Punching someone in the face who deserved it
Punching someone in the face who didnt do anything
Punching someone in the back of the head
Throwing darts at a picture of someone
Punching a bag imagining it is someone
Shooting bullets at a picture of someone
Shooting someone
Punching a bag imagining it is you
Shooting bullets at a picture of you ...
Thursday 26 December 2013
Saturday 21 December 2013
Perception
My family (myself, my partner and our two five year olds and a four year old) were discussing how people are able to differently percieve situations. How two people can see the same thing but have different views on what transpired.
Then one of our five year olds came out with a very mature concept. She looked at me and said: You're a perception. And at her mother and said: You're a perception.
And all we could say was: You're right.
When everything is boiled down to a bubbling thickened sauce all we are is a perception. And that sauce may be percieved as tasty on one day and repellent the next when it is the same sauce.
Of course, any sauce with anchovies in it tastes terrible.
Then one of our five year olds came out with a very mature concept. She looked at me and said: You're a perception. And at her mother and said: You're a perception.
And all we could say was: You're right.
When everything is boiled down to a bubbling thickened sauce all we are is a perception. And that sauce may be percieved as tasty on one day and repellent the next when it is the same sauce.
Of course, any sauce with anchovies in it tastes terrible.
Saturday 30 November 2013
The Hunger Games Trilogy
Okay, so I'm a little late to come to The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, seeing as the first two movie adaptations have already been released but excuse a person who up until now has only read Tim Winton's young adult fiction.
Prior to reading The Hunger Games I read the first book in the Dexter series. And the subject matter was less volent and not as well written for an adult audience as The Hunger Games was for a young adult audience.
I'll spare everyone from too much of a plot summary except for this. Katniss Everdeen is a sixteen year old girl living in District Twelve of Panem. This appears to be the remnants of the USA after an apocalypse. The Districts 1-12 (13 was supposedly destroyed after an uprising) are kept under control by the cruel hand of the venomous President Snow from The Capitol. Every year, every single 12-18 year old from the districts goes into the draw for The Hunger Games. One girl and one boy are chosen from each district and sent into a grand-scale arena and the winner is the last child alive.
And so begins the epic story.
The writing is pitched at a young adult audience so it is easy to read. But what impressed me most was the planning. No plot detail was there by accident. This could not have been conceived of and written in any other way than with a trilogy in mind. Not like the movie Godfather III which could never have happened if you read the book. This was an heroic project planned to the finest detail. The world created was believable and intricate and as all good other-worldly books should do, had a lot to say about our current world and our places and behaviour in it. The universals are the same no matter what time period something is placed within.
So, do I recommend The Hunger Games? Indeed I do. I am not an avid reader of young adult fiction, except for the as yet unpublished work of a couple of notable rising YA writers. Not for any other reason than it just hasnt crossed my mind except in the case of Winton. And you'll forgive a Winton fan of reading every single thing I can get my hands on.
The Hunger Games has enthused me enough to read The Harry Potter books.
Enter the wizard. After I finish The Unknown Terrorist by Richard Flanagan.
Prior to reading The Hunger Games I read the first book in the Dexter series. And the subject matter was less volent and not as well written for an adult audience as The Hunger Games was for a young adult audience.
I'll spare everyone from too much of a plot summary except for this. Katniss Everdeen is a sixteen year old girl living in District Twelve of Panem. This appears to be the remnants of the USA after an apocalypse. The Districts 1-12 (13 was supposedly destroyed after an uprising) are kept under control by the cruel hand of the venomous President Snow from The Capitol. Every year, every single 12-18 year old from the districts goes into the draw for The Hunger Games. One girl and one boy are chosen from each district and sent into a grand-scale arena and the winner is the last child alive.
And so begins the epic story.
The writing is pitched at a young adult audience so it is easy to read. But what impressed me most was the planning. No plot detail was there by accident. This could not have been conceived of and written in any other way than with a trilogy in mind. Not like the movie Godfather III which could never have happened if you read the book. This was an heroic project planned to the finest detail. The world created was believable and intricate and as all good other-worldly books should do, had a lot to say about our current world and our places and behaviour in it. The universals are the same no matter what time period something is placed within.
So, do I recommend The Hunger Games? Indeed I do. I am not an avid reader of young adult fiction, except for the as yet unpublished work of a couple of notable rising YA writers. Not for any other reason than it just hasnt crossed my mind except in the case of Winton. And you'll forgive a Winton fan of reading every single thing I can get my hands on.
The Hunger Games has enthused me enough to read The Harry Potter books.
Enter the wizard. After I finish The Unknown Terrorist by Richard Flanagan.
Thursday 28 November 2013
Epitaph
Now that he is gone and this poem has lost its immediacy and therefore any relevance for a contemporary publication, here is my epitaph for the former member for Griffith, June 2013.
The Honourable White Knight
(Epitaph
to the member for Griffith – June 2013)
It’s
warm now
His
bright white hair sheens in the camera flashes
Black
and beady eyes strobe blank as the light reflects off his specs
For
milliseconds he appears blind
His
hand gestures all extravagant and Lady Macbeth
Lips
pursed in sincerity at the gravity of his deed, or trying to retard the grin
His
whole body stiff in movement and faintly robotic - except for those bloody
hands
It
was cold
He
rode on with a dagger in his back
He
sabotaged and bored in and spoiled and refused to help
Some
were lost coming to his aid
But it was never cryogenically frozen enough to thaw The White Knight
Only
when the horizon was the only landmark did he bounce to the rescue
To
knife and drown the damsel
Riding
high again and drilling out opposition
This
Honourable White Ant
Saturday 2 November 2013
A Priivate Man - by Malcolm Knox (A brief review)
I have now read three novels by Malcolm Knox. Summerland, Jamaica and now A Private Man. And I am glazed by awe.
His style reminds me of the engaging minutiae of Ian McEwan, but more engaging for me I think because of the Australiana. Complex sentence structure that flows so well in the brain. Thought-processes crafted to appear like stream of consciousness.
His choice of words and erection of sentence build a complete picture of character such that everybody is full to bursting with traits that others would gloss over or ignore completely. And yet it drew me in so completely.
The plot centres around several characters from the same family. One a father who had died and is a GP. The other four are his wife and three sons. The three sons are a comfortable registrar, an estranged pornographer and an Australian Test Cricketer horribly out of form.
Every aspect of life is examined down to the space between husband and wife prior to sleep in their double bed.
I highly recommend Malcolm Knox's intricate brand of character analysis. I will be seeking out a copy of The Life, his fourth novel. I thank him for his work.
Tom
His style reminds me of the engaging minutiae of Ian McEwan, but more engaging for me I think because of the Australiana. Complex sentence structure that flows so well in the brain. Thought-processes crafted to appear like stream of consciousness.
His choice of words and erection of sentence build a complete picture of character such that everybody is full to bursting with traits that others would gloss over or ignore completely. And yet it drew me in so completely.
The plot centres around several characters from the same family. One a father who had died and is a GP. The other four are his wife and three sons. The three sons are a comfortable registrar, an estranged pornographer and an Australian Test Cricketer horribly out of form.
Every aspect of life is examined down to the space between husband and wife prior to sleep in their double bed.
I highly recommend Malcolm Knox's intricate brand of character analysis. I will be seeking out a copy of The Life, his fourth novel. I thank him for his work.
Tom
Convenience
Walking through the city I came across a convenience store advertising banner. I am reluctant to say that advertising had an effect on me. I pride myself on the unlikely outcome that this form of spiritual diminishment has no effect on me at all.
But I will admit to this one. As I walked past this banner ad I was drawn to it. Convenience stores have proliferated and provide succour to the sugar junkie craving the wonderful hit of sucrose or the similar craving of the faux-sweetness of phenylalanine or sorbitol (that excellent disclaimer on the sides of packaging: excess consumption may have a laxative effect - of course products containing sugar dont have to add that they may raise insulin to levels that may facilitate diabetes later in life).
Back to the advertisement. Somebody walking past the convenience store was asked to make a rather unusual impulse purchase. The common chocolate bar or confectionary bag or soft-drink special - no there will be none of that. Damn those cliches of modern living. Death to those lowly snack foods. Perish the thought of providing minimal income to the manufacturer who would have to sell many thousands of packets to make a shareholder-pleasing profit.
Now I really have raised the expectations of this item of food that could be popped in for.
So it is time to say what it was. To reveal the final piece of the puzzle. To tell the secret that made me sit in front of my computer and write my first blog entry for months.
It reminds me very much of the time I sat in front of the computer and spent hours searching for the terra cotta colour on a drawing program. Then I created a series of parallel lines that overlapped each other. Some vertical and others horizontal. Then I coloured the gaps in between that terra cotta colour. But that seemed cheap.
So I expanded the width of the lines shaping the rectangles and searched again for the appropriate colour to shade those lines. A sort of non-descript grey colour. The mortar was complete and very unlifelike. A brickwall. Two-dimensional. Like most brickwalls. And like every other virtual brickwall I have ever seen, it felt exactly the same when I banged my head against it. It had the plastic feel of a laptop screen but the same effect.
Meanwhile, back in Mawson Station Antarctica, I got back to the point. Banging my actual head against a virtual brick wall even though most brickwalls are two dimensional like my computer screen and should realistcally feel much the same has nothing to do with what I saw but I thought riffing on something would feel good.
Turns out, it isnt. It feels like self-indulgence of the purest kind.
So, what was the item of food that caused this abuse of the time of my band of loyal followers?
A 24-hour convenience store offered by a banner advertisement:
Black Forest Cherry Gateaux.
And I didnt succumb. How could I not? Why I didnt slide it inside my pocket and consume it whilst on the bus trip home? Cannot explain that really.
And before anybody asks, no they were not selling slices. Convenient whole gateaux. $14.95 I believe.
A Queen and a Pavarotti for a log of heaven.
Tom
But I will admit to this one. As I walked past this banner ad I was drawn to it. Convenience stores have proliferated and provide succour to the sugar junkie craving the wonderful hit of sucrose or the similar craving of the faux-sweetness of phenylalanine or sorbitol (that excellent disclaimer on the sides of packaging: excess consumption may have a laxative effect - of course products containing sugar dont have to add that they may raise insulin to levels that may facilitate diabetes later in life).
Back to the advertisement. Somebody walking past the convenience store was asked to make a rather unusual impulse purchase. The common chocolate bar or confectionary bag or soft-drink special - no there will be none of that. Damn those cliches of modern living. Death to those lowly snack foods. Perish the thought of providing minimal income to the manufacturer who would have to sell many thousands of packets to make a shareholder-pleasing profit.
Now I really have raised the expectations of this item of food that could be popped in for.
So it is time to say what it was. To reveal the final piece of the puzzle. To tell the secret that made me sit in front of my computer and write my first blog entry for months.
It reminds me very much of the time I sat in front of the computer and spent hours searching for the terra cotta colour on a drawing program. Then I created a series of parallel lines that overlapped each other. Some vertical and others horizontal. Then I coloured the gaps in between that terra cotta colour. But that seemed cheap.
So I expanded the width of the lines shaping the rectangles and searched again for the appropriate colour to shade those lines. A sort of non-descript grey colour. The mortar was complete and very unlifelike. A brickwall. Two-dimensional. Like most brickwalls. And like every other virtual brickwall I have ever seen, it felt exactly the same when I banged my head against it. It had the plastic feel of a laptop screen but the same effect.
Meanwhile, back in Mawson Station Antarctica, I got back to the point. Banging my actual head against a virtual brick wall even though most brickwalls are two dimensional like my computer screen and should realistcally feel much the same has nothing to do with what I saw but I thought riffing on something would feel good.
Turns out, it isnt. It feels like self-indulgence of the purest kind.
So, what was the item of food that caused this abuse of the time of my band of loyal followers?
A 24-hour convenience store offered by a banner advertisement:
Black Forest Cherry Gateaux.
And I didnt succumb. How could I not? Why I didnt slide it inside my pocket and consume it whilst on the bus trip home? Cannot explain that really.
And before anybody asks, no they were not selling slices. Convenient whole gateaux. $14.95 I believe.
A Queen and a Pavarotti for a log of heaven.
Tom
Monday 5 August 2013
predictive blogging
Some readers may remember a few weeks back I started a blog by talking about the possibility of somebody riding a bike over a piece of glass and puncturing a tyre. It then developed into a speculative piece about the guy who threw the beer bottle and the girl who was amused by it and how they ended up in bed together and both died horrible deaths.
On Friday morning in the rain I rode to work for the first time on my new bike seat post. On Wednesday afternoon my bike seat had failed. If anyone wants to ask how that occurs I can explain later.
As the second lot of driving rain hit while I was in the last kilometre to work on that Friday morning I saw too late a broken glass bottle of Pure Blonde in the bike lane. I rode over it and heard a crack.
When I got to work I noticed nothing problemmatic. I checked the tyre and it was fine.
End of the day though and the tyre was flat as. I removed it and checked the tyre had no more glass poking through and changed it and pumped it back up again but was working at cross-purposes to the puncture in the tube. I must have replaced the punctured tube with the same punctured tube.
I started again and ensured the new tube went in by throwing the old one far away. It pumped up much more quickly this time but as I packed up my gear I heard a hiss and checked the tyre again and it was flat already. I wont relay my words but there was a staccato stream of short syllables.
So I called a taxi and rode home wearing wet lycra in a cramped and cold taxi with my dirty and soaking bag on my lap.
I would have checked the online news for details of the unusual deaths of two youths by drunken broken bottle induced sexual misadventure but thanks to the Adelaide Advertiser's paywall (with free limited access by subscription) I couldnt do that easily and so will take two new tyres and two new tubes to work on Wednesday instead.
On Friday morning in the rain I rode to work for the first time on my new bike seat post. On Wednesday afternoon my bike seat had failed. If anyone wants to ask how that occurs I can explain later.
As the second lot of driving rain hit while I was in the last kilometre to work on that Friday morning I saw too late a broken glass bottle of Pure Blonde in the bike lane. I rode over it and heard a crack.
When I got to work I noticed nothing problemmatic. I checked the tyre and it was fine.
End of the day though and the tyre was flat as. I removed it and checked the tyre had no more glass poking through and changed it and pumped it back up again but was working at cross-purposes to the puncture in the tube. I must have replaced the punctured tube with the same punctured tube.
I started again and ensured the new tube went in by throwing the old one far away. It pumped up much more quickly this time but as I packed up my gear I heard a hiss and checked the tyre again and it was flat already. I wont relay my words but there was a staccato stream of short syllables.
So I called a taxi and rode home wearing wet lycra in a cramped and cold taxi with my dirty and soaking bag on my lap.
I would have checked the online news for details of the unusual deaths of two youths by drunken broken bottle induced sexual misadventure but thanks to the Adelaide Advertiser's paywall (with free limited access by subscription) I couldnt do that easily and so will take two new tyres and two new tubes to work on Wednesday instead.
Puns
After 4 months of warming and feeding and watering and building and mulching and clipping and feeding our chickens - Eleanor and Mabel and Rosie - they ran up to my daughter and I after we'd arrived back from the shops. They were clucking away like they were proud as punch. It seemed as though they had laid an egg. I checked the nesting box but found nothing.
Maybe they had just been excited to see us. We had lunch and put away the shopping and read some books.
At about three in the afternoon I was outside and saw something in the grass. A brown egg speckled white. One of them had laid an egg in the middle of the yard. I thought I'd better check the box and found another. Two eggs. No wonder they were tickled pink.
So, now we are starting to get into eggs. The three chickens are starting to grow up.
About to leave the nest.
Fly the coop.
Spread their wings.
Not wanting to fall fowl of anyone's sensibilities, but we didnt even have to egg them on.
Wattle be next?
Struggling a bit now, I'll need to use a fine-toothed comb. (That was a stretch.)
That's it.
Maybe they had just been excited to see us. We had lunch and put away the shopping and read some books.
At about three in the afternoon I was outside and saw something in the grass. A brown egg speckled white. One of them had laid an egg in the middle of the yard. I thought I'd better check the box and found another. Two eggs. No wonder they were tickled pink.
So, now we are starting to get into eggs. The three chickens are starting to grow up.
About to leave the nest.
Fly the coop.
Spread their wings.
Not wanting to fall fowl of anyone's sensibilities, but we didnt even have to egg them on.
Wattle be next?
Struggling a bit now, I'll need to use a fine-toothed comb. (That was a stretch.)
That's it.
Sunday 28 July 2013
Truth - A brief Review
I am a little late to the Peter Temple Fan Club. I feel like the doors opened years ago and now I'm the guy who got there late and is trying to catch a furtive glimpse through a dusty and grimy window. Last year I read his book called The Broken Shore and loved the mood and the environment and the ttunnel he put me in where I was watching a movie made only for me. One of those books that I kept close and read snippets in seconds if that was all I had.
The Broken Shore's semi-sequel Truth is one I picked up last week and remembered everything good about its semi-prequel. The character picture is holistic and visual. The settings and plot create that quiet dread within me that he got there first.
The style is sparse. Commas for conjunctions. Names for sentences. A word for a paragraph. And yet so much is squeezed into each page that it is little wonder that he won a Miles Franklin for it.
Inspector Villani is such a flawed and lovable character but he is only one in a role call of likeable people within whom I could recognise failings and impulses and bad judgments.
A back-catalogue of Peter Temple will shortly be making its way out of stores and onto my to-read pile already stacked with too many books now relegated to second-billing.
Tom
The Broken Shore's semi-sequel Truth is one I picked up last week and remembered everything good about its semi-prequel. The character picture is holistic and visual. The settings and plot create that quiet dread within me that he got there first.
The style is sparse. Commas for conjunctions. Names for sentences. A word for a paragraph. And yet so much is squeezed into each page that it is little wonder that he won a Miles Franklin for it.
Inspector Villani is such a flawed and lovable character but he is only one in a role call of likeable people within whom I could recognise failings and impulses and bad judgments.
A back-catalogue of Peter Temple will shortly be making its way out of stores and onto my to-read pile already stacked with too many books now relegated to second-billing.
Tom
Monday 22 July 2013
Trust in smartphones
At the encouragement of a smarter man than I another post has been written. Looking back on my previous anger-riddled attempt at connection to humanity I think it is a good thing that I dont leave that as my last published contribution to the world. It was certainly convcieved in contempt and misguided contempt at that. So I box on to try and create some sort of equanimity in my world.
Yesterday on my way to visit the smarter man than I and his delightful family it was an overcast day threatening rain that eventually came while I was still driving. It was the Melbourne midwinter. I was stopped by the intense amber then intense red of a traffic light. A pedestrian waited by the side of the road waiting to cross. She was immersed in a white headphone coccooned smartphone visual world. I have no idea what she was listening to or watching and would love to speculate but wont.
She obviously heard something in her external world because without looking away from her screen she stepped onto the road. Now, sidestreet, minimal problems. But I was on one of Melbourne's eastern arterial roads. By the time she was halfway across there was a serious line of cars backed up both ways. Saturday early afternoon with people possibly rushing to get home before the rain came is not the time or place or environmental circumstancews to push fate's envelope. And I dont even believe in that shit. So, let's try another analogy. It was not the time to test drivers' reactions or levels of fatigue. Or to put it another way, all it would have taken was another person driving a car to be doing exactly what this girl was doing (looking at a phone I mean, not standing by a pedestrian crossing, that would just be foolish) for this girl to be in serious levels of distress and exsanguination.
This girl looking at her phone made it all the way across the road and otnot the footpath before she looked up and appraised her actual rather than virtual surrounds.
And they say we dont live in a trsuting society anymore. Or maybe there is some new Safe Road Crossing Application.
Tom
Yesterday on my way to visit the smarter man than I and his delightful family it was an overcast day threatening rain that eventually came while I was still driving. It was the Melbourne midwinter. I was stopped by the intense amber then intense red of a traffic light. A pedestrian waited by the side of the road waiting to cross. She was immersed in a white headphone coccooned smartphone visual world. I have no idea what she was listening to or watching and would love to speculate but wont.
She obviously heard something in her external world because without looking away from her screen she stepped onto the road. Now, sidestreet, minimal problems. But I was on one of Melbourne's eastern arterial roads. By the time she was halfway across there was a serious line of cars backed up both ways. Saturday early afternoon with people possibly rushing to get home before the rain came is not the time or place or environmental circumstancews to push fate's envelope. And I dont even believe in that shit. So, let's try another analogy. It was not the time to test drivers' reactions or levels of fatigue. Or to put it another way, all it would have taken was another person driving a car to be doing exactly what this girl was doing (looking at a phone I mean, not standing by a pedestrian crossing, that would just be foolish) for this girl to be in serious levels of distress and exsanguination.
This girl looking at her phone made it all the way across the road and otnot the footpath before she looked up and appraised her actual rather than virtual surrounds.
And they say we dont live in a trsuting society anymore. Or maybe there is some new Safe Road Crossing Application.
Tom
Thursday 23 May 2013
Chuck it all into a bin and dump it and move in
So this waste of millions of sperm and an ovum stopped me this morning to tell me that the bin I just moved was there because this is not a bikepath. Despite the bike path along the river being closed because of the destruction wrought by the bridge between the Adelaide Oval and the city because other wastes of seed and eggs cannot walk an extra few minutes to the football in two years' time.
This is despite politicians and health experts decrying the obesity epidemic. Somehow it can be justified to reduce a walk to the plastic seats of a screaming cauldron to raise blood pressure at umpires whilst scoffing crusty and fried potato and a pastry filled with brown and thick fluid and pieces of non-descript mammalian viscera condimented by tomato and SALT.
And this fuckstick tells me this with a straight face tells me this is a footpath despite too many signs with a stylised bicycle printed above the words SHARED PATH in navy print upon white background.
This guy is goodlooking and fit and forty-ish and is unable to read a fucking sign.
If I were able to discern why got so defensive about it I would probably not be taking off on this poor fella. He was just doing his job. I assume that is what he was doing - supervising the bin staff making sure they poured the contents of a small bin into a larger bin ready for that to be poured into a really big bin so it could be transported to a really really big bin that could be loaded into a medium scale truck for final deposit into landfill.
Goodbye.
This is despite politicians and health experts decrying the obesity epidemic. Somehow it can be justified to reduce a walk to the plastic seats of a screaming cauldron to raise blood pressure at umpires whilst scoffing crusty and fried potato and a pastry filled with brown and thick fluid and pieces of non-descript mammalian viscera condimented by tomato and SALT.
And this fuckstick tells me this with a straight face tells me this is a footpath despite too many signs with a stylised bicycle printed above the words SHARED PATH in navy print upon white background.
This guy is goodlooking and fit and forty-ish and is unable to read a fucking sign.
If I were able to discern why got so defensive about it I would probably not be taking off on this poor fella. He was just doing his job. I assume that is what he was doing - supervising the bin staff making sure they poured the contents of a small bin into a larger bin ready for that to be poured into a really big bin so it could be transported to a really really big bin that could be loaded into a medium scale truck for final deposit into landfill.
Goodbye.
Monday 6 May 2013
Animal Welfare outcomes
Just a question. Since when did animal welfare outcomes come to mean quick death?
If we referred to social welfare as the process by which disadvantaged people were put to a 'humane' death would we feel the same way?
If dozens of people get on a plane and die before getting to their destination because of a crash there are outrages and reports and commentary and headshaking.
When thousands of animals are put on a ship to disembark only to be killed for their flesh, only when it is done in a slovenly and cruel manner is it even reported. And even then it is commentated upon, by some, as outside the norm and an isolated occurrence.
But when a plane goes down why isnt it commentated upon as an unusual incident or nothing to be concerned about because it is not a systemic problem.
Worth thinking about and worth thinking about why?
Tom
If we referred to social welfare as the process by which disadvantaged people were put to a 'humane' death would we feel the same way?
If dozens of people get on a plane and die before getting to their destination because of a crash there are outrages and reports and commentary and headshaking.
When thousands of animals are put on a ship to disembark only to be killed for their flesh, only when it is done in a slovenly and cruel manner is it even reported. And even then it is commentated upon, by some, as outside the norm and an isolated occurrence.
But when a plane goes down why isnt it commentated upon as an unusual incident or nothing to be concerned about because it is not a systemic problem.
Worth thinking about and worth thinking about why?
Tom
Tuesday 23 April 2013
Ride for Pain final post
The total amount raised by those who donated for me, excluding those who may have misspelled my name or forgot my name or couldnt follow clear instructions was $840. On calculation that would purchase 212.6 packets of paracetamol; a relatively effective analgesic. That was the cheapest legal price I could find. I decided to round up to 213 packets of 100 tablets and if you think that is cheating then I can honestly say that you are not in the spirit of this blog.
Placing these tablets against one another creates a line approximately 2.8 kilometres long. Enough to create a 13mm wide bridge between my home and the next suburb. Not even returning.
So, that proves the drugs dont work. That is a great song title. Someone should write that song.
Songs ... fucken hard to write. So why should anyone bother? Are songs even worth it?
When you get a corporate creation of minimal age writing of love and loss and being successful in terms of dollar value does it make anyone else vomit with rage and incredulity? I spew my last meal and any associated fluids and then bile and, fuck it, I dry wretch and then I just heave out my stomach and regurgitate that. If I run out of internal organs to disorge in a cascade of suicidal inversion then perhaps I, through thought-process alone, could create some blackhole of vomitus to express my displeasure at the sort of stuff that people will pay for to entertain themselves.
I'm not immune to that either. Not specifically in relation to music.
I'm not proud of that.
Does that mean I cannot judge something else?
Fuck no!
It means I have a perfectly balanced experiential basis upon which to base my conclusions.
Nothing is worth it. Nothing is of worth. Nothing should have a dollar value placed upon it.
Nothing.
In case you are interested I went to see The Drones. I paid $40.
Worth every dollar.
Contradiction soup.
Makes me human I suppose. To bemoan a dollar value and then feel something was worth the cost. I had a smile on my stupid face the whole night and didnt move from my spot and enjoyed every minute and would like the world I envisage in which someone could be supported in creating music like that for free for the enjoyment of others and for the crowd to enjoy it knowing that their home grown tomatoes or home produced art or home typed story could be part of the adequate barter for such a performance.
Now ... dont sympathise with me.
That was an instruction.
I know that I couldnt write a song that perfect in scope and meaning and context. Let alone sing it.
Yet I feel every bit of it. I want to be able.
I want to be able
I want to be able
I want to be able.
It takes too much of what I cannot give or do not have or may not understand or will not sacrifice.
I need to stop pushing the 'ENTER' button and just create a sentence that is not a paragraph in itself and is not just a line of prose that illustrates my state of mind in absolute confusion and disdainful selfdeprocation for my creative life up until this point. Is one sentence that takes up four lines enough to absolve me of using too many paragraph breaks?
Is anybody else enjoying this blog? Does anybody else feel that loss when they hear a Radiohead song? The loss of the song that was within but was not able to be written clearly enough. That realisation that a song chrystallises thoughts within so well that it can make you depressed and elated at the same time.
The song that forms only part of an album worth whatever someone wanted to pay for it as long as it was above a few pence. Really distressing for me that Radiohead is red-squiggly-underlined when pizza and consumerism and shopping mall and fuck-head is not.
But should Radiohead be in the dictionary when that could mean the mainstreaming of the greatest band in the digital age to use the digital age? And does inclusion in the blogspot dictionary mean mainstreaming?
At one point britney spears was in the official oxford dictionary (lower case purposely entered).
How does someone get from a donation total for a charity bikeride to questioning the entries of an English dictionary?
Tom.
Placing these tablets against one another creates a line approximately 2.8 kilometres long. Enough to create a 13mm wide bridge between my home and the next suburb. Not even returning.
So, that proves the drugs dont work. That is a great song title. Someone should write that song.
Songs ... fucken hard to write. So why should anyone bother? Are songs even worth it?
When you get a corporate creation of minimal age writing of love and loss and being successful in terms of dollar value does it make anyone else vomit with rage and incredulity? I spew my last meal and any associated fluids and then bile and, fuck it, I dry wretch and then I just heave out my stomach and regurgitate that. If I run out of internal organs to disorge in a cascade of suicidal inversion then perhaps I, through thought-process alone, could create some blackhole of vomitus to express my displeasure at the sort of stuff that people will pay for to entertain themselves.
I'm not immune to that either. Not specifically in relation to music.
I'm not proud of that.
Does that mean I cannot judge something else?
Fuck no!
It means I have a perfectly balanced experiential basis upon which to base my conclusions.
Nothing is worth it. Nothing is of worth. Nothing should have a dollar value placed upon it.
Nothing.
In case you are interested I went to see The Drones. I paid $40.
Worth every dollar.
Contradiction soup.
Makes me human I suppose. To bemoan a dollar value and then feel something was worth the cost. I had a smile on my stupid face the whole night and didnt move from my spot and enjoyed every minute and would like the world I envisage in which someone could be supported in creating music like that for free for the enjoyment of others and for the crowd to enjoy it knowing that their home grown tomatoes or home produced art or home typed story could be part of the adequate barter for such a performance.
Now ... dont sympathise with me.
That was an instruction.
I know that I couldnt write a song that perfect in scope and meaning and context. Let alone sing it.
Yet I feel every bit of it. I want to be able.
I want to be able
I want to be able
I want to be able.
It takes too much of what I cannot give or do not have or may not understand or will not sacrifice.
I need to stop pushing the 'ENTER' button and just create a sentence that is not a paragraph in itself and is not just a line of prose that illustrates my state of mind in absolute confusion and disdainful selfdeprocation for my creative life up until this point. Is one sentence that takes up four lines enough to absolve me of using too many paragraph breaks?
Is anybody else enjoying this blog? Does anybody else feel that loss when they hear a Radiohead song? The loss of the song that was within but was not able to be written clearly enough. That realisation that a song chrystallises thoughts within so well that it can make you depressed and elated at the same time.
The song that forms only part of an album worth whatever someone wanted to pay for it as long as it was above a few pence. Really distressing for me that Radiohead is red-squiggly-underlined when pizza and consumerism and shopping mall and fuck-head is not.
But should Radiohead be in the dictionary when that could mean the mainstreaming of the greatest band in the digital age to use the digital age? And does inclusion in the blogspot dictionary mean mainstreaming?
At one point britney spears was in the official oxford dictionary (lower case purposely entered).
How does someone get from a donation total for a charity bikeride to questioning the entries of an English dictionary?
Tom.
Wednesday 17 April 2013
Imagine
You are driving in your car towards home and listening to your
favourite album. You turn your steering wheel to the left to pull into your
driveway and you feel the shudder as your front wheels lower into and raise off the
concave guttering. The shudder is transmitted to your hands and your arms and into your shoulders where it dissipates. Once you stop the car in front of your garage door you use your right hand to turn the key in the
ignition to the standby position because your favourite song is next. You reach across to push the rounded stereo button with the painted forward arrow symbol worn away. You skip to your track.
Your favourite song plays
and that sets off the earworm in your head and you know the tune will play
through your mind during the rest of the evening whenever you are letting your
mind drift. And you wish for many of those moments.
Once the song is complete you turn the keys in the ignition to the off position and pull out
the key using your right thumb and index finger. You can feel the click of the lock as the key withdraws. You use
your right hand to pull the door handle and push the door open. The
muscles of your forearm and upper arm tighten as you push against the
resistance of the door.
Now step out of
the car and stand. Feel your leg muscles and trunk muscles elongate as you stand
and reach to the sky with both arms to lengthen what feels like every muscle and joint in your body. You can feel the endorphin rush from a simple stretch. Now
lower your right hand with the keys and put the keys in your pocket. Feel the
denim against your skin as you slide your hand into you loose jeans. And out.
Walk
towards your front door and as you do feel your right arm and left arm swing
gently with each step. Your right arm forward as your left foot swings forward.
As you reach your front door you hear the song play again and you smile with your mouth and your eyes. Reach back into your pocket and retrieve your
keys. Fan the keys out on your right palm until you spy
the correct one and arrange the pile so you can clasp the housekey. Gently grasp the rest of the keys in
the rest of your fingers and feel the brass of the housekey between your thumb and index finger. It is slightly warm from
your body heat while it rested in your pocket.
Feel each click
of the lock as you put the key in and turn it to the right and hear the opening
of the lock.
Admittance to your home.
Use your left hand at the same time to turn the doorknob and
push with both arms to open the door. Feel the pressure of the smooth painted
wood on your right palm.
Once you are
inside take your smart phone out and click the button and slide your right
thumb across the screen to unlock it.
Feel the plastic: cold and hard and lifeless.
Much like the medium itself.
Sunday 7 April 2013
The Ride for Pain
Today I completed the UniSA Ride for Pain - a ride to raise money for UniSA's chronic pain research. 100kms, including 1900m of climbing, through the hills plus a few extra to the start and back home. Perfect day for it.
It started at UniSA then moved on up Norton Summit where a few people got a bit ahead of themselves and tried to break the time trial record before realising there were still 85 ks to go. There's always a few in a group.
Then we undulated through various parts of the hills, through small towns and larger towns to Lobethal. The volunteers who kept up the banana replenishment rate, the water stations and the other fuels were a blessing. Fantastic people putting up with sweaty and tired and sunburnt riders when they could be elsewhere in the hills on such a lovely day.
Then it was back towards town with the spectre of Corkscrew Rd looming.
Anyone who doesnt follow professional cycling or is bored by it, play some elevator music in your heads for a bit. I will say when you can start reading again.
So it was a descent towards Corkscrew Rd and the peloton was bunched up but poised like a coiled spring ready to launch. The tight left hander showed itself on my left and I jumped out and made an attack and got some free space as I chopped away at the road, out of the saddle. I heard the roun, roun, roun of bike tires turning hard behind me. I chanced a look back and saw two boys in black pursuing me. Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome were pounding the pedals trying to bridge the gap. Cadel Evans was behind them but he was struggling to pull back time. Matty Goss had given it a crack, but he's no good in the mountains, we all know that.
We fell into a holding pattern, me dancing on the pedals and the British lads sweating it up and gasping in my slipstream. They were not helping a bit. I held that pace while the gradient crept up to and past 15%, then 18%. then it flattened out and they thought they'd pull a move together.
Nearing the top I had them, I changed onto the big chainring and sailed past them and gapped them by the summit. I'd pulled the polka dot jersey off of the shoulders of the great, five times King of the Mountain Richard Virenque who inexplicably had come out of his eight and a half year retirement to compete in a charity fundraiser with Wiggins et al.
The descent along the Montacute Rd was all mine. I tore up the asphalt, flicking it into the eyes of anyone pursuing. I took corners on the ragged edge. Wiggins and Froome were spent, they'd redlined it on the climb and were in energy debt.
I was on my way to winning the thing. But, just like him, Fabian Cancellara pipped me at the post to win another one day classic. I would have finished third but Peter Sagan was too busy trying to pinch the backsides of any female he could see on the street.
**Now you can turn off the elevator music and read.**
I sincerely apologise to anybody who thought that last anecdote about the Ride for Pain was true. I know, a lot of you would have been taken in and it was unfair of me to take advantage of your trust. The reality is that the Corkscrew climb was 2.4 kilometres and took me just over twenty minutes and every time I tried to get out of the saddle I felt my hamstrings about to cramp so I did the whole thing sitting. I am tired and my head is sore and I am pretty sure I am dehydrated and I have never eaten so much and still been hungry. On the plus side, my head is the only part of me that hurts.
There were some motivational phrases and stats about chronic pain on the climb up Corkscrew, as if we would have the energy to move and focus our eyes to read them. Given the physics-defying slowness with which I was ascending I was able to catch one or two. The one that caught me was this: enough pain medication is consumed each year to get us to the moon and back. Twice.
Now, I am fairly sure that is not a play on the hallucinogenic qualities of some of the opioid class of medication. So one can only assume two things.
That is that the number of pills consumed when laid end to end in some form of construction leading towards the moon would stretch far enough to get to the moon and back and you could construct a second one, presumable out of hubris. Now had they done their ABC sketch comedy program research they would have known that Shaun Micallef debunked the possibly of a bridge between earth and the moon made out of bread, and /or stale toast. Stale toast, at least in my mind is a much stronger construction material that tiny little pressed packages of powder.
And what would the earth to moon analgesia bridge accomplish anyway? Assuming it could actually be constructed. And reinforced enough to withstand people trampling across it, indeed up it. Because there is little point constructing a bridge to the moon that runs parallel to earth's surface.
That would be insane.
And the thing could only be feasibly used for its intended function, as an earth to moon bridge, not analgesia for those in pain, once a month. This bridge would reach its intended destination when the moon's orbit carried it back to that exact spot again. Of course, four bridges could be constructed as there would be no need to have a bridge that has a path to the moon and then one back again unless you presumed such heavy traffic that you would need a two way street.
That would be ridiculous.
So assuming light traffic at least in the early stages, at four points along the earth's surface you could construct an analgesic span that someone could scale to reach the moon and then wait for a few days until the moon reached the next bridge so the person could scale down it. This is impractical because the oxygen requirements alone would subvert the usefulness of the bridge. A rocket has only just made the trip to the international space station in six hours, let alone the moon which takes days with the power of hydrogen propulsion. Abseiling would take an incredible amount of time more. At least three days. More.
This whole idea of a trip to the moon and back balanced on a thin rope of pain killing tablets is absurd.
But that is an awful lot of pain killers isnt it?
Back to the ride. The positives.
Sure I groan like an old man with a fresh knee replacement whenever I get out of a chair. And yes I could sleep for at least eight hours if my children would let me. But to those of you who donated, you contributed at least $620 to chronic pain research (as of Thursday April 4th). I, and the researchers it will go to, thank you.
Tom
It started at UniSA then moved on up Norton Summit where a few people got a bit ahead of themselves and tried to break the time trial record before realising there were still 85 ks to go. There's always a few in a group.
Then we undulated through various parts of the hills, through small towns and larger towns to Lobethal. The volunteers who kept up the banana replenishment rate, the water stations and the other fuels were a blessing. Fantastic people putting up with sweaty and tired and sunburnt riders when they could be elsewhere in the hills on such a lovely day.
Then it was back towards town with the spectre of Corkscrew Rd looming.
Anyone who doesnt follow professional cycling or is bored by it, play some elevator music in your heads for a bit. I will say when you can start reading again.
So it was a descent towards Corkscrew Rd and the peloton was bunched up but poised like a coiled spring ready to launch. The tight left hander showed itself on my left and I jumped out and made an attack and got some free space as I chopped away at the road, out of the saddle. I heard the roun, roun, roun of bike tires turning hard behind me. I chanced a look back and saw two boys in black pursuing me. Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome were pounding the pedals trying to bridge the gap. Cadel Evans was behind them but he was struggling to pull back time. Matty Goss had given it a crack, but he's no good in the mountains, we all know that.
We fell into a holding pattern, me dancing on the pedals and the British lads sweating it up and gasping in my slipstream. They were not helping a bit. I held that pace while the gradient crept up to and past 15%, then 18%. then it flattened out and they thought they'd pull a move together.
Nearing the top I had them, I changed onto the big chainring and sailed past them and gapped them by the summit. I'd pulled the polka dot jersey off of the shoulders of the great, five times King of the Mountain Richard Virenque who inexplicably had come out of his eight and a half year retirement to compete in a charity fundraiser with Wiggins et al.
The descent along the Montacute Rd was all mine. I tore up the asphalt, flicking it into the eyes of anyone pursuing. I took corners on the ragged edge. Wiggins and Froome were spent, they'd redlined it on the climb and were in energy debt.
I was on my way to winning the thing. But, just like him, Fabian Cancellara pipped me at the post to win another one day classic. I would have finished third but Peter Sagan was too busy trying to pinch the backsides of any female he could see on the street.
**Now you can turn off the elevator music and read.**
I sincerely apologise to anybody who thought that last anecdote about the Ride for Pain was true. I know, a lot of you would have been taken in and it was unfair of me to take advantage of your trust. The reality is that the Corkscrew climb was 2.4 kilometres and took me just over twenty minutes and every time I tried to get out of the saddle I felt my hamstrings about to cramp so I did the whole thing sitting. I am tired and my head is sore and I am pretty sure I am dehydrated and I have never eaten so much and still been hungry. On the plus side, my head is the only part of me that hurts.
There were some motivational phrases and stats about chronic pain on the climb up Corkscrew, as if we would have the energy to move and focus our eyes to read them. Given the physics-defying slowness with which I was ascending I was able to catch one or two. The one that caught me was this: enough pain medication is consumed each year to get us to the moon and back. Twice.
Now, I am fairly sure that is not a play on the hallucinogenic qualities of some of the opioid class of medication. So one can only assume two things.
Assumption 1
That the profits to big pharma and little pharma and streetcorner pharma from analgesia consumptyion that they could pay for x number of people to fly to the moon and back, twice. Each year. The exact number of people this could be is not defined at all, leaving assumption 2 as the most likely.Assumption 2
That is that the number of pills consumed when laid end to end in some form of construction leading towards the moon would stretch far enough to get to the moon and back and you could construct a second one, presumable out of hubris. Now had they done their ABC sketch comedy program research they would have known that Shaun Micallef debunked the possibly of a bridge between earth and the moon made out of bread, and /or stale toast. Stale toast, at least in my mind is a much stronger construction material that tiny little pressed packages of powder.
And what would the earth to moon analgesia bridge accomplish anyway? Assuming it could actually be constructed. And reinforced enough to withstand people trampling across it, indeed up it. Because there is little point constructing a bridge to the moon that runs parallel to earth's surface.
That would be insane.
And the thing could only be feasibly used for its intended function, as an earth to moon bridge, not analgesia for those in pain, once a month. This bridge would reach its intended destination when the moon's orbit carried it back to that exact spot again. Of course, four bridges could be constructed as there would be no need to have a bridge that has a path to the moon and then one back again unless you presumed such heavy traffic that you would need a two way street.
That would be ridiculous.
So assuming light traffic at least in the early stages, at four points along the earth's surface you could construct an analgesic span that someone could scale to reach the moon and then wait for a few days until the moon reached the next bridge so the person could scale down it. This is impractical because the oxygen requirements alone would subvert the usefulness of the bridge. A rocket has only just made the trip to the international space station in six hours, let alone the moon which takes days with the power of hydrogen propulsion. Abseiling would take an incredible amount of time more. At least three days. More.
This whole idea of a trip to the moon and back balanced on a thin rope of pain killing tablets is absurd.
But that is an awful lot of pain killers isnt it?
Back to the ride. The positives.
Sure I groan like an old man with a fresh knee replacement whenever I get out of a chair. And yes I could sleep for at least eight hours if my children would let me. But to those of you who donated, you contributed at least $620 to chronic pain research (as of Thursday April 4th). I, and the researchers it will go to, thank you.
Tom
Sunday 31 March 2013
Isnt there an easier answer?
I just tried to post something on ebay and went through the several dozen minutes lodging process. Granted that it would have been easier if I had waited until the kids were asleep.
Then my Credit Card details were deemed inaccurate by ebay. Despite them being visible on my card the good programming at ebay deemed the hard copy incorrect. Since when did secure mean that you couldnt use your own card because your own card was wrong? Ebay seems to have a higher standard than everyone else. It works at the supermarket and at the petrol station and at the pharmacy and at other online stores.
Of course its good that they take security so seriously. However, even my bank accepts that the details on my card are accurate. The bank takes it a step further and even accepts the details as correct.
So I tried registering my regular bank account and debiting the amount. But that required the identification of my newly incorrect credit card which rendered the process ineffective.
So I emailed ebay customer support and suggested that something may be wrong.
Their suggestion: get another credit card and register that.
So, I'll use gumtree.
Tom
Then my Credit Card details were deemed inaccurate by ebay. Despite them being visible on my card the good programming at ebay deemed the hard copy incorrect. Since when did secure mean that you couldnt use your own card because your own card was wrong? Ebay seems to have a higher standard than everyone else. It works at the supermarket and at the petrol station and at the pharmacy and at other online stores.
Of course its good that they take security so seriously. However, even my bank accepts that the details on my card are accurate. The bank takes it a step further and even accepts the details as correct.
So I tried registering my regular bank account and debiting the amount. But that required the identification of my newly incorrect credit card which rendered the process ineffective.
So I emailed ebay customer support and suggested that something may be wrong.
Their suggestion: get another credit card and register that.
So, I'll use gumtree.
Tom
Saturday 30 March 2013
Isa Brown Chickens
We have just bought three one-week old Isa Brown chicks that we plan to grow for laying eggs. After holding one of these fragile little things I cannot imagine how anyone who has held one could possibly put a grown one into a battery cage.
I know there is an efficiency argument for battery cages but can I say fuck off to productivity? Why should we claim productivity, or economic growth, as the overriding consideration?
Everyone who owns a battery farm should be made to spend an hour watching chicks scratch around and interact and learn all the things chicks need to do to survive. Then another hour holding one.
If they still see dollar signs on their heads then there is no saving some people.
Come to think of it, let's make all drivers spend time riding bikes in peak hour inner city traffic before they get their Probationary licence.
And perhaps we could ask every dairy farmer to have their wives forcibly impregnated, not sexually but artificially (I'm not perverted) then the offspring removed after birth and attach metal and plastic pipes to the nother's breasts for a period of time every morning and evening. If they dont reach a certain standard then maybe a hormone that is really only likely to induce mastitis could be administered.
How did I get from holding a baby chicken to that last paragraph?
Tom
I know there is an efficiency argument for battery cages but can I say fuck off to productivity? Why should we claim productivity, or economic growth, as the overriding consideration?
Everyone who owns a battery farm should be made to spend an hour watching chicks scratch around and interact and learn all the things chicks need to do to survive. Then another hour holding one.
If they still see dollar signs on their heads then there is no saving some people.
Come to think of it, let's make all drivers spend time riding bikes in peak hour inner city traffic before they get their Probationary licence.
And perhaps we could ask every dairy farmer to have their wives forcibly impregnated, not sexually but artificially (I'm not perverted) then the offspring removed after birth and attach metal and plastic pipes to the nother's breasts for a period of time every morning and evening. If they dont reach a certain standard then maybe a hormone that is really only likely to induce mastitis could be administered.
How did I get from holding a baby chicken to that last paragraph?
Tom
Friday 29 March 2013
Appendix to cooking show jargon
If anyone out there is planning on applying for a cooking show and doesnt really care whether they make the grade or not, could you please construct a taco. Nothing special, it can be canned taco mix or whatever.
When the pompous chef-type people ask if this is just a taco, please say the following:
This is a reconstructed taco.
Of course I did once ask a close friend, who happened to be a cinema projectionist, to splice a single frame of pornography into another film just like on Fight Club and he didnt do it. I am not one to get off my behind and do it myself but I can claim like Andy Warhol did that the dieas are important moreso than who does them.
Can I claim to be an artist now?
Tom
When the pompous chef-type people ask if this is just a taco, please say the following:
This is a reconstructed taco.
Of course I did once ask a close friend, who happened to be a cinema projectionist, to splice a single frame of pornography into another film just like on Fight Club and he didnt do it. I am not one to get off my behind and do it myself but I can claim like Andy Warhol did that the dieas are important moreso than who does them.
Can I claim to be an artist now?
Tom
Tuesday 26 March 2013
Next Big Thing
I was tagged to take part in The Next Big Thing by an awesome published Short Story Writer I admire. Her name is Lynette Washington. Lynette started a writer's group in Adelaide about 4 years ago and it is still going and she always leaves me amazed by her subtelty and craft. Her responses to these questions can be found here:
http://lynettewashington.wordpress.com/
Here's how it works. I received Lynette's a few months ago and I either had to join Facebook or start a blog to answer them appropriately. So I started a blog. Then, I answer ten questions about my writing then ask other great writers I know to do the same thing. My answers are as follows.
1: What is the title of your next book?
I am unsure. I am most excited about The History Erasers. But I have completed a first draft of another untitled book that I have essentially shelved and am also working on a novel I have that I dont want to name (I will call it The Other One) because if it ever gets to publication it is going under a pseudonymn. The History Erasers and The Other One are equally exciting for me to write and I cant choose which I want to complete first.
2: Where did the idea come from for the book?
The History Erasers This one has been banging around in my head for about ten years now without an outlet. It came to me when I walked past the closed shopfront of a scientific artefact store.
The Other One This one is essentially catharsis. It will be based on my career.
3: What genre does your book fall under?
Each is probably loosely literary in style and nihilistic but compassionate in tone.
4: What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
The boy in The History Erasers could be played by Javier Bardem. Only because the guy can play anything.
The main character in The Other One would be played by Ed Norton because he is brilliant and is the lead actor in my favourite movie of all time - Fight Club.
5: What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
The History Erasers: A cop investigates a series of intricate and grand thefts that lead him to meet a man who will change his outlook on his ashtray.
The Other One: One worker in a health system with the insight to notice that which needs changing and is unable to change it.
6: Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
Fucked if I know? Hopefully represented if someone thinks there is enough merit in it. I have thought about whether I should selfpublish if it gets knocked back by all and sundry and havent had to cross that bridge yet. I will let you know. But, if it is selfpublished, you'll know because I am definitely going to hit up everyone I know to buy a copy to maintain my sense of selfworth.
7: How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
Both are presently incomplete and wonderfully so. I embrace their embryonic characters and developing plots.
8: What other books would you compare this story to in your genre?
The Other One: The House of God by Samuel Shem. The most satirical exploration of a hospital system I have ever read and required reading by medicos everywhere.
The History Erasers: I am unsure. Possibly a mish mash of many things by Chuck Palahniuk.
9: Who or what inspired you to write this book?
The History Erasers: Me. It captures where my head goes sometimes and then the argument I have with myself about it.
The Other One: My work. I love it everyday. And everyday I want out. And everyday I want it changed drastically. And that is an unpleasant state to be in when professional demeanour needs to be maintained.
10: What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
The History Erasers: Imagine a museum, large or small, emptied of all its artefacts in one night.
The Other One: I'll go for baseness. There's a threesome ... almost.
Below are the authors I am tagging to answer these questions next. I am not aware of any of them having blogs as far as I am aware, but if you do and wish to spread the word, please dont hesitate.
Sally Nimon: Fantasy Author. When I read her work I think Terry Pratchett and The Smartest Person in the room.
Steve Kroemer: Children's author and screen writer. There is never a quiet moment in his work.
Chris Horsman: Author of excellent stories and comics and editor whom I am sure pulls her hair out when reading my version of punctuation. The only person I know personally who has published a book.
Ken Schaefer: Author of rural stories and all round good bloke.
Tom
http://lynettewashington.wordpress.com/
Here's how it works. I received Lynette's a few months ago and I either had to join Facebook or start a blog to answer them appropriately. So I started a blog. Then, I answer ten questions about my writing then ask other great writers I know to do the same thing. My answers are as follows.
1: What is the title of your next book?
I am unsure. I am most excited about The History Erasers. But I have completed a first draft of another untitled book that I have essentially shelved and am also working on a novel I have that I dont want to name (I will call it The Other One) because if it ever gets to publication it is going under a pseudonymn. The History Erasers and The Other One are equally exciting for me to write and I cant choose which I want to complete first.
2: Where did the idea come from for the book?
The History Erasers This one has been banging around in my head for about ten years now without an outlet. It came to me when I walked past the closed shopfront of a scientific artefact store.
The Other One This one is essentially catharsis. It will be based on my career.
3: What genre does your book fall under?
Each is probably loosely literary in style and nihilistic but compassionate in tone.
4: What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
The boy in The History Erasers could be played by Javier Bardem. Only because the guy can play anything.
The main character in The Other One would be played by Ed Norton because he is brilliant and is the lead actor in my favourite movie of all time - Fight Club.
5: What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
The History Erasers: A cop investigates a series of intricate and grand thefts that lead him to meet a man who will change his outlook on his ashtray.
The Other One: One worker in a health system with the insight to notice that which needs changing and is unable to change it.
6: Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
Fucked if I know? Hopefully represented if someone thinks there is enough merit in it. I have thought about whether I should selfpublish if it gets knocked back by all and sundry and havent had to cross that bridge yet. I will let you know. But, if it is selfpublished, you'll know because I am definitely going to hit up everyone I know to buy a copy to maintain my sense of selfworth.
7: How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
Both are presently incomplete and wonderfully so. I embrace their embryonic characters and developing plots.
8: What other books would you compare this story to in your genre?
The Other One: The House of God by Samuel Shem. The most satirical exploration of a hospital system I have ever read and required reading by medicos everywhere.
The History Erasers: I am unsure. Possibly a mish mash of many things by Chuck Palahniuk.
9: Who or what inspired you to write this book?
The History Erasers: Me. It captures where my head goes sometimes and then the argument I have with myself about it.
The Other One: My work. I love it everyday. And everyday I want out. And everyday I want it changed drastically. And that is an unpleasant state to be in when professional demeanour needs to be maintained.
10: What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
The History Erasers: Imagine a museum, large or small, emptied of all its artefacts in one night.
The Other One: I'll go for baseness. There's a threesome ... almost.
Below are the authors I am tagging to answer these questions next. I am not aware of any of them having blogs as far as I am aware, but if you do and wish to spread the word, please dont hesitate.
Sally Nimon: Fantasy Author. When I read her work I think Terry Pratchett and The Smartest Person in the room.
Steve Kroemer: Children's author and screen writer. There is never a quiet moment in his work.
Chris Horsman: Author of excellent stories and comics and editor whom I am sure pulls her hair out when reading my version of punctuation. The only person I know personally who has published a book.
Ken Schaefer: Author of rural stories and all round good bloke.
Tom
Monday 25 March 2013
Poems are not my strong point
In effect, me publishing a poem is scarier than running naked through a city mall, zigzagging and starjumping.
This is called outline.
This is called outline.
an exoskeleton on a gritty linoleum floor
shell of a life born and died in a day
punctuated by procreation
and
predatory appetite
left to lie an outline of a life lived
to be crushed into grit on a linoleum floor.
Tom
Drones
Off we go in the morning to find the paydirt. Some species may search for nectar. Others for prey. All for mates. We choose money. Off to flower we fly, mine it for cash, perhaps show others where we found it if we were unable to keep it all for ourselves and then fly back home to protect our progeny from harm. Perhaps if we have no progeny, we could manufacture some. depends on how drone-ish we are.
Tom
Tom
I have had enough of cooking show jargon
This year I have watched several episodes of My Kitchen Rules. It is the first time I have done it. So now I finally feel qualified to criticise it. The jargon is especially annoying to me. I have never once referred to an element in my cooking. I am assuming that there are several dozen of them in every single meal I have ever cooked. Carbon, Nitrogen, Oxygen, Hydrogen to name four of the more common ones. Magnesium and Selenium to name two of the rarer.
Jus is not on any of the periodic tables I ever saw at school, including the one I tried to program into my graphing calculator. As far as I am aware, Pesto was never listed as one of the Lanthanides or the Actinides. Yet these people spout them as if they are chefs of the highest calibre who have earned the right to use jargon.
If ever there was an industry that could vomit jargon like a virgin drinker on a bender it is the one in which I earn my living. Health. And at every opportunity I endeavour to use lay language. In fact, it is required. So why do wankers on television use such language as if to elevate themselves above the watching audience? Realistically most of the watching audience is watching thinking these people are amazing and even moreso for their use of hierarchical language. As with any watching audience though, the IQ, on average is less than the number of noble gases anyway so they will watch a chef prepare porridge for hours if they are told to.
But that is not the one most annoying to me. There is one piece of terminology, that I assume has crept into the cooking lexicon long before My Kitchen Rules or MasterChef or Jamie's Kitchen or Nigella's Food Brothel (sorry, Kitchen Brothel). It is a concept really. And I am sure I am not the only person to notice this.
The concept is that of a deconstructed whatever. The one I have seen is Deconstructed Taco.
For something to be deconstructed, it first needs to be constructed. So, the chef (loose term) needs to construct his or her taco and then take it apart again and lay it on the plate. But that is not what they do. No, they fail to construct it at all. They make all the parts of the taco (dare I say elements of the taco?) and lay them on the plate expecting the patron, or perhaps subject, to put it together. It is laziness. Both in language and in food preparation. A taco is a taco. Apparently a plate with meat and sauce, salad, cheese and corn chips is a deconstructed taco.
To me, it is an unconstructed taco. More correctly, it is an unassembled taco.
Say what you fucking mean!
For anyone unimpressed at my pedantry, it was a vain attempt to change the tenor of the blog. With so many references to things my children have said or done I felt I was running the risk of being pigeonholed as a mummy blogger.
Tom
Saturday 23 March 2013
Disinhibition
I had been working in the garden a few days ago and came inside after I had finished. I was pretty hot and bothered and perhaps sweaty. Okay I was sweaty. As I was drinking my post-work water one of my daughters sat at the table. After exchanging pleasantries and trying to bait compliments from my progeny at my excellent effort in the front yard I suggested I should have a shower.
And she scoffed.
It was no simple scoff either. It was laden with disbelief as if a shower would not cut it.
Being five she is no student of film but I got the impression that she expected that I would need to be stripped down and strafed with a highpressure hose as Rambo was.
Or perhaps she could have been thinking that an automated carwash, sans the surrounding car, might do the trick.
So laden with contempt was that scoff that she was probably thinking that I needed to be autoclaved like an instrument at the dentist clinic.
Maybe even she was considering that a quick dash over to the as soon as possible to be decommissioned Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant might sterilise the odour sufficiently to allow comfortable social interaction.
I wish I could be as disinhibited as my kids.
Tom
And she scoffed.
It was no simple scoff either. It was laden with disbelief as if a shower would not cut it.
Being five she is no student of film but I got the impression that she expected that I would need to be stripped down and strafed with a highpressure hose as Rambo was.
Or perhaps she could have been thinking that an automated carwash, sans the surrounding car, might do the trick.
So laden with contempt was that scoff that she was probably thinking that I needed to be autoclaved like an instrument at the dentist clinic.
Maybe even she was considering that a quick dash over to the as soon as possible to be decommissioned Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant might sterilise the odour sufficiently to allow comfortable social interaction.
I wish I could be as disinhibited as my kids.
Tom
Monday 11 March 2013
Very little time
One child is asleep and the other two are about to arrive home after being picked up from kindergarten and I have a few minutes to do some writing in a large body of work I have been working on for over a year now and all I can think about is the injustice of getting a flat tire on my bike thanks to a small shard of glass worming its way in over time.
Black hands from the brake dust and road grime and high blood pressure are my punishment for trying to better myself and the world around me while some drunk neanderthal thinks it would be really funny to impress a girl my throwing a beer bottle onto the street and shattering it the night before ready for my, or someone else's, tire to run over it.
But playing it over in my mind, I feel these two people deserve each other.
Why? you ask.
Well ... I would like to think that this guy being drunk as a catholic priest would be a little inaccurate with the bottle's arc and it would land closer to his foot than he planned. A shard lodges itself in his skin near an artery in his lower leg. He and she go back to his and begin drunkfumbling and then drunkfucking and this guy is on top and the glass worms it way through the arterial wall.
Much like my bike tire really.
And because he is pissed as a lord he thinks that the dizziness and pale colours and swimming girl beneath him are due to the impending orgasm and so goes faster causing his heart to race and spurt the bright red blood quicker into a growing and warm and and as yet unnoticed wet patch. And as he collapses slavering and quivering onto his suffocating drunken girl she has a vision of flying broken glass before she dies. And I can feel comfortable in picturing the deaths of these two because draining that gene pool is not exactly like stopping the flow of the Amazon.
Is it wrong to imagine the deaths of imagined people just because one of them broke a bottle on the road and the other was impressed by it?
I thought so. Now, how to work it into a story.
Of course, the bottle could have dropped mistakenly, but isnt anywhere near so much fun.
Tom
Black hands from the brake dust and road grime and high blood pressure are my punishment for trying to better myself and the world around me while some drunk neanderthal thinks it would be really funny to impress a girl my throwing a beer bottle onto the street and shattering it the night before ready for my, or someone else's, tire to run over it.
But playing it over in my mind, I feel these two people deserve each other.
Why? you ask.
Well ... I would like to think that this guy being drunk as a catholic priest would be a little inaccurate with the bottle's arc and it would land closer to his foot than he planned. A shard lodges itself in his skin near an artery in his lower leg. He and she go back to his and begin drunkfumbling and then drunkfucking and this guy is on top and the glass worms it way through the arterial wall.
Much like my bike tire really.
And because he is pissed as a lord he thinks that the dizziness and pale colours and swimming girl beneath him are due to the impending orgasm and so goes faster causing his heart to race and spurt the bright red blood quicker into a growing and warm and and as yet unnoticed wet patch. And as he collapses slavering and quivering onto his suffocating drunken girl she has a vision of flying broken glass before she dies. And I can feel comfortable in picturing the deaths of these two because draining that gene pool is not exactly like stopping the flow of the Amazon.
Is it wrong to imagine the deaths of imagined people just because one of them broke a bottle on the road and the other was impressed by it?
I thought so. Now, how to work it into a story.
Of course, the bottle could have dropped mistakenly, but isnt anywhere near so much fun.
Tom
Wednesday 6 March 2013
Brillig
Went to see this fabulous band on Friday night with my partner and children. One of my older two girls was starstruck and unable to talk to one of the performers (Elizabeth).
Brillig do Cowboy songs and Sea Shanties. As they said they only played one song in which no one died, unless you count the song entitled The Devil wears Cowboy Boots.
It was very funny listening to the girls (all 5 years old and under) singing some of the songs later that week. They were all walking around the kitchen singing "I am the Hangman, I am the Hangman".
Very cool,
Tom
Brillig do Cowboy songs and Sea Shanties. As they said they only played one song in which no one died, unless you count the song entitled The Devil wears Cowboy Boots.
It was very funny listening to the girls (all 5 years old and under) singing some of the songs later that week. They were all walking around the kitchen singing "I am the Hangman, I am the Hangman".
Very cool,
Tom
Thursday 28 February 2013
Willandermonium
I feel like I just watched a movie that would go straight to video. It tired me out and left a bad taste in my mouth, mainly because it contained an Australian comedian.
I was in a hospital watching a live comedy gig by this Australian comedian. It was titled Will Andermonium. I'm not sure if that has ever been a title of one of his shows, so I am not claiming it as my own. It could well be my subconscious remembering something I had seen once.
The first half of the show was mildly funny. Then it was intermission and afterwards he played a self-indulgent mockumentary to his crowd. It depicted the trauma of orphans in Romanian orphanges. Normally it would be a harrowing topic and not self-indulgent at all.
Except that he directed himself in the starring role of sadistic orphanage warden complete with fake thin moustache and bald head wig and terrible eastern Bloc accent. I read a book through the whole sordid affair by the luminescence of a bicycle light. nobody seemed disturbed by it.
Before the end I left the movie and walked into the halls of the relatively deserted hospital without any clothes at all.
I had an overwhelming feeling of hunger.
I stopped at a kiosk and ordered fried chips. the deep fryer and cook was set right behind glass like a pizza chef assembling a pizza for the show of it. But on seeing the viscous and torpid soup of lard in which the potato was frying I declined the meal. The potato chef did not look up at me.
It was then I decided I should clothe myself and began searching for something to wear. For some reason I looked in all the bathrooms, presumably in an attempt to swaddle myself in toilet tissue and paper hand towels.
As I left the last bathroom a nurse saw me and said:
"This guy again. Come on, let's get you some scrubs."
And she led me away towards coverings.
I woke up.
Tom
I was in a hospital watching a live comedy gig by this Australian comedian. It was titled Will Andermonium. I'm not sure if that has ever been a title of one of his shows, so I am not claiming it as my own. It could well be my subconscious remembering something I had seen once.
The first half of the show was mildly funny. Then it was intermission and afterwards he played a self-indulgent mockumentary to his crowd. It depicted the trauma of orphans in Romanian orphanges. Normally it would be a harrowing topic and not self-indulgent at all.
Except that he directed himself in the starring role of sadistic orphanage warden complete with fake thin moustache and bald head wig and terrible eastern Bloc accent. I read a book through the whole sordid affair by the luminescence of a bicycle light. nobody seemed disturbed by it.
Before the end I left the movie and walked into the halls of the relatively deserted hospital without any clothes at all.
I had an overwhelming feeling of hunger.
I stopped at a kiosk and ordered fried chips. the deep fryer and cook was set right behind glass like a pizza chef assembling a pizza for the show of it. But on seeing the viscous and torpid soup of lard in which the potato was frying I declined the meal. The potato chef did not look up at me.
It was then I decided I should clothe myself and began searching for something to wear. For some reason I looked in all the bathrooms, presumably in an attempt to swaddle myself in toilet tissue and paper hand towels.
As I left the last bathroom a nurse saw me and said:
"This guy again. Come on, let's get you some scrubs."
And she led me away towards coverings.
I woke up.
Tom
Monday 25 February 2013
Happy Birthday
Happy Fifth Birthday to our two beautiful oldest daughters. Everyday they (and also our other younger daughter) do something that tells me they will be better and smarter and more well adjusted than I ever will be.
Tom
Tom
Women/People of Letters
Caught this fantastic show yesterday evening at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. There were ten readings from Australian celebrities, although none of them would enjoy the term apparently, and I believe that to be genuine. Some were touching, some were blokey, some very intellectual, others low brow. Topics included family, celebrity, politics, love, death and vegetarianism.
Every single one was meaningful.
It was an entertaining and inspirational evening listening to letters, some more heartfelt than others, written to somebody else.
The highlight was the exchange between Peter Goldsworthy on his daughter's vegetarianism and his daughter Anna calling him on his lapsed vegetarianism.
So, once again, the bug to write letters invades and replicates within me.
Join me if you wish. Let me know.
Tom
Every single one was meaningful.
It was an entertaining and inspirational evening listening to letters, some more heartfelt than others, written to somebody else.
The highlight was the exchange between Peter Goldsworthy on his daughter's vegetarianism and his daughter Anna calling him on his lapsed vegetarianism.
So, once again, the bug to write letters invades and replicates within me.
Join me if you wish. Let me know.
Tom
Monday 18 February 2013
Evolution
I have three children. All three happen to be female and two happen to be the same age and all are individual. And they are so vulnerable at their current age. None of them are old enough to start school yet. They are exploding with vocabulary and ideas and open to everything. They ask where food comes from and can pinpoint the difference between vegan and non-vegan food with a clarity that most adults struggle with.
Squidge.
Is it a word? Best I could find was that a squidge is: to make a squelching noise.
Of all the amazing things I have heard from these three children and all the mature ideas they have come out with and all the lengthy sentences they have erected, this word screams evolution to me. Now I am not bignoting my youngest child as some sort of future human. But she scooped out too much rice onto her spoon when eating tonight's curry and described it as a big squidge of rice.
Onomatopoeic I reckon.
And it is not a word I have used in that context. Nor would have her sisters. She came out with it because it seemed right.
That is what amazed me. I have no doubts or fears of any of the three children at the dinner table tonight outshining me. Probably even sooner than I think. It shows creativity and confidence. And now humanity is done with the grand signs of evolution, I think this sort of thing is the way we evolve from now on.
By grand signs I mean going from quadrupedal locomotion to bipedal or increasing brain size. If someone was born with a tremendously greater brain cavity and the brain matter to fill it most people would probably look at it with a form of disgust. If a congenitally one-legged person managed to propel him or herself with significantly greater efficiency we would probably try to expel them from elite athletics because they are cheating.
Evolution is now down to ideas and thoughts and that squidge of rice said to me that my kids will be fine.
Tom
Squidge.
Is it a word? Best I could find was that a squidge is: to make a squelching noise.
Of all the amazing things I have heard from these three children and all the mature ideas they have come out with and all the lengthy sentences they have erected, this word screams evolution to me. Now I am not bignoting my youngest child as some sort of future human. But she scooped out too much rice onto her spoon when eating tonight's curry and described it as a big squidge of rice.
Onomatopoeic I reckon.
And it is not a word I have used in that context. Nor would have her sisters. She came out with it because it seemed right.
That is what amazed me. I have no doubts or fears of any of the three children at the dinner table tonight outshining me. Probably even sooner than I think. It shows creativity and confidence. And now humanity is done with the grand signs of evolution, I think this sort of thing is the way we evolve from now on.
By grand signs I mean going from quadrupedal locomotion to bipedal or increasing brain size. If someone was born with a tremendously greater brain cavity and the brain matter to fill it most people would probably look at it with a form of disgust. If a congenitally one-legged person managed to propel him or herself with significantly greater efficiency we would probably try to expel them from elite athletics because they are cheating.
Evolution is now down to ideas and thoughts and that squidge of rice said to me that my kids will be fine.
Tom
Friday 15 February 2013
Spineless Wonders Presents ...
Went to this wonderful event on Tuesday night at The Wheatsheaf Hotel in Thebarton, Adelaide. It runs every three months. Anybody who is interested in a mixture of acting and literature and and early night or a late night (as you wish) would find this night fascinating and enlightening and funny.
Highly talented actors. Highly talented authors. Highly engaged audience.
Highly recommended event.
Tom
Highly talented actors. Highly talented authors. Highly engaged audience.
Highly recommended event.
Tom
Monday 11 February 2013
Narcosis
Six months ago I broke my arm in two places in a ridiculous bicycle accident. I was given oxycodone (endone) to take home for the pain. I took it in the early afternoon and sat on the couch and lay my head back and my mouth was agape and the ceiling slowly turned then turned back. It defied the laws of physics for never having a moment of zero acceleration. It constantly turned back and forth never seeming to slow down or speed up despite the direction change. And as I marvelled at the laws I was taught at school being flouted my daughters played around me. They might have played with building blocks or flicked through books or held a barbie doll that was given to us unsolicited. But I couldnt engage in what they were doing.
Narcosis.
It was pleasant even though I knew it was dangerous. I was not unwell and I was not dying but I knew that if some emergency occurred I would be watching the flames or the shuddering of the earth or the second coming of christ and still sitting on the couch with my mouth agape and my eyes looking at the ceiling and pondering the effects of the cataclysm on the ceiling itself rather than getting out of the house and grabbing as many of my offspring as I could carry.
This evening I was on this computer listening to music and playing solitaire instead of doing something meaningful with my life. I was in a stupor stronger than the drug-induced one. I couldnt get out of playing the game. I understood its pointlessness. I fathomed its meaninglessness. But I was in an infinite spiral.
As I did this a song called Narcosis played with its bent guitar notes in descending minor intervals and native american vocal harmonsation. The song gave me a landing on my spiral to rest and visualise myself.
I stopped.
Until das naechstes mal,
Tom
Narcosis.
It was pleasant even though I knew it was dangerous. I was not unwell and I was not dying but I knew that if some emergency occurred I would be watching the flames or the shuddering of the earth or the second coming of christ and still sitting on the couch with my mouth agape and my eyes looking at the ceiling and pondering the effects of the cataclysm on the ceiling itself rather than getting out of the house and grabbing as many of my offspring as I could carry.
This evening I was on this computer listening to music and playing solitaire instead of doing something meaningful with my life. I was in a stupor stronger than the drug-induced one. I couldnt get out of playing the game. I understood its pointlessness. I fathomed its meaninglessness. But I was in an infinite spiral.
As I did this a song called Narcosis played with its bent guitar notes in descending minor intervals and native american vocal harmonsation. The song gave me a landing on my spiral to rest and visualise myself.
I stopped.
Until das naechstes mal,
Tom
Post - The Second
While flicking through the channels on free to air television I noticed there was very little on. There are good shows like 4 Corners, but they dont have topics every week that I am interested in. There is a show with the British Nanny who looks stern and scary and has christmas hams for forearms and why wouldnt children and adults do what she says?
She will eventually have an army. Of this I am sure. She inspires fear in viewers with the forcefield of the television screen between. If she asked me to join her army then the best I could hope for would be to undermine her serruptitiously if I could unbrainwash myself.
And on another channel Jason Akermanis is putting forth his opinion and getting paid for it. (I feel certain he would do it free of charge.) And yes or no as the only answers to intricate debates is promoted.
Vote Yes. Vote No. Where do you stand? Maybe if we are lucky there would be a third option. Undecided. I once heard a radio host put forward the following question for the Herald Sun Voteline:
Are you stupid enough to ring up to vote on this question? Yes or No.
Since when is a debate decided by a yes or no? Since when were we marshalled into two sides only? Those who vote yes, can they please stand to the left. Those no, please to the right. Those unsure, wait until you work out which side has more and then gravitate towards that side with small shuffling and sheepish steps until you become immersed and anonymous with your opinion.
I think it should be at least like a clockface with only the twelve numbers marked. Agree with most of what is said? Go to one oclock. Disagree with most? Go to five oclock. Not sure? Then stay in the middle.
But in reality it should be more like the points of a compass. Infinite points on which you could stand. Everyone's opinion given just as much weight as the newspaper's and the reporter's and the minister's who commented and the shadow minister's who countered and the redneck's from nextdoor who thinks that islamic fundamentalism is to blame and the libertarian's from work who thinks everyone's opinion should be given equal weight.
I dont mean to contend that experts are not more qualified to comment but that opinions generated thereafter should be given equal weight.
Of course after all this Mediawatch was on and its final story was about a hacker who had sullied the results of many of News Limited's online polls and claimed to have done one of Fairfax's. An editor responding suggested that news Limited would no longer be writing articles about the outcomes of polls. No longer!!
Dont even know what to say about that statement.
Until das naechstes mal,
Tom
Do you agree with Tom's opinions?
Vote Yes or No. You decide!
Introduction
Okay.
Now.
So.
To call myself a luddite while typing on a notebook would be a touch hypocritical. To call myself neanderthal would also slip somewhere into that category. But I dont like technology for its own sake and I dont know enough about blogging to know whether or not it is a force for good or evil. I guess that depends on what you read and how you read it and how critically you analyse it.
Herewith my first blog post.
I commence by way of introduction.
My name is Tom and I am the same age that Jesus was when he was crucified. I am hoping that sort of comment will be taken for what it was. Overly clever and probably incorrect.
I live in a wannabe metropolis that is great for raising kids. The water is tasty like water should not be. The public transport is expensive and the innercity multilevel carparking is cheap and why are those things not the other way around? The city is flat and perfect for bike riding and the traffic is territorial and terrible for bike riding.
My aim with this blog is a selfish one. I want to do this to have a reason to write everyday. To write is what I want to do and the only way I will get better is to keep doing it. If someone wants to read it ... let me know by way of post.
And now I can no longer say I have never posted on a blog.
Tom
Now.
So.
To call myself a luddite while typing on a notebook would be a touch hypocritical. To call myself neanderthal would also slip somewhere into that category. But I dont like technology for its own sake and I dont know enough about blogging to know whether or not it is a force for good or evil. I guess that depends on what you read and how you read it and how critically you analyse it.
Herewith my first blog post.
I commence by way of introduction.
My name is Tom and I am the same age that Jesus was when he was crucified. I am hoping that sort of comment will be taken for what it was. Overly clever and probably incorrect.
I live in a wannabe metropolis that is great for raising kids. The water is tasty like water should not be. The public transport is expensive and the innercity multilevel carparking is cheap and why are those things not the other way around? The city is flat and perfect for bike riding and the traffic is territorial and terrible for bike riding.
My aim with this blog is a selfish one. I want to do this to have a reason to write everyday. To write is what I want to do and the only way I will get better is to keep doing it. If someone wants to read it ... let me know by way of post.
And now I can no longer say I have never posted on a blog.
Tom
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