the duke hotel

Once again, my Twitter stream reveals much of interest. This week’s highlights:

1. No matter how many times I say “Wynyard is a railway station” it still looks like a poorly-maintained pub urinal. It’s the colour.
2. If you have a beard, you’re allowed to be fat and incoherent.
3. “I hate it when you’re pulling off a buttoned shirt and the buttons get caught on ur nostrils.” Agreed.
4. I really should write more serious essays or news stories soon lest people think I’m only about odd drinking games and ranting on camera.
5. Hotel Cremorne: Friday. Semi-bearded ad agency geekbois and Lesser Office Wendys with overly-tall heels, overly-tight skirts, nasty accents.
6. The Duke Hotel in Enmore has barred me from drinking any Wirra Wirra wines from McLaren Vale until I try every other decent red on their new wine list.
7. Once I’m appointed Tsar, all jazz musicians will go to Nauru concentration camps, paid for by a levy on jazz enthusiasts.
8. “Apple has 3 basic moves”? No, just ONE. “We’re sooooo fuckin’ cool, iz pretty, buy our stuffz kthxbai.” [Chorus: "Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve Much Loves."]
9. “Dear Fat Bloke, nothing says ‘yobbo slav’ more than a pair of (fake) Bvlgari sunglasses kthxbye.”
10. “Dear Bus Driver, if having to change a $50 is your day’s worst then you and Mr 9mm need to chat.”
11. I now understand why the law prevents me from bringing firearms to conferences.
12. Platypuses don’t actually have antlers.

And at that point Twitter tells me it’s over-capacity, which is probably a good thing.

[Credit: Cartoon Twitter-bird courtesy of Hugh MacLeod. Like all of Hugh's cartoons published online, it's free to use.]

Here’s a closer, colour view of The Man in the Window. I still think he looks a little creepy.

I took this photo with my phone the other night at The Duke Hotel. The man stood at the window in exactly this position for about 15 minutes.

My notebook is full of references to the human mind.

Once, on a Saturday Night at The Duke last year, it was a written note by a chap who’d only just been released from jail.

This time (pictured) it’s ’Pong explaining certain basic neurological reflexes.

No, it doesn’t say “Eight High Freeze” — whatever that is! — but “Fight Fligh[t] Freeze”. This diagram explains it all, neurochemistry and everything. Uhuh.

I just love the way that sketched explanations only make sense at the precise moment they’re being created.

Maybe I should go back through that notebook…

It’s 8am, a crisp winter morning. 11C outside. I drag a battered flannelette shirt over my t-shirt — a shirt that’s now 12 years old, I remember. I bought it at Gowings when I first came to Sydney, and it’s still wearable, more or less. Where will I buy everyday clothes now that Gowings is gone?

The shirt smells of smoke. Why is that?

It’s not the acrid stench of cigarette smoke, but the dusty odour of burnt wood. Eucalyptus. A bushfire? Ah, no, I remember now. Sitting by the open fireplace at The Duke Hotel… red wine… the memories flood back as the coffee kicks in…

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Even if it’s your local pub, there’s a limit to the kind of photographs you can take in the urinal and still use the excuse that it’s for “Art”.