Gotta love a fishing story.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately folks. I've been as busy as a one armed wallpaper hanger.

Here is a nice little story from my buddy Sticko for your enjoyment.


This one's about the kinda fishing trip we have ALL experienced at some time or other...

IT was to be the kind of fishing trip you hear the old salts bragging about when they turn to reminiscing.

We were looking forward to perfect weather, convivial company and plenty of bigg'uns in the cooler when we got back ... proof of our prowess in that age-old battle of man against the best nature has to offer (ie man's own innate stupidity).

We got off to a crook start. On Thursday night we gathered at Gibbo's to plan the grand weekend.

Apart from your correspondent, there was Gibbo, Killer, Whoppa, Chook and Howie, all old school buddies, apart from Howie, a gently-spoken physicist who immigrated from Romania 12 years ago.

Howie was decidedly nervous about the whole concept - firstly because we had decided to be "spontaneous''. You know, not plan ahead too much.

He had vivid memories of our past disasters, especially that camping trip to Oberon and the Jenolan Caves when he wandered off in search of bush orchids and a feral pig trapped him up a tree for four freezing hours.

The only thing which eventually discouraged the cranky sow was that it began to snow.

The other thing worrying Howie was that his ample Aussie wife Janine had reminded him several times that they had long ago locked in a promise to have dinner with her elderly widowed father on Monday of the Australia Day long weekend. More specifically,

what had really put the wind up him was that Janine had bought a new wooden rolling pin, just in case he somehow overlooked the appointment.

Anyway, Thursday's plan was flawless, except that nobody woke up at the appointed time of 4am on Saturday morning and we didn't actually get on the road until 9-ish. Just past Waterfall, Gibbo twigged that the fishing gear so carefully inspected and spiffed up on Friday night ready for battle was still neatly stacked in his suburban laundry.

We finally got the show on the road after lunch. Dusk was hovering on the horizon by the time we reached Kiama and every motel was booked solid. (We hadn't brought any blankets with us. That wouldn't have been spontaneous, would it?)

Every van and mucked-out stable in Berry, Nowra, Sussex Inlet and Bendalong was chockers as well. We kept driving south.

By the time we found a pub with six vacant beds, it was almost 10pm and all the jokes and camaraderie had withered with the increasing likeliehood of half a dozen slumbering old fools crammed uncomfortably into a Commodore sedan, just centimetres away from three kilograms of defrosting prawns and mullet gut.

After a hearty country breakfast the next day, we continued south to a picturesque spot just out of Batemans Bay. It was paradise. Crystal clear aquamarine and turquoise shallows, with dark basalt headlands spiking out into the sea on both sides of the inlet.

Whoppa pulled in a whopper - a 40cm spotted cod with gigantic mouth on 'im - before Gibbo and I each hauled in pan-sized bream and Killer came good with a decent leatherjacket. Chook was still empty-handed but full of confidence at this expectant stage of proceedings.

Howie was so excited that his thick accent made him nearly impossible to understand. He wasn't much at fishing, but he offered to help by carrying our catch (the first of many many more, we figured) to the safety and coolness of a rockpool, well clear of the surge and suck of the ocean waves.

"Hey mets,'' he called out to us, with the dumbest grin you ever saw. "Look thees bee-oo-ti-fel fish.''

Howie was squeezing a blue-ringed octopus in his powerful Baltic fist. The staff at Milton Hospital were fantastic ... professional, sympathetic and kind.

Janine wasn't quite so understanding.

Whats the go Blogger?

Whats the go with all the whitespace at the top of my blog?

Sorry folks. Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

How long before this gets pulled?

Stand proud citizens of Australia. Bob & Kezza thank you for your opinion and choose to ignore it. That is all!

Those fascist greens are at it again

In the tradition of great left wing fascists, the mighty greens are trying the old poll stacking routine again. Not content with just having biased polls such as "The Federal Budget is appalling because..." and "Our PM is a lying rodent because...", we now get the situation where they are banning dissenting voters outright!
Check this out.

Figures!

Dubbo

We spent last weekend in the beautiful city of Dubbo for the Under 15 & 16 Country Rugby League Championships. The drive up was a real eye-opener. Man it's dry out there! At least it was until we arrived. We had only got as far as Lithgow before the rain started and it stayed with us all the way to Dubbo. Top stuff!! Mrs Gibbo & I were a bit concerned that we were going to spend the weekend huddled, shivering, under an umbrella. We needn't have worried though as the facilities at the ground were first class. They had a covered grandstand that would be the envy of many City fields.

The Group 6 U16's campaign started very well on the Saturday, winning the first game.

The Group 6 Under 16 team after their win on Saturday. This was Gibbo Jnr's first ever game in the rain!

Sunday didn't quite go so well with the boys being solidly outplayed by Group11 who went on to win the comp. Just an hour after the first game, tired and injured, they backed up for another game and were unfortunately beaten again. Oh well!
The boys played quite well all weekend and showed great spirit to keep trying until the full time whistle.

A special mention must go out to the coach Bob and his intrepid staff of trainers/managers/sports med people. These guys give a huge amount of time and effort in organising a competition like this. Thanks guys.

Another special mention must go to the parents of the lads who have also given much time and effort getting the boys to training etc. We spent a couple of VERY social evenings in Dubbo RSL Club with some of the other parents who proved to be great company.


Three of the four Camden players who represented Group 6. Gibbo Jnr, Alex and Tom. (Karl missing.)

Thanks lads for a great weekend. Better luck next year.

And now.... back to club footy!

You can't polish a turd, right?

We've all heard that old saying about not being able to polish turds, right? Well...apparently you can. The problem is that all you end up with is a shiny turd.

This thought occured to me originally during Mark Lathams reign as leader of the useless whinging bastards opposition. It all came flooding back last night as I watched poor old Kim Beazley struggling hard on the 7:30 Report. You know you are going bad as an ALP leader if even Red Kerry thinks you are shit. It was like watching someone stab themselves to death. The poor bastard's has got nothing! Sad really.

I recently read Kerry O'Keeffe's book "According to Skull" which contained an interesting insight into the man. At the end of his career one of his team mates jokingly said that Kerry had done well to play for Australia because he really only a State class player. Kerry was miffed for a minute then realised the guy was probably right. He had done very well to reach those heights when he probably didn't have the level of talent necessary. It takes a big person to honestly admit their limits.

This was the problem with Crean, then Latham, and now Beazley. They have(had) risen to a position which was well and truly above their skill level and it eventually showed through.

Polished turd is still turd.

Self explanatory really

Cashing In

Hi folks, I'm back. Sorry about the lack of posts lately. I've been doing evil capitalist shit that has been quite time consuming. Anyways..................

I really haven't got much to say about the whole Corby thing that hasn't been already said. Frankly, I don't know if she's guilty or not...but, neither does any of the loudmouths who have been treating the Indonesians with downright disdain because, surprise surprise, they choose to do things a bit different over there. Gee, I thought that it was their choice to have a shit system of justice or not. Oh well!

What really shits me is the bastards trying to cash in on the whole affair, from various bloggers to the main stream media(yes channel 9, I'm looking at you). The worst of the lot though is the lawnmower company that My Pal Brian(TM) told me about. They are now selling the Schapelle model lawnmower. Apparently it can hold up to 4 kilos of grass and comes with a 20 year guarantee!

In fact, My Pal Brian(TM) went past Schapelle's work place the other day.
There was a sign on the door saying "Back In 20"

Bulldog Bob Brown

So this is what he did before politics.

I went to a funeral yesterday.

The first funeral I ever went to was for a guy I went to school with. It was 1978, the year after we left school. I was down the back yard with a bike frame tied to the swings, spray painting it from a can. My Mum burst out the back door in tears. “Randall’s been killed” was about all she could get out. I was numb and to be honest, I didn’t really know how to react. He was only 17 years old and his life was over. Man, 17 years old, that’s just getting started. He was out driving on his brand new P plates when they ran out of petrol. While walking to get fuel he was run over and killed by an idiot who was running from the cops.

His life was taken away through no fault of his own by a man with a Tic-Tac sized cock who tried to make up for his lack of penis by hooning around the streets in a hot car pretending to be Peter Brock.

I remember going to the funeral with a couple of mates. None of us had dealt with this before. It really cut me up to see his Mum and Dad trying to be brave. This is just a parent’s worst nightmare. Having to bury one of your kids.

The one I went to yesterday was the same. A young man, just 25 years old, with the whole world at his feet. It was probably the saddest funeral I’ve been to and I’ve been to a few. It was sadder than burying my Dad. As young as Dad was, at least Dad got a decent turn. This one had the same feeling as the first one. It is just horrible to watch a Mum and Dad bury their child.

The respect this young man and his family have in their community was shown by the absolutely enormous crowd that turned up. Half the crowd had to stand outside. Speaker after speaker talked of this lads’ genuine love of life, friends, music, sport and his studies. This kid packed more into his short time here than most people do in 60 years. It was a moving experience. Sad because of a life cut short and joyous because of a life spent well.

They told of a boy who was passionate about sport and music, both as a participant and a spectator. They told of a boy who went from being an average student to doing a double degree in Law and Commerce. All the while keeping up his relationships with his friends and his passion for sport and music. They told of a boy who had a genuine passion for life. They told of a boy smart enough to pay his board in alcohol so he could get frequent flyer points on it!

His life was taken away through no fault of his own by a man with a Tic-Tac sized cock who tried to make up for his lack of penis by hooning around the streets in a hot car pretending to be Peter Brock.

Rest in peace Tim.

I don’t ever want to go to one of those again.

Nashional Yoonion of Shtoodents

Check this out.



The whole thing contains only three lines of text. In those three lines are:

• Two spelling mistakes. "loose" instead of lose and "downloadble" instead of downloadable
• A redundant capital letter in "Services"
• The link isn't working.

You don't need a long neck to be a goose!

Maybe a better use of ones' time might be studying instead of politics or basket weaving?

I can't wait for July.

Rams by a thousand.

Camden Rams 16a's had a brilliant start to the season beating Mt Anan convincingly on Saturday.

It started out as the Gibbo Jnr show as he scored 3 tries in the first 15 minutes and another one in the second half. At one stage he had more steps that the Opera House.

The game was really won on the back of a brutal and enthusiastic display by our whole forward pack. Their defense was great and they were spirited in attack, even managing some great offloads. This is a great lesson to my mighty Eels. When the forwards go forward... well you know the rest.

Well done to the whole team. It looks like a great year ahead.

Go Parra!

Finally we remembered how to tackle.
Finally we remembered how to run.
Finally we remembered how to pass the ball.

And guess what? We won!

One in a row! we are on a roll.

This actually happened!

Over the weekend we had a small barby for my Mum who had a birthday last week. At the barby was a very close relative of mine whom I love dearly even though she is a very active member of my sworn enemy...the greens. We get on very well due to the fact that we very rarely talk politics. After a couple of quiet refreshing ales, I asked her to tell Bob Brown that he needs to starting answering his emails as I had sent him some and had received no reply.

She said "who did you send them to?"
"Bob Brown and that sheila with the penis" was my reply.
Quick as a flash she responds with "Kerry Nettle?"

Bingo!!!!

I nearly pissed my pants.

An Easter Message from Sticko

I got this lovely easter message today from my old pal and guest contributor Sticko.


Easter has arrived again and, far from being all pious and egg-cited, I'm just hoping to come through unscathed. The annual egg-fest was never the same for me after Rosie bit into my cheek when I was a wide-eyed four-year-old, drawing blood and sending me screaming into my mother's apron. Rosie was a fluffy white rabbit, given to me by Grandma Bourke in the vain hope it would make me sit still long enough for her to tell me the REAL story of Easter.

Grandma was a pious woman with a passionate belief in the Good Book. She has a penchant for delivering sermons in a voice hushed with holiness, reminding us that we were put here for a reason - and we must never, ever reject God's plan for us.

Her zeal for spreading the word made me believe God's task for Grandma involved her personally saving at least 3000 heathens from the smouldering maw of Hell and, at the age of 78, she was acutely aware she was still well short of her target. Surely that was the only reason she'd bother spending an hour or more every weekend chiding our shapely baby-sitter, Miss Beryl, for reading trashy Barbara Cartland novels and not wearing gloves on Sundays as she filed into St Stephens at Newtown.

I discovered a bit later, after Miss Beryl met our paperboy Jimmy, that our buxom baby-sitter was never even the remotest chance of becoming one of those blessed 3000.

But back to Rosie. Far from being a compliant, child-loving bundle of soft fur, Rosie turned out to be a neurotic beast whose beady red eyes used to gleam with malice whenever a child wandered within striking distance. Any effort to pat her or, Heaven forbid, to pick her up for a cuddle, was greeted with the same kind of welcome a mailman gets from a mastiff. Rosie mysteriously disappeared from her hutch shortly after the biting incident and, I must confess, my grieving period was almost indecently brief.

A few years later, the Easter spirit took another pasting at our place. Grandma Bourke was feeding me chunks of chocolate Easter egg, sandwiched between parables from God's Word and admonishments for squishing wads of Juicy Fruit into my sister's long, golden hair. All the while, grandma held the partly-dispensed Easter egg in her uplifted left hand, out of my reach and my line of sight. I guess she sensed I'd make a lunge for it before Nicodemus had finished helping Joseph of Arimathea to bury the crucified Son of God if she didn't keep that egg at arm's length. That's probably why I didn't notice the skerrick of metallic foil stuck to the wedge of chocolate grandma thrust at her captive potential convert.

My first realisation of this oversight was a searing, scarlet-coloured pain which circumnavigated my skull when that tiny piece of silver wrapper touched a filling. I thought grandma had stabbed me in the chops with a chocolate-covered knitting needle; grandma thought I was possessed and started furiously with her grey head tilted back and her eyes half-closed. That scared me even more than the pain in my tooth so I again took off for the safety of mum's apron.

Trouble was, mum was in the middle of making a batch of hot-crossed buns and those clumps of spotty dough went flying. Mum began yelling and that interrupted my father's sacred hour of The Goon Show on the wireless. When he came to investigate, my old man's face was the colour of tomato sauce. So, grandma was wailing for God's forgiveness, mum was glaring at me, dad was ready to wring my neck and my tooth felt like a lava flow.

I was grounded, there were no hot-crossed buns, and Miss Beryl and Jimmy were the only one who got to go to the Royal Easter Show that year. It was their first date and they became "an item". Grandma offered frosty congratulations but, deep inside, was scandalised by Beryl's betrayal.

Nevertheless, the old dear bought them a gift: a fluffy little white rabbit- which she named Rosie.


Note from Gibbo: This contribution reminded me of a character that needs to be explored further during some of my "roadie stories". The one and only Jimmy, cousin of Sticko, our gracious author. I'm not sure that he is the same one mentioned in the story above but... in all the years I spent roadying, I only ever met a couple of characters like Jimmy. How many people do you know that can drink a bottle of bourbon... during the load in and then another one during the show! I'll put my mind to it and tell a Jimmy story or two real soon.

Medic!

Oh well, the euphoria lasted a week. As predicted by the Funelweb in last weeks comments, the wheels fell off Parra in a spectacular fashion yesterday. What the hell do we have to do to maintain some sort of consistency? They remind me of someone learning to knit. Knit 1, Pearl 1, Drop 1.
Have some pride in your jerseys boys!
I am going to get my arse kicked at the pub this week. Far too many bunnies boys there.

On a brighter note:
Camden Rams 16a's had their first trial match yesterday against Shellharbour and the boys looked great. It was a very convincing win although I lost count of the score at about 40-6. Gibbo Jnr scored one and almost had another couple but was cut down on both occasions by some great tackling. I can't wait for the season proper.

On a sour note:
John Hopoate is a fucking coward and needs to be run out of our game. If the Judiciary don't do it then Manly should.

Too much footy is hardly enough.

Well folks, the footy is back and Gibbo is in pig skin heaven. Not only did the mighty Eels win but Gibbo Junior also scored a try in his first ever rep game for Group 6.
The Eels beat the Tigers 28-12 in a scrappy game but a win is a win eh? The new half seemd to go well but there is still a long way to go. I notice that some of the tipsters have us as a real chance of making the top eight this year. I bloody hope so.

The Group 6 game was a beauty too. We played against Group 16 at Robertson Showground. It is a classic footy ground about as flat as Gibbo's stomach. Not too bad if your running down hill but a bugger if you are running up it. A well placed kick will run for half the length of the field, a tactic that our boys used to their advantage a couple of times.
We led at half time 16-10 but the Group 16 boys fought back to get to 16 all. Gibbo Junior then pounced on a loose ball and sprinted 50m to put one in under the posts. To my (very biased) eyes this was the turning point. The boys put another one in shortly after to seal it at 26-16.
Even though these guys are only 16, the skill level shown is very high and it was a quality game.

Those of you moan about the modern game of Rugby League and its' commercialism should get off your clackers and watch a local game.

Gibbo goes Brazilian

Shave for a Cure time is upon us once more and Gibbo has again left all common sense at home to go Brazilian.



One of these bloke is an world renowned, jet-setting, playboy movie star. The other one is Jackie Coogan.

It's all for the sick kiddies folks. Get ya wallets out and dig deep.

Mac...quarie Fi...elds For...ever

This is a letter from our local paper this week. I wish I had written it.

"I feel sad for the decent residents of Macquarie Fields, shamed and terrorised by the violence in their streets.
I am also sickened by the 'poor disadvantaged people' philosophy. Thay have disadvantaged themselves: they're uneducated because they wouldn't go to school, they're poor because they're too lazy to work and too dirty to clean themselves up for job interviews.
They're not outcasts but place themselves outside laws, our morality, our humanity.
If anyone deserves their hate it is the parents who were too selfish to make them get an education, too uncaring to teach them right from wrong or to respect others, and too irresponsible to raise useful members of society.
Sadly, it is glaringly obvious that this rabid mob don't care about their own dead, they're thoroughly enjoying theexcitement and destruction, and gloating over the publicity.
I have good friends who grew up in housing commision areas. They cared enough for their kids to lead them in to good and fulfilling lives.

Name supplied but withheld.
St Andrews."


Image via "My Pal Brian"tm

I don't know if Tim Smith is the answer.

I know things have been a bit grim for my beloved Eels of late but I'm not sure that I entirely agree with one of their new signings.
Apparently Tim Smith is jumping into the halfback role.
Look...he was funny in the Comedy Company but I'm not sure about halfback. Looks like he might need to take a bit of beef off first.



Whaddya reckon?

You can't always get what you want...but sometimes you do!

The Gibbo's are moving this week so posting will be light.

Mrs Gibbo's parents have become rather frail over the last few years and the job of fetching after them has largely fallen on Mrs Gibbo. We made the decision a while ago to look for a house with a Granny flat so we could move them in with us. The search was long but we ended up having to look for a house that didn't have a flat, but had the space to put one. This, of course, involves dealing with f***wit councils and jumping through many hoops. Finally an appropriate house was found in an area that wasn't too far from where we wanted and that had a large garage that could be converted. Then the real games began. The gooses we were buying the house from decided to play games. Basically they were broke and wanted all sorts of payments in advance to help them move. Well, we played that game for a couple of weeks before I got the shits and pulled the plug. The small loss of our initial deposit was dissapointing but the games were getting worse.
This left us in a great position. The In-laws place had already been sold so now they were moving in with us... Granny flat or not!
Mrs Gibbo, to her ever lasting credit, remembered a house that we had looked at 18 months ago but couldn't afford at the time. It was perfect for us. It was a really nice house that already had a brilliant two bedroom granny flat, was walking distance to the school that the kids already attend, was close to the shops, staggering distance from 4 pubs, close to footy and cricket training... the bloody lot mate! She had been told that the house didn't sell so she decided to write the owners a nice note asking whether they were still interested in selling. We got a call the following day in the affirmative. Yeehah.
To cut a very long story short we went around and met with the owners who turned out to be absolute Angels. A deal was struck that was beneficial to both parties without the aid of a real estate agent and it has been go-go-go ever since.

Anyways... I'll be furiously packing boxes and lugging stuff for the next few days, and I bloody love it. This really couldn't have worked out better for us.

"You can't always get what you want." Bullshit!!!!

There may have been an election at the weekend.

I went for a quick search this morning around some of the loony left blogs to get their reaction to the elections in Iraq.

Election? What election?

Chris (of death) Sheil has nothing to say.
Apart from the usual, shameless self promotion, Darp has nothing to say.
Apart from shamelessly promoting Darp (love is in the air I think!), Weezil has nothing to say.
She Sells Sanctuary has nothing to say.
Anonymous Lefty has nothing to say. Update: Comment has now been made, but guess what? It was a whinge!
Troppo Armadillo has nothing to say. Update: My mistake. The Armadillies have made comment. Thanks TimT for the heads up.
Psephological Catechism has nothing to say.
Piss n Vinegar has nothing to say. Update: Comment has now reluctantly been made. Mainly it was a whinge about me though. But, nevertheless, it was a whinge.
Robert Corr has nothing to say.
Richard Neville has nothing (coherent) to say.
The Line of Contempt has nothing to say.
Finally... over at John Quiggins place, we get the only comment... and it's bad. He, apparently, is concerned that "there’s always the risk that the Americans will make a unilateral decision to cut and run at the worst possible moment."

Gutless, whinging, fuckwits who make no positive contribution... the lot of 'em!

Off Your Face!

UGLY people all over Australia have started furiously saving their money. Their partners, particularly those who read today's newspaper report about the latest medical breakthrough - human face transplants - are diligently helping them squirrel away enough for a deposit. They dream of one day waking up next to Redford instead of Redneck, Britney instead of Bushpig.

Yep, it's true. Two British surgeons have outlined their face transplanting technique in the distinguished medical mag The Lancet, and barely is the ink dry on the story than the queues have started forming.

Incisions would be made around the back of the head and the scalp of the dead donor, and the face would be effectively `de-gloved' off the skelton, declared surgeons Peter Butler, of the Royal Free Hospital in London, and Shehan Hettiaratchy, from Harvard Medical School's Transplantation Biology Research Centre. The implications of their nightmarish discovery are horrendous.

Their work raises serious ethical and moral questions, such as `What if Cher hears about this?' She'll be Turning Back Time and annoying music lovers for centuries. Shane Warne will never retire from the Australian Cricket side and poor ol' Plugger will kick more behinds than anybody should ever be entitled to.

But seriously, people will abuse this discovery. No mistake about it. It might be funny to watch an ad where a guy hallucinates that Merv Hughes haunts him everywhere he looks and everywhere he goes, but now it could actually happen. Now I've got nothing against big Merv. He did heroic things in the name of terrorising English top-order batsmen, and perhaps it would entirely inexcusable to see him behind the wheel of a cab or serving schooners, but I draw the line at him turning up behind the checkout counter in Coles, particularly wearing a name-badge with the word Sharon typed on it.

Other things could go wrong too. Terrible coincidences could occur. Imagine walking into MacDonalds and seeing your loathsome and recently-departed Aunty Beryl - the one who always forced you to eat mounds of boiled spinach when she babysat you as a child - smirking, alive-and-kicking, at the table next to you. That masochistic teacher who used to wield the cane with such relish at high school could turn up at the office after just a few hours under local anaesthetic at Dr Hettiaratchy's exclusive surgery, sit down in your boss's chair and reach for the rattan. And what about the consequences if they link this latest breakthrough with existing scientific techniques in the controversial field of cloning. An unsuspecting movie buff - one with taste and discretion - could stroll into a post office and be confronted by a queue of stammering Schwartzeneggers or swaggering Stallones.

A dozen Stan Zemaneks could join your beloved golf club. Just think about that! Or a flock of Bronwyn Bishops could over-run your favourite cafe without so much as a warning hiss of hair spray. Disaster!

There are cultural ramifications to be considered in proceeding with face transplants as well. For example, the concept of ``losing face'' will be changed forever.

What if rich people started hoarding faces, a sort of personal library to suit every mood. The point of calling someone ``two-faced'' would be lost, for example. It would merely mean that they couldn't afford to have a whole wardrobe. The wealthy would quickly amass a comprehensive range in the same way Imelda Marcos collected shoes.

Just picture the with-it social butterfly: "Now, let's see, a political dinner ... ah, of course, I'll pop on my Amanda Vanstone". Then off to a dance party ... hmm, time to clip on the Kylie.

"Facelift" would be the new term for shop-lifting, a "face-off would be a simple change-room, and asking somebody "why the long face?" would force them to pop on their Bert Newton to avoid further scrutiny.

On the positive side, though, face transplants could offer some interesting options in conflict resolution.Imagine the next time that bastard neighbour started harping on about the noise from your party, threatening to come over and punch your lights out. You could try a whole new approach:

"Sorry, pal ... yeah I know I'm an ignorant, dopey dickhead who doesn't deserve to breath ... look, just hang on a sec, will ya".

You duck indoors to your study, and quickly flick through your face-a-fax.

Hmmm, nothing much under the A index ... how about the Bs, then ...

Let's see, Barrymore, Belafonte ... yes, here we are, this one

should do the trick .... the Bin Laden ...

From the keyboard of guest contributor Sticko.

Doin' a Sheilsy

Perenial loser, Chris Sheil, has stuck his head up again and is in classic form. The bloke has more positions than the Kama Sutra. Basically, he is the king of the each way bet. If you bet on enough horses, one might win. Unfortunately a lot will lose. That doesn't deter Chris at all. In his latest effort, he "endorses" Kevin Rudd but "predicts" Kim Beazley. Can't be wrong then eh?

I think that this tactic has some merit so I've decided to apply it to the Rugby League this year.

As most of you know, I am a Parramatta supporter so I am going to "endorse" them for the 2005 premiership. Because I don't think really that they will win, I've decided to "predict" that The Roosters will win.
I "suspect" that The Bulldogs could win.
I "presume" that The Cowboys could win.
I "envision" that Brisbane have a good chance of winning.
I "expect" that Canberra may win.
I "foresee" that The Rabbitohs will win this year.
I "acknowledge" that Cronulla may well win.
I "encourage" The Panthers may in fact win.
I "subscribe" that St George will come out on top.
I "stand behind" The Warriors as clear favourites.
I "advocate" that Melbourne are unbeatable.
I "contend" that the Knights are certainties.
I "recommend" Manly as a shoe in for the title.
I "prescribe" that the Tigers can't lose.

Thanks for the technique Chris. I can't lose!

Going on a real tour.

The “tour” story about Bandanna apparently gave some people, including my beloved Mrs Gibbo, the idea that touring was some sort of wonderful, bohemian lifestyle chock full of naked women, intoxicating substances and midnight law breaking!. In an effort to correct this very misguided idea, I would like to present a tale from the other end of the scale. A real tour!

Update. After a phone call from brother of Gibbo ,who dug up the original tour schedule, I have slightly ammended the list of gigs. Thanks mate.

It was 1992 and we were working for a great bloke by the name of James Blundell.


He was red hot property at the time and we worked hard. 6 shows per week, every week for 6-10 weeks at a time. If we could fit a matinee show in we would as well. Monday was classed as a “day off”. It’s funny how driving up to 12 hours can be considered a day off. We literally were on the job 7 days a week for weeks on end but it was great. I can honestly say that some of the best times I ever had professionally were with this band. There were a lot of factors that contributed. James himself was a thorough professional and a real gentleman. The band were absolutely red hot, all top class musicians and all top blokes. They were an absolute joy to watch. The crew all got on well and all did a great job. The standard of venues was usually good. Clubs, theatres etc and the hours were very civilized for people in our line of work. It was usually an 8pm to 10:30 show which is much earlier than a rock gig.

A day usually went something like this.

• Wake up in a hotel/motel room somewhere at around 8am
• Have coffee, shower, get dressed all while watching the tele.
• Drive to the next town on the list. Stop for breakfast/lunch on the way.
• Arrive for load in at venue at 1pm.
• The first road case off the truck was known as VIC. Very Important Case. In it was an urn, tea, coffee, biscuits etc. This got set up first so the water was boiled for a hot cuppa after the load in.
• Load in and setup 8 tonnes of PA, lights, staging, instruments etc. It usually took 3 hours as long as the room had easy access. Sometimes you carry that gear up as many as 4 floors, up the back fire escape quite often.
• Be ready for the band to arrive about 4:30pm for a sound check. This usually took an hour.
  Brother of Gibbo at his post side stage during a soundcheck. His job was to keep the whole band happy on stage by providing 8 seperate monitor mixes to an array of speakers on stage. Do you know what the difference between a Monitor Guy and a Toilet is? The toilet only has to deal with one arsehole at a time.
  
  
• You do a quick tidy up of any last minute crap like setting up the merchandise stand or such, followed by a search for something good for dinner. You try to have one “decent” meal a day if you can swing it.
• Get ready for “Doors open” at about 7pm.
• Support act on at 8pm for 30 minutes.
• Main Act at 8:30pm for nearly 2 hours.
• Pack up. With six crew we could pack up and load 8 tonne of gear into the truck in 1½ to 2 hours which usually got you back to you room not too far past midnight.
  
  The never ending stream of black boxes. Note the downing of a well earned, refreshing ale.
  
  
• A few late night beers and a little tele and off to sleep.
• Do it all over again, and again, and again…

As I said, they were pretty good hours really but shit we did some driving.

This is, to the best of my recollection, just one leg of a tour that we did, covering about 4 weeks.

Day 1, drive for about 1000k’s to meet up with the band and half the crew in Brisbane who have been doing record company promo shit.

Leaving NSW. Note the rainbow.

Arrive in Brisbane to find that the record company is still paying for room service. Yeehah!
The next day we are on in earnest. It starts with a drive to Gold Coast to pick up extra lights then off to Toowoomba for the first gig. Up 1 flight of steps!
then(roughly) Kingaroy, Caloundra, Gympie, and Bundaberg.


Some of the boys doing common after gig activities. One is passed out drunk. The other is dribbling shit to his Mrs on the phone just before passing out drunk.

We get a day off at some resort at Bundaberg before the show. The weather is shit so we just bum around all day but appreciate the rest already. We actually sit down to a real meal in a good restaurant. Wow.
Update. I was reminded that I had my first Cane Toad kicking experience in Bundaberg. Happy days indeed!

Then Gladstone, Rockhampton, Emerald, Dysart, Mackay, Townsville and Ayr. I get to catch up with my Auntie Margie and a few of the cousins in Townsville. We even get devon sango's with Uncle Ray the next day on our way out of town. Bleedin' luxury.
Enough of the socialising though, it's off to Cairns.
Even though the gig is at Innisfail, we drive a couple of hours past it as we are staying in Cairns and for some forgotten reason, we need to go there first. We then turn around and drive a couple of hours back to the gig at Innisfail. On the way back to Cairns after the gig that night, I fell asleep driving the truck. Luckily, the guy in the passenger seat was awake and managed to wake me up. He only realised I was asleep when we crossed the road rounding a bend and ended up sideways. Something that is not recommended in a truck! I was wide awake for the rest of the trip.
We got back to our room in the early hours of the morning to find that two of our rooms, mine included, had been robbed. In all the years I travelled, this was the only time it ever happened. They got away with mostly clothes and a bit of cash. I think a few other things went missing that weren't reported to the Police! Bastards.
We had the next day off in Cairns which was spent mostly sleeping. That night we walked into town to find a Blues Festival going on. It turns out that one of the acts are friends of mine and I am drafted into doing sound for them. So much for the day off. We end the night at Johnos Blues Bar, pissed as nits, watching Phil Emanuel go off. What a great night.
The next day we do our gig and as soon as the truck is loaded, we start the trek to Mt Isa. The first stop is Townsville for a few hours sleep in a bed. Then head about 1500k's inland. Fuck it's a long way. This is the last gig of the run and after this we are heading back to Sydney for a few days off before doing Southern NSW, Victoria and South Australia.

Shutting the truck in Mt Isa, ready for the 3 day drive home. That pan is 26foot long and is chockablock full. Top to bottom, front to back. My Uncle Ray who is a "real truckie" said it was a "poofy town truck that had no right to be driven so far."
The truck becomes a central part of life on the road. You drive it, sleep in it, eat in it and it carries your entire life for months at a time.

Nearing the end of the first day driving home, we came across the famous Blue Heeler Hotel at Kynuna which was the subject of James' first(I think) Golden Guitar winning song. We decided it would be a great idea to stop for a pie and a few beers. The publican was really friendly regailed us with stories of when the film clip was being shot. It was a real big deal for them and they treated us well.

Leaving The Blue Heeler.

Crossing the desert that night we were treated to the beautiful sight of a desert sunset.


"Only two more days of driving boys, and we're home!"

Linux is like communism.

I saw this great comment today on Tim Blairs' site:
"I run Linux, which was built by a world-wide group of individuals in their spare time for the good of humanity. "
Classic stuff eh?
I was only thinking about Linux myself the other day, and how much it was like communism.

• Most of the people who recommend it don't actually use it, but they think that you should be.
• It seems to work much better in theory than reality.
• If it doesn't work, it's because you weren't using it properly.
• It is advertised as free but it takes twice as much of your time to accomplish half the result. Apparently your time isn't counted as a cost.
• It is for "the good of humanity".
• It is another example of the "educated 2%" knowing what is best for the rest of us.
• It is all about reducing the needs of the user to the level the system can deliver as opposed to providing a system which the user can expand and customise to its' own needs.

Before one of you says "Hey Gibbo, most of the internet runs on Linux", the Linux they use certainly isn't free and neither are the armies of highly paid techs who keep it all running. Not free mate! Not even cheap... in reality!!!

The real cost of free systems is very often far too high.

And now for something completely different.

I've never had a guest contributor before... but all that has changed! I sent an old mate the link for this site the other week and he actually took the time to read it.

Sticko is an old rock 'n roll mate and a long time newspaper man (don't read the post below this one about Journo's mate) and sent me a reply which I think was meant to scare me off his turf. Writing! Anyway, the reply was so good I asked could I publish it. So with Stickos' kind permission...

"What a buzz to read your words of wiz, mate.
All the very best for an awesome 2005.
Don't have a blog meself, but offer these words of warning to anyone
foolish enough to spend their hollies trying to be "a handyman''.
My advice is fairly succinct: DON'T!
(Or this could happen to you too...)

I BLAME those television shows. They made it all look so easy.
But the fact is, handyman renovations should never be attempted by ``ordinary'' people except under strict supervision, preferably by Scott Cam, Jamie Durie or someone with a degree in astro-architectural engineering.
You're wondering how I know this, right? It's because I have now almost fully recovered from the injuries (but not the embarrassment) sustained while trying to rob accredited, professional tilers of what is rightly theirs: namely, the contract to perform a ceramic refurbishment of my dead cat-sized bathroom.
What could I have been thinking? Well, I figured it can't be too difficult to whack down a few tiles on the bathroom floor. (Everything else I'd attempted in that room had worked out OK). All you need is a sketch of your dream, the right materials and a phone within easy reach in case you need an ambulance.
So away I went, tingling with the knowledge that I would surprise my house-proud partner Siri and save at least $800 with my do-it-yourselfmanship.
First off, select your colour scheme and use your fingers and toes to figure out exactly how many tiles are needed to complete the assignment. No probs. So far, so good.
Then we rip up the old linoleum (pausing only to swat the fleeing cockroaches with a rolled-up copy of your local newspaper).
Next you smear the floor with the most powerful adhesive known to humankind, so that the tiles will stay securely glued in place until the year Cabramatta hosts the Olympics. The exertion of this bit will have you panting and sweating in the humid confines of your bathroom, so you might consider stripping down to your underwear or, if you are the only person in the house as I was, right down to your birthday suit. Now, lean forward, feet wedged in the doorway and one hand clinging to the side of the bath while you prod the adhesive into that far corner, aaaand ... fall flat on your face on the sticky surface, barely (and I mean BARE-ly) able to move a muscle.
At this point the surviving cockroaches, acquainted with the consequences of being lured onto those sticky cardboard mats which sneaky humans nudge behind cupboard and cistern ie being stuck fast and slowly starving to death over the next few days settle in to enjoy my demise, antennae twitching in anticipation.
Luckily I wasn't completely alone in the house. Help was at hand in the form of our pet kelpie Kylie, who did exactly what she had been trained to do: she rang an ambulance! No, no, I'm joking. Kylie's natural instincts kicked in and she did what millions of years of evolution had trained her to do: she jumped onto my back and started licking my ears.
She was still wagging her tail in delight and licking away playfully when Siri arrived home moments before I sank permanently into the Selleys Aquabond Adhesive like an exhausted stegosaurus into some steamy primeval swamp.
Siri did what any caring pal would do - jumped on my back and started licking my ears. I'm joking, of course. He just burst into fits of uncontrollable laughter.
But at the same time, he managed to yank me out of the glue and push me into the shower recess, where the glue on my toes and my right hand hardened like concrete. This meant I was - until Siri dashed down to Bunnings and bought a tube of Selley's Instant Gum Release - permanently attached to the floor of our bathtub and the adjustable shower rose.
Anyway, it all turned out for the best in the end. We found a reasonably-priced tiler in the classifieds section of our local paper and he laid our new tiles (although he had to apply a fresh adhesive layer, because my one had ``gone off' and, in any case, was marred by unsightly toe, knee and elbow prints).
We also learned that it pays to take a few precautions before attempting home handyman jobs of this kind:
* always have a tube of Selley's Instant Gum Release handy,
* get your bum waxed, and
* teach your kelpie how to call an ambulance."

He finally had the ball(s)

The One Pod Sod, The Mono Manberry, The Knacker Lacker has finally found the ball(s) to quit.

Listen good ALP. Australia didn't like the original Gough Whitlam and we didn't like the new Gough Whitlam. Don't get any ideas about the female Gough Whitlam(you know who you are Julia).
We are sick to death of career politicians who have never had a job outside the union movement or the Labor party. Don't try another one or you won't see office in this century, which would be just fine in my book.

The Sydney Morning Herald Is Fucked.

Both Sydney papers (The Sydney Moaning Herald and The Daily Telegraph) carry stories today of exclusive polls which show Kim Beazley as preferred Opposition Leader. The Moaner doesn't publish its' figures but the Tele tells us it was a survey of only 417 people. WTF? These pollsters are nothing more than shysters. I'm no satistician but, I'm sorry folks, 417 is too small a sample. Not one of the pollsters predicted the outcome of the last election. Not even close. Yet their words of wisdom still mean headline stories.
The prize, however, goes to the Herald which still managed to turn the ALP's troubles into bad news about John Howard. Dig this shit:

"There is genuine sympathy for the ailing leader, with opinion evenly split on whether he should or should not have made a statement on the tsunami disaster while on sick leave.
But with the party suffering its worst figures in decades - primary support at a dismal 34 per cent - only half of all voters want him to remain leader.
Even more embarrassingly, the poll shows that the support of the popular Prime Minister would plummet if his opponent were anyone other than Mr Latham. Currently 62 per cent of voters choose Mr Howard over Mr Latham (34 per cent).
But asked whether to choose between the Prime Minister and "any other Labor MP other than Mr Latham", the poll shows a huge drop in support for Mr Howard to 49 per cent, with anyone other than Mr Latham only 8 per cent behind."

Give me a break!

I would rather my kids came home & said they wanted to be lap dancers than journalists!

I normally supply links to quoted sources but the Herald can get fucked. I'm not encouraging anyone to read that shite.

Mullet Junky

Go here and be prepared to kack!

Goin' on tour.

I had a conversation with Gibbo Junior the other day that brought back a few memories. He is "getting a band together" with a few mates as teenagers do and we were talking about things rock & roll. The word "tour" came up as it does. It is a funny word in the rock & roll world and can mean all sorts of things to all sorts of people. When I was first kicking off, the definition of "On Tour" was driving more than 3 hours from home and not sleeping in your own bed! Later on it came to mean months away from home and many thousands of kilometers travelled, literally! It brought to mind though, my first "interstate tour". It was a trip to Queensland consisting of a gig in a wonderful place called Strathpine, Qld, followed by a midnight trip to a national park in S.E. Qld for a biker’s party. The band was called Bandanna.

They were the first band that employed me as a sound engineer. It was 1985 from memory. I had played in another band with the guitarist Larry. This guy could play really well as well as being a more than capable singer. The other guitarist was a Kiwi guy called Graeme who immigrated to Holland, which was sort of appropriate... if you knew Graeme! The drummer was the amazing Rick Doolan who you will eventually hear much about. The bass player was Terry who was known as "Dr Gofast". Another legend whom you will hear more about in future.
Basically they were a "bikers band". They played blues, boogie, rock etc. and were really, really good. As a lot of bands were then, we were working about 3-5 gigs per week and all had "day jobs". I had taken a few rostered days off to go on this jaunt.


This is us leaving the Strathpine Hotel. This photo includes myself, my pal Brian ™ , my brother, the band and a couple of extra crew known as "The Muckhole Brothers" who were "chemically enhanced" most of the time though they worked very well.


After an event free trip to Qld. and a great gig, we packed up and headed out the door.



Here are my pal Brian ™ and my brother Brett in their devastating youth.


Off to Aratula we go. The fun started early. We hadn't got 10 minutes out of Strathpine when we realised we were heading the wrong way which called for a quick U-turn across the median strip. This was something which seemed to annoy the local Police. I was driving my Lite-Ace "party bus" with the band, a couple of crew, a stray girl that the bass player had found, lots of grog, and a few other things that I won't admit to here. Constable Plod was thrown by a NSW license and a van full of rough heads so he let us continue on our merry way with a stern talking to about "the way we do things up here".
The rest of the trip was uneventful until the stray girl decided she needed to vomit. Now!
We pulled over to let her chuck. Awesome. The bass player was still interested at this point.
Off we go a few miles down the road when the stray girl decided she needed to pee. Now!
We pulled over but she was concerned that we might "perve on her" so she went around to the other side of the van. The side where the road was. The side where the traffic was. She quite happily piddled while cars drove past watching. I think we still perved.

Arriving at the party was an eye opener for me. If you have never been to a serious bikers party, then you have missed out on one of lifes great adventures. It was quite late(or early),in the middle of the bush and there were people everywhere drinking, smoking and... well, bloody everything. Come sun up, we were treated to the site of our stage.

What a beauty eh? That’s our truck at the back acting as a dressing room.

After setting up for most of the morning, there wasn't much to do so we went and watched a "bash the Japanese bike competition. You paid a few dollars to have a couple of swings with a sledge hammer and the first one to get the crankshaft out, won. Classic stuff.

The afternoon rolled around finally to everyone’s favourite event. The tit show.


This is where female members of the audience are asked to remove some of their clothing on stage for all to enjoy and a winner is democratically selected.
All was going well until some girl grabbed the mic and started rabbiting on about how sexist the whole thing was and that she "wanted to see some dicks".



Well, she didn't have to ask twice.

The stage and was swamped by blokes with their slugs out.



This bloke was the obvious winner.


Fairly soon it all settled back down to the girls and a winner was duly selected.

Her prize seemed to involve going back stage with a couple of the bikers! I wonder what second prize was. Later on we had to let the strippers use the back of our truck for a dressing room. While we were in there "getting stuff ready". It is quite bizarre watching a strip show in reverse. They would appear from the stage nude and get dressed again for their next bit. Wow.

Anyways, time was approaching when the band would actually have to take the stage and play. Trouble was that the singer was suffering from a bad cold and no sleep and 57 beers and......and was rapidly losing his voice. Finally the band started. The music was pumping and the crowd was going off. Until Larry tried to sing. Absolutely nothing came out. The band struggled on for a few songs doing "instrumental versions". This was not going down as well as we would have liked. Let me put it this way. Bikers are not the best people to disappoint.

It was decided that one of the support acts would loan us their singer. Great... he knew two of the songs. It was then decided to let this bloke have a go who could "blow the harp(harmonica) like a bastard!" He knew two songs as well. He played them twice I think. It was then decided to give it away and beat a hasty retreat before anyone got more angry at us. We packed up in record time and scurried back to Sydney. At this point, we hadn't been to bed for a while and some of us were a little bit "emotional". A small altercation was had between myself and my pal Brian ™ over who should get the sleeping spot in the van. Although this involved pulling over, much swearing, some pushing, much more swearing and a little bit more pushing, it was sorted and we had an uneventful and quiet trip home.

I crawled into bed at home finally, after three days with basically no sleep. Around two hours later the phone rings and wakes me. It is Rick, the drummer. He owned the truck with the bands gear in it. He says words to the effect of "If the cops call you, tell them you were driving the truck".
Half asleep to fully awake in .5 of a second!
"What the..." I say.
“Well, you’ve got a class 3 (truck) license haven’t you?” He says.
“Why?” I ask.
Rick says sheepishly: "I sort of overtook these Army blokes going along Putty road. Across double yellow lines, on the wrong side of the road, around a series of blind corners, going down the mountain, in the truck, and, my license isn’t sort of valid at this point. Can you cover it when they ring? Apparently some fuckwit officer has taken the number of the truck and has made a complaint.”

Oh how I miss those days.

Merry Christmas Folks

Merry Christmas to all from Gibbos Place, featuring, for your dancing pleasure, the "Cowper Drive Crooners"

That's me on the extreme right(hahahaha), on drumkit and esky, pretending to read the music!
What a great night it was. Beer, BBQ, belting out tunes and yacking till midnight.
Thanks to Norm & Brian for organising this once again.

The killing machine that is Marxism

"With the fall of the Soviet Union and communist governments in Eastern Europe,
too many have the impression that Marxism, the religion of communism, is dead.
Hardly. It is alive and well in many countries still, such as North Korea,
China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, a gaggle of African countries, and in the minds of
many South American political leaders. However, of most importance to the future
of democracy, communism still pollutes the thinking of a vast multitude of
Western academics and intellectuals.
Of all religions, secular and
otherwise, that of Marxism has been by far the bloodiest – bloodier than the
Catholic Inquisition, the various Catholic crusades, and the Thirty Years War
between Catholics and Protestants. In practice, Marxism has meant bloody
terrorism, deadly purges, lethal prison camps and murderous forced labor, fatal
deportations, man-made famines, extrajudicial executions and fraudulent show
trials, outright mass murder and genocide.
In total, Marxist regimes murdered nearly 110 million people from 1917 to 1987. For perspective
on this incredible toll, note that all domestic and foreign wars during the 20th
century killed around 35 million. That is, when Marxists control states, Marxism
is more deadly then all the wars of the 20th century, including World Wars I and
II, and the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
And what did Marxism, this greatest of
human social experiments, achieve for its poor citizens, at this most bloody
cost in lives? Nothing positive. It left in its wake an economic, environmental,
social and cultural disaster."

Read the rest here. It should be compulsory reading.
Via Dissecting Leftism

Plenty of gas Rachele!

Rachele, one of the lurkers at Crazy Dicks thinks I may have "run out of gas".

No, there is plenty of gas Rachele. As someone else said in the comments at Crazy Dick's, It is a bit like picking on kids in wheelchairs debating with your lot.
For those of you who aren't familiar with Rachele, here is just a sample.

"Personally, even though I sometimes dont understand what he's trying to say, for the most part, I agree with him."

"I never said his writings must be true. Perhaps he may never have said anything which has yet come true... but have you? Does simply doing nothing make you right"

"The Greens aren’t communists. They are rights activists."

"The left is too far right for me anyway. I want no part of it"

"HOw do you know that the world is out side when you shut all the doors and close the curtains...."

"your opnions and retalliations are perfect examples of juevenille behaviour"

"I'm pretty sure the point was shitty capitalism and people dying while people just like you sit back and scratch their arses eating McDonalds"

"What is so scary about the idea of communism and peace?"

"I would point out an example of a 'communist country in which I would like to live, if there were ever such a thing, but so far there has not yet been a country which has truly prescribed to the communist ideology."

"So you’re a sad old man eh? Beer swilling nationalistic, child rearing, typical aussie bloke…" [I love this one. Child rearing is apparently now a problem, Gibbo]

"Overwhelming amounts of people seem to think that anarchy is chaos, when in fact; this does not have to be the case. If the individuals of a society have a common sense of moral order, then anarchy is possible. Perhaps this is not the perfect system of goverment (or lack there of) in our society, but if you take a post modern perspective on things, all ideas have faults, and there is no right and wrong, because it is suggested that there is fundamental truth"

"I would like to argue that communism has never been fully implemented as a system of government"


I have to include a classic reply from Fred:
"Still, have to love commies who hate evil rich capitalists,and sit typing away on Wintels ( Or do you use a steam powered, enviromentally friendly, recycled bean tin running a copy of Linux Red Hat 5 which you nicked from a computer mag in the waiting room at the CES)."

Rachele, when you develop an original thought, or even a coherent one, we might try again. Until then, keep working on that list of Crazy Dick's prophecies. I haven't seen it yet.
By the way, if your site is supposed to be a porn one, show a bit more tit. If it isn't then knock off the fake erotica shit and improve the quality of your argument.

The final word should go to Rachele though. This from her site:
"I always assumed that people who had live journals had something profound to say, and yet I"m finding I lack the inspiration for such profound comments... perhaps I should shut up.
So I'm thinking of going to a fancy dress party as a cat..."

New Years Eve in Shepparton.

How often does Shepparton spring into your mind? Be honest. Not often I’ll bet. Well, I have had discussion recently with a certain Shane Campbell Muir of Shepparton and it jogged a few memories. Alas, none of them involve “chemtrails”.

As some of you know, I used to be a roadie. A few of my pals have been hassling me recently to publicly tell some of my “war stories”. I have resisted for a while but, enough time has passed now to make them interesting without getting people in the shit.

I have spent many an interesting New Years Eve, but among them is not the one spent in Shepparton.

From (unreliable) memory, it was 1992. I was working for a chap by the name of Rick Price who was doing good business at the time. We were booked to play New Years Eve at this pub in Shepparton along with The Black Sorrows and Daryl Braithwaite as well as one or two others(Dave Mason-Cox I think). At the time it was a very impressive line up and it promised to be a great night. The bloke who owned the pub had spent a motza on this night. He was planning to clean up on account of the fact that basically nothing else was going on for a hundred miles around. He had put a cyclone wire fence around the car park and had blacked it out with plastic. He had put a quite decent stage in, along with reasonable backstage facilities for us and the other bands. The topper was that he had knocked a big hole in the (brick) wall of the pub to allow him to sell grog at a phenomenal rate to the vast crowd. The guy had pallets of grog everywhere!

For the “PA Heads”… We had an ARX PA system of around 18,000 watts front of house and about 13,000 watts of monitors on 8 sends. The Black Sorrows had an almost identical system so we set them both up to form quite a decent system. It took all afternoon to set up and make the two systems work together. We had a crew of 6 and they had similar. They also had this poor schmuck who had “won” a competition on the tele to be Joe Camelleris’ personal roadie. He had been on the road with this particular tour for about two weeks. In the scheme of things, he was basically useless. The Sorrows’ crew made no bones at all about letting him know this. They wouldn’t let him touch anything. He was the epitome of “the lunch boy”. The poor prick was miserable but he was hundreds of miles from home and broke! Apart from this, their crew was blueing pretty good amongst themselves, so the atmosphere was “touchy” at best. Our crew were getting on well and took the opportunity to “stoke the fires” a bit.

The publican was expecting a crowd of many thousands, literally, and had invested heavily. Guess what? They didn’t turn up!

We had this massive setup, these great bands, the “hole in the wall bar”, the pallets of grog, the bar staff, the big stage, the security dudes, the backstage compound with catering, generators, cyclone fencing, but… no crowd. The artists, all of them, kicked arse. If you have never seen Joe Camelleri and The Black Sorrows live, then you have truly missed out. It is a musicians band. The musicians will know what I mean. Our band kicked too. Rick Price had a red hot band and they delivered. But no one was there. Daryl Braithwaite started the show with just himself and a keyboard player and managed to be thoroughly entertaining for about 45 minutes. Quite a feat for two dudes, but, no one was there.

At the end of the night you could have cut the atmosphere with a knife. The smell of burning promoter hung heavily in the air!

We packed up our gear in record time and then attempted to leave. The Sorrows’ crew decided to get shitty at this point. What right did we have to piss off early when the job wasn’t finished? Well, we were finished! We figured that we had about half the gear each. We had packed up ours therefore fulfilling our part of the bargain. However… these dudes were fighting each other and were working like “old moles”. In the spirit of reconciliation, and with much hesitance, we decided to help these poor buggers who had just about had enough, and wanted to go home.

We eventually got their truck packed and headed off to the Motel for a well earned kip. Only, my brother and I got side tracked into another Motel room with a local band! I’d like to tell you the full juicy details but… nothing happened. These dudes were the most boring people you could meet. No sex, no drugs, no rock & roll. Not even a couple of long necks.

It was one of the best concerts I have ever seen, and no one was there!

That is my complete experience of Shepparton. In my opinion, the place could do with a few more chemtrails. It could bloody well do with something!

That's not a mullet Darp, this is a MULLET

Darp thinks he has a mullet.
Sorry to dissapoint you mate but here is the real thing. Circa 1988 and complete with FuManchu moustache!


I have a better one than this somewhere, complete with Santa Claus hat. If I find it I'll post it.

If you have a genuine 80's mullet shot, then post it on your site or send it over. Maybe we could organise a vote. Darps' mob will reckon that the vote was rigged or stolen by Mirand Airey-Fairy or something, but it might be fun

Racism for Dummies

Update: As I have been accused of misquoting someone who I didn't even quote, here is the link to the post at Darps' Blog that started all this. See for yourself.

Original Post:
There has been great discussion recently regarding the topic of racism and, as Australians, our supposed predisposition toward it. It is a topic that is simply too complex to discuss back and forth in the comments section of someone’s blog, so I thought I would take a few moments to put my thoughts down in some sort of order.
To give you some context, I would like to explain a little about myself and my background. I am a fifth generation Australian (as far as I have traced so far), of basically British origins. I was born in 1962 and raised in Sydney’s Western Suburbs. Cabramatta, to be precise. That makes me a white male, 42years old and a westie. Prime racist material eh?
Cabramatta was then, and is now, a melting pot of many different races. We had wads of post-war immigrants of many different nationalities. I lived in a short cul-de-sac that had the migrant hostel at the bottom. The makeup of our street was roughly this: On our side it went Scottish, Russian, Italian, Aussies, Latvians, Serbs, Italians, Italians and Croatians. The other side went Italians, Italians, Italians, Serbs, Italians, Various, Aussies, Aussies, Ukrainians, Scots, Macedonians, and this was just my street. As you know, we then had a large influx of Asian refugees starting in the 70’s. In short, if you were racist, you didn’t have any friends. This community was remarkably harmonious. People just plain got along. Sure, there were people you didn’t like but it was usually something more substantial than their racial background. I will have more to say in a future post about why I think that this community was as successful as it was, but it serves to show you some of my background and why I get so upset when people say I am a racist because I am a white male or because I vote for John Howard. It is simply not true. It is a concept that I reject out of hand. This is not to say that Australians are not racist or that I have never been a racist. I am simply stating that we are no more racist than anyone else. I believe that all races use this “evil power” whenever it suits them.
It is not something that white people do to brown people. It is not something Aussies do to wogs. It is something people do to each other.

Let me explain it like this:
I support Parramatta in the football. I go along to games or watch ‘em on the TV and I get all worked up. When my team plays your team, I don’t like your team. Say we are playing against Newcastle, then that Andrew Johns is a mongrel bastard who must be stopped at all costs. Phoooey on him. Kick him in the nuts, pull his hair, whatever. Just beat them. But… when State of Origin time comes around, Andrew Johns no longer is a mongrel bastard who plays for Newcastle. He’s the bloody captain of NSW and a top bloke. Skillful, wiley, just a brilliant player. Great to see my man Nathan Hindmarsh in the same team as the great Andrew Johns. On the other hand, that Shane Webke is a prick eh? Bloody fridge on legs. I don’t like him at all! Smash him boys!!! Bloody Queenslander.
But… when the Aussie team gets picked to go and wallop the Poms, that bloody Webke. Top bloke! Never stops trying. Proud to have him in the side. Go Shane, smash those Poms.

That, my friends is exactly how racism works. It is all about the current perspective and what suits you at the time.
When it suits we are citizens of the world.
When it suits we are Aussies.
When it suits we are part of Asia.
When it suits we are of British descent.
When it suits we are ANZACS
When it suits we are a multicultural paradise.

I have never met a specific race or culture who is not capable of pulling out the race card whenever it suits. The problem is that it stifles genuine debate and the possibility of actually fixing some of our countries serious problems. If you shout down every argument that is not yours as racist, then you are not helping. Some examples of “Aussies inherent racism” were given to me at Darps’ blog today. One fellow said that he had never seen an Aboriginal married to a white person in Australia so therefore we must all be racist. Mate, I lived next door to an Aboriginal chap and his white wife for many years. It is not as uncommon as you think. Another person said that by my treating all races as equal, I was being ethnocentric and therefore was a racist. What the fuck? One person even said that I must be a racist because voted for “the right”. Just what we need mate, sensible debate.
I know it has become fashionable in some circles to be a self flagellator but don’t include me in your guilt trip. The we had the call for an "indigenous" blogger to come in and tell us once more how racist we are because only black people know. IE Black person says white person is racist. Ipso facto... white peole are racist. QED.
While we are talking about Aboriginals. Don’t think that they aren’t as bad as anyone else at this stuff. Many of the tribes are openly hostile to each other for no more reason than their “race” IE My tribe is better than yours. I have personally witnessed the unbelievable amount of diplomacy it takes to get some of these people to just be in the same room as each other, let along carry out a meaningful dialog. This is not a put-down. This just proves they are human like the rest of us. By segregating them into a sub-group of our society that is treated inherently different is racist beyond belief as just does not help. If every problem is looked at through the lens of “it must be whitey’s fault”, then you are missing many opportunities to fix things.
If someone in this country is living in sub-human conditions due to genuine neglect then that is a tragedy and should be fixed. The problem is not a worse one because the victim is black. When you are constantly told that your circumstances are not your fault, then life becomes easy. Any problem you have must be caused by someone else’s actions. Therefore, it is not your responsibility to fix. It might even surprise you to learn that not Aboriginals live under a piece of corrugated tin in Bumfuqnowhere. Not all of them are drug addled fuckwits from Redfern. The vast majority of them lead happy, fulfilled, quiet lives in suburbia, far from the hue and cry of the racist politics of the left. They even marry white folks sometimes Davo! By categorizing them as all being disadvantaged because they are black is racist in the extreme.

I’ll say it one more time for the dummies. It is not something that white people do to brown people. It is not something Aussies do to wogs. It is something people do to each other. If you think that it is an Aussie thing then you simply don’t mix with a wide enough group of people. Go out and make friends with some wogs. Most of them are nice people, just like everyone else. Most of them are capable of being racist pigs when it suits, just like everyone else. You might even enjoy the food. Better than chops, peas and potatoes anyday.

Andrew Wilkie. Hahahahahahahahaaaa choke gasp hahahaha

I have been having a nice little conversation over at my good friend Darps' place about the apparent disappearance of Andrew Wilkie. His website is gone and he has been expunged from the greens site.
So... I did a little googling and found this classic on the greens site.


It almost made my coffee come out my nose!!

Even wonder Bobs mob rate John Howards' version as more reliable than Weasle Wilkie.

Made my day it did!

It's all getting silly.

Copy cats are coming out of the woodwork with various food items that may or may not resemble "things"
The latest is a salmon sandwich that looks, and smells, like a vagina.
I've also managed to find another potentially famous grilled cheese sandwich here. The original "Virgin Mary" model seems to have sparked the whole thing off, while good old ET started me on my search for riches.
What's next?:
A haggis that looks like Michael Moore?


A peanut that looks like Mark Latham?


A goose that looks like Bob Brown?

A ferret that looks like Paul Keating?


Hey, once we have finished with food we could move on to other stuff.
Like the wing nut that looks like Bob Carr


or the donkey that looks like John Kerry


Where will it end?

Gibbo strikes it rich!

After all the kerfuffle lately regarding Virgin Mary Grilled Cheese and ET lookalikes in a Nutrigrain box, I thought that I would try and make a sly dollar myself.
A quick search through the pantry brought me face to face with certain riches.
The first one I found was the spitting image of Richard Neville. What do you think?



If this wasn't great enough by itself, then I found a group photo of some of the "special" folks that hang around in Richards' comments section.





Then folks, the topper of all toppers!
May I present: Kerry Nettle, Bob Brown, Andrew Wilkie and Peter Garrett.



I'm justing popping in to eBay now to list them. Man, I can see the dollars rolling in now!

Staff Training Procedural Changes.

Preamble:
Budgetary constraints now dictate that all staff training sessions should follow a set procedure regardless of their intended topic.
In the spirit of procedural integrity, all staff training will now reinforce positive approaches and frameworks, which will seek to enhance effectiveness and allow us to implement new paradigms with a “can do” attitude. Trainers will facilitate getting attendees “back on track” within a pedagogical context by developing “Personal Management Plans”.
Outcomes and synergies can be structured and measured against these frameworks in order to value the collective input.

Staff Training Structural Matrix:
Training sessions will now follow the following structure, which all trainers will attempt to follow, as follows:
1. Start of session. Trainers will get all participants to stand up and introduce themselves and describe their position within the organisation. Remember, a stranger is just a friend you haven’t met! This is an opportune moment for telling the attendees how special your particular circumstance is and how no one really understands you. You are permitted also to give brief examples of mistreatment from under achieving superiors.
2. All attendees will now talk amongst themselves at a progressively louder volume.
3. The trainer will now attempt to get the session “back on track” by writing things on a white board. If staff are still inattentive, ball games or lolly throwing may be instigated.
4. Morning tea will now be provided. This is another opportunity to let the other attendees know how hard it is in your particular department ad how unfair your boss is. Be sure to underline the fact that no-one really understands you or values your input.
5. After morning tea the session will move onto Conflict Resolution. Please open your workbooks to the approved activities. The trainer will then facilitate discussion in a small group scenario after taking nominations for team captains. Team captains are to facilitate the facilitation, which was instigated by the trainer, at a team level. This is to be done with consistent, incremental growth in volume to the point that the trainer needs to again throw lollies.
6. The team captains will then vocalise the outcomes of the group discussions. Attendees are invited to but in at any point to confirm that their boss doesn’t really value them intrinsically or extrinsically.
7. Spontaneous group discussion is now encouraged with a focus on each attendee’s particular, personal situation.
8. Drawings will now be made on flip charts.
9. Team captains will be invited to stick coloured squares of cardboard onto the flip charts. Brisk discussion at ever increasing volumes will then ensue.
10. Lunch will now be served. This is again an opportune moment to meet new friends and to explain to them how no one really understands your situation and how you feel undervalued as a person.
11. After lunch, all attendees except two will return. Brisk discussion will be undertaken as to the possible reasons for their tardiness.
12. The trainer may take this opportunity to attempt to show a video about Conflict Resolution, which may or may not feature John Cleese.
13. The missing two attendees are to walk in at 2 minute intervals after the video has started. Embarrassed looks are optional.
14. Discussion will now start about the lateness of “Some People”
15. At the conclusion of the video the trainer will attempt to get the session “back on track” by introducing the actual topic of the training session.
16. [INSERT TRAINING TOPIC HERE]
17. A PowerPoint presentation will now be attempted.
18. Attendees are invited to fiddle with the projector at will. Eventually, the person “who knows all about projectors” should step forward to direct the button pushing frenzy.
19. After watching the presentation about [INSERT TRAINING TOPIC HERE], the trainer will discuss the upcoming afternoon tea and the possibility of going home early as this has been a particularly “special” group today.
20. Afternoon tea will now be served. Note: This is one of your last opportunities to discuss your unique situation within the organisation. Make use of it! This is the best time to again explain the uselessness of your superiors and about who is probably rooting who in your office.
21. Attendees are now invited to reluctantly shuffle back to the training room.
22. The importance of Conflict Resolution will now be reiterated.
23. One last round of valued input will now be facilitated with special attention paid to vocalising underlying constraints within your personal context.
24. A Values Statement will now be prepared in consultation with the Mission Statement as it applies to the Outcomes Statement within the contextual framework.



Have I been in the public service too long? 18 months in and this is the result!

Back soon

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. Work beckons at the moment.
I'll be back in early December.

Love you'se all.

Pickle Me Grandmother!

Sorry for the light blogging of late. It can be explained by two words. "Euphoria".
I've spent a bit of time just reading lately and it has been quite interesting. This morning I thought I would check out a few lefty blogs for their thoughts on Mr Bushs' victory. Most didn't have much(intelligent) to say but I noticed that there is still a lot of angst regarding John Howards win.
According to such luminaries as Darp, it was another "stolen election" made possible by underhanded people posing as greens who tricked everybody into voting Liberal. Check the how to vote cards here and make your own mind up.
I left this comment on Darps site:

Darp, I just had a look at your friend Mirandas' web site. It clearly shows an image of the how to vote card that she was handing out. Do you REALLY think that this constitutes "fakie Greens How to votes"?
It is quite clearly a Liberal HTV. Again, your excuses turn out to be nothing more than the pathetic rantings of a serial loser. If you truly think green voters mistakenly voted Liberal because of these HTV cards then you are more of a goose than I originally thought. Maybe you understand the stupidity of your own mob better than I?
Calling your communist party "The Greens" doesn't give you carte blanche on environmental issues. This is the bit you haven't figured out yet. Most people ARE sympathetic to genuine environmental issues but they also understand that communism won't fix it.
Your arguments grow more shrill and thin every day. Thanks again for the entertainment.

To which I got this classic reply:

Gibbo,

Those HTV's were not meant to dupe EDUCATED Greens voters, they were meant to dupe well-meaning but politically niaeve voters who "kind of like the Greens cos they're like...cool ..like eh"

Ie, people who wouldn't know the difference between Labor and Liberal or people who don't know the Canberra is the capital city of this country.

If she wasn't trying to dupe potential Greens voters, why was she saying stuff like this as she handed out her HTV?

'Vote for a Green Australia' ...or 'Voting Green?'

Hmmmmm...and don't knock Gibbo's blog -It's like Kingswood Country online. TED BULLPIT LIVES - IN CYBERSPACE!

Now it all makes sense. It's all about stupid people again. The ones who didn't know who they wanted to vote for and were tricked by the evil and ugly Miranda. If only Darp could convince more stupid people to vote for the greens then the world would be a better place! This, from the same idiot who handed out How To Vote cards for Andrew Wilkie. Ha ha ha. I notice Mr Wilkie has been erased from the greens web site like he never existed. Beautiful.

Anyway, I'm off to give Neville the tastefully decorative concrete aboriginal another coat of Berger Breeze after which I'll take Gay Akubra and Repco Lad for a walk. Leave your money on the fridge darp.

Happy Birthday Bwian

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you
You look like a monkey and you smell like a zoo.
Take this quick quiz then go here for the answer


38 today eh? You're catching me!

As good as it gets.

What a weekend!
Friday:
Pub with Brian. Actually pulled money OUT of a pokie! Walked out with a bit more than I walked in with after paying for many beers. Top night.

Saturday:
Got up early to vote and look smugly at greens HTV people. Unfortunately the green lady didn't offer me a card so I didn't get to reject her and look smug. Never mind.
Pulled weeds out of the garden under a glorious clear blue sky.
Played my drums for a while, whilst watching Bathurst on the tele. Cracked a beer.
Had pizza for dinner and sat down to watch every moment of the election coverage. Cracked a few more beers. Things go well from the start and the "Westie with one teste" is smashed. Greens lose their only seat and are rendered (more)useless in the senate. One or two more beers then off to bed with an ear-to-ear grin.

Sunday:
Up early for Bathurst breakfast at Brians. Bacon & eggs taste better when someone else cooks. Crack first beer as green flag drops. Many beers..... Finally, a Ford fan turns up that we can put shit on. Thanks Dave.
Snags on the barbie for lunch. More beers... Holden wins!!!!!!! More beers.
Gibbo junior takes a wicket and a great catch to help Camden beat Picton. Whoohoo.
Australia beats India.
One more beer.
Off to bed still grinning.

Does the sky look a bit clearer today?

It doesn't get much better!

The Turning Point.

John Howards' Tasmanian forestry policy was, for my money, the turning point of the election. I finally feel confident that Howard will win. Latham was outmanouvered brilliantly and now stands to actually lose what were some reasonably safe seats in Tas.

It was the "Young Bull Vs Old Bull" cliche all over. Howard hints a few weeks ago that he will do something in Tas that might even get him Green preferences! This was never going to happen & he knew it. This forced Latham to react and react he did. It showed his inexperience in being forced to spend $800mill and piss the unions off at the same time. The greens were never going to preference the Libs. Latham should have shut his mouth, said nothing and he would have achieved the result he needed. Instead, he has spent the last few days panicing and screaming out for Howard to show his policy. Howard, wisely, did virtually nothing and managed to make the front page of todays Tele being feted as a hero by the foresty workers. Sheer brilliance!




This is the first time that I have really felt confident in tipping a win to the Libs. I am even going as far as tipping them with an increased majority.

Add to this ABC news going into its' shrillest mode. Music to my ears. Panic has set in big time!

Halelujah!

Entrenched Perceptions

This today from the moaner.

Today's Herald Poll finds voters are persuaded that Howard has been more
responsible in his election spending promises than Latham, by 42 per cent to
34.
This is false, but it illustrates the power of entrenched perceptions.
Australians have long believed that the conservatives are better economic
managers.

I'm glad I found out that my perceptions were entrenched! It is completely beyond the lefties to admit that they simply have no idea. Idiots!

Praise the Lord for the Private Health System

Is it just me or does anyone else find it ironic that Mark Latham turns to the private system to be the saviour of our ailing public health system, so lovingly administered by state labor governments?

He says that the old codgers can now have publicly funded beds in private hospitals because they don't have any waiting lists and have a surplus of beds. What the?

This is not an admission of the superior service that a free market system can provide is it?

What next? We could pay for public school kiddies to go to private schools maybe?

That's tops!!!

By the way, is all this free health care happening after the end of childhood poverty in 1990 or is that off the list now?