Take A Solid Brolly If You're Off To See The Art

And they complain when it rains cats and dogs.

Luxury!

(Ken Unsworth. Cockatoo Island, Sydney. 2009)

Pick From The List And Hit Play, Ok?

(Do the following in your best outrajoos Fronch accent. It’s more fun that way.)

“So, your CV is excellent, you have enormous experience running the back-of-house, the PA and the boards for these kinds of special events. Is there anything else we should know, Monsieur Dyslexique, before we sign contracts?”

“I feel it best to be honest with you, that at times I can have difficulty distinguishing between the letters “D” and “Sp.” But I have in place many ways to work around this problem and normally, context gives me the clues that I need.”

“We are equal opportunity employers here at The Tour, Sir, we will have no problem with this small matter. Your experience is too good to pass up. Welcome to the Tour de France Technical Support Team!”

A few weeks later (and this is the completely true bit).

On the crowded Parisienne streets, along the Champs Elysee, people crane and strain to see Contador as he climbs the winner's podium in his yellow jersey.

The Tour De France has been won for the second time by the elated Spaniard, and as he raises his arms in triumph, the glorious sounds of the Danish national anthem ring out through the streets of Paris.

Let's Go Play With The Lego

Jealousy is an ugly emotion. Too much of it can give you cancer. If I’m not right about that, I should be. If I had to give jealousy a flavour, it would be acidic razor blades. If I had to give it a sound, it would be fingernails being dragged across a sunburnt blackboard.

I’m fortunate because I don’t get jealous very often – but when I do… man, I gets a little mean. Right at this moment, James May (from the proper, English Top Gear) makes me want to kick puppies. Sure, I'd only kick evil puppies with spikes on them... but still.

When he’s not doing Top Gear stuff, he’s lollygagging around doing wine tours in France or docos of the 20th century with emphasis on locomotives and aeroplanes. The last thing I heard he was up to, though, broke the biscuit.

He’s had 3 million Lego bricks delivered to a vineyard in Surrey, where he’s going to build a life-size, working, Lego house.

My only solace (and it’s a small, yappy, lap-type-solace) is that the name of the place in Surrey, is Dorking.

Dorking. Yeah suck on that, you, you... ahhhh I can't. It's no good. God-speed, you lucky bastard!

Shock And Or

There are many ways to lose weight. You can eat sensibly and exercise. You can shave with a bacon slicer. You can crawl on bended hands and knees to the producers of a reality television show and have those things done to you for our entertainment.

Or, you can go into slight hysteria and then start vomiting at what's on Channel 9.

Dance Your Ass Off is obviously intended to induce instant and cataclysmic bulimia. I can explain it no other way. I thought there was a good chance I would love it. It has everything, after all; The legalised torture of fattys. People falling over. Lardos in high-pressure situations. Music.

But no. It’s just too much. Too much of everything. Too much of that hostess made out of the mostest. Too much sequin, spandex and the splits. And on the subject of splits - The response to the phrase “… what she had for breakfast.” Should never be, “Evidently a 7 course meal.” It’s simply a nauseating amount of America. What little I watched, I watched on 64 times the normal speed and I was still traumatised for life.

I heard that Australia was the only country to actually air this show. If that is true, I don’t know whether to be intensely proud, or profoundly embarrassed. That’s what modern TV is doing to me. Confusing me and keeping me svelte. I’m laughing and crying. Oh, and retching into a bucket I have next to the couch.

Symphony In The Key Of Random

First movement

I’ve seen the future (again).

Australian spin bowler, Hauritz, had his finger almost jammed back into his own pelvis by trying to pull off a caught-bowled on a ball travelling at roughly the speed of sound. The ultra-slow-motion replay was sickening enough, but when they put the infra-red, heat sensitive vision on the poor bugger, I swear I could see the pain messages travelling up the axons in his arm and exploding in his head.

So let’s get real about it. If we’re going down this path, I want EEGs on all these guys so we can analyse the brain waves when they dive for a catch… or start sms-ing the wrong women.

Second Movement

The light rail in Sydney is one of the best things I’ve ever been on. I was a cabby in this town for ten years and it is fair to say that it is hard to surprise me with the local geography. In general, I can say without fibbing, “Been there.” But the light rail took me through familiar suburbs at such an unfamiliar angle, at such a weird sort of height and through such unused chunks of land, that it was kind of like seeing Sydney for the first time… again.

In fact it was so good, when Emergency Contact and I got to the final stop on the line, we forgot to get off and started going back into town. We only cottoned on to this, when we started travelling backwards. Actually, what is doubly weird about this, now that I type it, is that I didn’t see the driver get out of the front bit, which then becomes the back bit, to walk down to the back, so that bit can become the front for the trip back… if you see what I mean. I reckon that would be kind of cool, driving from the back. It’s sort of the ultimate statement in relaxed control.

Third Movement

Someone who sits in the same room as I do at work, is prone to making bold statements about famous people. Particularly, how much they mean to her. One of the regular little pearls is,

“[insert talentless, media creation’s name here] is my idol.”

The other day it was “Beyonce is my idol.”

I couldn’t help myself because the day before it had been, “Britney Spears is my idol.” I rose to the bait and said,

“What? How can Beyonce and Britney be your idols? That just doesn‘t make any sense.”

“They’re like the opposite of each other.” she says. I don’t know why, but that just does not seem right to me either.

“No they’re not.” I say. I'm mentally slapping myself for even getting involved, but I’m in too deep, I have to keep going.

“The opposite of Beyonce, is Michael Caine.” and as soon as I’ve said it, I realise the unassailable truth of what I’ve just light-heartedly thrown out. As it comes out of my mouth, I realise how fantastically and accidentally bang-on-the-money that is. The room goes quiet and everyone smiles a little at the crystallising wholeness and rightness of the revelation. I am just a conduit at this point and I sit there with them and enjoy the essential yin and yang of this universal balancing axiom. One beat goes by, and in a flawless J. Micklewhite impersonation, Smurfy says,

“Not many people know dat.”

The Mean (And Confusing) Streets Of Sydney

It's five in the morning. I'm leaving for the gym.

I pass by this terrible sight.

I pause. I know I'm looking at a crime but I can't decide what sort.

Is this a murder scene? Has the killer mutilated his victim?

Or.

Is this just a very naughty bear, exposing himself?

Getting Back On The Horse

Look, apologies for the lack of input this week. I know some of you swing by A Grey Area to get a taste of the heady world I inhabit, while others just check in to see if I’ve still got a pulse. I’ve managed to furnish proof of neither in the last few days and I'm sorry.

That’s because I am in the middle of testing a website that is about to launch. Who knew it would be this much fun?

I always assumed that doing repetitive, detailed work that required concentration and the self-awareness of a battery hen all day would leave me refreshed and in the mood to pump out a few hundred words of entertaining insight as light relief.

Turns out, no.

So at least when I get home there’s still some Buffy the Vamp… what!? We’ve finished it?

I keep repressing that.

If you watch 144 hours of blood spattered entertainment, it becomes a gross habit. (I made a “unit of measurement” joke. Oh baby - I still got it.)

When it all comes to an end… well you need a little something to... you know. Hey, I’m sick man. Just a little taste. I swear it’ll be the last episode I watch. Common’! Just some credits… I’ll lick your… ahem.

So apparently, the methadone is supposed to be Angel. I could go on a long time about the indefinable “it” that is required to carry a TV series - and how some people don‘t have it. I could bang on about the unconquerable division between physical and personal attractiveness of the main damsel. (Seriously, I don’t care how rack-tastic you are. An arsehole is an arsehole.) Instead, I will simply say this; When you're using Angel, I know why you might have lapses and accidentally break into people’s houses to borrow a couple of quick discs of BTVS.

The Return

You can learn important things from telly.

In the 70s, I used to sit with Mum and Dad and watch The Ascent of Man. The narrator and author, Jacob Bronowski, presented ideas that were mostly beyond my ken. Mostly. (Say it like Newt. It’s more fun that way.) I was in single digits and could only grasp some of the more obvious points. Like silly Leonardo and his heavier-than-lead, air-screws. But I felt important and included, sitting with my parents, watching complicated things being presented.

Recently, I had one of those moments where I was reminded of Bronowski, telly and learning larger truths. (The Bronowski moment is here. And probably better seen after my lightweight idea.)

I heard a sublime rant of Eddie Izzard’s this week, where he describes sawing wood. He impersonates the middle bit of sawing, where you aren’t trying to get it started and you’re not worried about it snapping off and falling on the floor. The bit where you can do big, full length cuts. He does a sound effect of the satisfying bit and says, “Where you feel like your dad. Sundays at my place. Saw some wood and then off to watch The Ascent of Man… snore.” It’s said with genuine affection and I went rushing off to a similar place in my mind where telly could be a major contributor to a profound experience.

In one of the later series of Buffy, she dies. She is then resurrected and she comes back all wrong. It’s not what I would call an entirely successful raising of the dead. She is depressed and then elated. She behaves oddly and the overwhelming impression is that you’re mucking with the essential order of things when you forcefully intervene in the birth/death cycle.

The same thing has happened to Poh on MasterChef.

Ah, Let 'Em in. How Much Damage Can They Do?

China. The Middle Kingdom. Mysterious Orient. Most populous place on Earth. Home of the panda… So I’m going there in October to give them a piece of my mind. Emergency Contact is part of the tour, which will be nice. I expect her to do the holding while I do the kicking.

The Chinese like a visa process. They appear to like a lengthy visa process. In fact, when you are accidentally arriving in the middle of the 60 year anniversary of Communism, they like a visa process that takes a quarter of a year.

EC and I toddled off the shops to get the snaps done that are required to go on the visa applications and the little Chinese man at the photo shop must have thought that we looked like the sort that would bring valuable tourist dollars into the homeland, because he gave us a leg-up with our visa applications.

He left the camera on a macro sort of fish-eye setting and it has given me and EC a particular kind of look. There is absolutely no way that the Chinese authorities are going to look at those photos and think to themselves, “Ahhh, here are the deadly secret agents the west are sending to bring down Communism in our glorious 60th year.”

No, they’re more likely to be wondering why we’re not riding around in a special bus under adult supervision.

Maron Blando

There is unexpected fun to be had everywhere you look. That’s why I like it here. For instance, I don’t expect much from free-to-air telly, but last weekend a little pearl dropped out of the box and rolled across the floor at me.

I found myself accidentally watching Teahouse of the August Moon. This piece of genius gets 4 ½ stars in A Grey Area’s List of Unintentionally Hilarious Films.

You might have thought that Mickey Rooney delivered a deft and subtle performance as Mr Yunioshi in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, but I see you and raise you - MARLON FREAKIN’ BRANDO AS A JAPANESE VILLAGER AND TRANSLATOR! (Yup. Look at that picture again.)

I have never seen anything of such breathtaking and insouciant racism in my entire life. I wept laughing.

I know zat is long. Solly Bors.

Why You Get Up

It’s been a good day. Thirty chimpanzees escaped and a ginger midget came to work.

The chimps escaped from a zoo in Cheshire and reportedly went in search of food. I told this to the canteen lady who over-boils the milk in my morning coffee, and she gave me a blank look.

I suggested that chimps in search of food at a zoo would probably end up at the canteen.

Another blank look.

“Chimps”, I said. “In line at the canteen. Searching through their non-existent pockets that are not attached to their furry legs in the vain hope of giving you the exact change they don’t have… for a cup of crap coffee and toast with too much vegemite on it.”

Blank look.

So I threw poo at her.

Well… maybe; but let’s move on.

Last month, I was forced to stop a colleague (Sticky) in the middle of a complex explanation to correct her understanding of ongoing events.

She was saying, “The testing timetable is going to be rigorous, consideri…”

“I’m going to have to stop you there.”

“Why?”

“Because a ginger midget in a pin-stripe suit is about to walk past the window in… three… two… one!” and then everybody looked where I was pointing.

And there he was. It was one of the finest moments of my professional life. (He has a long red beard as well. I know... too good!)

After we’d put Sticky back in her seat and removed the oxygen mask, we all agreed that it would be so excellent if he “got the job and came to work here… but not with us.”

He started work today and it was so cool. He was even eating lunch in the canteen. He's so cute. He thinks he's people!

Just Throw the Empty Husk Away

Sometimes, you gotta use these forums to tackle some of the tougher topics in life. Here we go.

Navels.


Emergency Contact is funny about them, so I have to type quietly. She thinks they’re unnatural and is a bit put out by even having to wear one. Even mentioning them puts her dead off, so there are hours of fun to be had by walking past and giving hers a quick little poke. (Now that Mollie Sugden is dead, I can make statements like that and the studio audience doesn’t react at all.)

During the Renaissance, there was a lot of tension between theological groups as to whether Adam got one. I can understand that. Evolutionary biology, to my mind as solid as anything else we’ve got going on, hadn’t really put its hand up yet. The argument tended to rage around whether God had pushed his pinky into the play-doh in an effort to give the mold some authenticity, or whether it really didn’t come up until the first umbilical cord made its appearance. (That last sentence should have EC squirming.)

Good or bad, insey or outsey, natural or not, I’m normally not so fussed (although a really prominent outsey can make me lose my appetite). But mine is giving me pause. I don’t even know what verb to use when I describe the phenomena.

My level of navel lint production/collection is reaching heights I never thought possible. It must be production. I just don’t wear clothes of that colour, so I can’t be collecting it. I’m worried my stuffing is coming out. I am losing a bit of weight, but I had put that down to exercise. I got in the shower the other day and a small hall-runner rug fell out. I’m going to collapse at work one day like Obi Wan Kenobi and they’re just going to kick through my empty clothes and say, “Yep, all empty. Not much of a surprise though, he was an NLP Grandmaster.

(You thought that stood for Neuro Linguistic Programming didn’t you? Nup. Navel Lint Production.)

Close, But No Bamboo

The knockers are always going to take a shot at you when you are at the top.

As a world reviled naturist* and panda expert, I and my roving assistants are constantly in the firing line of those that would tarnish our good name. But let me say right here and now that we at the Grey Area Institute for Fuzzy Things are not so easily fooled.

Here again, we see an elaborate hoax designed to fool us into producing bogus work. On his travels, some people have attempted to dupe my colleague Gooby, into spending time at their institute, studying the “pandas”. He posted me this revealing photo last night.

But my esteemed workmate and friend saw through the charade almost instantly. He knows damn well that you can’t put two badgers and a skunk on stilts and pass them off as pandas.

*Yes I know. It’s a joke, Joyce.

Have We Learnt Nothing?

I note with alarm that the TerreStar satellite is now in orbit.

It is the largest satellite to have ever lived and is apparently self aware and plotting our downfall as I type.

From the infallible Wikipedia (with a little scientific help from A Grey Area):

TerreStar (aaaahhhhhhh! Who put the terror in TerrorStar? They did. Sing it with me now.) was launched at 17:52 GMT (We’re having a Greenwich Mean Ol’ Time. It’s the only time you can have when TerrorStar’s around) on 1 July 2009, during a two hour launch window that opened at 16:13.

The launch occurred towards the end of the window due to bad weather in the first hour (brought by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as they rode towards the facility), followed by two aborted countdowns for launch attempts (the terrified scientists knew they had created evil, and just as Dr Frankenstein rued his decision the minute the lightening struck the doohickey, they knew they were in some deep poop and tried twice to abort it.) scheduled at 17:12 and 17:34.

The launch was conducted by Arianespace (lotta Frenchies in that organisation. Noticed how well they’re doing with aeroplanes lately?)….After launch, the satellite separated from the carrier rocket (and then ate it) into a geosynchronous transfer orbit.

(Now get ready for the truly worrying bit) It will subsequently raise itself into geostationary orbit by means of its onboard propulsion system (it will then ready, arm and point its onboard megadeath-ray and hold us all to ransom). It will be positioned at 111° West longitude (multiply 111 by 6, people, it’s all there in front of us…), and is expected to operate for 15 years. (A period that shall henceforth be known simply as “The Reign of Terra”) A second satellite, TerreStar-2 (Also known as T2. Son of T or T-Wrecks) is scheduled for launch in 2010. (We won’t be here to witness it.)

So long, it's been aaaaaahhhhhhhhh

Previously Unheard Definition of the Word 'Lucky'

Dr. Phil McGraw is bringing his live show to Australia in August and one lucky Angus & Robertson Rewards member will have their life changed forever.








(Thanks to ICHCB)