The Metaphoric Gauntlet & An Abundance of F*ckwittery

I'm here again before the screen, fingers a-itchin' to fly over the keyboard (I am a very proficient and fast touch-typist). Wanted to type that it's been a week of highs and lows, but that is as clichéd as a foppish character played by Hugh Grant.  Still, there have been ups and downs.  I pondered this this morning as my 13yo walked by, carrying two plastic zip-lock baggies each containing a disconcerting red pulpy mess.  I wondered, What's in there? Aborted foetuses? Turns out he had eaten the celery sticks I'd packed but not the cherry tomatoes, then put the baggies not in his lunchbox but straight in his backpack, whereupon the tomatoes were squashed by his school books.  He tried to put a positive spin on this heinous act by suggesting I make a pasta sauce.  I snapped at him to just put the mess in the bin.  I am aware that the italicised thought I have included in this anecdote is offensive to some, and will likely garner me some online abuse.  If you're planning on abusing me: stow it elsewhere; at least I pack my kid a healthy lunch.

That was definitely a 'low'.  I had a kind of 'high' yesterday, but it was the yin to a 'low's' yang. I caught up with loved family but it was at a funeral. The patriarchal uncle of my family passed away aged 92 on the morning of Anzac Day.  How fitting for him, given he respected the solemnity of the day so much.  Mr Bingells and I travelled two hours to the funeral, and along with my brother, took a pew in the church.  It was with trepidation I sat beside my brother.  I have not done this since childhood because he would, without fail, crush my hand every time during the sign of peace ritual of the Mass.  We would quarrel and my exasperated mother would slap us. By-the-by, the officiating priest said, 'Let us offer each other the sign of peace.' I gingerly extended my hand, but thankfully my brother realised he is no longer fourteen-years-old (he's just turned fifty-seven), and I escaped with my fingers intact.

It is important to focus on the good things like family and uncrushed hands, when there appears to be an abundance of fuckwittery in the universe of late.  People act like triggered fools over the stupidest of things.  Don't get me wrong, I respect people's cultural heritage. What I don't respect is pissants who decide some random has offended them, and retaliate to this perceived slight by having approximately 100 thousand people abuse this random online, particularly when the random is a kid of about seventeen.  Okay, I will clarify. A young American girl wore a pretty red cheongsam style dress to her prom.  She posted a picture online, as the youth of today wont to do.  A Twitter user named Jeremy Lam attacked her with a pissy, hissy tweet along the lines of: My culture is not your prom dress!  The poor kid, who probably just wanted a nice night at her school dance, copped a barrage of abuse. I haven't met the kid, but I doubt she wanted to denigrate a race and culture, and I also doubt Jeremy Lam can really prove she did.  I, along with many other Twitter users, did wonder why Lam got all uptight and piss-elegant, when his own profile picture has him wearing an Adidas baseball cap ('Hey, stop appropriating American culture!').  Why doesn't he target genuine racists and mongrels, instead of inciting people to bully a kid who, like I mentioned before, just wanted to wear a pretty dress and have a nice evening. Honestly, some people really need to go and have a good, long, firm poo.

Next on the list of those who engage in unpardonable fuckwittery is the Daily Telegraph. I know, it's no surprise, stop rolling your eyes. They are again plunging to their nadir with their putrid style of addressing Emmanuel Macron's description of Lucy Turnbull.  President Macron referred to Mrs Turnbull as 'delicious'.  I'm guessing it's some kind of Gallic flattery, and nothing for people to bother their social justice warrior heads over.  Certainly Lucy Turnbull did not appear to care.  But here is the front page the Telegraph ran yesterday:

My initial thought, which has not changed, was: I am fucking embarrassed to be Australian when I see that. Seriously, DT? What ails you? Is it the progressive views of Emmanuel Macron that has threatened your puppet master Murdoch so? I'd expect nothing less from a rag helmed by Murdoch, a foul, scabrous, scaly reptilian thing that appears to have been shat out from the titular planet of that old Eighties miniseries V.

Okay, now I'm in stirring mode. Time to put up or shut up, Julia Banks MP, aka Little Miss I-Can-Live-On-$40-A-Day.  I am throwing down my metaphoric gauntlet, Sirrah. Or perhaps that should be She-Sirrah?  Whatever.  I chucked it on the ground and I am challenging you to do this. Before you pick it up and stroke my metaphoric visor, I should point out I am not alone in challenging you to live this way.  It will be something of a shock to you, given you own - is it five or six? - properties.  By the way, I don't care that you have some an impressive property portfolio.  I wish I did, too. What I do care about is the attitude of you and the Liberal party ilk about how easy it is.  All you do, along with the Murdoch press, is engage in welfare bashing.  Think you can do it?  Give it a try.  Three months should be sufficient.  Furthermore, I'm calling for conditions to be imposed.  Conditions that your odious party would see imposed upon people already struggling in the form of the Orwellian-inspired, fascist-dictatorial cashless welfare card (which will keep your buddies at Indue jizzing like crazy).  You can't save by buying at markets, or on Gumtree, or at Aldi. You can't have a little cash in hand transaction (like a cleaning service, or a tradie).

I'm old enough to recall Stephen Usher MP (shit, I remembered his name!) attempting to live on the dole in the mid-Eighties.  I think it was for a week.  He had to eat his words (along with very basic meals of mince and tinned spaghetti).  He admitted his naïvete, and I grudgingly admired him for doing so.  And like the prim old spinster who gets flashed by an exhibitionist during church, you are in for one rude shock.

Well, there we are.  These are just some of things that have me grousing this week. What I am not grousing about is the news I will be liaising soon with the graphic artist charged with designing the cover for my next book, Howling on A Concrete Moon.  Looking forward to it.