Rarely have I been so disappointed in a sporting result as I was when I heard about Craig Stevens' decision to pull out of the 400m in Athens. Throughout the whole sorry process, which attained an importance in the eyes of the media and therefore in the eyes of the Reality-TV watching classes that I wouldn't have believed possible, both Stevens and Thorpe behaved with grace and dignity. However, for Thorpe to say that he didn't want any pressure applied to Stevens is a bit far-fetched. If he was serious about it, all he had to do was say that he wouldn't swim the 400. Why do Swimming Australia bother having the trials if they can just nominate somebody for a race based on previous performances? They've certainly changed their attitude since I was coaching in Central Queensland in the nineties.
And what about the poor bastard who came third, (Who shall be the answer to the most commonly asked question in Trivia contests for quite some time.), how good would he be feeling right now? If SA applied its own rules correctly he'd be up in Lonsdale Street in Melbourne right now, adapting to a diet of souvlaki and ouzo.
On a brighter swimming note, how good did I feel when Brooke Hanson qualified for the big show? I fair dinkum had tears in my eyes watching her dance down the pool apron to the award ceremony. It reminded me of Jennifer Capriati winning the Oz open. That's why you compete, for the excitement of achieving a dream, not about gloating or strutting about the place making a dickhead of yourself. Although I did enjoy it when the boys in Sydney gave Gary Hall Jr. a bit of an air-guitar demonstration after the 4x100 in Sydney. Only 'coz he's a dickhead.
After a while, when you've been driving a cotton picker up and down at 4.2 miles per hour (don't know what that is in metric, I'm too tired to work it out) you start to see things that aren't there. And not seeing things that are there. Accidents happen and damage occurs - you'd be surprised how expensive a 4m.p.h. crash can be. When you realise that the machine costs around $550,000 and that yearly maintenance on the picker heads alone costs $40,000 to $50,000 just on normal wear and tear some of the surprise may dissipate.
Thankfully, no accidents so far this year, but in the past I have seen pickers roll over, burn down and crash into various solid objects and once, when the driver had fallen asleep, I saw a picker pull out of the paddock, through the tail-drain and into the return channel. Would have been funny except the driver went out through the windscreen and over the picker heads, luckily he didn't get caught up in the angle-drives. Actually, it WAS funny. Nevertheless, it caused around $100,000 damage and cost the driver three days in hospital as well as his job.
A few years ago, when I worked at Colly Cotton, I saw the roof of the operators cab knocked off the same module builder three times in two days - twice by pickers and once by a boll-buggy. The guy operating the builder was a massive Maori shearer we called Gigantor. Luckily he had a sense of humour or we'd all be dead.
Following on from yesterdays information about my lack of sex in recent decades, Cees Veerman, the Dutch Agriculture Minister is taking steps to extend the drought. It seems that last Monday he addressed the Dutch parliament to outline his plans to outlaw bestiality. It's already illegal to castrate your own pets in Holland (doesn't mention the neighbor's Tom that spends half the night doing Ozzy Osbourne medleys on the fence) but now they want to ban loving your dog or gerbil in a very special way!
I've given up on finding a human women who will let me subject her to the base urges that infest my imagination - for hours and hours, time after time, relentlessly, like a machine. Well 30 seconds really, including a quick cuddle afterwards. Some of those Labradoodles and Cavalier King Charles Spaniels were starting to look pretty cute, especially with the lights down low and about half-a-carton of social lubricant under my belt, but now I guess I'll never know, curse those Dutchies.
Whilst researching today in that bastion of all things intellectual, the old newspaper I was putting the vegie scraps in (in this case, the Toowoomba Chronicle of March 13) I came across an article that may go a long way towards explaining why I have been out-of-sorts lately.
Apparently, sex is good for you. Well, duh! Although I suppose it depends on what sort of souvenirs you take home with you afterwards. Before sex, your body produces Oxytocin, a hormone that promotes emotional bonding. It is also produced by nursing mothers. During sex, your body produces Endorphins, which reduce the sensation of pain, leading to the well-known "natural high" experienced by athletes and spandex coated gym-freaks. After sex, your body produces seratonin, which I thought was a skin pigment, but apparently it produces a feeling of "satiety".
You will notice that I have referred exclusively to your body throughout this article. That's because I'm in a drought that's been going so long that in two months' time, I get my virginity back.
Here are a few occasions when kids have made me uncomfortable:
1. When teasing a ten year old girl about Guy Sebastian or whatever it's name is that won Oz Idol, (was the competition so bad that it was the best they could come up with?) I told her that "Guy sucks." Her reply? "He doesn't suck, he licks!"
2. Way back in the eighties, while drunk at a friends daughters tenth or eleventh birthday party I was conned into giving shoulder rides to the official attendees. Selecting the smallest and most angelic of the girls I put her on my shoulders and took her for a lap around the outside of the house, as instructed. Outside, in the dark, where no-one could see us, the following conversation took place;
Angelic Little Girl: You know those girls inside?
Self: Yeah.
ALG: They probably think you're fucking me.
3. Same party, later in the evening, when I had calmed down a little, (remember: eighties, tight pants) I was laid back on the couch when another Angelic Little Girl leaned over and said to my girlfriend, who was sitting next to me, "Gee, your boyfriend's got big balls."
And the point is...the bit at the front of an arrow.
After four recounts, the two candidates for the influential post of Mayor of Burke Shire Council in North Queensland were tied at 85 votes apiece (Wonder how long it was before they started calling trends?), so today the electoral Commission, using all the latest whizz-bang technology, allocated a different coloured marble each to the two candidates, Curly and Macca, and drew one from a hat.
Of course in Tasmania they do it even more hi-tech; a listener called in to the ABC to say that he ran for Mayor of a small town(un-named) and tied with the incumbent. According to Tassie election procedures, each candidate wrote their name on a piece of paper with the incumbent given the job of drawing one out. So what does he do? Draw the other blokes name out! Why didn't he crease his paper or write on a piece of foil or something so he could tell them apart? He deserved the arse - we don't need people that inept in government.
I was reading last weeks edition of Queensland Country Life today and read an article that said men in Australia died younger, had a higher incidence of pretty much every disease going and were more likely to have stress-related illnesses. Not indigenous men. Not gay men. Not homeless men. Not refugee or migrant men. Just men, which includes ME!
So now I'm officially a victim, where do I sign up for my benefits? Who's leading the class-action to sue those evil bastards who are depriving me of the right to piss and moan to same age as those oppressors of equality - wimmyn?
It's taken many, many years, but now I finally feel that I belong because now I'm a victim too!
I like beer and I like to think that beer likes me. It makes women more attractive. It makes me more witty and my comments more pithy. In fact, if I have enough beer, I used to be a pretty damned fine football player. Beer , however, does make operating this keyboard a bit of a challenge. Me and the boys have been training hard though, and I'm confident we can rise to the challenge, in the meantime, we'll be taking it one post at a time.
When I started this post I had something particularly clever and, some may say, poignant to say; I can't for the life of me remember what it was.
AND SO A BLOG IS BORN
Great rejoicing was heard throughout the world and grown men wept with delight as a shiny new blog entered the world. It will not contain well-researched or even well-reasoned posts cleverly designed to showcase my brilliant education, insight or intelligence.
What it will contain is whatever happens to be on my mind at the moment; which at the moment is Ray Robinson, the ATSIC Commissioner. He was on the radio today complaining that aboriginal affairs was being treated as a "political football". What's he complaining about - he's been a pretty handy little half-back in that game for years. Actually, it isn't just Ray-baby that's been on my mind; it's the whole aboriginal industry. If you have a look at ATSIC or any of the regional Land Councils you will see that the mindless pursuit of power, prestige and influence is not confined to the whitefellas.
Many years ago I lived in Alice Springs where I met an aboriginal girl, who , for the sake of clarity I will call Cathy Freeman. Actually, I met shitloads of aboriginal girls but only one of them is relevant to the story. She was not a local, but was from the Bardi people, north of Broome. Not only was she very good looking, she also had great taste and never let me even see her pants, let alone get into them. Cathy had been working for the Central Land Council in the excisions department for two years at the time I met her. So what had the CLC been doing with Cathy's Arizona State university educated mind for two years... Absolutely nothing. There hadn't been an excision claim in that time and the Powers-That-Be decreed that she wasn't allowed to work anywhere but her own department. Cathy got so bored that she would come around to my workshop on Saturday mornings when I would teach her how to rebuild old Holden engines. (CLC wouldn't let her do it during office hours because she might get behind in her work.)(When they eventually gave her some that is.)
So what's my point? I don't have one - I told you this won't be well reasoned. The spell checker just told me to replace shitloads with stilts. Who programmes those fucken things?
