April 6, 2004
A new blog I dig
Z's not dead, baby, but it seems everyone around him is. He's a Portuguese Goth who works as a gravedigger.
In the end of the morning, when I was taking care of some flowers that I planted last week, I heard the church bells toll, anouncing the death of someone. Ding ding, dong; ding ding, dong. It was a woman. If it were at man, the beels would go dong dong, ding. It came to my mind the people that are in the city hospital....Constantina, my cousin in third degree, her grandmother was first degree cousin of my grandmother. Constantina opened her wrists. I din't believe that it could be her. It was the third time that she opened her wrists. I never believed that she really wanted to kill herself. She knew her husband would arrive and she opened her wrists a few minutes before that. I can imagine her husband driving her to hospital. Just a few metters before the city hospital, they crashed against other car. I can imagine the paramedics surprise when they arrived at the car crash and found a woman that bumped her head and had her wrists open. She stayed in hospital because of the head bump. I never believed that she really wanted to kill herself. She just wants her husband to notice her. She is just sad.
...
When it is not raining, I clean the graves of those that everybody forgot and I colect dead flowers left by old widows. I should take off some of the lower branches of cypresses any day soon. When it is raining, I sit by the door of my little shelter house. I imagine a lot of things while I watch the rain falling over the fields of olive-trees and cork trees that lie above the walls of the graveyard, smoking a joint and listening to "Helplessness" by Lacrimas Profundere
His blog has original poetry and quirky tales from the graveyard shift. Go catch some Z.
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Voyeur eyes only
A working girl's blog. (I think I came across recently this via Weekend Warrior, but I can't remember now.) And you thought my blog was revealing.
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Can of worms
Opened here.
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April 5, 2004
Society in the wilderness
We're strolling down an unsealed road past a little wooden house with the sound of Bob Marley softly drifting out, when I hear voices. I look up and notice a man sitting on his verandah with a large cat curled up on the railing in front of him. I wave.
"Don't mind me, I'm just talking to my snake," he calls out, stroking the cat, and it starts to unfurl itself along the railing until it is a few metres long. What the...? I wheel the stroller around and we go back to have a closer look. Sure enough it's a giant diamond python. Eek!
"There's only five of these left in the valley," the man says. "This is Candy. Don't be afraid, she's harmless. Want to touch her?"
Uh, no thanks.
He comes down to the street and stands beside me holding a plate of toast, and we have a chat. Turns out he's our neighbourhood's resident greenie. He fits the stereotypical mould: waist-length hair in a ponytail, fraying beard, faded yellow Bonds teeshirt, beads around his wrist. He tells me his name is Peter and that he works for the local wildlife rescue group. "See over there?" he nods at a nearby tree. "There's a tawny frogmouth and her baby. I've been looking after them." I squint through the foliage and make out the two owls. "I thought owls only come out at night," I say. He shakes his head. He says he's turned his property into a reserve for endangered species, and points out the rare plants along the front of his house--"there's only three of these left in Australia"--and reels off a dozen types of endangered dove that he nurtures.
I tell him I love walking around with Harley and listening to all the birds. He frowns and mutters, "Well, there'd be a lot more, if it wasn't for all the cats". Gulp. I don't mention my cats, and secretly wonder if he's the one responsible for the anti-cat message I saw on the local noticeboard the other day. I rationalise to myself that my cats haven't caught a bird...yet.
We talk about how much the area has changed over the years, how built up it is now. He delivers a blistering attack on the hordes of seachangers and holiday-housers who have moved up here, with their four wheel drives and domestic pets.
"They're killing all the wildlife with their noise and pollution," he rails.
"It's looking more and more suburban," I nod. "All these perfectly manicured lawns."
"You get these idiots with their leaf blowers--you know, just blow all the leaves magically out of sight around the corner--and there, you've got an instant fire hazard. And you know, if there was a fire, I'd be out in the street, hosing down a dozen properties, because nobody's here, these ones are all holiday houses. And the funny thing is, they all hate me, cos I'm a greenie!" He looks wounded at the thought.
"Well, I don't hate you. I like you already," I smile.
"The thing is, you can't even swim in the lake anymore. I tell people--but they don't want to listen--it's a closed catchment lake. So every time they hose their dogshit into the creek, every time they wash their goddamn car, all the water just runs down into the lake. And stays there."
It makes me sad, because I remember how much fun it was to play in the lake when we were kids. Back then, there were no jetskis on the lake, just rowboats and water tractors, the ones you pedal with your feet. I'm relieved I chose not to swim in it when I was pregnant this summer--it just looked too murky and unappealing.
"And now there's these new fire regulations, where they say you've gotta chop down all the trees within 70 metres of your house, or they won't approve your development application." He pauses for breath. "And builders, man, they're the worst." He looks at me sideways. "Now you'll tell me your hubby's a builder."
"No," I laugh. "No hubby...no builder."
Peter tells me he came to the area fifteen years ago, after his wife died, to raise their five year old daughter closer to nature; bit like me. "But there's less and less nature by the day," he laments.
"My dad calls it North Mosman," I say.
He turns to me. "Oh, you from the North Shore then?"
"Yeah, grew up in Balmoral."
"You're joking. I went to Mosman High," he says.
"Me too!" I say. It's one of those small-world moments.
"When did you leave?" he says.
"88," I say. "You?"
He grins. "I was kicked out in '69."
"Geez, what on earth could you get kicked out of Mosman for?" Mosman was full of kids expelled from other schools; a school of last resort.
"Um...attacking the headmaster, actually," he smiles sheepishly. And I'm curious but too slow, and don't think to ask him to elaborate. I'll ask him next time, I think.
I get home and open the Sunday papers to read about another conservationist called Peter; Peter Garrett, who's thinking of returning to politics, standing as a Green in the next election. Coincidence, or something more?
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April, come they will
March was a quiet month for us, but April looks like being pretty lively around here. I've got five sets of houseguests coming through the month, so blogging may be sparser than usual. Maybe--you know I can never stay away for long!
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April 3, 2004
Bumper crop
I thought Americans weren't supposed to be any good at laughing at themselves, at least not as good as Australians or Brits, but flicking through the February issue of Vanity Fair (no link), I came across a page of "New Slogans for America". Here's a sample:
America. Almost All Paved.
America. The Moon's Ass Belongs to Us. So Don't Be Landing Your Skanky Rocket on It. Don't Even Be Looking at the Moon.
America. Inventor of the Gated Community.
America. Tell It To Somebody Who Cares.
America. Proudly Serving Ritalin to Our Children since 1995.
America. We Nearly Smashed Al-Qaeda.
America. Teenagers With Money.
So I don't get accused of being anti-American, I thought I'd better come up with a few New Slogans for Australia:
Australia. Where Men Are Men and Women Won't Breed.
Australia. We're Not the Sheriff, We're Just the Deputy. (So Don't Shoot Us, Please.)
Australia. We're Tough.
Australia. Just Don't Try Coming Here By Boat.
Australia. It Used To Be Bigger.
Australia. Where Even Vegemite Is American.
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April 2, 2004
Babe
Here's the little harlequin at four weeks.
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April 1, 2004
Jam on, jam on
Tim's latest blogjam is up. Ah, we bloggers do love to see stories about blogs and blogging in the mainstream press, so these blogjams are great. More power to us.
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The blues
Well, that's what you get when you sell your soul to the devil, Chris. And the blues is what you give your non-sporting-minded readers when you use cricket metaphors for describing politics... Geez, isn't one uebersportingpundit enough for the blogosphere?
Jokes aside, yeah, it's sad news about Lucinda.
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Sweethearts together
I never thought it would happen, but my secret lover (I can keep some secrets, you know) apparently wants to make an honest woman out of me, and in the interests of keeping Bettina Arndt happy, I've accepted. Incredible, huh? A complete fairytale.
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March 30, 2004
Shiver me timbers
Thanks to James for sending me this old snapshot of Captain Quiggin:
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Arndt misbehavin'
Bettina Arndt reckons single mums would turn down a relationship because they've got it so good on the dole:
"There's no doubt less-educated young men are being left on the shelf. Since almost half of the unpartnered women they meet are likely to be single mothers, these males can't compete with the financial incentives offered by the government to lone mothers who remain single."
Of course, Bettina. I mean, who needs a man when you're in bed with the Government? And I don't know about you, but I always get my calculator out when I'm falling in love.
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March 28, 2004
Sunday
We took the long way around to the boatshed today and back up the hill to the shops, past all the kids playing footy in the street and the retirees out for their power walks. Walking around this neighbourhood reminds me of why I moved out here; it's like living in a rainforest. Except for the kids playing footy and the retirees, that is.
On every street corner there's a little wooden arrow nailed to a tree, pointing in the direction of the boatshed cafe, painted with the words FROTHY COFFEE. The signs have remained the same since we started coming here in the Seventies, when I guess nobody knew what "cappucino" was, and have always been a source of amusement to us city folk.
Up at the shops, I bought all the ingredients for veal marsala except marsala, and a tub of TimTam icecream (argh!). Outside the general store there a noticeboard with a bunch of handwritten notes on it, advertising bodyboards, boats and rotary hoes for sale, the 'ultimate girls' night out!' (some kind of lingerie-Tupperware party, I take it) and a local sk8ter competition. There's a note written "to the person who ran over the cat in ____ Drive. You could of at least STOPPED to render assistance instead of leaving the cat there to DIE. The kids at the bustop were DEVASTATED. I hope you get bad KARMA." Underneath, someone (the culprit, perhaps?) has scrawled, "Good on the driver!! Cats are wildlife killers!!" And under that, someone else has written, "A life is a life! It's not a cat's fault it is an introduced species. Our cats wear bells anyway!"
My cats haven't caught a bird since we got here. They're generally afraid of them. There's so many it's like living in a giant aviary--a thousand twittering birds. The worst are the butcher birds that come to steal the cat biscuits--they have such a hideous, raucous cry that I wish the cats would catch them.
Everyone we pass on our stroll always stops to exclaim how tiny the baby is and to ask how old he is. He seems huge to me (latest weighing has him at 4.630kg), and it's only really when we're in the company of other, older babies, that I realise how small he really is. Like yesterday, when he shrunk in comparison to a beefy six month old baby and two one year olds.
When we got home I put on my two new CDs--The Salesman and Bernadette by Vic Chestnutt (courtesy Tim) and my friend Steve's latest album, Stolen Goods (Steve Griffiths, Fork Records, available to order via Red Eye Records); scroll for a small description here). Both full of gorgeous laidback Sunday tunes. While the baby slept I cooked dinner and then tried to paint hippos and giraffes, copied off some cot linen, because I figure his nursery needs something to liven up the walls. I couldn't quite nail them; think I need live models...
Then he got me all choked up when I sat down to gaze at him and rested my hand on his chest and he stirred slightly and gently placed his little hand on top of mine. Awwww...
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Tainted love
What exactly is her point? That it's hard? That it's harder? (than when?) That it's all women's fault for being too picky? That it's men's fault? That it's nobody's fault? What?
Ah, here's the answer. It's economic, stupid.
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March 26, 2004
Handle with care
I was on the phone tonight to my friend J., who is Jewish. She pointed me to this story today in the International Herald Tribune which gives a pretty good analysis of the motivations and repercussions of Sheikh Yassin's assassination. In my view the assassination was a strategic mistake, no matter how many people Yassin killed. Rather than making Israel appear strong as it withdraws from Gaza, and so deter violence (as Sharon seems to hope), it seems just as likely to incite further hatred and cause more violence. Purely from an anti-Israeli propaganda point of view, you can't really get much more potent than those images of Yassin's bloodied wheelchair. And as the IHT story details, it's all just about spin. That's exactly why that other pre-emptive unilateral strike--America's war on Iraq--was a strategic mistake in the 'war on terror'. Here's how Hamas spun that:
"We are dealing with America as the co-partner with Israel for all the crimes committed by them against our people. So they give them the green light and Sharon will never decide to assassinate Sheikh Ahmed Yassin without taking green light from Bush. Bush, who brought army to attack and to kill also civilian people in Iraq. Bush now is representing the... as he described, a new Crusades."
Mahmoud al Zahhar on dateline
On the same program, Shimon Peres gave us the root-cause argument in a nutshell:
"I believe personally that you cannot stop terror just by killing the terrorist. You have to fight them, clearly. But you also have to tackle the reasons for terror. You have to ask yourself what are the motivations of people who commit suicide and for that reason, we in the Opposition feel that you have to do two things, which are contradictory in a parallel way. One is to fight the terrorist in a determined way. On the other hand is to negotiate with the Palestinians that they themselves will begin to fight terror because terror is their enemy, not only ourselves. The terroristic works are frustrating any agenda that the Palestinians are trying to introduce."
It's the only way forward, no matter how hysterical Tim Blair gets about the simple idea of attempting to "know your enemy".
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Ignorance is not bliss
Talking to J. tonight reminded me of a phone conversation we had after peace activist Rachel Corrie was killed in Palestine last year.
J. said, "Darling, I can't talk now, I've got D. over for dinner."
"That's OK," I said. "I just want to know, in a sentence, what's your view on what happened to Rachel Corrie? Do you think they deliberately ran her down?"
"She sat in front of a bulldozer, Gianna. I mean, I think it's tragic, but of course they didn't target her. She shouldn't have been there. Those bulldozers only target houses where they know Palestinian terrorists are hiding."
I said, dumbly, "But why won't Israel give Gaza back? It's terrible what they do to the Palestinians. Rachel's emails, they're heartbreaking." I sensed her increasing frustration with me, but went on, "So, what's the Jewish position on Gaza, again?"
"Listen, Gianna, you don't understand. Israel tried to give land back to the Palestinians and they didn't want it, it was all or nothing--"
"What about how Arafat won the--"
"He's the guy who's responsible for every fucking airliner that was hijacked in the Seventies!"
"Well, a few years back he got the Nobel Peace Prize together with Rabin, I think, and someone else."
"He invented terrorism!" Deep sigh. "Look, I'm going to lend you those two books I told you about, so you can try to understand."
"Okay, okay."
"OK?"
"Say hi to D."
"I will, darling."
"Goodnight."
"Goodnight, sweet."
I never did borrow those books. I wish I had, because the Israel-Palestine conflict isn't going away and it's a root cause of the Islamic terrorism that threatens all of us now.
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March 25, 2004
Heartbreaking
Once in a blue moon I can receive SBS up here, and last night was one such occasion, so it was great to be able to catch the two fascinating interviews with new Hamas deputy leader Mahmoud Al Zahhar and Israeli Opposition leader Shimon Peres on dateline. (Note, Dateline has an irritating way of posting transcripts whereby you can't link directly to the stories as they only open in small text boxes off the main site.)
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March 24, 2004
DNA
Has anyone ever had to do a DNA test? Harley's father's lawyers are insisting I have one, otherwise Harley won't see a cent of child support, apparently. Strange, since the father has already signed the birth registration papers, and in the past I've sworn an affidavit confirming Harley's parentage, which was used in a court case (not mine). And geez, the father was extremely keen to claim Harley as his child on his website, so being told by the lawyers that he's questioning paternity is a bit rich. I mean, as if I'd lie about who the father was, when it could be proved through DNA anytime. Oh well. It's also a bit strange that m'learned friends are demanding that my DNA be sampled at the same time. Surely we don't need proof that I'm Harley's mum? It's like that Irish joke where the daughter comes home and announces she's pregnant and her father says, "Are you sure it's yours?". And I'm not all that pleased with the idea of my DNA being stored on some database somewhere, where it could potentially be misused, either. Anyway, I hope they can just snip a lock of Harley's hair (god knows he has enough of it!) rather than stick a needle in him.
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March 23, 2004
Over before it even began
For a while there it looked as if Jeff Kennett might become the Peter Andre of politics, but he's now ruled out a comeback, apparently. Mystified as to what he meant by an 'announcement of "federal" importance' though.
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Of all the blogs in all the world, you had to walk into mine
Something got lost in translation over at Languagehat.
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The unforgiven
I like to read about other people's families. The Scribbler, for example, has just written a lovely piece about his dad. I'd like to write something about my dad, too, even though I think he occasionally reads my blog. We've only just come to a kind of truce after not speaking for some time over the summer. This happens periodically in my relationship with my father; when I was 18 he didn't speak to me for a year because he didn't approve of my junkie lover--but what father would? It's funny, though; it only recently emerged that he's still angry at me over those events more than a decade ago. I'm not someone who can hold a grudge for longer than a couple of days, so it always amazes me when others can.
My mother comes by about every second day. She rides her bike, or my father gives her a lift. He'll drop her off and stand by the car, so I have to bring the baby out to see him. He says he won't come into the house until I apologise. He's still smarting over some things that were said over the summer. In fact we both said things, but my mother admonishes me, "You're the younger one, so it's you who should apologise." He thinks I'm an ungrateful child; I guess he never read this.
For Harley's sake, the other week I attempted an apology. But my father deemed my apology to be only half-hearted and so is holding out for a more convincing one. In the meantime, he won't come in the house, but when pressed, he'll join us on the deck. Last Sunday my mother brought around a chocolate pecan pie and some leaf tea and a glass teapot--she doesn't care for teabags. She spread out a white tablecloth on the deck and we sat there with the rain cascading down all around us, eating cake. I made the classic 'proud mother' mistake of waking Harley when they arrived, even though he'd only just fallen asleep, in order to let them have some quality time with him awake. He'd been awake for most of the morning but had fallen into a deep sleep about a minute before they arrived, so I woke him and gave him a bath and dressed him in the faded purple jumpsuit that my mother had bought him at the op-shop. After all the excitement of seeing his Oma and Opa he was overstimulated and wouldn't settle again for hours. You learn these things the hard way.
My dad shies away from holding the baby and he winces and grimaces when I do, as if I'm going to drop him. "Luis," my mother rolls her eyes. "You don't have to worry. Mothers have an instinct about their babies." It makes me wonder what he was like when we were small; I know he was wonderful when we were children, but perhaps he was afraid to hold us when we were babies, too.
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March 21, 2004
Soldiering on
So anyway, what I wanted to add about Christopher Pearson's piece yesterday is that, like the Howard Government, he wants us to believe that Australians are terrorist targets solely because of 'who we are, not what we do'. But what I don't understand is how we can divorce one from the other. Surely the idea of 'who we are' is affected by 'what we do'. I mean, if terrorists just want to kill us because we are a secular democracy, then why aren't they targetting, say, Sweden?
On the refusal of the Howard Government to admit that the war in Iraq made us more of a target, as though they can't comprehend the concept of 'more', Pearson just dismisses the concept of 'increased risk' by talking about 'the madness of the Islamo-fascist project' where 'relative vulnerability becomes more a matter of terrorist opportunities than notional orders of provocation'.
However Pearson ends his column by quoting the 'leading expert on Al Qaeda', Rohan Gunaratna, who said,
"Australia has no option but to work with the US in the fight against terror because it has long been regarded by Islamic fundamentalists as a crusader country."
And Pearson concurs that "our antagonists imagine us as a crusader state". Well, if we are perceived as such, doesn't it have to have something to do with our actions, rather than just the fact that we are a secular democracy?
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Rudely cut off
I hadn't finished blogging last night when the line dropped out, and I didn't want to risk waking the baby with that hideous dialup noise. Just wondering, can anyone tell me if there is any way of dialing up silently? Cheers.
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March 20, 2004
Peed my lips
Think this is In bad taste?
"CITING public concern, Virgin Atlantic has scrapped plans to install urinals in the shape of a woman's lips at the airline's clubhouse at New York's John F. Kennedy airport."
They could've come up with something worse, but we won't go there (this being a family blog now 'n all).
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Silly me
In today’s Australian, Christopher Pearson writes:
“…the task of government will be to engage [Australians] as conscious, civilian participants in a life or death struggle that will undoubtedly reach these shores one way or another,”
then in the same paragraph goes on to say:
“…the lessons of Bali have not been learned and the land of the long weekend lives on in the infantilised minds of many.”
So the Government should treat Australians as ‘conscious, civilian participants’, but Pearson can keep describing us as ‘infantilised’. Got it.
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March 19, 2004
Oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood
Checking my letterbox this afternoon I found a gift from my neighbour Debbie, she of the devoutly Christian family of nine. There was a handmade card with 'Babies are God's gifts' written on the front and a copy of Above Rubies magazine:
"Above Rubies is a magazine to encourage women in their high calling as wives, mothers and homemakers. Its purpose is to uphold and strengthen family life and to raise the standard of God's truth in the nation."
The stories are quite interesting--organic babyfood, homeschooling tips, inspirational anecdotes, that kind of thing--even if every second word seems to be "God". Do you think she's on a mission to save me? At least now I know why the lawnmowing is so cheap: it's either pay or pray. Don't get me wrong though, I'm not poking fun at her. I'm secretly impressed by the religious, because they have so much certainty about everything. Hell, I wish I could be a believer, but unfortunately I can't seem to suspend disbelief.
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Where do we go from here?
Tim does the hard work, we just link to it--here's this week's Blogjam.
As far as hot blogtopics go, I'm trying to keep up with all the Madrid debates but I have to admit I find the whole thing pretty confusing. I wish we could just start over and find a practical way to deal with terrorism instead of wasting a lot of time and energy with all this namecalling and fingerpointing at each other in the West. It just doesn't feel like we're getting anywhere in this supposed "war on terror". It feels hopeless. I don't feel as if there is any kind of intelligent strategy to destroy terrorism from the bottom up--ie. from where ordinary Islamic people are seduced and brainwashed into supporting fundamentalism. Catching the megalomaniacs de jour in the leadership positions of the various Islamic terrorist organisations is important, sure, but it isn't enough if we aren't doing something about the reasons why fundamentalism is able to be so effectively marketed by them. When I say "we", I mean us and "them"--the world's moderate Islamic majority. If it's going to work it needs to be a joint venture.
update: This is a start: "Al-Qaeda a bunch of crazies: Mufti" .
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March 17, 2004
Referrer madness
Thought I'd do a regular post linking to any new referrers I get, or new commenters who have blogs. Of course, you can already access them through my site stats or through the comments box, this just makes it easier for me to visit them in future, especially if I want to add them to the blogroll (although I don't get around to updating my template very often). Anyway, please meet zucchinis in bikinis, lunacy101, The China Letter, soul pacific, bowled over, Powerup, kitschenette, any resemblance and amnesty for Claire--some of whom you may already know.
And hey, lookee here, stradbroke isle has been blogging again, if sporadically. Here's a link to David's latest post, about Hawaii: Forlorn in the USA (love the headline). One for my brother who lives there--in case he reads me, which I suspect he doesn't.
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Palm reading
My local neighborhood newsletter, Voice of the Palms (no link; it probably only has a print run of a couple of hundred), carries a news item about a recent visit to our area by Carmen Lawrence:
"...Before her speech and questions, Carmen Lawrence visited each table and talked with just about everyone there. She shares Mark Latham's belief that politicians must listen at least as much as they talk. At the end of the evening, she was farewelled with a standing ovation. This was at 11pm. How many politicians would you farewell like that after 4 hours of them?"
Bodes well.
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Tricky and out of touch
I'm having so many problems with the internet again lately, it's not funny. I can't get into hardly anyone's sites--it keeps telling me "the connection with the server was reset". And when I do manage to logon somewhere, I am booted off after a minute or so. I had this problem around Christmas but then it kind of fixed itself before I got around to switching service providers (I assume it's a service provider issue). This time, I don't know...Optus, you are officially on notice. Hell, I can't even read the news. Just when I feel like blogging again, too.
Well, while I'm here I may as well give you the weekly Harley update. He's three weeks old now, and has finally got the hang of feeding without causing me to grit my teeth. Unfortunately, he's also got the hang of inexplicable daily crying sessions, but the books assure me this is normal once they hit three weeks or so. And oh, joy, it's supposed to last til about three months... Still, we've now invested in one of those amazing pouch thingys-whoever invented them deserves a medal. Puts him to sleep almost immediately and has the added benefit of allowing me to catch up on housework. The hard part is unattaching him (or stopping moving) without waking him up, so I often resort to doing laps of the dining table while reading a book. I'm sure the cats think I've gone nuts.
update: The connection seems to be working again...it's now given me almost half an hour online without cutting me off...amazing.
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