You know you're Australian when...

1. You're familiar with Neighbours, Home and Away, Playschool, A Country Practice, Norman Gunston, Barry Humphries, Blue Heelers, Ray Martin, Bert Newton, Lisa McCune, Jon Burgess, Number 96, Molly Meldrum, Kerry O'Brien, and of course, Kerry Packer and Rupert Murdoch.

2. You know that Burger King doesn't exist. It's Hungry Jacks.

3. You know that snow is a memorable and freakish occurrence. Sometimes it's even fake.

4. You know the difference between thongs and a G-banger.

5. You know that "stubbies" are either short shorts or small beer bottles, a "gimp", "bogan" or "geezer" is a random idiot, someone in trouble is in "strife" and you're liable to burst out laughing whenever you hear of Americans "rooting" for something.

4. You know how to abbreviate every word, all of which usually end in -o: arvo, combo, garbo, kero, lezzo, metho, milko, muso, rego, servo, smoko, speedo, righto etc.

5. You know that some people pronounce "Australia" like "Strayla" and that's ok.

6. You know that there is a universal place called "woop woop" located in the middle of nowhere... no matter where you actually are.

7. You know that while we call our friends 'mates', we don't use terms like 'shiela' and 'shrimp on the barbie', contrary to popular belief.

8. You know that none of us actually drink Fosters beer because it tastes like shit. But we let the world think we do. Because we can.

9. You know that if a man has sex with another man, he's a homosexual, and (until recently), a criminal in Tasmania

10. You resent people who succeed over others- everyone should do the same thing, so we all get a "fair go"; a kind of 'American-dream' in reverse. This is why we actively like not liking Americans.

11. You've seen Gallipoli, Crocodile Dundee, Young Einstein, Muriel's Wedding, The Castle, Beneath Clouds, Strictly Ballroom, 40,000 Horsemen, and maybe even Wolf Creek.

12. It makes you happy when someone in Hollywood is actually Australian... Mel Gibson, Nicole Kidman, Russle Crowe, Cate Blanchett, Baz Luhrman, Elle MacPherson, Olivia Newton-John, Midnight Oil, ACDC, INXS, Greg Norman, Cathy Freeman, Dawn Fraser, Pat Rafter, Ian Thorpe...

13. One word: Skippy.

14. You know that Sydney 2000 was one of our proudest moments in history. We just fucking rock.

15. You know that you are not going to die of cholera or other Third World diseases (remote Aboriginal communities are a different matter)

16. You know our country has never been conquered by a foreign nation (you don't count 1788).

17. We know that the Metric system will always be better than anything inches, feet, pounds and fahrenheit will ever offer.

18. You drive on the left-hand side of the road.

19. If you're a pedestrian and cars are stopped at a red light, you will fearlessly cross the street in front of them. 'Hit and runs' just aren't cricket. Because Aussies stick together.

20. You think of Australia as being somewhat out of place within the Asia-Pacific region; surrounded by unstable ex-colonial nations who regard you as racist, imperialist, and unfairly wealthy.

21. You know that New Zealanders are basically our naive country cousins, who have a weird 'fush-and-chups' accent, and for some bizzare reason, think that they invented pavlova. Bastards. They are to be pitied and laughed at. They have no hope of gaining the upper hand in the endless sporting rivalry between our two nations.

22. You know that you can't eat Fantails alone... Otherwise who will you play the 'Who am I...' game with when you're reading the wrapper?

23. You know that Sydney should be the capital because Canberra is a hole.

24. You know that Americans think we're all Steve Irwin clones. And crickey, they couldn't be more wrong.

25. You know that Lawyers wear wigs and gowns. And we make it look good.

26. You have some time in your life slept with Aeroguard on in the summer. Maybe even as perfume.

27. You feel obliged to spread salty black stuff that looks like congealed motor oil on bread... and actually grow to like it. You've also squeezed Vegemite through Vita Wheats to make little Vegemite worms.

28. You believe that democracy means the freedom to draw caricatures of good ol' Johnny Howard

29. You think footballers dressing up in drag on TV is funny (but your son being gay isn't).

30. You have the ability to compress several words into one - ie 'g'day' and 'd'reckn?'. This allows more space for profanities.

31. You've ever used the words - tops, ripper, sick, mad, rad, sweet - to mean good. And then you place 'bloody' in front of it when you REALLY mean it.

32. You know that the barbeque is a political arena; the person holding the tongs is always the boss and usually a man. And the women make the salad.

33. The private lives of footy and cricket players become more important than local and national news stories.

34. You say 'no worries' quite often, whether you realise it or not.

35. You know what fairy bread tastes like, and you can't imagine your childhood without it.

36. You know the first verse to the national anthem, but still don't know what "girt" means. And you're ok with that.

37. You've drank your tea/coffee/milo through a tim tam.

38. You know that backyard cricket is a nice way to bond with family and the rubbish bin. And the 'one bounce, one hand' rule always applies.

39. You know that we are home to the just about all of the world's deadliest of animals. That's why if anybody messes with us we'll get some funnel webs on their arses.

40. You see people walking bare-foot on the footpath and don't scorn.... because you're doing it too.

41. You know what trop-fest is and it makes you happy.

42. Sausage rolls and meat pies. End of story.

43. You firmly believe that in the end, everything will be ok and have offered advice that included the words, "she'll be right, mate".

44. You have a story that somehow involves an excessive consumption of goon... but you can't remember.

45. You own a Bond's chesty. In several different colours.

46. You've ordered a steak the size as your head and only paid $5 at your local RSL

47. You know that Italy should never have been granted that fateful kick in the 2006 Soccer World Cup.

48. You know how to 'slip, slop, slap' like it's nobody's business.

49. You've heard the Prime Minister dismiss anyone who disagrees with him simply as 'un-Australian', and that's enough to make us sit down and shut up.

50. You know that the value of a public holiday is measured in terms of alchohol. God bless the queen and her 4-day birthday.



And right now you feel bloody awesome.


Alexandra Argenti (Villanova)
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I love this prairie dog

Kill Bill Version



LOST Dramatic Chipmunk (prairie dog, actually, but hey)

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The Magician

*Click on image to enlarge :o)

At Midnight

Now at last I have come to see what life is,
Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun,
And the brave victories that seem so splendid
Are never really won.

Even love that I built my spirit's house for,
Comes like a brooding and a baffled guest,
And music and men's praise and even laughter
Are not so good as rest.

-Sara Teasdale

Lasse Gjertsen - incredible musical stop-motion

"I can neither play drums nor the piano..."


"Thanks to my friend Mattis for letting me borrow the drum kit. Also thanks to the person letting me use her piano, but she didn't want her name here :P.
And now; to you people saying I'm ripping off Michel Gondry: I've seen his video with the drumkit called "Drumb and Drumber". It's here on youtube somewhere. His video and my video are different because of one very important detail: Gondy filmed himself doing drumming sequences and LOOPED them, while I hit each drum and piano chord seperately and edited them together. This is a very big difference if you have any idea about video editing. Actually, there is a short sequence of 5 sec where he does cut the beat, but I didn't notice this until recently, which makes me an idiot. But I still don't think it's a rip off, only similar. SO one question to you guys: If I write a song which includes the words "love" and "tight", am I ripping off The Beatles?? :P I met Michel Gondry in Milan, Italy and asked him. He didn't really give me a clear answer, but it seemed like he thought so. Either that or he didn't like my clothes. Lol." - Lasse Gjertsen

at Norah Head

My Aunt Penny is a bit of a legend.
She was a ballerina in her youth and now aged 66 she has taken to tap.

This short film (2:12 min) is the first concert by her dance class.
She is the oldest in the group, but is certainly the least ...umm... rhythmically challenged ;op.

*Auntie Pen is the one at the back

Welcome James William Langhorne Martin

Date: 27/04/07
Delivery: 3.10AM
Weight: 3.32K / 7lb 5oz
Labour: 5hours 40 minutes
Congrats Jo and Steve!

Yer Blues

Pome On Dr Sax & The Moon

Dr Sax the master knower of
Easter was now reduced to penury
and looking at Stained glass windows
in old churches-His only 2
last friends in life, this impossibly
hard life no matter under what
conditions it appears, where Bela
Lugosi and Boris Karloff, who visited
him annually in his room on 3rd Street
and cut thru the fogs of evening with
their heads bent as the bells of St Simon
tolled a heartbroken "Kathleen" across
the rooftops of old hotels where similar old
men like Doctor Sax sat bent headed
on beds of woe with prayerbeads between
their feet, Oh moaning, homes for
lost pigeons or time's immemorial
white dove
of the roses
of the unborn
astonished bliss-

And there they'd sit in the little
room,Sax on the edge of the bed with a
bottle of rotgut Tokay in his hand, Bela
in the rocking chair, Boris standing by
the sink---
and then Sax wd always say

"Please play the monster for me" and of course
the old actors, who loved him dearly and came to
see him for human tender sentimentality not
monstrous reasons protested but he always
got drunk and cried so that Boris first had
to get up and extend his arms do
Frankenstein go uck! then Bela
wd stand and arm cape and leer and
approach Sax, who squealed

Excerpt from Pome on Doctor Sax (1961)





The moon her magic be, big sad face
Of infinity An illuminated clay ball
Manifesting many gentlemanly remarks

She kicks a star, clouds foregather
In Scimitar shape, to round her
Cradle out, upsidedown any old time

You can also let the moon fool you
With imaginary orange-balls
Of blazing imaginary light in fright

As eyeballs, hurt and foregather,
Wink to the wince of the seeing
Of a little sprightly otay

Which projects spikes of light
Out the round smooth blue balloon
Ball full of mountains and moons

Deep as the ocean, high as the moon,
Low as the lowliest river lagoon
Fish in the Tar and pull in the Spar

Billy de Bud and the Hanshan Emperor
And all wall moongazers since
Daniel Machree, Yeats see

Gaze at the moon ocean marking
the face-

In some cases

The moon is you

In any case

The moon

~ Jack Kerouac (1922-1969)

genealogy

Information re: above pics

1.Langherne/Langhorne Castle, Carmarthen Shire

2. Ven.Richard Langhorne.

"The tryall of Richard Langhorn Esq, counsellor at law, for conspiring the death of the King, subversion of the government, and Protestant religion who upon full evidence was found guilty of high treason, and received sentence accordingly, at the sessions in the Old-Bayley, holden for London and Middlesex, on Saturday, being the 14th. of June 1679."


Beatified in 1929
Feastday: July 14
English martyr. Born about 1635 in Bedfordshire, he was educated at the Inner Temple and worked as a lawyer. He was arrested in 1667, released in 1679, then arrested again as a conspirator in the so-called “Popish Plot.” He was hanged at Tybum on July 14.

He was the third son of William Langhorne of the Inner Temple, by Lettice, daughter of Eustace Needham of Little Wymondley, Herts. He was admitted to the Inner Temple in November, 1646, and called to the bar in 1654. He married a lady, Dorothy, daughter of Thomas Legatt of Havering, Essex, and lived at Shire Lane, to the right of Temple Bar. His chambers were in Middle Temple Lane. He was arrested on 15 June, 1667, in connection with the great fire. Arrested a second time on 7 October, 1678, and committed to Newgate without any previous examination, he was kept in solitary confinement for eight months. On 14 June, 1679, he was brought to the bar at the Old Bailey; Oates (the "Oates plot"), Dugdale, Bedloe, and Prance gave evidence against him, and he was found guilty. He was offered a pardon, if he would confess his guilt and also make a disclosure of the property of the Jesuites with which he had become acquainted in his professional capacity. This last he did -- probably with the consent of his fellow-prisoner, the provincial, Fr. Whitbread -- but, as he persisted in declaring his ignorance of any conspiracy, he was executed. His last words were to the hangman: "I am desirous to be with my Jesus. I am ready and you need stay no longer for me."

His son was also arrested.
"Richard Langhorne the Younger was brought to the Bar; and Mary White was produced as a Witness against him; who being asked, "Whether she did know the said Richard Langhorne, and what she had to say concerning him?" She answered, "That she did know the said Langhorne; and she did hear the said Langhorne say, He did not doubt but, if one Thing hit, his Father would be the Third Man in the Kingdom."
Langhorne confessed he knew the said Mary White; but denied he spake any such Words; and said, "Why should he say any Thing to her, who was an Enemy to Catholics?"
Then Mary Planner upon her Oath said, "That she was told by Mrs. Langhorne (Mother to the said Richard Langhorne), That she went lately to her Son's Chamber, and found him very jovial; whereupon she asked him, "How he could be merry, seeing there was a Warrant against him, upon the Account of bringing the Commission to his Father, to be Judge Advocate?" He replied, "He did not fear; nor would he fly." At which Mrs. Langhorne said, "None but a Prince could make Generals." To which he said, "Let them bring it to that."Then Mrs. Langhorne said, "She was at her Son Richard Langhorn's Chamber; and he said to her those Words as Mary Planner hath deposed."

[ 'House of Lords Journal Volume 13: 7 November 1678', Journal of the House of Lords: volume 13: 1675-1681 (1771) ]

(From top to bottom)1. My parents
2. Great Grandmother Miriam Langhorne(mother's side)
3. Grandparents Maxwell and Helen Langhorne Parks

four quartets

"What we call the beginning is often the end.
And to make and end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from."
(T.S. Elliot, Four Quartets)

The marvelously muddled mulberry sponge

The Mind Is Its Own Beautiful Prisoner

the mind is its own beautiful prisoner.
Mind looked long at the sticky moon
opening in dusk her new wings

then decently hanged himself,one afternoon.

The last thing he saw was you
naked amid unnaked things,

your flesh,a succinct wandlike animal,
a little strolling with the futile purr
of blood;your sex squeaked like a billiard-cue
chalking itself,as not to make an error,
with twists spontaneously methodical.
He suddenly tasted worms windows and roses

he laughed,and closed his eyes as a girl closes
her left hand upon a mirror.

- E. E. Cummings (1894—1962)

Words fail me all the time
I don’t even feel like talking
still I go on and on
I’m dying here and you keep walking

why are you asking me this?
can’t you see I’m trying?
I don’t like it like this
no I think I’m dying

I can’t calm down at all
panic is what panic feels like
can’t we just stay silent?
speaking now seems far too violent

why are you asking me this?
can’t you see I’m trying?
I don’t like it like this
no I think I’m dying

The Radio Dept. 'I Don't Like It Like This'

today

random january pics...

???

1. Gum Bend Lake

2. Gum Bend Lake...

Senryū

Breath cold and silent
The thaw is unconvincing
I stand on thin ice

© 2006 k.a.l.m


Senryū (川柳, literally 'river willow') is a Japanese form of short poetry similar to haiku in construction: three lines with 17 or fewer morae (not syllables) in total. However, senryū tend to be about human foibles while haiku tend to be about nature, and senryū are often cynical or darkly humorous while haiku are serious. Senryū do not need to include a kigo, or season word, like haiku.
Some senryu skirt the line between haiku and senryu. The following senryu by Shūji Terayama copies the haiku structure faithfully, down to a blatantly obvious kigo, but on closer inspection is absurd in its content:

かくれんぼ kakurenbo
三つ数えて mittsu kazoete
冬になる fuyu ni naru

Hide and seek
Count to three
Winter comes

Terayama, who wrote about playing hide-and-go-seek in the graveyard as a child, thought of himself as the odd-guy out, the one who was always "it" in hide-and-go-seek.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senryu