All Fired Up

I'm normally one for prudent behaviour, but sometimes you have to compromise your principles. I didn't watch any of the New Year's Eve coverage, but of course heard all about it this morning, about how Tex Perkins 'stunned' viewers when he took to the stage, turned towards Kirribili House, and shouted, 'This one's for the Prime Minister!', as he flipped the bird and then launched into the old Cruel Sea hit The Honeymoon is Over.

You know something? I'm completely with Tex on this.

How can I not be? The country is on fire. Experts tried to warn Scotty from Marketing back in May, but did he listen? No! Whilst he deemed it too unimportant to take advice on harm minimisation strategies for bushfires, he did all he could to push his odious Freedom of Religion Bill. We already have rights when it comes to religion, and not being discriminated against. What he seems to want is the right for people to use their faith to discriminate against others. It's stupid to use your faith to discriminate against others. ('I'm not baking you a cake for your same-sex wedding because it goes against my religious beliefs.' 'Fine, you bigot, I'll take my business elsewhere, and tell my friends about it, who will in turn take their business elsewhere. Go broke. See if I care'). That flippantly toned scenario in the parentheses is one thing, but it concerns me that medical and mental health services could be denied to a person in need, on the bases of the religious beliefs of service providers.

Furthermore, the clown pissed off to Hawaii, and had the temerity to compare cutting into the holiday with his family (by all of 45 minutes, so it would seem)  to the decision of a plumber to take on an extra emergency job on Christmas Eve. I have no problem with the Prime Minister having a holiday, but this is a national crisis. It's not a clogged-up dunny spouting effluence on Christmas Eve.

The NSW Government cut funding to fire services, and hey presto! - the frigging State is now alight! I'm in my fifties, and I cannot recall it being this bad. People have died. We have lost an astronomical number of wildlife.  For weeks, the air has been redolent of smoke. I woke up today feeling like I was hungover, and I only had one beer last night. Yeah, I'm angry.

New Year's Day has a sad association for me. It is on this day twenty-seven years ago that my mother, surrounded by her children and her many siblings, and with my father by her side, took her last breath. I remember the raspy sound of my Dad's stubble as he rubbed Mum's hand against his cheek. My parents are now together. I miss them today. However, I have my own family now, and when I look at the young men they have grown into, I am filled with pride and wonder (and occasionally horror because, I will admit, they can be ratbags). I have family and friends, and will likely catch up with some friends later for a New Year's toast, and a swim.

I'm off to read the book I treated myself for Christmas: Identity Crisis by Ben Elton. I'm liking the satirical look at the chronically offended hashtag generation.

Happy New Year, Reader.

Reasons People Suck

Reason people suck #134: that a woman in politics will be criticised for her wardrobe and lack of children. I've been reading about Deb Frecklington (leader of Queensland LNP) saying in an interview, with a publication I understand to be a Murdoch rag, that her children etc keep her grounded, and sniping about the Queensland Premier's choice of designer wardrobe. You know what? I am so fucking tired of people criticising the attire of female politicians. Provided the pollie is dressed appropriately, then what does it matter if her wardrobe comes from Target or Millers, or from Sass & Bide? Another thing: Premier Annastasia Palaszczuk has suffered miscarriage, failed attempts at IVF, and has endometriosis. If you're reading this, Freckles, please be advised you're a spiteful, catty skank who's behaving like an alpha girl in high school. Pick another hill to die on, like, I don't know, perhaps your opponent's POLICIES? This is one of the reasons I'm not keen to go into politics. For the record, I buy my clothes from Target, Big W, Best & Less, Just Jeans, Rockman's, and op shops. I also have two children. However, my novels contain sex and drug use, and in one there is a reference to Gary Glitter music, so everyone will have a field day with this.

Reason people suck #135: my Twitter feed is all about an argument between a woman and a service station attendant. The woman (OP) didn't like the service station's policy that the toilet will not be made available to anybody who has not made a purchase. I think this is a reasonable policy. However, the person requiring the toilet was not the OP, but her toddler, who was bursting to go. This is a TODDLER, people. Anybody who has had children (like good old Freckles referred to in the above paragraph) will know they have trouble holding on. Also, no matter what the age, using the toilet is a matter of dignity. Sometimes this must be taken into consideration, like when you're dealing with a toddler or a heavily pregnant woman. The OP actually did make a purchase, and her child got to use the dunny. In the meantime, everyone's lost their shit over it (hopefully they've made a purchase if they're at a service station). The whole bloody thing's got bigger than Ben Hur. Why does this need to happen? For weighing in with my opinion that whilst da rulez is da rulez, common sense should be exercised as well, I have been called a 'hippo' and told I look like a '65-year-old granny'. Um, okay. For the record, this is my Twitter profile pic, and I think I look like neither of these things in the picture:

I'm not actually offended by the words, just puzzled, and a bit amused. In any event, for this particular tweep to affectively insult me, I would first have to value his opinion.

But you know something? It really bamboozles me as to why something like this takes on the gargantuan proportions it does. I don't even see why a skirmish between a flustered mother and a service station attendant over store policy  had to be put on social media in the first place, but it was, and everybody went totally bugshit. It is a shame Tom Wolfe has passed away, because this makes The Bonfire of the Vanities look like The Little Engine that Could.

But sometimes people don't necessary suck. My oldest son has received confirmation of his acceptance into university to study a Bachelor of Education. This is a source of both relief and great pride for me.

Today I made a discovery. If anything is missing, it will probably be located under my youngest son's bed. Today I found a charger, a missing pair of shorts, and a Tupperware container. Next week, it will be the lost City of Atlantis.

Good Gravy!

Christmas is done and dusted, as the saying goes, for another year. Wrapping paper has been put in the recycling, and the book I bought myself with the gift card from my employer has been commenced by your blogger (it's Identity Crisis, the latest from Ben Elton, and it deals with the culture of the easily offended and hashtags). I had a very busy few days over Christmas and Boxing Day - I was rostered to work. When I was driving to a client's home, what should come on the radio but one of my favourite Christmas songs: How to Make Gravy by Paul Kelly. You know something? I teared up a little as I was listening. The predicate and narrative of the song is a Lump-in-the-Throater: a first person account from a prisoner writing a letter home - he's going to miss Christmas with his family because he's in stir - and among other things, he gives his tips about how to make the gravy for Christmas lunch; apparently up to the offence that saw him serving a custodial sentence the gravy had been his task. Paul Kelly is a fantastic lyricist and his delivery in this song is superb, but then again, Kelly could sing the ingredients listed on the side of a cereal box and have you reaching for the tissues. Perhaps my emotion was due to missing my father, whose anniversary falls around now, and it's only been a few years since we lost him. He was very much in my mind as I worked. I guess Gravy makes the listener think of all the people who can't be with their family on Christmas Day. People such as emergency workers, hospital staff, and of course this year the volunteer fire fighters.

This means it's another year before we're bombarded with Christmas songs again. I will be safe to wheel my trolley down the aisle of the supermarket and not be subjected to Last Christmas by Wham. That song seriously sucks camels' balls, and it makes me want to puke like a demonically possessed adolescent girl everything it squirms its nauseating lyrics into my ears.

If Last Christmas has the power to irritate, so to does Wonderful Christmas Time by Paul McCartney.  It's such a nonsensical load of pointlessness, and it sets my teeth on edge. McCartney is partially responsible for some of the greatest popular songs every recorded, so what's the deal with this? Did somebody cut off the oxygen supply to his brain?

But anyway, as long as I've got Merry Christmas (War is Over) by Lennon et al, Rockin' Christmas by Ol' 55, Merry Christmas by Slade, and Paul Kelly's aforementioned number, I'm happy and know Christmas is here.

I know it's late, but Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Seasons Greetings, and may the good outweigh the bad.

Bad Erotica I Read Today

I will preface this by admitting that I know what I am about to type is a rant of glib condescension of a magnitude that could plug up the hole in the ozone layer. It might put prospective purchasers off buying my novels, so I will take the opportunity to point out my narrative voice in the fiction is different to my narrative voice as a blogger. However, read what I'm sharing here, and tell me I'm wrong, people; this is the most woeful dung I've read since Fifty Shades of Grey, in terms of predicate and prose:

'

The red markings are my additions because I wanted to draw your eye immediately to the glaring atrocities in this, um, work. I discovered this ham-fisted erotica courtesy of a Twitter account I follow which is dedicated to bad writing by men about female characters. Some of their postings I actually disagree with, but others are total eye-rollers, and this had my eyes rolling into another dimension. Anyway, let's work our way through in a linear fashion, top-to-bottom, as per my notes.

1. Kaley's mom came an hour after we finished eating. Um, what? Yeah, I know; puerile double entendre on my part, and all that jazz.

2. I took off …  watching television. Whilst a lack of commas can set a certain tone in a passage (such as exasperation or urgency), there are times when they are needed. Don't be afraid to use a comma if you're not trying to give an air of urgency to your narrative voice. Commas make sentences less frustrating to read and also help clarify the sentence's intention. Y'see, the problem with the subject sentence is there are other possible interpretations, such as the couch being the thing wearing undies, or the undies are watching television. Structure and commas matter, people. 

3. Several questions … relax'. New idea, new speaker: NEW PARAGRAPH!!! 

4. Settle down Susan. It's called the vocative comma, and is to be used whenever a character is being personally addressed, such as in this case when the antagonist (Mark from accounts class) is addressing the protagonist (Susan). Without it, this phrase could be interpreted as a direction to settle or calm a crying baby named Susan. Anyway, the prose in this passage is beyond stupid; it's plain fucking woeful. 

5. He walked aplomb...People don't walk aplomb. Aplomb refers to a person's self-confidence in a tricky situation, not his or her gait. People can walk 'with' aplomb.  Reading about someone walking aplomb made me almost snort my morning cup of tea out my nose.

6. Running vagina. Quick! Catch it before it runs onto the road and causes an accident!

7. Long-shaved legs. Mate, this is NOT how hyphens work. I'm guessing Susan has long legs, and they are shaved. The misuse of the hyphen here gives the interpretation that she has been shaving her legs for a very long time, and as a technique for inspiring arousal in the reader, it fails dismally. Nobody cares if Susan has been shaving her legs since she was relatively young. Does making the legs shaved make the story all the more sexy, or should Susan have had her legs waxed instead? Now, if it was a depilatory cream that rendered those pins hair-free: whooooo-doggy! (*fans self*). In case I need to spell it out, those last few sentences are my attempt at sarcasm.

I forgot to underline it, but what on Earth is a 'panty'?

Other people commenting on the Twitter thread took umbrage to the entire predicate of Mark from accounts class (and accountants have a reputation for being staid and boring!) entering Susan's room uninvited in this predatory manner. I actually have no issue with this, although it's not my bag at all. It's erotic fantasy - well, SOMEONE'S erotic fantasy, anyway - and I do not believe in kink-shaming. Do what you want, but don't do it in public to an unconsenting audience because you will frighten everyone. 

Whoever wrote this is trying to inspire sexual arousal in the reader, but the atrocious writing just renders this piece about as erotic as a love bite on a turd. 

To whomever wrote this festering tripe: please stop.

More of Murdoch's Muppets

It was my sorry experience to view footage of social commentators discussing Scott Morrison on Sunrise this morning. Yes, I know morning television is a blight sure to annoy, but I found the clip in my social media feed, and clicked on it. I cannot recall having been so angry for a long time, maybe since Forrest Gump won Best Picture over Pulp Fiction - a travesty that will confound me to my grave (seriously, Academy, what the fuck were you thinking?).

The commentators were Gretel Killeen and Chris Smith, and the host was that Basil with the surname I can't remember, and any respect I had for him flatlined the time they were discussing IVF, and he, along with the cohorts, took a flippant and insensitive attitude. Let me tell you my respect was not revived in any way when I viewed the clip.

The topic for discussion was the criticism aimed at Prime Minister Scott Morrison for taking leave during this current bushfire crisis. I agree the man is entitled to go on holiday with his family, but this is an EMERGENCY, and he has to show leadership (yeah, I know; stop rolling around laughing and get up off the floor). Yes, I know fire services are State issues, but this is a NATIONAL crisis. Morrison has the leadership of a sheep that's running along behind its flock, dried dags clicking and clacking like castanets - an apt thought, given the Prime Minister tries to market himself as a loveable daggy dad. News just in, Scomo: you don't come across as loveable; you come across as ineffectual and bungling. He also had the ungodly temerity to criticise then Victorian Police Commissioner Christine Nixon for going out to dinner during the Black Saturday bushfire crisis. Nixon goes out for a feed when an area of a State was affected; Scomo fucks off to Hawaii when large sections of the country are burning; who can tell me what's wrong with this picture?

It's all well and good for him to say he's being briefed by the Deputy PM etc, but have you SEEN the dim-witted deputies etc? Talk about Dolts on Parade. McCormack stood there bleating about people holding up signs with misspelled words, and had the gall to end that sentence with a preposition. We have a cop frightening a little girl protesting outside Kirribili House (this little girl's home had been lost in the fire) instead of speaking to the little girl's father, who was right beside her.

So naturally the topic was discussed on morning television today. Well, I say 'discussed', but there was no discussion from Chris Smith. He interrupted Gretel and shouted over her, spiralling to such a state of manic apoplexy that he almost wet his pants. Smithy, I'm guessing you have not done a lot of debating in your time, and I'm guessing nobody's ever told you about basic manners, either, but there are some things of which you should be made aware (and Michael McCormack, this is how to not end sentences with prepositions):

1. In a discussion, the other person has the right to speak sans interruption.

2. Shouting over the other person will not strengthen your own argument; if anything, it weakens it, and shows you up for the obnoxious buffoon you are.

3. My jaw is still aching after it hit the floor when I saw you shout that Scott Morrison is the greatest leader we've ever had. Seriously, man, are you taking the piss? Here's an idea: don't suck a crack pipe when you're in the green room awaiting your television appearance. This is the only explanation I can come up with for your outrageous and laughable assertion.

And as for Basil What's-His-Face, you sat there like an impotent lump whilst that loudmouth Smith carried on like a rude, bullying horse's arse. The He-Can-Have-A-Holiday rhetoric you guys spouted, and the rudeness to the guest who pointed out we are in crisis and Scomo's leadership is lacking, just lends credence to my theory that Sunrise is a conduit for the LNP, and you are nothing more than incapacitated acolytes fellating Murdoch.

There's no cool way to do this segue, so I'm just going to say to those who've not finalised their Christmas shopping, how about buying my novels as gifts for those you love? Check them out via the links on the home page of this blog.

Carloses & Karens

Just thought I'd share the lamest thing I've read in a long time. Seriously, were this piffle any more  lame, the vet would be putting it out of its misery.  I'm of a mind the poster of this nincompoopery has posted with the sole purpose of stirring, vexing, harassing, and annoying.

Anyway, do I fit this criteria? Let's see.

1. I am reasonably fit, but the idea of climbing a hill makes me want to collapse in a heap.

2. I am slim-to-medium build, so yeah, okay.

3. What constitutes 'feminine'? My genetic code comprises XY chromosomes, so as far as I'm concerned, I'm feminine to the nth power.

4. I am a very good cook, but a shit cleaner (by the way, can the dude who posted this asinine slop cook and clean at all?).

5. 'Don't swear'. Fuck that shit, and fuck you mate, and fuck the horse you rode in on, but most of all fuck you sideways with a toaster.

6. 'Don't nag'. Yeah, right. I nag like the most miserable old fishwife that ever walked the face of the Earth at times.

7. 'Smile'. Will this do? *Bares teeth in the manner of a frightened chimp*.

8. 'Have kids'. Well, I have two, but what are you going tell the women who don't want children, or who have been through the grief of fertility treatments that have not come to fruition? Read Point 5 above.

9. I have very long hair, so I guess that will make you happy.

10. I choose not to wear a lot of makeup, because I don't like it very much. But it's MY choice, and not to appease some shit-goblin with his head up his own arse.

11. Modest? Fuck you, mate! I'm smart and funny, so screw you.

12. I wear dresses. I wear jeans. I wear trousers. I wear skirts. I wear what the fuck I want whilst taking into account atmospheric conditions and legislative standards.

13. 'Submit to a worthy man'. What people do in their bedroom is none of your business, you sick nosy fuck.

14. 'Get married'. Well, I did do that back in 1998. But what if I hadn't wanted to? Am I less of a woman? Jeez, people like this twerp are annoying.

Mate, if your views are for real, please borrow Doc Brown's Deloran and piss off back to 1950-something. Don't try and convince women to listen to you, or comply with your moldy old views. Just save your breath; you will need it to inflate your girlfriend.

Why are some people so stupid? Did their mothers ingest drugs whilst nurturing these clods in utero? Were they perhaps dropped on their heads at birth? In conjunction with being stupid, why are some people just plain awful? I'm talking about the couple who were filmed harassing their neighbours for having an Aboriginal flag on - and remove your socks, because this will knock them clean off - THEIR OWN PROPERTY WHERE THEY RESIDE! (Sorry about your missing socks). Why does a flag trigger some people? I could understand if the neighbours of these grubs had hung a flag featuring the swastika, and then by all means complain, but for the love of Crimony, it was a freaking Aboriginal flag on the property of people who identify as Aboriginal. What's the problem? Oh, I get it: Boganus Stupidus. People can decorate their houses how they bloody well like! Personally, I cannot abide Coldplay, but if a neighbour has a Coldplay poster on his or her wall, I'm not going to storm their premises and tear it down

I'm thinking that line: 'It's too strong for you, Karen' is going to become a metaphor for strong movements and backlash.

Well, I'm off now. I've got the seeds of another novel germinating in my mind.

The Cheezel That Walks, & Being A Dance Mum

I just looked at my last post, and it was over a week ago! What gives? This is so unlike me; I'm normally ranting every second day at least. Maybe it was owing to the fact I carried out quite a few tutoring sessions last week, and my kid hogged the computer. Today, I made the concerted effort to boot him off, and he complied. In a week's time, we will learn of HSC results. Where have the years flown? It seems only yesterday we dimmed the lights and put on the Barry White CD, and now the resulting zygote is looking at university.

Life's been a hotchpotch of good and bad. In the past week, I have had to draw on inner strength and make decisions. I know the decisions I've made are the right ones, and I'm feeling good.

What else has been going on? Well, I've submitted an application to a 2020 writer's festival (Sydney based) to sit on the Young Adult panel. My application has been received, but I am yet to learn whether it has been successful.

On the weekend, I watched my younger kid perform in his dance school's annual concert. The concert was held at the local high school, and it was decided that once the kids had been signed in, they would sit in the school library owing to the current dire air quality. So, I signed my kid in and sat in the playground, and got out the novel I'm currently reading. I became aware I was feeling a little unwell, which was of concern because people generally don't like having to run to the toilet whilst there are performances on stage, especially ones in which their children are featured. But I got through the first act, even though the seating area was oppressively hot and stuffy. During intermission, I had to go outside to the fresh smoke. However, I managed to keep my guts intact during the show, and was able to smile the patented Mum Smile as my son performed with his musical theatre group to a medley of numbers from Annie.

But yes, the constant pall of smoke and ash has been making my eyes itch, and giving me merry total heck in the old sinuses. Other things that have given me the sighs is the beyond asinine comment made by Donald Trump aka The Cheezel That Walks at some anti-abortion rally, wherein he stated, 'Right now, in a number of states the laws allow a baby to be born from his or her mother's womb in the ninth month. It is wrong. It has to change.'  Um, what? Is he channelling MacDuff from MacBeth, who in the play's fabulous denouement states he was from his 'mother's womb untimely ripped' (nowadays known as a C-section) because MacBeth arrogantly believed a prophesy that 'no man of woman born' would harm him? The common sense in me realises Cheezel Man is likely crapping on about the notion of a late-term abortion, a procedure that is NEVER carried out on a whim, but because of complications that endanger the mother's life. I'm not going to say to not comment if you don't have a uterus, because that's like someone saying I can't have an opinion on circumcisions because I am not the owner of a penis. What I will say is this: if you can't have an informed opinion, then don't comment.

The other thing that's given me the sighs lately is the death last week of Andrew 'Greedy' Smith from Mental As Anything. Shit, that's unfair. He wasn't old, and he was a nice guy. I had the pleasure of meeting him a few times, and we discussed trekking Nepal (I trekked Nepal in 1989, and our guide asked my friend and I had we heard of Greedy Smith; our guide was a former musician and developed an interest in Australian music after taking Greedy on a trek, whereon Greedy had mentioned to our mutual guide he was a musician in Australia).

Life just stinks at times.

Today's Power of Three

A common ploy used in creative writing is 'the power of three'. It seems to be some talismanic quality that renders three the magic number, particularly in comedic articles. Keeping this little 'thing' in mind, I'm going to write about three things that got up my nose today.

We will begin with the article I saw this morning about the usual 'outrage' because a mother was fined for having a magician entertaining at her kid's birthday party, which was held in an Adelaide park.  It's great that she provided employment to a professional entertainer, who was likely more convincing than Uncle Harry trying to entertain the kids by playing Camptown Races on a wax-papered comb, and whose repertoire of magic tricks start with the magic incantation: 'Pull my finger'. Naturally the Outrage Squad are complaining about the Fun Police, and officious local government bureaucrats. But the reason the councils require permits for professional entertainers in parks relates to public liability insurance. However, what really has me grinding my molars is the woman hosting the party actually enquired whether a permit was required, and was told that there was indeed a permit to be obtained before being allowed to have a hired entertainer perform there, whereupon she decided she DIDN'T want to pay for the permit, went ahead with the party and the professional magician, copped a fine, and WHINGED TO THE MEDIA! Am I getting old, or is the world being overtaken by sympathy-seeking, point-missing, entitled jackasses? I know that if I was stupid or arrogant enough to flout local government bylaws, thus receiving a fine for my own informed decision, the last thing I'd do is take it to the media expecting sympathy. And do you know why? Because I know I would arouse the ire of irritable old biddies like myself, who'd know straight away I'm just an attention-seeking, spoilt twit.

The second thing that annoyed me today is reading about politicians in Ohio seeking to introduce a bill that would have doctors reimplant ectopic pregnancy or face abortion murder laws. My dudes and she-dudes, this is biological balderdash. Ectopic pregnancies are NOT VIABLE! Furthermore, they have the potential to cause fatal injury to the mother. If you want to pass bills policing women's bodies, at least have the common sense to fucking learn about them first. The Handmaid's Tale is not a textbook, it's a work of dystopian fiction, so stop trying to follow it so closely.

Finally, today I read a locally written article about a bail application relating to a crime that was committed in the area last year, and one of the sentences began with 'And'. My fellow grammarians will know this is simply not on, when it comes to sentence starters. Yes, I know my paragraph regarding the first of my annoyances today has a sentence starting with 'and' (to wit, 'And do you know why?'), but here's the difference: I'm writing a creative piece that will hopefully entertain you, whereas the article I read purported to be formal prose. When writing formal prose, my loved blog-browsers,  you do not commence a sentence with a conjunction. It ruined my day, and only a fellow grammar pedant would understand how infuriating it is to see the standards slipping and sliding like a bunch of kids (and drunken beer-gutted uncles) on a soaped-up Slip-n-Slide on a hot Christmas Day.

Well, those are my contributions for the 'power of three'. I hope you enjoyed reading them, and I hope they didn't get up your nose to the extent they did mine.

Being Vocally Vocative

I cannot recall when I last purchased a women's magazine. The ones I regularly purchased were Cosmopolitan, Cleo, and Australian Women's Forum. AWF folded, sadly, and I guess I kind of got over the two Cs when I had a baby because I found I couldn't relate to the headlines ('Does My Bum Look Big In This & Other Dilemmas'). I have never purchased New Idea or Woman's Day. My late mother subscribed to the latter (hiding it before my late father birddogged it and did the crossword puzzle), and was a frequent purchaser of the former, so I'd have a read of her copies, and wonder why I had bothered.

Whenever I'm at the checkout and glancing over the magazine covers, I am reminded why I am not in the habit of purchasing them. The headlines alone are dreadful and obviously totally fabricated bull droppings: 'Kate Middleton Pregnant Again, & This Time It's Twins!' (note to magazine editors: she is the Duchess of Cambridge, and she had probably eaten cauliflower with her lunch, and was rubbing her stomach to ease the ensuing gas attack. If she WAS pregnant, the Palace would have issued a formal statement. My use of the word 'Palace' in this manner is called metonymy, and maybe you twits could look that up, too); Jennifer Pregnant! (note to magazine editors: Jennifer Aniston is in her fifties); Kate & Megan At Loggerheads! (note to magazine editors: they are known as the Duchess of Cambridge and the Duchess of Sussex respectively, and how would you know if they were at loggerheads, aside from the ubiquitous 'palace insider'?).

But one of them really had me grinding my teeth today. It reflected some supposed grievances of Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie of York against their father, Prince Andrew (there's probably a bit of merit in this claim, I'd be a bit pissed off if he was my dad, too). But there was a quote on the front page, and it went like this: 'How Could You Dad?'

Read that quote, and tell me what's missing. Yes, it's the good old vocative comma! You know, the one that goes before the person being personally addressed. The quote, which is also doubtlessly made up by some shit-gibbon editor, should have read: 'How Could You, Dad?', and when I saw that outrageous crime against grammar, I am sure I looked a little like this:

I mean, seriously, what is 'How Could You Dad' meant to signify? Minus that all-important vocative comma, the question appears to be seeking an answer as to how one carries out the activity of 'dadding'. I don't know what dadding is; do you? I'm thinking it might be some millennial idiom relating to parenting from the male perspective. Before any of you millennials derisively sneer, 'Okay, Boomer' at me, I will take the opportunity to point out I am Gen X.

Well, that's me done for now. Like many, I am heartbroken over the death of Lewis the Koala. The footage of him crying in pain as the kind rescuers put water on him put a lump in my throat. I hoped he would pull through, but his injuries were very severe.  Poor baby. But it's not just Lewis; it's all the wildlife that has perished in this vicious cycle of conflagration. Why couldn't the Government address the concerns raised by the Fire Service months ago? Were they too busy dreaming up ways to be even bigger twatwaffles with their heads in the sand? Hell, we're led by a clown who wants people to work until they're 70, and then practically passes out climbing a hill (and Morrison's 51).

I'm out of here, but thanks for reading.

Legging It

What's making news today? Well, it seems shit has been lost everywhere at the most alarming rate because a school in Melbourne has banned girls from wearing leggings. The excuse for the ban is that leggings are supposedly distracting to boys. 

I'm of a mind that this is teetering dangerously close to the edge of the precipice leading to a sharp and deep drop into total buffoonery. Teenagers are little more than cauldrons of bubbling hormones, and it takes significantly less than exercise wear to distract them. What really gave me the irks is that it potentially plants the seed of, and propagates the idea, that women are 'asking for it' with what they choose to wear. How about just telling kids if they're distracted, to acknowledge their own feelings, and then get back to their schoolwork? 

The school has the right to enforce a dress code, and let's face it, leggings are not a uniformly item. If they're being worn as outer wear, then they're downright ghastly, especially in an institution of learning. If they're being worn under a skirt, then what's the problem? They're not much different to opaque tights. 

Who else is completely over this smoke? My head has been aching, and my eyes are irritated. I have been having flashbacks to childhood trips in the car with my parents, both of whom smoked at the time, and I would be stuck in the front between them and they would be puffing away, and steadfastly refusing to wind down the window, despite (or maybe because of) my constant pleading and whining. We would reach our destination - half an hour later than necessary because my father was a slow driver - and my face would be the colour of an avocado. The other day, I was rostered to work in my childhood home town, and I thought: Great! Looking forward to seeing the place. Got there, and couldn't see a damn thing! There was hazy smoke hanging about the place like a ghostly ectoplasm. It was like an absolute pea-souper of a fog, and the only reason I knew it wasn't fog was that my hair didn't coil and spring like Redfoo's. I had to travel to a farm that was being subjected to the smoke from a national park fire. These fires are a blight, but I should give thanks everyone I know has remained safe during this crisis.

Last night, I took my fifteen-year-old to see an ABBA tribute show. He thought he would show his sense of humour by wearing a Metallica T-shirt. I thought I would show my dagginess by doing the 'clap' and rotary dialling motions on the chorus of Ring, Ring. This made my kid cringe. 

Oh well, I am going to have a quick shower and crawl into bed now. I am very sleepy, and working tomorrow. One good thing this week: I've managed to get a few copies of Howling on a Concrete Moon sold. Click on the link on the home page of this blog, and you might end up buying a copy of your own once you've read the first chapter.

Yule be Sorry

We are halfway through November already, and to use a hackneyed phrase: Christmas is almost upon us. I've already started Christmas shopping (well, buying one gift at a market yesterday counts, doesn't it?). As much as I like Christmas, it's a bloody stressful time of year. The crowds would rival the platform of a major train station in Tokyo during rush hour. You rush around like your feet are on fire and your arse is catching as  you try to get things organised, and the actual 'lunch' is over in a few hours, and SOMEONE has to wash up. The season has sad connotations for me; both my parents and my father-in-law died over the Christmas/New Year period. It's easy to be melancholic, but you are allowed to be happy, and you have to live. Anyway, there are a few constants about Christmas that contribute to the associated stress:

1. Someone will have a moan about some problematic Christmas carol, or song traditionally played at Christmas. Last year it was Baby, It's Cold Outside because some woke as fuck clowns said the song was predatory. From what I can tell, the male in the song is trying to convince the female to stay with him (yeah, he probably wants to bang her, but so what?), but he's not actually forcing her to stay. I still recall Rupert Nureyev performing this on The Muppets in a duet with Miss Piggy. In a gender twist, the shy hesitant character was played by Nureyev, and it was the porcine diva who portrayed the wannabe seducer. If a (then) closeted gay man and a stuffed effigy of a sow, that was operated and voiced by a man, can sing it and maintain their dignity, then just treat the song for what it is: a SONG. Besides, The Little Drummer Boy is much worse. That song totally blows, and if I was Our Lady, I'd grab that kid's drum and force it over his head like a watermelon for bashing the drum and waking up my newborn.

2. Recycling of misconceptions and flawed tropes via shouty memes in my newsfeed. You know, the ones that go We Aren't Allowed To Say Merry Christmas Because It Will Offend Muslims. This popular favourite will be followed closely by the runner-up complaining that any given major department store will not have a Christmas-themed display in their window, and someone will be moaning about 'Happy Holidays' being a portent of doom and the annihilator of Christmas and all other things associated with western civilisation. A few points, folks: by and large, neither Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, Hindus, Rastafarians, adherents to the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, nor atheists are bothered if someone says 'Merry Christmas' in a moment of goodwill and bonhomie. They are more likely delighted someone took the time to be polite and friendly. Some people say 'Happy Holidays' because this time of year is sacred to other faiths as well, and it is in an inclusive term. When I look at it this way, it doesn't bother me at all, although I personally prefer the sound of 'Season's Greetings'. But I will keep saying, 'Merry Christmas', and I'm sure you won't be offended. If you are, then that's your CHOICE, and I'm not apologising. But can people please stop buying into the crud that gets circulated every year at this time? Who's doing this; is it people who want to be deliberately divisive? Can you just stop? Christmas is stressful enough as it is.

3. Signs that read: Santa, Please Stop Here. Those twee representations of kitsch that get pushed into the front lawn get up my nose. I know I sound like a Grinch, but I can't explain it; I see one of these signs and have to fight an almost uncontrollable urge to go and snap the damn thing off its spike. But I don't. And do you know why? I'm not a colossal jerk.

Did anyone else read about the tweet sent by Will.I.Am regarding his treatment on a Qantas flight? He's claimed the flight attendant was racist. I don't know if the attendant was racist because I wasn't on the flight, but wasn't it the case he didn't remove his headphones to listen to the safety procedures? There were federal officers awaiting him at Brisbane, which seems a little over-the-top for a refusal to remove headphones, but I'm wondering where is the racism in this? I've read comments by people who purport to have been on the said flight, who have stated the attendant's behaviour was unacceptable, and The Veronicas have weighed in and said they had problems with that same attendant. Maybe the attendant has no people skills, which is kind of a problem if you're working as a flight attendant. I will conclude this blog posting by saying this: I don't think the Black-Eyed Peas ever recorded a song that didn't shit me to tears.

Fire!

I am a member of a local author's group, and we meet once a month to showcase our work. and discuss the whys and wherefores of the literary world.  We also set ourselves a task to bring along a 500-word piece to a pre-agreed theme. Yesterday's theme, darkly serendipitous given the raging bush fires plaguing two States, was 'fire'. 

I could have gone down the 'Fire is the result of exothermic chemical process of combustion...' and all that jazz, but the first thing that went through the vagaries of my mind was Fire by The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. Arthur is not a name traditionally associated with rock-and-roll, but there is a reason this song was the first association in those vagaries, that float and appear like options in a Magic 8-Ball.

What can I say about this song, aside from the fact that it's the most demented, brainsick, and totally bananas arrangement ever recorded? If you doubt what I say, check it out on You Tube, particularly a black and white clip from Top of the Pops in 1968. I don't know who did the most LSD here: Brown, the backing band, the engineers, the art director, or the set designer.  You are greeted by guy in some kind of apocalyptic makeup, flaming horns on his head, who roars by way of introduction: 'I am the God of Hellfire!'  I daresay when this was aired, Ozzy Osbourne and Alice Cooper, then both likely young men aged approximately eighteen and twenty respectively, sat in their respective loungerooms, gazing at the television and sighing, 'I wanna be HIM!' Seriously, pause the song when there is a close-up of Brown, hold a black-and-white photograph of Alice Cooper beside the screen, and I defy you to tell the difference.

This pyromaniacal maelstrom of a song continues in a series of psychedelic scrambling arpeggios whilst Brown does his best to freak the snot out of everybody. He coos what sounds like veiled threats in a deceptively gentle bridge, and then rips off his robes and, bare-chested,  starts pogoing about. Around this point another young up-and-coming musician caught this performance on television and thought, 'Yeah, that could work! And Iggy Pop would be a superb name, numerologically speaking.' 

Finished with the pogoing, Brown completely blows a spring and goes into full unhinged mode, warning over and over: You gonna burn! Burn! Burn! Burn!, like the most hysterical fundamentalist preacher to ever take the pulpit.

Listening to, and viewing the performance of, this song is akin to being hit by a truck, or maybe fighting a raging conflagration. It will leave you dazed. The only song more exhausting than this is Jim Carroll's  People Who Died.  

They say if you remember the Sixties, then you weren't there. Thank goodness for  YouTube, which enables us to, er, experience numbers like this.

You know something else? I happen to really like this disturbed, dippy, and utterly crackers number.

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A Reminder of Grotesque Series

It is a rare occasion that I watch television during the daytime. Even when I was on maternity leave with my first, I rarely looked at the google box. I would be often asked in jest had I got into Jerry Springer yet, but the few times I glanced at it told me it would be utterly repulsive viewing. Who decided it would be hugely entertaining to showcase incestuous yokel families (with less than the standard number of adult teeth in a set between them), all with hyphenated first names (and the name to the right of the hyphen is always Jo, Joe, or Lee), and all arguing about why the other family members felt entitled to be also having sex with the conjoined twin midgets with whom he or she was currently in a sexual relationship. That last sentence might seem bamboozling, but it still contains more coherence and common sense than the typical episode of The Jerry Springer Show.

Back to my point: I finished work about lunch time on Friday, so I decided I would make a cup of tea and relax. The television was already on, and I gleaned it was the midday movie. There was a young woman in a wheelchair arguing with a home care nurse about the meals she was being served, and I thought: This rings a rather unappealing bell - and I have just realised I have inadvertently made a kind of pun. I picked up my iPad and did some quick googling, and sure as eggs, it was a dramatization of the novel Gates of Paradise by VC Andrews (or more truthfully, a ghost writer churning out Virginia Andrews-style pap following Andrews' demise, which the VC Andrews novel series are). This series featured the family of a girl named Heaven. Like most of the VC Andrews factory, it told of family secrets that seemed to centre around young women being porked by their half-brothers, step-brothers, step-fathers, or uncles. Come to think of it, these families would have been ripe for an episode of The Jerry Springer Show. Women of a certain age will likely remember reading this series around the late 1980s. The books were trashy car-crashes, and the writing was airy-fairy, farty piffle. Heaven was a character I detested with scary vehemence. Her ability to annoy the living snot out of anybody was debilitating enough to stop a charging rhino. On the scale of punchable women in literature, she is matched only by Anastasia Steele from Fifty Shades.

Anyway, the movie I watched last Friday was not about Heaven (who by this time had died in an accident), but her daughter Annie, who had the hots for a guy she believed to be her half-brother. Thankfully, given Heaven's fling with her own uncle, the guy after whom Annie lusts is not a blood relative after all. This makes things so much better. As an aside, I am now wondering why the characters in this keep-it-in-the-family saga all look like airbrushed models, instead of the drooling oafs in Deliverance.

By way of background, Heaven was conceived when her own mother Leigh was raped by her stepfather Tony. Leigh was only about thirteen or fourteen.  Tony is clearly a Polanski-ish child-grooming, predatory nonce. After an icky life, Heaven moves in with Tony and the woman who is her biological grandmother, and starts banging someone who turns out to be her uncle. At some time in the salacious series, Heaven (at the time pregnant with Annie), gets felt up by Tony. Further down the track, we see the orphaned and injured Annie sent to Tony's House of Fun to recuperate, and she also gets groped by the lecherous old perve.

And, last Friday, I sat in delirium on the lounge watching the dreck. I am guessing the movie's budget went on sets or hiring of stately homes, because the staircase in the mansion was magnificent; but there was not much left for anything else. I say this because Tony is played by Jason Priestly (yeah, Brandon Walsh in 90210), and in order to 'age' him for the older Tony, it is obvious the hair and makeup staff upended a 2 kilo bag of flour over his head. This movie is one of a series, as it turns out, and he would have played a younger Tony in the earlier ones. Will I watch the earlier ones? I don't know. As I mentioned, Heaven is seriously one of the most irritating protagonists I have ever encountered, and I doubt being translated into a movie will make her any more fetching.

I needed to cleanse my mind after viewing this, so indulged in some guilty pleasures that were less creepy - I YouTubed Bay City Rollers clips (yes, I know their drummer has been done for offences of a sexual nature, too). One of my favourites is Rock and Roll Love Letter, and it contains the lyrical magnificence that is: 'I see an ancient rhythm in a man's genetic code...'. Clearly, there are not enough references to deoxyribonucleic acid in songs these days.

Total Ickmeister

For the past few days I have been unwell with an infection, but some antibiotics and rest have got me on that hackneyed and cliched path known as the Road to Recovery. I was thinking of the text as I'm typing, and thought don't type that overused phrase, and if you MUST type that overused phrase, at least acknowledge it is as old and boring as shit.

Life can be stressful at times, like when you open your emails and find a letter from your electricity provider warning you about disconnection if you don't pay a certain amount at a certain time. I respect the importance of paying for a service, but is it really necessary to send an email when the bill's not actually late yet? They remind me of black-suited, sunglass-wearing goons hired by unscrupulous loan sharks.

Being a parent also brings its aggravation. Just once, it would be nice to hear, 'Good morning, Mum. God, you're great!', instead of, 'What's to have for breakfast?' This morning, whilst Mr 18 faffed about with the bread and toaster, I asked Master 15 what he was going to have for breakfast. He didn't even look up from his phone as he replied, 'The souls of the innocent.' I am yet to find that in the cereal aisle, and I am very fussy about what commercial cereal I purchase. I will have a look for this next time I'm shopping, and these souls of the innocent turn out to be one of those gruesome confections falsely promoted as food, he will not be breakfasting upon them.

I decided to give myself a bit of a digital detox today. It went okay. Then I checked my social media timelines and read the most grotesque thing I've heard about in a long time (and this is saying something; I'm the mother of a kid who wants to dine on the souls of the innocent). There's some rapper who goes by the name T.I. I do not know what the initials stand for, but I'm thinking it might be Talentless Imbecile or Twatwaffly Imperiousness, but most likely Total Ickmeister. Anyway, he said he takes his daughter to the gynaecologist every year to check if she's still a virgin. Ick. Just ick to the nth power. T.I., some pointers:

1. Hymens can break in various ways, not just penile/vaginal intercourse.

2. Sex takes many forms, not just penile/vaginal intercourse.

3. Surely what you're doing entails some kind of child abuse.

4. What the fuck type of doctor would go along with this type of foulness?

5. Your fetishization of virginity is creepy as fuck, and to extend your fetish to your daughter makes me want to vomit like a demonically possessed adolescent girl.

6. You're one of the reasons I hate rap music.

I had been recovering nicely from my minor illness, but reading about this loser almost had me spiralling into a relapse.  I had to go on You Tube and play Down by the Lazy River by the Osmonds - it's something of a cheerer-upper, and despite the naffness and cheesiness, by crikey those boys could sing and move!

The Healing Power of Dolmades

I'm kind of at a loose end at this very point in time (12.14 AEDT) as I type. Thought I might just toss about a few thoughts. I was rostered for just under two hours this morning, but am tutoring this afternoon. I guess I should plot my next novel, but I think I will plot a letter to my local council and suggest they build a few more drains in our street because we had some very welcome rainfall on Sunday afternoon, but it got quite scary when there was a very concentrated deluge going on.  We have been flooded twice in the past six years, and I am in no hurry to experience it again. It is amazingly distressing. It took me a long time to recover emotionally last time, and if it happens again, I will need some serious help. And you know what else? I feel like an arse for saying this because it's only WATER! It's not like losing a family member in tragic circumstances. Having to replace furniture is a first world problem, and I should remember this.

So, to stave off anxiety about heavy rainfall, I have been pigging into dolmades. Whilst not a recognised medication under the guidelines set to govern pharmaceutical bodies, the dolmades are doing a good job. I bought a tin yesterday - I do love me some of those tart little vine-wrapped fuckers - and as it happens, none of my family are all that keen, so I got to hog the lot. This is good.

Last Friday, between care work and tutoring, I pre-recorded an interview with my local ABC radio branch, to promote Howling on a Concrete Moon. I don't know if it's been aired yet, but the producer promised to email me a copy of the link, and when this is done, I will make a little video of it and share it to my socials ('socials' - am I hip or what?). The producer asked something along the lines of: 'Regarding the book being set in the Eighties, do you have a fondness for that era?' I almost snorted hard enough to send ribbons of snot from my nostrils that would have wavered like New Years Eve party streamers. I almost choked on the water I had been thoughtfully supplied, as I took a sip.  I felt like screeching, 'Are you fried? That was the worse decade EVER! Shit music, shit movies, shit attitudes, and shit hair!' Instead, I chuckled like the cultured yet cynical dilettante I try present as, and replied that I had lived through the Eighties and considered it a particularly horrendous time. Still, looking forward to sharing the interview.

Anyway, I'd better get going and work on my submission for more drains in our street. I'm aware you catch more flies with honey than you do vinegar, but at times I feel like buying a gigantic, weapons-grade can of Mortein, and a fly-swatter the size of a tennis court.

Cheers,
Your Blogger Bingells.

A Latter-Day Mr Squiggle

Okay, life is getting a teensy bit less hectic, although I have been exceedingly busy of late. I was not rostered today, so I have been following up proposed author appearances with local libraries, and organising interviews with local branch of ABC. At this stage, I am pre-recording an interview tomorrow in the window I have between finishing work and tutoring English. I will share a link to the interview, but I'm told the questions I'm likely to be asked are the usual run of the mill: What's It About, What Inspired You, and How's It Been Received. I said to the producer, 'A seventeen-year-old girl trying write her memoirs, I wanted to try something different, and very well, thank you.' In the meantime, peeps, here is  a link to the first chapter of Howling on a Concrete Moon.

Being a parent brings many surprises and challenges, some of which you can really do without. My fifteen-year-old is a gluttonous, pimpled fiend, but thanks to his metabolism and the fact he is a dancer, he never gains weight. One thing I've noticed (and remember myself) is that fifteen-year-olds find the most infantile things funny. Last night, I drove He of Voracious Appetite to his dance class, and just as I turned off the engine, I was subjected to one of those things you can really do without.

Kid: 'Mum, we can't go in yet. I've still got a penis on my leg.'

Me (in a state that transcends normal flabbergasted): 'What?!!!!'

Kid (pointing to something on his thigh that looked like a crude prison tattoo): 'My friend drew a penis on my leg.'

I stared in abject delirium, and my kid told me the backstory to the work that went into this, um, art, including the fact the artist has wanted to draw pubes, but my son suggested the hairs on his leg would serve this purpose well. I told him he couldn't go to dance with that thing on his leg, and that he would have to scurry into the toilet and scrub it off. He then suggested - and I swear I saw the lightbulb appear over his head - that we turn it into a rocket ship. I handed him my pen, and my son went about sketching portholes, and combustion flames coming from what had once been testes but were now the base of the rocket. He added a stick figure sitting astride the craft, and asked me to write the caption: I'm going to the moon! So, I did. My son exclaimed at the apostrophe I included: 'Hey, you're even punctuating!' I replied, 'It's ME. I'm hardly likely to not punctuate, am I?' The cover-up was completed with my son taking the pen and tracing a speech bubble around the text and attaching it to the 'astronaut's' mouth. I compared myself to Mr Squiggle, and then had to explain to my kid who Mr Squiggle was.

I wonder how Mr Squiggle, Blackboard, and Miss Jane would have coped with this one?

My Night with the Boss, and Spying Government

When I was aged about nine, I was given for Christmas an anthology of tales by Hans Christian Anderson. The translation from Anderson's native Danish to English was impeccably done, and I found the tales enthralling. As a side note, I did try to read The Three Musketeers some time ago, and whoever translated Dumas's tale to English should think about his or her choices. Anyway, thanks to Disney, most of us  familiar with The Little Mermaid, notwithstanding the studio's softening of the more grisly and gruesome aspects of the story. But this anthology had lots and lots of stories, and one of them was about a swineherd who was in fact a prince in disguise, and whilst in disguise he 'sold' a princess a magic kettle.  The properties of the kettle included a function wherein if someone held his or her finger in the steam of the kettle, he or she would be able to smell what was being cooked in the households of the town. The price for this marvel of appliances (are you reading this, Breville; might be worth thinking about) was ten kisses from the princess. She was worried that someone would see, and had her ladies-in-waiting spread their dresses out and block them from view, as she danced the tongue tango with the swineherd (whom as we know, was a prince). The disguised prince got his kisses, and she got her magic kettle. She took it home and tried it out. The ladies-in-waiting thought it was amazing.

'We know who has soup, and who has pancakes for dinner today, who has cutlets, and who has eggs. How interesting!' they all cried.

Anyway, I read this, and thought: This is not interesting. Why on earth would you want to know what someone's having for dinner? (Fast forward to nowadays when thanks to social media, we get to learn what people are having for dinner whether we want to know or not!).

But I guess it just shows it's not a new idea, people in authority (and the monarchy depicted in this story do have gubernatorial authority) wanting to know what people are doing in their homes. I've read the Department of Home Affairs has suggested facial recognition technology to confirm people accessing online porn are of legal age to do so. Never mind having people just enable parental controls and filters on their computers to keep the kidlets away from questionable material, the government, in the manner of the princess with her kettle, want to know who's looking at what. I reckon the grotty grubs just want to look at everybody's 'orgasm face', and check out the sites they're viewing. Get out of our bedrooms, and our studies, or whatever room in which the computer is kept.

On Saturday night, I drove to a nearby town and watched a Bruce Springsteen tribute show. I really enjoyed it. I didn't spend too much time filming on my camera, because I have a newish camera and am not used to the filming function. I did capture some wobbly, wonky footage of  'Bruce' performing Hungry Heart, but after that, I put my phone away and just enjoyed the show. Most of the patrons were older than I am, but young at heart, as evidenced by the dancing. Well, I think they were dancing. There was one woman reliving her young sharpie days, and doing some blend of the Sharpie Dance and Interpretive Dance. It was a sight to behold. Some drunk guy tried to get me up to dance. I actually like to dance, but I declined that night because: (1) I don't like dancing with drunk men; (2) I didn't want to leave my handbag unattended; (3) my sexy new shoes were pinching my toes; and (4) I didn't want to put myself at risk of being stuck by the elbow or foot of the ageing sharpie. When 'Bruce' started on Dancing in the Dark, I actually did toy with the idea of dancing near the stage; I thought he might invite a woman up to the stage to dance a la the young Courtney Cox in the original video; and I so wanted to be that girl. But my misgivings overwhelmed me, and I remained seated. It was just as well, because this 'Bruce' didn't invite a female audience member onto the stage to dance. It might have been the insidious phenomenon known as Insurance - public liability and litigation are an evil mix at times when it comes to fun. However, I think he was also worried about his own health: extending an inviting hand would have no doubt led to the ageing sharpie knocking all competitors out of the way as she stumble-staggered to the stage, and 'Bruce' probably didn't want to be buffeted and pummelled by flailing body parts, either. To borrow from his grand finale - Born to Run, natch!: it's a death trap.

Anyway, that's it for now. Thanks for reading, and check out the first chapters of my novels (links on the homepage of this blog).

Will you walk with me out on the wire
'Cos baby, I'm just a scared and lonely rider...