Don't Label Me

Getting undressed the other day, I looked down at my gentlmen's area and made a shocking discovery. Stuck to my bits was a sticker that said, "Inspected by J008".

I don't mind admitting a few alarming things went through my head at that point.

• Emergency Contact had unilaterally started a new quality control campaign.
  
  
• The aliens were standardising their approach to abduction.
  
  
• I was getting incredibly forgetful and had handed myself in for some appalling testing.
  
  
• But above all: I've been inspected, sure, but what was the result?

Turns out I was wearing new undies and hadn't got all the labels.

They Will Slouch Among Us

Pictured Left: Agent 119 practises a technique known as LIAFSOS. (Lulling into a false sense of security.) By appearing to be either cute, comatose or caught in a tree, the agent prepares its attack.

 

With K. Rudd’s rise to power, many felt that positive change had come to Australia. His crowning seemed to herald a new era - a better place. The approval ratings would indicate there’s still a lot of love out there for The Blond Frog, yet I have uncovered an international conspiracy, perpetrated by his predecessor, that TBF is doing nothing to reverse. It could ruin everything… assuming that everything wasn’t already buggered.

 

You see, disguised as a sign of international goodwill and friendship, we’re getting two Pandas from China in September. I’m not sure if either government is fully cognisant of the danger they are putting us in. Maybe they are, and it’s part of an elaborate plan to depopulate the country, thus leaving it ripe for the picking.

 

But if we do have to have these vile, dangerous, useless creatures on our shores, at least we should be able to name them. 

I would like to propose Philby and Burgess.

And Pigs Might Flu

It’s a trope of philosophy that the Ancient Greeks have asked all the big questions about the human condition.

I used to be a bit sceptical about that. I used to suspect there must be questions being raised in modernity that they could not have predicted or comprehended. We are fresh and we are smart. We make our own, new problems.

But the latest world-panic-thingy makes me think that they might have actually had it covered.

Let me draw the strings together on the macramé hand-basket that we’re all going to hell in.

The Greeks had many tales of part man, part beast characters that terrorised their populations – I’m naming and shaming some repeat offenders below.

The Minotaur: Part man. Part bull. Not allowed to drink in pubs until it become a Majortaur.
Harpies: Part winged demon, part sexually transmitted disease.
Echidna: Part porcupine, part spiny ant-eater.

These malignant archetypes reared their hideous heads again this morning when the radio reported the new flu about town is a genetic mix of avian, porcine and human influenza.

So if you’re sitting on public transport and see a bird-pig-man, don’t immediately panic. If his little beaksnout is running, though, then it’s time to panic.

Every snotty cloud should have a silvery mucous lining, though. Fashion designers could exploit these pandemics. If Collette Dinnigan pulls her finger out and designs face-masks that women want to wear…

ANZAC Day

Vivien Bullwinkel

Elbow Deep In Genius

Channel 10 are about to release a show called Talkin’ ‘bout Your Generation. 

Ho Hum. 

I live the dream... I wasn’t even starting to collect the non-stop gold that fell from my GenY’s mouths seriously, until recently. I rue the loss of what has gone unrecorded, but some recent favourites are below. 

(And no; you can’t make this shit up.)

1) Overheard claim to have the biggest, and therefore best, bonsai tree.

2) A report that mum was angry at brother for cluttering up living room with air-guitars.

3) “The Moon is overrated.”

4) Had following exchange with me:

- My Goddamn dry-cleaner is stealing the buttons from the end of my shirts.

- When you say ends, do you mean the spare buttons sewn on the inside of the tails of the shirt?

- What? No! The ends here, near my hands. Look, I’ve got no buttons there.

- But… you’ve got disposable cufflinks halfway through some of the button holes.

- I know! Look! He takes my buttons and leaves it like this…

- Wait. Are you saying that your dry-cleaner is stealing your buttons, but replacing them with longer cuffs and four, carefully sewn button holes on each cuff?

- Yes!

- Let’s carefully examine the likelihood of what yo….

- Goddamnit this isn’t my shirt!

- I know.

- What the hell is going on?!

Up The Spout

Lying in a guest bedroom in Newcastle over the weekend, I was woken by a crazy storm outside. I remember thinking about the fact that these days we don’t seem to have weather so much as intermissions and then acts-of-god. I then moved on to greener mental pastures and thought of Intsy-Wintsy Spider (or Bitsy. Couldn’t decide which one).

The rhyme scuttled around my skull a couple of times. I was imagining a spider standing at the bottom of a drain pipe, four hands on hips, looking at the deluge coming out the bottom and thinking to itself that as the construction industry is too prone to weather delays, it might as well go and become a sign writer for a pig.

It then occurred to me that nursery rhyme is one of those ways we get conditioned to thinking that the protestant work ethic is a good and normal idea. Trudge into work, catch the elevator, labour away at task that will be lost in the torrent – and then, quite literally, rinse and repeat.

You know how it is at night, the theme grows on its own.

Jack and Jill - getting us used to earlier mortality age of males.

Humpty Dumpty – inuring us to under-performance of nationalised institutions because of the poor skills management.

There Was An Old Woman Who Swallowed A Fly - as I’ve mentioned before, the dangers of feral and exotic pest management through introduction of predator species.

Punchinello – the general unfathomable meaninglessness of existence.

And, consoled that I had seen through the whole ghastly plot, I rolled over and went back to sleep... until Linda the Hostess's giant boof-headed cat walked through a mass of unwashed glasses and bottles on the kitchen bench-top, breaking a few items and generally frightening the hell out of everyone in the house.

That sent me down a path of mental enquiry where I think I have now worked out how the common household cat is involved with the World Crime League and their bid to burglarise every home in the western world.

Make Us Proud

China. Gymnastics. The Beam.

FRA: 1.9 USA: 2.1 ITA: 1.8 AUS: 3.1 CHN: 9.8 ENG: 2.0 GER: 2.4 TAI: 5.3 TWN: 6.1

 

Panda Infiltration Technique #17

Do not be fooled. Disguised as everyday black and white objects, pandas will try and infiltrate your home and places of business.

Here, a rare photo from a secret panda training camp shows a young operative mastering the bathroom camouflage technique known as, "Only Us Towels in Here, Lady."

Belfast 2009

I note with... with... I dunno; other than tell you what I have seen.

The Sun Herald reports that the World Dwarf Games start in July this year.

Some of the events include

Track:- The 10 metre. The 20 metre. And the incredibly grueling 4 X 60 metre relay.

Swimming:- The width of the pool.

Field:- Discus. Javelin. Frisbee. And Tennis Ball Throw.

Hot Cross Pug

Ahem. Ok. In three, two, one. 

Thanks Stan, I'm here in the produce hall at the Easter Show, where the judging has just... oh good Christ! Why do I bother?

I'm so lonely.

(The next guy who makes a horn joke is gettin' one in the goolies.)

Back to you, Stan.

One Year In And Still Bitching

Wun Year Auld Blog. I Haz One!

Yup, the blob turns one today. Happy Birthday blob!

Hard to believe that this time, one year and one day ago, I didn’t have a hobby. Oh, I had pastimes, distractions, work-life balance, all that. But something was missing. Something that would take a good deal of waking attention. Something that I could really worry away at like a well-formed scab. Something that was free. (I mean, how lucky am I that I actually enjoy this and Google provide it for nothing?)

I like to think I’ve achieved a lot in that year‘s worth of blobbing, too. I also like to think that I am the correct weight, am devilishly charming and in no way contributing to global warming.

So, let’s have a quick wander down memory lane and see how this blob has made the world a better place.

You are now aware of how NASA thought it could fake a Mars landing.

You are now aware of how the church fakes the existence of god.

You are now aware of how pandas are faking their own innocence and uselessness and are really on a path to world domination.

Cane Toad control is back on the national agenda.

You are now aware of my untrammelled talent as an insomniac, OCDish, ADHDish poet about town (now that’s worth the price of admission alone. Shut up).

Some of the serial point-missers that live among us have been exposed.

Emergency Contact has had some good practise at saying, “No, that just doesn’t work.”

A detective agency has come into being and the case remains, as yet, unsolved. (Honestly though, that’s kicking my arse a little. Bird Flew Press are not paying up until I find Fruitnose.)

And that’s just to name a few of my incredibly well thought out and highly researched points of view and “ideas”.

So, patient readers, I hope that in among the atrocious spelling (nope, still not getting any better. It seems to be terminal) and the challenging grammar, you’ve had a bit of fun along the way. Yeah?

Onwards and upwards.

Yours,

Nick (Grey Area)

Hot Punk Bun

(Sing it to the tune of Anarchy in the UK by the Pistols. It's more fun that way)

Anarchy in the Bakerayyyyy
It's coming this Easter, maybayyyy
Give the wrong time stop a crucifyin'
Your future dream
Is a bun with cream!

'Cause I wanna beeeee....

The Squids Are Awrigh'

Caution: This is written with right-hand-drive bias. If you are a reader from a country that drives incorrectly, please follow the instructions below.

1. Press [ctrl + f] on your keyboard. The “Find and Replace” window will be displayed (unless you’re on Mac. Find your own way.)
   
2. Click the “Replace” tab.
   
3. In the field Find What: type “left” (not “self esteem” or “glory days”).
   
4. In the field Replace With: type “right” (rather than “security” or “respect”). 
   
5. Repeat process for right and left.
   

I’ve been seeing trusting yupster-types on underpowered scooters lately. 

I ask; why would you venture out in Sydney traffic with so little going for you? You’ve got no protection, no carry space, no roof and let’s cut to the heart of the matter, you are on a motorcycle with no power and therefore, no cool.

 

There’s a name for them too, apparently, Squids. Maybe some clever contraction of “kids on scooters” or the like. I dunno.

I usually leave the lights quickly when I’m in the left lane. Sooner or later there will be a parked car. If you drive the right sort of vee-hickle, it’s easier being first out of the blocks and choosing when you’re going to change to the right lane rather than hoping for a gap and trying to fit in somewhere further back in the queue. 

And let's face it, the right lane doesn’t want you there. You’ve nicked their place. If they see you miles ahead and having nothing to do with their spot in the traffic jam, it doesn’t affect them. If you bully your way in front of them because you misjudged a launch at the lights, you’ve just done something rude… and impotent. If you make the pushee miss a set of lights because of this - road rage should rightfully ensue.

 

My driving habits are honed (Tainted? Formed? Accreted?) from years of driving public transport in this city and I tend to drive… uhm… efficiently.

Taking my usual course up the inside recently, a straight backed man in a light-cotton suit and chinless helmet decided turning right in front of me as the lights went green was a good idea. If he’d been on a real bike, it would have been no contest. He would have been across the intersection and halfway to the horizon before I could get the clutch fully engaged - and I wouldn’t even mention it. But he wasn’t. 

He was a Squid. 

Gooby and I have decided it’s the sound they make when you hit one and it gets caught up in your driveshaft.

Wouldn't Want To Meet a Meat Ant

I have attempted to make the world a slightly safer place by warning you of some of the less obvious dangers out there. (Kyle Sandilands, juggling crystal balls and ibis poo, to name a few.)

I need to add a new menace to the list; and if he keeps going the way he is, he’s going to knock pandas off the top of world’s most useless, yet dangerous animals list.

I give you: Professor Rick Shine.

We have come across this joker before when I mentioned his fine work in Citizen Cane Toad. He’s back and I think I need to institute a new “watch” to keep us up to date with what the half-wit is hatching. I think I will call it the ‘Rick and Shinola Report’

In his previous escapades, he suggested releasing sterilised ‘teacher’ toads into the wild. They were going to make the animals that ate them sick, rather than dead. This would teach them not to do it again.

Well, Ricky “the Fifth Horseman” Shine has changed his tack and has made a splash in the media this week with his next answer to the cane toad problem.

Meat Ants.

Let’s mine a little Shine gold here. My help is in parenthesise.

He described them on the ABC recently as:

“… quite large ants, up to about a centimetre long.” (WTF!)

”They don't have a sting like the bull ants, but they've got a very powerful set of jaws.” (as in, “You're going to need a bigger boat.”)

”They're probably the kind of ant that causes problems if you leave your bit of chicken on the ground during the picnic.” (By sneaking up behind you, pistol whipping you and stealing it.)

Shine wants to encourage the ants to forage into areas they aren’t currently in, to help control the toad population. Yet again, we at the Grey Area Institute of Fuzzy Things and Monumental Balls-Ups need to remind you of the dangers of the “She swallowed a fly” method of fauna control.

If nothing else, isn’t the name a warning? Meat Ants. For god sake Rick, children are made of meat! Have some sense, man.