Den Done Did

Ecotone

2012-02-15T00:24:00.001+11:00

So this is my first of hopefully many little letters to youpenned in yr absence but with dear thought and embrace as if I could reachthrough space and time and shake you up. I said 'hopefully' but obviously I'dprefer to not be writing such letters atall now that it’s too late for the post to ever reach you. Or maybe it does. Wedon't know. Maybe you’re reading this over my shoulder, but maybe not on thisoccasion as I'm writing this sitting on the toilet, a place where I do much ofmy best work.

7.29am and feeling pretty good despite self. It’s anovercast morning, the kind which you loved. There’s a fragrance in the air (Notin here but out there) not quite damp--but moisture in it, post-rainfreshness…an optimism. That I'm still alive and you might well be. There hasjust been some sort of colossal misunderstanding.

(When staring out my Shoreditch window, not knowing what hadhappened --I knew enough to know that life would never be the same...so Ipaused for some time to reflect in the ecotone between the past and the futurethat awaited).

9.46am and I'm back again thinking of the Masters IceCoffees and Coffee Chill highs. Mornings in Subiaco on Hensman road when WestAustralian iced coffee (The best in the country BTW) and cricket were all thatreally mattered to us...maybe a smoke or two and Southern Cross cricket game ifthe mood prevailed. That giddy laxative feeling in the stomach -- post Icedcoffeed metabolic spike. Had one just now and thought of you old friend with mysame old percolating stomach, adrenalised need to shit. Not pretty for you likewriting about flowers and philosophy, (No flower like that flower what knewitself), but true daily true like showers (Dirty/clean) and dishes (That neededdoing).

PS - My apologies but that’s all I wrote before this dayended

Wordless, Formless Love

2012-02-14T21:22:00.000+11:00

There's found beauty in the mundanity if only we'd notice it. Look at the eye of the thing. Is there life there? Beyond the stars there's darkness and dust. It's unlikely we'll ever see it for ourselves nay some formless incarnation.

The accidental conjunction of art and the mundane spoke to me today--wordless, nameless love and a flat tyre on my rubbish truck.

The 112 Tram

2012-02-04T09:07:00.001+11:00

Sitting in my truck alongside the Miller street tram line. Waiting for a coffee. Thinking of Max as I do so often and grinning on his move toward being the central theme of this blog. Thinking how he took the 112 to work. Staring out the window with tired, glum eyes. Wondering how it might end and how he could escape the cycle of the same routine, the same fatigue, the same view traming through and the gloom of another day gone on the return leg only to be sure the same again lay in store tomorrow and tomorrow. And I think of him that last night I saw him alive. He asked when I'd return. I told him I didn't know. Felt bad and added, "It'll be soon though man"

It wasn't soon enough and and when I did return a year later it was for his funeral.

The poet saw beneath the skin.

2012-01-29T17:34:00.003+11:00

Vergissmeinnicht

Three weeks gone and the combatants gone
returning over the nightmare ground
we found the place again, and found
the soldier sprawling in the sun.

The frowning barrel of his gun
overshadowing. As we came on
that day, he hit my tank with one
like the entry of a demon.

Look. Here in the gunpit spoil
the dishonoured picture of his girl
who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht.
in a copybook gothic script.

We see him almost with content,
abased, and seeming to have paid
and mocked at by his own equipment
that's hard and good when he's decayed.

But she would weep to see today
how on his skin the swart flies move;
the dust upon the paper eye
and the burst stomach like a cave.

For here the lover and killer are mingled
who had one body and one heart.
And death who had the soldier singled
has done the lover mortal hurt.

--Remember the War poet: Keith Douglas.

Sticker Herd

2012-01-25T20:22:00.000+11:00

Paper over the lines,
Paper around the edges,
Sticker behind the signs
and hidden above the ledges.

Fragment 2006

2012-01-24T20:06:00.004+11:00

I'm sick of buying and selling rubbish,
I'm sick of watching you do it.
You look pretty vacant to me.

Outside the rain is falling in stair rods.

2012-01-22T12:03:00.002+11:00

"Outside the rain is falling in stair rods. But in Athill’s room, all is cosiness. There is a bed, a desk on which stands her battered laptop and a comfortable armchair in which Athill sits, a handsome woman, her striking profile framed by a halo of silver hair, elegantly dressed in a brown-linen trouser suit. The two hundred or so books she eventually deemed as 'necessities' are arranged in a case – the collected works of Chekhov, the letters of Lord Byron and the first editions by V S Naipaul, Jean Rhys, Margaret Atwood and Brian Moore"

Excerpt from Mick Brown's Interview with Diana Athill
The Telegraph

Hanging From Flory's Shoes

2012-01-20T12:10:00.002+11:00

We will all experiment
With different ways
To an out-of-it State
Mainly an escape
But really a mind rape

And at the mad gate,
We're in and standing
Down
Having our silvery gown
Hoky drug boy clown

We might be feelin'
But
It's shifting though
And everything smacks of an LSD glow

We was all snaky climbin'
Through craters etching
Tunnels through the chambers
Of his heart

Falling Faster than the Stars

2012-01-02T21:43:00.011+11:00

"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."

Kerouac - On The Road.

"Falling star"
Witold Pruszkowski 1884.

Max Snap Dreaming

2012-01-01T10:28:00.000+11:00

When we were kids Maxie spoke frequently of making a snap kick on goal during tennis ball road soccer. And so it came to pass one drousy Perth summers eve that he found himself there in position and conquered the strangeness of the game and the glowering unforgiving stickiness of the tarmac and blew that volleyed kick through the goals, mercurial Flory and snapped its reality goalward so that the heavens gave pause and the birds stopped twittering and we were suspended in time. Yokes for all before us. It was two-on-two dynamics and he and I roared around the empty stadium slapping imaginary hands and being hugged by the invisible crowd that spilled over the hoardings as only invisble crowds don't.

We all slept on the floor that night and I replayed moments from the day in flashes of golden eternity…a brilliant spotlight that cloaked all matter around the spot where Max picked up the ball and looked long into the sky. “Oh my eye…oh my eye”

The last thing I remember before I fell into sleep were the final words of a poem…a poem written for us as kids forever lording over the declining years…
The voice in soothing timbre: “A thing of beauty, a thing at rest, a thing asleep o’er the top of the nest.”

Max mumbled far-off sonnets as he slept content that the long long days numbered ahead.

Previously on Den Done Did for 2011.

2011-12-31T22:04:00.000+11:00

Life as a work of Art. Having resettled in Melbourne in 2010 I face 2011 with a new business, Fromelles novel and side projects in progress and bachelor again for the first time in years. Will 2011 be the game-changer I expect it to be? I aim to explore this question and others as they arise...perhaps we could explore them together.

No more be grieved at that which thou hast done...

2011-12-23T14:42:00.001+11:00

"There is no one…however wise, who has not at some period of their youth said things, or lived in a way the consciousness of which is so unpleasant to them in later life that they would gladly, if they could, expunge it from their memory. And yet they ought not regret it entirely, because they cannot be certain that they have indeed become a wise person—so far as it is possible for any of us to be wise—unless they have passed through all the fatuous or unwholesome incarnations by which that ultimate stage must be preceded. I know that there are young people…whose teachers have instilled in them a nobility of mind and moral refinement from the very beginning of their schooldays. They have, perhaps, when they look back upon their past lives, nothing to retract; they can, if they choose, publish a signed account of everything they have ever said or done; but they are poor creatures, feeble descendants of doctrinaires, and their wisdom is negative and sterile. We cannot be taught wisdom, we must discover it for ourselves, via a journey which no one can undertake for us, an effort which no one can spare us."

Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past: Volume I - Swann's Way & Within a Budding Grove

Meredith Music Festival 2011

2011-12-14T19:48:00.020+11:00

I went to my first Meredith music festival this weekend. It began with an arduous all-pack, a caravan of three cars, a midnight road trip, arrived around 3am all hepped up on caffeine and delirium...queued up some 30 cars back from the entrance and waited for the sun.

I saw great things, great people, highly charged music...the atmosphere and tumult...festival lives and crazy adventure -- the youths and the rest of us intermingled in a celebration of life, love and creativity... I don't know how else to say it.

I found a Meredith wife. We ran around like 18 year old kids. Blissing on the mania --
Pulled into the crowd on Friday night for Explosions In The sky. Somehow she moved us seamlessly through the throng into the perfect position in the middle of the Supernatural Amphitheatre. Lit by sunset, an o'erhanging firmament of thick clouds set against deep blue sky, Flanked by trees, grass and coloured lights -- an intense atmosphere that made you forget everything else.

My Meredith wife and I swooned by the music became elated. We watched for a while and then began a dialogue that heaved along with the brilliant music of EITS. We spoke in frenetic meter of many things, music, books, life and death. We danced through the throng heaved wistful and long, carnival passion long dip-diddy done-done --I lived a thousand lives before I met her..
before the conversation ended. To connect with another human being ushered by the high form of Meredith-- Dont sink me I thought. Dont let this moment end and it didnt really but dove and ducked and dived alive beyond all recognition -- the dance of humanity the romance of recognising yourself in someone else. Being understood, understand? We took the Ferris wheel twice, had an 80's dance off, searched for drugs in Top Camp whilst the lunar eclipse darkened, tripped on guy ropes, ran arm in arm laughed laughed laughed laughed

-- swaying trees with no need of us but vibrating to the music, feeding on the energy. Our symbiosis. It all connected and for once I felt totally alive. Totally free. Jubilant connection with the people, our people and all people for this is a festival of the mind in which the human condition is elevated to sparkling resonance --- and we can never be the same...

The rain came on Saturday night -- we met again, whirled around searching feverishly for life
As much to move through the heaving mass of bodies, chatter everywhere the song of the trees harmonic night...revelry...symposium...I just cant put the words in play to say--

I had a revelatory experience with my friends and my Meredith wife. Satorial. I learnt many things, not least of which to remember. Remember Den? To love my time and embrace the moment. My Meredith wife helped me with that the most. Finally we spent a cold wet night together. There was nothing tawdry or sexual between us beyond the intermingled connection of our souls, this is to say this was no one-night stand, for we lay close but had no fear of each
other...pure innocent companionship. It was one of the best nights of my life and sorely needed after a year of being out of sync in my head and with just about everything and everyone and wondering if my inner spark had finally puffed-out since Max died and my relationship died and friendships that came and went in the night like snatched up memory torn out in midnight operation that I didn't consent to and the stupidity of youth played out again in my life somewhere past youth and still re-learning lessons I thought I'd passed and passed through. To be brought back to such a reckoning...again and again...in a groundhog day without Bill Murray to give you the courage to laugh at it and the surreal back hander that life can be when you charge with your heart and not your head...although I will always shield-up with my heart --hard wired romantic dreamer...I thought I had gamness and I do...I do...
but I forgot, not what to do but how to do it--

My Meredith wife reminded me of this, probably will never know how she helped me and I wish we could spend weightless years in that bush together, in the park, up in the sky on wheel overlooking the ravine and the Supernatural Ampitheatre melting into the foreground, in the tent hiding from the cold and rain, under the sheet warmth --- running, hugging arm-in-arm laughing like fresh teenagers, laughing about how much we were laughing.

The Californian punk band Off inspired me to leap into the moshpit for the first time in years -- felt the love of my brothers & sisters --their sheer exuberance -- thrashing around with those marvelous kids, who smashed into each not to hurt but to emote and emote and wrote this sitting looking back trying to 10% my way back there. Force open a window in time so I could small way share this with you.
You.
Future of the Left wrought tight power and nostalgia in me for Mclusky even though I had to assure H that we indeed were not "all going straight to hell" And I feel I should evoke more of the music but I cant move past my connection with her...my Meredith wife who asked me if I could be part of her life after this. I said we'd try but who knows right? We have separate lives that run in parallel and as you get older it seems harder to force the streams together, to close the gap for long enough to forge bonds...but we have a bond now and I will try and I hope she will try and maybe with a dual try...we will defy the trend of single serving festival friends. The orgiastic future that F.Scott's its way year by year before us -- it eluded us then, but that's no matter, for tomorrow we will beat on -- I hope so because I love my Meredith wife and I'd love to be her friend.

Post Script: I took my SLR and had my phone camera but forgot to shoot. I took two photos on the Thursday night and attempted one photo in the festival which was of two butterflies mating in our camp. I reached up and back, trying not to disturb them and mashed the photo but the accidental art --the conjunction of objects...well there it is.

Listening to: M83 - Midnight City

All that dies with us leaves it open to no regret.

2011-12-13T20:46:00.000+11:00

I stare at the naked light, hold my eyes shut fast --
Your face burnt on my retina recedes into the night.

Delete These Novels

2011-12-01T11:24:00.004+11:00

This is my first post from my phone. Whilst I should be working I thought I might reflect for a moment on my drive into a deleted scene from Apocalypse Now. Dark clouds hung low overhead. Mud sat high underfoot. Rain, constant rain dressed it all. Two tonnes of tires my load, my offering to the gods of rubbish...out here on the hard edge of consumption. Dirty workers in dirty clothes sloping the mud from their boots attend the dark scene with weary eyes and a dank forlorn resignation. I tip my load and jog the truck out onto the highway. A truck ahead spills styrofoam chunks in its wake. I am transfixed by this scene. The Styrofoam vibrates across the road exactly like snow doesn't. The advancing vehicles churn the Styrofoam into smaller beads that dance across the tarmac in celebratory glee. Someone says on the radio 'don't throw your teddy bear in the dust'. I press on. Eyes on the road, hands welded to wheel welded to whang (thanks Jack).

Neal Cassady

2011-11-15T21:06:00.001+11:00

Roy was known to have a drink or two, and died sometime in the '70s, but not before repeating some of his favorite Neal Cassady stories to a young man who worked there starting in about '72. I ran into this guy by coincidence when I had some tire work done at the present location of the shop, and after seeing my last name on the work order, he was glad to share some of Roy's stories with me. Roy's favorite was how Neal would drive his car down from our house, which was two miles up a hill from the tire shop, without the benefit of brakes, an almost obsessive pastime of Dad's. I believe this would have been the '49 Pontiac. Anyway, he would time it perfectly every morning so the car would bump up into the driveway (after having slowed it by rubbing curbs when necessary), he would then hop out in front of the garage doors, and the car would continue along the flat driveway, the door flapping shut, and on out to the back dirt parking lot, where it would nudge over a small mound so the front wheels would rock back and forth to settle into the dirt trough beyond. It never failed to amaze and delight Roy.

http://www.litkicks.com/JCI2/

Out Here on the Perimeter

2011-11-10T15:11:00.002+11:00

"Wandering, wandering in hopeless night
Out here in the perimeter there are no stars"

"I Will Tell You in the Next Life when We Are Both Cats"

2011-11-08T14:56:00.002+11:00

The Ire That Binds

2011-10-23T22:35:00.002+11:00

I remember a dream I had when I was small. I awoke in my bed, I mean really awoke, no dream state. I felt the immediate press of fear, the closing in of the walls. The delicate mangle of eternity. Unknowable, unquestionable unrequited there. The walls transformed to heaving sides of dark flesh. In the corners the darkness itself stepping over the strangled form of light laying crumpled and prostrate at its feet. Advancing on my single bed like rows of silent waves. Waterless and without fear. For I was just a little boy with not much to offer in way of defense, but I was fleet of foot and rolled out of the bed before the darkness enclosed it.

Kicked my big toe on the corner of the wall as I peg-hopped around, feet spinning, ground barely moving...I flew into my parents room and hovered above their bed. Willed-on the reading light. Soft yellow light, wan glow of hearth, heart and home. Everything will be alright. No eternity, no night. --but they had fangs and reached for me with the arms of monsters.

I will never forget, more than fear, the sense of betrayal and I am reminded of this sensation a lot of late --when your omega lines to dust, your get-away plan has inked off the page in sight unseen spectral rain. Your best friend has died and the next and the next...more still are crippled, others yet MIA...in the War, in the War. (What Fucking War Den?)

--and you note the pattern mote by dust hanging in the light invasive to the floor that my best friend's died, my best friends die -- disappearing are the starving hysterical naked (Thanks Allen). That my love is a gift and a curse, that to love me is to die. Know this as you lay beside me.

ANZAC Day. Melbourne Dawn Service

2011-04-25T14:38:00.002+10:00

Went to the Dawn Service in Melbourne this morning and as the Last Post rang out a head-spin wave rolled toward me and I fainted. Woke up lying on the ground looking up at a medico and concerned faces. My good friend AB asking me if I was ok as he rolled me into the recovery position. I'm all good though. Who bloody knows why? Sympathetic rapture anyone? :-)

Zero Time. (Rough Extract)

2011-04-24T17:55:00.003+10:00

"Do not stand at my grave and weep. I am not there, I do not sleep"

- Anon.

Fromelles, France. July 19th, 1916.

We were well nigh exhausted. All day yesterday and again today we had hunched our backs, kept our heads low. Trying not to be seen, trying to suppress the urge to have a dekko over the parapet and see what Fritz was doing. If a bloke stood up straight he ran the risk of having his head cracked. More than fear for your own head, mostly you were concerned with thoughts that it just wouldn’t do to put your mates through that sort of thing.

[...]

In the late afternoon we helped some lads from the 54th Battalion build an ammunition dump. It was a lot of heavy lifting and hard dragging through mud and over sodden duckboards. We didn’t mind lending them a hand. We knew that the 54th had been at it for two days, bringing up general equipment, trench mortars, bombs and tons of ammo…bit by bit, hand over hand. By the time we joined in they were already shattered. If the word came to jump the bags, I hoped that it wouldn’t be from here. The 54th would be protecting our left. I didn’t doubt their resolve but you couldn’t help but worry when your assaulting troops were already spent from laboring. Such thoughts made you feel guilty. There was a lot of that guilt to be had. Like when someone you knew got hit and your immediate thought was ‘it wasn’t me’. You just had to put it aside.

[...]

A massive volley of machine gun fire tore up the top of our position. Two explosions and a host of flares lit up the horizon near where I guessed the 54th would now be copping it. I slumped down against the parapet, my hand touched down on something hot. Pain shot up my arm, I caught sight of Driscoll watching me and I bit-down on the noise. Even above the roar of the fighting I could hear the shell fragment sizzling in the mud next to me. There it glowered, hissing and spitting like a small demon…fragmented from the whole and cursing the world of men. Driscoll crawled over and threw a sodden sand bag over it. He pushed in next to me and said “We’re going in a few minutes aren’t we?”

“Yep”

“Ripper. It couldn’t be any worse than it is down here.”

I noticed Simmo across the trench. He looked asleep. His left hand was crudely bandaged and he clutched it to his stomach. All the way down his sleeve and across his waist was darkened with blood. I nudged Driscoll “They’d probably let Simmo stay out of this you know. Someone should go tell em'...get him back to a dressing station. Driscoll smirked as he lipped a rollie, deftly sealed it, lit it and had it in his mouth seemingly in one motion.

“Ive already told him he was gonna bleed to death, but he reckons he’s not going anywhere till after we’ve knocked over Fritz tonight” We both laughed. Bits of hardened dirt spat down on us like rain. A big bloke I knew, Private Dorsey crouched down in front us. Everyone called him ‘Pub’. I had no idea why. He was breathing heavy and had a pretty good nick off the bottom of his right ear. It bled freely down his neck. He asked Driscoll if he could spare a smoke. Driscoll gave him his tobacco pouch. Paper Hanger and another bloke arrived and squatted in next to Dorsey. They all looked at Driscoll for a moment and he smirked and motioned that they too could help themselves to his tobacco. Another bloke came over and huddled into our smoking circle. He produced a grotty little tobacco pipe and puffed on it earnestly before offering it to me. Dorsey had obviously had his hearing rung. He spoke so loudly I feared he'd bring a barrage down on us.

“One of dressing stations caught a direct hit…I was knocked out I reckon. Just before I got belted I overheard Major Norrish’s adjutant telling another bloke that we were supposed to have already jumped. They’re bloody confused about something. They're trying to get word back from the last wave about what the situation is out there” More shells exploded nearby. This time the concussions were close enough to shake our bodies. Paper Hanger joined in sharply, “I can tell them what the bloody situation is out there…”

Be Free

2011-04-09T18:25:00.004+10:00

There are several of these superb paste-ups alive around Melbourne at the moment. I havent been able to find the name of the artist. Maybe it isn't important.

Be Free (Swing) Dummett Crescent, Clifton Hill underpass (Near Clifton Hill train station)

On the wall of the Tin Pot Cafe, corner Scotchmer st & St Georges rd, Nth Fitzroy.

Ghost Car Intersection

2011-01-22T23:00:00.003+11:00

Intimacy

2011-01-20T22:42:00.000+11:00

Watching a travelling couple sitting in Mumtaz restaurant, Saigon. They sit opposite each other. She asks him quietly to come and sit next to her. He asks why. Her response is inaudible. “Its weird” he replies. She gets up slightly and moves into the chair she beckoned for him. I go back to my caphe-sua-da. I’m thinking he should’ve got up and gone and sat next to her. Its presumptuous I know but I feel like telling him he just lost a beautiful opportunity for intimacy.

Saigon, Jetstar and the meaning of success.

2011-01-18T21:30:00.002+11:00

We’ve had nothing short of a bollocking from Jetstar since we left Melbourne. They left us sitting on the ground at Tullamarine for more than an hour, barely said a word about it to us neither, bit short on decency for a stoppage that was going to be “around 10 minutes”. In the air over Singapore they had us in a holding pattern for 30 minutes. On the 15^th we went to Than Sohn Nhat airport in Saigon to fly to Hanoi, they informed us that our flight had been delayed by 10 hours; we got a lunch coupon though ;-) After standing around negotiating, translating, scratching on rocks and making clicking sounds with our mouths and lips we managed to communicate that flying out of Saigon at 1am wasn’t really going to work for us and that we’d like to be put on the next available flight that wasn’t going to put us in Hanoi at 4am. They switched us to a 5pm flight for the next day. I’m probably not capturing for you just how much too-and-fro and universal sign language it took to broker that little deal. So alls well that ends well right?, If it would but only end. The next day comes and we’re rocking some morning tea (that’s elevenses people) on Pham Ngu Lao and we get an email from Jetstar that tells us our 5pm flight has been delayed again, this time by 7 hours. Oh yay we’re back to having to arrive in Hanoi at 4am! So we get on Skype and try the travel insurance company, who initially remind us of just how bad off we really aren’t by pointing out that all non-medical emergencies will not be fielded today owing to Queensland having been submerged like Atlantis. Sheesh its hard to argue with that. So we attempt to get help from Jetstar Australia. We’ve heard that they speak English, but we have our street argot ready (Straight outta Blade Runner). The kindly folk at Jokestar Australia inform us that not only can they do nothing for us but that our midnight flight to Hanoi has been bumped once again and we will now be flying out of Saigon at 1:40am. We struggle, we resist, we prevaricate but that doesn’t achieve anything, largely due to the fact that nobody is sure what it means then finally we accept our fate and take the 1:40am black-eye (That’s the one after a red-eye flight). We lob into Hanoi’s Noi Bai airport at around 4am. The first thing I’m struck by is that it’s a freaking ghost town. Normally you have to elbow your way through a throng of touts trying to get you into their ‘Taxis’, (Den makes elaborate display of inverted commas with his fingers). There are two official taxis waiting outside and the other tourists have started in-fighting about whom is going to take those. So I pass up that malarkey and make my way up the road toward a less crowded part of the terminal. A likely looking Hanoi lad sidles up to me and starts his pitch: He’s got a taxi. He can take us into Hanoi for 300,000 dong. His taxi is better than other taxi’s in that whilst its doesn’t say ‘taxi’ anywhere on it, it is in fact an undercover taxi masquerading as a sports car…and he’s not kidding, it’s some sort of WRX knock-off and short of the neon blue under-chassis lights his car is pimping. Ok my eyes are bleeding right? I’m so tired I actually am asleep and all this happened in a dream last night whilst I yelped and twitched, puppy style, curled up on a Saigon street. So maybe I’m having a moment of weakness right? I nod wearily to the Hanoi lad and he leads us to the boot of his hottie and puts our backpacks in. He opens the back door and gestures that we should climb in. I peer into the darkened interior. There’s two dudes in there already and they aint smiling. Suddenly I wake up and I’m standing in Noi Bai airport at 4 in the morning with f-all people around and I remember the reams of official and anecdotal warnings about Hanoi airport scams and one of the most popular being the one where you get driven to a lonely spot in the city and then the price goes up and if you want to argue about it there’s a cabal of negotiators who have now appeared, out of nowhere, around the outside of the Taxi…and you know what, no offence to Eli, but if I had AB or AC with me I might’ve taken my chances --belligerent digger style, I mean f*#k it right? But I looked at my team and realised that us Vs three Hanoi chavs with possibly more lying in wait wasn’t our best move. So I spun on the bloke and told him what I thought of his ‘not-at-all dodgy’ undercover taxi and I demanded in English and then Vietnamese that he get our bags out of the boot because we weren’t riding with him. He freaks out a bit, starts coming on all tourist-bully with me, but I’m switched on now, channelling my very best impersonation of an “I don’t care mate” digger. “I don’t care mate… I don’t care what you say, you can find someone else…I don’t care mate” I drag our bags back toward the airport. He follows badgering and cursing in Vietnamese. He enlists other cronies and a little group of them get between Eli and I and start close-talking me. I show them my game face and thankfully they dissolve like so much pumped up suds. God bless front hey? An old bloke in Melbourne once said to me ‘I like you Den, you’ll be alright, you’ve got more front than a row of Woolies’. It’s an attitude and technique that have got me out of more than a few potentially sticky situations. The mob moved on to fresh arrivals and whilst they were distracted and distracting we grabbed a new taxi that arrived and skedaddled. When we got to our hotel in the Old Quarter we had to knock on the roller door to wake up the poor blighter whose turn it was to sleep in the foyer. There was no response initially so I peered through the glass and saw the man lying curled up on a couch. I tapped on the window and he seemed to open his eyes to narrow slits and nod, all without moving mind you, suddenly the roller door lurched to life and began to slowly open. We dragged ourselves up to the darkened reception desk and awaited his getting up to take our passports and check us in. He didn’t move. We chuckled quietly and began to look around to see if there was anyone in the dark corners whom we’d missed who might be going to help us. All I could think about was sleep at this point. After a while of standing around, slightly bewildered I told Eli to sidle behind the reception desk and grab a key off the wall (Well she’s smaller and tailor made for stealth ops!) She did so and we made our way up to an awesome two room hotel room that we knew from a previous visit, yes that’s right two rooms!) Sleep glorious sleep….oh except that I lay in bed for 20 minutes feeling guilty about possible scenarios in which the bad-denizens of Old Quarter Hanoi slithered into the now open hotel foyer and looted the place. It was too much for me so finally I got up, got dressed and dragged myself back downstairs with our passports to wake the guy up and remind him to shut the roller door that he had sleep-opened. Did I make that clear? Sleep-opened with his clicker! When I got downstairs everything was still dark and quiet and seemingly intact. The roller door was down. Sleep clicker.

Today I reflected on the effects of sleep deprivation and the tendency of our Vietnamese cousins to burn the candle at both ends. The average Vietnamese person works incredibly long hours. Up at 6am, working till midnight, you do the maths. When I went down stairs this morning to give them our passports and possibly, sheepishly, explain to them how we had come to self-serve our way into their hotel at 5am in the morning I found that they knew nothing, or rather just assumed that the night porter (Read exhausted sleeping man on the couch) had checked us in. They didn’t ask any questions at all so I didn’t tell them any lies. The whole nation is kind of like that and once you realise it you start to see them in a new light. The whole nation is a bit sleep deprived and the lack of sleep does curious things to your behaviour. Jovial, mercurial, erratic, prone to bouts of inspiration followed by scattered plummeting despair, (sounds like our author)…but jovial and mercurial and that’s something I really like about the Vietnamese, whilst we’re doling out generalities. They are a great people and this is a fascinating country to visit.

Descending from the stars...

2011-01-15T01:55:00.000+11:00

I try to remember to savour the first few moments of anything good. Descending from the stars last night, through the haze over Ho Chi Minh City. Plane gently hovers in, twinkling lights wink through the gloom, surveying the darkened rooftops, catching occasional signs of life, a xe-om picking its way through some half deserted street, a truck unloading down a lane.
Anticipating my first definitive glimpse of HCMC’s intensity and then it comes as we crossed in front of a large building. Descending lower than the rooftops, surging down, opened up across a main arterial, the lights of a thousand motorbikes, street full to bursting, a pulsing heart… the blood of light. Curtain pulled back, I shield my eyes for a moment, glare adjustment then neon colour washes over my face-- slack-jawed, open-mouthed awe…

Post Cards from the Eternal Child

2010-10-20T23:44:00.009+11:00

I know I don’t post here enough. To tell you the truth Ive thought about retiring this blog. For the last few years I’ve been simultaneously contributing to another blog called Fabulist Savannah but alas that too has seemingly waned of late. Mainly due to the originator and senior editor having some personal struggles that have lead to his being non-communicado for months on end.

The problem for the Den Done Did blog is finding the time and inspiration to write about blog-worthy occurrences in my life. What is blog-worthy? If this was a blog about recipes I suppose that would be an easy question…or perhaps if it were a blog about cats I could just fall back on the photos I've snapped of cats around the world (Now there’s an idea). Or if I’d thought of a great blog idea like Monkey Punch Dinosaur before Adam Ford did…I might’ve done that.

Often it’s a case that I don’t know how to frame something that's happened, or one naturally worries whether an anecdote or everyday tale will be interesting enough to anyone other than me...but perhaps that’s the real point for a blog like mine. It is supposed to be a slightly esoteric and random window into my life and thoughts…but only a window. The blog isn’t me so I guess I shouldn’t laden it with such importance and expectation all the time. Ive written things recently and have been advised not to post them to a “mere blog”(not my words)… I dunno, in case they get stolen or something. Good problem to have I suppose. But in the spirit of this ramble here is a slightly esoteric string of events that is in its way indicative of who I am and the sort of random day-to-dayness that I have been known to appreciate. Ok, Disclaimer over.

I was working on a rubbish removal job recently when I found a bundle of old postcards and photographs from the 1940’s. I couldn’t countenance seeing them go in the bin so I saved them for later investigation.
There was a stylish 1946 Christmas card sent from the owners of the Red Hart Inn in Worcester, England. It was still in good condition so one morning I got the idea to type a quick letter and post it to the current owners of The Red Hart Inn. I wrote “I found this card from 1946 while doing a garage clean-up in Melbourne. Alas I have no idea who the card was sent to. I just thought you might get some enjoyment out of seeing it. Maybe put it up in your bar….funny to think of it returning to its place of origin after 60-odd years”

Rubbish removal guys are always waxing the lyrical about their altruistic recycling activities. A friend of mine Amanda was about to take her kids camping to the Grampians. I said to her “I’ve got show-&-tell items for you to share with your kids” I gave her six photos of the Grampians in the 1940’s. To me that is a pure form of lost-object-found recycling.

I guess I’m trying to be the sort of random act of every-day fascination that I want to receive. That’s the way isn’t it? I often act on these sort of quirky impulses. I put a proverbial message in a bottle and toss it out to sea. I hope this invites the world to reply in kind.

The late gentleman whose postcards I rescued was named, funnily enough, Jim Melbourne. I have done a couple of brief Google searches and can’t find anything about him. Based on the old papers I saw I think he may have served as an aeronautical engineer in England during WWII. Extending that further I imagine that after the war ended he went travelling in the UK before returning to Melbourne. The majority of his postcards are from the UK in 1946. He wrote a lot of postcards that never got posted, including this classic:
“Dear Mum, Another couple of postcards that I haven’t sent previously. Love Jim”

Anyway let’s hope Jim would understand my love of sentimentalia or lost-object-found ephemera or whatever the frack it is that I’m doing here.

A Den Done Did first:

FREE GIVE AWAY!

I have 18 random 1940’s postcards. I am going to make a limited edition, first in best dressed offer

If you would like to be a part of the life of this blog, I will Post to you (That's snail mail kiddies) your very own, probably one-of-a-kind, 1946 post card. Just leave a comment or send me an email with your postal details and I’ll flick one your way! Lovely-Jubbly

Listening to: Foals - Red Pugie

Parallel Epoch 1988

2010-07-22T13:15:00.000+10:00

The Things You Own...

2010-05-09T09:13:00.005+10:00

“Sooner or later we all became what Tyler wanted us to be...” - Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

My heart has been heavy all day with the knowledge that the things that I have collected will not save me. The memorabilia, souvenirs, keepsakes, forget-me-nots, pet rocks, post cards, birthday cards, toy lions, toy T-Rex’s, old bottles, cricket games, books, pictures, CD’s, Band T-shirts, old letters and on and on…all this that I have carted around these many years will not alter the fact that one day I will, in all likelihood, die. I say ‘In all likelihood’ because I still cling to the possibility of a Kurzweilesque technology spike. A singularity event that might give me the option of uploading my consciousness into the digital heavens. Then I could flit around in a virtual reality environment like Second Life or maybe, even better, be downloaded into a new body. I guess that casts grave doubt on whether or not I believe in an afterlife doesn’t it?

Today I tackled the onerous task of unpacking and sorting through the boxes from our most recent house move. It is worse than packing in my opinion. I couldn’t find anywhere to put most things. Assorted random objects flowed out of the boxes like a river of shapes. I tried different drawers but the drawers quickly filled. I moved furniture around but each new move created five smaller moves. It wasn't so much the functional items like tools and stationery that were disturbing me, although I've definitely hoarded too much of that stuff, it was more the personalia: An old love letter, a movie ticket, a little rock I picked up whilst driving across the Nullarbor.

As each new article of personal memorabilia appeared I began to feel worse. I felt the old emotional conflicts rising: Where do you keep them? How do you store them? How do you honour the memories correctly? As the boxes emptied I felt like I was loading weights onto my shoulders. Finally I couldn’t take it any more, I had a long cathartic rant to Eli about how I was feeling strangled by my possessions and then I quit the process for the day.

Overnight I experienced a satori.
I have to let go. What has been upsetting me isn’t only about collecting and hoarding possessions it’s also about accepting that life is passing. It’s a bitter concept for me to digest. I am still coming to terms…think of me as a white belt novice earning his second belt on the long road to mastery.

"Latent form is the master of obvious form" - Heraclitus

My oldest friend died suddenly in August last year. His death has shocked me into acknowledging that our collections will outlive us. I can no longer place the same significance on carrying around collections of sentimental souvenirs. Trying to find cupboards to fill them with, feeling guilty anyway because it might not be the appropriate forum for a piece of genuine Denny memorabilia --then I’m swirling lost again because there's no Show-&-Tell ceremony at which to flag the significance of the items to the world…and even if there was what good would it do for more than a few minutes… maybe an hour?

Lasting change does not live in icons and statues. It might visit. It might cling residual for a few moments to the site of a great victory or linger like smoke around the edges of the podium as we hold aloft the trophy. But then we are all gone home. The game is finished and the time has past. Day's end and trophies gather dust in the night. What good is a memorial if the precious thing we are trying to honour in form doesn't live within us? ---the lights go on and I'm alone in an empty room. The room is stark white and filled with a brilliant light that doesn’t sear my eyes. You might think it’d be lonely. All that empty white space yawning out. But it isn’t. Everything that matters is here. Everything about matter…because It's me, I'm there. I'm the memorial… I am the article of faith.

In the end the things we own are but the worshiping of false icons. If I don’t come to the conception that it's all within me then I am choking, distracted --weighed down…belabouring the idea that If I have the best stamp collection in the world that I wont die. I will become the stamp collection.

I’m far from free of this paradigm. Well short of mastery. I just know that I have to try and let go. I cannot go on filling the attics of our future with stuff. I did a job last month in which I had to clear out the back shed of a deceased gentleman. Half a tonne of marble stone off-cuts that he had duly gathered hobby like from work-sites and hard rubbish piles over the years. I’m not saying that’s wrong. Because he built things with some of the stone and I hope that collecting and neatly arranging the pieces of marble gave him much pleasure. I was just struck by the fact that in the end it was his sons who were left to wonder...what to do with it all. The sense of guilt they felt as they watched us throw it in the back of a truck destined for landfill. So I asked myself: If it’s ok for it to go in the bin when I’m dead maybe some of it should be destined for the bin now?

The memories live in me. I am not my stamp collection or a box of cricket cards…I am no closer to my late Father for having carted around some of his clothes for the last 15 years. I drive past the old houses of our childhoods, the old haunts, the old parks -- We’re not there, it’s not there…It is not the place or the thing is it? It’s you and me. We are the articles of faith.

"And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea."

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock - TS Eliot

~ Footynotes ~

[1] Ray Kurzweil
http://www.singularity.com/
Theory that one super computer builds a superior super computer which builds a superior super computer and on and on until technology advances exponentially in an unimaginable acceleration or spike. And that then Den can get a fully body transplant if he wants one...
[2] “Ending one minute at a time” – Tyler (Fight Club)
[3] Listening to: Roots - How I Got Up

My Cat Left Me

2010-04-27T14:07:00.003+10:00

I meant to post this two years ago. Better late than never I guess.

In 2003 my cat Emery Henry Bird went missing. I tried hard to find him. I went to the lost cat & dog home, posted flyers around the neighborhood and searched high and low. To no avail.

Just prior to his disappearance I had shifted house. He had not taken it well. Things grew worse when my girlfriend at the time introduced a new kitten into the household. Emery freaked out. He started disappearing for a couple of days at a time. Not long after that he simply never came back.

So forward four years to 2007 and I'm not living in Melbourne anymore. But I'm over for a visit and my ex-girlfriend tells me how she thought she caught a glimpse of Emery late one night whilst walking home. She couldn't be certain but she was fairly sure it was him. It quite surprised us because we had both assumed he was long dead. So a short-while later I found myself down on Wellington street Clifton Hill near where she had made her sighting. I saw a cat sitting right near where she told me she'd seen him and as I drew closer I knew that it was him. He walked toward me then shied away and trotted over to the edge of the road. He regarded me with suspicion and what could only be described as awkwardness. It was as if he was saying "oh...its you. What are you doing here?"
I drew closer and crouched down before him. He let me pat him for a moment and then he moved back just out of my reach. I said his name "Emery...Emery?" Then I did our little cat whistle that nobody else does. My Dad used it with all our cats when I was a kid. Emery seemed perplexed, turned to leave and then rolled over in the gutter playfully as he might've done years ago. I got my mobile out and took a photo. He turned and trotted up the street. I called out to him but he ignored me. That's cats for you I guess. I followed up the street a little. He reacted coolly...like there was nothing else to say.
I said goodbye to him. Wished him well and continued on up Wellington street.

So there its is. My cat wasn't run over by a car or poisoned. My cat left me. Found himself a new home.

Listening To: Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros

Boba Fett

2010-03-30T22:58:00.002+11:00

And thus ended my drawing career in 1981. I think the Picture Of The Year star was an in-house award ;-)

Listening To: Foals - Spanish Sahara

Corey Haim

2010-03-12T23:58:00.005+11:00

I really want to say something about the death of Corey Haim... but I cant think of anything clever to say so I'm just gonna write whatever little homage I can: I always liked him when I was a kid. Other friends of mine thought he was a dick but even knowing in the back of my mind that it was sort of true I remained loyal. I loved the idea that the two Coreys became buddys because they shared the same first name. I saw an interview Corey Haim did in the mid eighties, he referred to Corey Feldman as the "Feldog". The Lost Boys is one of my favorite films ever. I dont care that it was uncool to like him. Corey Haim reminded me of good times from my childhood. He like Feldman represented for me a sort of mythic-nostalgia --An 80's that I probably didnt even really experience...but its the way I like to remember it now.
I watched the dreadful "Two Coreys" reality-tv show a couple of years ago and came away convinced that Haim was in serious trouble with prescription meds. I made a Google news alert for him in my email account. For the last couple of years I'd been reading sporadic news reports about the latest B-grade film he was working on. B-grade films, but working. Hope springs eternal.

Anyway I've got nowhere to go with this. No punchline or neat ending. I just wanted to put his name on my blog and acknowledge that I liked him and that I am sorry that he has died...way too young.

Corey Haim Pictures

"Look at your reflection in the mirror. You're a creature of the night Michael, just like out of a comic book! You're a vampire Michael! My own brother, a goddamn, shit-sucking vampire. Oh You wait 'till mom finds out, buddy!"
- Sam Emerson (Haim) The Lost Boys

Memories of Max

2010-03-04T18:41:00.006+11:00

This is the blog my Mum wrote for Max recently:

My first memory of Max goes back to Shenton Park.

I don't remember where, or how, Max and Denny first met, but one day he turned up in our backyard and was a welcome fixture in our Onslow Road home for all the years we lived there.

He was snowy haired and barely eight at the time. A right little "fireball".

Over the next ten years, Max all but moved into Denny's room. Sleeping Over endless nights. Playing cricket for hour after hour in the side street. Summer days spent swimming in the backyard pool. Summer evenings spent putting snags on the BBQ at Shenton Park Lake. Winter brought its own delights. Keeping the fireplace in Denny's bedroom going for days on end while they, and other boyhood friends, played Dungeons and Dragons well into the night.

The fireplace in Denny's bedroom must have had its own special magic because

one memorable winter they managed to feed into it our entire stock of wood in a roughly seven day period!

Max was so much a part of our family that my store of memories is massive.

However some memories are so sharply etched in my heart and mind they will be with me forever.

Max ordering a Hamburger, at the Jolly Friar on Onslow Road, is one such gem:-

"Hamburger please mister -

Hold the lettuce

Hold the tomato

Hold the onion

Hold the pickle"

Max's aversion to anything "green or salad like" stayed with him well into manhood.

But perhaps my most poignant memory of Max was six weeks before he died.

We had caught up for coffee in Subiaco.

We spent a lovely couple of hours together enjoying the reminiscence of times past. Talking about his life and job in Melbourne and just generally "Chewing the Fat".

I remarked later in a phone conversation with Denny, how well I thought Max looked and, even more importantly, how contented he seemed.

How could I possibly have known, that as I dropped Max off at his Mother's home, turned the car around and waved goodbye, that Max would, shortly, "exit stage left" from my life.

God Bless you Max. I pray that your soul has been freed for new adventures.

Sue Carr

There are more comments for Maxie on a previous blog entry from November 2009. Or you can click HERE to jaunt straight there.

For more photos of Max Flory or to contribute a photo please visit this flickr page

Shooting the shooters

2010-02-24T21:38:00.003+11:00

Shooting the shooters
Originally uploaded by Diggers Abroad

Ok so this is a fairly crass thing to do in Phnom Penh and I'll take the blame for it. I'd always wanted to fire a machine gun and David was keen too. It would also be fair of me to mention that Eli didn't want to do it at all.

We paid our penitence However. As soon as we'd done shooting we went and visited the Killing Fields. A sobering experience and the perfect contra-distinction to the narcissistic pleasure of firing a gun.

Also quick note: Our stand in camera guy didn't put much stock in composition...you might say he was more of a 'point and shoot' sort of fellow ;-)

*Originally posted on my Flickr page

Listening To: Cambodia Rocks - Various Artists

2010-02-20T13:09:00.003+11:00

SAVE LIVE MUSIC

PROTEST RALLY THIS TUESDAY FEBRUARY 23RD

We march in protest. Our small venues and community must be protected, empowered and respected.

Assemble at the State Library, cnr Swanston and Latrobe Sts.

ARRIVE EARLY - MARCH LEAVES AT 4PM

This is a peaceful protest. Families welcome and encouraged to join the march.

STRICTLY NO ALCOHOL. It’s illegal to drink in the street and important to show the broader community that WE ARE NOT HIGH RISK.

S.L.A.M.

is Save Live Australian Music, a non-politically aligned, independent entity made up of musicians and music-lovers.

In a bid to address street violence Liquor Licensing Victoria (LLV) has introduced sweeping changes with unintended consequences for the local music scene.

LLV should admit its mistake and make simple changes immediately, acknowledging that there is no link between live music and high risk. The Tote is gone, who’s next?

On 23 February, coinciding with the 34th anniversary of AC/DC’s famous ‘It’s A Long Way To The Top’ film clip shoot down Swanston Street, S.L.A.M. is protesting in support and celebration of Victoria’s music scene, where new liquor licensing laws threaten to pull the plug on live music.

Meet at 4pm outside the State Library to make your way along Swanston Street and up Bourke Street to Parliament House to hear guest speakers from 6 to 7pm.

The RocKwiz Orchestra with guest performers will lead the rally, repeating the three chords from ‘It’s A Long Way to the Top’ in the back of a flatbed truck as we follow – ALL 10,000 PLUS OF US – holding placards and instruments chanting down these ridiculous laws. Over the famous riff new lyrics will be created, such as ”So the Tote’s been shut down, send Sue MacLellan [LLV Director] on her way”.

Lack of support for this precious industry has gone on for too long! Celebrate the diversity of Victorian music. Be one of the thousands of musicians and music supporters who will make this a day to remember!

Music means many things to many people, but the most important is that it IS passion, creativity, happiness and life for many people. So please come and help support one of the best things that Australia has to offer: live & local music.

Invite everyone and if you can’t attend please sign the petition. If you are reading this you love music. Keep it alive by keeping it live.

- http://www.slamrally.org/

TOTE HOTEL CLOSURE. Contact List

2010-01-15T14:33:00.005+11:00

If you are upset about the Tote Hotel closing then register your protest by contacting the following people:

Emailing is good but letter writing and phone calls are best...faxes too!

Please feel free to email me with any alterations or additions.

Richard Wynne MP

State Member For Richmond:

richard.wynne@parliament.vic.gov.au

Postal PO Box 1474 Collingwood 3066
Phone 03 9415 8901
Fax 03 9415 8918

Minister for the Arts:

* PLEASE NOTE : it may not be worth writing to Lynne Kosky since she announced her resignation today. A new Arts Minister will be announced soon.

lynne.kosky@parliament.vic.gov.au

Suite 603, level 1, 2 Main St. Point Cook Town Centre, Point Cook 3030

(08)9395 0221

FAX: 9395 3061

Victorian Minister for Consumer Affairs and the Minister for Gaming:

tony.robinson@parliament.vic.gov.au

Electorate Office Address

9 Blackburn Road, Blackburn, 3130

Ph: 9878 4113

Fax: 9878 9135

Ministerial Office Address

Level 5, 1 Macarthur Street

East Melbourne 3002

Ph: 8684 1400

Fax: 8684 1444

Director of Liquor Licensing:

sue.maclellan@justice.vic.gov.au

Phone (03) 9655 6600

Fax (03) 9655 6978

General inquiries Liquor Licensing:

liquor@justice.vic.gov.au

Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal General Inquiries:

vcat@vcat.vic.gov.au

The Victorian State Premier John Brumby:

Email: john.brumby@parliament.vic.gov.au

Ministerial office –
Level 1, 1 Treasury Pl, Melbourne 3002
Tel: 9651 5000
Fax: 9651 5054

Electorate office –
145A Wheatsheaf Rd, Glenroy 3046
Tel: 9300 3851
Fax: 9300 3915

Your Voice Victoria "Contact The Premier":

http://www.premier.vic.gov.au/your-voice/contact-the-premier.html

---

The Victorian Deputy Premier &

Attorney General

Rob Hulls :

Email: rob.hulls@parliament.vic.gov. au.

Electorate Office Address:
473 Keilor Road, Niddrie VIC 3042
Ph: 9379 5879

Fax: 9379 4434

Ministerial Office Address:
Level 3, 1 Treasury Place
East Melbourne VIC 3002
Ph: 9651 1222
Fax: 9651 1188

---

Gallaga 1981 Kicks Darkness

2010-01-14T17:29:00.003+11:00

Hit my PB (Personal Best kids!) on Gallaga at the Tru-Mould Factory tonight! I Was never much chop at the game when I was a kid. Rich Giliberto loaned a vintage cocktail table edition of the game to the Tru-Mould factory a couple of years ago. Tone tells me that it is a first generation 1981 edition.

For some reason the fire-button and joy stick are back the front so we play with our hands & wrists crossed over and overlapping.

Anyway this is my second retro computer game post. The previous one was from 2007 when I was taking on the Bentley Tavern staff at Bombjack and had also just hit a PB (and finally crushed my main rival's ambitions...teehee thanks Callum!)

Tonight I txtd my high score to Maxi e's mobile too...of course his phone number is still in my phone and shall remain for the remainder of my life. I know he wouldve appreciated my 'knock' on Galaga tonight. We played many such games together when we were kids in Shenton Park...(Vale the Jolly Friars and the old Onslow road deli) Alas Max is not even the only dead person in my phone contacts list. My Dad is in there also.

All things must pass: Even the Tote Hotel as it happens, which I have just heard is closing its doors due to the ongoing pressure that Liquor Licensing Victoria has placed on it and the general lack of support from the Victorian state government -- the fucktards at Yarra city council and the various undead yuppie scum-zombies who have invaded this fair city and beguiled it with their tedious white bread desires and horrible mainstream sensibilities. Fuck you all. "When I am king you will be first against the wall" Or as my friend Robbie wrote on Facebook tonight "farewell another rock god on our road to banality"

I will do another post about the demise of the Tote but this ere' bit blogged off in that direction of its own independent free spirit so. Bop Prosody...so be it.

Remember when we were young and Brunswick Street wasn't only for the wealthy? Ahh those heady days of cultural diversity (Vale the Punters Club & the Evelyn indie band room)

But enough of this tangent, heartfelt joy kicks darkness though it maybe, I hit 325,750 on Gallaga tonight and got to stage 37 and saw a Challenging Stage that I'd never seen before and Tommy Rushford witnessed the whole glorious innings, my finest and according to him, one of his favourites.

"Now cracks a noble heart. Good-night, sweet prince;  And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest"

- Hamlet - Horatio, scene ii

2010-01-13T23:54:00.000+11:00

Den & Eli's

2009

World Tour

AKA

"Diggers Abroad"

~ Photographic Highlights ~

...An ongoing retrospective

Available for your viewing pleasure

FLICKR

Peace in 2010 Friends.

Listening to: Jenny Wilson "Like a fading rainbow"

BANKSY

2009-12-29T16:33:00.002+11:00

BANKSY
Originally uploaded by paul le chien

Contemplating the jump...

2009-11-24T03:10:00.002+11:00

Contemplating the jump...
Originally uploaded by Diggers Abroad

Dalat, Vietnam: My third free jump of the day and the one that gave me the most pause. When you jumped you had to clear some rocks and a secondary ledge before plummeting 11 metres into the waterfall pool below. It tapped into all my fears of heights and was eerily similar to a dream I had a couple of years ago. See my cliff jumping blog post from 2007.

Anyway its not quite the 60 to 80ft jump I failed to make in my dream with Tom Westman, but close to 40ft will do you right? Well, it'll do me for now...I was stoked. :-)

Sideline postscript: I just noticed while doing this post that Survivor Palau's

Tom Westman might be back for Survivor's 20th anniversary series Heroes Vs Villains All Stars

Acronymizable

2009-10-24T12:44:00.001+11:00

Tone-A-Tronic's Electronic Muscle Stimulation TM is an advanced acronymizable technique used world wide for toning, reshaping, and firming thighs, buttocks, and for maintaining muscle definition. Tone-A-Tronic has been used for many years by professional athletes, physiotherapists, chiropractors, travelling tinkers and Bruce Lee. Home Ontological Muscle Orgonic Stimulation systems (HOMOSS) allow you to supplement your regular slump into depressive-body dismorphia, without putting stress on your joints, lower back or neck and shoulders. EMS machines are ideal for today's Nordic lifestyle. When time is limited and you can't get it up, you can hook up to your Tone-A-Tronic exerciser in the privacy of your home, classroom, super-market, office-toilet, while catching up on the dirty paper work, talking on the phone, watching TV or surfing porn. Tone-A-Tronic Electronic Muscle Stimulation systems are great for physically disabled people to prevent consumer atrophy. Many of these EMS units include a TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) to re-wire your versatile solution to living. The Tone-A-Tronic system works by sending minute electrical impulse(s) to the chosen muscle(s) and by depositing huge sticky wads of cash in a smashing little bank in Varosha, just south of the Cayman Islands. These impulses copy the message your brain (if you had one) would send to the muscle(s) to make them erect with ectoplasmic gear. Most units come with their own carrying minority hill tribe and larger models have briefcases with a Hemi-donk.

Get Yours Here

A Boys Will is the Winds Will

2009-10-20T12:29:00.002+11:00

Toneatron and Carrot did a lot of work with stencils and paste-ups during an adventure on the West Coast in 2005. Mot of the work we did had been obliterated by the Thought Police within a matter of weeks. A couple of pieces such as the one above survive to this day. Kicking on to 5 years old now! ~ That's 36 years in Cat Years!
Dig on the way that this one has had a close encounter with someone with a pneumatic cleaning device. It seems they got half-way through erasure and had second thoughts....or maybe the Digger in them whispered ghostly... "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." - Longfellow

Max Flory Comments & Sympathy/Guestbook

2009-10-10T17:27:00.000+11:00

G'day everyone,
For those of you who knew Max Flory and would like to leave a comment on my blog-page about him, this is the place to do it.

How it works is simple:
Select 'Comments' at the bottom of this blog-post leave your comment and details and I will add the comment(s) to this page.

Max Flory Comments & Sympathy book:

Your passing is a singularity in my world...Live in Perpetuity my old friend Florstar!!
- Denny

~*~

If we shadows have offended, think but this; and all is mended that you have but slumbered here while these visions did appear and this weak and idle theme no more yielding but a dream. Gentles--do not reprehend if you pardon, we will mend. And, as I am an honest Puck if we have unearned luck. Now to scape the serpents tongue. We will make amends ere long else the Puck a liar call. So--goodnight unto you all. Give me your hands if we be friends.
(Puck) - "A Midsummers Night Dream" William Shakespeare.
- M.Louis Darling

~*~

Max, when the world trod on me till i felt less than a maggot on a carcass, you recognized the metaphysician in me and quietly palmed into my hand my first book of philosophy.
You took the deadly serious lightly, our insignificance playfully. This life is no more than a flash of lightning in the night. The reflection of the moon in a puddle.
Journey on brother. See you on the other side.
- Sam Robb

~*~

This star of yours Max, may have been taken from the night sky, but even while vacant, the place that it held still guides this ship of mine.

Love,
Archie Brown

~*~

Hey Denny I'm really sorry to hear about Max. I remember him as a good guy and I'm absolutely amazed he is still not with us. Stay strong and remember you've got lots of support.
- Stewart Hay

~*~

Max was quick with a Simpsons quote, and i always enjoyed trying to find one he might not know. No matter how obscure, max always knew it. And his cat's breath smelt like catfood.

We'll miss ya mate, but your legacy will live on.
- Hugh Ford

~*~

Found this late but the loss of Flory is timeless. He was a gentle man. I always enjoyed talking with him. I had thought I would see him again some time. He's missed. He's missing. The world is missing out. I miss him.

- Adam Ford

~*~

A monkey, ready to be shot up into space, ready to sacrifice himself for Project Mayhem.
- Tyler Durden's words coming out of Simian Hoods mouth.

~*~

I regret that I didn't know Max all that well, but he did make a massive impression on me in high school for the time I was there. I remember him best for being a lovable goof but I know, in my heart & through reading other's comments, that there was so much more to him. I wish I knew you better. You will live on in our memories Max.
- Wanda

A Salty Salute

2009-09-30T21:23:00.002+10:00

Disarm the settlers
The new drunk drivers
Have hoisted the flag
We are with you in your anger
Proud brothers
Do not fret
The bus will get you there yet
To carry us to the lake
The club is open
Yeah, the club is open
Hey, the club is open
A-come on, come on, the club is open
Cmon, cmon, the club is open
Cmon, cmon, cmon, the club is open...

- Guided By Voices.

Thanks Toneatron

Vale Max Flory

2009-09-09T12:49:00.007+10:00

“He had an incredibly finely-tuned and rapidly-delivered sense of erudite tangential humour that would bring great mirth to people of our ilk, but I suspect it could have caused total bewilderment to some others.

[...] he wrote (and wrote, and wrote) for the sheer love of writing itself rather than as a profession. Whenever there were troubles among our social circle, he had a ready ear and sound advice, and whenever physical assistance was needed he had a ready hand. He brought a little magic to the lives of all those he touched and he'll be remembered with great fondness.“

- Lev Lafayette

Lev Lafayette's journal

R.I.P MAX FLORY 1973-2009

2009-09-08T13:22:00.002+10:00

"...and then we'll be Kings and then we'll be necessary"

Bottlo *

2009-08-04T03:36:00.007+10:00

So many people I see in this bottlo appear to be alive only because there’s nothing else to do. At least that’s what they might think. What is the point then?

I found myself just the other day watching a bloke as he left the bottleshop. I couldn’t help muttering out loud to myself “what is the point of your life?” You see it gets to you after a while, the endless parade of hopeless souls.

- “Where’s the other bloke?” Here’s another one on the back seat of a car load of hopeless souls, having just secured their pre-lunch 6 for $10 bourbon-n-cola cans.

“I don’t know who you mean mate” He’s looking for some sort of discount or deal. I’m really not in the mood for this.

“You know…the other blokes?” He gesticulates in description. Indicates two blokes to me.

“They’re not here”

They drive out of the bottlo. When I’m sure they won’t hear me I mutter “Actually mate, I know where they are, they’re around your mum’s house working on a new mong race”

I don’t think I used to be this unsympathetic.

Is it every man for himself? Is it? It must be. Because otherwise what else could this all mean in a society where so many people are struggling through they’re lives. What am I referring to by ‘This’? The hopelessly under-educated and socially dysfunctional people I see every morning. They’ve got no money but they spend it on grog anyway. They limp and drag their feet slowly up the hill toward us. Like a scene from a zombie movie. The Dead Living.

How can we be so rich and have failed so many?

A Young guy left his wallet on the bar last night. It’s gone. Well actually he’s not sure where he left it. He’d had more than a few. He checks in the bottlo the next morning. Has anyone found it or handed it in? He had $300 in his wallet last night. The entire remains of his social security. After the young guy has left the bottlo, I’m standing there wondering how he could be so bloody stupid as to “get on the piss” with all the money he has stored in his wallet. How could anyone be that stupid? As if on cue – enter stage right: his dad. His 68 year old pensioner alcoholic father has come in to pick up his pre-breakfast 6 for $10 bourbon and cola cans …but more from him in a bit.

Why does…how can…such a wealthy society fail so many of its people?

This morning I just want to cry.

I feel paralysed by rage. What is my rage about?

My rage is about my inability to make a life with meaning. I can’t even just ‘blah’ on about financial goals and rewards anymore. Because I can see it’s not gonna be enough to just make money. On its own that is not going to give me meaning. Although as the comedic like to observe, it might dull the pain of the emptiness.

“You want a bag for that bottle mate?”

“Nah mate. We’ll smash that before we get home!”

I flew into a rage before. I’ve been doing some boxing training for a couple of years now. Just to get fit. My ex-girlfriend said to me recently that I seemed to her to be “more violent” than I used to be. “More aggressive somehow”… funny thing is, that little argument I had with her just made me want to cry…I mean I was sitting there trying to defend myself against her assessments and then that welling up in the eyes, a slight feeling you might choke, then a calm…a loss of self and then a strange sad remorse. Things lost. Things once, now gone.

“Did anyone hand in a wallet?” Now the Dad’s doing his bit. “My son was in the bar last night. He had $300 in his wallet. Says he put it on the bar. When he remembered to look, it was gone.”

I want to jump the counter and shake this poor old man. Ask him what the fuck he’s doing, why is his son a moron? What sort of fucking example are you setting by buying booze before breakfast every morning?!

I’m so full of rage at the moment. It begins to consume me.

Maybe it’s just because I have been recovering from a flu. It’s been a while since I wanted to punch anything. I came close to punching the duty manager this morning. Fortunately for us both, he scurried away. Unfair weight advantage. I guess I am more capable of violence than before. Better able. Maybe my ex was right. I felt the boxing drills this morning. I felt the boxing hands pour out of me. I was sick last night, but the hands exploded out of me. Flurry and fury. I had to write up five cans and 2 cartons to breakages.

The training probably has made a difference.

“You got any specials on beer mate?”

“Slabs?”

“What the bloody hell else would I want?”

“Just there” I wave my hand across, indicating the long line of display slabs and blocks six feet from his car window. The ones covered in paper signs marked “Specials”.

“How much is VB?”

“$38 mate”

“Bullshit” He drives off.

“Yup nice one. Petrol is $1.50 a litre mate. Enjoy that $2 you're gonna try save!”

Later though, when I think about it more, I develop some sympathy. I can’t really blame this guy and his ilk. I mean all they want is some beers after work and the price keeps going up every three months. Then they try to remember the last time they’re wages went up.

After I punched some boxes, punched a door, pushed over the ladder and kicked the shit through a beer sign, I did some primal screaming…

Well all I really wanted was to have a cry. I must be depressed. Isn’t that what they’d say?

Rage and feelings of futility, inability to cry…or inability to stop crying. It’s gotta be a textbook outline of depression. Doesn’t it?

Fuck all that. I just want some meaning.

- “Has your son asked the bar manager if they have found a wallet this morning?”

“Yeah well I dunno you see…my son was so angry….so angry… he was screaming and yelling and carrying on. Blimey… I’m only a pensioner you know. I told him there’s nothing I can do. I’m broke. The boy’s smashing stuff up. Stupid boy does his whole fortnights money in a night!” He stares out of the bottlo at nothing in particular. We share a moment of silent contemplation.

-“What was he doing with all of his money in his wallet?” I ask.

The father taps the side of his head with his finger. Rolls his eyes back and pushes his tongue out the side of his mouth. He repeats these actions several times. I’m not sure who he is referring to but apparently somebody isn’t right in the head.

I’ve started having daily chats with this 66 year old alco' who lives across the road. He’s a nice enough bloke I suppose, but he’s bloody hopeless really. I’m pretty sure the only reason I think he’s nice enough now is because his age has taken the edge of his ability to be an aggressive drunken asshole. This is my male role model.

Where have all our fathers gone? We lost our fathers in the War. What fucking war?! Well there must’ve been one and we didn’t notice, because there’s scarcely a viable male leader in sight. I’m pretty sure I could benefit from the counsel of a male elder. There simply aren’t any though. Maybe I’ll evolve. Maybe I’ll become my own male figure, my own role model and my own source of inspiration. Or maybe I too will break apart, or be absorbed by consumption. Fade away… or whatever it is that happens to the men of this generation.

I’m scrambling for some meaning here… but this is and has become the whole point hasn’t it?

I shut the shop and go home. The lights are on but nobody’s home.

* "Bottlo" is an extract from a semi-fictional novel-in-progress of the same name. While it is based on some of my experiences it is not about me so please do not be alarmed ;-)

'Bottlo' First published on the creative arts blog Fabulist Savannah

Listening to: The Ramones (Mixed Mp3's) whilst brambling with a scythe in Normandy! True story ;-)

Savendi At Large

2009-07-31T03:17:00.000+10:00

Dearest M.L Darling,

What day is it? I am awash in sensory input. The heightened sense of experience that some travellers get when the sensation of days stretch out and become as if weeks. Experiential time dilation kicks in and your head is spinning and you are left wondering when it was that you stepped out of the airplane and into this stream...this current that has ripped you along in so much broiling froth and light - a rub-a-dub dub. And sound-n-sounds and people from worldwide and imagining no countries. So much water having swept under the proverbial and now I turn to you in full flow and ask...in all sincerity...how long has it been? What day is it today?

Oyes...of course now that I actually pause to write this large upon the screen sat in Phnom Penh netcafe it gives me a small-space to remember it's only been 3 days. Mad Plumber will definitely remember this phenomenon from our last Thai expedition. Experience so dense that the normal sense of linear time bows out so that you cant remember anything but a head full of blessed experience... Stand up, fall down...a moment on your knees - And give thanks that you can experience the luxury of such travel. For I know that we are blessed just as Mad Plumber and I knew we were blessed in Thailand. Just as I'm sure that everyone who has been mad-awake in travel has taken a moment to reflect... Filled their lungs and pushed out on an eddy...into a small and gentle bay to take brief pause...long enough to catch up with oneself a moment. Bundle into a netcafe and share and give and write thanks. Love to you all and to all of you who have in some way helped me or encouraged me to persist and press on...to go and go and go...

I soldiertostandupsoldiertostandupsoldier - For this I thank you, for in its way it has helped me to here...Blessed.

You know who you are.
~
"Savendi at large" As titled by Mad Plumber, First appeared on the creative arts website Fabulist Savannah

Toneatron & Tommy-R-Us

2009-07-25T00:40:00.004+10:00

The two stars of this exhibition poster are my old chums Toneatron and Tommy-R-Us!

Hell Gallery: Lisa Radford and Friends Go To Hell

You've got to love MELBOURNE!

Hoi An Balcony View

2009-07-20T14:07:00.009+10:00

Chrome balustrade. Yellow starred red flag flapping in the wind. Cao Lau stall on Tran Cao Van. Scooters and bicycles. People wearing surgeon face masks. Fruit stall on crazy little intersection with no stop sign or lights or stop and go paraphernalia...no lines no lights just go and go and go. Huge dinosaur eggs some dark like rotten, guess there's gonna be some streetfood I'm never gonna try. Coconut palms on the near distance. Sea breeze is in and blowing. Cyclo cycles through. Swat and H20 tees. Great big dirty green tents. trad garb...old school new school and no school. Shirtless man in thongs with a necklace and jade pendant. My back aches. Wires and dark stained walls built out of mould. Painted mould. papadum snack bigger than the kids head. Strange sweet savoury mix we find so alien and common here. Hoi An coolsie kid on black rimmed peddler. Ochre paint jobs. Old lady with walking stick and hunched up back...moving pretty well though. I haven't see them smile much the old ones. Bright red mod scooter. Tourists on $1bicycles. Kids eating noodle soup and cao lau with fast moving chopsticks just off the road corner stall of red plastic chairs and tables all low down like a kids tea party set. Ice buckets, steaming buckets and a paint bucket someone left on the roof above them. Mint leaves and some salads i cant discern from here. I discover Macbook's photobooth...we stare at each other and I shoot ten photos of myself in black and white.

* 'Hoi An Balcony View' first appeared on the creative arts website Fabulist Savannah

Listening to: Bowie - Aladdin sane

Night dreams, sense and recollection.

2009-07-15T07:50:00.000+10:00

I had this dream last night. AC and I were standing just outside of a doorway that led into a grand internal courtyard. Let me describe it further by saying: imagine an enormous Elizabethan style mansion, almost a small castle or a keep and tall with at least 3 stories. The mansion was so sprawling that it had vast internal courtyards contained within the building. Open to the sky, but flanked on all sides by the high stone walls of the mansion. AC and I were stood on the edge of this internal courtyard, next to a door we had just stepped out of. I didn’t see this, in the dream sense of “seeing”, but I sensed it. Evidently the storyline was already well underway, when my brain decided to start recording it to the forward memory that I now relay. I sensed the back-story within the dream, much as I sense now the atmosphere of what had transpired just previous to my sudden jaunt into dream consciousness (dig?). It was night and a dark one at that. We had been exploring the grand old building. It wasn’t a ruin, it was very much in use as if it were lived in by some rich family or up- kept by some historical committee or better yet as if we were back in time…in the mansions prime…suffice to say the place was alive with it’s own presence…and that works nicely leading into this next insight, which is that AC and I were pursuing a ghost or ghosts. We knew something or some things supernatural were active in this enormous building. The hair on our arms and necks stood on end. Something very old and powerful was there. We were scared, but elated. Driven by a desire to confront and maybe understand… a desire that overcame the feelings of fear…that malingering unnameable terror that welled up within us as we moved through the sprawling dimly lit mansion. Apparently we had been in somewhat of a chase. Who was chasing who I cannot say (I wasn’t there (winks aside) but action was afoot. In that moment we enter the dream AC and I were taking a breather…a moment or two…we were discussing what had been transpiring, there was a sense of brevity between us…wry smiles and quiet chuckling. We were being humorous, but our skin was bespeckled by goose bumps and the radiant atmosphere had us rubbing our hands together, shifting feet to-and-fro and shivering… although not from any cold. We had found something…a spirit or a ghost and its very existence filled the dreamscape to the point of overflowing. Elements of its energy seemed to spill into the real world. It’s corny to say, but it was as if we knew we were in a dream, but more still…it was as if we were in its dream. In unison we both looked up at one of the narrow windows high up on the wall that overlooked the courtyard. The window was open. It had only just opened and a dark slip of curtain fluttered out from within. No one could be seen in the window but we knew it was the Presence. Maybe out of fear, I don’t know why, I started to crack the wise. I heard myself say something loudly like “yeah yeah very dramatic, very spooky…just what we expected” AC joined in. We were stirring it up…giving that supernatural force a rev up...letting it know that the Diggers weren’t afraid. Something spoke up, spoke back to us. It was something unnatural. In our heads or out loud…maybe both at once… It said “Third floor NOW!” We charged back inside, off to confront this thing. Round a corner and down a wide ornately laid out corridor we ran. The atmosphere was charged with preternatural energy. I noticed a large tapestry hanging on the wall. The tapestry bowed outwards as if someone or something was crudely hiding behind it…I could see the floor beneath the tapestry and there were no feet to be seen. AC yelped as he’d seen the same thing I had. I was terrified but I pushed behind the tapestry. In that split second I let out a terrible noise like a low mournful howl, immediately followed by another a second later. It sounded a mix of exhilaration, suspense, tension and fear. It was not a pleasant sound, and I know this because it woke me up in bed. In that last millisecond within the dream I found there was nothing supernatural behind the tapestry, only an ill placed game hunters mounting. But the noise of my howl was a collision of dream and reality. It was almost as if the mansion had kicked me out of the dreamscape. AC and I had been charging into the unknown…headed for some stairs up to the third floor, summoned, challenged by some unspeakable unknown force. The shrill terror of it all…the terror was a power surge that overloaded the dreamscape…shorted out the link and left me sitting up in my bed. It was about 1am…pretty early for an intense dream in my experience. I thought of how AC had got on…did he charge onwards to the third floor? Did I disappear in front of him? Whose dream was that anyway? In the dark of my room the heavy shroud of the dream still hung heavy, refused to let go to reality…I determined to go back in. I was still groggy. I lay back down and tried to re-enter the mansion. I still felt the force of the Presence…palpable as if it really had spilled out into the room with me. There was something major and unresolved still moving me, pumping through my adrenalised heart like a possession. I lay down and before I blacked out again there was a fleeting moment of reflection, like my own third person narrator saying…this doesn’t look right…is not the same place…or is it? Then the darkness and the forgetting.

*Special love goes out to: M.L Darling, Petri Ivalo Sinda and the Mad Plumber of Fabulist Savannah, where this piece first appeared in 2008.

Listening to: Pnau

Rabbit Hill painting - Denmark

2009-06-23T07:26:00.004+10:00

More progress on the Rabbit Hill painting. This is it for the week!

I just had to blog this piece of art in progress. I think its so great.

It appeals very much to my taste. Nice work pOps.

I'm In Denmark at the moment too. So there's a kind of continuity...dont you think? ;-)

Please check out the artists other work at his Flickr page.

Den's Listening to: Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours

Bottle Top Boat Racing

2009-05-21T05:34:00.007+10:00

I’m working pretty hard today considering…
Considering I’ve got a flu happening…but I’m reminiscing even harder about old times and my old chum Florstar, when we were kids and bottle top-flotsam and jetsam boat racing in the man-made creeks of Sir Charlie Gardiner hospital’s parkland. It was so much fun. I remember enjoying it so much that it sears into the present now…
and I’m there, splashing water, warm air and clear blue skies. I remember a couple of little objects that became like champions to us…maybe a slightly crushed white plastic milk top and a stubby stump of anonymous orange plastic. These were vessels that won several races in a row…fast, consistent performers…continually in the top three of a race. One of our favourite flotsam-boats won again and again. The mythology grew, we had a little character here…our own private champion. Through the treacherous conditions they sped, gloried over by us as race stewards bounding nimbly across the rocky creek bed, along the slick grassy banks of the watercourse chasing fields of boats as they hurtled to the finish line. Magical play.
Then the time we lost one: A close race that put too many boats across the finish line too quickly for us to steward…too quick to gather them all, lost in the excitement of a probable dead heat, too quick to grab them all to safety as we’ve lunged and splashed… “Plastic Whiteys gone!” Shot through for a win or a place…it was too close…hit on through the rapids as we scrambled to grab the fleet…a great close race, four, five or even six vessels tightly bunched on the finish line and we’ve lost precious seconds in our roles as stewards and adjudicators…there was a race won, but by who?…Hearts pumping, paused mid stride hovered over the finish line, trying to pick the winner, then mad scramble, reports go out…The champs missing! The final collection of little boats normally a relatively simple affair…races where boats usually only came through on their own or in groups of two or three…but this whole fleet of flotsam & jetsam bundled through “race of the century!” Hair raising frozen with glee at the prospect of it all… lunging for the boats… “the boats… the boats!”
“Florstar! Have you got Plastic Whitey?”
- “Nup”
Splashing and cursing… Our little champion, our little genius piece of trash elevated to mythic nautical speedster in our minds…our new sporting world expanding with every passing second, but he’s gone…
we scour on, searching the reeds at the edge of the run through the rapids, out along the banks to the greater lake that the creek plunges into. “He’s gone through the rapids and gone out to sea!” We scan the surface of the lake but can’t see him. The excitement begins to give way to a mournful recognition that we’ve lost the champ. Reality briefly shines through the curtain of fantasy…but we were vigil:
All other races are temporarily called off. Proceedings halted. No more championship regatta till there’s been an inquiry…a reckoning. Renewed searches for the plastic fantastic Plastic Whitey. To no avail …we stop empty handed…
Everything is quieter for a few moments…just the popping and sploshing of the creek and the low distant hum of the hospital generators.
But the game must go on and there are new rounds of elimination trials to be held. Search for a new champion…up away from the creeks and reeds, by a lunch area with benches, looking for bottle caps and popsicle sticks, down by a drain entrance …push through the reeds for a bit of old rubber thong…or a shapely branch stub, or an old comb…Things we should have enshrined with notes, but time is not passing when your young and there’s no end to finding new bits-n-bobs to try their speed as grand rapids racers…and new days and new ways to celebrate our love of such story and high drama and competition…the uplift of the winners…our winners. The arvo dims and we head down Abedare road to the deli on the corner of Florstar’s street for pre-dinner hotdogs and cokes…Florstar has a twenty, he is the treasurer.

* Bottle Top Boat Racing first appeared on the creative arts website Fabulist Savannah

New rock is the old rock rolling…

2009-05-19T12:38:00.000+10:00

Babel Fish

2009-05-18T01:23:00.003+10:00

This one's for Douglas Adams I think:

Recently I got a beautiful email from our friends at A La Ferme B&B on Somme. One of the owners Jean-Claude doesn't speak a lot of English and so wrote to us in French. I had to use yahoo's Babel Fish in an attempt to translate it. The result was funny and off-kilter in a poetic way. Eli thought it would be interesting to compare how Google-Translate went with the same text so she ran it through that and got a similarly strange and yet lyrical result. Please see below the Original email in French and then the two attempted translations:

Original:

Hello les amoureux.

En Français

Merci pour votre très sympathique e-mail.

Notre amitié va toujours vers des personnes sympathiques et particulièrement

vers le peuple Australien qui a payé très

cher en hommes pour nous défendre lors de la grande Guerre.

Vous pouvez réserver bien sur dans notre B&B, par contre faites le plus

rapidement possible.

Nous espérons que Eli a repris des couleurs et que nous vous reverrons en

pleine forme.

Nous vous réserverons naturellement le même accueil.

Isabelle, Jean-Claude

Yahoo Babel Fish:

Hello in love ones. In French Thank you for your very sympathetic nerve e-mail. Our friendship always goes worms of the people sympathetic nerves and particularly towards the Australien people which paid very expensive as men to defend us at the time of the Great War. You can reserve of course in our B& B, on the other hand made as soon as possible. We hope that Eli took again colors and that we will re-examine you in full form. We will reserve the same reception naturally to you.

Google Translate:

Hello lovers.

In French

Thank you for your very nice e-mail.

Our friendship will always friendly to people and especially

to the Australian people who paid very

expensive men to defend us during the Great War.

You can book well in our B & B, made against the

quickly as possible.

We hope that Eli has taken the colors and that we meet again in

form.

We give you the same natural host.

Listening to: Dappled Cities 'The Price' (Download Free here)

Some random things I think of when I think about Eli:

2009-05-08T04:11:00.003+10:00

Eli is unusual and likes unusual things and yet when I tell her about the most mundane crap that I’m currently interested in she gives it her full attention and makes me feel ok about it. - This in turn reminds me that celebrations of life can be found almost anywhere and this I believe is key to how she lives. She loves things big and small, significant and passing alike; Eli’s passion for knowledge reminds me of what having an open mind can do.

When I look at Eli I see the primal joy of living refracting off of her like a crazy fantastic rainbow.

Eli drinks water funny and it makes me happy.

Eli smells like the future.

Eli laughs like a lemon might laugh if you gave it a little face or crossed it with a pixie (assuming you could find one of course. Eli would probably help you look), her laughter reduces me to childish exuberance.

Eli’s way of being reminds me that innocence is neither contingent on naivety nor synonymous with weakness.

Eli is a fem-fantastic warrior-poet and I love and admire her. It has been both an inspiration and a pleasure to know her and I am grateful for every day of it ….I sincerely hope to know her for many many years to come

French Bed & Breakfast for ANZAC Day

2009-04-30T23:04:00.000+10:00

Eli and I were fortunate enough to be in France for ANZAC Day. We attended the Dawn Service at Villers Bretonneux.

We discovered a wonderful bed and breakfast called A La Ferme

"A Farm" I think in english...anyone? ;-)

It's in a beautiful little village Bayonvillers about 8km east of Villers Bretonneux

Anyway this is a shameless plug for them because the owners Jean-Claude & Isabelle are wonderfully nice people and richly deserve success. They went out of their way time and again to help us. And made us feel welcome and at home with their warmth and hospitality. The rooms are lovely. Jean-Claude makes the best omelet I've ever tasted with farm fresh eggs sourced from their own chickens. They also provide mouth-watering bread, cheese and butter. Isabelle's homemade jams and marmalades are pure gastronomic genius. Isabelle gave us a whole jar of Strawberry & Rhubarb jam. Would have to be close to the best jam I've ever had in my life! Anyway I'd have no hesitation in recommending them to anyone. Especially if you are planning on traveling to the Picardy/Somme region for ANZAC Day (when accommodation can be hard to find) or visiting WWI sites. Tell them Den and Eli sent you and experience the love!

"Isabelle (she speaks English) and Jean-Claude welcome you in their lovely farm, in Bayonvillers (Somme, France)."

http://www.a-laferme.fr/eng/

Old Banner Quotes 1.

2009-04-08T19:40:00.000+10:00

"If you never get knocked out, then you ain't fighting the right people" - Matt Hughes

About me then

2009-01-25T16:29:00.000+11:00

January - December 2009

I’m on the road finally after saving for about two years. I'm throwing my cards in the air, my dice on the ground, my hat in the ring... I has done all the dumb things innit .

These sort of things I hope to explore...

Gay Spiderman Dance

2008-09-25T12:58:00.005+10:00

This is a video clip from the now defunct AIF Class of Oct 2007 blog. We'd had a couple of champers because we'd just graduated.
I thought I'd save this from cybertrash by posting it on Dendonedid. It's good for a laugh still :-) Thanks to Andrew W, AIF Fitness Team Captain & PT extraordinaire for posting this clip originally. I have also included a clip from the same day of a young guy who really can dance.

"This is why you won the Energiser Award Denny! :)

Keep on Rockin' Den,

Can Do Andrew (15/10/07)"

~~~

Adonis! Break it down B-Boy!

Listening To: Cut Copy, The presets, Grafton Primary, Pnau.

Harden The F#ck Up Australia: Chopper & Den

2008-09-15T19:44:00.005+10:00

Here are a couple of belated pics for my readers, including my favourite: me and Uncle Chop Chop (AKA Heath Franklin) after a Melbourne performance of his show "Harden the F*^k Up
Australia!" I meant to post these last spring...true story...and I have no excuse.
Ok so better late than never right? Consider this some blogtastic repayment for times lost, punters! ;-)

Listening to: Joy Division, Faker, Sigur Ros

Large Hadron Al-Qaeda

2008-09-12T00:02:00.004+10:00

Yesterday at work Timee came up to me and with a look of consternation on his face and said "Den what's going on with all this Large Hadron Al-Qaeda stuff? Why are they trying to kill us?!

The Foodies

2008-08-12T14:14:00.005+10:00

G'day,

I’ve been away ages huh? Maybe I’ll just start every Dendonedid blog now with a paragraph apologizing for my absence… for “Times being what they are”

- “What are they?”

- “Mercurial” *

Anyway reason I’m back is to regale you with more tales from retail:

I thought it was just selling liquor that would fill me with disappointment and dread…of sorrow for my fellow man and the repetitive scenes of wasted potential…of wasted lives. Now whilst this tale of grocery shopping gone wrong may not on the surface seem as bad as a boozey life…it's getting on towards a tragedy and visions of shopping malls, hospital halls, broken families, wheezing while walking, sweating whilst eating and of early graves and

Mother & young son go shopping in a mini mart 3pm 9/8/08

And in six minutes they’ve filled their trolley with:

H/fresh 100% apple juice 2ltrs. (That’s 100% “juice” not 100% apples)

Salted Cashews 150g

Mars Bar Classic Funsize 264g

Cadbury Dairy Milk chocolate 235g block

Peters Ice-cream Old English Toffee 2ltrs

Smiths Salt & Vinegar chips 175g

Smiths BBQ chips 175g

2 packets - Tim Tams ‘double coated’ choc biscuits 200g

2 packets - Garlic bread 200g

2 Bottles of Lemonade 2ltr

Pascal Marshmallows 250g

Glengarry Shortbread biscuits 200g

Chicken Crimpy shapes biscuits 200g

Kraft Light Philly Cheese Sweet Chilli dip 250g

2 tubs - Copperpot double garlic & capsicum dip 170g

Salted Peanuts 170g

Nabisco Potato flavoured shapes biscuits 175g

$75 worth! They seem like nice people, really they do, the boy looks just like his mum he has a nice ruddy happy face, but also like his mum he’s getting incredibly fat. He’s about 11 years old. I don’t feel good about this negativistic grumble, but what am I gonna say? Nary a fruit or vegetable in sight, And lo though you say “Hey Den it might be shopping for a children’s party” Yeah it might’ve been but it doesn’t really matter because they shop like this all the time. Is this what the Corporation wants? I think it is. You see nobody is holding a gun to their heads right? Relentlessly encouraging people to eat this food isn’t like forcing them is it? Is it?

*Apologies to Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

Listening to: Playlist of - Baseball, mclsuky, Art brut, Shooting At Unarmed Men and Future Of The Left.

Supermarket Encounters

2008-01-14T16:58:00.000+11:00

One evening recently I was standing in the supermarket checkout queue waiting for my turn to be served. I was fourth in line and trying to keep my head down a little, as I had seen a former classmate from the AIF, “K” and I didn’t feel like talking to her at that moment. You know when you’re out and about and your busy and or tired and just want to get on and do what your trying to do, but you see someone you know, maybe an old co-worker or a friend of a friend and you know you probably should just take the time to say hello for a moment…it’d probably only take a minute or two, but for whatever reason you really don’t feel like it, so you do the whole no-look or look away and concentrating on something else. Your avoiding potential eye lines… maybe they won’t see me and then we can just mutually go about our business… In this case, I was tired and I just wanted to get home and make some dinner, but there’s more you see, because towards the end of the AIF course K stopped showing up to the classes. Everyone wondered where she’d got to, because the course was quite intensive and demanding and she’d already made it most of the way through when she started being absent. In the final fortnight of the course, another one of my classmates “Adonis”, on his way into the building, had seen K being dropped of by her boyfriend. It was like a scene from a movie. He heard her boyfriend say ‘Have a good class’ and then watched as she walked towards the course building, only to turn away and head in the opposite direction when her boyfriend had driven away. Adonis tried to wave her over, but she just gave him a cheeky smile and turned heel and headed somewhere else. “Have a good class!” So this was a further layer of complexity that I now sort to avoid, as it was clearly her boyfriend doing some shopping with her, and I figured she might just as likely wish to avoid a conversation with me that might go potentially something like “Hi Denny”, “Hi K, how are you?” “Did you end up passing your certificates?” “Yes, what happened to you? I didn’t see you in the last couple of weeks of the course…” etc etc… So it was an overly complex social scenario that lead me to my position four people back in the checkout queue trying not to look anywhere near my left where three aisles across K and her boyfriend were going through a remarkably slow checkout process. I now became aware of two men at the head of my queue chatting away in a friendly and cheerful manner. I recognized one of them from my childhood neighborhood. A good guy called Ben. So here I go again, in a situation where I probably should say hello, but I don’t really feel up to it, and I’m trying to keep a low profile already….maybe its just the existing state of mind making me feel like this, but I decide to keep my head down anyway and pretend to not notice him…he might not recognize me anyway. I feel really bad about this one. Much worse than avoiding K. I mean I hardly know her, but this guy was a real character from my childhood. He married his neigbourhood sweetheart “V” another nice character from that era and I could clearly see him clutching a beautiful little blond girl of about 4 or 5 who I presumed was there daughter. So I’m keeping my head down, trying not to be seen…by anyone… and fighting the rising sense of guilt that I’m feeling about Ben…sheesh den you know how it is…I don’t want to be rude, but its inconvenient…the supermarket is really busy and I’m tired and hungry and its getting late…yaddayaddayadda but its all BS really and I’m losing because the voice for the affirmative is drilling me and I know I should just let him see me and see if he recognizes or acknowledges me and greet him warmly if he does and ignore the fact that all these strangers standing around will be listing in as we wax the lyrical about how long its been “Its been over 15 years…you look great…you too…” But I don’t. Head down, don’t look left, don’t look forward…minding the business of one’s toes. Ben finishes his conversation and his checkout. He bids farewell to the other chap he’s been chatting with and bustles out of the supermarket. Well at least that’s one all round awkward situation resolved. Just as I’ve thought this a woman from the adjacent aisle leans over and taps the woman in front of me on the shoulder. “Excuse me is that your bank card on the ground there” She asks as she points down near our feet. The woman in front of me picks it up and says “nope, it’s not my card” She turns to me and asks if it’s mine. I already know its Ben’s before I’ve even looked. I say “Does it say Ben on it?” We both read the name Benjamin on it. She assumes its mine and hands it to me. I explain that it was that guy who’d left a minute ago. We look out of the supermarket, and up the mall I spot Ben leaving via the far exit and disappearing around the corner. I chuckle at the situation. I’m the only one who knows what he looks like…I’ve got his bank card….I excuse myself from the queue and run after him. I catch sight of him crossing the carpark. “Ben!” I say it as if it hadn’t been nearly 20 years since we’d last spoke. The fog of weirdness descends, but he turns and seems to recognize me immediately. He’s nonchalant and smiles warmly perhaps searching for my name as the years melt away. “You dropped your card in the supermarket” I say as I hand it to him. He takes it and we shake hands. I’m filled with a genuine nostalgic sense of warmth. I’m a fool sometimes…I can’t believe I considered not acknowledging him or saying hello…awkward and inconvenient or not. It is now a genuinely happy moment. He introduces me to his young daughter bundled up in his arms with the groceries. I recognize V in her facial features immediately and I tell him so. He seems pleased about this and tells me about his other child who apparently looks like him. I tell him I’d love to catch up for a beer. I hope we do. A warm late summer’s evening glow, the distinctly clean and fragrant west coast evening air and idiot-me saved from myself, and Benjamin casualling across the carpark having not lost his bank card in the supermarket…Benjamin who we used to call ‘Ronnie’ because he lived in The White House… What a great little situation made of beautiful little things.

Den's Top Ten Films 2007

2008-01-05T16:29:00.000+11:00

I managed to get to 22 films this year. I saw 300 and Control twice.

Oddest thing I saw was an obscure 16mm 1975 drug culture film “Pure Shit” although it was known at the time as Pure S. It wasn’t particularly good, although it was interesting. I was a bit disappointed there weren’t more street shots of inner city 70’s Melbourne. The majority of street shots were at night and streaming from car windows. There was one nice moment where some of the characters after breaking into a chemist run into Edinburgh Gardens in Nth Fitzroy and hide inside the rotunda. (Rotunda: See SpiderBaits “Run” video clip)

1. Pans Labyrinth

2. Control

3. Blood Diamond

4. Atonement

5. This Is England

6. Death Proof

7. Transformers

8. The Good Shepherd

9. The US VS John Lennon

10. 300

In between days

2007-11-09T15:31:00.000+11:00

Of late Ive had few of my peeps tell me that they have been surfing my blog regularly to see if I've added anything new. Mostly what they express is in disappointed tones, as obviously I am a fairly erratic poster. Sorry to all who'd like to see more regular updates, but I never wanted this to be like an online diary. Full of day to day activities and trivialities...not that i don't enjoy a triviality or two. I guess i have been curtailed somewhat by my thematic desires for this blog, which coming to think on it now, it would be hard for me to define for anyone what exactly those were. What is blog worthy to Den? Well surely some of my content covers that, but i guess its a bit random and sometimes things that i think might interest some of my readers, I'm not confident would be appropriate reading for others ;-) Perhaps i need a members only section preambled with "Beyond here scant tales of dendonedid debauchery may await ->"
So having rambled to here i will string together a few journal like thoughts on the last few weeks as a kind of concessional effort for those of whom my blogging inconsistency has disappointed.

I went in to my boxing gym a few weeks ago, i hadn't been in for 3 or 4 weeks due to work and study load, and the gym was full of flowers. I went to the sign in desk and commented to one of the trainers "Well thats a lot of flowers..." His expression drained from his face and he said "Oh...you haven't heard yet" He took me aside and told me that one of the main identities of the gym, senior trainer and organiser 'Megan' had recently passed away. She was 29 years old. I wanted to walk out of the gym and go home. It was so shocking. This old school boxing gym space was very much her space. Hers and her brilliant partner Robbie's. Robbie is a pro boxer and our senior trainer. Together they formed a tight and supportive atmosphere of a home away from home for the people who came to train with them regularly. Megan was 29 and fit as all-get-out. She had a heart attack. I haven't been able to bring myself to call anyone and find out what the coroner's report has said. It's so strange to see someones photo memorialised on the wall above where you have seen them so often...there she was week in week out supporting you whilst you trained,encouraging, chatting about fitness, cooking and philosophy. We were lucky enough to have them over to my mum's for a BBQ last year...Megan was a good person and I am glad I knew her.

I have been in Melbourne working for Ad Assoc at the Spring Carnival. Its been grand. How good is Melbourne in spring?! If you love big grey cities and hidden bars. Me and AB went for a quick beer in the city on Tuesday night. We were looking for a little hidden bar he knew and ended up finding this very cool little open aired rooftop bar several stories up on Bourke street. Sat out on deck chairs on some astro turf and lorded over the city and a couple of pints. Beeeaauutiful.

Wanna see Den doing his own interpretation of a hyperactive 'gay spider man' dance?
Check out the clip at the blog: AIF Class of Oct 07

...Or dancing like a cockney nut job as Tone put it!

I recently graduated from The Australian Institute of Fitness and am now taking my first steps as a qualified personal trainer and fitness instructor. Will keep y'all posted.

You might also wanna say g'day to me at my facebook site
There doesn't seem to be an actual unique url for my page, so just do a search for denny carr and you should find me.

The Ian Curtis/Joy Division film "Control" is beautiful, visually brilliant, sad, funny and moving. Watch for the astoundingly good playing by the actors playing the part of Joy Division. You might swear you were back in 1979 Manchester or London.

Listening to: Joy Division (what else!)

Base Jumping with Survivor Tom

2007-06-25T02:09:00.000+10:00

Recently I had this intensely vivid dream. I was trekking in a strange landscape of forests and hills, but it was subtly different to present day earth, perhaps prehistoric even, with massive stands of large and densely leaved alien looking trees and thick coffee coloured loamy soil underfoot. Through this landscape I was making my way with Tom of Survivor Palau. Tom Westman the NYC fireman winner of Survivor Palau no less! I walked up a steady incline
towards a hill crest which became a large bluff and a dramatic cliff edge. Here the path diverged. To my left was a slow meandering trail that wound its way along a hill line and eventually down onto the valley floor and straight in front of me the path proceeded up to cliff overlooking the valley. I peered over the edge of this enormous drop-off, and some 60-80ft below there was a large green lagoon. The lagoon and its surrounds were very beautiful. The panorama filled me with a sad unnameable longing. I considered the paths. I looked at the lagoon and wondered if I might make the jump. I was distracted by fears of broken limbs and alien crocodiles or big fish that might live in the mysterious jade waters below. I turned to Tom and he came up and joined me on the edge of cliff. He paused there for a beat, gave me little smile and then… took a big step off. He descended through the air feet first like a missile, plummeting into the water below with a spectacular splash and then resurfacing moments later looking up at me with a huge and expectant grin on his face. I think I actually spoke aloud and said something like (Smirking to myself) “Now that’s why Tom’s a million dollar Survivor winner and I’m standing on the edge of this damn cliff wondering what to do” I was wracked by fear…contemplating in awe, inspired by Tom’s example, but knees knocking and mind racing at the possible outcomes… I found myself recalling the sequence in Basketball Diaries when Jim Carroll and his friends were base jumping off a cliff, and one of them had never made the jump and was baulking at the edge…I’m sorry to say that I awoke at this point…before this story could force a conclusion…flash images of free fall, underwater rock and being unconscious and isolated in an alien landscape. So it’s somewhat off a cliffhanger I suppose ;-), but I will say that when I awoke I felt as if I were still there, wiped the fine rain forest mist from my face, but quite honestly, and although there’s the benefit of doubt here, I might’ve been just seconds away from admitting defeat and going the long way around.

Listening to: Devoted Few - counting cars

Bomb Jack Coin

2007-06-05T15:25:00.000+10:00

We've got this great little 'Cocktail table' arcade computer game at work that has about 50 games from the 80's on it. Me and Neil and some others have been giving the game Bombjack a bit of a belting. Bombjack is a brilliant little arcade game from 1984 that has stood the test of time surprisingly well.
The pub staff can mark their coins with an X on one side and their initials on the other, so they can get their coins back when the computer game chap comes and cashes out the games. Neil left the pub a few weeks ago to take a job managing a store in Kalgoorlie (about 600km East of Perth), and one day after he hadnt been there very long, he looked down on his till and lo-and-behold there was a shiny dollar coin with my very own "DC" & "X" marked on it! What are the fuckin odds huh?! Crazy! I think he's kept that dollar. Cool huh? :-)

A virtual moment with Den

2007-05-15T15:58:00.000+10:00

I got up late today around 10:30, hit snooze on my alarm three times. I always get a bit lethargic in the mornings around this time of the year. I think its the transition into the darker colder season. Some people call it S.A.D and I'm inclined to agree with them...that's what it feels like, so I try remember to go outside and stand in the slim bands of undiluted sunlight that part the outer lips of shadow and kiss me neatly on the forehead. I try and catch some rays, bar-up and get on with it.

I had baked beans and an egg for breakfast. I'm trying to eat less grains and less carbs. Which is very hard, because I love wheetbix and toast. Future folk will probably look back on our era and chuckle about everyone all strung out and jittering. High as a kite on all the GOD DAMN sugar. I wouldn't mind so much except that current research suggests it fucks you up in the head as much as it does in the belly.

After breakfast I read a few pages from A Fighter's Heart which is an intensely interesting book about a writers journey through the various sub-worlds of martial arts. I then sat out on my balcony where the sun was shining. In the warmth of its bathe I daydreamed briefly whilst staring down into a neighbours beautifully composed garden....catching sight of lawn, sunny lawn and childhood memories rolling in. Memories of lunches and optimism, the great unknown world of tantalising possibilities. Memories that intersect the present moment...evoking in me contemplation of my current attititude towards life. Learn to let go, learn to charge up on happiness whenever and wherever you can find it. To Be hungry without being consumed by its ambitions. To Be ambitious without being eaten by the future...To be able to survive drought.

I began reading a few pages of the novel Snow Crash. I am looking for references to the Metaverse because I am preparing to write for an oral presentation that I have to give at Uni this afternoon. My presentation is to be on Virtual Reality, with its central reference being an extract from Virtual Reality called Cyberspace and human nature. I could just leave it at an analysis of the prescribed text, but I cant help but throw in Snow Crash, which is one of my most favourite and seminal books. I was contemplating V.R and the Net and hyperreality when I felt compelled to write this little bit...a desire to share a virtual moment. I'm paying it forward right now, because I'm feeling the love and I'd be happy if you could too.

Bless.

aww c'mon guys

2007-01-15T15:10:00.000+11:00

Last Monday night we had four idiots walk into our bottlo and take 4 or 5 bottles of spirits off the shelf and then uber-casual-like stroll out of the exit. One of our guys was in the main coolroom and didnt see a thing, but Joshy caught sight of them as they were on the turn and went right up to them and said to them "Come on guys..." that if they "stopped now" and "put the stuff back" that he wouldnt call the police. Other than attack them in some way there was nothing Joshy could do. They responded by speeding up a little, all confidence, and casualled outta there. No fault on Joshy, because we dont get paid enough to be bouncers and he did real well just to get close up and confront them...anyway when we looked back on the security footage we were all struck by how funny Joshy looked as he reached out to these morons, a study of opposites - "c'mon guys...be reasonable" so here it is...the perfect caption: "aww c'mon guys!"

Triple J Hottest 100

2007-01-14T15:49:00.000+11:00

I voted in the Triple J hottest 100! Because I rock and Triple J rocks. Do you rock?

Looking over my ten songs for this year, you might notice I’m sporting a heavy bias towards the more indie acts (That’s a kind of tactical voting…isn’t it Pollbludger? ;-) Certainly if I wanted to vote in a more populist way I would’ve at the very least included the following three songs, which I’m certain will feature large somewhere in the top 20:

Kanye West’s - Touch The Sky, Youth Group’s – Forever Young and Lupe Fiasco’s – Kick Push. They’re good songs, but they don’t need my vote. All three of these songs were or still are getting heavy rotation on big FM radio. Some people might even argue that these types of songs shouldn’t be played on JJJ anymore, too big and too popular in the mainstream…although it occurs to me that its good for JJJ to have some “big hits” and good for smaller less known acts that they be heard in the mix with big platinum unit shifters such as Kanye.

Anyway… so I probably won’t have a single song I voted for in the Hottest 100 this year, whereas I had 5 last year! *-)

Dappled Cities Fly - Fire Fire Fire
Deloris - Loup Garou
The Editors - Blood
Faker - Love for Sale
Josh Pyke (Night Hour) - Memories & Dust
Laura Jean - I'm A Rabbit I'm A Fox
Pony Up! - The Truth About Cats & Dogs (Is That They Die)
Red Riders - A.S.P.I.R.I.N.
Subaudible Hum - All For The Caspian
Valentinos - Rain

Top Ten Films 2006

2007-01-10T19:38:00.000+11:00

Syriana

The Prestige

Jackass 2

Ten Canoes

The Departed

The Host (Gwoemul)

Clerks 2

Thank you For Smoking

Crude Awakening

In The Shadow Of The Palms

──

11. Darkon

12. Seven Swords

13. Shooting Dogs

14. The Great Yokai War (Yôkai daisensô)

15. Overcoming

16. Performance (Special mention)

I had a wonderful year for film going. I saw the most films ive ever seen at cinemas in a year, being 31, of which 14 I saw at the Melbourne International Film Festival. It was also my privilege to briefly work at the utterly superb “rare, cult & foreign” video store The Movie Reel in Northcote. And I attended the Melbourne premiere of Clerks 2 with over three hours of Q&A with Kevin Smith afterwards! Choosing for my list was extremely close this time around and I could have easily done a Top 15 with nothing much between 1 and 15 in terms of how I felt about them. Hence I’ve included 5 alternates and a special mention for Performance, the surprisingly rare 1970 film starring Mick Jagger and James Fox in his last film before an almost decade long sabbatical and alleged breakdown, which was in no small part connected to the psychedelic shenanigans that occurred during the making of Performance. I was very lucky to see a restored print screened at the impressive Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACME) Cinémathèque in Melbourne. Its an excellent and film and I had to mention it, even though it was filmed way back in 1968.

Stan bin laden - 70K (reprise)

2006-11-18T20:48:00.000+11:00

As I promised in the original Free 70K blog, here is a link to the Herald Sun article that illuminates in more detail, the “taskforce” and international search for Melbourne Super-Villain “Stan”

Littlerach

2006-10-16T02:10:00.000+10:00

Dendonedid Presents:
Rach, Rach Rach Little Rach...ive not mentioned her enough on this here blog. When i first met her i was told she was the door-bitch. She was the best god damn door bitch a beautiful little punkrockroom could have. Rach rocked...and rocks and knows all about rock but yet little about geology...but that doesnt even begin to scratch at the surface of the femme-enigma that is lil Rach. Talk to her about rock. Talk to her about punk...about punk attitude...about how it can save your life. Like it saved mine!

RACH RACH RACH RACH RACH LilRach!

Go and talk to her via the seminal Mess+Noise neighbourhood

Quickly before she makes me take this down ;->

Listening to: Placebo - running up that hill

Island That Time Forgot

2006-10-14T22:50:00.000+10:00

Here’s a quick reminder to check out Adam Ford’s inspired Monkey Punch Dinosaur site.
Whilst using this plug as an opportunity to show off a great pic of mine that didn’t make the site because of the strict “punching” requirements. As I emailed Adam
“I don't suppose it would help if I explained that in MMA-pro-fighting terms that the monkey has assumed a position that is called ‘the mount’ (true story;-) and is pursuing a side to
side punching tactic known as ‘ground and pound’
...heheeheh except its not working and he's gonna get eaten…shhh”

...go on what are you waiting for?! Make one of your own and send it in! Go to it!

PS- Island That Time Forgot - Special thanks to Rich,Karen and Ollie for production, set design, casting and on site catering!

Little Grey Car

2006-10-01T10:57:00.000+10:00

Last week I completed a Philosophy short course at CAE. The course was superbly taught by a gentleman named Sam Gates. “Without chalk-and-talk or lectures students must engage with the issues themselves, evaluating philosophically important arguments while advancing their own opinions” Mr Gates had an engaging style that brought forward classic modes of thought, that could be simultaneously examined and applied within the context of day-to-day & modern life situations. There are several philosophy short courses being taught by Sam Gates at CAE Melbourne and if you get the opportunity I highly recommend signing up for one of them.

A couple of weeks into the course I told the class a story about when I was 5 years old and I had this little grey Matchbox car that I was using in an experiment that involved digging a small hole and then burying the car and then waiting a while and then digging it up again to see if it was still there. I did this several times and each time, surprise surprise, the car was still there (hey I was 5 all right!) finally however I dug the hole and the car was not there. I frantically dug around the area, searched through the small piles of sand that I had excavated, dug through, pushed the sand around, went away, came back, dug and searched and pushed sand around, but the car was gone…gone and never to be seen again. It was a big moment for me, and I have often thought of it since. Why’d I tell this story? I think I told it because the class was discussing notions of certainty, which would make sense since the course was subtitled Quest for Certainty
At the end of my final class a fellow student named Viki (spelling?) approached me and lifted up my hand. She put her hand over mine smiling sagely as she placed something in it. I looked down and it was a little grey car. She explained to me how she and her family had discussed my story and had thought it would be an appropriate gesture to find a little grey car of about the right historical age and present it to me as a gift. Furthermore Viki explained to me how the family had meditated on the object, empowering it with positive energy that I could take with me and use as inspiration in my coming university adult entry exam. They put a lot of thought into which little car they felt was the right one to get for me, even, as Vicki told me, having a little argument about
Needless to say I was floored. It was such an unexpected and kind gesture. I was very much moved. I Felt like I’d received some kind of class merit or peers award. So I’d like to thank Viki and her family, her kids Isabel and Orion and her husband (afraid I can’t recall his name), for their thoughtful gesture.
I will be taking the little grey car into the STAT exam with me.

“In the abstract world…unalterable truths, before this world I knew all forms and when I was born into this world, (what I did) what I do is that I recognize these forms that I have already known…before this world when I knew all forms…” – Fragment from my
in-class notes. (From a Plato dialogue I think. I include it as it ran down in my notes, because a lot was happening at that moment and how it fell onto my page is in its own way quite beautiful and hints at the larger idea in a poetic light. Don’t you think? ;-)

Listening to: Laura Jean - I'm a rabbit I'm a fox

FREE 70K

2006-09-20T15:52:00.000+10:00

For those Melbournians or anyone familiar with the prolific (often difficult access and high altitude) graffiti of Stan & Bonez and the rest of the 70K crew, who have recently been the subject of an international taskforce, with most members having been arrested and facing prison…I saw this on the weekend Clifton Hill Station & Hoddle streets and thought it worth a mention. Looks like the Free 70K campaign has begun!
Still trying to find an online link to the most recent Herald Sun article dated 01/09/06.
here is a link that mirrors a previous article from The Sun earlier in the year.

Monkey Punch Dinosaur

2006-08-02T00:33:00.000+10:00

G’day g’day! I’m very sorry dear visitors that I have been such a force of absence these past months. The sad truth is that during this time I have composed several blogs in my head, but have not got around to posting them. But anyhoo I’m back now and here’s why:

I have an entry at the fantastic Monkey Punch Dinosaur website so please check it out.

…and stay tuned for some retrospective blogs in the coming weeks.

Peace on yer.

Listening to: Chinese Rocks – the Ramones version and the Heartbreakers one…back2back double play roCK!

Good Friday

2006-04-15T17:09:00.000+10:00

Here are some photos I took on Good Friday whilst walking around Fitzroy/Collingwood. I was going to show the street art pics, but I like the building shot as well, and in it's way I believe it is a related branch...part of what we like referring to as Accidental Art and the like. I will probably throw some more pics from this day up on MySpace.com, so check em out "by yourself or enjoy them with a friend"

Listening to: Arcade Fire, The Walkmen & rare instrumental version of 'Dosed' by RHCP

Blood Tests

2006-04-15T15:41:00.000+10:00

(Sub title: “Tough Love” The prequel)

Recently for the first time in my life I had blood tests to test for every conceivable STD, HIV or any other similar neo-zoom dweebie hazards such as the Hep gang.

I recently arrived in Melbourne for a working adventure (*Perhaps more on this at a later juncture) and had to call a doctor in WA to get the results. I controlled the fear fairly well. You’ve got to “let go” I guess. The courage to ignore that which you cannot change or affect…it goes something like that doesn’t it?
Anyhow It was a nerve wracking few minutes as the receptionist placed me on hold to fetch the results and inform me that it was all good.
How good is that? Over the years I have done many risky things, and I’m a bit fortunate I guess…so if you ever did stupid things with Den…well at least for my part (ooh err) its all good! (Motions to the sky, praying or just taking a deep breath? it is unclear)

Listening to: Faker, Bluebottle Kiss and The Cure

Hey Hey My My

2006-04-05T16:58:00.000+10:00

- This follows on nice from the previous blog entry. The 5th of April was the 12th anniversary of Kurt Cobain’s death.

There’s a good little write up here,
that comes from a Washington radio station called KXRO. As an additional side-note It also mentions that it was the 4th anniversary of Layne Staley’s (Alice In Chains) death, who I had forgotten died on the 5th of April also. Anyhoo…I’ve been in Melbourne doin a lot of walking and getting around on trams and trains, headphones in, volume up, soaking up the atmos of grey-london-antipodes, listening to “From The Muddy Banks Of The Whishkah.”

“New rock is the old rock rolling”

Lagged me to my Mum

2006-03-03T20:25:00.000+11:00

Talking to my Mum it has just emerged that one of my old friends, and I WILL find out WHO, made some passing comment to my Mum about 8-10 years ago that, and I quote “Denny’s been into some heavy shit”
hehehe sounds like I was in a badass crew with a heavy rep doin jobs and chunks of time! ;-)
The Fuck.
Weak as piss whoever you are…weak as piss.

To make sense for my other readers, at the time the person was referring to my drug taking adventures in the underworld.
Lagged me out to my Mum. Didn’t even “Tough Love” me, or organise a freakin intervention (not that I needed one) …and we all saw how successfully “TL” worked with Kurt Cobain (Bless)

“Its kicking on to 12 years now, and still no sign of Mr Mojo rising!”

Nothing of any substance, just a cryptic note under a door or a whispered guilt breathing in a corner…
Lagged me out to my Mum was all one had to offer…
Weak As Piss!
You know who you are!

…hehehe that was fun…I’m so hard ;-)

Listening to: Bloc Party
Reading: Valis - Phillip K.Dick

Drive-Thru Dragon Fly

2006-02-20T15:21:00.000+11:00

When I opened the Bottlo on Sunday morning an enormous Dragonfly blew across the ground in a curlicue of leaves and other detritus. I carefully picked it out and put it up on the desk. It seemed to exhale and it straightened itself out and we sat together quietly for a few moments while it died. I put it in a plastic money bag. By the time I got it home that evening, much of the bright tigerish yellow gold bands around its tail had faded. I scanned it… so that it in part lives on in digitized recollection of its brief but brightened glory.

“If you were designing an organism to look after life in our lonely cosmos, to monitor where it is going and keep track of where it has been, you wouldn’t choose human beings for the job. But…we have been chosen, by fate or providence or whatever you wish to call it. As far as we can tell, we are the best there is. We may be all there is. It’s an unnerving thought, we may be the living universe’s supreme achievement and it’s worst nightmare simultaneously.” - Bill Bryson 'A Short History Of Nearly Everything'

Shit Sandwich

2006-02-15T15:33:00.000+11:00

One of my regulars in the Bentley bottlo is this priceless old character called Tommy.

I was telling him recently that we were thinking about organising a social cricket game, and perhaps he might be interested in joining in. He instantly replied:

“You know me mate… I’ll be in anything but a shit sandwich! And that’s only cause’ I don’t like bread! ”

**lol**

Tommy >>>

Heavy Product

2006-02-03T04:05:00.000+11:00

I meant to give a shout out to my old mate Adam Ford ages ago.
So better late than never I suppose.

Adam is an excellent writer and diligent advocate of literary expression. His debut novel Man Bites Dog was published by Allen & Unwin in 2003. In 2004 it won Best Designed Young Adult Book in the Australian Publishing Association Awards, and last year was runner up in the 2005 One Book, One Brisbane award.

Recently Adam chucked up a street art photo of mine on his website.
He is collecting photos of the work of a mysterious sticker artist. See extract from Adam's site below:

Heavy Product Gallery
Outside the wind has picked up. A solitary guy with a canvas satchel strapped to his back and a skateboard tucked under his arm walks past. He pats the side of the pub with one hand and strolls on. I notice that he’s left something behind where he touched the wall. Gina comes out and locks the door behind her.
“Oh, shit,” I say, nudging Gina. She looks to where I’m pointing.
Just underneath the blackboard announcing next week’s gigs is a Heavy Product sticker.
“That wasn’t there before, was it?”
“What?”
“The sticker, for fuck’s sake.”
“Oh. No. No, it wasn’t.”
“It’s him, then. We’ve found him!”

Though Steve and Gina are fictional characters, the mysterious individual who places "This Is A Heavy Product" stickers on flat surfaces all over Melbourne is all too real. Below are some of the more recent sightings. If you have spotted one of the tell-tale markings left by this mysterious individual, we'd love it if you took a photo and sent it in, so it can become part of this ongoing divination project. Or if you can't be arsed traipsing out camera in hand, you could drop us a quick email and let us know where you saw it and maybe we'll go out ourselves. All contributors to the gallery will receive an exclusive Adam Ford Zine-and-Other-Stuff Pack (tm).

Check out Adam’s site at:
http://www.labyrinth.net.au/~adamford/index.html

Reading:
Illusions - Richard Bach

Listening To:
Music Vs Physics

South Perth foreshore

2006-02-01T03:40:00.000+11:00

Heres some photos I took down on the South Perth foreshore last night.

Hugh Ford (The Magic Cowboy)

2006-01-31T16:38:00.000+11:00

This is a pic of an excellent work called "Walkers" by my good mate Hugh Ford. If you really like it you might fancy youself as some sort of art collector and want to buy it. Well your too late as it has already been sold!
Check out Hugh Ford's blog FOREVER APE at : http://magicowboy.blogspot.com/

and dorfens

2006-01-13T18:19:00.000+11:00

How do you feel now? You’ve got to remember these things as best you can….long after they’re gone. Because in a way, that’s far more important than the ‘High’. The accurate and more still, meaningful recollection of ‘The Moment’. What it meant, how you got there…how you get there again.

Den's Top Ten Films 2005

2006-01-12T09:38:00.000+11:00

As part of my ongoing list therapy (boy I’m never gonna get tired of that piece of personalia) here is my first blog regarding the top ten films I saw in the year. I started this list a couple of years ago, mainly as a nerdy celebration for me and my fellow film loving mates to enjoy.

I don’t feel like my viewing in 2005 has matched the stellar heights of 2004. With the likes of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Lost In Translation, Kill Bill 2, and Return of The King to name but four from last years list. I would however have to mention the Aussie contingent. Last year there wasn’t one Australian film in my top ten, (or even amongst the fourteen films on my short list). This year there are four. 2005 was undoubtedly an excellent year for the Australian film industry.

2005
1. The Aviator
2. Look Both Ways
3. Riding Giants
4. The Proposition
5. Little Fish
6. Sin City
7. The Weeping Camel *
8. Narnia LWW
9. Hitchhikers Guide
10.The Magician

*As in last years list, I made the decision to include a film, The Weeping Camel, that was released 30/9/04 in Australia (26/2/04 U.S), because I didn’t see this film until February 2005 and it was a significant part of my cinema going experience for the year. Interestingly this film is listed on IMDB as a joint German and Mongolian production. It was first shown to a cinema public at the Toronto Film Festival all the way back in September 2003. It made its debut in Germany 8/1/2004 and there is no listing for Mongolia. Guess I should look into this further, but I have no idea what Mongolia has in the way of cinema infrastructure. My mum was there in 2002, I should ask her what she thinks :-)

All other films on this list were released in Australia sometime in 2005.

As an example of how complicated things can get in listology, Stacy Peralta’s film Riding Giants made limited release in the US in July 2004, but didn’t get released in Australia until March 2005.

Listening to: Triple J

Energy Cannot Be Destroyed

2006-01-05T15:57:00.000+11:00

I was going to make some big song and dance out of my return, but instead I’ve just decided to get the ball rolling again with this wee blurt about exercise, stuff and gunk.

Once you attain a certain level of fitness it becomes easy to forget how far you’ve come. As of writing this I have just completed my first boxing for fitness session for 2006. Prior to this it has been quite a lay off for me. In October I flew to Melbourne to work at the Spring Carnival for Advertising Associates, (but that’s another story), I ended staying in Melbourne for over six weeks. Whilst I was there I struggled to maintain a regular training program. I did a B4F class immediately upon my return to Perth, in which I was good and strong, but had clearly lost some endurance. Then I came down with a bizarre flu-like lurgy that ended up being viral conjunctivitis. It made my right eye puss up and close over, my nose bleed, my chest congest, threatened to turn into bronchitis threatened to never go away and generally beat the crap out of me for over two weeks.
So now I am taking a moment to reflect on where I have come from, how far I have come and how badly I want to resume progress on this journey to fitness.

I got onto this talking jag because tonight when the heat was on I was shocked to feel how weak I had become. On several occasions I actually had to stop during the circuit. I felt weaker than the first time I ever attempted this B4F circuit. Amazing sensation, but thinking about it now, it probably shocked me more because I have rarely been sick since about August 2003, (I know this because it was about six months before I quit cigarettes), when I had my final bout of severe bronchitis. And because I haven’t had to train back to form from being sick, since this whole campaign of transformation began some nineteen months ago.
I keep thinking of a scene in the M.Night Shyamalan film Unbreakable, when the character David played by Bruce Willis asks his wife “Do you remember me getting sick?” It goes on because she can’t recall a specific occasion and neither can he.

My old buddy Max Flory is fond of pointing out how many stories and novels could be condensed down to their first and/or last paragraphs…even last lines, without them losing their principle meanings. So it is with that in mind that I finish with:

It still surprises me how much the physical training battle is a mental one.

The First law of thermodynamics = Energy cannot be created or destroyed; only changed from one form to another.
(Also called the law of conservation of energy)

Listening To:
Bluebottle Kiss - Patient

Last Days

2005-09-05T08:27:00.000+10:00

*From discussions of the Gus Van Sant film ‘Last Days’ on the Internet Movie Database website.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0403217/usercomments-51

I think much of the criticism surrounding this film is fair.
I however find myself rating the film fairly highly. Like many other reviewers, I too found myself challenged and slightly bewildered by the film’s long scenes with static camera work, that seem to not end up going anywhere. There is one scene in particular where Blake has fled out the back door from another unwanted visitor and has just run past a row of trees and plants in the back garden. Blake runs through the frame and the camera holds the shot on the background of trees and shrubs for what seems like 10-15 seconds. Although this is definitely unconventional filmmaking, I can appreciate what Van Sant and Co might be trying for. There is an emotional resonance throughout the film. Conveying this to an audience in a unique way is a delicate task. I suspect that the frequent use of long static shots is Van Sants attempt to allow his audience the time to consider what is transpiring. The film language is daring and requires the audience to participate in creating the emotional landscape that the film requires to live.
The film is definitely frustratingly static at times. The action is minimalist. The narrative probably does fail when held up against the orthodox requirements of traditional film and storytelling narrative. It is at the very least a daring piece of filmmaking and challenges its audience all the way. It is ‘empty’ in a way, but the films emptiness reveals a subtle emotional storytelling and a deep atmosphere. I found this playing on my mind long afterwards.
Does the film work without some prior knowledge of Cobain’s story? I can’t honestly answer that, as much of my appreciation of this film comes from my own personal ‘back story’ as it were. I think this film may suffer from people’s initial reactions, but I believe there is something living within this film that warrants quiet reflection.

http://www.lastdaysmovie.com/

Noi The Albino

2005-08-30T13:57:00.000+10:00

Heart-achingly beautiful film from Iceland

Noi The Albino

http://www.noi-themovie.com/

do thine self a favour...
*grins*

Listening to: CKY infiltrate-destroy-rebuild

Alien Zoo

2005-08-20T04:50:00.000+10:00

Last night I had a very vivid dream. At the point that I can start recalling the dream, it feels as if quite a bit of the story has already evolved. The sense of this is heightened by my actually waking up during the dream. In fact now I’m not sure whether I awoke at all, but rather dreamt that I was awake thinking about the intense dream I was having.
I was on board an alien spaceship. Actually I’m not sure it was a space ship, I’m assuming it was. It was somewhere big and aliens lived there. I was wandering around in a very clean set of halls and corridors. Like the movie cliché white and metallic spaceship interiors. Something had made me feel annoyed or distressed and almost instantly ‘they’ sensed it and gently levitated me into a giant domed area like the inside of a multilevel shopping mall an enormous domed ceiling enclosed a space the size of an arena. The atmosphere was very quiet and serene. There was a lot of lush hanging foliage dangling from large hanging baskets that reached down from high above. ‘They’ levitated me toward an enclosure that was walled by some sort of clear Perspex or glass and I immediately understood that this space was some type of botanical garden or zoo. Within the darkened enclosure there clearly moved several humanoid forms. I was levitated right up to the glass. The dim light from the giant atrium didn’t quite penetrate the enclosure. I'd have to say that this looked like a controlled phenomenon. I could see the humanoid shapes moving out of the darkness toward the glass I distinctly remember thinking ‘shit I’m gonna get a shock here when these creatures become suddenly visible right in front of me and I willed the levitation to pull me back a few feet from the enclosure. I then noticed that a few metres to my left there was an open doorway into the enclosure anyway, and one of the humanoids kind of half stepped out half leaned around with a long gangly arm that reached out in a handshake gesture. It’s upper half remained cloaked in dark so that I couldn’t really distinguish its features, however its arm was quite visible and the skin was a reddish brown colour with a ruddy skin texture flecked with what looked like large sunspots. It spoke to me in what I assumed was English, but thinking about it now it could’ve been any language or even non-verbal. It greeted me and introduced itself. Alas I can’t remember its name, but I’ve a vague recollection it was something unlikely like Richard or Wayne. I was then levitated to another enclosure where I saw another set of very humanoid looking creatures, again in a dimly lit enclosure. All I can really recall about them is that they seemed to have a green colouring (god this is sounding more and more like the product of 30 years of television). This bit of the dream is vague in my memory and I think it is here that I woke up in my room lying face down on the bed, feeling a bit spooked and looking around to see if there were aliens in the room! I remember they kind of spoke to me telepathically and explained to me how their method of ‘borrowing’ humans, was very different to our pop culture depictions of alien abduction. At the time the information struck me as some kind of revelation, alas I can’t remember what this information was. I Remember thinking that it was something to do with a ‘mind lift’ that left our physical body where it lay on earth, but simultaneously enabled us to be wholly somewhere else…in another dimension or just out in Space orbiting the earth? But a type of temporal/phase transfer. Extra dimensional, but linked…all linked. Particle physics I think…quarks, gluons, and leptons doing bizzaro virtually incomprehensible superstring theory stuff like being “vibrating strands of energy that oscillate in eleven dimensions, consisting of three we know already plus time and seven other dimensions that are, well, unknowable to us. Strings that are very tiny (‘well duh’) tiny enough to pass for point particles” Passing for point particles when they are in fact strands of ‘crazy string’…well, at least that’s my understanding (*grins*) Cant help but picturing pink string foaming out of spray-cans at this point. The above quotation is author Bill Bryson attempting to simplify the mind-boggling quantum physics ideas of people such as physicist Michio Kaku. http://www.mkaku.org/
Anyway I digress, although that’s pretty much it really. The aliens weren’t malevolent, for example the whole trip to the zoo was a response to my becoming uptight, they were trying to help…and responded instantly as if my thoughts were being monitored, which obviously in the context of this story, they were. I clearly recall being impressed by their technology and the childlike quality of their handling.
Best of all after that dream I went straight into a dream about my beautiful ex-girlfriend Sarah and it was very pleasant and comforting, and again very vivid and with full detailed settings, like standing outside in the car park outside Max’s old house, his Mum’s place in Subiaco. Heaps nostalgic, but also a celebration of things. This is a hugely important recognition for me. And it left me feeling thus. Which is nice for a change, normally such reminiscences are sad and at best ‘exquisitely’ painful. Gives me hope for the future. And for friendly aliens (*winks*)

“We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship”
- E.M. Forster

Listening to: The Guild League ‘Inner North’

The Take

2005-08-18T17:05:00.000+10:00

Went and saw a great doco at the Luna last night called ‘The Take’
http://www.nfb.ca/webextension/thetake/
It’s about a kinda socialist (dogma-lite ;-) movement in Argentina.
“In the wake of Argentina’s economic collapse in 2001, Latin America’s most prosperous middle class finds itself in a ghost town of abandoned factories and mass unemployment.
Thirty unemployed workers walk into their idle factory, roll out sleeping mats and refuse to leave. All they want is to re-start the silent machines. But this simple act —the take —has the power to turn the globalization debate on its head.”
-Director/producer Avi Lewis
Anyway the reason I mention this, apart from the fact that I enjoyed it and its worth checking out, is because this morning whilst at work in the bottlo, a nice old lady started talking to me about a current political issue in WA to do with trading hours and trading restrictions. (There is a proposal to lift restrictions on liquor stores opening on Sundays)
http://www.caan.adf.org.au/newsletter.asp?ContentId=t25072005
Anyhoo I gave her my spiel on how I saw the current state of play and then I went on a mini-rant about ‘The Take’ and my opinion on the role of big business in the decision making of Western governments. She asked me if I was studying Law, and then she said “Do you know that you’re the first intelligent young person I've spoken to..(she took pause)...well...in years!”
She was well pleased and left full of smiles.
Regardless of truths here…it sure did make me feel nice and hence my chucking it up here. Going to bed now…hard work today, then hard boxing and now wasted ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Croc drags man from canoe

2005-08-17T18:21:00.000+10:00

“Crocodile kills man after dragging him from his canoe.”
16th August 2005
This is a terrible thing for the man who has lost his life in such a brutal and bizarre way and no doubt for his family, not the least of which his poor wife, who was in the canoe with him when the great beast struck and tried to help her husband b4 being propelled into the river after their canoe capsized during the course of the attack.
Of course I feel for these people.
But how is killing this animal going to help anyone?
If a 4 mtr croc was hanging around a drain in Newtown Sydney, then maybe kill the animal as a last resort, but we’re talking about a sparsely populated, fairly remote National Park in Cape York no less. In fact I have just found on the Queensland Government & E.P.A website the unequivocal piece of advice for people wishing to canoe within Lakefield National Park
"Canoeing is not recommended because this is crocodile country"
see: http://www.epa.qld.gov.au/projects/park/index.cgi?noback=1&parkid=187

It came on the news last night that they were searching for the “big rogue” croc.
I turned to my mum and said “Now they're gonna kill that croc or some other random 4 mtr croc that they come across…”
Unfortunately that’s exactly what has happened. They found a big croc on the 17th of August and killed it. http://www.abc.net.au/farnorth/stories/s1440820.htm
They cut it open and its stomach was empty. Apparently it could’ve still been the ‘guilty rogue man-eater’ due to a crocodile’s tendency to cache its food before eating it. But there’s no way to be 100% certain.
At the risk of hammering my point…best we go and kill some other big crocs, just to be sure.
August 19th Minister dismisses calls for crocodile cull
http://abc.net.au/news/items/200508/1441197.htm?farnorth

And finally I found this nice one page report (with an excellent drawing) done by a Queensland student, on the legend of a boat-attacking crocodile
A 6 metre salty known as ‘Sweetheart’
http://www.herbertonss.qld.edu.au/landofoz/judedwin.htm

Not Today

2005-08-17T12:16:00.000+10:00

England v Australia, 3rd Test, Old Trafford, 5th day.
August 15, 2005
It was way past my bed time. I had just turned out all the lights, had got into bed. I had to work in the morning, but I couldn’t leave the cricket in such a situation. I got back up.
Turned the TV on just in time to see Ponting get out for 156. Australia are 9 for 354. Four Lee and McGrath must survive 4 overs to save the Test.
For 24 balls I knocked on wood, gripped the edge of the table and spoke firmly, nervously at the TV “not today” “we are not going to lose today” “its our turn for some luck” every ball, every single ball.
Ball beats the bat and narrowly misses the off stump…
“Not today”
Skied chance falls short…
“NOT TODAY!”
Somehow I felt in my knotted stomach that they would do it. And they did.
Lee and McGrath hung on and kept the Poms out for 24 balls. Saved the match and maybe, we shall see, the Ashes.
Series level 1-1.
In 20-odd years of watching Test Cricket a draw has ever meant as much to me.
Special mention to: Ponting, Warne, Lee, McGrath and Clarke.
Well done lads!

Final 24 balls cric-info commentary:
http://aus.cricinfo.com/db/ARCHIVE/2005/AUS_IN_ENG/SCORECARDS/AUS_ENG_T3_11-15AUG2005_BBB-COMMS.html

Den's Top Ten Songs (July)

2005-07-31T17:22:00.000+10:00

1. The Presets - Girl and the Sea
2. Data Rock - Computer Camp Love
3. Helium – Cosmic Rays
4. Turbonegro – All My Friends Are Dead
5. Dappled Cities Fly – Battle Won
6. Andy Clockwise – Alice May
7. The Bloodhound Gang - Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo
8. Bloc Party – So Here We Are
9. Blue Bottle Kiss – Running Into Doors
10. Darren Hanlon – A To Z

Aussies didnt fare quite as well on this one. Aussies- 5 OS- 5

Listening to: Bit By Bats

cosmic rays and memory tricks

2005-07-29T16:51:00.000+10:00

I had a rewarding musical experience today. I guess it was a rewarding ‘memory recall’ experience also. I was at work, it was early in the morning, I got an unknown fragment of a tune in my head and had absent-mindedly begun whistling it. Then It occured to me that the fragment, was sorta wrong. What I was whistling was a distortion of some song that I liked, but that I hadn’t thought of in years. Somehow I knew that the snatch of tune I had was from an obscure song that had been briefly important to me, some 4 or 5 years since, and that at the time I’d made a mental note to try and remember it. After several attempts, I managed to straighten out the tune in my head so that I had the correct melody. I recalled the sensation, from years ago, of being struck by what a poignant melody it was, yet I still had no idea what the song was, who it was by…or even when or where exactly I’d heard it. Then doubts plagued me about whether it was a song at all, and all that foggy memory game stuff started banging around in my head. Doggedly I kept whistling the melody over and over for about 5 minutes. An intuition came to me, that it might’ve been something I’d heard on a Matador Records anthology about 4 or 5 years ago. I wrote myself a stupid note that mentioned this notion. It was like 8am in the morning and I feared that even with this note, that by the time I got home I’d have forgotten the melody. I tried a Jedi memory trick…well actually it’s a technique that a spoken word poet, whose very distinctive name I can’t presently recall (duh) explained to me one night in Shelton lea’s bookstore in Clifton Hill. And whilst on this, it further warrants a mention, that the senior trainer at Boxing For Fitness, Robbie Bryant, does a very similar memory association trick, in what has become a ritual at the start of every training session. He looks around the gym and says “Ok, and we have…Denny, John, Paul, George and Ringo, we have…etc etc” until he has said absolutely everyone in the gyms name. Even people he has just met. It’s all to do with attaching in one’s mind a physical or symbolic association with the person or thing, that acts as a trigger to recall. You have to wonder why it isn’t easier to just remember ‘Fred’ rather than something like ‘roman nose, curly grey hair, face like a donkey = Fred!’ I dunno that I fully grasp the concept… and I have well digressed--- So because I was worried about forgetting the melody that had mysteriously and randomly popped back into my head after years of being ‘lost’, I attempted my version of this memory association trick and locked in on the time of day and how silly I felt at that moment whistling the melody for the seventieth time. It worked and when I got home I put on the Matador Cd, which for the completionists among us, is called ‘Everything is Nice’ and is a ‘10th Anniversary Anthology’ of Matador Records releases, which include Pavement, Cat Power, Modest Mouse, Guided By Voices, Sleater-Kinney, Cornelius and Yo La Tengo…to name a but a few (pretty fuckin great list there huh?) So yeah, it worked ‘cause ten songs into disc one I discovered the song…a song that I had been listening to with William Bowe in 2000, ( It’s actually Billy’s cd on long-term loan to my collection!)….{ d r u m r o l l }- - - ‘Cosmic Rays’ by an American outfit called Helium.
Wow that was longwinded wasn’t it…I must be a bit fried from the three 10 hour shifts I’ve just done in a row. ;-)
Anyhow for my patient, loyal and overly interested readers the song ‘Cosmic Rays’ can be listened to at: http://www.mp3.com/albums/259465/summary.html and the story of the enigmatic singer/songwriter behind it can be explored at: http://www.marytimony.com/neusite/
Where there are also some free mp3’s to download.

Aint the memory grand.

Listening to:
Mary Timony

Satan’s Special Service

2005-07-25T01:38:00.000+10:00

Last night I enjoyed an excellent evening in Fremantle visiting my good pal Petri Sinda and watching the Australian Cricket team take a winning position in the first Test of the Ashes series. I headed off home at around 1am. I was driving east along Leach Hwy when I noticed a Transperth bus had come up fast behind me and was now tailgating me. Odd thing really, they’re not like taxis, I mean these buses aren’t generally known for they’re erratic driving. So I’m kinda wedged between the bus and a slow moving car in front of me. Before I could take evasive action the bus pulled out wildly from behind me and tore up the outside lane. It went by so quick I didn’t catch sight of the driver or even its route number, but I could see that the bus appeared to be completely empty. I pulled out from behind the car in front of me so I could try and stay in touch With the bus. I laughed sharply when I saw that on the back of the bus it’s fluoro green route number was 666. The bus increased in speed and began pulling away from me and the other car, which was a bit back from me in the inside lane. The situation was quite surreal. There was no other traffic to be seen in either direction. The inside lane car sped up dramatically and past me. In the far distance I could see that the bus had pulled up at the traffic lights at the intersection of Carrington Street & Leach Highway. Maybe because it was around 1am and a foggy night, or maybe it was our proximity to Fremantle’s gigantic cemetery, but the atmosphere had become suddenly and distinctly eerie. Despite this, I had a broad grin on my face and was chuckling to myself a lot. I guess it was a disbelieving kind of chuckling, I mean I could definitely see the bizarre and funny side of the situation. I was still grinning as I drew up on the intersection and realised that the bus had been sitting in the right hand turn lane while the lights were green…as if it were waiting for us to catch up. The lights changed to red as the inside lane car reached the intersection. That left me approaching in the middle lane with the 666 bus on the outside right of me, and the other car on my inside left. I slowed down. The bus was definitely empty, it’s interior was strangely lit…I don’t know how to describe adequately…it was sort of dim, soft light with a yellow tinge…but the soft light had an almost misty quality to it. I rolled up toward the very front of the bus. I could see the drivers section was cloaked in darkness. For a brief moment I imagined I was about to see an empty drivers seat. I glanced across at the inside lane driver, still a sardonic, enthralled grin playing across my face. He glanced at me, then his eyes fixed in the direction of the bus. The route number on the side of the bus said ‘Special 000’. I stopped at the white traffic line. Thoughts whispering in my head ‘No driver, no driver…could there be no driver?’ But at that moment I saw that there was indeed a driver. Unmistakable. In the dim recess of the drivers compartment, his upper torso and head faintly lit. The absurd theatre of it all. Lit just enough so I could see the driver looking directly back at me. Looking back at us, unflinching with a steely mischievous grin. My heart rate pulsed. I glanced back at the inside lane driver. He appeared as if in a trance, his eyes locked on the bus. A tingle rattled across my shoulders and shot down my spine. The bus took off turning right. The lights had gone green again. I watched the bus as it tore off down Carrington street. A second or two later I realised that the inside lane car was well up Leach highway, obviously moving very quickly. I rolled off the lights and looked down Carrington Street as I passed through the intersection, but I couldn’t see the bus anymore.

Listening to:
The Best Of The Band

Bullfuck

2005-07-09T16:09:00.000+10:00

I guy came in the bottleshop on Friday night and wanted to know the various prices on Highland scotch and cola pre-mix cans. I told him the bottlo had a 8 for $15 'run-out' special on Highland stubbies. He became full of bluster and swaggered toward me saying " 8 for 15?!",
"-Yep"
He continued to swell in size like some angry gas filled balloon...i felt sure he was going to nut me...
"Bull Fuck!"
"It's true mate, 8 stubbies for $15"
"Bull Fuck! There's no such fuckin thing as Highland stubbies!"
He turned away from me and walked over to the display fridge containing the Highland scotch and cola products, "8 for fuckn 15 stubbies! Ive never fuckn heard of em! Where are they then?" This was a classic piece of bizzare bottlo behaviour. He was standing right next to them.
Anyhow the rest of this story continues to move around in a rough Beckett-esque circle for several more minutes until the guy decides that he's well pleased that the stubbies do in fact exist, and that it's a "blody good deal" and he'll "go two of em" all the while still managing to look like he might attack me at any moment. But the real reason i recount this story is because of my fascination with his exclamation of the term BULL FUCK which i'm pretty sure i havent heard anyone say since circa 1978...
Bull Fuck. A true-blue Aussie amalgamation of Bullshit and get fucked or fuck off (depending on context and delivery of course). "Denny that's a load of Bullfuck!" for example.

Listening to:
Darren Hanlon
Little Chills (album)

Reading:
'Generations Of The Acid'
by Petri Sinda