Lake Bolac: The Home of Bob the Bunyip

Bob's Clot

2006-03-19T09:40:00.000+11:00

It felt like a cramp: I got out of bed and stood on my instep, finding enough relief to get back to sleep for the last few hours of darkness that morning. But my calf was still sore the next day. "Perhaps I'd torn something trying to relieve the cramp?" By Thursday the oedematic swelling in my shin and ankle was ummistakable and the dull pain had not abated.

"Might as well go straight to the hospital!", my surgeon mate told me, "That's where the GP will send you anyway." So, off to St V's it was, where Cas was not the experience A Current Affair would have us believe. The triage nurse was friendly and instantly concerned. The wait was fair but not extended. A quick history for the registrar and around for an untrasound. Oh dear! Mum had consistently warned me about the need for clean undies, but I think had never really come upon even the concept of "going commando". The technician was gracious and passed me a towel before smearing gel from groin to ankle. (They even think to warm it beforehand!)

No dallying pubis to patella, but the pause behing the knee was the giveaway, and the black texta mark a few inches above the ankle. Of course he couldn't tell me that it was a thrombus - that was the doctor's job, but "No" I couldn't walk back to Cas: "Wait for the orderly, he'll take you on the trolley".

"Have you had surgery lately?"
"Been on any long plane trips?" (And I thought they were bunyip specialists at St V's!)
"Gained weight recently?" "Not really, I've lost 10kg."
"Had your leg in a cast or been in bed for a prolonged time?"
"9 times out of 10 we don't know what causes them anyway!"

Several vials of blood, a couple of jabs of clexane in the belly, a warfarin tablet and some advice later, I was discharged to the care of Hospital in the Home for daily injections and bloods. Proud I was (forgive the Yodaism) of my bravery in learning self-injection and gradually the warfarin pushed my INR above the therapeutic and mystical number 2, so the need for daily nursing visits is gone.

And now I wait like some sixteenth century monk for the looming dissolution!

Finding loot ...

2005-10-13T05:57:00.000+10:00

Photo Captions From Katrina Stir Debate
By JOCELYN NOVECK
The Associated Press
Friday, September 2, 2005; 6:23 PM
NEW YORK -- In one of the photos, a man wades through chest-deep waters with a large black bag filled with items from a grocery store. In another, two people wade through equally high waters, carrying bread and soda.
They were just two out of hundreds of stunning images transmitted Tuesday, the day after Katrina ravaged New Orleans. What has drawn attention to these two photos, though, is their captions. Full story: Washington Post

I [Doombah Chuckledunkin] feel better now [with apologies to Medibank Private]:

2005-07-05T09:36:00.000+10:00

This only takes a minute. Sometimes when you have a stressful day or week, you need some silliness to break up the day. And, if we are honest, we have a lot more stressful days than not.

The following in an excerpt from a children's book, "Captain Underpants And the Perilous Plot of Professor Poopypants" by Dave Pilkey. The evil Professor forces everyone to assume new names...

Use the third letter of your first name to determine your new first name:
a = snickle b = doombah c = goober d = cheesey
e = crusty f = greasy g = dumbo h = farcus i = dorky j = doofus
k = funky l = boobie m = sleezy n = sloopy o = fluffy p = stinky
q = slimy r = dorfus s = snooty t = tootsie u = dipsy v = sneezy
w = liver x = skippy y = dinky z = zippy

Use the second letter of your last name to determine the first half of your new last name:
a = dippin b = feather c = giggle d = burger
e = chicken f = barffy g = lizard h = waffle i = farkle j = monkey
k = flippin l = fricken m = bubble n = rhino o = potty p = hamster
q = buckle r = gizzard s = lickin t = snickle u = chuckle v = pickle
w = hubble x = dingle y = gorilla z = girdle

Use the third letter of your last name to determine the second half of your new last name:
a = butt b = boob c = face d = nose
e = hump f = breath g = pants h = shorts i = lips j = honker
k = head l = tush m = chunks n = dunkin o = brains p = biscuits
q = toes r = doodle s = fanny t = sniffer u = sprinkles v = frack
w = squirt x = humperdinck y = hiney z =juice

Oh dear ...

2005-07-05T06:01:00.000+10:00

I hope no-one noticed ... it's gone now ... hidden in the fifth word of this very apologia. But it will probably be enough to get me expelled from the Ancient and Noble Order of Pedants!

One can't help thinking of Pierre, the Marseillais WW1 hero and the taunts of the jeunes mecs locals ... "just one little apostrophe" sounds so hollow when all is said and done and written!

Apparently the phenomenon is going global but that's no excuse for us at the Lake. We've devoted nearly 0.763% of our lives to its eradication only to find "it's own pace and rhythm" lulling us into compacency! The price of freedom IS eternal vigilance.

Nor does it assuage our feelings of shame and guilt to know that the error was rectified without "external audit" or that archive.org failed to capture it. There is no comfort in knowing that us dystypophobics often make such rods for our own backs! The gum has fallen in the gully and a sound was born! The proof reader will be taken to a forest in Siberia! Oh dear ...

A change of season & scenery

2005-06-26T09:09:00.000+10:00

The longest night has gone, here down south. Paris can't be found, nor Farouk. I did tell them both that marsupials and members of the family, Mustelidae are not wont to hibernate, but the cold weather just seems to have that effect on us all: we just want to curl up in a branch or burrow warmed by the sun and wait till the wattle blooms.

Daphne's in Siberia by this stage, we think. The last postcard we had was from Japan where she had sheltered briefly with my brother who coaches cricket there.

When winters become countless (as they do for bunyips), melancholy blooms. It was just all getting too depressing for me, so I thought I'd do an early spring clean on the blog. New warm colours, better defined text to make reading through screens that fog up in the dew easier!

And I took myself to the cinema in Hamilton to see Kingdom of Heaven. That was probably a mistake! Baldwin IV, hiding his leprosy in his iron mask, was horrific enough: thank goodness it ended just as Richard I failed to persuade our fictitious hero Balian the smith to return with him to slaughter the 2,600 innocent Muslims at Acre.

Too many shades of the present day to make pleasant viewing, to my mind!

Mesomphaloskepsis

2005-06-02T07:52:00.000+10:00

Yes, I know others use "intraomphaloskepsis", but we, at the Lake, have never found mixed roots very appealing!

Little did Daphne expect the tempest she would unleash with her simple quack of ennui posted on the pretender to our friend, Scaramouche's website, Dreamnation Recording Co. [dnrc].

How were we to know that some ex-hippie who found Damascus Road in Brisbane in 1984 would have turned the most modest act of personal hygiene into an international record?

Or that *the substance formerly known as navel fluff/lint*, of which the average human accumulates some 2-3 milligrams a day, was dangerously inflamatory as well as inflammable? (That's some 85kg in a lifetime, by the way.)

Despite all the kerfuffle (pardon my Gaelic), we still need help, friends; Daphne remains inconsolate because no-one has yet answered her question:

"does anyone know the correct word for the lint that collects in one's navel? and why is it always blue?"

It transpires that she's been reading the Don Vivo trilogy:

"Don Emmanuel grinned, scratched his rufous beard and then his pubic region, and said, 'I will give you all the advice in the world if only you can tell me why it is that the dingleberries excavated from my navel by Felicidad are always composed of blue Lint, when I possess no clothes of that colour.' "
Extract from The Troublesome Offspring of Cardinal Guzman by Louis de Bernières, published by Secker & Warburg.

Please post if you can help her with her questions - then we can all get some sleep.

Busy at the Lake

2005-05-15T07:18:00.000+10:00

It's autumn on the shores, and the season has its own pace and rhythm. Things are at once slow and busy as the weather works its wonders: no new growth but provisioning aplenty.

Farouk took his Easter late in a year when the Julian and Gregorian calendars were most at odds. Daphne saw this as a portent of the world as we know it. But, she has always been a bit too ready to catastrophise. Those of us with no ritual duties headed off for the weekend to visit the North East. Paris still refuses to be photographed by day and hid in the trees while some friends from Alexandra and Bali chatted with Scaramouche, a llama in exile:

There was a further example of this bizarre ikonophobia some weeks later when Paris (the Peripatetic) and I also spent a weekend along the Great Ocean Road visiting some relatives who run a bough and breakfast in Ocean Grove with some Melbourne mates. He was busy "marking" the famous entrance to the road when some tourists stopped for photos. He was off like the powers of ...! You can just see his tail disappearing past the "Historic Marker" sign. How apt!

on waiting for a hard disc to format ...

2005-04-24T07:45:00.000+10:00

Some things still take time! Once everything did, of course; and strangely, I didn't seem to notice it so much then. Now, it's like a nanosecond is always too long - even if you're dealing with 100 gigabytes! When I read Christopher Booker's The Neophiliacs back in the 60's, and his lament that we were all 'plunging down a cataract of change', as well as the metaphor being a little queer for those of us who do such things, I was struck by an overwhelming feeling of ruth for a man so averse to risk.

And now it's just told me that it will take 7hr 36min 11sec to do a backup ... hang on: it will take me a few minutes to calculate how many nanoseconds that is - 2.7371 x 10¹⁴ ... and wouldn't you know it? While I was calculating that, my backup failed!

Paris to the rescue! Apparently, we can make the backup over the LAN and that will take a mere 2.445 x 10¹² nsec - a great time saving during which I think I will have a swim!

Feeling better now, and that wonderful little green bar has almost run full across the screen: less than 13 minutes to go.

I was going to write that sometimes, these days, I don't want things to go quite so fast either, that I wished it wasn't all "brilliant sun without the healing shadow". That must have been before I got my computer.

an eerie day ...

2005-03-26T10:12:00.000+11:00

the day 'between', when nought knows quite what when to do!

friday is the cruelest day, not this year in the cruelest month,
with streets so quiet and souls so still,
even as processions pass
and cafe patrons sip abashed,
friday's purpose crosses by; all know when to take their rest.

sunday is a nascent day, when Webers flame back into life
with pickled pork and families poised,
then pickled people past their point
and afternoons that mellow bye:
sunday's hours are full and framed, sunday's minutes all assigned.

but in between? to work? to play? to shop? to watch? to wait? to write?
and do what's due while listening to
the meld and blend in sheer delight:
'why yes, it's her ... she is the goddess'.
tram bells mark time passing by and life bears on not knowing why.

these are the voyages of our everyday enterprises;
these are our sands
through our days and our lives.

Grape grazing

2005-02-19T08:50:00.000+11:00

Paris set out last night for his annual visit to cousins in the Yarra Valley who have him over about this time each year for the Grape Grazing festival. Apparently, or so he tells us, the place gets 'innundated' (I told him that was an insensitive choice of words!) with 'chardonnay sipping pinkies' (a breed of human he despises) and he and his cousins take great delight in 'pissing on them from a great height'. This is a less charming side of Paris we prefer to let him indulge away from 'family'.

It did give Farouk and me an all too uncommon chance to chat into the small hours about the state of the nation. Farouk is very perturbed of late: he has read about the horrendous circumstances of Cornelia Lau, an Australian woman with a psychiatric illness detained without treatment first by Queensland police and later at the infamous Baxter Immigration Detention Centre because part of her persecutory hallucinations was that she was an 'illegal immigrant'. Though one must wonder whether that was an illusion! Some might suggest that Australia itself is presently caught in a great national hallucination, and the back of the cubicle door got it right: "It's alright to be paranoid if the world really IS against you!"

Farouk is an alien, you see, who takes great delight in sitting on the ground playing in the dirt - a 'new Australian' who came to these parts precisely because in his native land liberty is taken lightly (literally). He views these events with foreboding and the insight of a culture where nationalism has grown into the greatest of evils. He tells me he genuinely fears for Australia.

My sense is otherwise: not fear, not apprehension - what's the right word for the genuinely empathic response to tragedy? How did Alan Paton feel when he penned the title, Cry the Beloved Country?

Here, Bob, this will cheer you up ...

2005-02-13T11:15:00.000+11:00

14 things a man can do at K-Mart ... while his woman is taking her sweet FARKEN time:

1. Get 24 boxes of condoms and randomly put them in people's carts when they aren't looking.

2. Set all the alarm clocks in Home-wares to go off at 5-minute intervals.

3. Make a trail of tomato juice on the floor leading to the ladies rest-room.

4. Walk up to an employee and tell him/her in an official tone: "Code 3 in House wares!" and see what happens.

5. Go to the Service Desk and ask to put a bag of M&M's on lay-by.

6. Move a "CAUTION - WET FLOOR" sign to a carpeted area.

7. Set-up a tent in the Camping Department -- and tell other shoppers you're sleeping over; invite them in if they bring pillows from the Bedding Department.

8. When a clerk asks if they can help you, begin to cry and ask: "Why can't you people just leave me ALONE !?!?!?!?"

9. Look right into the security camera, use it as a mirror and pick your nose.

10.Dart around the store suspiciously, while loudly humming the theme from "Mission Impossible."

11.In the Auto Department, practice your "Madonna look" using different sized funnels.

12. Hide in a clothing rack . . . and when people browse through, say: "PICK ME!!! PICK ME!!!

13. When an announcement comes over the loudspeaker, assume the fetal position and scream "NOOOOOOOOOOO! It's those voices again!!!"

And last but not least:

14. Go into a fitting room, shut the door and wait a while, then yell loudly: "There's no toilet paper in here!"

It's been a long time

2005-02-13T08:04:00.000+11:00

... but it's amazing how long it takes to write a poem ...

tsu
any port in a storm? the place
to find fresh fish! I saw the foraging kids
cloven from the beach
the Causes of the Terrestrial Convulsions
Lisbon, All Saints, 1755
what is metaphysics? A dark ocean without shore and lighthouse
nami
certainly different from a pulse; understanding
why two waves introduced into a medium
with perfect timing might produce
a point of displacement
“the pumps of the entelechy, its push and pull,
are attraction and repulsion”

Run, climb, clamber, mount -
that's what the Geographic Survey says!
The contemplation of such dreadful events is edifying [lehrreich]
On the feast of Stephen

Final legs ...

2004-10-10T00:54:00.000+10:00

HUE:

2 British girls, Bryony and Jackie, who dared to try the local champagne for our day trip along the Perfume River - at the Hon Chen Temple, recommended by our guide, Paul Keating's interpreter's uncle (or so he said - and that was about all he said)

Pick the possums:

HANOI:

We arrived in Hanoi just after National Day, and decided to lash out and stay in 5-star comfort at the Sofitel up on the West Lake -

a little bit out of old Hanoi, but with sweeping views of the city and across the Red River.

Our compatriots, John and Terry, and allies, David and Anthony did the same. So, it was just a quick shared taxi trip into town for a meal at Seasons of Hanoi, visit to Uncle Ho's tomb and house or a showing of the water puppets.

VINH HA LONG:

What a way to end our trip ... one of the natural wonders of the world! Daphne just about goes loopy when she sees these pics. We just remind her how good the duck and swan tasted in Hanoi!

"The best laid plans of bunyips and possums ..."

2004-09-10T04:23:00.000+10:00

I know we did promise before we went to Vietnam to try to keep an updated journal of our trip. But we didn't ... bandwidth problems, getting the stuff out of the camera, all that sort of stuff had Paris wringing his paws in despair.

So instead, we thought we might do a little "retrospective" of some of the highlights:

SAIGON (TP HCMC):

Paris (3rd tree from left) watches Australian tourist, John pose outside our hotel (the Palace) in Duong Nguyen Hue:

CU CHI:

Vietnamese soldier discovers entrance to our secluded holiday burrow:

Bob obliges by taking photo of 2 Australian tourists, John and Terry, being shown the Cu Chi tunnels and abandonned US military hardware by Vietnamese guide:

NHA TRANG:

Panoramic view from our chaises longues at Ana Mandara beach resort, Nha Trang. (Paris's jocular assertion that the shadow in the foreground is my belly is risible!):

Nha Trang cyclo drivers ponder the weight difference between Bob and Paris before taking us for massage and pho:

HOI AN:

We bump into the Australian tourists and their colleagues from Palm Springs CA, Anthony and David at the Mango Room Cafe:

Young Vietnamese boy doing bunyip impersonation near Cantonese Meeting Hall, Hoi An:

Cardinal George Pell pays flying visit to Hoi An for UNESCO World Heritage celebrations:

HAI VAN PASS:

Bob ponders the beauty of the countryside north of Da Nang and considers the possibility of retirement south of the DMZ on our trip from Hoi An to Hue:

And that's about half our journey. The wonders of Hue, our meeting with Jackie and Briony, Hanoi and Vinh Ha Long must wait for another day.

Bags are packed, we're ready to go ...

2004-08-12T22:35:00.000+10:00

(with apologies to Peter, Paul and Mary - who probably should be doing the apologising themselves!)

Paris and I are off to Vietnam next Thursday: my first time there, although Paris has been before. I'm living on the smell of it. We fly into Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) and then wend our way north, via Dalat, Nha Trang, Hoi An, and Hue to Hanoi (with a side trip to Halong Bay).

The tickets and visas all arrived yesterday - so, Socialist Republic of Vietnam, here we come! The visa is so incredibly "neat" but I suppose that's one of the things about communism: it's incredibly neat. The juxtaposition in a fast growing, young and vibrant S.E. Asian country is bound to intrigue me!

Anyway, Paris just wanted me to write to let you know that we'll try to keep a running journal here on the blog so all our friends at the Lake can stay in touch. It'll be a bit dependant on access to Internet cafes and the digital camera, but we'll do our best. Only 7 more sleeps: I can't wait.

(What is this strange thing developing between me and colons? I never used to use them!)

Powerpoint presentation - feedback appreciated

2004-07-31T23:11:00.000+10:00

powerpoint.pps

Liars for Howard

2004-07-28T23:49:00.000+10:00

http://www.liarsforhoward.org

What a wonderful site! So in tune with the feelings of ordinary Australians like us here at the Lake! Thanks to Davey Dreamnation for bringing it to Daph's attention. (Daph passed it onto me because she thought it was about "lairs" LOL)

Here's the email I posted to them today:

Dean

I very much admire your efforts in bringing to the fore the outrageous discrimination suffered by ordinary Australians who just once in a while tell a little porkie at the hands of the black-armband brigade who get so upset because our country was founded on that classic, the "terra nullius" fib. However, I feel it necessary to take issue with your assertion of John Howard's right to lie to the Australian people.

The concept of a right, as you well know, has been used regularly by do-gooders like Dr Sev Ozdowski of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, the High Court, Marcus Enfield, Sir William Deane and even the US Supreme Court recently (to name just a few) to pour scorn on the legitimate efforts of the Howard Government and our allies to use deception to ensure that the horrible truth about refugee incarceration, the treatment of children, Guantanamo Bay, aboriginal Australians or the environment does not distract us from our prime task of economic advancement.

I prefer to say that John Howard has a duty and a mutual obligation to the Australian people to lie. This is an older, more trust-worthy concept, used long before that demented pinko, Doc Evatt and his so-called pro-truth cadres at the United Nations foisted the Universal Declaration on us in the late 40s. It has its origins in the fine historical attempts of august institutions such as the Catholic Church and the British Crown to keep order and civility in our society. More recently, it has been used so well to upgrade our social security system to make it the envy of every sixth form prefect in a grammar school!

I know that those chardonnay sipping whingers at the ABC have banned the use of the phrases, but don't let that deter you. Beer swilling commentators, who know a crafty press release when they see one, are becoming increasingly sceptical of the way the political correctness of the truth-seekers has blinded them to a good yarn when it's spun. Remember Alan Jones and London 1988, or Andrew Bolt and the High Court 2004!

AND grasp the nettle - insist that John Howard do his duty and lie to the Australian people about anything that will distract us from our relaxed and comfortable agenda.

Bob

Like: there's a war on and ...

2004-06-21T17:14:00.000+10:00

Not sure how we missed this one! Perhaps it was our pre-occupation with finding weapons of mass destruction, or some evidence to link the former Iraqi regime to terrorist activity? Perhaps we've become too accustomed to using words like "obsolete", or "more modern" or "unacceptable" only in overly global contexts.

Still, it will be just one more thing Colin Powell will be remembered for, along with My Lai ...

US bans time-honoured typeface

In a sign that no matter is too small to affect international diplomacy, the US State Department has issued an edict banning its longtime standard typeface from all official correspondence and replacing it with a "more modern" font.

In an internal memorandum distributed on Wednesday, the department declared "Courier New 12" - the font and size decreed for US diplomatic documents for years - to be obsolete and unacceptable after February 1.

"In response to many requests and with a view to making our written work easier to read, we are moving to a new standard font: 'Times New Roman 14'," said the memorandum.

The new font "takes up almost exactly the same area on the page as Courier New 12, while offering a crisper, cleaner, more modern look," it said, adding that after February 1 "only Times New Roman 14 will be accepted."

"This applies to diplomatic notes," the memorandum said tersely.

There are only three exceptions to the draconian new typographical rules: telegrams, treaty materials prepared by the State Department's legal affairs office and documents drawn up for the president's signature, it said.

The memorandum offered no explanation for the exceptions, leaving foreign service officers to speculate as to whether the White House, US treaty partners and telegram readers are not yet able to handle the change.

Oh my ...

2004-06-13T07:27:00.000+10:00

... it HAS been forever since we last posted. The vagaries of life at the Lake, I suppose, or just a type of creeping angst: the world should be different!

I have been busy though, having now truly discovered the world of blogdom (thanks to Daph). What a strange domain that is! Enough to give one hope that Rupert Murdoch might have accidently fallen upon the truth when he told Alan Jones (cf. April 08, 2004 below) that, "There is so much media now with the Internet and people ... and so easy and so cheap to start a newspaper or start a magazine, there's just millions of voices, and people want to be heard. And we don't really have to worry ... you know, the old ideas of it being too concentrated ... I think that's fading away."

(Yes, this is one and the same Rupert Murdoch who obligingly dropped the BBC from his cable broadcasts to China at the behest of the communist government: "The fact is, autocratic governments can work," Murdoch said, revealing his true sentiments toward the freedom he pretends to champion.)

True, blogdom is an uneven field: everything from excerpts from the Indian Journal of Chest Diseases and Allied Sciences (thanks, laur3nce):

Jaswant Rai Speciality Hospital, Meerut, India.

A 27-year-old lady presented with persistent cough, sputum and fever for the preceding six months. Inspite of trials with antibiotics and anti-tuberculosis treatment for the preceeding four months, her symptoms did not improve. A subsequent chest radiograph showed non-homogeneous collapse-consolidation of right upper lobe. Videobronchoscopy revealed an inverted bag like structure in right upper lobe bronchus and rigid bronchoscopic removal with biopsy forceps confirmed the presence of a condom. Detailed retrospective history also confirmed accidental inhalation of the condom during fellatio.

through to "little gems" like Unknown News and RichardNeville.

So, we had a chat, and decided that there'd be no more "trivial pursuit" at the Lake, no more musings about our own little foibles, no more funnies sent to us by net buddies (unless, of course, any of the above served a worthier, more noble purpose).

No! The Lake has been "rebirthed". Until peace breaks out, poverty is no more, Australia has a half decent government, police corruption ends and Richmond wins a premiership, you'll find a new tone and a new energy among us - well, most of us -- Paris isn't so sure!

Noses and razors

2004-05-08T09:52:00.000+10:00

Daphne was disgusted, and Paris took it as a post factum justification of merely one of his idiosyncratic and anti-social habits. But it was the science that I found so appealing.

Farouk had been browsing the Austrian newspapers. He does that! I think it's his wistful way of saying he wants to be part of the "new Europe". He came across this juicy [sic] little piece in ANANOVA:

'Picking your nose and eating it is one of the best ways to stay healthy, according to a top Austrian doctor.

Innsbruck-based lung specialist Prof Dr Friedrich Bischinger said people who pick their noses with their fingers were healthy, happier and probably better in tune with their bodies.

He says society should adopt a new approach to nose-picking and encourage children to take it up.

Dr Bischinger said: "With the finger you can get to places you just can't reach with a handkerchief, keeping your nose far cleaner.

"And eating the dry remains of what you pull out is a great way of strengthening the body's immune system."'

I had always wondered why I seemed so impervious to the infuenza epidemics that rountinely sweep around the Lake. Unlike Paris, I am not wont to flaunt social norms; but I must confess to an occasional boogie bite in the privacy of my own lair. I had never thought it a prophylactic! How would anyone ever come up with an idea like that? And that's when it hit me - the beauty of the scientific method and the parsimony of Ockham's Razor. Today everything seems different.

Some mothers ...

2004-04-19T06:37:00.000+10:00

I found this the other day at Memery:

Grab the nearest book.
Open the book to page 23.
Find the fifth sentence.
Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions.

All right then:
'Like many an Australian and New Zealander, he heard antipodean speech as English English gone wrong.'
- K S Inglis of Conrad Charlton in This is the ABC.

Yeah! So now what?

IKEA

2004-04-12T08:46:00.000+10:00

Farouk and Paris came over yesterday with red dyed eggs and the new IKEA Catalogue. It was hilarious: we tried to work out what products you would have to buy to be able to email Daphne and say, in good conscience, 'You may be a slut on heat with a bit of flabb and I might just be a jerker boning up, but I go fartfull and groggy every time I see your micky. Would you risk a roger?"

Year 8 stuff, we know, but the solution (for those crypticly inclined) is a visitor chair, a trivet, a wall lamp, a computer table, cannisters, a work bench, a tray, a mirror, and a chair.

God, I can't believe I posted that!

To tell you the truth ...

2004-04-11T08:14:00.000+10:00

Bob is such a sweetie. Saying that I've been productively engaged and all! But, it would not be fair, dear readers, to leave you with the impression that that is the reason I haven't been seen here for a while.

If my experiences at Chat Groups Anonymous have taught me anything, it is that we must be honest about our addictions, and I will be. I haven't had the time to post because I've been chatting so much.

Oh, I could be terribly twee and minimise my own responsibility by blaming you good folk. I could point to the disappointingly poor number of comments we receive, and go all philosophical about how interactivity is the nature of the Net. But, no! I am a chat group addict and I must accept the consequences of so being. I'm on duckdar and yahoo! so often that I don't even get time to speak to my old friends.

Not that my dependency is without it's advantages, mind you. I've met new friends (who are all unattached and aged 28 and who 'love me for just who I am' to a soul). I've learned about places I've never been, even on the long hauls north. And my vocabulary has changed for ever. Look for example at this list a friend sent me of things you can say in chat groups:

Extremely Amused. - Only to be used for the Gold...
ROFL - Rolling On the Floor Laughing
LMAO - Laughing My Arse Off.
JIJPM - Jesus I Just Pissed Myself
GITIJRS - God I Think I Just Ruptured Something.
IHLSMSISA - I Haven't Laughed So Much Since I Saw Airplane!
EIEYHO - Eddie Izzard, Eat Your Heart Out. (One of my personal favorites.)

Very Amused - Used for stuff like my show ... (We went last Tuesday and it was great! Thanks, Mike.)
LOL - Laugh Out Loud
SMCOCK - Sprayed My Coffee Over the Computer Keyboard (You wish, Paris! It isn't funny to be snide! GOYD)
LVHBSOMC - Laughing Very Hard, But Still On My Chair
LVHBMAII - Laughing Very Hard, But My Arse Is Intact

Slightly Amused - Kind of like an encouragement award...
VD - Very Droll
STMATO - Smiling To Myself At That One
TRWQWT - That Really Was Quite Witty, Thankyou.
YSWCFF - You Should Write Comedy For Frazier
NHIA - Nodding Head In Appreciation
WHTM - Went "Hmph!" to Myself.

Confused more than Amused - I get a lot of these...
ZOOM! - That one went way over my head.
IDGI - I Don't Get It
HUH? - Huh?

Not very Amused at all - For posts like this ... (to be used sparingly)
GOYD - Good On Ya, Dickhead.
YASFYMMLALAL - You Are So Funny You Make me Laugh And Laugh And Laugh.
YSWCFHI - You Should Write Comedy For Home Improvement.
OTWAJ - Oh, That Was A Joke!

Have a happy Easter everyone!

It's been a while ...

2004-04-08T08:22:00.000+10:00

Yes, well, we all know it, and are all blaming one another and excusing one another! It's just that when things really settled back to normal after the summer break, no-one really seemed to make our blog their number one priority. We could all say we were busy: Paris has taken up tennis coaching to add to his already busy schedule and has been spending hours down at the school after the kids go home hitting a ball against a wall and grunting. Daph has gone into one of her 'meditative' phases, focusing on reading, cooking, crafts and spirituality. Farouk had been 'lying low' since the nice men from DIMIA had their information night in Hamilton: every now and then he shows his face for just long enough to pose silly questions like 'How can a ferret be an economic refugee?' or 'How come Australians just don't get it about weasels?' - then we don't see him for a week or more.

I have, of course, been in regular correspondence with some of you throughout the time of this page's hibernations. And there have been some absolute gems flying through the ether:

A northern cousin sent the following, which he claims is an actual advertisement from an Irish Newspaper:
1985 Blue Volkswagen Golf
Only 15 km
Only first gear and reverse used
Never driven hard
Original tires
Original brakes
Original fuel and oil
Only 1 driver Owner
Wishing to sell due to employment lay-off
Please see Attached Photo.

Paris's friend, Stewie was the source of this 340Kb parody of Telstra's outsourcing of call centre services.

But, 'the winner is Sydney' for this candid snap of local talkback radio host, Alan Jones.

Enough from the lake for now. We'll try to be better 'correspondents' in the coming months! Love from us all.

Daphne

2004-03-05T10:13:00.000+11:00

You thought I was joking, didn't you? Here's an email she sent this morning:

----- Original Message -----
From: Daphne Duck
To:
Sent: Friday, March 5 2004 10:08 AM
Subject: Hoax Warning

Please send this to everyone on your e-mail list.

If a man comes to your front door and says he is conducting a survey and asks you to show him your bum, do not show him your bum. This is a scam; he only wants to see your bum.

I wish I'd gotten this yesterday. I feel so stupid and cheap.

Daph

Just one more sign that life at the Lake has been fairly unremarkable of late. Everyone just 'being themselves', busy with work, putting things away on these hot and humid summer days for the lean days we all know are ahead.

I went to Bendigo for a week and visited a cousin at Lake Weeroona. She showed me around the new sporting facilities, and told me about the plans to extend the historic tramway all the way down to the lake and beyond. Bendigo had a real 'go ahead' feel to it! Young people everywhere, trendy cafes and restaurants among the $2 shops; the historic precinct all very historic (I didn't dare ask how many museums a provincial city actually needs).

We don't do things that way at Lake Bolac: here we like things to have a certain patina of use and familiarity. Who's to say who's right?

Duh!

2004-02-19T11:01:00.000+11:00

Sometimes with Bob I just don't know whether to laugh or to cry. If you saw his diatribe about poor old Daph below you'll know what I mean: he's either too deadly earnest or sometimes incredibly dorkish, at once insightful and at another time naive. He is very serious about other people taking themselves too seriously.

So I should have known: he hardly ever sends me e-mail and when he does it's normally to correct some pecadillo or explain a subtlety I've missed. I thought he'd had a change of heart, taken pity on me in my present "isolation" and sent me some solace for these humid, late summer nights. Have a look!

The big "find"

2004-02-15T23:53:00.000+11:00

Daphne came running over this morning, all ebullient and giggly about some "secret" she had discovered. From her manner, I thought she was the as-yet unidentified winner of Thursday's Powerball lottery! But, she was keeping "mum" about exactly what it was. She told Paris that, if she told him, she'd have to kill him, and when Farouk ambled by and asked how she was, she snapped, 'Why do you want to know?'

When they all left, Daphne drew me aside conspiratorially: 'You know the stolen Windows code?' she asked. She showed me the news article when I said I didn't.
'I think I've found it!'
'Don't be silly. Show me! And besides, what the heck would you do with it if you had?' I wondered.
'OK, look here,' she said surreptitiously opening her laptop like a kid taking the asparagus out of his salad sandwich.

On a deep black screen, wriiten in tiny system font was her dirty little webpage:

/* Source Code Windows 2000 */
#include "win31.h"
#include "win95.h"
#include "win98.h"
#include "workst~1.h"
#include "evenmore.h"
#include "oldstuff.h"
#include "billrulz.h"
#include "monopoly.h"
#include "backdoor.h"
#define INSTALL = HARD

char make_prog_look_big(16000000);
void main()
{
while(!CRASHED)
{
display_copyright_message();
display_bill_rules_message();
do_nothing_loop();

if (first_time_installation)
{
make_100_megabyte_swapfile();
do_nothing_loop();
totally_screw_up_HPFS_file_system();
search_and_destroy_the_rest_of-OS2();
make_futile_attempt_to_damage_Linux();
disable_Netscape();
disable_RealPlayer();
disable_Lotus_Products();
hang_system();
} //if
write_something(anything);
display_copyright_message();
do_nothing_loop();
do_some_stuff();

if (still_not_crashed)
{
display_copyright_message();
do_nothing_loop();
basically_run_windows_31();
do_nothing_loop();
} // if
} //while

if (detect_cache())
disable_cache();

if (fast_cpu())
{
set_wait_states(lots);
set_mouse(speed,very_slow);
set_mouse(action,jumpy);
set_mouse(reaction,sometimes);
} //if

/* printf("Welcome to Windows 3.1"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 3.11"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 95"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows NT 3.0"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows 98"); */
/* printf("Welcome to Windows NT 4.0"); */
printf("Welcome to Windows 2000");

if (system_ok())
crash(to_dos_prompt)
else
system_memory = open("a:\swp0001.swp",O_CREATE);

while(something)
{
sleep(5);
get_user_input();
sleep(5);
act_on_user_input();
sleep(5);
} // while
create_general_protection_fault();

} // main

I simply don't know how to tell Daphne about things like this: she's sweet and open-minded and tolerant and accepting; she's never disingenuous, cynical or sarcastic or blunt. She takes the world as she finds it, and treats people as she herself likes to be treated. She always says "hello" to people in the street as she hops by, and gets genuinely hurt when they stare and don't answer her back. AND ALL THIS TO A FAULT!

It's almost as bad as the time her Mini Minor broke down coming back from Casterton. She was on her mobile all day to Paris and me telling us we had to get a 701 plug from Hamilton and bring it out to her, because she was so 'absolutely sure that it was the cause of the problem because it was loose' that she didn't bother checking her petrol.

No mechanic we consulted had ever heard of a 701 plug. Fortunate, then, that a passing motorist had one of those new camera phones, and sent us a picture when he finally got coverage. Paris discretely "tightened" her plug for her while I poured the ten litres of petrol into her tank!

"Arsicons"?

2004-02-11T18:59:00.000+11:00

Yeah, well thanks for telling the whole world about my dirty little obsession, Bob. Makes up for my "list" comment, I suppose. Truce?

Stewie sent me this and I felt I had to share it:

We all know those cute little computer symbols called "emoticons," where:

:) means a smile and

:( is a frown.

Sometimes these are represented by

:-) and

:-( respectively.

Well, how about some "arsicons"? Here goes:

(_!_) a regular arse

(__!__) a fat arse

(!) a tight arse

(_*_) a sore arse

{_!_} a swishy arse

(_o_) an arse that's been around

(_x_) kiss my arse

(_X_) leave my arse alone

(_zzz_) a tired arse

(_E=mc2_) a smart arse

(_$_) money coming out of his arse

(_?_) dumb arse

Agendorum ...

2004-02-11T18:27:00.000+11:00

Yeah, I know it's been a week or more since I last wrote. We've just been busy: what, with Daphne's legal dilemma, Farouk's new "friend" and Paris's pranks, it's a wonder I get time to write at all.

Last night was the first time we'd all been together for ages. Daphne had us over for a meal and then showed us these "Soundboards" she'd discovered on the net. Basically, they're collections of sound grabs from famous people, assembled for one click access on a web page. There's a page for Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Jackson, Judge Judy et al. There are also some great examples of prank phone conversations that have been recorded by people using the audio grabs to pretend the celebrity in question was calling someone.

Did you sense a natural segue for Paris? Wrong! Although, I've never seen that side of Daphne before! One by one she called the people on her contact list as Dr Phil or Michael Jackson or Jack Black and either offended, confused or 'pranked' them all. I just hope none of the ones who hung-up read this before they call the Federal Police!

So what happened to Paris? Well, he found the link from the "Soundboards" site to a site called "Flabber" and spent hours sitting in the other corner on his laptop, cursing the vagaries of the Dutch language until becoming almost mesmerised. He seemed to be saying something like, 'Why can't they make these bloody laptop screens bigger!'

Legal advice needed!

2004-02-04T20:05:00.000+11:00

O'Keeffe Pithouse have always been our family lawyers. Mum liked them because the spelling of their practice name reminded her of how she and dad had met at Swan Bay, just north of Queenscliffe. But, I was worried that digital rights management may not be the strongest suite of an established Western Districts solicitor! So, I went looking for dad's old friend, Mr Myers in the public bar at the Royal Mail in Dunkeld (yes, they still have one!) to see if he could help. None of the trendy young cockies who drink there these days seemed to know him!

It's about the pumpkin scones! You know, the Lady Flo Bjelke-Petersen ones! I've been using the same recipe for them for years. I got it from the tea towel with the picture of Lady Flo that dad brought back from Kingaroy:

Ingredients

1 Tblsp butter/margarine
½ cup sugar
1 cup cooked mashed pumpkin (cold)
2-2¼ cups self-raising flour
1 egg
¼ teasp salt
extra flour for rolling

Directions

Beat butter, sugar and salt to a cream.
Add egg, then pumpkin and beat well.
Sift flour and stir by hand into mixture.
Turn onto a floured board then use a floured round cutter to cut the scones out. (Use a cutter that is about 5cm in diameter).
Place on a heated, floured baking tray, and brush the tops with a little milk.
Bake in a hot oven, top shelf: 230° C / 450° F, for 15-20 minutes. The scones should be well-risen and have golden tops.
Serve spilt horizontally with butter.

"Nothing wrong with that," you say! "Fine recipe!" I KNOW! BLOODY FINE! That's why I posted it on Snackster! ... BIG MISTAKE! Apparently it's one of the most traded recipes on the server.

Next thing I know I get a letter from the RIAA (Recipe Industry Association of America) president, Kerry Sharman, telling me that although "we are taking each individual on a case-by-case basis" it was likely that I would be "among the first 261 people sued for copying thousands of recipes via popular Internet file-sharing software". Mr/Ms Sharman's letter says that thousands more suits could be on the way. "Nobody likes playing the heavy and having to resort to litigation," the letter continued, "but when your product is being regularly stolen, there comes a time when you have to take appropriate action." The letter also said that the "RIAA might be prepared to offer amnesty to file-swappers who come forward and agree to stop illegally downloading recipes over the Internet".

Can anybody tell me what I should do? Ducks don't know a lot about suits!

The day the music died

2004-02-03T07:41:00.000+11:00

Daphne is inconsolable. I tried showing her that amazing list (yeah, I know, another list ... but I thought it would cheer her up) of the 213 things that 'Specialist Schwarz' wasn't allowed to do while on active duty in the Balkans. I especially like No. 31: "Not allowed to let sock puppets take responsibility for any of my actions". I can never read the thing without getting an uncontrollable burst of the giggles at one stage or another.

But no, doing that was entirely counter-productive: she blurted out, '45 years ago today! Richie was the youngest and he was only 17. Big Bopper was 29 and Buddy 22. If they'd gone to the Balkans instead of Mason City, they'd be in their 60s and 70s today. Why was 'Specialist Schwarz' so lucky?'

Some types of logic just don't warrant scrutiny! Some types of scrutiny are positively dangerous!

It's happened ...

2004-01-31T08:08:00.000+11:00

... Bob's lost it.

"3 lists and you're out!"

We already knew about the peotillomania, now we can add glazomania (an inordinate fascination with listmaking) to, dare I say it, the list!

On this day ...

2004-01-31T07:06:00.000+11:00

In another place, at another time, and for a specific purpose, I used to compile a list of what had happened 'on this day'. I knew at the time just how ideosyncratic the choice of what to include or not was. Digging through my backup files, I found my list for today and mused about my preoccupations over the years:

January 31st

1606 Winter, Rockwood, Keys, and Guy Fawkes, convicted for their part in the Gunpowder Plot against the English Parliament and King James I, were executed.
1761 Lachlan Macquarie, Ulva, the Scottish Hebrides, Governor of New South Wales, born.
1797 Franz Peter Schubert, Vienna, Austria, composer (Unfinished Symphony) born.
1876 The US Government declares that it will consider all native Americans who do not move to reservations hostile.
1882 Anna Pavlova, St Petersburg Russia, ballerina, choreographer, born.
1882 Peter Smith Dawson, singer, born.
1901 Chekhov's Three Sisters opens at the Moscow Art Theater.
1915 Thomas Merton, Pyrenees-Orientales, France, radical pacifist US priest and Trappist monk, author (The Seven Storey Mountain) born.
1921 Carol Channing, actress (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) born.
1921 Mario Lanza, singer (d.1959) born.
1923 Norman Mailer, author (The Executioner's Song, The Naked and the Dead, An American Dream) born.
1928 Sticky tape first marketed by 3-M Company (Scotch, Durex). (This one tickled Paris's fancy for some reason)
1929 The USSR exiled Leon Trotsky; he found asylum in Mexico.
1935 Kenzaburo Oe, Ehime, Japan, author (The Silent Cry, Personal Matter) born.
1938 Pix magazine was launched in Sydney.
1943 Field Marshal Paulus defied Hitler to surrender the German 6th Army to the Russians at Stalingrad.
1946 Yugoslavia adopts new constitution, becomes a federal republic.
1951 Phil Collins, England, singer, drummer (Genesis: Against All Odds) born. (Daphne's favourite)
1955 RCA demonstrated the first musical synthesizer.
1956 Johnny Rotten [John Lydon] rocker (Sex Pistols: God Save the Queen) born.
1958 James van Allen discovers radiation belt around Earth.
1958 Explorer I, the first US Earth satellite, was launched from Cape Canaveral
1968 Nauru gains independence from Australia.
1968 The Viet Cong's Tet offensive begins.
1983 The wearing of seat belts in cars became compulsory in Britain.
1985 South African President PW Botha offers to free Mandela if he denounces violence.
1990 First McDonalds in Russia opens in Moscow. (Farouk chose this ... duh!)
1994 The Gran Teatro del Liceo in Barcelona burns down.
1994 The Dow Jones hits a record 3,978.36.

I gave a copy to Daphne, Paris and Farouk, and asked them what event was most important in their eyes. You can see which ones they chose. You should have heard the argument: I just kept saying that they were all important to me; that's why they were on my list.

Daphne quickly changed her mind and said they were all important to her too! But, why, then, had I left off Blondie's song, The Tide Is High hitting #1 in 1981? Farouk would only concede that the beginning of the Tet offensive in 1968 might approach the significance of McDonalds opening in Moscow as a "geopolitical event of significance", but seemed a little hostile to the whole idea largely because of the politics of its perpetrators! Paris couldn't see beyond the "most practical invention of the century".

I remembered, then, why I had stopped compiling the lists:

there's plenty of them around anyway (like the SCOPE Systems list)
nobody can agree what should go in and what shouldn't (to wit - OUR little discussion), and
there is furious disagreement about when things happened:
- when it started or when it concluded?
- when it happened or when it became known?
- in which timezone?
- by which calendar?

Have a look at Calendar Zone if the theory interests you. I've "got a little list" for most days of the year. Let me know if you want a copy.

I knew I had 'em somewhere ...

2004-01-28T07:26:00.000+11:00

Thanks, Stewie, for sending these to me a while back. After Bob's carry-on yesterday, there ought to be a law something like the Riot Act, where you can stand on a bough, read the list out, and everone's gotta keep quiet until it's finished ...

The Rules of Life for Australian Heterosexual Men

Any man who brings a camera to a buck's night may be legally killed and eaten by his mates.
Under no circumstances may two men share an umbrella.
It is ok for a man to cry under the following circumstances:
1. When a heroic dog dies to save its master.
2. The moment Angelina Jolie starts unbuttoning her blouse.
3. After wrecking your boss' car.
4. One hour, 12 minutes, 37 seconds into "The Crying Game".
5. When she is using her teeth.
Unless he murdered someone in your family, you must bail a friend out of jail within 12 hours.
If you've known a bloke for more than 24 hours, his sister is off limits forever, unless you actually marry her.
Moaning about the brand of free beer in a mate's fridge is forbidden. Complain at will if the temperature is unsuitable.
No man shall ever be required to buy a birthday present for another man. In fact, even remembering your mate's birthday is strictly optional.
On a road trip, the strongest bladder determines pit stops, not the weakest.
When stumbling upon other blokes watching a sporting event, you may ask the score of the game in progress, but you may never ask who's playing.
You may flatulate in front of a woman only after you have brought her to climax. If you trap her head under the covers for the purpose of flatulent entertainment, she's officially your girlfriend.
It is permissible to quaff a fruity alcopop drink only when you're sunning on a tropical beach ... and it's delivered by a topless supermodel and it's free.
Only in situations of moral and/or physical peril are you allowed to kick another bloke in the nuts.
Unless you're in prison, never fight naked.
Friends don't let friends wear Speedos. Ever. Issue closed.
If a man's fly is down, that's his problem, you didn't see anything.
Women who claim they "love to watch sports" must be treated as spies until they demonstrate knowledge of the game and the ability to drink as much as the other sports watchers.
You must offer heartfelt and public condolences over the death of a girlfriend's cat, even if it was you who secretly set it on fire and threw it into a ceiling fan.
A man in the company of a hot, suggestively dressed woman must remain sober enough to fight.
Never hesitate to reach for the last beer or the last slice of pizza, but not both - that's just mean.
If you compliment a bloke on his six-pack, you'd better be talking about his choice of beer.
Never join your girlfriend or wife in dissing a mate of yours, except if she's withholding sex pending your response.
Phrases that may not be uttered to another man while lifting weights:
1. Yeah, baby, push it!
2. C'mon, give me one more! Harder!
3. Another set and we can hit the showers!
Never talk to a man in a toilet unless you are on equal footing: Both urinating, both waiting in line, etc. For all other situations, an almost imperceptible nod is all the conversation you need.
Never allow a telephone conversation with a woman to go on longer than you are able to have sex with her. Keep a stopwatch by the phone. Hang up if necessary.
You cannot grass on a colleague who shows up at work with a massive hangover. You may however, hide the aspirin, smear his chair with cheese, turn the brightness dial all the way down so he thinks his monitor is broken, and have him paged over the loud speaker every seven minutes.
The morning after you and a girl who was formerly "just a friend" have carnal drunken possum sex, the fact that you're feeling weird and guilty is no reason not to nail her again before the discussion about what a big mistake it was.
It is acceptable for you to drive her car. It is not acceptable for her to drive yours.
Thou shalt not buy a car with an engine capacity of less than 3.8 litres.
Thou shalt not buy a car in the colours of brown, pink, limegreen, orange or sky blue.
The girl who replies to the question "What do you want for Christmas?" with "If you loved me, you'd know what I want!" gets a Playstation 2.

Don't worry, Bob; one day the old penny will just drop ...

2004-01-26T08:54:00.000+11:00

Daphne and I decided that, because it was Chinese New Year during the week, we would put a sign saying "Kun Hei Fat Choi" ("Congratulations and Prosperity" or something like that to you all) on the manna gum near the oval on Frontage Road. They're not big on these exogenous celebrations down here at the Lake, so we felt it was better to understate things a bit!

Paris arrived while we were putting it up in his "Fanatics" gear with his face painted like an Australian flag and accused us of being "un-Australian". We were too kind to make any references to the ethnic ambiguities of a bush tailed possum with a Union Jack framing one eye, and told him that we believed it was possible to celebrate diversity even on Australia Day.

We told him how we had been to the Australian Open and had applauded the fine tennis played by people from all around the globe; how we had got into a chat with a seagull from Siberia who was supporting Marat Safin, and an Italian weasel (a distant relative of Farouk's we discovered) who had the hots for Mara Santangelo.

OK, I'll admit that Daphne went a bit off the deep end talking about "Invasion Day" and that, but that was no excuse for his cruel reference to the promiscuous nature of her kind's migratory behaviour. I still think he should apologise.

I was sure we would have a canny ally in Farouk who came over to see what the fuss was all about. I explained the Mandarin sign and our intent. However, to my surprise he simply gave a resigned sigh and wandered off muttering something about me not knowing the difference between mandarines and cans of peas. Do you ever have one of those days when you feel like you just can't win?

Bumper sticker competition

2004-01-17T06:48:00.000+11:00

According variously to bumper stickers on cars heading to Mortlake on Service Road -
Accountants do it with double entry.
Alcoholics do it in groups.
Anglicans do it decently and in order.
Archaeologists do it in the dirt.
[Didn't know we had many of them in the district!]
Assassins do it from behind.
Astronomers do it while gazing at Uranus.
Boy scouts do it in troops
[I don't think they appeciated the double entendre!]
Carpenters do it with wood.
Christian Scientists think about it.
Cosmologists do it in the first three minutes.
Dancers do it on the floor.
Dentists do it orally.
Economists do it with interest.
Electricians do it without shorts.
Engineers do it with less resistance.
Environmentalists do it until it is green.
Firemen do it with a big hose.
Genealogists do it in the library.
Geologists do it to get their rocks off.
Hackers do it with fewer instructions.
Historians did it.
Kayakers roll over and do it again.
Lawyers do it in their briefs.
Lutherans do it with grace.
Mediators do it until everyone is satisfied ... but in separate rooms.
Pentecostals do it loud & with tongues.
Pharmacists do it over the counter.
Physicists do it at the speed of light.
Pipers do it with Amazing Grace.
Polymer chemists do it in chains.
Psychologists think they do it.
Quakers wait for it to happen.
Statisticians probably do it.
Telecommuters do it at a distance.
Unitarians talk about it.
Vegetarians do it with relish.
Witches do it in circles.

I came up with these myself -
Ducks do it with any sized quack.
Possums do it with nuts.
Ferrets do it in holes.

And Daphne tells me that those with a scholarly interest in the topic can find a fairly comprehensive list of "do it" aphorisms on Roughoat.

But as for Bunyips? Not a word! Make a comment to leave your suggestion. Neatest correct entry wins. (Duh!)

Silence

2004-01-16T07:26:00.000+11:00

It's been unnervingly quiet at the Lake. No more Christmas cards, no phone calls promising to catch up 'between Christmas and New Year' or 'before we get back to work', no more frenzied SMSing until our poor single old mobile phone tower (the one they don't even bother trying to disguise down here) just can't take any more like on New Year's eve. Farouk says that the 'yenks' (as he is wont to call them) have got it wrong with their DO NOT CALL REGISTRY: what we need in Lake Bolac, he reckons, is a DO-CALL list.

He'd been on the web seeing if such things existed, but the poor old blighter could only find some site that let him become a pen pal for prisoners. He says he's resolved to write to Cathy from Wisconsin because she doesn't drink or swear, and she likes boating.

I thought I'd try to help him out and typed 'ferret' into a few personals sites: that was a mistake of gargantuan proportions. Ferret_tits? I don't think so! Ferret78 would never do: he's an aquarian, and Farouk goes by that sort of astrology stuff. Ferretman3 lives on the wrong side of Port Phillip for any sort of significant bonding to occur. Farouk said he would have taken a fancy even to Ferretlady3 had she also not been so far away, and confessed that she spent 8 hours a day at her computer. I was too kind to point out that she was also a graphic designer!

Boundaries

2004-01-10T08:12:00.000+11:00

See, that's the problem with Paris: everything for him is a joke. Well, maybe "joke" is too strong: everything for him has a bright side, another aspect, an unusual take.

Like this ->
little joke he sent me the other day.

Apparently, because he's 2 years old and I'm immortal, it's very funny or something! Like I should wet myself laughing or something because he's so bushy tailed. I don't think so, Paris! And I say this in a considered way:

Wetting myself would simply prove your point, and I've only ever been wrong once in my life. That was when I said I was wrong and I was right all along!
You don't understand the difference between ageless and immortal. Bunyips, for your information, Paris, are "ageless" - those functional problems you so easily laugh at in others will afflict YOU before they ever beset me!
You have absolutely no idea at all of how upsetting that is for me, do you? Like I'm really going to enjoy seeing things like that happen to the people around me I love one by one. Like I don't remember it ever having happened in the past.

Sometimes you ought to think first, possum. Boundaries, Paris, boundaries!

Sex

2004-01-09T08:19:00.000+11:00

I was doing Dr Bob's Quiz on the Australian Skeptics website yesterday, and I came across this doozie:

Why is the word for the number between 5 and 7 so like the word that denotes gender and its related carnal activities. In Swedish it is actually the same word, which may explain how I came to marry a Swede. Anyway, my question is, why in many languages does the word for '6' so strongly resemble the word for 'sex'?

This is a very difficult problem: the 'sex' in sex (so to speak) comes to us from the Latin sexus, ûs, m., which is cognate with the Latin secus, indecl., n., and means 'a sex (male or female) of humans, animals or plants' or in modern English usage, 'gender'. The root in the cognate form, sec- gives us a clue to its origins in the verb, seco, ui, sectum, v.a., meaning 'to cut, cut off, cut up'. This verb is possibly related to the Greek, schizô, and is the root of English words such as section.

The 'sex' in 6 is another matter altogether: it comes from the Sanskrit root, (1 = eka, 2 = dvi, 3 = tri, 4 = chatur, 5 = pajncha, 6 = shhashh) and goes into the European languages in many diverse forms (through the Persian: shesh, to the Greek: hexi and the Latin: sex). And so, in modern English & French, we get: six, in Icelandic, Swedish & Danish: sex, Italian: sei, Lithuanian: szeszi, Russian: sheste, Irish Gaelic: se and Welsh: chwech.

Now I think I'll go and bake some scones!

Tails

2004-01-08T08:32:00.000+11:00

It's wonderful seeing all the humans running around here during the holidays. They're amazing creatures: the way they run and jump, throw and catch, speak and think and laugh. I love it when they laugh: it's such a funny thing to do!

And, sometimes, I can just watch one of them "think" for hours, especially the little kids when they're trying to work something out as they play.

I was telling Daphne and Paris and Farouk the same thing yesterday, and Farouk had this amazing insight. 'But how much better they would be if they had tails!' he said. And he's right, of course. We all take them for granted. Once we get to thinking about them, we realise how much of our communication, stability, agility and *blush* sexuality is dependant on our tails.

Apparently, some humans are born with tails, but there has been a well-orchestrated medico-religious conspiracy over the years to suppress the fact, and dock the offending appendage. Something about satanic and bestial (hey, wait a minute, that's us!) overtones!

I, for one, am pleased to see that those thoughtful humans at the Halfbakery do take the issue seriously. They do it in their usual satirical way, but they do take it seriously. I loved Wolfie's suggestion that it would catch on if Madonna got one.

Those magnificent men ...

2004-01-05T09:25:00.000+11:00

I was down at the landing strip yesterday (37° 41’S 142° 52’E for the aficionados amongst us) watching a Piper Warrior arrive and leave yesterday. It brought back delightful memories of the Biggles books and my own days learning to fly. I know it's a bit adventurous of me, but I think I will challenge Daphne, Paris and Farouk to a flying competition. Not the real thing, of course! Daphne wouldn't go near a light aircraft, and no-one should let Paris near one!

No. I thought we could have a paper aeroplane competition. I've done a bit of research and discovered that the construction of such planes is a highly refined craft. Believe it or not, the Costa Ricans seem to have got it down pat. "My" design has to win (but I'm not telling the others what I've got up my sleeve). I reckon they'll all be in it.

A picture of everything?

2004-01-04T09:46:00.000+11:00

Daphne is an absolute gem: the girl's web browsing skills are never ending! Just when I thought she had scooped the pool yesterday on only the third day of the New Year with her amazing rainbow type engine find, she emailed me this morning with the link for the "Picture of Everything".

It's an amazing work. Someone who must have help with their domestic chores has set about a Brugelian style attempt to condense the history of Western thought and culture into a single web page. Does it work? You be the judge, dear reader. I, for one, could not find my kin there, let alone myself.

Hello

2004-01-03T10:36:00.000+11:00

How do you like this amazing "Rainbow Text"? It's made with a little program called "JTHZ Rainbow".

You can download it for nothing at http://www.geocities.com/wcswebbuilders/freeware/freeware.html. I showed it to Bob and Farouk and they said it was very nice too. But I heard them giggling about it later with Paris. (N.B.: yuk colours!)

I think he's a dickhead, and he brings out the worst in the other boys.

A new deck for the halls

2004-01-02T09:42:00.000+11:00

Global politics do not make it onto the agenda very much down here. I mean, there isn't exactly a "mass" to target around the lake, and most of us are far too busy with the politics of 2 or 3 people to worry. "Destruction" tends to be local and personal as well!

However, I was feeling too elated after the Christmas and New Year festivities, so to get things back into perspective I started to read some of Michael Moore's musings.

That was just far too disturbing, but I found a link there to a wonderful piece of irony, a revised "Deck of Cards". I could chuckle and fume all at once ... what a splendid sensation - there really ought to be a word for it!

I wonder if the boys are up for a game of solo tonight

Finding Nemo

2004-01-01T15:10:00.000+11:00

I loved the movie Finding Nemo. So when a friend emailed me the web address for a quiz that lets you see what character you are like, I couldn't wait to do it. Not that I wanted to seem over-anxious or anything! No more gryst to Paris's 'identity crisis' mill was one of my 2004 resolutions.
Well, now everyone knows - I'm a "Nigel".
I quite liked Nigel in the movie, especially in his pivotal role in the final denouement! But how did they know about my 'strange little obsession'? It's a bit creepy.

What Finding Nemo Character are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Farouk got a "Bruce". I think he was little offended by that, but I couldn't tell what language he was mumbling in, let alone what he was saying. Something about sharks being the dogs of the underwater realm? It was more his tone that gave it away. His sentences didn't end on an upward inflection like they normally do!

Paris wouldn't do the quiz: what good is it, he reckoned, telling a ferret he's like a shark? And I though Daphne might be feeling a little too delicate even to ask her to participate.

Happy New Year to you all!

2004-01-01T09:42:00.000+11:00

I think we had a very wild party last night judging by the disarray the place was in this morning. I remember snippets: Daphne doing the one-legged moonwalk in her undies; Farouk toasting Arnold Schwarzenegger's contributions to ferretdom with some foul smelling concoction he said his mother had sent from 'the old country'; and, not to be outdone, Paris, having returned late from preliminaries with 'the boys', passing around some powder blue 'vitamin pills' (not!).

And the pyrotechnics! I remember them - simply marvellous! Loose Change who played at the Eel Skinners and Duck Pluckers Ball a few weeks ago were back as well. Councillor McKenzie and others responsible are to be highly commended for the entertainments as well as the tasteful festoon lighting decorations in the high street.

Now it's back to the clean-up. Daphne will need her clothes, and other bits and pieces have to be returned to their owners or sensibly disposed of to preserve our pristine environment. I've already found one odd sock that is going to be a problem unless it's Daphne's. Anyhow, with the marvels of the Internet, I might be able to find a match at Lonely Socks.

City Possum Party

2004-01-01T07:34:00.000+11:00

Thought I had experienced just about everything a 2 year old possum could, but never did I envisage a wild night like New Year's Eve turned out to be. The night reached a climax at Bob's place as I had promised him I would turn up to his "bash". Bob always plans as if he's having a party for 100 people and worries as if only two will turn up. He rang both Daphne and Farouk to make double sure they still wanted to party with him, and sent 4 sms's to me confirming details of the party. I agreed to be there no later than 2.30am whereby he sms'd me back with the promise that he would try not to dissapoint as a host but nevertheless not to be too angry with him if he did. I wrote back telling him to take a chill pill.

Before all this, I received a phone call from my possum mates with whom I had climbed trees whilst growing up in Dunkeld. They informed me of a New Year's Eve bash at the Flagstaff Gardens. I had heard about these annual gatherings organised by the city possums. City Possum Parties (or "CPP's" as those deemed cool enough to be an insider call them) are notorious for much rorting, induced intoxication and the ample consumption of chemically enhanced substances. Still, the sound of "Doof Doof" music pounding from the Docklands and the chance to catch up with the boys again seemed a good way to welcome in the new year.

I hitched a ride to the CPP on the back of a ute and what eventually transpired at the gardens passed by in a haze. I do remember witnessing members of the posse scaling and then deplaning a tree repeatedly for no apparant reason at all. There were those possums heavy on the turps, equipped with a new sense of confidence, putting on cute displays to humans passing by to entice a feeding frenzy. We all had the munchies anyway! The lucky ones got apples. The not so lucky choked on stones and other inedible objects, which, on this night, had an uncanny resemblance to fallen berries. I dont know which was more terrifying, the Victoria Harbour fireworks display, or the resultant thud of a falling possum. It was noted that the casulty count was apparently up on the previous year: 12 possums concussed, and 1 epileptic attack. Someone should tell these humans that possums find fireworks a really "trippy" experience.

The fireworks lasted longer than expected and remembering my promise to Bob, I quickly jumped onto a truck and rode out the 2.5 hours, wishing the driver would put pedal to metal. The night was still young and I was already missing my friends at Lake Bolac. I arrived at Bob's party to find Daphne and Farouk struggling with the "moonwalk", and the "running man" respectively. It was evident to me that both lacked conviction in their chosen dancesteps and suddenly, I realised I had just the thing for them. It was at that stage I noticed Bob slumped on the couch. He didnt look very happy at all. It was 3.30am.

The Pleasure Study

2003-12-31T08:36:00.000+11:00

Daphne has been filling in a proper, academic PLEASURE STUDY, she tells me. It is being conducted by a Canadian professor of marketing. I wondered why you would give some marketing guru the information needed to take the pleasure out of one more experience.

Daphne said it wasn't like that: it asks you about two recent pleasurable experiences, how they came about and how they were similar or differed. She told me that she had written about a trip she took earlier this year and about a romantic encounter she had had recently. You could see her get happier as she remembered! I eased the conversation on, not wanting to kill the moment. She smiled more as she told me how the experiences differed, the one being 'restful' and 'pacific', the other 'enervating' but 'attenuating'.

Paris came up, whistling. Daphne's look changed and she went silent.

I still haven't been able to make contact with Scaramouche: perhaps he's helping with the relief efforts in Bam?

My image

2003-12-30T16:08:00.000+11:00

Paris got back today - his arrival gave a whole new meaning to 'bright eyed and bushy tailed"! But, more of that when he settles down!

Daphne paddled over earlier at a pace (you can tell ... the list was about 45° ... she has to lean more the faster she goes). She found this new Identikit thing on the Internet and has been playing with it all day. She made a picture of me, and thought I looked very 'fetching'. I checked it ('Load face', 'Bob Bunyip') and thought that it looked a bit like Alfred E. Newman, but that any resemblance to me, fetching or otherwise, was really quite 'far fetched'!

I really don't know why it has to be so hard for me to have an image. Perhaps it's because I can't be photographed?

Just wasting time, really

2003-12-29T09:09:00.000+11:00

Yeah, right, Paris! Wish you were here too!

It's a bit hectic around the Lake at the moment. What, with the holidays and all the the contented families cavorting and canoodling all over the place! I decided the best thing for it was to lock myself away and have a quiet day yesterday. I did some work on my current research reports that are due on 12 January, and "pottered" a bit, netsurfing.

I was in a debate once about "the future of the book". We drew the short straw and were resoundingly and mercifully defeated by those who argued that the book has a future in the age of technology. In the course of her conclusion, my opponent quipped that she had often wondered what it would be like to see into the mind of God and have access to all the information there was. She said that she had been on the Web the day before and now knew: it was CHAOS! Still, it's a serendipitous chaos!

Yesterday I found this amazing site where they've emulated types of walking. If you slide the selectors to "male", "light", "relaxed" and neither "happy" nor "sad" and then rotate it while trying to imagine it walking on four legs, it really does look a bit like me. And "male", "neutral", 1/2 "nervous" and "happy" is definitely Farouk when he's got something on his mind.

You can play with the bloody thing for hours! I did!

Neophilia

2003-12-27T13:26:00.000+11:00

Paris left this morning, bound for Yarrawonga and the Murray River, for a weekend of what he calls "chemically enabled debauchery and decadence" though I don't think the order matters. Apparently poor old Lake Bolac is too "straight" (as he said pointedly to me). Lake Mulwala and the Yarrawonga Weir "rock", it seems. I must confess I find the idea of skijets and water skiing abhorrent. I thought it was a fair concession when we raised no objection to Bill Brammall and the Hamilton Rowing Club trying to set up a branch over here.

And whatever is wrong with our golf course? Or our wineries? Like Moyston is second rate or something compared with the Rutherglen wines? No! Paris is simply what Christopher Booker called a "neophiliac": nothing tried and true ever seems to engage him for long enough for him to try it, let alone sup its truth! Parigi, o caro ... Sospiro e luce tu mi sarai, Tutto il futuro ne arrideráÂ ... Ah, non piú! Well! At least not for the next few days!

"Coin"?

2003-12-26T11:37:00.000+11:00

I couldn't let the sun rise further on my anger ... so, I went to speak with Daphne. She usually has a way of making things seem, I dunno, less "stark". I found her on the small bank beside the highway.

'Coin, coin,' she said as I mosied on up.
'Kwan, kwan,' I mimicked, 'What the .... is kwan, kwan?'
'It's the noise a duck makes in French,' says she!

Why? Why would a perfectly normal Australian blue-billed duck (other than for the amputation, that is :) want to speak French.

'It's a ruse for the hunting season,' she told me. 'It is either that or "vak, vak" (which is apparently what her long lost Turkish cousins say) ... they'll need interpreters or they'll never find us!'

And I thought I had matters of moment on my mind. Suddenly, the day seemed better!

Stepping out on the feast of Stephen

2003-12-26T09:37:00.000+11:00

Welcome, fellow travellers, to my little bit of the web. Boxing Day has not been good for me! I went to see my old friend, Scaramouche (whom I had not had the opportunity to contact before Christmas) only to find him disconsolate after a self-induced illness and an aborted flute lesson. To try to cheer him up, I began researching the Feast of Stephen, hoping I would find a morcel of wisdom for him in the semiology of the day.

But no! Only details of senseless slaughter. I might as well have waited for the feast of the Holy Innocents! As a matter of fact, I think I will!