Bumper Crop

I don’t do bumper stickers. I can’t think of single subject  I’d talk to a stranger about that could be summed up in one line. Perhaps I should get a bumper sticker made that just says “Pointless Bumper Sticker” to answer some of the stuff I see getting around.

“Magic Happens”.  Remember that one? And the answer is “No, it doesn’t”. Then there was the equally fatuous “The Goddess is Dancing.” I hope she’s making a quid out of it, ‘cause none of her other projects seem to be in evidence. “Practise Random Acts of Kindness and Senseless Beauty.” You would not want to get stuck next to that hippy at a dinner party.

The most pervasive and long lasting sticker has got to be “Baby on Board”. Is this a plea not to run into the car as hard as you would have if the baby wasn’t there? I’ve never understood that one. Many years ago, a mate of mine stole one of his sister’s infant dolls, nailed it unnecessarily brutally to a piece of four by two, and stuck a “Baby on Board” sticker on it. It rode around on the parcel shelf of my V8 Valiant for years and I would get admiring glances from lots of people. I think.

These sort of stickers are annoying because there's either implicit advice on how to behave or there’s an attempt to get me to change my mind. Some self important herbalist thinks they know better than me. Well, I'm not going to change my ways based on the advice I read on the back of a homeopath’s 1978 turd brown Corolla.

There are other pointless varieties of bumper sticker that I would classify as Stating My Position. “I Fish and I Vote.” That’s a full day. Well done. “I Brake For Children/Unicorns/Teddy Bears/Smoko”. Ok, seems a reasonable response - is it something that really needs advertising? “Zero to Bitch in 6 Seconds.” Your mother must be very proud… oh, she’s the one sucking on a Winnie Blue in passenger seat, is she?

This vent comes about because today I tailed one of the most pointless bumper stickers in all of Christendom. It makes “Horn Broken, Watch For Finger” seem profound. It says:

“I Stop At Rail Road Crossings.”

What this person feels very strongly about - strongly enough to go to the shops, get their wallet out, buy a big sticker, clean the back of the car and attach it carefully and straight, is the personal realisation that they are not suicidal.

See, this is where blogs are good. I couldn’t have fitted this entirely pointless rant on a sticker that you could read at three metres.

Dance Yourself Clean

Due to a scheduling conflict, Daft Punk will not be playing at my house.

It does give me the time to do something that I don’t normally do, though; A music review.

I’m normally a bit charry about recommending music - it’s so personal. But I have to break my own rules on this one.

LCD Soundsystem were hovering on the fringes of my awareness for a while and I finally got around to sitting down and listening to the second album, Sound of Silver, released in 2007.

I cannot remember the last time I smiled the whole way through an album. I cannot remember the last time I got to the end of an album and went straight back to the start to hear it again. I then bought the eponymous first album on the strength of Sound of Silver and it’s almost as brain-bendingly fantastic. It's been a long time since I was excited at the thought of an impending album release. What would the next one be like?

The new album, This is Happening,  was released this week… and it is.

Man it’s good. If you like your dance music punk, if you like your electro synth ballads rock, if you like your sad lyrics funny, this is the album for you.

What I think happened is that Talking Heads were driving down the road in a van and they stopped to pick up Bowie, who had the Velvet Underground in his bag, and they were all going over to Gary Numan’s house, but they got into a head-on accident with the Eurythmics and Frankie Goes To Hollywood was driving the ambulance and they took the whole mess over to James Murphy Hospital, where doctor Murphy stitched it all back together and called it LCD Soundsystem.

This is Happening is not as good as Sound of Silver, but that’s like saying gold is not as good as platinum. You’re still happy with a big pile of it.

Noir

I’d been working the case for hours and getting nowhere. Every time I thought I had something - a breakthrough - some detail would emerge and trash it. I was standing there, just staring at the crime-board, when the Chief flat-palmed the door open.

“Anything? Tell me you got something.”

He was starting to build up a good head of steam.

“No Boss. Nothin’. Just keep going round and round.”

“What in the name of see-through-budgie-smugglers am I going to tell the Mayor. He’s got a press conference in two hours. Lemme know the minute you have anything.”

And back out through the door he went in a cloud of muttered invective and bad temper.

I turned back to the board. All the players were there. Short ones, big ones, dark ones, light ones. There were the old ones I knew well and new ones that had only just appeared on the scene. It was a tangled mess and I had to get it sorted.

Twenty seven individual plain black socks and not a single pair to be found between any of them. How does it happen?

(True story. Well mostly. I sat down with them all laid out in front of me to just "get it done"… and that was two days ago. I’m down to harnessing the subconscious, like physicists and mystery writers do when they’re tackling something really tricky. I’m just walking past the laid out socks, hoping that I will see a pair out of the corner of my eye. )

Cold Souls

I expect a lot from Paul Giamatti.

If you’re going to look like that and then wilfully get up on my screen, you better be doing something extra-specially good. It’s the Danny DeVito paradox. “I’m a club footed midget with a questionable hairline and an aggravating accent. I’m going to Hollywood to become a big star.”

It sort of takes the viewer off guard. We assume there must be some great acting going on because he isn’t there for the jaw-line. (This is the inverse to the George Clooney effect. When the actor is easy to look at, you forget they’re actually putting in a bloody good performance. Up in the Air and Michael Clayton support my case.)

I know what I’m in for when Paul G is up on the screen. American Splendour, and that one with the guy from the show that what’s-her-face was on, before she became Grace in Will and Grace. You know the guy, Stewart Thomas Michael Anthony Haden Church, or whatever. Oh, and the one with the pool, and the lady, and the guy with one big arm… directed by M Night Shyamalama-ding-dong. It’s got a twist!

I have some expectations when it comes to Non-Blockbuster-Character-Driven-Movies. And I snapped up Cold Souls at the DVD store last night.

Lemme give you the premise. It’s a cracker. An actor called Paul Giamatti, coincidentally played by Paul Giamatti in this film, is rehearsing for Uncle Vanya and making a hash of it . He’s paralysed by the sort of existential angst that Russians are renowned for. Now if the Russians are renowned for a little angsty ennui; Chekhov plays a deeply competitive game. You can see how this is already folding in on itself like a lovely post-modern Matryoshka. The DVD cover points to this.

Giamatti’s agent, getting irritated with his constant sighing and whining, tells him to look into getting his soul extracted and stored for the duration of the play. After taking the advice and finding that he’s feeling a little light and empty, he rents the soul of a Russian poet… just to get him through the performance. Meanwhile, his soul is nicked from the storehouse by a “soul mule” to be used by her boss’s wife - an aspiring Russian actress on her way up the industry ladder. “She wanted Al Pacino. I dunno. Who wants an American soul?”

I won’t go further for the risk of plot spoilers, but I don’t know that I can recommend the film. I think the ideas are terrific, but it is one of the most underdeveloped scripts and films I have ever seen, and that’s a real pity. Normally, I’m reeling backward from the sharp blows to the head that big American production houses wield to labour the point, overwork the gag, and then treat me like an idiot. They don’t do that in this film, but at the risk of sounding impossible to please, it is too restrained. It’s half-baked.

The de-souled experience could have been fleshed out. There were some moments where there was going to be some really clever comedy (Emily Watson does a compressed WTF face like no other. She’s great). And for the sake of tension, the Russian part of the escapade could have been more dangerous. And, at the risk of being as post-modern as the film, I don’t think they should have cast Paul Giamatti as Paul Giamatti. He’s not very good.

I liked the film but I should have loved it. I should have loved it with my very heart and… oh, crap.

Turning Into the Teeth Of The Storm

No one else seems to have the courage to bring this up, and I will probably be made to walk the plank for doing so, but it's these insights that keep you coming back.

I look at Jessica Watson's crazy baked-bean teeth, and they just scream scurvy to me.

Maybe I Do Wanna Be Buried In A Pet Cemetery

A while ago, I mentioned Kitty in The Carpark.

He wore a hi-viz vest like the rest of the warehouse lads. He got around doing his cat thing. Security once sent out a message that a small set of keys had been found and handed in, and I imagined that Kitty had started to commute. And he met an end on the road out the front. (Paws to Reflect)

I joked that the warehouse was going to have a tasteful little ceremony with full hi-viz honours.

Well, turns out I wasn't far from the truth. When the carpark got unusually crowded the other day, I got forced into an area I never use and came across his grave.

Nice.

I particularly like the spelling. Click here to see him in his hi-viz jacket.

Can't Mop! (hammertime)

They're here they're here they're here.

My mops have arrived. Well, when I say arrived, I mean, they're at the Post Office. I almost want to put off getting them, just to see what else can go wrong.

Oh yes, my world has become a tiny thing. I am now putting off the arrival of post-ordered cleaning goods, just to enjoy the anticipation. This is the true definition of Trivial Pursuit

It's A Long Way To The Mop

Under the influence of an insistent advertisement and the advice of certain friends of mine, I bought an electric steam-mop. Actually, that’s a lie. I bought two electric steam-mops.


I know that sounds like a contradiction (“Electric, but still steam-powered? I do not understand, good Sir. Pray tell, how does such a contraption contrive to cleanse your floors?”) but I wanted a steam mop on the pretext that it would somehow improve what Emergency Contact and I palm-off as “completed housework“.


Honestly, if there’s a household chore that I find less rewarding and more annoying than mopping, I can’t think of what it is… apart from washing dishes… and hanging out two weeks of black socks… oh, and don’t forget dusting the high places. I hate that. Actually, when I think about it, the only housework I think I would enjoy is rocking backwards and forwards on the balcony with my shotgun on my lap, telling the neighbourhood boys to keep off the grass.


The deal was one of those ‘twofus’ and I become aware of the special magnificence of it as I was doing the Saturday crossword. The ad that seemed to have been going for half an hour in the background of my awareness finally crossed the threshold into my consciousness and I sort of came to, thinking, “I’ve always wanted one of those - maybe even two.” My call was very important to the Kiwi lady who answered the phone, and I quote, “Thuts icksullunt, cheers aye?”


I ordered the mops and asked for them to be delivered to work. I left special instructions to the effect that they should be delivered to reception so I could sign for them personally, rather than being delivered to goods receiving round the back where they'd disappear. “No drumus, aye.”


On the fifth of May, I decided that the wait had been too long. I gave them a bell and was told that the mops had been delivered on the 21st of April, nearly two weeks before my call. Investigations would ‘bigun at their und’.


I asked if the special instructions had been obeyed. When I was told there weren’t any special instructions in my order, I expressed my annoyance. Back and forth we went, and my first call ended with me promising to go and check the goods receiving for my mops. I would get back to them and let them know the results of my search.


I donned reflective safety gear (to blend in, not stand out) and made my way out to the forbidding territory of The Fuckin’ Warehouse, to look for my little electric mops.


As far as not standing out is concerned, try stumbling around heavy machinery and heavy blokes saying, “’Scuse me, have you seen my little mops? They’re about this big and should’ve been delivered by now.” (I could only have improved it by lisping.)


Now, here’s what this story hinges on. One of the lads out the back says, “Yeah, I saw a box for one of them out in the recycling.”


I went and looked and, to my horror, there was an empty box for one of my little mops. Empty. No mops. I instantly knew that I was up against the stony, unhygienic face of Union Backed Workplace Theft Of White-Collar Clown’s Stuff. This is considered a sport and an honourable pastime in some places. Out the back in The Fuckin’ Warehouse, I felt like crying and stamping my feet. That’d show them.


But I decided to become implacable about it and set my shoulder to the task of getting my mops. There was still some of the registered mail sticker ID on the box, just enough to get the number. It wasn’t entirely hopeless.


I spoke to Australia Post (second time lucky I might add, the first agent feigned faulty phone, yelled “Hellohellohello” and then hung-up on me, after 11 minutes on hold.) When I gave them the registered post ID, the agent said, “Yes, that was delivered to South Australia and signed for by *name*, in Findon Post Office.”


I sat back and mustered my patience.


“But you can see the problem with that, yes? I am holding the empty package here, in Sydney. I want the signature of the person who signed for it, here in Sydney, so I can track them down and get the contents of my package.” (And mop the floor with them.)


She came back with, “We must have recycled the number.”


It’s funny where your mind goes when you’re up against “the man” and “the man” floors you with one of those fantastic pieces of idiocy. My first reaction should have been, “What the hell is the point of registered mail if you recycle the registrations?”. Instead, it was, “Wow. You’re telling me that there is so much registered mail sent in this country that the post office has to recycle ten digit numbers every month? You could fix that by adding another number, you know? It’s not like we are going to run out of numbers.”


I left that phone call with the promise that there was going to be an investigation launched and that I should wait to hear from them once they had a signature scan. I went back to the New Zealanders who sell the mops, and told the nice Kiwi lass that, because my special instructions had not been faithfully transcribed, my precious mops were in the clutches of the great unwashed and I would never see them again. She told me what she had been doing while I was away.


“Now, I’ve lussened to thi recording of your order, and the sales agunt dud take the unstrictions down. She ivun rids thum beck to you. We cen hier her typing thum. What appeers to heve hupppened, is the softweer tekes out the unstrictions whun ut forwuds it onto the coureeer, aye. Wool sund you sim replucemint mops.”


Oh joy, oh bliss. I will get my mops.


And it was then that I looked over at the empty mop box from a slightly different angle to the way I had been looking during the phone calls. There, scribbled in blue pen on a blue background, upside-down and almost illegible, was a scrawl saying, “Findon 15/3.”


Findon was the town that the postal girl thought this box was delivered to, and 15/3, if I guessed correctly, was a month before I even ordered the mops. It had gone to South Australia, and it had gone there before I knew I even needed it. Wait a minute…


Holy Crap!


This was a box for the type of mop I had ordered, but not actually my missing mops.


I looked closer at the box. I realised that it had been opened and then resealed. Someone had ordered the mop in South Australia, unpacked it and then re-used the box to post something else to my company in NSW, leaving some of the original postal ID stickers on the box.


What are the odds? Let me recap: I went looking for my missing goods out the back of a giant warehouse, someone happened to notice a small box in one of many enormous, industrial skips, that matched exactly what I was looking for, and I went and started WWIII, thinking that this was my missing stuff.


A bit embarrassing.


But my stuff was still missing. I did have to go back to the phones. I explained to the Australia Post girl that she could wrap up the investigation of my case. She said, “I don’t know what to put. I don‘t have that in my drop-down-box for a resolution”. I asked her if there was 'customer error' or 'alien abduction'. She answered that maybe “Other” was the safest. Yeah. Other.


Now I’m waiting on the replacement two mops which may be joined by the original order of two mops that still have a slim chance of showing up (a man can dream, can‘t he?). If I end up with four mops, I will turn them into a pop group; The Four Mops. Oh, my sides. I think I just made a mess. Wish I had something to clean that up with.


See, it works on so many levels. Four rhymes with floor. Mops rhymes with Tops. It’s one of those things that totally makes the whole, ulcer inducing debacle worthwhile… okay, maybe not.

For Those Who Are About To Fall On Their Face, We Salute You

I was rude about channel Go! when it first went to air. I said it was the equivalent of building an island out of sewage and calling it a paradise resort. Well, a little palm tree of goodness has taken root in the filth. Go! plays the new bread and circuses, which is cheese and Wipeout.

Wipeout and its British inbred cousin, Total Wipeout, are champagne television. That might state my case enough for you to turn away now, go look for the remote and turn it on. But, if you think you are not cultured enough for it and are a little intimidated by its highbrow content, let me try and change your mind.

It has loads of single entendres.

It has people falling on their faces in the mud.

It has very few minutes of “getting to know” the contestant.

It has people falling on their faces from heights.

It has a number of different challenges per show, but not so different that you don’t get to anticipate the fact that it will include…

People falling on their faces. (Quite often in a pose that has the soles of their shoes touching the backs of their heads. Sham-paggun, I tell you!)

If the silly old Romans had removed all the gore from their entertainment and stuck some big ol’, bouncy, red balls in the Colosseum, who knows, they might still be with us?

It’s not as morally corrupt as lion v Christian, but you still get to laugh like a loon at other people’s misfortune. With a tasty old cheese and a glass of wine, it is the perfect pick-me-up (and throw me face down in the mud) at the end of the day.

I give it two Roman thumbs up.