Poochapalooza

Izzy the gorgeous white and black terrier (pictured below) had cleverly managed to buy, hand write and post our dear little Dogadoo a Scooby Doo-themed invitation, asking us around to help celebrate her 2nd (or 14th, depending on either human or canine age interpretation) birthday and commemorate moving into a new place at Kensington.

Apparently Douglas the fuzzy muttley (adopted after a cruel dumping at Mambray Creek) arrived first, and promptly left a fragrant calling card or three on the back lawn. Whilst hostess Izzy busied herself giving them a good sniff, William the whippet seized the moment to expertly squeeze himself into the cat-flap and cock his leg on the loungeroom beanbag. Luckily Eleanor (aka Izzy's Owner) deducted that, at age thirteen (or 91 if you're four-legged), William was reduced to producing 'dry runs' as a purely symbolic gesture and no damage (or saturating) was done.

My pooch, Dogadoo, heaved up her breakfast as soon as she arrived via the back gate. Not being the world's classiest guest, my first reaction was to say, "Ah well, you know what dogs like to do...it'll be cleaned up soon enough", but Eleanor (Izzy's owner) decided to find some newspapers and get rid of it so that the party guests would still have their appetites for chew bones, mutt mints and chook necks.

The tone had already been set for this doggee soiree however: - poo, wee and vomit, and all in the first five minutes! All it needed now was some ear-bleedingly loud doof-doof, P-plated gatecrashers and a visit by the police to be the carbon copy of the 18th birthday party down the street that we'd suffered through recently (including having lemons stripped from the neighbouring tree and thoughtfully placed under our windshield wipers).

I decided it was time to hand out a Schmackos beef hide for each of the guests. Izzy and Douglas looked at them doubtfully - in terms of size to height ratio I guess it was like asking them to gnaw through a boogie board. William the elder took his off to eat in privacy behind the willow tree and Dogadoo flopped on the doormat, holding it between both paws and gnawing at it protectively. It would be nice to be able to write about Dogadoo behaving impeccably after that but alas that wasn't the case. She snapped irritably at any pooch who ventured within a metre of her until every last shred of the beef hide was eaten.

William (as you can see here) was rather non-plussed by the whole event and was clearly hoping that there'd be a fire, a broadsheet newspaper, a pipe and a rocking chair for him to enjoy and retire to.

He was quite happy to let the three young upstarts have a good tussle over the pass-the-parcel event: it was pointless telling the three boneheads that each layer had liver treats in it and each guest was going to receive a doggy rope ball. Photography was an even more pointless exercise because their wagging tails, wriggly bodies and twitchy noses made posing an impossibility.

Soon it was time for party hats but Dogadoo was not impressed. She had hers on for about three seconds before jumping clear from my restraining arms, flapping her ears like a centrifuge and escaping the infernal appendage.


Douglas was more tolerant, but no less inclined to sit still for a photograph.

It was then that the humans decided to go inside and have a cup of tea, some croissants and mud cake and leave the dogs outside. "They all seem pretty happy now - I'm sure we can trust them," said William-the -Whippet's owner. "We can see them all from here," replied Eleanor reassuringly. It felt as though we were four Norwood yummy-mummies leaving our 3 three years olds unsupervised in the garden....

Sort of. Douggie started howling, so was brought inside to the laundry and placed behind a child-proof gate so that he could see his beloved owners but not chew at the table cloth. William sought sanctuary from the rabble by hiding amongst the bushes and, as the rain started falling, Izzy decided to retreat to the warmth of her kennel.

My Dogadoo sat on the mat, looking forlornly at us eating, drinking and making merry inside; occasionally adding a heart-rending whine to make the croissant flakes stick in my throat like ash. "You won't die out there, furry-face," I told her.

An hour later we both walked home in the soft rain. Dogadoo's tail wagged as she forced me to stand and wait patiently as she strained to birth the Norton Summit of butt nuggets and eagerly investigated her party bag of treats including a pig's ear, chew-toy and bone at the other end. Life was good in Dogadoo Land.

Life's Big Question - Uggies or Crocs?

I'm about one-third of the way through writing a book at the moment. No, not a booker prize-winning novel that will cause stampedes of the literary-minded to Dymocks, a glowing interview with Jennifer Byrne and an all-expenses-paid first class flight to Chicago to feature as Oprah's book of the month but a self-help book (more on that later, perhaps).

What it means for me, right now in practical terms, is that I'm working from home for three months and can lower my standards of dress sense and style even further than my usual, "If it's black and clean, it's fine" approach to corporate attire. Look at the picture above; this is what I'm waahing on about. Come tomorrow (Monday), I'll be showered, dressed in my most forgiving elastic-banded trakkie daks, some form of polar fleece zip top and faced with the most important decision of the day - crocs'n'socks, or bare feet and uggs?

Love Chunks loves to chortle about my hypocrisy when it comes to Crocs. For the past two summers, whenever someone aged over 10 would galumph down the street in spindly legs wearing some huge form of primary-coloured kindergarten playground equipment on their feet, my comment would be instant and predictable: "God I hate those croc shockers. They're so butt ugly and make the wearer look as though they've stepped on a melted Smurf house on their way to a sheltered workshop." Then, a few months ago, Sapphire - on the cusp of turning eight years old - started to pester me to buy her a pair. "Pl-e-a-s-e Mum, everyone in my class is wearing them...!"

She had me at 'everyone' because, since finding out that it wasn't Bali belly from Langkawi but a foetus that was causing me to lose my lunch on the train, I swore to myself the most sacred of oaths. I swore that if my child - my own flesh and blood progeny - needed a particular brand or item of clothing in order to fit in, he or she would get it. There were too many painful memories I'd never been able to repress of having jeans that were too baggy to pass muster in 1982, finally getting a pair of kiaks the second they went out of fashion or hoping my dunlop volleys would look as cool as the ubiquitous Adidas Romes. It didn't matter that Mum said volleys only cost $7 from Grandisons compared to $38 for the Romes at Sportsworld; it was like suffering a thousand tiny papercuts in my heart when I realised that I'd have to go to school looking like the love interest from 'Revenge of the Nerds'.

Back to Sapph - therefore, if 'Crocs' were in - and they most definitely were in her class - she would get a pair. LC and I have agreed that our precious one is not to set the trends for her peers, but we will certainly try to make her school life easier if she has one less thing to worry about. So there we were, in the shoe shop: Sapph in raptures at my capitulation ("I know you hate them Mum but I love them and you!") and me rolling my eyes at her obviously-successful parental crawl and the sheer retardo-factor of the shoes. A few seconds later, however, I found a pair on my feet. Ohhhh Lordy lordy me; they were like wearing the buttery chocolate insides of a lindor ball - superbly soft and as light as a feather. Needless to say, two pairs were purchased that day and I defy anyone to say, "Does she realise how dumb they look - is she planning on doing some gardening on the sea floor?" because they're bloody comfy. Nicole Richie could rent them out as a holiday house they're that soft.

No such reversal of opinions about ugg boots. Being a Murray Bridge bogan born-and-bred means that they are as familiar to me as the ceiling shag pile in a Sandman and will continue to be long after the Hollywood rehab chickies have considered them too passe to wear with their micro minis and exposed nipples. They're warm, last forever and can take me from morning to evening with confidence. Not so acceptable at work though.

How will I cope with having to select items such as black boots, flat courts, loafers and strappy sandals to shove on my feet from September? Not to mention having to repress doing long and rattling burps out loud, followed by staccato bursts of flatulence and the occasional tuneless humming of an inane commercial jingle.... it will be tragic when my working-from-home time is over, I tell you!

In the meantime, I plan on making the most of it. If someone invites me out to a restaurant that features in the gold section of the Entertainment Guide, I will seriously have to consider whether the event is worthy enough for me to have to put aside the crocs'n'uggs and tart myself up. I did it for Love Chunks last weekend at Magill Estate and unless John Cusack phones and offers me a million dollars to spend a week with him in the Bahamas inhaling bollinger and haighs choccies, he'll just have to wait until September or come over to my place and see me ala ugg. Same goes for Jude Law.

"...and don't forget to bring back the Axylotl!"
Now that's something you don't hear every day, is it?

For a suburban blurber, sometimes the 'to do' list in my tattered Far Side paper diary says a great deal about what's occupying my lindt ball-sized brain. For instance, over the weekend it contained:

Saturday

• 9:15am - Sapphire's tennis lesson. Note to self: Is it our turn to bring coffee? Second note: must stop mucking around with parents Rocky, Ali, Grant and Roberto and instead pay attention to Sapph's efforts
• Collect Axylotl from Nature Education Centre - anytime on Sat. between 1pm and 5pm for Sapphire's school. Don't forget the frozen beef hearts!
• Do meditation homework: 1) stand starkers in front of full-length mirror for at least five minutes. Note to self: Room temperature, Love Chunks and Sapphire-free time and self-loathing permitting; 2) Eat and drink one meal s-l-o-w-l-y and without distractions like reading the paper, talking to someone else or standing up. Note to self: will be challenging, especially if forced to eat gluten-free crackers again; and 3) Look at your physical/emotional state - are you agitated, balanced or dull? Need to ask teacher: can I be all three at once?
• Get Sapphire ready by 5pm - for dinner at Cafe Primo, Shrek 3 and sleepover at Angus's house. Note: remind her that only one - not all fourteen - Beanie kids will fit into her Jessie from ToyStory II backpack and that if I hear about Tamagotchi version four one more time I will decapitate Mama Beanie Bear and insert it up the split in Gummi Bear's backside...
• Feed Axylotl - sorry 'Arthur' and train Dogadoo to not growl at him and to stop licking the taped up sides of the aquarium.
• Tart myself up - booking at Penfold's Magill Estate for LC's early 40th birthday dinner made for 7:30pm. Note: need to start psyching myself up for make-up application at midday, with first attempts commencing at 3pm

Sunday

• Set alarm for 8:00am to collect Sapphire from Angus's place. Reminder: Mum Catherine hopefully not utterly fed up with Sapphire but has to get Angus and party food ready for Norwood Bowl adventure with boys from his school;
• Re-do Chapter Five - editor hates it, and with good reason. Note: must delicately negotiate non-family and housework time around LC (likely to be hungover) and Sapphire (likely to be grumpy).
• Go to Coles - need potatoes, liquid paper, non-gluten rice crackers that are edible and Farmers Union Feel Good Iced Coffee. Note to self: get the Sunday Mail because we need to know what's on the telly for the week.

You'll be pleased to know that all of the above tasks were ticked off my list and Arthur the Axylotl's arrival in Sapphire's classroom this morning was treated with the greatest interest and respect by the kids. LC had to carry the aquarium in because it was too heavy for me, I had Arthur swishing around in a plastic bag inside a blue bucket with his water aerater, beef hearts and PH soluton. Sapphire had her lunch and the information pamphlet.

After filling up Arthur's tank and placing his bag in the water to acclimatise, Love Chunks and I were ready to leave. We farewelled our sweet child who barely turned around to acknowledge us. She was already lost to the environment of school mates, armpit farts and the reflected glory of having a Mexican fish with legs in her home for the weekend.

Camping About
















We three have just returned from a long-weekend at the 'Gateway to the Flinders Ranges', aka Mambray Creek.

It's a Claytons* kind of camping which is designed to ease in Four-Star-Stuck-in-the-Muds like myself who can pretty well put up with all sorts of outdoorsy grot and misadventure as long as there is a hot shower, flushing toilet and warm bed at the end of it.

Well Mambray Creek offers one out of the three. Unlike last year where we stayed at the long-drop toilet site, this year we opted for the flushing toilets and showers. We should have left our soap at home because the single shower available was cold water only - not particularly attractive in zero winter temperatures that could freeze the cuddle nuts off a koala. It also meant that any issues I had about BO or personal hygiene were also willingly thrown out of the tent window as I vowed not to remove the first two layers of clothing from my body for the next four days.

So, a flushing toilet, but no (hot) showers and no soft bed or warmly-lit five star BnB accommodation either. Instead, we had our rather grand 'Taj Mahal' tent which has separate wings for Sapphire, our gear, and Love Chunks'n'me. Any thoughts of nocturnal nookies with LC had long since vanished - who'd want to get hot and sweaty with someone who hadn't washed for four days and who smelled like burned wood and wino grease?

We spent our time 'out in the wild' with three other couples and their kids. Love Chunks and I sometimes took a second out from the group to smile smugly at each other and mutter, "Oh, isn't it great that we only have one child and she's eight years old," before walking back to the central camp area and being assailed with squeals, poo-filled nappy pongs and anxious parents herding their toddlers away from the flames like osteoporosis-inflicted goal keepers.

As the oldest child, Sapphire reigned supreme. The second oldest child, cousin Matt, remained enthralled with her instructional lectures on the virtues of collecting Beanie Kids and for a kid who likes to "be a battler who kills things and wins all the time", he displayed formidable commitment to sitting around a pretend gum-leaf fire singing songs to stuffed animals.

Little brother Jack was then free to play with Hamish, who normally flocked to Matt. Hamish was most certainly NOT going to hang around a boy - no matter how much he idolised him - who held hands with his girly cousin and did the limbo with 'Beanie kid Priscilla and Princess' under his arm. Even way past his bedtime when his mother had to unzip the tent and tell him to go to sleep for the tenth time, I could still him chattering on:
"Mu-u-u-u-m Sapphire said that there's a Viking beanie kid who's really strong and a super Beanie Boy who wears a cape and.....Muuuum? Do you think the Tooth Fairy will find my tooth tonight even though I'm not at home?"

By 8:30pm every night, each child was entombed in their sleeping bags and us parents were ready to party. Or, at the very least, drag out some dark chocolate and port and risk using a few swear words in our conversations.

As for nature, she did her best. Cold nights and clear mornings with just the right sprinkling of wildlife to make it interesting but safe. A couple of emus would regularly stroll through the camp on the lookout for stray toast crusts and squashed marshmallows and would stoically endure a growing gang of excited brats following them around yelling and brandishing tree branches. A few kangaroos sproinged around in the distance and plenty of kookaburras were on hand to laugh maniacally at my unfolded, uncleansed morning face and beanie hair. By 'beanie' I do not mean the infernal toys that Sapphire loves, but the woolly hat jammed on my head. From the morning of Day two it was obviously from the hairs greasily slicked against my skull that it was mandatory to adhere to the 'beanie time, all the time' rule to avoid offending the other innocent campers around me.

Love Chunks maintained his usual high standards of culinary creations - from a gas stove and a rickety card table he produced pan-grilled scotch fillets, green chicken curry, spaghetti bolognese, home-made smoked beans, pancakes and bacon'n'eggs. Oh and not to mention mastering the cafe tierre and producing coffee so fragrant and pungent that it took the enamel of our teeth and made us more alert than a Hilton Ho in the cell block showers.

As for me and camping - we'll always be content to remain nodding acquaintances but I grudgingly did enjoy myself. So much so that I bought an ourdoor gazebo tent thingy for our camp kitchen instead of LC's rather patchy tarp and four poles effort - does that mean I might actually want to do it again, and soon?


*Claytons was an alternative to alcohol, heavily promoted by John 'Bewdy Newk' Newcombe in the 1970s. Since then, anything described as a 'Claytons' in Oz means a safer alternative. For example: Bert Newton is our Claytons Michelen Man because he's more recognised in Australia'

Irritable Bowel?
Pretty bloody FURIOUS is more like it!





One, two....three...........PUSH !!!


Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) is the most inappropriate label since Goebbels describe Hitler's feelings towards Jews as "a little bit negative."

After spending a couple of weeks on a self-imposed detox, I have timidly ventured into eating a bit of sugar, cake, choccie and wine again, only to have my sphincter crack a full-sized hissy fit in immediate retaliation. Instead of cleansing out my system, I think the detox has made my Furious Bloody Bowel Syndrome even more sensitive - just a mere inhalation of the hundreds and thousands covering Sapphire's birthday cake the other day was enough to have me locked in our laundry loo, shivering in misery and producing pretty well nothing. (Note to self - must must MUST get a new window - the permanently-open louvres from the 1950s letting in the stiff winter breezes are not making lingering loo moments very comfortable).

As if Love Chunks hasn't had to endure many horrible nights of Doona Dutch Ovens and having my butt blasts follow me in from the back door to the living room, he now has to come and request that I ~ ahem ~ "Fill up a friggin' bucket and flush those river pebbles down and out of my sight." Whilst I bask in the security and endurance of his love and admiration, I think that viewing my abnormal excrement is not on his list of turn-ons....

Why do we use such gentle terms to describe such arse-tearingly awful ailments?
Strep Throat sounds a tad annoying, but if you have some streptococci setting up camp in your oesophagus you're in for a world of pain that isn't visible from the outside but makes even breathing in air an awful act to contemplate.

Wisdom teeth 'removal' - ah, if it were only that simple. Getting them taken out 'in the chair' sounded so easy, so quick. Several hours later, my jumper was dripping with cold sweat, my ears were filled up with tears of terror and the dentist (or should I say student) had to yell at me to stop hyperventilating. My eyes were squeezed shut, but my water-logged ears definitely heard the assisting nurse exclaim, "Oh Nooo!"
"Don't worry about it, Nance," was the hung-over reply from the stupid student.
The drama of my 'removal in the chair' was also relayed to the next few suckers in the waiting room who witnessed me falling through the stainless steel saloon doors, drooling blood - there was no budget for cotton pads - and gurgling, "Love Chu-u-u-u-u-u-n-k-s? Take me home now!"

Minimal Tearing during childbirth - Over eight summers ago, LC and I were eagerly lapping up all of the advice provided in the pre-birthing classes. At least, until we saw the birth video and the voiceover gleefully announced, "Sandie is so lucky - she has only torn two centimetres." I wanted to suck that foetus up my fallopian tubes like iced coffee through a straw it terrified me so much. As for my own situation a few months later, let's just say that I tore from A to V and walked like an arthritic cowboy for two months afterward.

You're all just meat on a slab to me, said the doctor, as I blushingly eased myself onto the examination trolley, dreading my annual pap smear. It was OK for him - he does hundreds of them a year but for a relatively modest gal who had never even seen him before turning herself in a pornographic letter 'Y', it wasn't so common. To add more fuel to my already fire-red face, the window of the examination room directly faced out onto the Greensborough line and the blinds were open. "Er, Doctor P, would you mind closing those blinds? I don't want to give the Eltham folk a free peep show on the way home."
He rolled his eyes, leaned over to snap them shut with his left hand while still inserting some kind of enormous stapler inside me with his right.
"Oh and doctor? I'm MillyMoo, it's nice to meet you. What's your name?"

Insomnia - sounds more like an exotic holiday destination: "Dina's just choofed off to Insomnia for a fortnight of wine, men and song, the lucky duck..." Instead, it's the term used for a protracted period of sleep deprivation that is also adopted with inhumane enthusiasm by international torture experts. There's nothing lonelier than lying awake at 3.00am hearing the sound of regular breathing beside you (or outboard motor-loud snoring) knowing that you won't be heading in the same blissful direction and it sure as hell doesn't prepare you for a two hour meeting after lunch on 'strategic performance indicators' when your eyes look and feel like fractured jaffas.

It only takes a second to take it out said the medical researcher after spending close to one hour inserting a lubricated tube up my nose, down my throat and attaching the end to a scary-looking refrigerator that measured my stomach waves. And yes, she was right - it did only take a few seconds to pull out the tube faster than going about on a Sydney-to-Hobart racing skiff, but the demonic little valve on the end was sharply angled for insertion, not removal and sliced my throat and inside of my nose like a whip as it departed. Luckily for the researcher I was too busy staggering about the room in shock and agony to ram her head into the sharps bin.

Hating with Honesty

I was watching a funny-as-a-piece-of-cold-toast comedy called 'Meet the Robinsons' the other night, willing it to get better because it has the Office's lovable Tim character in it. What really turned me off was the Tim character's hugely stereotyped brother and sister - fussy high achievers who belong only in 3rd grade comedies and not in the real world.

The sister dropped her boyfriend because he didn't find 'Fawlty Towers' funny. YAY!!! Neither do I - I hate it! I find Basil about as amusing as an amoeba and consider his beating up of Manuel, stupid theatrics and escalating situations to crisis point to be unpleasantly stressful viewing. The fact that they only made about 6 episodes that keep screening over and over in an effort to indoctrinate non-believers in the 'supremacy' of British comedy makes me hate it more.

Now that that admission is off my chest, here are a few more:


Jennifer Jason Leigh, Nic Cage, Chevy Chase -
I've lumped these three 'actors' in together because I have never, ever seen a movie with any of them in it that they have
a) done a good job in;
b) I've enjoyed watching, or
c) has become a modern or cult classic.

JJL looks permanently unhinged, Nic Cage has about as much charisma as a cowpat and Chevy Chase has a stupid, "I think I'm really funny and sexy" look on his face that I just want to slap right off. I'm not sure what Miss UnHinged is up to these days and Chevy Chase was last seen doing an advertisement for car insurance here in Australia***, and Nic Cage just seems to be playing dress ups and marrying foetuses....

Casablanca and Citizen Kane
No-one is prepared to admit that nearly every single bloody 'Greatest Movies Of all Time' lists have these two godawful time-wasters in them because people are too scared to admit how crapulously awful they are, and slot them in because they think they have to. It's like we're all scared to admit that we might prefer watching 'Clueless' or 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off' over and over, so we all put down the obvious ones so that no-one takes us aside, strips us naked and parades us on the internet as 'Cinematically Challenged.'

Casawanka hasn't improved with age but merely shows that Ingrid Bergmann displayed about as much acting talent as a bench seat, and Humphrey Bogart is about as believably attractive as my Dad's old golf bag.

As for Orson - I *ate* the Zerox machine - Welles, his epic suck-fest is just one huge love letter to himself. Boring from start to finish. Now let's all be honest in our movie votes from now on, so that we'll see the movies on it that we watch the most - or at least every time they're on TV and we're at home - Star Wars, Gladiator, Life of Brian, When Harry Met Sally.....Birdy Num Num!


Catcher in the Rye
Again, this pointless piece of printed pap gets trotted out on all 'literary classics' lists, yet is about an unlikeable, unrealistic and stupid waste of space and his 'travels'. About as inspiring as David Hasselhoff's temperance treaties and yet no-one wants to admit that they don't know what the hell it's all about. Why not admit that we all read Hailey's 'Roots' from cover to cover, as we did Henry Charriere's 'Papillon', Leon Uris's 'The Exodus', and hell - anything by Nick Hornby, Bill Bryson and Douglas Adams?


Whole Prawns
Why do so many normally-sensible people go nuts when they approach a buffet table groaning with plate loads of whole cooked prawns? How can rather bland tasting sea meat be worth such adulation and why-oh-why would anyone wish to end up smelling like a dead shark's arse when they're splattered with juices, prawn poo-pipes and beady black eyes from dismembering the poor little shrimps?

Peeled, yes, I can go a few of those, but unpeeled, no. They are simply not worth the effort.
Give me an egg and bacon sandwich any day, and don't forget the lindt balls, cheese platter, champagne and top quality coffee....

David 'Kochie' Koch from the Sunrise Show


His swarmy, self-satisfied smug mug annoys the living crap out of me and I fly into a ranting rage every time I see him on television. So much so that Love Chunks pats me patronisingly on the knee and says, "We know, dear, we know" and backs out of the room slowly with the remote control shoved up his jumper.

David Koch likes to portray himself as the 'normal, everyday Aussie bloke' yet has written best-selling books on how to invest money, make a buck or million and wouldn't know what a real Aussie battler was if it came shoved a broken VB bottle up his $300 Country Road bum.

The two trapped Tassie miners were 'lucky' enough to have him barge into their ambulance after being stuck underground for two weeks - wouldn't that be great? A faceful of Kack-tastic Kochie before you've had a chance to eat, drink, shower or receive any medical treatment? Perhaps we should get the 'Chaser' guys to do that to Kochie when he's having his first aneurysm....

Angela Bishop
Angela used to be a regular visitor on Working Dog's 'The Panel' on channel ten, endlessly name dropping the celebrities she was paid to interview 'exclusively'. Clearly she believed in her own importance and value and remained oblivious to my shouts of 'Shut UP you mental pgymy!' every time she appeared.

It seemed pretty obvious that 'The Panel' merely endured her presence, knowing full well those 'exclusives' were her allotted two minutes of the star's time during an 18 hour Australian junket and, being a channel ten show, they were contracturally obliged to feature her. No doubt too it was the same for their interminable Big Brother segment which eventually caused me to avoid their show altogether.

Now Angela has about as much insight and talent as, well, pretty much everyone else on the planet, really. Perhaps Mum (Bronwyn, she of the Cement BeeHive and anti-pensioner fame) might have helped things along a bit, but we can all feel certain that no casting couch acrobatics were involved.

Peter Helliar
If this guy wasn't already partnered and a father, I'd set him up with Angela so they could while away their days preening each other whilst gazing over each other's shoulders at their own reflections in the mirror.

This guy seems to be one of Rove's entourage but has neither the skill, charm or comic timing of Rove or any other stand up comedian with a microbe of talent. He seems to think that broad caricatures and YELLING out his punch line makes him an 'everyman' and therefore funny, and looks as though he's about to burst out laughing at his own hilarity. Some words of advice to you, Petey boy: you are about as funny as a dead kitten and possess the wit of a deaf mute. Quit the comedy and go and find yourself a nice job selling photocopiers.

Mick Molloy

Another Australian 'funny man' that I've never ever found even remotely amusing. For some reason 'Working Dog' (The Late Show, The Panel) are friendly with him and he seems to get praise - and work - from basking in their reflected glory.

His much-celebrated job as radio cost with Tony Martin was 100% due to Tony Martin. Tony is quick, clever and inventive whereas Mick seems to think that being an overweight slob with a broad accent qualifies as champagne comedy.

Perhaps he, Peter Hellier and even Dave Hughes should club together to open up an Aussie Home Loans franchise where they could serve the bogans they purport to represent in their performances. At least that way they'll be off the air and out of my hair.

*** If 'stars' come down to Australia to do paid advertisements, they are sooooo very close to having the clause 'Will Work for Food' permanently tattooed on their foreheads and in their contracts. See also Tom Selleck, Tara Reid, Pamela Anderson, Matt LeBlanc.

Not that there's anything wrong with that


We haven't heard much from Jerry Seinfeld since finishing his show and doing his bit to repopulate the earth, so it was a pleasant surprise to see him do the publicity rounds for his new movie.

His new flick presumably for children and not anything to do with remaining 'the master of his domain' and the outfit is rather forgiving for any middle-aged paunch he may have developed, thus negating the need to keep changing his jeans labels to '32 inch' (old 'Seinfeld' fans will understand)

Shitney's 'Road to Recovery' seems to be rather non-traditional one of never going home, forgetting she has two children and donning outfits consisting of her little sister's strawberry shortcake braces and nanna's sarong.

And while we accept that Britney is the master of clothing understatement, Christina Aguilera is the reigning queen when it comes to 'barely there' make up.

Nothing says 'Low Maintenance Female' like white, over-moussed hair, orange skin, transvestite eye shadow and plum puffer-fish lips.

Like meatloaf through a straw, so are the days of Kate and Pete's lives....

Personifying a couple of healthy, meat-eating, oxygenated and bright-eyed youngsters, they've even taken their dieting regime a step further by sharing one tiny cup of espresso between them.

Not only that, but Pete looks as though he's about to barf his share of the coffee back up, and I'll keep my fingers crossed that Kate can keep hers down - Pete appears to be about as fresh as the inside of a camel's mouth.

We all know that Semi and Butcher are happily hitched, but whilst she's maintained a fairly glamorous dress sense, he's been heading down the Nick Nolte Date Rape Police Picture path that makes me wonder just what the attraction is.

Here's hoping his odour doesn't match the look he's going for, or Semi's in for a night of dutch ovens, parmesan cheese breath and mouldy manure armpits.



This picture has done the rounds already but it shocks me to see 'our Cate' impersonating an albino stick insect on crack.

If those collarbones protrude any further, she'll have a plague of grasshoppers using them as a skate park, or be swatting away elderly ladies who keep pulling at her dress thinking its going to summon in Jeeves with a tray of tea and scones.

EAT Cate, EAT - whatever role you're starving for, make sure the next one is about the life story of the Two Fat Ladies - "Full Fat, Full Throttle, Full Aneurysm"


Lyndsey LieDown is the only person on earth who can make an innocuous black and white striped t-shirt into a piece of clothing sluttier than a sequinned nipple sticker.

Why she even bothers to cover up her map of Tassie escapes me, unless there's nothing but a 'Will Work for White Powder' tattoo etched where Hobart would normally be located.

And if one Lyndsay Ho-down wasn't enough, let me present you with Rehab Rejection Lyndsey! My guess is she's applied her lipstick with her left hand seeing as the right one was busy holding the 1 litre bottle of vodka. The task was made even more difficult by lying on the bar with her head upside down nearly touching the floor and Trevor the keg guy putting on her eye shadow using the blue billard stick cubes.

Nice one, Lynds - Christina Aguilera is apparently very envious.

Thanks to E!Online, The Superficial and Go Fug Yourself for the above happy snaps

The ecstasy of outrage

The girls/ladies/comrades/sisters at my work are all extremely intelligent, hard-working, gorgeous and broad-minded. Every day I learn something from them and admire their research goals, social consciences and their senses of humour.

However, there's one thing they enjoy doing that is so predictable and provides me with no end of free amusement. They love to read articles in The Australian or opinions and quotes attributed to fellow bozos John Howard/Peter Costello/Tony Abbott/Joe Hockey/Alexander Downer - hell, even Nicole Cornes - and puff themselves up with righteous indignation..




You know, that MillyMoo ought to take a good, hard look at herself...
Yes, she should pull her socks up and remember her manners....


Every morning, as we all arrive, get our coffees and ease ourselves into our working day, my esteemed colleagues start up their ecstasy of outrage conversations. The names have been changed to protect the innocent, but it tends to go something like this:

Dulcie: Oooh, did you see what that Peter Hendy bloke from the Chamber of Commerce wrote about the latest WorkChoices debacle? He's the spitting image of Peter Reith----

Joyce: ----as if one wasn't ugly and awful enough------

Esme: That's nothing. What about that stupid Pecker head Corrigan and his arse-end article on why the 'Bastard Boys' got it all wrong? All it proves is that they were right - he is a total pecker head! Greg Combet got a good run though.... He's not a bad piece of intellectual erotica is he? I'd gladly take off his glasses and -----

Eunice: Steady on Esme, it's only 9.15am and you haven't even finished your skinny capp yet!
Mmm, well I'm still reeling at the sheer cheek of Johnny Boy Howard telling Alan Jones that he's a forward thinker---

Mavis: ----maybe forward from 1954 to 1955, heh heh heh-----

Dulcie, entering the office: Nicole Cornes has kept her blonde head down for a bit, hasn't she?

Joyce: Most likely being indoctrinated by Rudd's little roustabouts. You know, learning how to spell 'parliament', picking out Kevin Rudd from a line-up and memorising their policy on uranium and that.

Esme: I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than the frontal lobotomy that Nicole needs to function properly-----

Eunice: Don't you worry, I've already nominated you for taking tickets at the next union fundraiser, so keep a hold of those brain cells, you hear?

Mavis: What about me? I'll even shave my legs for the event if I'm allowed to get up on stage and maintain the rage...."

I sit there and have a good chuckle at their friendly and familiar rants. All I need to do to get their ire going is to continue to yell out stuff like "Andrew Bolt", or "Jeanette Howard's in the Bulletin as Mother of the Year" or "The cute guy from the Chaser is dating Angela Bishop". If only I could harness their good humoured verbal vitriol as a green energy source.

Bless them - their average age is thirty six!

The Weapons of Mass De-Fluff-tion




















Have you ever wondered just where all the fluff that we produce actually ends up?

On Saturday I spent at least half an hour of my precious time bent over like a rice-planter with osteoporosis vainly trying to brush in dozens of dog hairs, dust bunnies, greyish lint, Love Chunks' whiskers, balls of cotton from our new flannelette sheets - and god knows what other sources of fluff - into a dustpan.

If I'd bothered to think clearly I would have realised that dragging out the vaccuum cleaner and sucking out the fluff once and for all was easier than continually chasing dusty fluffy puffs around and around the house.

The humble dustpan-and-broom (or brush, really) must be vaguely related to the Van-Der Graaf generator that we all had to put our hands on in year nine science and have our hair rise up higher than Hugh Hefner on his horizontal folkdancin' meds. Why, I hear you breathlessly ask yourselves - I'll tell you why - there's obviously some kind of unspoken static electricity that propels dust bunnies away from the broom or dustpan. This natural action thereby condemns the sweeper (in this case, me) to many wasted minutes of bending over to sweep, swearing in frustration as the fluff floats off somewhere else, shuffling over to said fluff whilst still remaining stooped, seeing it again f*** off out of reach, swear again and eventually stand up, red-faced, angry and clutching lower back.

So, not only is the stuff inexplicably everywhere but it's impossible to catch and destroy once and for all. And how come we end up with a handful of greyish blue fluff after each cycle in the spin dryer yet our clothes still look the same? How much fluff is left before our clothes one day simply give up the ghost and fall right off? I mean - hey, it seems to happen a lot in soft porn movies and maybe they're bravely documenting the outcomes of using the dryer too much.....

More importantly, how often does our hair 'down south' regenerate? It must be pretty bloody often if our puke-inducing pale pink bathroom floor is anything to go by (no, it wasn't chosen by us and will hopefully be removed soon). Strangely, when my answer to the sales woman's question of 'What floor tiles are you looking for?' was "Something that is pubic hair, belly button lint and towel fluff camouflaging", I didn't get quite the selection I was hoping for. Instead, we were rather gruffly handed a few brochures and pushed towards the automatic exit doors.

Is there something this un-identified flying fluff could be used for, in the name of public good? Could it be converted to a constantly available energy source, or as a cheap filling for raincoats and the dinghies we'll need when the polar caps finally melt? An instant supply of undergarments readily available to mentally starved 'AActresses' and heiresses at mobile phone launches?

All very valid queries, just crying out for good, scientific answers and implementation....

They're leaving me
Hi there regular readers. It's Dogadoo here, filling in for MillyMoo who is on a detox bender and can no longer sit still enough on the computer chair before her farts raise her butt off the seat like a hovercraft and it starts spinning her around and around like the poor kid in the Exorcist.

At the moment I'm the only person at home who can bear to be in the same room as her. At the first sign of one of her aromatic farts, Sapphire and Love Chunks run to the other end of the house. As for me, I don't think she's ever smelt better. It sure beats that dreadful Chloe perfume and Rexona roll on she coats herself in every morning, let alone that sinister peppermint foam she fills up her mouth with twice a day. My toiletry needs are far simpler - give me a dead seagull to roll in and a ant-infested piece of roadkill to snuffle and I'm a happy little beast.

The first photo shows me in my favourite spot, the beanbag. Actually it's my second favourite: my all time favourite is lying anywhere on my back with a willing human scratching my tummy. Once MillyMoo entered a chatroom posing as me. She said that I was 21 (which is three in human years), had brown eyes, auburn hair, was an outdoor girl who was very affectionate, sporty and loved to make friends. She had to close down her account soon after because as soon as she wrote, "My favourite position is lying on my back in every room of the house". I'm not sure of the reason why, but overheard Love Chunks saying something to her like 'Thanks to you the server's in meltdown mode and who is that weirdo standing outside in the street wearing nothing but a dirty parka and a video camera.'

It's been too easy to digress: today is all about ME. Me and my daily suffering. You see once I overheard MillyMoo on the phone to a friend saying, "Oh dogs are soooo much easier than kids. At least you can leave them outside in the garden all day with a bowl of water and some crunchies."

This was very disappointing to hear, to say the least. Can't she see that by 8.00am I'm already fearing the inevitable departure of my Alpha family by 8.30am, leaving me all alone in the garden with only my old bones and flat tennis balls for company?

No matter how hard I try to work my adorable 'Please don't leave me' face (check me out below - I have built-in black eye liner that MillyMoo would die for), MM's heart is harder than a male Cocker Spaniel after a second in the breeding kennel.
She just pats me on the head and burbles, "See ya later Furry Face," and laughs at her cruel nickname as she shuts the gate in my face. Yes, she laughs. Laughs at my heartbreak, my misery and my sadness.

I'd like to give her something to really laugh about but then I remember that she's also the one who feeds me and takes me for runs around the school oval. Once she even dressed me in a leotard but I'm working on forgiving her for that one.....














By 8:30am, Love Chunks has long since left for work, and MillyMoo and Sapphire are leaving for school together. I make a mad dash to the other side gate and put in a gargantuan effort to silently plead with them to take pity on my impending loneliness and stay with me. Or to take me with them.

MillyMoo has taken me to Sapphire's school a few times for 'Show and Tell.' This is always great fun for me because all the kids are sitting down on the carpet in a circle and so their faces are really easy for me to lick. One time Ben had brought in his two pet rabbits and I nearly chewed through their cane travel basket so that Ms Evelyn had to stand up on a chair with the bunnies on her head. The worst time was when MillyMoo spray painted my back green so that I'd match Sapphire's hair when she left for Sportsday. I hated it when they were laughing at me - it was like Christmas time when I had to wear a poxy little Santa hat or last year when I had a red bone with flashing lights put on my collar.

I've also been to work with MillyMoo a couple of times, but she seems to get really mad when I do a whizzer on the floor inside but don't do one outside when she takes me for a walk around the grounds. What does she expect - drizzling on demand? I got lots of attention and pats on those visits though and one nice lady - Jo I think her name was - also smelled a bit of dog and she played with me for so long her black velvet coat looked orange when she left. Ah, fun times.


Here's the final photo of me trying to shove my whole head through the gate. I tend to throw in a couple of whines to make the entire scene more pitiful but they leave me anyway.

Then I am all alone, the house all to myself, no-one to play with, nothing to do, no-one caring one iota about me. I'm about to let out a howl when ----

What's that - Ooooh, it's a magpie - gotta chase it!

Whoah, there's a few more rotten plums over here - do I eat them or roll in them - decisions decisions---

Hey hey HEY - get out of here you stupid lizard. Don't you dare hiss at me-----oh. That hurt. Let me just say that I'm letting you live and be free out of the goodness of my Good-O heart, scaly brain----

Whoo Hoo - yes MJ, I can hear you through the fence too! Did you owner leave you too? Why don't we----

Oi! Oi you, postman! Get your filthy fingers out of my letterbox you minibike riding mongrel---

Bonus - some old lamb bone from last winter...I'll just drag it over to the door mat and-----

----Well whaddaya know - at least three cats have crapped in this flower bed since last night...

ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz


Yay they're home already! WHOO HOO! I love youse all !!!!!!!

Bella Bottom Burp

Yep, that's me: a walking, talking Butt Blasting Machine.

Some of you will know that farting and me are like tomatoes and basil; jam and cream; Lennon and McCartney; Paris and sluttony. No matter how hard I've tried, the odd 'parp' can escape during such events as karate training, running or even bending over in a hurry.

These, however, are mere hiccups compared to what's been produced right now and the picture included here of Dogadoo's buddies greeting each other would be a more attractive fragrance to inhale than anything I've emitted this past week.

The reason? One word = Detox. In deference to the old saying of 'treat your body like a temple', mine had been abused so badly that it whatever temple I possessed was gradually being built over as an inflatable castle at an amusement park. On holidays with Love Chunks, daughter Sapphire and my Mum last week I gutzed myself full of chocolate, wine, cheese, chips, steak, lollies, icecream, more chocolate, pastries and cake trying desperately to pretend that my stomach rolls were not big enough to store books in and that my clothes had mysteriously shrunk.

It was time for a detox, I decided, but this time I wasn't going to buy a stupid kit from the chemists, I was going to do it all myself. Since Saturday (six days and counting), I have virtually eliminated every single fun food from my life. No coffee, no milk or dairy, no meat, no wheat, no sugar (except honey), no lollies, no wine (or alcohol of any kind) and no chocolate.

Love Chunks is very kindly going along for the detox ride - at least in partaking of the evening meal. He is still enjoying his morning cappuccino from Mr Gaggia the coffee machine and his treasured glass or two of red at night. Oh and the post-dinner snack frenzy of chocolate or chips when the sensible little vegan meal has been digested and his stomach is crying out for something decent to eat.

Surprisingly, I have been coping with it all rather well. Chocolate does enter my thoughts every now and then (on approximately the same level as sex does for teenage males) but I have not taken a single bite. It takes a lot of internal positive talk to get excited about having a cup of liquorice tea, or convincing yourself that 4 dried figs are just as good as a faceful of smashed Easter Egg chocolate. Cheese and pasta would be nice but can be resisted but I am sorely missing having a good cup of coffee in the morning, more for the taste than for any improvement in my mood. Despite these sacrifices, I am finding that it's relatively easy to maintain the will to refuse any crap food right now.

This good behaviour of mine isn't being reflected by my stomach, or lower down..... If I thought I was a farty femme before, well now I'm at asphyxiation level. By bed time, my gut is so swollen you could drum on it and I daren't let LC poke me - not even in jest - because he runs the risk of popping a human balloon and seeing the room fill with a rotten egg vapour and his wife madly flying around the air, squealing.

Fortunately for me, this week my boss, Queen B, is out of the office and I've been able to set up her articles, books and files in relative privacy. This means that I don't have to spend my days (as per normal) sitting politely at my desk and, erm , cough, ahem ~pushing the refugees back on the boat~ and walking around as though I've just sat on a fencing post.

There I was yesterday, humming inanely, working in Queen B's office, letting a few ultra ripe ones rip whenever I felt like it. What freedom it was after the first few days of repression! I was also comfortable in the knowledge that the hammering, drilling and swearing of the builders putting in a new kitchen and office area on the other side of our floor covered any explosive aural emanations that were occurring. What I hadn't accounted for was visitors.

Poor, dear, sweet Jude. She had gone to my office to ask me something and had quickly deduced from the sounds of tuneless singing and clanging about that I was in the boss's office.

No sooner had she knocked and opened the door than she was confronted - no, that's too gentle a word - had her nasal passages completely and utterly raped and pillaged in a vicious, deathly and unprovoked attack no human should ever be forced to endure. "No Jude. For the love of all things holy - DON'T STEP THROUGH THE DOOR!"

Alas, it was too late. She smelt, she felt and she staggered slowly backwards her usually-smiling, kind face in a grimace of shock and pain. Not surprisingly, she rang in to say that she was going to work from home today......

Ask and ye shall receive....

......a slap in the head for bothering me.

It's time to update those old chestnuts that tend to get automatically wheeled out whenever we're faced with an annoying problem. They serve no purpose other than to make the listener feel even more frustrated about their situation and tempted to give the utterer of the saying a quick, stinging flick on the nose.

Here's some of my own interpretations for your consideration.

Too many cooks
.....have websites, magazine columns, TV shows and tie-in cook books. Turn the camera off and get back into the kitchen where you belong and cook me a meal that I can a) afford, b) actually want to eat, and c) is not made using only the finest Valhrona chocolate, Andeluvian goat lips or some other stupid ingredient I have to hire a sherpa to find and a bank manager to cough up the money for.

A Rolling Stone gathers
.....far too much money for strutting around on stage like a geriatric piece of beef jerky when he really should shut up singing, stop shagging models young enough to be his children and retire. Quietly.

A bird in the hand is worth more than
.....a poo splattered on top of your head after tweety flaps off into the sky

Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do
....to amuse yourself on long haul economy-class flights and in doctors' waiting rooms. Preferably with nothing to hand but a 1981 Readers Digest, a Tickle-me-Elmo with both eyes missing and a cheese sandwich stuck under the coffee table.

Give a man a fish and he'll feed for a day. Give a man a
......remote control and you won't hear from him for hours.

A problem shared is a problem
..... hand-balled on to some other poor sod.

England expects that every man should do his duty
......but hopefully not in his pants.

We shall fight them on the land, we shall fight them on the beaches, we shall
.......put those pesky refugees into a 'processing internment facility' on Christmas island to rot longer than David Hicks, unfortunately.

'Tis better to have loved and lost
....than to still be a dateless virgin at 43 who believes that Michael Jackson is a well-adjusted, single bloke still looking for a mature, heterosexual life partner or that Pete Doherty just needs a nice hot bath.

All that glistens is not .....a boogie on your shoulder, is it?

I think therefore I...... will be praying fervently that John Howard doesn't get voted in again by the hordes of mental pygmies out there who actually believed that he influenced interest rate increases and George Bush could remember what his name was.

You had me at Hello..... so this time can we at least sit down and find out each other's names first?

I am not an animal!.....I just look and act like one (Tommy Lee)

Frankly my dear, I don't give ...... a fat rat's clacker to charities who phone me up just as I'm mid-way through dishing out the evening meal, putting my child in the bath or just about to water the garden/hang out a load of washing/read the mail/have a long session in the loo.

To err is human. To forgive is... pretty bloody silly in this age of litigation and payouts.