Archive for October, 2005

Inter-city express.

Crikey!

I only have 51 days left in this fine city (Melbourne) before I join the hoardes and head for southeast Queensland. Inner Brisbane to be precise. Melbourne has been an amazing place to be for the last 8 years. It’s changed me. If simply living somewhere changes you, it must be a good place to live, learn and grow.

So. For the next 50 days, starting tomorrow, I’m going to post one image a day of places/people/scenes that will remind me forever of just how good this city has been to me.

Bushy.

http://www.planetdan.net/pics/misc/georgie.htm

Tighter than a fishes…

News Corporation. It’s one of the biggest media firms in the world. HUGE!

But in order to gather why they are so profitable and successful I think you should check out point 10 in their ‘Courier Mail (Brisbane) GREAT Daily Quiz’ terms and conditions.

Point 10 is pretty bloody lousy considering the claim to fame in point 17.

Diesel flavoured.

You know the feeling. If you don’t then you’re obviously a non-drinker. There’s nothing wrong with that though. We all deal with that ‘after a long, crappy day’ feeling in different ways.

After 12 hours of work, non-stop work, with only a 30 minute lunchbreak, you get home and say to yourself, “Fuck it…I’m having a beer.” You know fully well that a beer means anything from 6 to 12 beers and that you’ll be feeling like a dead dog in a gutter when you wake up in the morning. But that thought doesn’t figure. It’s just beer time.

For the record, in my case I’m not talking about going to the pub and cussin’ and fussin’ and puntin’, I’m talking about a purely homebased beer experience.

Beer under construction

Some of the advantages of brewing and drinking@home and not having to go to a bottle shop, supermarket or a pub to enjoy or buy a beer is that:

• There is no opening or closing time to worry about.
• A slab/case/carton will cost you a maximum of $13.00.
• No one can kick you out or refuse to serve you after enjoying a few too many.
• The beer has flavour and substance.
• You can sleep nude in your own beergarden.
• There is no taxi fare after a good night.
• No crappy counter meals. You are the short order cook and can cook whatever you want.
• Existence of queues, arrogant people, smoke, gambling and sticky carpet are entirely your own fault.

Construction zone - do not enter.

It’s a nice day in Melbourne today. A little bit hazy though.

Only 10 years ago the area where you can see the football stadium and the apartments was working docks. Full of sweaty, bearded men driving cranes and forklifts. Now it’s full of dudes in silk fucking shirts and women with shoulder pads in their tops drinking expensive cocktails and dining out on faux French food. I can’t wait for the day when an Estonian ship’s captain ties up his rusting hulk against the waters next to the apartments, running over the expensive day-cruisers moored there (which never seem to be used!) and unloading 20 000 metric tonnes of superphosphate onto the café boardwalks. Yum!

Post no bills.

There’s an empty billboard in between Clifton Hill Station and Rushall station on the Epping line in inner-northern Melbourne, next to the Terminus Hotel in Clifton Hill. It’s a billboard that has seen many interesting posters stuck on it over the years. The last poster to expose itself to northbound traffic along High Street was a collage of Saddam Hussein pictures. It was ripped down 2 years ago and now all of a sudden up has sprung a new poster.

I can’t say I’ve seen any beautiful people use the stuff. Only self interested, ego driven arseholes. Cocaine is a drug of affluence, not something I’ll ever expose myself to (besides, I’m not affluent enough to afford the shit anyway).

Polly wanna cracker.

The whole bird flu virus thingy amazes me. Not that I think it’s amazing that it has happened, just amazing in the way it is being tracked around the globe and that it is being spread by nature itself. Migrating birds. Somehow I doubt that a ‘War on Migrating Birds’ would be successful at all. Nothing would surprise me though in the current climate of fear being peddled by politicians of all leanings.

The BBC reports that the strains of the virus recently found in Romania are of the H5N1 strain, which can spread to humans and kill them. Nasty. 60 people have died from the aforementioned bird flu virus in the last two years (60 out of 6 000 000 000 people. More people die every day in this world falling off chairs while reaching for a long lost can of baked beans found hidden at the back of the kitchen cupboard…I can’t prove that, but I’m sure it’s true).

Apparently it is believed to have happened before, in 1918 with the Spanish flu epidemic.

Who knows? This whole ‘Polly-Wanna-Cracker Flu’ could turn out to be a nightmare for the human race, getting rid of a few hundred million of us. On the other hand we might have to rely on the world’s population falling off chairs in order to reduce the numbers of Homo sapiens that put pressure on mother nature.

More choices.

From Subjunction.

Another good choice.

Unpatriotic folk are starting to fire up their image editors all over the nation. Fantastic!

Thanks to mushroom and rooster.

Thanks to machinegunkeyboard.

Good choice.

Nobody needs to guess as to my opinion of the government’s proposed changes to the way Australians work and get paid.

Please feel free to copy this image and share it with your friends.

Dealing with telemarketers.

About three months ago I put myself on the ADMA’s ‘do not call’ list. This is supposed to prevent telemarketers from calling my house. It hasn’t fricking worked. Most afternoons I get bombarded by people offering me free holidays, free mobile phones and free mortgage advice. As we all know, there’s not much in this world that comes for free so I politely decline their generous offerings and hang up.

Over the last 3 months or so I have changed my method of dealing with telemarketers. I don’t hang up. No more will I be the first to slam down the telephone handset. You see, these telemarketers are just doing their job and nobody deserves to be treated with disrespect while performing their job. It’s their livelihood. I wouldn’t want someone abusing me or being nasty in my daily dealings.

So this is how I tackle it.

This afternoon…

Me: Hello.
Her: Hello. Is that Mr. Collins (in a delightful Indian accent - I’m not being sarcastic there, I love Indian people).
Me: (even though that is my name, I answer) No. You must have the wrong number. Sorry.
Her: Is this 03 XXXX XXXX?
Me: Yes.
Her: So you are Mr. Collins?
Me: No. You must have the wrong number.
Her: Ok. Anyway, your number has been chosen to receive a new Nokia mobile phone.
Me: But I already have a Nokia mobile phone.
Her: It is an offer for…
Me: Are you in India?
Her: Yes.
Me: What’s the time over there?
Her: About 830am sir.
Me: Is it sunny?
Her: Yes. But it is a little bit smoggy.
Me: Oh that’s terrible. Is it hot? Because I love hot weather.
Her: Yes. I have an offer for a new Nokia mobile phone for only…
Me: I already have a mobile phone. Are you offering me Mr. Collins’ mobile phone? That’s not right.
Her: If you’ll let me finish sir…
Me: But you wanted Mr. Collins and now you are trying to sell me his phone.
Her: No sir you don’t understand. Your NUMBER has been chosen to receive a new mobile phone.
Me: But I already have one. Thank you. (followed by 3 or 4 seconds of silence)
Her: Thank you sir.

She hangs up…

Yesterday afternoon…

Me: Hello! (I shouted Hello - sometimes I answer the phone in an unorthodox fashion)
Him: Hi!
Me: Hi! Hello! Bonjour!
Him: I’m John from Trendwest and I have an offer for a free 10 night holiday at Noosa.
Me: Can I use it during the daytime as well or do I have to fly back to Melbourne during the day because you just said it was for 10 nights?
Him: No (he laughs), 10 nights in this case means 11 days and 10 nights.
Me: How does that work? I mean, there’s a day and a night in each day?
Him: You miss an extra night because you have to return home…
Me: Ahhh, so I have to cross the international date line. I get it. Sorry. Carry on.
Him: No. Noosa is in Queensland.
Me: Queensland? Where’s that?
Him: (clears his throat)
Me: I’m not going if it’s anywhere near Bali.
Him: It’s nowhere near Bali mate.
Me: That’s a relief.
Him: Are you still interested?
Me: In what?
Him: A free holiday to Noosa for 10 nights…and 11 days.
Me: Do I have to pay anything?
Him: No, you simply need to come along to a 90 minute presentation on the advantages of timeshare accomodation presented by…
Me: So does that mean that when I go to Noosa for 10 nights, someone from Noosa comes to my place and has a holiday here in Melbourne? Because I have a cat and they’ll need to remember to feed it or I won’t let them stay.
Him: Ok. Thank you, I’d better go now. I have more calls to make.
Me: Thanks very much.
Him: Thanks. Bye.

He hangs up…

Just remember. Be nice and have a quick wit. It doesn’t have to be a clever wit, just quick. No umms. No ahhs. Just be over-friendly and come out with nonsense and/or stupidity. They will hang up first and never ring you back because you will be put on THEIR ‘do not call’ list. A while ago I gave some tips on how to avoid jury duty as well. Try it sometime.

Past a joke.

This silly piece of webspace has been around for 4 and a half years now. There’s no doubt it’s silly. It hasn’t contributed to the development of mankind, nor has it solved any major problems facing society. It hasn’t become a site where you can see slanging matches in the comments section, nor has it become a blog that polarises its viewers, creating argument and counter-argument where neither argument proposes any solution to an issue and is forgotten by the time the sun rises the day after the argument.

This blog isn’t written by an aspiring talkback host like the ungagable Tim Blair because I see no point in stirring the emotions of dumbfucks all over the online world. This blog pushes no agenda, it’s not selling a book on web design, nor is it planning to. The blog is not trying to recruit suicide bombers to wreak havoc upon decadent western infidels or trying hard to let me become a columnist in one of Australia’s pitiful newspapers or periodicals.

I’m just happy having a crack at whatever pisses me off, having an innocent laugh at someone else’s expense and having a chuckle at something witty written on a brick wall in the city (last week I saw some graffiti in Melbourne city that said, “This Life Stinks.” Today as I walked past it again, someone had scribed underneath it, “Yes, keep holding your breath!”).

So, to the few that are emailing me with pretty harsh abuse of late, just fuck off and find something better to do with your day. You’re starting to make yourself look sillier than this page.