Snapshot

It's early afternoon on an average Thursday. A gale has come up from seemingly nowhere. The sky is dark, thick with cloud and red dust. I doubt there will be rain today. Palms are bending backwards like you see them do in cyclone footage on the television and I wonder how long before one comes down on a line and puts the power out. There's a buzzing weirdness like electricity in the air. The dog doesn't seem to notice and is happy napping on the couch.

Dismantled Mix Tape - Paper Tiger + Guess I'm Doing Fine

Not So Old School After All

I went to a public library today for the first time in a long time. The four years I lived in Brisbane, I never set foot in such an institution and yet I am drawn to the tiny room that is the Port Hedland library. I was feeling very nostalgic about it. It kind of reminds me of the casino public library where I researched many an assignment back in the golden days before I felt the soul destroying crush that is institutionalised learning (took me 7 years of primary, 6 of secondary and 8 years of tertiary to come to such a conclusion). Back in the day, when I was trying on the teenage rebel outfit for size, I hung out at the library when I wagged school. Totally Bad Ass. This library has the same feel. A dozen or so shelves of reference books, decades old and probably then out of date. Rows and rows of Wilbur Smith, Jeffery Archer, Patricia Cornwall and Agatha Christie, well thumbed, tea coloured pages read by so many a bored miner's wife, possibly twice. And a shiny newfangled wizzbox in the corner offering all of the infinite possibilities that the world wide web has to offer, parcelled out in 30 minute bookings. Ah, small town public libraries. Odd thing is that I found exactly what I was looking for (neither Patricia Cornwall or Wilbur Smith). Odd thing is that I enjoyed the experience so much I was grinning like a mad thing when I got back into the car. Odd thing (no, I'd say more amusing than odd) is the librarian, on seeing I was borrowing a book on tape asked me if I knew how to use a cassette. Never, never ever in my whole life have I been asked such a question. Bless. I've never really thought of the CD generation before, and despite the large carton of cassette tapes in my cupboard, I guess I am firmly one of them. But do I really look so young as someone who doesn't know about tapes? I wonder if there are kids out there who have all of their music digital and know naught of CDs?

Waxing Lyrical.

Saturday morning. and who's gonna play with me. it's six in the morning. I gotta long day ahead of me. Forgive me if I misquote a lyric or two from time to time, but you'll just have to deal with it. But it is saturday morning, oh no wait. it's afternoon. Crap. this is getting less and less legitimate as I go. Though I am alone at the moment, not that it's a problem today. This is Brisbane. These are holidays. And this is someone who finds it much easier to live zen when they are on holidays. Y'know, you should never under estimate the potential of existential insight in the lyrics of pop music. Take massive chances with your life. That's what Madonna said to me. Travelling down this road, watching the signs as I go, I think I'll follow the sun, isn't everyone just travelling down their own road watching the signs as they go, I think I'll follow my heart, it's a very good place to start. It may not be poetry or brilliant, unique insight into the human condition. But it convinced me that moving to the other planet that is western australia is a good idea. Possibly more importantly, it continues to convince me that I can, not should, but can stay there. At least for the times being.

Happy Freakin Birthday Madonna. You've done more for me than any philosopher, poet or self help manual could ever do. Thankyou.

How did you mangage to convince yourself of that?

C'mon, Be Nice To Each Other.

And here, I vent.
I like online communities. I have participated in numerous forums on numerous topics and generally there are no problems. It's fun in a way, to say what you think, to answer questions or to ask questions of your own with the possibility of communicating with people from all walks of life that you might never otherwise have the opportunity to interact with. And yet, there are some people I have encountered over the years of exploring topical message boards, chat rooms and forums who cannot engage with these forms of communication without being complete and utter pricks. And these forum nazis are becoming the norm. Example: without using any names, there is a forum that I have had dealings with on a particular topic of popular culture. There is one individual who makes seemingly a million posts a day on whatever topic, whether his comments are relevant or not to the questions or whatever. And each time, he shoots people down and basically comes across as an arrogant fuck - so so much better than everyone else because he has his own website, because he has published books (apparently). My question is, if he is so amazingly worldly and knowledgeable, why does he spend all day responding to posts on an online forum, pissing people off? If you need more, go and read some of the user comments from urbandictionary.com. People are getting seriously slagged, really really cruel comments are made just because someone makes an addition to what is a ridiculous yet humorous web site meant for nothing more than fun. So why must people get so freakin' nasty? Do they talk like this to all people they encounter, or just those who can't directly slap them in the face for being such total assholes.
I am not a person who can say that you shouldn't say nasty things to or about people. I say nasty, judgemental things all the time, and think them, sometimes dream them. But not everything that comes out of my mouth or keyboard is a slag off. So, here's my gripe, enough is enough people. Before you write something fuckish towards someone (yes, I have just decided that fuckish is a word now. I'd put it on urbandictionary.com but for fear of someone responding fuckishly to my contribution), think, would I say this out loud to a real person.

The Half A Five Year Plan.

I've always thought people who made 5 year plans were those overly ambitious corporate high acheiving types, or Stalin. Same thing really. But here I am, thinking of making my own five year plan. I can't call my self overly ambitious. Oh, I do have ambitions. I'd like a life where I make my living from doing interesting, creative and generally fantastic things. And I'd like to live in a nice place in a nice house, with nice things and I'd like to be surrounded by genuinely cool people that I know and love all of the time. I like to think that I am too ecclectic, too easily distracted and too easily bored to live the corporate life where 5 year plans are generally a given, but I think I'm more lazy than any of those other things. Yet, I digress.
I am about to articulate my first 5 year plan, in a live (semi-live) internet broadcast.... get ready, it's gonna be boring.
July, 2008 - February 2010. Thesis. Retire from academic pursuit. Fuck me. 2010, that sound just far enough away to be forever, but really only 18 months. Breathe. Relax.
February 2010 - January 2011. Occupy my final Pilbara year with developing skills for my ambitions for a creative, fantastic life. Current ideas for that - writing of various types. Independent film if I can somehow access the equpiment here, othewise I'll spend the year drawing really bad story boards. I might get a book, make it official.
And there...... there I am stuck. What is going to happen after that year is a curiously wobbly question. And one that I don't really fancy going into with the world who never reads this anyway..... So, the conclusion is that I am not currently in a position to have a 5 year plan. Can I have a series of 5 year plans and choose appropriately as time progresses? Ah well, Actually, the fact that I can't really devise anything now does fill me with a little bit of excitement. It means i'll still have moments of possibility and chance to look forward to. Why then is that so terrifying?

Dedland

Is small town living really all that bad? Something that I've discovered these last few months - six months, hey! The sentence is 1/6 complete! - is that question can only be answered in the context of the town in question. Take Port Hedland for instance - well, technically I live in south hedland, it's pretty much the same, just not as nice, and that's saying something. Allow me to allow you a glipse into my current place of residence................
When I drive past children in the street, I expect them to throw rocks at the car. On two separate occasions I have nearly run down two people, once when a drunken old man leaped from the kerb into the path of my vehicle and stood, holding onto my bonnet, swaying, staring directly into me as I screamed 'get the fuck out of the way!!!!'. It was 9am. Another time, same corner funnily enough, I turn the bend, there's a woman laying prostrate on the road. She might be dead. If it was any other town, I might have expected that, but here I know better. I drive around her. She crawls to her knees. I hate turning that corner now.
I've lived in three major Australian cities (well, if you count Canberra) and have hung out in numerous international cities, some with reputations of question. And where is the only place that a drunken, sweaty and odoriferously repugnant man has bothered me at an ATM? Good ol' south hedland shopping centre. And that's another thing, I've worked in Toombul Centro, I've encountered some fairly ripe smelling freaks in my time, but is there a deodorant shortage in this town? C'mon people, you've seen the ads, use some fucking soap goddamn it!!!! Or at least stand downwind from me so I don't have to smell you. Seriously, the video ezy here smells like zombie armpits. Plus they have shit movies.
Everybody here is from elsewhere. This is home to no one. How can anyone belong in a place like that?

Do people just not care because they don't belong here?

Gonzo By Default.

The blog is the gonzo of the new media generation. No, we're not talking muppets - well you might be, and I was this morning when I made an obscure Sesame Street reference involving oatmeal and Rick Morranis, but that was Bert and not Gonzo (guess the reference, win a prize!!!), but I'm not talking about muppets now. ----brief interlude where I google the word gonzo---- God bless wikipedia (disclaimer - Factions of Fiction does not endorse the use of wikipedia. In fact, wikipedia in some respects might be better known under the title of this blog. Yet it will do now). Ok, according to wikipedia, Gonzo is a Boston slang term for the last drunk standing at the end of the night. I already new that, but the Boston slang part is new. It was first used in the way we have come to love it today, by Bill Cardoso to describe the style of writing by one Hunter S Thompson, who, as well all know was no less than the DOCTOR of Gonzo. So where does that leave us? Nowhere really, I just had the random thought of blogs being a new media gonzo and thought it was cool. And as the only drunk here, i find myself gonzo by default.
I'd reckon that old hunter s would have been a right bleeding asshole. I mean, politics, suicide, guns. Guns. Give me one gun nut who isn't an asshole. Give me one person who has anything to do with guns who isn't an asshole. Police? Give me one policeman who isn't an asshole. Back at the point, This asshole won the respect and adoration of hundreds of followers because he sat down, stood up, lay down, fell over, and said stuff to people. You might like it, agree with it, hate it, have no idea who I am talking about or think that this kind of half true egotistical drool is a total waste of time and think no more of it, however, I think if you say stuff to people, stuff you think about, not just random words or things you're parrotting for the sake of sounding like you think of stuff, then you rightly desrve the respect and adoration of at least one person, even if it is only yourself. Here endeth the sermon, and my glass, so I had better go fill it up before I write anymore.

Birthday Solutions. Cheers Mads.

How's a girl supposed to celebrate her birthday in a house all alone with nothing but a crazy beagle for company? Listen to The Immaculate Collection and dance around the loungeroom is one perfectly viable solution, which I heartly embrace with all the enthusiasm of a dancing beagle.

Bars and Hurls. Mars and Pearls. Stars and Curls. Tim Rogers, You Sexy Bitch You.

I've been listening to Tim Rogers and The Twin Set's album "What Rhymes With Cars and Girls" for a good ten or so years now as one of my absolute favourite cds. I always thought the song 28 was kinda cool and always thought I got it. Today I feel much more legit about it though. A heavens to betsy now I'm 28 and what is there to do.....? Funny, I always thought the line was "she sang like sandy dee" as in grease. I guess Sandy Denny is ten times cooler, but still I feel a little stoopid.


A heavens to Betsy now we're 28 and what is there to do?
We hardly even talk no more but to you I'll be true
Tell me that you feel the same even though I knew
Everything that you say right before it came from you
Art house movies and flat renovations
Newspaper politic and dinner reservations, oh
And Monday's a wine appreciation course
Talk about te drugs that you just wont touch no more

What a breeze just help me off my knees

Yeah, you met her during happy hour drinks and you kissed her on the cheek
You dreamt she sang like Sandy Denny and smoked like a malle tree
But now you're talking invitations and seating plans and marquees
It sounds real good in Italian but it scares to the teeth
And where're we gonna hide the keys

And you fold your arms behind your back like and old man
And you say you hate that guy but you sure understand him oh
And she's creasing at the mouth just like her old lady
Her sister's picking the names for the babies, oh

What a breeze just help me off my knees

do do do do

Now we're 28 and what is there to do?
We hardly even talk no more but to you I'll be true
To you I'll be true
To you I'll be true
To you I'll be true

Today Is The Last Day of My Mid Twenties. How Do I Feel About That?

...........I should have done something by now. I am now, officially a late starter, unless of course I never end up doing anything. Which is always highly probable.

What is the ideological function of ideological function?

It seemed like a good plan. I wonder if everyone who attempts to write a thesis feels like this? Sure, it beats real work. Sure, it's everything I've ever wanted in a job - my time is flexible (to a degree), it's mildly interesting, I don't exactly have a boss, just a freaky dude supervisor I'm not completely sure of and a faceless department and yes, if it works and something eventuates that something could very well be a reasonably serious pay cheque and of course a mild sense of intellectual superiority, but I already have that last one (mild!). So what's the point? Therein lies my point. What IS the point? To avoid the 9-5 drudgery of my experiences of working thus far? Is that all? I started this project 6 months ago. It was all exciting and fresh and new. I laboured through a proposal and all of the official stuff and now, a few weeks into writing, I'm so bored of it. Who, really in all serious gives a flying fuck about the ideological function of fairy tales in modern film? Me? I'm writing the damned thing and have since realised I don't really care. the plan was to work on this for three years, turning it into a doctorate next year. I really do like the idea of a doctorate (intellectual superiority, or is it just sibling rivalry?) But three years of the same topic? Urgh. Even if I manage to get through a year and a half and ditch the doctorate, that's a freakin long time to be having days like these. It's only 12 o'clock. I've worked for hours, with probably only half an hour of actual production. I just don't care about it. But I care about the process and the result, kind of. So I will muddle on, wasting time telling the Internet about problems such as these that are essentially unproblematic, wondering why 'Internet' is a proper noun. Hey, if you're reading this far you only have yourself to blame.

Have days always been this long?

Speaking of Facebook

I just thought I'd share the most ridiculous thing I have found on Facebook so far. And of all the utter shite that fills those millions of pages and profiles, to highlight this as the MOST RIDICULOUS... well that's saying something.

When you are feeling alone like no one cares, read this cuz its absolutely true: Every night, someone thinks about you before they go to sleep. At least fifteen people in this world love you. The only reason someone would ever hate you is because they want to be just like you. There are at least two people in this world that would die for you. You mean the world to someone. Someone that you don't even know exists loves you. When you make the biggest mistake ever, something good comes from it. When you think the world has turned its back on you, take a look. Always remember the compliments you've received. Forget the rude remarks. So if you are a loving person, send this to everyone on your list including the person who sent it too you.

Sentimental dribble written by and for those who need to believe this stuff to validate their own purpose. "the only reason someone would ever hate you is because they want to be just like you" - no, the only reason people would hate you is that you are some kind of horrible person who probably deserves it, or you are the idiot who wrote this and decided to circulate it all over the freakin' internet.

Going To The Beginning......

Sometimes it feels like Eels songs are all about me. Perhaps they are. Which is why I like them so much. To adopt one of those Kerouac type of fax paper roll process, that was just to get the typewriter started..... I spent three or so hours today playing peeping tom on facebook. Looking at people I had no intention of becoming friends with, some I already am friends with, some I am actually frineds with, other I just didn't want to be rude. Either way, yes I am a stalker of the facebookian variety. I always resisted these ego uploaders, but here I am writing a blog, talking about a facebook obsession. But I've had a revelation, of sorts. Perhaps it's just because I feel kind of starved for varied human contact these days. Perhaps. So Yeah, they're all orchestrated designs of who people want to be, what people want to be, and what they, ok we want others to see us as. Yes, I am a facade. Just like you buddy. But that's cool. Is like that old adage Life is Performance Art. Actually, I think that was something Nell told me once (I hope she's thinking about it herself these days), but it's such a true thing that I'm sure it was some kind of adage first. All the world's a stage... yeah. And now that stage is facebook. Myspace. This blog. So here I am world. How I want you to see me. How I might really be. Even I can't know that line in its entirety. Some of it might be true as in actual total and utter truth fact reality. Some of it might not be. Hunter S Thompson was a journalist.