things, so kept my mouth shut.

"That is the ONE SEAT that should have someone in it," he said. it was in fact the very middle of the row, right in front of the mike.

so I shifted. I moved across from my seat into my husband's empty seat, thus filling the ONE SEAT and leaving mine empty.

hence the comment: "you're something of a genius aren't you" and on with the show.

omg he noticed me! etc. it was almost worth the $28 I blew on the ticket, plus the embarrassment, to be called a genius by Tim.

maproom blog

maproom blog

brochure for mapping confernce I've just missed...not that I would have gone I guess, but interesting mob

am I the only one thinking that thermal imaging of whale trails might be a little too useful to the Japanese whalers if they get hold of the technology?

poetry lost and found...

birdman eating uses pages from old books to put under the iron pans it serves its eggs in...I thought the poem Andrew had a few weeks back was lovely, in an oldfashioned melancholy way, but the grease got to it and now the actual words have gone from my mind.

more permanent, however, is this old sanskrit poem that I saw tattooed in longhand script on the nape of a young man's neck yesterday:


"Look well to this day
For it is life
The very best of life.
In its brief course lie all
The realities and truths of existence,
The joy of growth, the splendour of action,
The glory of power.
For yesterday is but a memory.
And tomorrow is only a vision.
But today well lived
Makes every yesterday a memory of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore to this day.

oooh...an op shop website/blog...linked to maps...nice

Barack Obama's reading list