Quotable Quotes: Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
(Douglas Adams, Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy)

April Audit

I am currently: Watching the Miss USA 2007 pageant. It is worse than you can possible imagine.
I should be: Doing shorthand. Pah.
Later on I will: Go and see Dylan Moran. Awesome.
I am reading: Alias Grace (Margaret Atwood). Very nearly finished.
I am listening to: Nothing new.
Last movie I saw: Stomp the Yard. Oh god. It was sort of awesome but I've never seen so many wannabee homies in one movie theatre.
I am thinking about: The future. And what colour I should paint my table.
Last disappointment: Realising I may never finish another novel. Because I'm la-zy.
Last victory: Passing 70 words a minute in shorthand, much to my surprise.
Last good deed: Um... buying coffees at work. Which is sad.
Last bad deed: Not doing the Walk Against Want with Kym this morning.
I am looking forward to: Walking into town... and Andy getting home today.
I am dreading: Shorthand test tomorrow, for which I have not prepared and which I do not want to do.

I think living in Northbridge is making me paranoid.

Today I got a call on the intercom while I was home alone. I don't always answer the intercom because it faces out onto a slightly dodgy street over the road from a crack den and a hotel and I reason that my friends and family have my mobile number if they want to find out if I'm home. Today I did answer it, however, and the conversation went something like this:

Me: Hello?
Man: Uh hello, sorry to bother you I'm (indistinguishable) from (indistinguishable) repairs.
Me: Uh huh...
Man: I'm downstairs at the (indistinguishable) hairdresser because they have a leak and I think it might be coming from your balcony.
Me: My... balcony.
Man: Yeah I was just wondering if I can come up and have a quick two minute look at it to see if that's how the water is getting in. Sorry to put you out.

So at that point I let him up, he checked the potenntial leak out and was on his way, right?

Er no. Clearly paranoia is getting to me because I immediately thought this could be some kind of cunning ruse to get this guy into the complex and/or my apartment.

So I lied.

But that wasn't enough. I didn't just lie - I lied. I fell into the classic trap of bad liars and went ridiculously, improbably fucking overboard. I told him I was hosting a baby shower on the balcony so, no, he couldn't really come up to check it out right then because it was full of excitable and potentially hormonal women.

Seriously. I wish I were joking.

But, to my credit, not being made of stone I thought there was a fair chance this guy was telling the truth. After all he sounded so apologetic for dragging me away from the "baby shower" (or so I thought - but more on that later). So I told him to come back later in the afternoon when I knew Ruth would be at the house with me. Cunning, eh?

Well, when the guy turned up a few hours later I thought straight away that it was a lucky thing for both of us I hadn't let him in the first time. One look at his uber dirty black adidas tracksuit pants, singlet peppered with stains of unspecified origin and his general 'I may have just come from robbing a bank' demeanour and I probably would have koshed him over the head with the wok first and asked questions later.

But, tracksuit pants or no, he did appear to be there on legitimate business and went out to the balcony to check it out. He talked (presumably) intelligently about leaks, cracks and grout. And about this point I thought things were going pretty well: the guy was legit, I'd done the smart thing and I'd gotten away with a pretty dodgy lie.

If only.

Because it was about this time that tracksuit-man happened to mention he had popped his head over my balcony earlier that day while fixing the roof below... Had Popped. His Head. Over. My. Balcony...

... presumably moments before he rang my buzzer to be told I was hosting a baby shower. On my balcony. Uh huh. Awesome. The smug bastard knew I had lied. He knew it and I knew that he knew it.

I got him the hell out of there as soon as I could.

But the sorry footnote to this sad little tale is that I need to call my old mate tracksuit man this week to let him know if it's okay to go ahead and fix the cracks on the balcony.

At this point in our tenuous relationship I fear I have so little hand - having already been exposed as a distrustful, lying, snob that the only way to fix things is to let him into the apartment and help him carry my TV, computer and assorted valuables out to his car myself.

It's a moral grey area really...

I really am anti death penalty but, at the same time, I am pro being allowed to run down in my car the dickslaps who (allegedly) bashed three kangaroos to death. This little joey was the only survivor.

This day in history...

• Marked the start of the Old Bailey trial of Oscar Wilde in 1895. Fuckers.
• Was the wedding of Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon to the then-Duke of York (Queen Mum and King George VI) in 1923.
• Was the day of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.

The Anzac Post

I know I posted Sassoon the other day but, screw it, it's Anzac Day.

Base Details

IF I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath
I'd live with scarlet Majors at the Base,
And speed glum heroes up the line to death.
You'd see me with my puffy petulant face,
Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel,
Reading the Roll of Honour.
`Poor young chap,'I'd say -- `I used to know his father well;
Yes, we've lost heavily in this last scrap.'
And when the war is done and youth stone dead,
I'd toddle safely home and die -- in bed.

(Siegfried Sassoon)

Token Smokin' Hottie: Carl Barat

To paraphrase a great movie I feel I am drifting back into the arena of the unwell. That is to say that my obsession with now defunct UK greats The Libertines has been well and truly reignited by the purchase and hasty reading of The Libertines: Bound Together biography.

A quality read with great ho-yay laden pictures (Bec: that mock-up postcard you sent me is on the fridge in the new house. It makes me hungry alright...) and suddenly I'm full of a desire to dress up like Oscar Wilde and throw a television through the window...

Hence this week's Token Smokin' Hottie, the quite delicious Carl Barat who famously smashed the shit out of his face on a bathroom sink but managed to retain uber hot status. Bastard's talented too.

"The question is not, "Can they reason?" nor, "Can they talk?" but rather, "Can they suffer?" (Jeremy Bentham)

So our government has decided to continue to keep breeding pigs in stalls so small they can’t turn or take more than a step in any direction for another ten years.

Awesome, well done guys.

Other western countries around the world are phasing them out or at least making sure the pigs spend less time in these crates but pigs can’t technically vote in this country so apparently there’s really no need to keep them happy.

This is really, really fucked.I know bacon tastes is really delicious but it really doesn’t taste good enough for this.

How can something so wrong feel so right?

I feel that I should hate this website because reading a really great book on a computer screen is not the same as reading a lovely real copy of the book and I should be against anything that might stop people from buying books on principle... but I must confess I keep going back there for a wee snippet of some old favourites. Gah, I"m no longer going to be welcome in the library when this gets out...

Quotable Quotes: Suicide in the Trenches

I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.

(Siegfried Sassoon)

Only when she looks down?

Some days are worse than others. And some days are worse than those days. Then some days take a giant dump on all the aforementioned days and reach heights that can’t be topped.

Today is not quite one of those days but somehow I have gone from being super chipper this morning to being one step away from going up the road for another bag of Nando’s chips and using my diet coke can to bash myself to death.

On top of naffed-up photos, The fucking Voice, an irate deputy lord Mayor and a headache you might think that another visit from The Man Who Calls Up and Cries might be the final straw.

You’d be surprised.

Regular readers may remember him from a few weeks ago, when he memorably wept over the future of OBE while playing incredibly loud in the background in a slightly mental fashion.

Today we reunited when he talked me to talk about a particular ABC newsreader. A rather attractive newsreader, he was at pains to reassure me, not “the one that looks like a Klingon when she looks down”.

This newsreader had, he said, been wearing a lot of turquoise-coloured clothes lately. Not that this was a bad thing - he liked turquoise, his daughter (he’s breeding?) likes turquoise… everyone’s happy. But lately said newsreader has started to vary her wardrobe a little, including wearing rings on her right hand… her right hand you see, not her left, so that her loyal viewers don’t know if she’s married or not.

The little minx.

Part of being a journalist in my particular organisation is dealing with wackos and there are absolutely no shortage of them. But this guy… well I kind of like him. Despite (or perhaps because of) being completely mental he’s actually pretty funny. He knows that he’s nuts which is more than a lot of people can say and that he’s often only a drink away from fall-down drunk which, again, is at least some kind of self awareness.

More than that he knows he’s being a pain in the arse and apologises constantly for wasting my time or talking shite. Somehow this makes me feel like I’m doing a community service by talking to him because he seems to appreciate the human contact. At least he keeps coming back for more.

It also makes me realise that however crappy my Friday is going things could be a looot worse for me. This guy could know where I live, for a start.

And yep the crazy vaguely operatic music is indeed still playing in the background.

Honestly it’s no wonder they were caught.

All references to “homosexual perverts” aside this court case involving two men kidnapping and raping a 14-year-old boy is obviously pretty disturbing.

Now the jury has ruled the men planned to murder the kid to stop him from going to the police.

Horrible stuff.But like any good gory court case there is an element of the incredibly bizarre in this one.

Because, according to today’s news reports, part of the evidence against Robbie Sebastian Wheeler and Victor Leslie Urquhart was an envelope full of “damning notes”. Including the following:

“We have to get rid of him soon”

and:

“Won't acid take care of the body so it's just bones?”

Now really... Is this really the kind of matter that can be discussed via notes?

Asking someone to pick up dishwashing liquid or a carton of milk = perfectly reasonable to leave a note.

Discussing how you really do need to remember to get rid of the body of the 14-year-old you haven’t yet killed in the other room, or musing on whether to dissolve his body in acid?

Not note material.

What kind of lives do these men lead that this kind of thing is worth of a post-it and nothing more? I'd love to hear the subject matter when they really sit down for a serious talk.

And really nobody, whatever he's into, wants to come home from a hard day at the office to find a whiteboard full of messages like “which of us has to dismember him, do you think?” or “Shall you hold him down while I rape him this time?”

Victor, Robbie, if you ever do get out of jail: put down the pen and paper and get some goddamn face time.

Oh you mean THAT guy…

I’m sure I’ve emailed this to a few people before but it still makes me laugh and is worth the read if you’ve got the time. On my own front I’d also like to formally add The Guy Who Has to Out-Obscure-Band You When Talking About Music Even Though You Suspect He Listens To Linkin Park along with The Guy Who Stares Into Your Eyes During Sex Because He Thinks Its Romantic And Not In Fact Incredibly Creepy.

Hero Schmero, just take your shirt off again.

Sometimes I think the television world is run by a bunch of horny middle-aged men. Often I think I’m completely correct in this assumption, based on the number of improbably “hot” women and girls who inhabit the TV universe, frequently slumming it with guys who are nothing much to look at themselves and provide the average female viewer with nothing but a vague sense of unease.

Seems like there are a lot more unattractive men on TV than unattractive women is all I’m saying.

But I would like to take it all back and kneel at the feet of the creator of Heroes who have lovingly packed more man candy into a weekly hour of television than I would ever have thought possible. Honestly if the hot older brother isn’t planting moist Bro-Yay-laden kisses on his even hotter younger brother then the long-haired heroin addict hottie is taking his shirt off for no good reason at all and constantly wandering around looking like he’s just about to, already has or is in the process of taking a shower.

Meanwhile the memory-removing black one and the black Dad are competing for the title of Hot Black Bald Man (both doing an admirable job by the way) and even the scruffy-but-possibly-gay schoolkid looks like a is-he-legal-I’m-not-sure-that-could-be-chest-hair one to watch.

Phew. Believe it or not this was going to be a blog about the translation of comics to the big and small screen. Really it was. I was going to talk about why Sin City and 300 are more interesting than Spiderman and Batman and how they got it so right with the first two X-men movies and so very it-blows-very-hard wrong with the third one.I was even going to throw in some references to Ghost World and that other one with Paul Giamatti that I could never get into.

But now is not the time for my personal theories on superheros on the big/small screen. Now is the time for daydreaming about shirtless junkies and uber hot male nurses and politicians. Oh yes and for looong cold showers - now is definitely the time for that.

Next target: the disabled.

I was going to write something about this but then I thought why bother? The day John Howard stops being a cunt is the day I start wearing white hot pants and spraying myself with a hose. His latest proposal to stop HIV positive people from migrating to Australia is offensive in so many ways I can't quite bear to even go into it for fear I will have an aneurism. And if there's one fucker I don't want to be responsible for my death it's our hopefully s00n-to-be-gone PM.

I only care about the cute and fluffy ones, though, obviously…

When this slightly sooky looking cavalier-cross was found he had an elastic band wrapped around his neck, was undernourished and riddled with fleas biting his skin.

The elastic band was on so tightly that it had dug into his skin and caused an infection.

His owner admitted that she’d known he was sick but hadn’t taken him to the vet. Because she was a fuckstick, presumably.

Without the RSPCA Toby would suffered in pain for weeks until his owner took him to the vet or let him die. With the RSPCA he was taken away from his owner, who was fined and given major skin graft surgery and placed into a new home.

I’m only writing about this on here because I can’t actually write about the RSPCA Million Paws walk fundraiser for the paper I work for. Heaven forbid we encourage people to go to this walk and actually raise money and awareness for a fantastic cause if the event is sponsored by another media outlet. What a fucking tragedy that would be.

For anyone who does care about this kind of thing the Million Paws walk is on May 20th, kicking off from Sir James Mitchell Park in South Perth and it’s a fantastic cause.

And if anyone needs an almost three legged, half blind and almost certainly senile poodle to drag around after them… well you know who to call.

Hmm er cut me off a er piece of uh... that...

Okay MJ *sniff* Pete Doherty's weeping facial sores are still going strong. You just had to go and ruin it for me, didn't you...

Quoteable Quotes: Catch 22

"As always occurred when he quarreled over principles in which he believed passionately, he would end up gasping furiously for air and blinking back bitter tears of conviction. There were many principles in which Clevinger believed passionately. He was crazy." (Catch 22)

Pussycat Dolls, Pussycat Dolls, where have you been all my life?

After only one week living in coupled-up semi-bliss I have uncovered the major flaw in the whole living-with-the-boyfriend plan. The major reason why living with a girl or girls is awesome.

It came to me at 9.30pm last night as I watched Channel 10's the Pussy Cat Dolls Present: Search for the New Doll (or whatever).

This show personifies everything I love about reality TV. It's incredibly trashy, everyone bitches about everyone else, it's graced by/hosted by/judged by C-grade celebrities and it features girls trying to out-skank each other. Obviously it's completely awesome. And yet...

When I watch this kind of thing with girls it's a top-shelf bitch fest. I get to make fun of the boring girl who looks like a pre-nose job Ashley Simpson or the girl who cried because (apparently) she's blown away at how good her voice sounds. I can talk about how much I hate that little growling noise singers make and snigger at the classic reality TV show 'reaction shots' and the dodgy cuts where some production editor has clearly mish-mashed some random shots together to get the storyline or conflict that he or she wants.

But watching trashorific TV with Andy... well, for a start, Andy can't stand it and disappears into the other room. So I'm watching it by myself and... who am I supposed to make sarcastic remarks to?

I have to get right up against the wall and shout if I expect my neighbours to hear my one liners and re-hashing the show the next day tends to take the spontaneity out of comparing some poor unfortuante soul's weave to roadkill. Instead I end up sitting on the couch and worrying that if someone walked into the room they'd think I was enjoying it in a, you know, non ironic way.

They might even think I coveted the hideous panty-baring minidresses sported by four girls last night instead of day-dreaming about how many sequins it takes to look that tacky and how the girls were probably all furiously sewing by torchlight to take the hems up half a freaking foot. Okay those dresses were sort of fantastic in a crotch-displaying tranny way but still...

New policy? I'm keeping Ali and Ruth on speed dial so I can call them up and bellow "Is she supposed to be fellating that pole?" down the phone at them at only a seconds notice. Actually I could probably have a text message ready to go with "Is she supposed to be fellating that..." and fill in the blanks as I go. Yes, folks: it's that awesome - why aren't you watching it?

Sometimes it’s good to preserve a little bit of mystery

There is a store down the road from my new abode that never fails to fire my imagination every time I walk past it purely based on the fact that it is called The Resistance.

I’ve never seen inside the shop because I’m usually walking the other way and just catch a glimpse of it over my shoulder.I think this is a good thing because, really, there’s no way the actual shop can live up to the shop in my mind.

In my head it’s a coffee house/safe haven for hot men with stubble and berets.

There’s a one coffee and five cigarette minimum and if the inhabitants of The Resistance aren’t planning ways to overthrow the government they’re teaching me how to play poker “Eastern European style” or look dashing while wearing braces and a stained white wifebeater.

To gain entry to The Resistance you have to either know the secret knock, know the secret password or bring your own spirits.

Everybody has well-thumbed copies of intellectual books which everybody assumes you’ve read but nobody ever asks you to prove it.

Nobody seems to have any money but everyone has awesome, if shabby, clothes, and an endless supply of booze.

At night someone drags out a gramophone and plays old records while everyone gets rat arsed.

In reality it's another Vietnamese restaurant or a cruddy second hand store flogging smelly jumpers and books without their covers but in my mind it’s a pretty awesome place.

Luke: call me.

Lindsay will tell you that I am a pussy when it comes to skinny boys who have just come into a man's body and one certain Perth actor in particular but I swear I am unbiased in suggesting that anyone interested in that sort of thing or in interesting theatre generally to catch Phaedra's Love at PICA until April 22.

Drinking half a bottle of wine before going is, however, not recommended, unless you want to find yourself giggling like a school girl when an underwear clad man winks at you from a metre away.

And just so I can say I did I'm putting the lovely Luke Ryan on my watch-list or, as if you prefer, keeping him in a holding pattern, right now. The boy is talented.

He can zing his arrow into my buttocks any time (hey, it's an AD reference you dirty so and sos)

I’m such a predictable bastard but I’m pathetically excited about the start of the BBC Robin Hood series this Sunday night. I’m really not spruiking for the ABC but I’ve been hanging out for this one ever since I saw the first promo shots and realised it was likely to be stuffed full of skinny boys, bows and arrow, horses… honestly, I’m practically panting over here.

It might turn out to be lame but, really, considering I've seen Prince of Thieves about 10 bloody times and love, love it how picky do you think I am?

Ch-ch-ch-changes

New colour scheme, updated profile, new pic, multiple posts... all point to the fact that I've got too much time on hands.

I'll take what milestones I can get...

... Yay! 800 visitors since I put the counter on here. In my mind, instead of having, like, 10 people drop past 80 times over the months I have 800 readers just hanging on my every dribble... Can you say delusional? I'm ready for my close-up...

Night time pursuits enjoyed by my neighbours, judging on what I hear from them:

• Dancing.
• Turning the taps on and off and on and off and then on again just for shits and giggles.
• Rollingsomething heavy and spherical down the hallway.
• Listening to Anthony Call-whatshisname. You know, the gay one. And I don't mean gay as in lame, but he qualifies on both fronts.

You know what really grinds my gears?

You know what really grinds my gears?

The apparent media conspiracy that is going on as to what constitutes a “healthy,” and “curvy” woman’s body.

My long-simmering rage on this has reached boiling point thanks to The West Australian’s coverage, today, of Glamour magazine’s list of sexiest female bodies.

This annual list has, this year, been topped by the lovely Scarlett Johannson which… fair call. She’s hot and I like the fact that a she can wear her giant knockers pretty well. But what really grinds my gears is that the paper goes on to make a big deal of the fact that the top women on the list were “curvier” kind of women. And sure, Boobs McScarlett qualifies. But who comes next?

Jessica Alba. Uh huh. I think she’s hot but… you know. Giselle Buchanan, who looks like a boy with tits if you ask me… Jennifer Aniston (a boy without the tits) and so on. And the paper make such a big deal of “skinny supermodel” Kate Moss being down at number 20. As though half the women above her on the list aren’t exactly as teeny tiny skinny.

The fact is that every one of the women on the list are tiny by comparison to the average woman. And that’s fair enough because it’s the business they’re in and it’s what they have to look like to succeed. I think some of them are uber hot and probably perfectly healthy too. I don’t give a toss about the list or these women’s bodies per se - I just give a toss about that media coverage that tries to make women think people like Jessica Alba and Jennifer Aniston are “curvy” and normal-sized women.

They’re not. They’re tiny, toned and put about ten times as much work into their bodies as the average woman. And again: that’s fine but don’t act like this is normal.

I hate the fucking media conspiracy to arbitrarily hail someone or other as the new saviour of “curvy” women just because you can’t see their ribs through their clothes or because their tits haven’t completely wasted away to pecs. It’s as fake and as transparently false as fucking Cameron Diaz’s outrageous claims about eating ten hamburgers before an awards ceremony. What. Ever.

So go ahead and covet these hot bodied wenches, and feel free to think some or all of them look fantastic. Just don’t pretend that this is normal or that the rise of Jessica Fucking Aniston is going to make wide-hipped, rolly-polly-stomached women everywhere suddenly believe that they have got it going on. Fucking ridiculous.

Items found in a cardboard box while unpacking my stuff in my new home...

• A short black electrical cord, presumably belonging to a device I neither recall buying nor ever owning.
• A plaser cast of my teeth.
• A VHS tape with episodes from series 3 Buffy. Hey, it's still good.
• The prologue (torn from a book) of Heart of Darkness.

Moving, moving moving...

Yep I've been quite the slack bint blogger but it's all in the name of moving house. My new Northbridge pad is shaping up pretty nicely if you ignore the broken blinds, broken champagne glass(es) and the pile of crap I just dumped in the cupboard because I couldn't be arsed putting it away...

On the plus side, I saw the worst movie ever last night. Seriously Art School Confidential almost gives Gigli a run for its money. Okay, I'm kidding it doesn't but 'almost almost' is enough...

Noteworthy notes to the PR who is ruining my life:

1. My desire to run a story on whatever bullshit event or product you are spruiking is inversely proportionate to the number of ‘follow up’ or ‘just checking in’ calls I receive from you.

2. Every time you try to bully me into getting a late-night photographer I want to poke out your eyes with my pen and I was lying when I said I had checked with the photographer.

3. About half of everything I say to you is a lie.

4. I didn’t go to that function last week because I would rather strip naked, grease myself up and throw myself into the paper-clip emporium than be trapped with you in a room for even an hour.

5. I’m taking my dislike for you out on your clients and the stories I write about them.

300 8-packs

I hate the fact that there is a lot of snobbery about the fantasy genre.

I have been a fairly big fan of fantasy books ever since I read Ursula LeGuin’s fantastic Earthsea series in primary school.

I’m also a big fan of other genres but I never get as much shit about reading anything else as I do about fantasy. And because I studied English at uni and am well into my Forster and Fitzgerald etc people seem to be surprised at my David Gemmell collection. Not just surprised but… kinda judgemental.

Which annoys me sometimes but, you know, if they base that judgment on what they see of fantasy movies… well, who can blame them?

While watching 300 last night, however, I did start to wish the genre had a bit more respect. Because then, I reason, they could produce some better goddamn movies.

Not that 300 was bad. Despite being completely ridiculous, wildly historically inaccurate, peppered with the most blatant displays of unnecessary nudity I’ve ever seen, more eight packs than you can poke a stick at, coming off as vaguely racist and chock full of corny dialogue it was sort of stupidly engaging.

Okay maybe the eight packs had something to do with it but still.

Anyway, the movie was enjoyable and all but not great and, thinking about it, I don’t think there has been more than a handful of fantasy movies that I thought were really well done. The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Willow, Ladyhawke and The Princess Bride are about all I can come up with off the top of my head, and I’m not entirely sure the latter strictly qualifies.

On the other hand I could list a string of stinkers without trying too hard. (I would do so here but if I have to recall the utter tripe I watched recently that was supposedly based on the Earthsea books I might start weeping).

There are crap movies in any genre, for sure, but at least there’s a bit more diversity out there - different sized budgets playing around with different ideas in one genre, which is the way it should be. I’d like to see a few small budget fantasty movies have a crack, or just something that doesn’t have dialogue that reads like it was written by two fifteen year olds playing Dungeon Siege 2 while they do it. Or something that didn't give me a mental picture of the writers shrugging and saying to each other "well, that'll do: it's only men aged 15 to 45 who are going to see it anyway".

So long as fantasy movies remain bogged down in the middle of the road the genre as a whole will continue to be lambasted by people who’ve never read some of the great fantasy books there are around. Seriously, dudes, give it a chance. Together we can banish lines like "tonight... we dine in hell!" from the world forever.