Shame Shane's such a Shockin' Sh**head Dear old Shane Warne. All blonde tips, bowling balls and boofhead behaviour. Many thousands of words have already been said and written about his skills as a bowler. Many millions more words have been said or written about his 'exploits off the field'. He seems determined to remain the poster boy for the rich and the retarded. It is time for me to add my ten cents' worth to the sorry sage that is Shagging Shane - that lobotomised lab rat who keeps pressing the buzzer for the food pellet, only to get an electric shock over and over and over and over again....... Firstly, let me rehash the ages old horror that most of us feel about the salaries earned by people who are able to fling a hard round leather object (and I don't mean his testicles) better than most. Divide this amount by, oh say about a hundred and you'll get the money earned by a cancer researcher or a social worker. Factor in that a chap such as Shonky Shorts also has considerable resources available to him - deportment/speech coaches, media representatives, marketing analysts, economists, public relations experts - and it only serves to increase the horror. Forgive my lack of detail re the chronology and preciseness of some of Shiffer Brain's events, but they bear a bit of very shallow analysis. Firstly, the fact that he has been given the opportunity - for years - to travel and experience the cultures of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the West Indies, but has shunned their food. Instead he preferred tins of baked beans and Big Macs with the burger flung out and french fries stuffed in (I can't believe I know this stuff). Granted, this culinary crapulence was understandable in an eighteen year old as my own favourite meal at that age was a prawn cocktail, rump steak and chocolate mousse. However, most of us have expanded our tastebuds' range since then. But not Warthog Warney, oh no. He once hosted a meal at Melbourne's premier restaurant, The Flower Drum, but arranged to have a pizza delivered at the table for him to eat. None of that gourmet Chinese muck for him! Shabby has long been known to like a fag or two. The red Marlboros, not the George Michaels. Incredibly, enough of his brain cells managed to survive the chemical onslaught of hairdressing bleach long enough to accept a $200,000 payment from Nicabate to kick the habit and set an example for Aussie youngsters. Sadly, the dye eventually burnt off all remaining functioning synapses and he was soon photographed puffing away on the cricket pitch, suckin' a ciggie in a bar and angrily chasing away one of his young fans after he caught him smoking. Naturally, for blokes of his, um, mental magnitude, drugs entered the picture. Not coke, grass or even Eccies, but his mother's diuretic diet pills. A forbidden substance in even the cricketing circles, they were found in his urine test. Manfully, he blamed it on mummy and admitted that he wanted to lose a bit of weight before his upcoming media conference. Well there was a media conference all right, but it wasn't his weight that got people's attention; it was the sheer vacancy of thought and the overriding vanity regarding his physical appearance. And then, there were the women who still seemed to like him regardless of his porky pig like physical tendences..... Bless his wilful little willy, Shane's game was SMS and lots of it. If he wasn't offering to lick red wine off the bulging body of a British nurse, he was annoying shabbier South African drag queens. Plenty of these conquests came forth to the reputable pommy newspapers such as 'News of the World' and 'the Daily Mirror', spilling all of the gory, "He was insatiable", details. It seemed that Shaggy Pants wasn't too fussy on the looks department as most of his nookie chookies were on a visual par with the livestock centrefold in the Rural Journal. All through this, his wife, Simone, also a possessor of an empty fruit bowl brains-wise, regularly posed with her children on the front covers of Australia's finest magazines: No Idea and Womens Duh, shoving it down our throats that hers was a rock-solid marriage of fidelity, commitment and um, the goodest smartness or something like that. Wham-Bam Warney continued with his horizontal hobbies. Heaven help the floozy on his futon the night he ate baked beans on the tour. Eventually his marriage ended, and 'poor old Simone' scored more magazine covers, a home renovation column (who knew she could renovate? Hell, who knew she could write), a gig on 'Dancing with the Stars' (the term 'star' is used in its loosest possible sense here in Australia) and several TV appearances in which she ran the gamut of emotions from A to A. Even I felt a tad sorry for Shane as he sobbed to all of us about his regrets, his desires to do anything to get Simone to take him back and how he would seek help to change. Sadly no, he couldn't remove his SMS thumbs, 'cos he needed them for chucking that red ball around. But, a few days ago, our Bowling Bonehead was caught on film in a London hotel room with two women and a blow-up doll. These girlies, colloquially referred to by the media as 'models' but known more commonly as 'skanky whores', were quite happy to release the footage and again tell us of his prowess and willingness to try anything. Of course it takes two to tango, or, in Shane's case, three plus a doll. Again, I feel a slight tug of sympathy towards our blonde-tipped bozo - he was very obviously set up, but also he is very obviously dumber than a box of stilettoes at a lesbian hockey club. It could be safely assumed that Shaggy Dacks would also have paid good money for receiving some kind of media training, deportment skills, career planning, marketing and public speaking, yes? At the very least, couldn't they have all banded together to make sure that he was to be babysat at all times by a team of experienced Retarded Rootrat wranglers - or at the very least popped into a strait jacket in front of Hi-5 until his next cricket test was on. Whoever is currently his manager should be nominated for their equivalent of the Fugly award, with the key achievements being: having your client rip-off a $200,000 sponsor get caught taking slimming pills SMSing several dozen women whilst shagging at least another dozen; and being photographed in a menage a FOUR (we'll count the blow up as a participant) .... well done for protecting your client's anonymity and personal life! Hey, wait a minute - is George Best really dead or is he now living in Australia....?

Eating in the dark with chopsticks

.........Is very difficult. Love Chunks and I were on our way to pick up our darling daughter Sapphire from my parents' place after three days holiday with them.

As all parents of school-aged children know, coordinating care throughout the school holidays can be about as tricky as getting Paris Hilton to wear a polo neck. LC and I realised a while back that even if we two never got to have a day's holiday together, we still couldn't cover all of Sapphire's days off. We get eight weeks leave in total and she gets a whopping thirteen weeks.

That's where my parents come in. They're classic SKIPees (Spending their Kids' Inheritance) and thus we have to book their services in advance. Otherwise they could be off to New Zealand, Greece, the Flinders Ranges or houseboating on the Murray river. They also have to juggle their longstanding commitments to Probus (apparently a kind of Rotary for Wrinklies, despite the unfortunate-sounding name), Country Women's Association choir practice, working in the LifeLine second hand goods store, playing golf, learning how to play competitive bowls and eating out at any hotel that features a smorgasbord.

John and Pauline were happy to have Sapphire for the week. In fact they were eagerly looking forward to having her all to themselves. All kinds of activities were planned including the obvious - 'Ice Age 2' and 'Eight Below' at the movies and trip over to Granite Island. They also booked two reading and craft sessions at the local library and took Sapphire to the whale museum.

She was also their willing (and chatty) escort to the Grosvenor pub's 'Tuesday Night Roast', Cafe Primo's 'Schnitzel Celebration' on Wednesday and eagerly joined the church social club at the Crown Hotel for 'Friday Night Feasting'. Luckily she took her bike and scooter with her because Grandma was making her famous little cakes and needed the wisdom of the six year old grandchild's culinary experience.

Love Chunks and I missed her terribly. At first we looked at each other after she'd driven off with Grandma and did an 'Oh What a Feeling' impersonation - "Yee Hah! We can do what we want, when we want! Let's go out to a restaurant that doesn't feature nuggets and chips on the menu!" Which we did - three nights in a row.

What dampened our long-forgotten feelings of childless freedom was, well, the child. Our house literally resonated with her - any second we expected to hear her little voice singing from her bedroom or to see the dog trot in with an array of flowers, scarves and beads hanging around her neck. Her toys were in every room and spoke volumes about her interests, her fun and her loving nature. Maybe that's why we went out: the house felt too empty without her....

At the restaurant, we were even worse. All parents have a moan about never having enough time or energy to be alone together and have some decent conversation (among other things), and, after a few moments of surveying the menu, Love Chunks' first stab at breaking the silence was, "Gee I miss her."
"Oh me too! You know, she did a really funny thing the other day when she....." and thus went the discussion for the rest of the meal. We talked about a few other things like what we'd do if we had the money to properly renovate the house, or what sort of car we'd get but they too were connected to Sapphire. The house needs extra space for her activities and the car, well we wonder if it's too old and unsafe for her to be in now.

So, by Friday night, we both got home from work as quick as we could. We knew that she was with my parents at the Crown Hotel for dinner, but figured that the 110km drive would allow us to grab a takeaway and be there in time for them to get home. And that's why we were sitting in our car in a sidestreet off Portrush Road, the windows getting increasingly steamy due to the freezing rain outside and our boxes of takeaway noodles inside.

"Why oh why did you get chopsticks when you knew we'd be eating in the car? I could have been driving and eating, but no, I'm sat here in dark with shreds of onion plopping on to my trousers..!"
He was right, but I took umbrage at his accusing tone. "It's not my fault - that's what they gave me. I'm sure you'll live - just lean right over the box and shovel it straight into your gob - it seems to work for you at home."
He snorted and poked me in the ribs with a chopstick. I squealed and reactively squeezed the box too hard, causing sticky sweet and sour sauce to ooze over the sides and drop onto my brand new jeans.
"You're a funny one," he said, smiling at me. "Let's go get our girl, shall we?" He dropped the empty box on to the floor and put the keys in the ignition.
"OK," I said, still pretending to be offended, "but you might want to take out the coriander from in between your teeth. It might be dark but it's not that dark."

"MUM! DAD!" Sapphire yelled as she climbed out of Grandpa's car and ran towards us. "Look at the swan we made out of a serviette!" We two grown ups might have been sticky, covered in spilt noodles and reeking of garlic sauce, but god, it felt so good to be her parents again.

A Stockman's breakfast

Last night we had Love Chunks' Melbourne boss, Roger, over for dinner and to stay the night before he left for a thrilling 4WD ride to Woomera to look at some new weather measuring equipment from Japan. LC was relieved that it wasn't him who had to make the journey, preferring instead to stay in his study at home, in the warm, computer chugging away and dog sleeping cosily in her beanbag at his feet.

After a huge meal of roast chicken, tiramisu and some delectable cabernets, we were all bleary eyed and ready for bed. "What do you have for breakfast, Roger?" I asked, playing the role of dutiful wife and soliticitous hostess.
"Ah, well, just a stockman's breakfast really."
LC and I looked at each other with blank expressions. Like we do most of the time, actually.
"What's that?"
He laughed, "Oh, a stockman's breakfast is nice and simple. You have a smoke, a piss and a quick look around."

And I think that's exactly what he did this morning before he left! I was out for a run with the dog and LC was having a more substantial breakfast of tea and toast. Sapphire soon woke up to her bowl of 'rabbit droppings' (as we all call them), or 'Nestle's cocoa puffs' as they're more commonly known.

My breakfast - a Working Mum's Breakfast - was a stray slice of cheese left over from making Sapphire's school sandwich, an orange cut into six segments crammed unbecomingly into the mouth whilst leaning over the sink to catch any juicy spurts and a meusli bar shoved into my pocket as I headed out the door. A few minutes later as I sat on the bus on the way to uni, I wondered about what other 'breakfasts' there are.....

The Newlyweds' Breakfast - (After a long Sunday morning lie in) - Percolated coffee in matching mugs, warmed croissants with gourmet jam, fresh exotic fruits. Usually eaten outside on the decking/balcony/garden bench with the newspaper divided up into the relevant sections and time out for a few kisses when trading the sections with each other. Time taken - 2 hours plus

The New Parents' Breakfast - (rubbing eyes) - "Whaaaa--? I'll feed the baby right here and can you just shove something in my free hand over here? Yeah yeah, that's fine, whatever - I can suck the condensed milk out of the tube hands-free. Hey, see that bowl of olives on the coffee table - can you push those over as well....?"

The Established Parents' Breakfast - (or maybe I'll be honest and call it MillyMoo's Breakfast) - "Wah heeey - there's some leftover cherry cheesecake, yesss! That'll go down nicely with a cup of coffee (with skim milk and sweetener mind you: gotta keep that weight under control)..... Wonder if I've got time for a second piece before the others wake up? Nah - I'll just take this easter egg and smack it on my desk for morning tea later on today."

My Boss's Breakfast - 11:30am, sharing a taxi back to the office - Holds up a clear plastic bag with what looks like gum tree bark and mushrooms in it: "Hey MillyMoo, want some of this?" "Err what exactly is it, Queen B?" "It's pumpernickel and cheese - it's supposed to be my breakfast." Nodding politely, I'm still cheeky enough to say, "Well good for you B, but I'd rather suck a bird turd - you go and enjoy it without me."

My Mum's Breakfast - A cup of tea so weak that she freaks out if her hotwater so much as looks at a teabag. This is followed by a bowl of her homemade muesli which has enough dried fruit and nuts in it to keep her chewing for most of the morning. To make it completely unpalatable, the top of this squirrels' wet dream-of-a-banquet-in-a-bowl is covered in bee pollen granules. They look like yummy yellow cake sprinkles but taste like, well, what they are: bee vomit. She swears that taking them has eliminated her hayfever and I don't doubt it. Besides, she deserves to get rid of it just for being brave enough to eat those noxious little pellets.

The Morning After Breakfast - Coke, non diet. Also known as "The Black Aspro." Lean forward so that the tiny fizz comes out of the top of the glass and pings against your nose. See: you can feel something, you are still alive. Pizza, always served cold. Microwaving it changes its dynamic and the smell will make your puke pipe want to work its magic. Stick to cold - the congealed grease will seal off your stomach and keep everything down. Now, shuffle over to the kettle and make a coffee with at least three teaspoons full.... gently now!

The 8 Hour Drive to Melbourne Breakfast - (Shielding our eyes from the rising sun as it catches every speck of dirt on the windscreen): "We're at Tailem Bend now. Time for a wee and some breakfast." Several minutes later, Sapphire and Love Chunks come back to the car with an identical trucker's feed: flavoured milk (chocolate for her, coffee for him) and two large sausage rolls with sauce. This gives me a second or two to feel mature and superior: "For goodness' sake, that's a terrible breakfast. Those sticks of bum fat are like Dr Who's tardis - they produce more crumbs of flaky pastry than were stuck to the sausage in the first place!" Then it is their turn to mock: "Oh, and a chocolate hedgehog slice and King-sized Kit-Kat washed down with nearly a litre of iced coffee gets the tick of approval from the Australian Heart Foundation, does it?"

The Dog's Breakfast - One weetbix, finely crushed, topped with a generous slop of skimmed milk. It is enthusiastically lapped up in less time than it takes for me to step back through the door, her tail wagging madly all the while.

And lastly, My Dream Breakfast (available only in MillyMoo Land) - Before Jude Law the masseur comes to gently wake me from my slumber, the help has left a silver dish filled with a dozen dark chocolate lindt balls, pesky foil wrapping already removed. Each one is sucked slowly, giving me that essential energy boost needed to leave my boudoir. In the kitchen, Love Chunks has prepared a platter of tropical fruits drowned in cupfuls of passionfruit pulp and hands me a cup of his freshly-brewed coffee.

'The Age' Sunday edition is laid out on the table, ready for me to decide which section to read first. Love Chunks joins me at the table in time for John Cusack to serve us our grilled bacon, scrambled eggs, tomatoes and wholewheat toast. My attention is slightly diverted by the sight of him rubbing down the kitchen counters....... Topher Grace clears the plates away in time for Hayden Christiansen to present us with ricotta hotcakes drowned in maple syrup and generously sprinkled with assorted berries. Now full and content, there comes a tap on the french doors overlooking the infinity pool.

George Clooney is there, tennis racquet in hand. "I'll just get dressed and I'll be right out, George!" I give Love Chunks a lingering kiss goodbye and watch his departing back as he walks out to the helipad on his way to his office in Port Douglas. It's great that he earns half-a-million bucks per hour but still makes sure he has time to have breakfast with me.....

Phantom Pharter

In every workplace - or so it seems to me - there is at least one person who gets their vicarious thrills by letting a few ripe clouds loose from their trouser trumpet. Or, in layman's terms, a sneakily smelly little person who likes to drop a fart, leave and let someone else suffer from the stench and get silently blamed for it.

At the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) in Melbourne, there was obviously a tribe of them because I was 'caught' many times. I mostly suspected the youngish, recent uni grads who hadn't yet integrated into the sensible slacks, grey velcro slip-ons or taken to carrying vinyl briefcases that were empty except for their newspaper and a banana. These guys were also the kind who still met up at the local grungy pub by the river for a bevvie or seven and could still physically handle staying out all night and turning up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for work the next day.

The building we were in was seven stories high and our department used nearly every floor. As a Project Officer for the largest unit, I was a regular rider in these and was often caught in the following scenario:

***

The green light on the wall goes 'Ping' and the doors slide open. I've got an armful of bulging manilla folders and am running several minutes late for a meeting four floors below. My mind is already focussed on my apology, what project updates I'll need to talk about and whether I've got time to SMS Love Chunks about booking the local Greek restaurant for dinner than night....

The doors close, and I realise I've got the lift all to myself and.... what the hell is that? Aww man, this stench is awful - did a horse die in here somewhere? I can't breathe...."
Ping! The lift then stops at the next floor and of course, it's our Chairman who steps in. Brian smiles at me warmly and settles in to do the usual lift-riding routine of looking straight ahead and staring at the glowing floor numbers.

My face is aflame with embarrassment and sheer mortification. What if he thinks it's me who produced this noxious odour? I can see that his normally composed face is twitching and he's now sneaking a few little glances at me, clearly wondering just what sort of creature I must be to have produced such a rectal reaction.

***

The above scenario happened to me on two other occasions, both with senior managers. It was awful to think that they thought that I had created - and proudly let go - of such a phenomenal fart. On the fourth event, I had to speak up. "Look Brian, I gotta say this. This --" I gestured all around me - "--was most definitely NOT of my making. It was in here before I stepped in!"
He laughed nervously, "Oh, OK then, whatever you say," and immediately pressed the button for the next floor, deciding that his original five floor journey with me was intolerable.

And to think that my employer held sole responsibility for Melbourne's air quality....!

Back to the present day and I find myself still suffering from the results - and unspoken blame for those results - produced by a university-based Phantom Pharter.

This one is female because she's limited herself (mostly) to the tiny little toilet room under the base of the stairs, the only facility in the heritage listed hellhole we work in. There are just two men in our building, and I'm 'lucky' enough to have my office right next door to their toilet, complete with rather graphic acoustics and the odd odour that accompanies their activities.

But I digress - our gassy girl is maybe a keen dhal curry eater, favours veges and is very, very regular. Yay for her, but not so for me, or indeed any of my fellow workers. Phantom Pharteress manages to drop a killer stink bomb no less than three times during the average work day. Said bomb has the staying power of a cockroach surface spray and literally contaminates the girls' room, stairwell, lobby and the photocopy room.

This time I was not going to suffer the undeserved blame at all and I spoke up right from the get-go: "Elizabeth, lovey puss, you, like me, have just walked into a wall of world-beating bum fluffs - it was here doing it's work before I came in, I'll have you know. I did NOT, I repeat NOT do it."
She paused for a moment to consider what I'd said, then smiled, and replied with, "Oh dear, I can't believe you just said that!", but then leaned in closer to me, "But I know it's not you, because it's been like this ever since I started here last year."

We then entered our respective cubicles, but kept talking over the noise of the drops and the plops. "Elizabeth?"
"Hmmmm?"
"Have you got any idea who it is?"
"None whatsoever. She must sneak in when the coast is clear, unleash her weapon of mass destruction and then piss off as quickly as she can."
"I guess that's fair enough. I just wish her mushroom cloud would dissipate in a few minutes and not hang around for longer than a Peter Jackson film!"
Elizabeth sighed loudly enough for me to hear. "Yeah, it never lets you escape."

The only upside is that so far Ph Ph hasn't taken to dropping them in the kitchen or office doorways as a malodorous joke. We can only hope and pray that she is one day transferred to a research unit far, far away. And preferably down wind.

Cadbury Crème Egg

Oh dear, sweet, accessible Cadbury Crème Egg. My fillings ache just by glancing over at you, glistening in your primary-coloured foil, stacked in a fetching pile near the check out.

Easter may have just ended, but you manage to linger on. Why is it that you, of all the commercial holiday refuse, remain at full price and all of the other pretenders to your throne (Red tulip, Cadburys, Heritage, even Lindt) are now thrown into a cardboard box emblazoned ‘50% Off'. They're not fit to be seen next to you. All are disfigured - crudely broken, holes picked into their sides from sticky little fingers, smashed into fragments or their boxes dented unbecomingly.

I may have spent the four days of Easter long weekend dreaming of you, but you were never made a reality. No-one gave me any of you - I would have smelt and sensed you long before you were plonked out on the kitchen table for Sunday morning anyhow. Don’t fret, little egg: I made do with many mournful mouthfuls of rabbit ears, dark squares, M&Ms and anything that my daughter Sapphire wished to share. Of course it wasn't enough: it wasn't what I really craved. That, dear Creme Egg, was you.

And so, two weeks later at the supermarket I now find my hands excitedly fumbling for my wallet; coins spinning on to the moving checkout belt. My surrender is now complete. The family groceries are paid by credit card but the pack of six Cadbury Creme Eggs are paid in cash, like a guilty secret, and shoved into my backpack before anyone else can see. Like a true addict, I fidgeted nervously and looked around for a secluded spot to eat one. Not out in the sunlight where it would be too public and possibly offensive for people to see, but in the shade, at the side of a building or beside a........ the alleyway by the cinema! My feet were yearning to run like the wind instead of badly act out the casual saunter my brain was imposing upon them. It wouldn't do to have someone else guess my purpose; I was never ever going to share.

A quick glance around revealed no other passersby, just bird crap-spattered cars, takeaway containers and cigarette butts. My shaking hands ripped off the foil as I eagerly hunched over the egg, shielding it from view. My eyes closed as my two front teeth bit hard into the thick chocolate. The egg white fondant poured out of the top and ran becomingly down the sides of my mouth, but I was already far away from my grimy spot on earth to care. Another big bite saw the fondant turn into a yolky yellow as I greedily gulped it down and chewed the chunks of chocolate at a more leisurely pace. Blood was now pumping warm in my veins and successfully insulating me from the wind and cold of the dull day. After only three precious mouthfuls, I had reached the last morsel - the bottom of the shell. No fondant, just a thick layer of Cadbury dairy milk chocolate. A cruel consolation because it left me wanting more.....

No thoughts at all for other people, my reputation or for finally making my sad little addiction general knowledge I continued in my quest for fleeting pleasure. The wrapping was ripped off in hurried, impatient movements as I crammed the top of the second egg between my teeth, not about to waste one more precious second before consummating the consumption. The foil remnants caused my fillings to buzz in dismay, but who cared - I threw the second half of the egg almost casually into my far-too-willing mouth. It was sheer heaven to lean up against the wall and chew the chocolate chunks and fondant into a dreamily delightful mouth mess....

As my eyes slowly opened, they revealed Debra, a research assistant on the floor below, shopping bags in her hands, gaping at me in disgust. "Ummf, ummf, chomp chomp, Hi there Deb," I called out, wiping the melted chocolate and fondant drool from my face with the back of my hand. Her answer was indecipherable as she spun on her heel and clip-clopped away from me as fast as her stumpy little pins could carry her.

I too made my way back to work, but with nowhere near her frenetic pace. It is disgust and not delight, that makes you do that. Instead, I was reliving my two brief-but-beautiful encounters with you, dear Cadbury Creme Egg, and feeling satiated. For now. There were still four of your comrades left, burning a hole at the bottom of my bag. My mental jury was out as to whether they'd survive the journey through the carpark, across the lawns, under the bridge and up the stairs..... Damn you, you ninety-nine cent oval object of evil !

Is it possible to fall in love with an appliance?

(Figuratively wagging my finger at you, dear reader): No no, no, I don't mean that appliance used mostly nocturnally by the lonely and lustful - but a dishwasher!

Love Chunks and I partially renovated our kitchen earlier this year and felt that our island bench deserved a state-of-the-art dishwasher inserted in it. We were hesitant: would such a box really be capable of cleaning cutlery as well as a pair of hands in pink rubber gloves? Admittedly I was the most skeptical. In 1988 when I was single, sharing a townhouse in Hackney and still convinced that a shaggy spiral perm was the epitome of sophistication, it was also the last time I had ever used a dishwasher.

It was a lovely poo-brown monster, with bright orange knobs on it in homage to the era that fashion, common sense and interior design forgot - the late seventies. However, for us it was only a few years old and certainly seemed a much fun-ner way of getting our plates clean than one of us doing it. Besides, we were diligent university students. We were much more focussed on drinking, finding money for drinking and learning how to cook (usually in that order), and these pursuits left little energy or will for doing anything as sensible as filling the sink up with palmolive and finding the green scourer thingy.

Therefore, the brown monster's first operation for us three girls was an important one: what luxury to have a dishwasher and how remote those arguments with my brothers about whose turn it was to do the dishes seemed. Jo, as the sexy but sensible geology major, read the instructions etched on the front and Fiona, the scatter-brained but creative writer flung in some dishwashing powder. I made all three of us my Tuesday night dinner specialty - toasted tinned spaghetti sandwiches with additional slices of cheese.

Our laboured chewing of the charcoaled squares of mostly inedible filling served only as a coincidental background percussion to the sounds of fury emanating from the kitchen. The windows rattled in sympathy as the machine seemingly sprayed, shook and blasted it's way through the 'regular wash' cycle. "Jeez, I thought that they were supposed to be gentle on your dishes," I remarked, giving up on my sandwich and venturing into the kitchen for a look.

There were some foam and bubbles oozing out of the bottom but what did I know - that also happened when Mum put on a load of washing and the drain in the laundry floor vomited the froth back up. Tentatively, I placed my hands on the counter directly above the machine, noting that the volume had now moved beyond eleven. The formica felt hot, but hey, what did I know - dishes had to be cleaned in hot water didn't they?

My head was starting to throb from the noise, so I grabbed three bottles of cider and backed out of the room into our living area. No respite there, seeing as it was all open plan. "HEY JO," I mimed, "CAN YOU CHECK IT? IS IT WORKING OK?" She bravely skulled her bottle and did a rather good impression of a muscle-man swinging his arms in determination. Good old Jo would know what to do. All of a sudden, the noise stopped. "Thank Packets of Panadol for that," Fi sighed. "At least now we'll be able to put on the telly and...." WHOOSH! WHOOSH! CHUGA CHUGA CHUGA WHOOSH!

She spoke too soon. Our few seconds of peace was merely the eye of the sudsy storm. It was decided that we three needed to escape the din and instead walk around the corner to the pub for a while. Several hours later we came home, full of spirits that produced a lot of good cheer. Had the dishwasher finally finished? Was the kitchen still intact? Yes it was. Jo opened the poo brown door of the dishwasher. Sediment from the detergent was still smeared down the walls and all over the glasses giving them a somewhat festive look. The crockery on the other hand resembled a basket of shattered easter eggs that sat mournfully in a puddle under the sprayer. "Stupid bloody thing," I muttered, giving the door a kick. Ooops - this last movement caused the three vegemite jars we used as drinking glasses to topple over and crack. "Er sorry Jo, I'll get you another couple...."

........... Eighteen years later, I read the dear old Dishlex's instruction book from cover to cover. It was quite an education let me tell you. I'd never even heard of internal fresheners or rinse aids and needed to phone a friend for pasta bowl packing advice. After a busy day of eating (for the dishwasher's sake of course) our first load was ready. Love Chunks popped in the block with the 'magic ball' (it just looked like a common old jaffa to me) and I shut the door. We agreed to select the 'economy cycle' and went to bed.

The morning dawned warm, balmy and bright with hope. Dear sweet Dishlex's door was opened to reveal a gleaming top and bottom drawer full of clean, streak-free and intact dishes. Perfect plates, gorgeous glasses, nifty knives and terrific tupperware. Blinking back tears - either from emotion or from sticking my head too far inside and bashing it against the stainless steel roof - I closed the door, leaving all of the magnificent dishware inside. I quickly looked to my left to make sure that Love Chunks and Sapphire weren't about to enter the room, and I gave the Dishlex door a kiss of gratitude.

Reality then set in - I really felt like a coffee, and the dog was pestering me for her weetbix breakfast. What a bugger - I'd have to unpack the dishwasher.

Blood in the Boardroom

My boss, Dr B, a respected university professor, was hosting a roundtable discussion on an extremely important issue last week (and no, I don't mean the introduction of fat-free chocolate with added fibre and selenium). As the newbie to the centre, it was my role to ensure that it was all catered for, set up properly and that all the visiting egg-heads could insert their data sticks and direct themselves towards the baguettes and fruit on the table.

None of the above responsibilities are difficult, unless it happens to be required of me, the clumsiest and most un-smooth person in the southern hemisphere. On this particular day however, things seemed to be chugging along rather swimmingly. The caterer had arrived a half hour early to set up the coffee machine and fill the long oval table with baguettes, fruit and carrot cake and I had already made enough copies of the program and discussion papers and put them on every chair in the room.

Midday saw the data projector working nicely, the whiteboard pristine (hint to youse all: baby wipes gets rid of the old faded scrawls that the eraser can't rub away) and a beaming Dr B exhorting me to stay and join her boffin buddies for lunch. "You've done an amazing job MillyMoo. I'd like to introduce them all to you as I'm sure you'll be forging some pretty productive working relationships."

Reddening, I accepted her invitation even though I felt rather sweaty and dishevelled after wrestling in the doorway-sized rat-hole that served as the boardroom's kitchen. I needn't have worried - of course, these were academics we were dealing with here, the kind of people who dress themselves in the dark and who think the Twist is a crazy new dance that all the young kids are doing.... Academics are a unique breed who are often world authorities in their particular fields of expertise but struggle to comprehend the workings of velcro. Naturally then, the baguettes and fruit were enough to impress - most of them would have been functioning on fellowships and grants that would have made a jar of international roast a daring luxury.

It was then that Bernard's keen eyes fell upon the plate of carrot cake. "Oh wait a second," I piped. "Let me go and get our new bread knife so that I can slice up some pieces for you." Off I trotted to our little treasure trove of kitchen implements. The rancid rat hole only possessed a bolognese-splattered microwave, a paper towel dispenser and some poo brown 'cafe bar' cup holders originating from the late seventies. Hidden in the corner behind the unclaimed shelf of warped tupperware lids, was a reflex paper box, and in it were our newly-purchased-from-KMart platters, glasses, serviettes and knives. Full of pride I scuttled back to the boardroom with the new Wiltshire glinting evilly by my side.

Off went the gladwrap as my right hand prepared to sink the knife into the glisteningly moist cake. Somehow, in less time than the blink of an eye, the blade skimmed the top of the cream cheese icing and instead sliced into my left index finger. Two seconds later when the pain finally reached my nerve endings and my eyes registered the cake being redecorated in red splatters, I dropped the knife, muttering something like "BLOODY HELL!"

This naturally brought the entire roundtable discussion to a standstill. "Oh, sorry folks, it's OK, I'll just um, pop out and find some, um...." Leaving an MA18+ rated trail of bright red drops behind me, I found myself again in the rathole, frantically pulling out papertowels and wrapping them around my finger. "POO BUM BUGGER SHIT FART!" I screamed at the bar fridge, giving it a kick for extra emphasis. "Why do these things always happen to ME?"

Dr B tapped me on the shoulder. "MillyMoo are you all right? Should I take you to see a doctor --- oh dear, it's seeped through and it's running down towards your elbow!"

The blood plop plopped on the floor in a steady stream. "Oh never mind, it's a good thing I'm wearing black," I said, smiling weakly. "You go back to your egg-heads ----- sorry --- colleagues --- and I'll find myself some decent band-aids." Such hopeful, naive words were rarely spoken in the heritage listed hellhole known as our Research Institute before. There was no first aid box, no-one in their office who'd been clever enough to stuff a bandaid in their briefcase and nothing other than toilet paper that was even remotely absorbent. (Actually that's not strictly true, but I don't think that sticking my hand in the brown berber modular settee abandoned in the front hallway would have been a particularly successful look either).

After ten minutes of much cursing, fumbling and dripping later, I tried to slip back into the boardroom quietly and unnannounced. No such luck. "Give us a look at your finger MillyMoo! Has it stopped bleeding yet?" "Do you feel dizzy from the blood loss?"

"Well actually yes I do come to think of it---"

"Have you filled out the OHS 'Incident and Accident Report form'?"

"Um no, I've been a bit waylaid----"

"We've sliced the half of the cake that wasn't tainted by your blood spill. Wanna piece?"

In my haste and greed to say yes, the triple layered paper handtowel came loose and more claret splashed onto the table, my elbow and the cake. As I dashed from the room in an aura of disgust and disappointment, I hoped fervently that the baguettes and tim tams made up for the desecration of the cake.

Old Boilers' Night

My dear friend Bec is getting married to her longtime love and co-creator of her two daughters, Phil. Whilst the nuptuals will occur next month, a friend decided to organise a Hens' Night for her on Saturday night.

Bec approached the idea with a fair amount of (quite reasonable) trepidation: "Look Pam, I'm thirty six years old. I don't need to wear a veil or have any condoms pinned on to my skirt, OK?" I don't know who was more relieved when Pam quickly agreed - Bec or me. No, it was simply to be a night out with the girls - food, wine, laughter and - if more wine was consumed - dancing.

Love Chunks and Sapphire drove Bec, Deb and myself into Rundle Street and were even kind enough to slow down to a mere 25km to let us roll out onto the tarmac unscathed. It was hard not to look after them with a droopy bottom lip as I longed to be with them at home, on the sofa, in my ever-reliable grey marle trakky daks, cuddling the dog. Nevertheless it did not take long for the top floor of the LemonGrass restaurant to fill up. There was about twenty of us 'hens', all frocked up and made up, and all a-chattering, a-clucking at Samara's 7 month-old belly and a-slurping the too-easy-to-inhale sparkling burgundy. Once again, the current trend in restaurant decor (hardwood floors, chrome and glass) made conversations only audible if screamed directly into my ear or drunkenly mimed in front of me.

The night was going along marvellously - as well as a moth at a lighthouse. I got to know a few of Bec's friends that I'd heard about for years and found that we all got along like well, the moth who found the lighthouse and then caught on fire because it was too huge and too hot and set him alight..... Or something like that; the sparkling burgundy was starting to play with my ability to pronunciate. Helped me hear a lot more though, I was sure of it.

Having ordered a Thai banquet for 20 was somewhat of a logistical challenge, especially when we were now onto white wines and vodkas. King Prawns scuttled away from my tenuous grasp with the chop sticks and the hokkien noodles were more slippery than a timeshare salesman at a seaworld smorgasbord. It was delicious though and made me very grateful to have worn all black for the evening so that the pesky beef strip escapees taking the perilous Cleavage route to the freedom of Skirt Valley could not be spotted.

"Whaaa-a-aaa? Oh, we're goin.... where are we ah goin to.....?" It was hard to tell whether I asked the question or heard somebody else holler it over the packed room of diners. It was easiest to follow the leader; the very decisive, tall, elegant and glamorous Kate. The Botanic Hotel.....!? My face glowed redder than the raspberry vodka I was holding as I remembered the last times I had been at the Bot. 1986 with Sean in the underground restaurant. Uber posh meal for us two students, of prawn cocktails (yep, resting on lettuce in wide champagne saucers), rump steak (with peppercorn sauce and chips thank you very much) and a chocolate mousse - hopefully not in a hastily-rinsed out prawn cocktail glass. And then, a few years later, on a date with Ian, the hopefully gropey geology PhD dude. His ancient Mazda smelled as though a flatulent jersey cow had slept in it, and Ian wasn't much better. My mature solution to avoid the inevitable octopus-wrestling conclusion to the hellish date was to liberally flush out my system with $4 bottles of champagne and then wind up - or should I say on the floor in the special room that flushes....

Looking around the velvety, funked-up interior didn't fill me with any sense of nostalgia, nor relief about the obvious design improvements. The front bar and pool room were jam-packed with hot, sweaty, 20-year old bodies - all of whom could have been my children, I realised glumly. My long black top, pink skirt and black boots had felt rather nice as I dabbed on some lippy in front of the mirror at home, but here I felt like I was looking for my young lad Nathan who had outstayed his curfew by two hours and had told me he was at choir practice.....

Poor Samara's difficulties squeezing past people with a Snoopy-like stomach forced the Hens to try the Stag hotel. Downstairs was much like the Botanic, but less velvet and more wood; and therefore much more spillage. This was all realised by my brain after my legs suddenly slipped through the beer slop, determinedly on their way to a full split if not thankfully stopped by the sides of the beer tables either side of the doorway. Any cool credibility I had was now gone, so I meekly hobbled after the rest of the hens up the stairs.

It was rather flattering to have our hands stamped by the bouncer and see him refuse a group of young girls and a larger bunch of young blokes. Why us? Did they want to increase the average age of the upstairs punters? Was it out of pity? Nah: after half a bottle of burgundy, a glass of white and two raspberry vodkas the answer was clear - it was because we were GORGEOUS. Our husbands didn't know how LUCKY they were to have such hot, intelligent, switched-on, sophisticated.....Oooops sorry about that Pam. I'll see if I've got some safety pins in my handbag when we get upstairs - I'm sure I'll be able to re-attach the bottom of your skirt somehow... these boots are longer and pointier than I thought.....

After venturing up the bar and having only been ignored by the groovy young bartender with Dumb Hair for ten minutes, I managed to scream out my order for a drink to make Pam less aware of her clothing troubles - "A double vodka with lemon and lime PLEASE, and I'll have a raspberry VODKA with...." My twenty buck note was eyed with disdain; not a bad achievement for someone with four eyebrow piercings: "It's twenty TWO dollars love."
LOVE? How dare he assume that because of my age that I'd accept being called such a patronising....... Hey, wait on a second - TWENTY TWO DOLLARS FOR TWO DRINKS?
Maybe I should have drunk up the spilt beer on the floor by the door instead of doing the splits.

Several drinks and giggles later, the other hens pushed their way through to the dance floor; a sticky wooden square wedged directly in front of the epileptic DJ. Samara sat with her hands on her in-vitro-vestibule looking weary. "They're all dancing, which is my sign for going home," I yelled into her ear. "Wanna go and find some taxis?"
And we did. Well, after taking another quarter of an hour hugging everyone goodbye, telling Bec we loved her and squeezing our way back through the sweaty youngsters - a 7 months' pregant Mum of three and her Nana, ready to jab someone in the buttocks with her automatic brolly if they didn't move along quick and sharpish.

I had a good night, honest I did. It's interesting - not fun - to do it occasionally, because it makes me realise just how grateful I am for what I have at home, which is the best nightspot in Adelaide in my opinion. The house was dark as I dropped the keys on the floorboards, gallumped around in my boots and dropped the eye-make-up remover jar on the bathroom tiles. All around me they were sleeping - Love Chunks, Sapphire and the orange dog. How I missed them that night!

My left ear hole

As my regulars know, I’m 37. And a half. Normally the reality of careening towards the end of my thirties like a greased up luge victim travelling faster than the speed of light really doesn’t worry me too much.

However, at my age, I thought I was long past the stage of getting pimples. I’m getting wrinkles instead: crows’ feet, laugh lines, frown furrows and even the marks made by my face scrunched up on the pillow take hours to disappear. Therefore it's extremely frustrating to wake up one morning - with a visage that will take until lunchtime to fully unfold – and see a zit on my neck; another hiding in an eyebrow and a mini-Mars gravitated on the flap of skin/cartilage by my left ear hole.

OK, so they may not be on my nose, chin or cheeks but with my fluorescent skin they stand out like angry red texta squiggles on a whiteboard. I mean come on….! It’s hard enough dealing with ageing without also having to endure the indignity of pimples as well.

Surely my posh Ella Bache ‘Purifying Emulsion for oily, sensitive skin’ (at $69 – Love Chunks will kill me) should be able to keep both wrinkles and pimples at bay? Just to be sure, I checked through the list of ingredients. In order of quantity, they are:
Water
PEG-8 Beeswax
Octyldodecyl Myristate
Caprylic Triglyceride
Cyclomethicone
Glyceryl stearate
PEG-100 stearate
Propylene Glycol
Tomato extract
Butcherbroom extract
Hydroxyethylcellulose
Carbomer
Triethanolamine
Methylparaben
Propylparaben
o-Cymen-5-ol
Trisodium EDTA
FD&C Red 4
D&C Red 33
FD&C Yellow 6
Fragrance

(Affecting crazed, Jim Carrey-like) smile: Well isn’t that nice. Don’t they sound all-natural and enticing! No wonder my skin is confused about being either a spotty adolescent or a particularly sprightly pensioner – it’s trying to deal with tomatoes, wax and something called o-Cymen-5-ol. Have you ever heard of anything called ‘o-Cymen-5-ol’? Me either, yet I’m willingly rubbing it onto my face…..

And for future reference, the exclamation ‘Crikey!’ isn’t just the sole property of fellow Aussie Steve Irwin. Forget the potential chemical cocktails or carcinogenic concerns of the emulsion and let’s focus on the money. This stuff cost me sixty nine hard earned Aussie dollars (about $10 bucks American, or one English pound) for what - a gloop of water and beeswax? Perhaps I should just go back to the sorbolene that ‘Ned’s Crazy Bargain Store’ sells for $2 per half-litre. If it feels too sticky, I could keep my eyes open for whatever slippery unguent is cheapest at Coles.

All this was tumbling around and around in my brain as I drove into work and gleefully found the well-hidden free car-parking spot this morning. ‘Free’ means that the ‘three hour parking ONLY between 8am and 6pm’ sign has been flogged, leaving just an empty pole. There’s six of us in a row that are willing to risk it and challenge any parking tickets that have yet to materialise.

Anyhow, I was feeling OKish. Still not thrilled about the face – Wrinkles and Zits give me the Sh---- sure-fire excuse for a blog; but OK enough. Until a fierce, cruel autumnal gust of wind swept through the gum trees, across the carpark and ……….straight up my skirt.

Of course I would be wearing a floaty, three-tiered peasanty skirt today wouldn’t I. Generous volumes of material and lace edging that so very easily enabled the breeze to blow it right over my head. At least it momentarily covered my face and my look of sheer horror and humiliation. Unfortunately it didn’t muffle my ears and so I heard a huge guffaw from the fat guy delivering a tray of focaccias to the Italian restaurant behind me. A sixty-something admin lady walked past me as quickly as she could; her eyes downcast but her mouth pressed shut in a grim line – clearly trying not to piss herself at my misfortune.

Actually on further thought, there was a bright side – my wrinkles and zits were hidden.

Death or Debts?

In the Age newspaper today there was an article about inheritance. Cheerfully they're warning us that if we’re counting on landing a large inheritance to pay off the mortgage and fund the world trip then we have not bought ourselves a ticket to Reality Land.

Researchers have found that the odds of someone landing a large bequest are small, with only one in every 100 inheritances big enough to buy an average house in Sydney. (That high? I thought only one in every 10,000 people could afford to buy a house in Sydney). The University of Canberra's National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling has found that more than half of all bequests in Australia are less than $20,000 and just 18 per cent worth more than $100,000.

Their study also found that people on higher incomes have a better chance of inheriting. "Those with the least need have the greatest chance of inheriting a significant amount," they say. Only 1.4 per cent of adults receive an inheritance in any given year. The boffins are at pains to stress that even though the average inheritance is currently $64,000, that figure is artificially inflated by a small number of very large inheritances that went to those who were already wealthy. (Typical isn’t it? Smug rich bastards just get richer when Grandma carks it, and they’ll be the ones who end up emulating Kerry Packer’s ‘achievement’ of only paying $100 per year in personal income tax and calling everyone not a billionaire a bludger....)

Sorry, off my soapbox and back to the subject at hand. With the typical inheritance beneficiary aged under 50, and the majority of bequests less than $20,000, the study concludes most inheritances will probably be consumed well before retirement. Therefore most baby boomers, Generation X-ers and Y-ers will not be able to depend on that increasingly mythical 'big inheritance' to see them into debtless retirement. If anything, all they’ll be able to do is buy a brand new Hyundai Getz and spend a week at Surfers Paradise.

Well, well, well…. The above article would be the paper evidence to flash under your folks noses, wouldn’t it? That’s right, those selfish early baby boomers (born in the forties) who all took packages at 55 and immediately splashed out on a new 4WD and matching caravan. Open your eyes: the roads are full of them – beaming Bruces and permed Pams in their gleaming road trains: hogging the highway as they tootle leisurely along at 80km p/hour on their merry way up to Queensland to avoid the chills of a southern winter. Whilst we are roughing it in our tents at the non-powered sites, the Bruces and Pams only leave the comfort of their 5-star mobile homes to squelch across the gravel in their rockports to use the ablutions or go buy some steak for their min-webers.

Not that I blame them – my mockery is just an obvious sign of jealousy. My parents are part of this generation – the SKIPs – Spending the Kids’ Inheritance Pronto. Dad was a highschool teacher (and a market gardener in his spare time; also a cricket coach, cricket player, tennis player, golfer, marathon runner, champion basketballer and art-class devotee), who decided that thirty years of teaching sullen teenagers the mysteries of chemistry and biology was long enough. Mum was a clerical assistant (after fifteen years full time mothering of three children; also reading newspapers to the blind, helping in the school canteen, Meals on Wheels, listening to children read, being the wardrobe mistress and costume designer for the local dramatic society, playing tennis, umpiring netball) who stuck at her job until she was 63 before receiving her Seniors’ Card in the post. She was the lowest paid in her office but could run rings around her supposed superiors - they were just 20 years younger when they entered the workforce.

My parents deserve to be SKIPs and I think I can confidently say that my two brothers would heartily agree with me. They managed to raise us on one piss-poor teachers' income when we were young and we always went away somewhere every single school holidays. We had our very own cricket pitch in the back yard - complete with nets - and somehow managed to survive on the tragic Australian dollar conversion rate when Dad transferred to Aberdeen Scotland for a year. (Although I never want to see another digestive biscuit or turnip-loaded anything ever again). Later they put all three of us through university with the staggering expenses that it entailed, especially the accommodation costs for three country bumpkins experiencing pub crawls, toga parties and skullduggery for the first time. At term holidays, their street was full of gas-converted early 1970s volvos that Dad had found for us: safe and cheap.

When we were finally off their hands, they must have sighed with relief, kicked up their heels with joy and whilst rubbing their twanged back muscles then looked around their house with dismay. Picture the scene: "Oh this is juuuust Great – we’ve got a house built in the 1960s that we’ve decorated in a late 1970s style in time for the 1990s. Our volvo is approaching 30 and the toyota has a beehive flourishing amongst the rust-encrusted back fender. The caravan is a bright-orange 1976 leaky nightmare and we’ve only been overseas once: 20 years ago. We've both shopped exclusively at Target - (Mum to Dad) - and you've essentially bought the same brown shirt, jumper and trousers since 1973 and I've either sewn my own or rustled through the sales racks."

So, for the first time in their lives, they started to live, really live. You know – buy a chocolate mudcake instead of the dried-out ‘butter cake’ from Balfours. The strong green canvas ‘designer’ chairs instead of the slatted plastic shockers from K-Mart. Most surprisingly to me was that they even started to go to the cinema – virtually unheard of before. The last time my olds went to see a movie not playing on TV was when they had just paid off the house - Mrs Mableson offered to babysit us and their idea of letting their hair down was to see 'Picnic at Hanging Rock'. In 1974. I worried about what Mum would make of the language, nudity and violence that would assail her delicate sensibilities. Obviously not much because she now goes every week and has been hassling me to see ‘Miss Henderson Presents’ because it has “tasteful full-frontal male nudity…”

And yet….. there’s a part of me that thinks: Oh Bugger. Sadly for Mum, both her parents had died when she was only 38 years old – exactly my age right now. Her share of the inheritance was enough to buy a brand new toyota landcruiser, a 23 foot long caravan and various other bits and pieces. It’s difficult to stop myself mentally calculating what that would cost me now: $85K easy for the ‘cruiser and at least $50K for the ‘van. Whoah, what we could do with $135,000 right now – pay off the mortgage!

Isn’t that absolutely pathetic of me? I’m exactly like the over-anxious losers that the Uni of Canberra’s research so clearly shows are NOT going to get anything like that and shouldn’t be expecting, well, anything of note moneywise.

The nice MillyMoo beams and says: “Go for it Mum and Dad! Travel, enjoy yourselves, entertain, buy heaps of stuff – you’ve earned so you should spend it! You did it hard to raise us, so now you should be spending hard!” The evil MillyMoo curls her cruel, thin lips and snidely mutters: “Yeah great, good onyers. It’s all right for you guys to be able to buy what you liked at our age but don’t worry, we’ll get by, we’ll somehow muddle our way through…..”

I want my marvellous, kind, funny, generous and creative Mum to live to 100. I want my perceptive, intelligent, funny and broad-minded Dad to live to 99. (That’s just so he’s in rigor mortis the same time as Mum). Therefore, I’m realising, only whilst I’m sitting here typing this, that I don’t want $135,000 to come my way this year.

.......Well, I do, but it’ll have to be via a lotto win. Or a scratchie ticket. Maybe a gold nugget, mysteriously buried in our geranium patch, dug up when I do my annual (and much-resented) weeding. A $2M overdraft from penguin books, simply on the strength of my dazzling personality, intellect and typed up chook scratchings...... I think I'm worse than pathetic!

Desperately seeking Sanity

Yes dear reader, it's been a few weeks since I've become enraged enough about the clothing worn by our so-called celebrities. Here's a few that have given me cause to shake my head ruefully before cacking myself with laughter.


First cab off the rank, Yasmin LeBon, was recently voted one of the UK's style icons.

(Invested with as much weariness as possible): *Sigh*. Those stupid little capelet things are about the dumbest things worn by sartorial slaves everywhere since we convinced ourselves that ----

Yassa's blouse reminds me of what my Mum's choir group used to wear with their black skirts in the mid-seventies and her skirt was clearly swiped from the satin and candlewick bedspread at my grandma's house.

Is it just me, or are you also disturbed by the trend in recent years to wear nothing that matches whatsoever. 'BoHo' is more 'Hobo' . If I dared wear this tragi-pastel ensemble out, I'd be compared to 'Mary' the rehabilitated mental patient from the fabulously funny TV show 'Little Britain'. Chances are I'd probably then lick your face as well "Eeeh eh ehhh...."



This uncoiled strip of twine is all that remains of Anna Kournikova these days. Any chunky muscles from thwacking a fuzzy yellow ball around have completely disappeared - instead she's gone for the standard, 'Welcome-to-the-US-of-A' emaciated starving starlet look.

Dunno why she's looking so pleased with herself: perhaps she spotted Nicole Richie across the room and called her a Big Fatty Boom Bah Lard Arse. Or asked her for diet tips.

Anna, Anna, Anna - go inhale (and keep it down) a big bacon sarnie right now. Then cram in some large fries, a huge chocolate milkshake and a KitKat chunky. Maybe I'll have one on your behalf.


I have never understood the world's fascination with the Moulding Bones or in particular, their lead wrinkly, Mick Jagger. He is simply a brittle little breadstick with a set of lips that could suck the juice out of a lemon in the next suburb.

So here he is: his latest model's very own ventriloquist's dummy, who unfortunately still gets the opportunity to sing for himself. His minders have to carry around a stepladder and a support shelf for him to climb up and rest his lips on in order to kiss her occasionally.

Anything more intimate than that is an impossibility: she'd slice him with her shoulder blades and any physical friction created by Mick would start a fire.



From crap rock to crap lit: Salman Rushdie with his 6 foot wife. Another case of mid-life, mid-multi-million dollar crisis.

....and I'm sure he married her for her exacting editing skills and insight into the issues facing modern muslims today.....

He looks so damn smug - I just want her to reach down and slap him rapidly on the head like Benny Hill used to do to the short bald guy on his show.... or just slap him, full stop.


Aw, bless him - Rogerin' Rod Stewart's opted for homespun comfort wearing a Scottish dressing gown and his wife Penny has gone for a sequinned stick of liquorice.

He's actually looking pretty grim because Penny just whispered, "Now you look here you sleazy little bugger - one flirty move from you at my niece's 18th birthday tonight and I'll hang you up on the coat-rack behind you and use your willy as a shoe shiner"

But wait, Rod's always lagged behind dear old Tony Curtis, here pictured with Wife Number Seven who is about 40 years younger.

Again we have the cleavage, the one-foot height difference and a look of total self-satisfaction from both sides: "I've got me a hot young gal....." and "I can close my eyes when we shag and think of my brand new BMW..."

Tony's gone for the RainMan look with the waistband up around his armpits, cutting him in half like a human humpty dumpty. Number 7 isn't any better unless she's actually a Marilyn impersonator in drag?

And finally, I present you with a photo of Gary Glitter, recently sentenced to three years in a Vietnam prison for sexually abusing two young girls. He's done a sterling job of visually convincing us that he's pure, innocent and absolutely able to be trusted with the local girl guides' regiment.

Dreams had better not come true

Admittedly I’m never too excited when the first sentence of a blog states: “I had a really weird dream last night.” But tough luck; I really did have a weirdo dream last night.

It was one of those dreams that your brain sends you to let you know that your bladder is full and it’s high time you woke up, staggered down the hall in the darkness and emptied it; all the while praying to yourself that, because your eyes are still closed, you are still asleep and NOT going to lie awake scratching yourself for the rest of the night. In this particular dream I was wearing one of those pointless Nascar racegoers’ hats that had a siphon running around the brim and a tube that fed beer directly into my mouth.

In all honestly, there’d certainly be a fair few Aussie car watchers (Grand Prix, Clipsal 500) that would regard such a device as being the best thing since getting a sun-browned butt-crack whilst still fully clothed. Anyhow, I was sipping away on the tube happily, feeling mightily pleased with myself and life in general.

A quick glance around me revealed the location to be the university: lots of tall, elegant gum trees, green grass and winding paths. ‘What was I doing here wearing this hat’, I wondered idly, noticing that no-one else walking by had one. ‘Perhaps it’s a concert or an all-day family event’, I guessed.

However then I looked down towards the blurry thin outline that was the drinking tube. That cloudy plastic python stealthily wound itself down around my waist, further down around my hips and disappeared into – well, gulp – an area that no-one would wish to drink some yellowish liquid from….. As I sat up in bed and brushed my sticky fringe out of my eyes, it made me realise that it put a new spin on the phrase: “I tip my hat off to you.” It also explained why I've never ever liked the taste of beer in my waking/sane hours.

Unlike the other bloggers, I very rarely have dreams that I can remember. If I do remember them, they’re normally recurring ones that are mundane: many’s the time I’ve been dream-running for my life/bus/partner/Frisbee/nearby toilet and woken up to find the sheets all twisted into a fabric plait and my legs still kicking along.

The other regular nocturnal nightmare is one where I am prevented from getting to where I desperately need to go. People call me, intercept me, accidents happen, I fall over, get caught in a traffic jam or asked to do more work before I can leave. This normally finds me clenching the sheets and quilt so tightly that I’m covered in sweat and still feeling unaccountably angry long after I’ve woken and skipped to the loo and back. Love Chunks once had inadvertently woken me up during this nominal nightmare so that he could have his share of the sheets and I yelled at him to “LEAVE ME ALONE, YOU HOLLOW-HEADED MOOSE MUNCHER!” No, I don’t know what it means either, but he seemed content to lie on his side of the bed without any covers.

Love Chunks has thumped me in the face on more than one occasion. Put the phone down, we don’t need the Domestic Violence unit; he was asleep at the time. He tends to nod off on his side, with both arms raised to his chin, ala Rusty ‘Cinderella Man’ Crowe. Unfortunately for me, when his muscles go into their psychotic spasmic dance, one of the fists shoots out and pops me a sharp one on the nose. Needless to say, we don’t tend to sleep face-to-face much any more. Also the thought of waking up to each other’s Morning Butt-Breath isn’t convincing us we’re missing out on anything either.

Love Chunks, like me, doesn’t have much to report inside his noggin’ at night-time. Well, maybe that’s a bit harsh, because he also has a recurring dream. In it, he’s sitting on the toilet, feeling OK, feeling comfortable, doing what a bloke has to do. Laying a cable; Dropping John Howard off at the pool; Posting Osama a letter...... All is well and good until he realises that he’s not in a stall or at home, but is instead plonked right in the middle of Rundle Mall, right by the Silver Balls sculpture. No-one is noticing him, but his embarrassment is enormous. Does he finish what he’s doing and walk away with confidence? Stay seated so that nothing pops out and scares the old gals on their way to Harris Scarfes? Ah, if only we had the foresight and lateral thinking we (mostly) possess in our waking hours – he should have put his cap on the ground in front of him and convinced some shoppers that he’s a living art busker. Might be more money in it than meteorology….

Perhaps I should try what my buddy Jillaroo recommends - Dilmah decaffeinated tea. Both she, hubby Kent and their friend Ingrid have all sworn that they’ve had the most psychedelic and off-the-planet dreams the night of slurping one of the dilmah decaff bags. I’ve forgotten all of the details, but I know that in one part of Jill’s jolly nocturnal journey she “did something to anger a nearby ferret, who rode his bike over and…..”

I'm not yet convinced though. Couldn't I sniff a few whiteboard markers here in the office and then go home to inhale a full family-sized block of Nestle Dark Cappuccino chocolate and get drunk on Bailey's irish creme instead?