Word-whore. I write 'em. I talk 'em. Information, politics, media, and the cybers. I drink. I use bad words. All publication is a political act. All communication is propaganda. All art is pornography. All business is personal. All hail Eris! Vive les poissons rouges sauvages!
On a beautifully rainy morning, a raindrop becomes part of a metaphor in my horoscope from Astrology.com.
Have you ever stood too close to a painting or a photograph? Here you thought you were looking at a drop of rain, but when you back up, you realize it’s the entire ocean. Take that perspective on your life now.
Yes, you. Now.
Um, yes Miss.
Back later.
On Friday night I ran into three local restaurateurs chatting in the street — proprietors respectively of Sydney’s best Lebanese restaurant Fifi‘s, Greek meze specialists Kafenes and The Razor’s Edge.
While I’ve eaten at Fifi’s several times and can vouch for their wonderfulness, which is why I stopped to chat too. I haven’t tried the others — but they both have excellent reputations.
The guy from The Razor’s Edge left to set up for dinner. And then the guy from Fifi’s mentioned that his kitchen hands were late and he had to go too. Maria from Kafene’s reaction: “Do you need a hand?”
Restaurants across the road from each other are meant to be arch enemies, aren’t they? Or are they? This cooperative approach to business was inspiring.
The unknown bird call which woke ’Pong and me the other day has been identified. This morning I spotted the beautiful pair of Grey Butcherbirds (Cracticus torquatus) on a tree next door.
Today’s morning chorus also included 30-odd long-billed corellas, a scattering of rainbow lorikeets, a low-flying pied currawong (I love the way they fly well under the main canopy, staying hidden) and assorted pigeons and miners.
This poster advertising share accommodation in Sydney is pretty typical of the genre — a list of features, tear-off tags with phone numbers, and the notice that you’d be the fifth person in a 3-bedroom apartment.
But there are two features worth pointing out.
1. Boasting that “Nobody sleeps in the living room!!!!!” reminds us that it’s now normal to over-crowd CBD apartments. These buildings were designed with a certain occupancy, so may the gods help them all in the event of a fire.
2. Saying “Europeans, North- and South Americans or Australian applications preferred” is just a coward’s way of saying “No blacks or Asians” — which is a bit rich for someone choosing to live in Sussex Street, right next to Sydney’s Chinatown.
Owners of mobile phones 0415 520 775 and 0403 220 688, you may well own a plasma TV and “really nice furniture”, but you’re still racist turds.
If it wasn’t for the fact that doing so might count as harassment, I’d suggest that we all phone you and say so.
When I posted about the astronaut attempted kidnapping story the other day, I hadn’t realised it had already become a major global story. Now Freakonomics co-author Stephen Dubner asks: Why?
I realize the story represents a sort of perfect storm of media stickiness — a female perp and a female victim, lust, revenge, NASA, pepper spray, and of course the diaper — but I have to confess that I am overwhelmed that this has become such a round-the-clock story. Who cares, and why? They were even talking about the story on the two ESPN shows I saw pieces of last night (SportsCenter and Pardon the Interruption); in each case, the anchors sheepishly acknowledged that the story had zero to do with sports but… they simply couldn’t resist.
With 63 comments so far, there’s plenty of interesting ideas. Well worth the read. The highlights for me…
That great satirist Peter Cook was once asked if he thought that satire had a political effect. He said:
Absolutely. The greatest satire of the twentieth century was the Weimar cabaret, and they stopped Hitler in his tracks.
Attributed to Stephen Colbert, in a Rolling Stone interview, thanks to Blog Them Out of the Stone Age.