Bread and pandas

Adelaide has been in a state of pandamonium for the past two years, ever since the zoo announced it was getting a pair of giant pandas on loan from China. Hi, I’m Red and I’m underwhelmed. I’m not quite sure where all the excitement has come from, really, because most people just seem to say, “Meh, pandas. Oh, look, is that an ingrown hair?” Nevertheless, the Traumatiser and all the tellies and radio stations have gone panda crazy. There’s been a panda countdown clock and Melbourne Street has claimed the title of Panda Central. As you do. I suppose it could be being driven by all those awful eastern suburbs mothers who make it their business to see that their children have every opportunity available. “Pandas? Why of course you’ll be first in line to see them, Veruca! Yes, I’m sure they’ll sell us Funi and she can live on our little hobby farm with your pony. We’ll all hop in the BMW and drive down to see her on the weekends.”

As far as I can see, pandas are kind of cute because they look like teddy bears, but otherwise they’re completely useless. The stupid things arrived on the weekend and have basically done nothing but chomp through bamboo shoots and apples and pee on the walls of their brand new panda palace. The rather patchy ABC show Hungry Beast did a debate on its first episode on whether pandas should be allowed to become extinct. One of the arguments was that since they were fat and had short willies, nature was conspiring against them. And fair enough, too.

Predictably enough, panda merchandise is also out of control. You can buy Wang Wang and Funi toys and T-shirts and lunchboxes and key rings and Christ only knows what else at the zoo. I think chocolate maker Haigh’s is the only one with the right idea, with their chocolate pandas. Which naturally got me to wondering what panda might taste like.

My guess is that it would be pretty fatty, but there must be ways of serving it. I reckon that anything you could do with pork or duck, you could do with panda. Smoking might work – we could make pandacetta. Barbecuing should work too, but we’re going to need a bigger barbecue oven than any of the ones they have in Chinatown. I was thinking of an eight course degustation menu, with fairly small portions. After all, there are only two fairly large ones to go around and everyone in town is going to want a bit.

Here’s what I have so far:

Pandacetta two ways: barbecued asparagus wrapped in pandacetta and sprinkled with parmesan shavings and mushroom risotto with crisp pandacetta
Wok-tossed panda fillet with bamboo shoots (for the irony value)
Panda cotta with toasted pandatone

Any suggestions to complete the menu?

Here, have my goat

I really don't have much use for it.

I know it's been a little quiet chez hack for a while, but don't worry. I'm still pissed off at the world. So, without further ado and certainly without further adont, here are some of the things that are annoying me this week:

Hyperactive flacks
PR is a thankless job. I've done it and I know, OK? But I also know that no-one ever got a story in any paper by being relentlessly obnoxious. Your story gets in if it's a good story or you've got a good picture or it's a slow news day and the journo is desperate. Hassling someone about when your story is going to get a run is not a good idea. I get up to 200 emails a day. Believe me, if you piss me off with your whiny-ass antics, I will block your email address and you will go straight to spam for the rest of your natural life. Or for the life of your email address, anyway.

Christmas decorations
I'm torn between thinking, "Aww, fake snowflakes! Perty!" and "The blinking LEDs in that faux bloody pine hall-decking twaddle look like the eyes of malignant gnomes!" But that could just be the time of day that I see them. The faux pine with the little flashy things is in the train station and I see it about 8am when I'm really not ready to deal with the world. I have no real problem with mornings per se. I just wish they started later in the day.

People who can't make their tenses agree
I'm not sure what happened to the education system between the time I got grammared up and when Gen Y was taught English, but it can't have been anything good. I imagine it was something like Vanilla Ice trying to rap. Tip number one: when you start a sentence, it should all be in the same tense. For example, "Mary said she wanted to decapitate Tony Abbott with a blunt spoon", not "Mary said she wants to decapitate Tony Abbott with a blunt spoon". I know she probably still wants to do it now and will continue to want to do it tomorrow and the next day and the day after that, but grammar doesn't make that much of a commitment. Grammar lets you change your mind. At the time she said it, she wanted to do it. That's enough.

I feel the same way about people who have no idea where to put apostrophes, people who think 'alternate' and 'alternative' are interchangeable and people who think that 'enormity' is interchangeable with 'hugeness'. And do not even get me started on people who think that "audience", "team", "group", "staff" and "couple" are plural. It's "the team is", not "the team are", m'kay?

That said, I think I am reasonably lenient with your average Joe. I don't bail up green grocers and berate them for their "tomatoe's". Nor do I tell the guy in the train station that it's not "raison toast" or that a "bacons" sandwich isn't quite the go. This is because secretly, I think they are both rather gorgeous. But if you write for a living, I expect you to know these things and I reserve the right to be put off by your mistakes or to proof-read you into oblivion. That is, of course, if death by red pen is possible.

Heather Mills-McCartney
There aren't too many new jokes left where this bird is concerned. I read a hilarious Crikey story about her a few weeks ago that used pretty much all of them - you know, don't have a leg to stand on, etc., etc. But then she had to go and suggest we all have rat-milk lattes and kitty-milk custards. And that pissed me off all over again, because you know and I know that that's just dirty.

But I think there might be one joke that hasn't yet been used for the evil witch, so I'm going for it like Luke Skywalker about to blow up the Death Star. For someone so darned unpopular, she really does seem to be getting around to a lot of talk shows and speaking engagements. In fact, I'd venture to say that she's been busier than a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest. Ba-dum-tish. Thankyouveramuch.

Discuss: Heather Milles is more toxic than Yoko Ono. (Big call, I know.)

James Reyne
It's almost sacrilegious of me to put the J-man and the unholy queen bitch together, isn't it? I used to love James Reyne. I thought the sun shone out from under his salt-bleached mullet. I even interviewed him when I was a green hack because he was one of my '80s heroes and I could. And he was a twat, which rather ruined my crush. But nevertheless, I saw him live on Saturday night for the second time. And he was... still a twat. For a die-hard Crawl fan, this is a terrible admission. Come on - I've got Crawl albums on vinyl, people! He was double-billing with Mark Seymour of Hunters and Collectors fame. And Mr Seymour was incredible. As usual. I've seen him three times now and he's never disappointed me. He's got the energy, he's got the rage (does that equal angergy?) and a cracking stage presence to boot. Mr Seymour can leave his boots under my bed any old time he likes. (Unless Clive Owen has left his there first, of course. There's a pecking order in my crumpet list.)

James Reyne, on the other hand, was bored dumb. He looked like he hated the audience, hated the old Crawl songs and hated his life. But for Ford's sake - he was only drinking water! That would have been enough to push me over the edge too. He's leaning in a bit of a country direction these days and obviously he can't understand why everyone else is stuck in the past. Oh, I dunno - maybe because country is crap? His backing band was rubbish, y'all. He was glued to the spot and he just didn't even try to sing louder than the fans who drowned him out with "Reckless" and "Erroll". Le sigh. What a disapointment. His biceps are still looking pretty damned good, though.

Girly drinks
What is it with bloody ready-mix drinks? I'm sure there'd be a great market for ready-to-drink mixers that weren't 80 per cent sugar. Vodka and soda with fresh lime? Delightful. Gin and tonic? Not my cup of plonk because I don't care for gin or tonic, but plenty of other people like it. A nice tart/tarty cosmopolitan? Dandy. Yes, I realise that most of these little alcopops (aka "bitch-piss", aka "poofter drinks" if you're in Port Augusta) are actually designed for 13-year-olds. I know that. Booze manufacturers have to make their money at Schoolies somehow, right? But sometimes when you go somewhere, the wine is all cardonnay and the only vaguely drinkable thing on offer is ready-mix. For example, last night I dragged poor old Hungry Hungry Hypocrite off to see some hot lesbian circus girls as part of Feast. What was the ready-mix vodka drink? Allegedly, it was pomegranate and citrus. Unless "pomegranate" and "citrus" are both code for "sugar", I'm really not convinced.

This election campaign
I cannot tell you how bored with this campaign I am. Thank Ford it will all be over this time two days from now. First we had the Clayton's election campaign that didn't even get you mildy tipsy and then we had the real election campaign that was even less alcoholic because there wasn't even the suspense of wondering when the election would be called. If I didn't hate John Howard and the Liberal Party to death, I wouldn't consider voting for Kevin. Let's face it, the man's boring as batshit! If only Julia Gillard had been elected party leader. Sure, her voice makes Missy Higgins sound like a Swiss finishing school girl, but who cares? She's not vanilla-flavoured Tin-Tin.

My one great consolation is that I don't have to work on election night. Last year's state election was one of the least pleasant days of my life. Let's see:

• started off hung over;
• sustained third-degree burns to the roof of my mouth from a snatched pie at lunchtime;
• pissed off the chief of staff by my mere existence;
• wrote stories in my car on paper because I didn't have a laptop;
• phoned said stories in to people who had no idea of how to punctuate a sentence;
• forced to use pub toilets all day;
• put my money on the wrong horse in what was a rather close count;
• because of that managed to lose the winning candidate with half an hour to go before deadline; and
• nearly had a nervous breakdown;
• ended up working a 14-hour day for free.

So yay for last year's election! But will I be happily treating Election 07 as the Hack Grand Final and be watching it from the comfort of my couch (with access to my own toilet, my own fridge and my own pantry) on Saturday night? Pffft - does the Pope shit in the woods?

Movember
There's no two ways about it: porn moustaches just shit me. You are heeeeere to cleeeeeen ze pooooool? What? I don't have a sodding pool! Bugger off! Either grow an eight-layered, waxed muttonchop extravaganza, lose your teeth and learn to girn or just do not bother me. You're a mob of lightweights, all of you Movember tragics. How the hell did Movember become fashionable? And once people started raising money, it just turned into the bloody 40-Hour-Famine-Thon-Day. Naff off and jam some barley sugar up your nostrils. It will complement your stupid facial hair. You mark my words - next it's going to be Old Man Eyebrow March and then who'll be laughing, hmm?

Parking stations
Adelaide used to be the City of Churches. Then it was the City of Serial Killers. Now, since we haven't had a gruesome serial killer on the rampage since Snowtown, it's become the City of Parking Stations, which is far less entertaining. Boo, hiss. I decided to bring the car to work a couple of weeks back because I was going to the theatre in the evening and didn't want to train it home at 11 o'clock. So I parked in one station near me with an "early bird" all day rate. My $13 proved to be well spent, as the station was comedy gold, Old Gen Trek style. Every level was named for a planet and the lift had this clunky retro spaceship voice: "You are now arriving on Saturn", or "You are now arriving on Mars". For some reason, nobody wanted to park on level eight: "You are now arriving on Uranus" ~snort~ (Of course, the station has been around since before Pluto was declared to be a dwarf planet and therefore Not Worthy.)

But the real imposition came when I moved to another parking station. Station Star Trek closed early, so I had to shift to one on the other side of the city mile. Where it cost me $20 for three and a half hours. Bloody outrageous - those are Shitney prices. For once in my life it would have been cheaper to have gone home by cab.

Melbourne Cup Day
I know this was a few weeks ago, but it's still ticking me off. I don't understand Cup Day. I went to a Cup Day lunch a few years ago at the invitation of the lovely dad of a lovely pal, but I have to say I still don't get it. I bought a $200 frock for the occasion, had scrawny old rich tarts looking me up and down and comparing their kit with mine, lost my money at the TAB and ended up absolutely rotten drunk. While the rotten drunk part was just dandy, I don't get the rest. Gambling: no interest. Frocks: no interest. Old scrawny tarts: saw some in the Traumatiser this year and was truly repulsed by their anoerexic legs, painted toenails and bigger-than-Texas hats ~shudder~ I love a boozy lunch, but Ladies Who Lunch make me want to do feed them into a mulcher, Fargo-style. And I hate the Cohen Brothers.

The thing that really annoys me about Cup Day is that people who don't give a scrap of earwax for horses or horse racing the rest of the year feel that they absolutely must get frocked up and go out to lunch, darling. The hypocrisy just kills me. I have no problem with race-horse owners enjoying the day, or people who go to the races regularly - my great granddad was a trainer and my granddad was a bookie, for heaven's sake. But people like that are few and far betwee these days. Melbourne Cup is just another excuse to get sozzled and pass out behind the portaloos Kath and Kim-style and you know, I just can't see the point. Why not get messy at your favourite pub without having to buy a frock-shoes-hat package that cost the equivalent of a week's support for a dumped Liberal Minister? For just $3000, you can keep Christopher Pyne or Malcolm Turnbull for a week in the style to which they've become accustomed. But really - why would you when you could just buy a mulcher instead?

Of spam, maimed spiders and odd socks

Yes, I'm still alive. Sorry for the silence, for the four of you who noticed. New job brain-drain, bloggers' block, etc. Now Bloke has cleared out for the Dark Continent again, leaving me here with only Mr Furpants for company. Le sigh.

For some reason, spam is really starting to sap my will to live. My new gig has put me on some mean mailing lists. Combined with a spam filter set so low that you could catch your toe on it and trip, I'm getting 1000 emails a week. I don't think I'm a prude, but being asked 15 times a day whether I'd like a bigger cock is starting to depress me. I don't want a copy watch, you must be stupid if you think I believe I've won 3 million euros and I have enough software/drugs/friends. Leave me the fuck alone.

Then there's the little four-legged spider clinging to the bedroom wall by Bloke's bedside table. He's been there for three weeks now. I poke him on a Saturday morning when I'm stripping the bed to see if he's still alive and he waves some of his remaining legs at me. Somehow, I can't bring myself to kill him, even to put him out of his misery. He's not hurting anyone and who knows what thoughts are running through his spidery little mind? Something to the effect of, "I'm only half the spider I used to be," I imagine. Or, "Fuck, where did you think I'd have gone? Down the boozer to get a pint and some crisps? I'm a four-legged spider, for Chrissake. A moth tried to eat me the other day. A moth. Oh God, the humiliation." And yes, I'm aware that 'he' is probably a 'she'. But my eyes just aren't good enough to turn him upside down and find out one way or another. Plus, I don't really care. It's a spider, man. I'm sure gender issues don't really matter to it.

Odd socks are worrying me more than usual at the moment. At one stage, there were four mismatched socks hanging around the place like spare pricks. And, to mix metaphors, it was a bit like the abusive drunk woman at the party: I kept waiting for her partner to show up to remove her. But how long should I wait? Should I just keep that odd sock for a couple of washes and then give up, as the Democrats must surely have given up on this election? And where the hell have those lost socks gone? Has the tumble drier turned carnivorous? Or is it a tardis, whisking them off to battle Daleks and Cybermen?

The cream cheese in the fridge is also highly problematic. I opened a tub of that ultra-low fat Philly gear a good three months ago, but it refuses to go mouldy. I don't want to eat the stuff - it's a good six weeks past its use-by date - but now it's become a test of wills. Will the cheese give up and go mouldy and give me the pleasure of watching a blue-green velvet spread over its surface or will I get bored and throw it out? Not sure yet, but it does make me wonder exactly what is in that no fat stuff. Whatever it is, it bears precious little resemblance to actual cheese.

Three bean mix is another thing that's been bugging me. Well, the lack of three bean mix, really. Sometime last year, three bean mix suddenly started turning into four bean mix. Chick peas began infesting perfectly tasty cans of beans. Ever tried picking out all the chickpeas from a can of beans before you put said beans in a pot of minestrone? It's a thankless task, I can tell you. One by one, the brands fell to the lure of the chick pea until there were no humble suburban three bean mixes left. I was desolate. I'd stand in the canned veg aisle at Coles, listlessly picking through the cans in the hope that there was a hidden stash. Every now and again, a few cheap-arse home brand three bean mixes do turn up, but then they disappear again. If I wanted chickpeas, I'd buy the sodding things. After all, I imagine they might make rather good slingshot pellets. And that yappy little dog over the back has been pissing me off...

Oh, and I've got another charming head cold. I'm beginning to wonder whether I have even two white blood cells to rub together. Six, six, six, six, any advance on six colds for the year? Going once? Going twice! Going three times - and sold to the lady with the false pelican fascinator!

When in doubt, whinge

Ah, whingeing. It makes people so eager to see you or call up for a chat. Practice the gentle art of the whine and you'll find it works a treat in getting rid of the bastards. Hey, presto: more time for reading.

I may have little to write about at the moment, but there are always things that are pissing me off. So here's the honour roll for this week:

Cirque du Soleil
I love circuses, especially the trapezy-acrobatty sort where eighteen people with inherently-amusing facial hair all pile onto a bicycle and then wobble around the ring looking pleased with themselves. What if one sneezed? Or farted? They'd all break up laughing and fall off. It would be nothing short of comedy gold. I'm a little ambiguous about clowns because of The Pilo Family Circus and the fact that some of them look more than a little like Mr Pervy, but I'm able to look past that for a good circus. Just not for those guys who tie balloon animals in the Mall.

(As an aside, can you imagine doing that for a living? Or wearing a soiled and mangy elephant suit like the guy who hands out balloons in the Central Market on Saturday mornings? Wouldn't you look at yourself in the mirror as you zipped the great big smiley head over your own somewhat less smiley head and wonder, "How has my life come to this? Where did it all go wrong? Should I have tried harder in trigonometry?" But one digresses.)

But I cannot and will not tolerate Cirque du Bollocks. Sure, the acrobatics are great and dang those six-year-olds they kidnapped from China and forced into cirque-du-slavery can spin a good plate, but they ruin the whole effect by being so arty-bloody-farty. The costumes look like something Auntie Jean made in her painting on nylon class when the cat knocked over all the paint pots on the Crows flag she was trying to paint to take to Showdown 816.

And don't get me started on the music. I have a suspicion Enya writes it under a nom de plume. Even she would be ashamed to put her real name to that goat-herding twaddle.

When I first saw Cirque du Merde on TV years ago, I oohed and aahed with everone else because it was different and new. But the next time I saw it, I couldn't help thinking, "What a load of old crap." Something that makes me hate Cirque du Shite even more is the fact that everyone else loves it. Its performances sell out. People are willing to pay ridiculous amounts for tickets. And why? Because they think they should. They think it's erudite and cool and fun. No-one admits to going to sleep during the performance because it's so perilously close to modern dance.

Cirque du Pants has been planted in the Parklands for about five or six weeks now, but I think they're due to roll up their over-engineered tents and push off in the next day or two. Bugger off and don't come back.

"Gift" shops
I just realised the other day that "gift" shops are packed with the most unmitigated load of crap known to Ford. There's one I walk past a few times a week and I'm so blinded by the riot of primary colour and shiny useless things inside that I'm never really sure what they sell. I have an impression of a crowd of malevolent glass elephants and papier mache cats and fake Carnevale masks that haven't ever seen Venice unless there's a town in Taiwan that was renamed for marketing purposes.

There's another particularly scary shop that has a rack of little-girl scarves out the front in various pastel shades of fake fur. At the bottom of each scarf is a mournful-looking teddy bear that seems to melt into the fabric. It's as though someone caught a teddy in the wild, skun it and spread it flat before turning it into a scarf.

They remind me of a fur stole my grandmother used to have. You know the sort - it had a head and paws and a little chain to link the front paws to the back paws so the poor dead little thing looked as though it had just jumped onto your neck and curled there out of love. Just in case you were ever tempted to think that just a teeny, weeny little fur coat might be OK, there was Stinky the Stone Marten peering back at you with his beady, glassy eyes, his nosehair-curling aroma of camphor and his little dead paws ~shudder~ Fur is never OK.

More digression. The point is, I don't really care if people want to have shops full of rubbish. I also don't care if other people want to buy said rubbish. It's no skin off my nose, after all. I also have a horrible feeling that my outlaws have a more than passing acquaintance with "gift" shops, given their past form.

What I really want to know is how such shops have come to be known as "gift" shops. Is it an acknowledgment that gift-giving is essentially useless? Or that no-one but my friend Stephanie puts in the effort to choose a really good present that's suited to its recipient? Call me picky and ungrateful, but my idea of a good present is not a pink rabbit-shaped letter rack. Nor is it a set of see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil walruses.

Anti-nose blowers
There are no two ways about it. My sinuses are a burden. They always have been and they always will be. Plus, no-one would call my nose small, so when I start unpacking my trunk (as a friend's husband used to say with unnecessarily malicious glee), it can be reasonably loud. When one of my nephews was small, he would actually burst into tears every time I blew my nose.

Today, I blew my nose in public. I had no choice: the Snot Fairy has come back for another visit, her fourth this year. Anyway, a woman who was standing about six feet away turned around and give me the most disgusted look, for all the world as though I'd just walked up and spat chewing tobacco on her shoes. And because I was so surprised, instead of saying, "Bugger off, you old trout! Would you prefer I snorted?" I actually apologised. For blowing my nose.

And no, I did not spray her.

Too-long trousers
Why are people walking around town with their trouser-hems in tatters? It's an epidemic, I tell you, mostly among the young. It doesn't seem to matter whether the wearers are male or female or whether they're wearing jeans, trackies, cargoes or suit pants. Some of these trousers look like the wearers have dangled their feet in a pond full of the little-known but ravenous polyester piranha.

The dark magic that is hemming has been lost. I think it's a sign of the impending fall of civilisation. Come on, loves! When you buy the pants, all you have to do is pay another $10 and someone will take them up for you. Go that extra yard and say no to looking like a dero.

Clothes shops putting out summer clothes in winter
Hello, retailer people? Listen to me for a minute. It's still cold. I don't want to try on little strappy dresses right now because I'll have to take off all six layers. I don't want to try on sandals because that would involve getting frost-bitten toes. Plus, I'm fat from too many winter stews and yummy, warming pasta dishes. Now I know this is a bit radical, but do you think you could bring out summer clothes just a little closer to summer?

On the bright side, though, sooner or later they'll lap themselves and we'll be able to buy winter 2010 clothes in winter 2009. We'll be able to be ahead of the fashion pack AND appropriately dressed for the season.

Mobile phone ring tones
I understand that these days, very few mobiles come with a ring tone that goes "bring bring". The last phone I had could tweet, neigh, miaow, play Peer Gynt, do a polka and let rip with atrocious thing called The Bells of Spring that made me want to stuff my ears with hamsters to block out the noise. But there was no "bring bring". So I understand why people download ring tones. In fact, I'm coveting my brother's Doctor Who ring tone even as we speak. Mmm, Christopher Eccleston and his great big bony nose...

But listen to me when I say that if you happen to be the person who sits a few cells away from me in the cube farm and who has the Adelaide Crows theme song for a ring tone, I am going to eviscerate you with a plastic teaspoon if you don't turn that thing down.

Whingers
Oh God, I hate whingers.

You shit me to tears...

Ah, whatever happened to The Tenants? In memory of a great one-hit wonder of a Triple J Unearthed winner, I give you the things that are shitting me to tears this week:

People who are bothered by me jaywalking
I am a committed jaywalker. I say if it's good enough for our Lord Mayor, it's good enough for me. In the past few days, I've looked both ways and walked against the lights, only to have two people say (not to me, but loudly so I can hear it), "She must be colour blind" and "She took her life in her hands there!" FFS, people. It's Oddelaide. Ever tried to cross a highway in Kuala Lumpur? That's taking your life in your hands. And do you think you might mind your own fucking business? Hmm? If I get run over, I'll try not to splatter you with my tragically-wasted grey matter, OK? Now piss off.

Emos
I know that coming from me this sounds a little rich, but cheer the fuck up! You can't all have had deaths in the family/been laid low by the futility of modern existence/read The Catcher in the Rye in the same week. And I don't think that with those hairdos, you should be driving. I'd really rather you could see out of both eyes. Remember, I jaywalk.

Mornings
It's not that I don't like 'em. It's just that I'd rather not see 'em. I can't remember who said it (and Google and my short attention span stubbornly refuse to oblige me) but I think it might have been Dorothy Parker: her publisher told her to be in his office at eight the next morning. The response was something to the effect of, "Why, are there TWO eight o'clocks in a day?" Hear, hear, my dear.

I don't really mind being awake so long as I don't have to get out of my toasty-kitty-warmed cocoon. Ah, bed. It's the only place to be these frosty mornings. Inevitably, I drag my sorry arse out from under the doona and tramp to the train station for my blissful half-hour of reading only to be vomited onto a platform absolutely heaving with zombies.

Yes, zombies.

Nothing else can describe the way train passengers stagger towards the turnstyles, tickets in their death-clawed fists. Their eyes are dead and their limbs are slack. What else can be drawing them forward but the faint but sustaining hope of warm brains? And I join them. What else am I going to do? If I let them know I'm still alive, they'll have bitten through my skull in the time it took John Howard to refuse to say sorry.

So piss off, mornings. I'll deal with you after midday.

Crappy attempts at marketing
Ad people, please listen to me when I say that I will never buy a product called Nurofen: Period Pain. I find the name insulting and unless it contains dehydrated vodka and super-concentrated chocolate, I can't see how it will work better than standard painkillers. Am I supposed to go, "Ooh, period! I have one of those!" and buy it? Pffft. Get a grip.

High heels
I ain't a shoe gal, as such. I refuse to have any truck with something that causes me pain and high heels are pretty high on that list. When my feet hurt, I'm in danger of committing murder, and not just the average shoot-you-through-the-skull type of murder. We're talking slow and painful, like peeling off all of your skin a hotdog skin at a time.

However, I do love boots. I think I have more boots than shoes. So when my favourite boots died, I was bereft. Just like all the other doggies (sorry, obscure Scout songbook reference) I raised a little headstone and on it I did write, "Where the fuck did my boots go?" No-one answered, so I went and bought another pair. And of course, the new ones pinched like a pervy uncle.

I have yet to sink low enough to buy ugg boots, but I demand comfy shoes, Ford-damnit!

Being expected to pay $12 a kilo for zucchini
Come on. How many people, when asked what their favourite vegetable is, say "Oh, zucchini! Every time! Love it boiled, stewed or raw." They're just padding. They don't have any taste. You use them to make your bolognaise go a bit further or add fibre to your chilli con carne. And every bastard knows that if you take your eye off the bastards they grow into something as long and thick as your forearm that would put John Holmes to shame. So do not tell me that they're worth $12 a kilo.

The fridge
I know I've whined about fridginess before, but it warrants a second whinge. How is it that stuff goes moldy with such monotonous regularity? The cheese turned blue and lumpy while I wasn't looking. And I fished out a bag with some anonymous green sludge in the bottom the other day and on the way to the bin showed it to Bloke.

"What's that?" he said, with wrinkled nose.
"Erm, you probably should ask what it used to be," I said with a blithe smile.

(Hint: it looked like squashed caterpilars, so it was probably about a book's worth of zucchini.)

Teenagers getting book deals
Now this really shits me to tears. It's even worse because I looked in The Aus a couple of months back and realised that (a) I couldn't possibly finish a Vogel-worthy manuscript by May 31 and (b) by next year I would be too old to enter. Something died in me about then. Yes, I think it may well have been the world's smallest violin, so just bite me, all right? But I had a horrible flashback to my uni days (mark one) when my thesis supervisor told me the sorry tale of suddenly realising she was Too Old for the Vogel. Ha, my 20-year-old self thought. I'll be published before I'm 35! And here one is. Not.

So, every time I see a story about some bloody over-achieving 15-year-old with a three-book deal for a gazillion bucks and who just happens to have parents who are teachers or lawyers or rocket scientists it annoys me just a tad. Christoper Paolini, I realise you are now somewhat more than 15 and that your parents paid to publish Eragon the first time 'round, but I'm looking at you, sonny jim.

Housework
When I spend my precious time cleaning something, it should bloody stay like that, goddamnit! After all, every time I scrub the scum of soap and toothpaste off the bathroom, it's another 45 minutes of my life that I'll never get back, you know? Maybe if I'd never cleaned the bathroom, I'd have written that Vogel-winner by now.

Cue violins.

But I'd also have the bathroom out of Trainspotting. Swings and roundabouts, I guess. Swings and roundabouts.

Grumpfest

I’m back. The Phlegm Fairy has relaxed her snotty grasp just enough so that I can think coherently again. Hurrah, etc.

Gigglewick has kindly tagged me for a meme that was obviously made with snarky bitches like me in mind: 10 things I hate about other people. The only trouble here will be restricting oneself to just 10 things. As you may have noticed, I’m not prejudiced. I hate everyone.

So, I’ve have a big bowl of crabby flakes, I’ve got my angry pants* on and I’m ready to give it all I’ve got. ~flexes knuckles, cracks grumpy bones~

So, in no particular order:

1. Watching them eat
There aren’t many things I hate more than watching other people eat, unless it’s John Howard and stepping barefoot in cat sick at 2am. My perfect weight-loss video would be watching a 300kg man in boxer shorts steadily working his way through three dozen double Whoppers with cheese, while chewing with his mouth open. I would probably never eat again. If you chew with your mouth open, I don’t want to see you eat. The same goes if you
* talk while you’re eating and spray lumps of half-chewed chip onto the table;
* jam huge chunks of food in your mouth; or
* you’re shoveling in the grub as though you were stoking the boiler of a steam train.

Take it home and eat it. I do not want to watch. And don’t even get me started on people who can’t hold their cutlery properly. I’ll forgive you for poor chopstick style, since Bloke used to say I held chopsticks like someone who’d been brain injured. I’ve recovered now, thanks for asking, and can hold my own with the fiercest of dumpling snatchers.

2. Their capitalistic greed
Everyone needs a house. No-one needs an $18 million house. How many rooms can you use at a time? Likewise, a car is a useful thing, especially in cities with lousy public transport. A Ferrari, a Mercedes, a Porsche or anything else that costs as much as an average home, is unnecessary. Similarly, $500 bottles of plonk, $1000 shoes, $2000 jeans, $5000 handbags, $30,000 home theatre systems and $500,000 diamond rings are simply not necessary. There are children starving in Africa and you’re buying, what? A pair of shoes that you’ll be bored with in a few weeks? Yay, you.

3. Sharing the road with them
I believe in carma. It’s similar to karma, but it relates specifically to traffic. You let people merge in front of you, you don’t block side streets, that sort of thing. Just like the wheels on the bus, what goes around on the road comes around. If you let other drivers in, someone else will let you in when you have to do a zip merge. (I love that expression. It sounds like a submarine manoeuvre. “Zip merge, captain, zip merge!”)

However, I know how the Dalai Lama feels, because not everyone embraces my philosophy. Especially in Oddelaide, home of weird serial killers, unpalatable meat pie dishes and uncontrolled wankers of the road. There are arsehats everywhere: people who are unaware of the purpose of an indicator, people who speed up to close the gap when you are trying to change lanes, people who tailgate when you’re doing already 62 in a 60 zone. So while I try to practise carma, I would also like a backup rocket launcher mounted unobtrusively on the roof of my hatchback.

4. Their pack mentality
As one of my friends says, “Nothing is any good once other people like it”. And she’s right. I don’t care whether it’s tickets to U2, a football team, Ikea, Stella McFartney clothes from Target or any other danged thing that suddenly becomes popular. Make up your own bloody mind, for Ford’s sake! Fashion – just say no.

5. Celery
“Hang on,” I hear you say, “Celery isn’t other people’s fault! It's a vegetable!"

Yes, it is other people's fault.

If no-one liked celery, then it would fall out of favour. It wouldn’t be grown, it wouldn’t be sold in green grocers’ shops and it wouldn’t find its way into my Asian takeaway with such monotonous bloody regularity. It’s easy to mistake celery for a piece of cabbage or bok choy and once you’ve started chewing, you can’t spit it out, can you? No. Death to celery.

6. Low food standards
The average café/purveyor of pies/food court shop-filler seems to put most of their effort into making their food look good while completely disregarding the taste of the finished product. Why? ~throws self to knees, punching fist at sky~ Just because a dish is cheaper than $10 doesn’t mean that the noodles automatically have to be gluey, the soup watery or the pasta stodgy and overcooked.

And while I’m hating people for their food, can we please stop playing hide the chips? It pisses me off no end. And why does an ordinary schnitzel suddenly resemble half a cow, steam-rolled, crumbed and flash-fried? For some reason, if it isn’t schnitzilla and if it doesn’t overhang the plate, it’s just not value for money. I’d be happy to pay 2/3 the price for half the schnitty. Frankly, it’s off-putting to see something on my plate that could easily feed a family of four.

7. Their nut worship
I’m allergic to nuts. Not peanuts, because they’re legumes and not water chestnuts because I think they’re just a random vegetable saddled with an unfortunate name. But pretty much everything else that calls itself a nut will cause my throat to swell shut. Most of them also induce hives. As a kid, my mother suspected I was allergic to cashews and asked my old House-style doctor about it. His response? "One afternoon when you don't have anything to do, give her some more and see what happens." Golly gee, I loved that doctor so much.

So, I don’t quite understand why everyone loves nuts to such an extent that they put them in anything they want to look a bit schmicko and fancy. Walnuts are not necessary in salads. Pesto tastes great without pine nuts. Butter chicken is way better sans cashew paste. And having two nut desserts on a two-choice menu is just rude. It’s nearly as bad as then serving me a fruit platter when I have clearly requested the Belgian chocolate ice-cream from on of the nut desserts. Grrr.

8. Their rampaging self-esteem and sense of entitlement
I’m not quite sure how this came about, but suddenly every man jack thinks he is God. And not just a god: the God. They may be presented with dozens of reasons why this is not true – laziness, surliness, lack of application, poor marks at school, attitudes that are even worse than mine (and believe me, I could give attitude for Australia) – yet they continue to labour under the misconception that they can all be brain surgeons. Nay, that they have the right to be brain surgeons and that anyone who suggests they can't is just not working for them.

I blame the parents. And Paris Hilton. Sure, I only have to discipline a cat, but there’s constructive encouragement and then there’s encouraging your kid to believe in something that is never going to be true. And that latter is doing them a serious disservice. I’ve heard all that stuff about positive thought and encouraging good self-esteem and that’s great, but please, can we have some realism?

When I wor a lad, we used to live in a rolled up newspaper by t'side of t'road and every day we'd have to get up, before we went to bed, and lick the road clean with our tongues. When kids are brought up to believe they are the best there ever was even when they have fairly solid evidence to the contrary, then that’s really not doing them any good. As Cloris Leachman’s alcoholic mother character says to Tea Leoni’s highly unpleasant daughter in Spanglish (which is really rather a cute movie, I must say), “Sometimes, dear, your low self-esteem is just good common sense”. What's wrong with teaching kids to work hard to be the best they can instead of suggesting they just deserve it automatically? /rant

9. Their cursed ignorance
I’m a history nerd and I follow world events. When someone asks me a question like, “Was Germany involved in World War II?” or “Was there a war in Yugoslavia?” or “Where’s Japan?” I want to do them a serious injury. How do people grow to adulthood, breed, hold down a job and still be so damned ignorant?

10. The way they try to use my innate politeness against me
On Saturday, I was in a shopping mall. Icky, I know, but there’s a supermarket and a book shop there, so I can get Diet Coke, cat food and books in the same place and I only have to park once. Bite me, all right? Unfortunately, there are also other things in these hideous places where the sun don’t shine. Like charity muggers. When I went yesterday, I was crook, sleepless and miserable, but I dragged my sorry arse out to get needful stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah – it’s the world’s smallest violin playing “My Heart Bleeds”. I know. Anyway, as I was escaping the ninth circle of hell, I tried to manoeuvre around a tall lad wearing extended-toe pimp shoes, which he had inconveniently shoved into the aisle. “Hi,” he said, turning on the 1000 watt Colgate smarm and holding out his hand for me to shake. “Can I ask you a question?”

“No,” I growled, ignoring his outstretched mitt and walking on as the smarm melted from his mug.

Of course, what I should have said was, “You already did. And you wasted it. Ha ha bloody ha!” But I was diseased and not thinking of anything but getting the DC, kitty fodder and books back to the car boot and then going home to bed.

These people are turning me into a nastier, less polite person than I used to be. If that were possible, of course. Come on - I'm already pushing a trolley that has all the responsiveness of a stoned, retarded crab. Do I really look like I want to stop to chat? I’ve already had merchandising chicks in the supermarket offer me a bit of apple on a stick, a stodgy-looking chunk of sugar-laced muffin and something white and sludgy that may have been yoghurt, custard or fabric softener. So, Mr Ring of Fricken Confidence, if I’ve resisted the seagull urge for free food in the supermarket, then I’m damned sure not stopping to chat to you about whatever charity you represent. I make informed choices about who I donate to, not spur of the moment decisions based on your happy smile and faux mo. Now fuck off.

Gosh, I could have gone for miles and miles and now I’m all out of space. Perhaps I’ll tag myself later on and gripe some more. But in the meantime, I’m tagging Audrey, Ariel, Sakura, petstarr and killerrabbit. Come on, loves give us a big blast of your grouch.

* In case you were wondering, my angry pants are a "bargain" pair of black size 11 bootleg Levi’s that some wretched underfed little shop girl told me would surely stretch enough for me to breathe if I just put them on and loafed on the couch for an evening. She assured me that she did this all the time. Such was my lust for the bargain black Levi’s that I bought them, despite serious misgivings. A couple of hours on the couch later, I was losing feeling in my everything and the jeans were swiftly bundled into the bottom drawer, waiting for the day when I skinny up. Now I just put them on when I need to rustle up some angry. I also own some whiny pants, but they’re floppy trackies that I like to wear when I’m hungover or disease-ridden.

It's hell with fluorescent lighting

Perhaps I’m not a team player. Maybe I’m one of those people who just likes to be alone. After all, a former boss did say that she thought I would make a good sniper. I was never sure whether that was a compliment or not. Whatever the case, I can't deny having an extremely low twit threshold. But I don’t think I'm being entirely unreasonable when I say that there are certain conversations that I do not wish to be forced to overhear in the office. Inane and banal conversations are everywhere and I’m sorry to say that most of them are conducted by women. I know I’m going against the sisterhood, but it makes me realise why men have cultivated the ability to switch their ears off.

I’ve tried and I’ve tried, but when there’s a conversation taking place at the desk next to mine, I can’t not hear. I can sit there, silently singing “la la la!” or reciting Jabberwocky in my head to try to run interference, but it doesn’t work.

And it's not that I'm the fun police - I just hate being subjected to pointless crap. Remember, I'm trapped at my desk and there are only so many times in a day that I can get a glass of water, a Diet Coke from the machine or go to the loo.

So, on my planet, people who banged on about any of the following topics at work would have safes dropped on them.

Birth
Save it for your mums and bubs group. If you don’t belong to such a group, please find one. Quickly. I have sat at my desk, doing an internal impression of Jack Nicholson in The Shining while several mothers have discussed their birth experiences for upwards of 45 minutes. The words “and then my water broke” can send me screaming from a room. The same goes if you're pregnant. I don't want to touch your belly, see your ultrasound photo or hear about what's happening to your boobs.

Your kids
When your child has done or said something that really is funny or wise beyond their years, then that’s fine. Please do share it. But be aware that the majority of kid talk, including stories about dirty nappies (this includes colour, texture and frequency), toilet training (ditto), sporting participation, etc., is seriously lacking in entertainment value for everyone but the child’s parents.

And don’t get me started on baby photos being sent out on an all-staff email. It’s a baby. Some are cuter than others and they come in half a dozen different shades of duco, but they pretty much all look the same. It’s really only the accessories that change and who wants to look at a never-ending parade of little jumpsuits or half-sucked teddy bears?

Clothes or accessories in any detail
Nothing more is required than, “Oh, I like your boots/jacket/earrings,” with the possible addition of, “Where did you get them?” if you wish to sneakily buy some yourself. If you’re snarking a la the Fug Girls, then of course that’s a different matter, but rapturous and extended discussions of fashion make me want to do you an injury. I don’t care whether you are agonising over spending $500 on a handbag, either. Buy it or don’t buy it, but for Ford’s sake, shut up about it!

Appearance
Tooth whitening, hair extensions, shades of eye shadow and Paris Hilton are all pretty much pointless. None of them is worth an extended discussion. Really. The world will not stop turning and it’s 15 minutes of our lives that none of us will get back.

Arguments
It is never appropriate to have a phone argument in the office with your partner, your mother, one of your kids or even John Howard. Oh, all right, if you’ve got Little Johnny’s phone number and a gutful of angry to share around, you go your hardest. I’ll probably even cheer when you score points. But a truly banal row that goes from low but intense to loud and intense and continues for more than three seconds is putting your life in danger. And if you finish the row and then come over to recount the whole thing to someone sitting near me, you’re just asking me to crack open my barrel of Psycho Bitch.

In fact, any long personal phone conversation is pretty much guaranteed to piss me off. I don't want to listen to you have a big long "he said, she said" with your bestie. I don't care whether your brother's friend's girlfriend is being, like, a total bitch to, like, everyone. And if you ring three different people in one morning and tell them all the same thing, we're back at that barrel of Psycho Bitch again with the crow bar.

Hot beverages
Making or purchasing a cup of coffee or tea is quite a simple process. I don’t care whether you choose a skinny soy decaf latte with a twist or a spiced chai soy latte. They are both equally pretentious and deciding between them does not require a United Nations vote. JUST PICK ONE! Wistful sighing of, “Oh, I’d just kill for a (insert wanky beverage name here),” in the hope that someone will get one for you should be punishable by death.

Bread and circuses
There’s a reason I don’t watch Big Brother. It bores me. The same goes for Neighbours, Dancing with the Stars, The Biggest Loser, Desperate Housewives, Ugly Whatshername and most of the other crap the TV stations dish up. If I wanted to know what was happening on any given TV show, I would simply watch it myself. Radical, I know.

And boys, you can quit your snickering. You’re not off the bloody hook either.

Footbrawl
I don’t care about Aussie rules, rugby (league or union) or soccer. My response to, “How about those Crows, then?” will always be, “Are they some sort of sporting team?” Talk about it while you’re having a slash or something. I don’t care who’s winning the office tipping comp, I don’t want to hear who you think will win the games on the weekend and I most certainly don’t want a ball-by-ball discussion on Monday morning.

Cars
They have four wheels, a variable number of doors and, if they’re working properly, go “broooom”. Like babies, they come in a number of colours. We’re done now.

Power tools
Come on, mostly they're just boy toys. I think we can safely say that most powertools are purchased, used three times and then shoved in the shed.

Fishing
You went fishing. You caught fish. What, you didn't bring me any? Bugger off then.

Golf
Possibly the most boring game ever invented. You don't need to tell me what your handicap is. I already know.

Yes, I’m a grouchy bitch who should just work alone in a shed in the middle of nowhere. But did you ever doubt it?

Public MySpace skills for bed and breakfast team bitches

Ah, WEA, how I heart you.

I suspect that WEA stands for Workers' Education Association or something similar and that it was all very socialist and radical in the day. It was born shortly after my grandmothers and I really wish I knew what sort of courses were taught in the ninteen-teens, because I bet they were a collective cracker.

I have no beef with the WEA. After all, that's where I learned how to write HTML, lay tiles, take photographs and paint watercolours. I'm still pretty crap at watercolour (probably because I have very little artistic talent), but I'm vaguely competent at the other stuff.

But the current course guide is just gold, gold, gold, Jerry.

The cover is great all on its own. There's a balding man clutching his forehead in artistic agony while drawing licorice all-sorts with some lovely bright coloured pencils. Of all the lollies out there, I would have thought that licorice all-sorts would have been one of the easiest. Square. Layered. Black, white, pink, green, orange, yellow. Not brain surgery, you know? But then you look closely and realise that he's using jelly beans as a model and you realise that this is one cool and funky cat! "God damn you and your capitalist jelly beans! You throw me curves, I see angles. I'm just that kind of guy..."

"So, what sort of courses do we have inside?" I thought you'd never ask, darlings!

Public speaking in a day
Take it from me: this will not work. I did a public service course like this and the sole techniques were (a) recording your voice and making you realise how crap you sound on tape and (b) making you talk for four minutes in front of an audience about Something. Apart from the odd drunken tirade against a Random Sci-Fi Wanker who thinks that Australian writing isn't worth a pinch of poop, I can't talk about any one topic for four minutes. Fail. (But Random Sci-Fi Wanker, if you're reading this, you know who you are and the next time we meet it will be tumbleweeds at 40 paces. ~red gives a squinty look and strokes her six-shooter meancingly~)

Languages for fun and travel
Italian, French, Spanish, German, Greek, Korean... I don't see Esperanzo on this list. I think that would be immensely useful. My language skills extend to, "Ooh, you are a big hunk!" and "I would like a ham sandwich, please" in French and (my special party trick), "I don't speak Russian" in Russian. Oh and "with a bath, please" in Spanish, "very hungover" in Afrikaans and "welcome", "exit", "milk", "taxi rank" and "fat chicken" in Bahasa Malaysia. I'm comospolitan, me.

Learn to burn a CD
Read CD burning software manual, then select, drag and drop. Hang about, you people want $69 for that?

Internet safety and awareness for seniors
For people who watch so much damned Today Tonight and A Current Affair, you really wouldn't think that they wouldn't go off the rails just because they received an email that said, "You've won the gazillion pound lottery! No, you didn't need to buy a ticket! What were you thinking?" My mum keeps telling me about TT and ACA stories and I keep saying, "Mum. Mum? Mum!!! There's a reason why I don't watch "current affairs" TV. It's because it's bollocks and I don't want to know." TT and ACA are all about the four Fs: Fat, Fraud, Freaks and Failures. And you know what? I don't need any of that shit bringing me down.

MySpace
"Heard about MySpace and want to know what it is?" I can help there: tits, bullying, bollocks, emos and being pathologically egocentric. If you have to ask what MySpaz is, you can live a full and meanintful life without it. In fact, go browse through your toilet paper cupboard. It will be a better use of your time.

Importing for Small Business
Oh, I geddit. This is all about how to bring in drugs and endangered birds' eggs, yeah? Cheeky!

Starting Up a Bed and Breakfast
There isn't actually a lot to this. Really. All you have to have is a house in a cool location, a granny flat and a talent for cooking a good breakfast. Bloke and I had a rather bad B&B experience when we were Courting. We decided to go to Aldinga for A Weekend. (For non-Oddelaideans, Aldinga is a rather pretty southern beach. Cliffs and dunes, stones rather than sand and seagrass, plus a bit of surf to look at - pretty.) But the owners. Oh, holy hell. For all potential B&B owners, here's what NOT to do:

• Do not start a B&B in your retirement "for company". If you are boring, no-one wants to talk to you, least of all paying guests.
• Do not address any couple of 20-ish as "Mr and Mrs". It's just embarrassing for all concerend.
• Do not pound on the bedroom door of said 20-something guests - and keep on banging even though they are clearly Ignoring You For A Reason - to say that you are "just popping into town". No-one cares.
• Do not appear in the common lounge room right outside your guests' bedroom and sit there for an entire rainy afternoon, watching TV.
• When said guests finally give up on indoor sports and emerge from said room, do not talk non-stop, as though you could keep going underwater with a mouthful of marbles.
• If your guests say they don't like grilled grapefruit, it is not your place to make them try it. Grilled grapefruit tastes like arse.

Selling Your Own Home
Oh Ford! Why would you do this? Selling your own home would make you a defacto real estate agent and no-one likes those twats. I was walking down a hall the other day behind a real estate agent and it made me think of a great name for a band: Harry Highpants and his Cuban Heels.

Introduction to Candlestick Charting
Apparently you can apply this ancient wisdom to buying shares. Hang about, why didn't you say so? Sign me up!

Defuse Conflict and Motivate
Meh, why waste your time? Buy a gun instead. An AK-47 is the ultimate conflict defusor and motivator, especially when loaded with hollow-points.

Creative writing
Call me a miserable old cynic, but I really belive that if you can't write already, no bloody course can help you. Did anyone teach Dickens or the Brontes or Mark Twain? I suspect that someone did try to teach James Joyce, and that's why he bites so badly.

Writing Your Life Story
Read my lips. No-one cares. Sorry. If it was really interesting, Harry M. Miller would already have been knocking on your door.

Being Your Best
See Writing Your Life Story. It's rather like that old addage, "McDonald's Employee of the Month - how to be a winner and a loser at the same time".

Attract Your Ideal Parner
Well, for a start, you sit down and write out 80 essential things that you're looking for in a partner. Take no notice of your own shortcomings as you do this. It doesn't mater if you're fat, ugly, braindead, enjoy collecting used soap or love listening to John Farnham. You can still get Clive Owen or Angelina Jolie if you just believe you can. Come on, now - let's all sit down and have a believefest!

Repetitive Patterns
"Have you ever wondered why it seems like you end up in a relationship with the same kind of partner over and over again? Or with a boss who treats you in a certain way no matter how many times you change jobs?" Obviously this means nothing is your fault, whether it's your shitty attitude to work or your passive aggressiveness. Screw everyone else - take no responsibility for your own rampant stupidity.

Self Defence for Women
Now that's more like. I read a story in The Aus or The Fin Review the other day about a NY Times food critic who was "nuts-kicker in chief". This course sounds like the way to get to that ideal job.

The Goddess Returns
The Goddess. Of course. Look, I've danced with pagans on the beach at the full moon and I've listened to spiritualists bang on about having conversations with their dead uncles. It was all in the name of continued employment, of course, but communing with Morgan La Faye about life rhythms or Shakta about energy doesn't seem like the best use of my evenings. I could be sitting in a corner drooling.

Past Lives
Do you know, I always thought I was Nefertiti in a past life and now's the chance to prove it, once and for all. One question, though: why is it that no-one was ever a scullery maid who was spat on by a leper and then run over by the nightman's cart at the age of 13?

Party Hair
Does that use Something About Mary gel? Or perhaps Technicolour Yawn spray? I'm not sure I want party hair...

Make-up Made Easy - For Women
They had to add that little rider because Boy George was banging on the door 24/7, wanting to take the course. What about I save you $59 and six hours of your life? Don't draw a skinny black line on your top lid. It WILL make you look like a brothel-owner. And lip-liner that's darker than your lipstick? Don't go there either unless you want to look like a shim.

Scandinavian Handcrafted Felt-making
Yes! At last! I have been wanting that totally unique BoHo handbag or piece of jewellery. And I had been dreaming about felt. That, and setting fire to my own hair.

Montage Mania
Alliteration! Collage! Surrealism! Cubism! Oh my God, it's got it all!
~vomits~

Warming Winter Salads
That would be an oxymoron. Even if a salad has gravy on it, it's not going to be warming. It's just going to be sick-making.

Caring for Native Wildlife
What are you going to do if you find a poor, frightened little bogan lying on the side of the road? He's just out of the pouch and you can't just leave him there. You're going to have to take him home and put him in a beanbag in front of the footy. Do know exactly how much Farmers' Union Iced Coffee he needs a day? What about meat pies and West End Draught? And do you know how many wife-beaters and pairs of footy shorts he should be wearing to keep from getting builders'-crack rot? Remember, the bogan is an endangered species and you have to do your bit to keep the little guys from becoming extinct.

Blind-Making Made Easy
Step one: Make a pointy forky thing with your first and second fingers.
Step two: Poke someone in the eyes.
Easy.

Beaded Flower Fairies
I couldn't tell you how many times I've woken up in the middle of the night, screaming, "Noooo! We don't have enough beaded flower fairies in the house!" Thank Ford, my needs can now be given a good seeing to.

Twelve Steps to Permanent Weight Loss
One: Eat less.
Two: Exercise.
Three: Repeat four times.

Introduction to Massage
You know as well as I do that this course will have 12 students: 11 boho sort of chicks (five of whom have some idea of being professional "masseuses" down at Stormy's) and one Dirty Old Man in a sweat-stained bodyshirt. Euww. No-one wants to partner that DOM.

Foot Reflexology
No bastard is touching my feet and I'm not touching any other bastard's feet. Full stop. Feet are revolting and they usually smell.

Natural Birth and Water Birth
No, no and bloody no! It doesn't mention any recipes for pasta with placenta and mushroom sauce, but it really wouldn't surprise me if there was a little cookbook included in the course cost.

Run the City-Bay
Oh, for fuck's sake. Only head-cases and actual athletes do the long-distance running thing. I used to work with a chick who was into triathlon and that was bad enough. Do you know that if triathletes are riding around on their bicycles and they feel The Need, they just, er, let it all go? Right there on the bicycle seat? Of course, the moral of this story is that you should never ask to borrow a triathlete's bicycle, even if you're wearing a space suit.

Simple Car Maintenance
Do you own an FJ Holden? No? Then there's no such thing as simple car maintenance anymore. Just get a little man to do it.

The Knights Templar
Isn't that just another word for Freemasons? No-one likes either of them and there's all those grotty associations with bones and aprons and secret handshakes.

Beyond the Wall: Discover West Terrace Cemetery
For non-Oddelaideans, West Terrace is a reasonably old cemetery. Not old in a European way, but old for a city that was only settled in 1836. There are all sorts of minor celebrities buried there, like the person who wrote Song of Australia. (Song of what?) I've only been to West Tce once; one of my uni lecturers was sort of Necroboy and kept dragging us around graveyards. The day he took us to West Tce, there was a thunder storm and we all ended up cowering under Moreton Bay fig trees, trying to keep dry and not get hit by fork lightening. Oh, and someone fell in a grave, but you expect that on history field trips.

Researching Your Scottish Ancestors
Don't have any. What about researching your pscyhotic ancestors? I'm fairly sure I've got some of those.

Spies, Spooks and Secret Service
Shh! Shh! There are people who've implanted microphones behind my kneecaps and they're listening right now! Ssshhh!!

Growing Garlic (online course)
You buy a head of garlic, you break it into cloves and you plant it. And then, after it's flowered, you dig it up and make pasta sauce. There. Just saved yourself $19 to download something from the internet that you may or may not have ever read.

Nightclub Dancing
Do you mean to say that there's more to nightclubbing than standing in a circle with your galpals and shuffle-dancing around a pile of handbags? What about when you've had enough glasses of champers and you become the sexiest goddess in the known universe by vogueing and striking Dance of the Seven Veils poses? Oh, surely not.

Balloon Animals
For pedophiles. Pedophiles who like to dress as clowns. (Clowns are scary.)

Living With Antiques - Furniture
Handy hint one: Don't wee on the couch.
Handy hint two: don't juggle with 18th century glass.
Handy hint three: Antique folding tables aren't ideal for extra seating.

Basic Blues Harmonica
Take this course or don't take it: I don't give a rat's arse. But if you do take it, just remember that playing a harmonica at 3am on my back verandah when I'm trying to sleep will get you smacked upside the head. I don't care how good you are. You could be Bob fucking Dylan and I'd still get up and bitch-slap you.

All in all, though, I must say that I'm disappointed that they've discontinued the haunted house course. That was one of my favourites. I've always wanted to have a ghost make me a toastie for morning tea.

Strayaday

What happened? When did Australia Day become National Bloody Barbecue Day? It used to be a non-entity of a holiday and an excuse for a long weekend and that was that.

When I was a kid, I did like Australia Day. That was when Adam was a lad, in the days before compo claims and public liability wankery, when Adelaide used to have a Birdman Rally. The Birdman Rally was ace. It even used to be televised. A mob of wallies would build things with wings and take a flying leap off the end of Glenelg jetty. The person who went the furthest got a prize. The most creative bit of crap with wings got a prize. It was hilarious. There were heaps of entries and there was always some dickhead who'd just dress up as a duck or Mr Percival and jump into the water. There were people who went to huge amounts of trouble to make dragons out of beer cans and string that used to break apart in mid-air or as soon as they hit the water. There were even serious entrants who built mini hang-gliders that were designed for distance rather than amusement value. It was arseloads of fun. I loved the Birdman Rally when I was a little tacker.

Apparently, they still have Birdman Rallies in Moomba and other places, but not here. Some bloody killjoy made jetty jumping illegal because people kept breaking their necks. Pfft. That not only destroyed the Birdman Rally, it buggered up the Greek blessing of the waters as well. Now all the Greek lads have to walk gently down the ramp, taking care not to slip on the squishy bits, step cautiously into the water and wait for the cross to be tossed in. Dull, dull, dull and duller.

But, as so often happens, I digress. We were talking about Strayaday. For a good 15 years after the Birdman Rally was shot in the head by the number crunchers, Australia Day was sort of like Labour Day: a good excuse for a day off in the Land of the Long Weekend.

Then a few years ago, things started to turn weird. We were no longer the Land of the Long Weekend. We became Straya. Spontaneous barbecues started to break out all over the country. Sam Kekovitch started banging on about stuff that was "unAustralian". Strayan flags erupted from people's shoulders like huge, silly wings. Newspapers felt obliged to run front-page photos of people wrapped The Flag without the least sense of irony. This morning's Traumatiser had a perfect example. There was a girl in bathers, there was a flag, there was water. That just symbolises Straya, doesn't it? The poor bloody photographer was probably forced to take a meat pie with him as a prop, just in case The Flag wasn't quite Strayan enough.

I can't pinpoint when this happened. When did this bizarre display of patriotism break out? Was it at the same time as we all turned into McDonald's barge-arses and forgot how to cook? Was it when pub meals went super-size and you got chips with everything but had to pay extra for salad or veg? Or was about the time our lovely Federal Government decided refugees were evil, dirty people who would try to drown their children just so they could worm their way into our great country? Is that when all this blasted national pride hit? Just when we had the least reason to be proud of ourselves? Whatever the case, it seems to have taken over Anzac Day as well. Every good little Strayan has to go on pilgrimmage to Gallipoli or walk the Kokoda Track. They bang on about doing for The Diggers and remembering their sacrifice, but it's doing nothing but cheapening their memory.

I don't feel that much national pride, to tell you the truth. Yes, this is my home and I love the land where I was born, but there are far too many days when I'm ashamed to be Australian. That would be when I hear another story about our Government sticking its head in the sand and refusing to sign the Kyoto Protocol. Or when I think of poor bloody David Hicks and all the other Guantanamo Bay inmates sitting there, slowly going mad in solitary confinement and orange jumpsuits. And any time I see John Howard's smarmy, self-satisfied little face, purporting to represent me when he says the "War on Terror" is a good fight.

Australia is the beach at the end of my street. That's the Australia I love and I'm proud of. On this, our national day, I would like to give all of those other things, all of those Strayan things, a hearty Fuck You and wish that they might choke on their patriotic lamb chops.

In fact, why don't we just move the whole damned celebration to the 4th of July and be done with it, y'all? Bring back the Birdman Rally and maybe we'll talk.

Stuff you should know by now

1. You may not be able to see your own arse, but other people can
Strange but true! If I had a dollar for every person I've seen blithely rummaging around trying to pluck out a particularly tenacious wedgy, or scratching so enthusiastically they could be in training for the national arse-scratching team, I'd be JK bloody Rowling.

2. Freemasons make great scapegoats
It must be all that truck with secret handshakes, aprons and human bones. People will believe anything about them.

For example:
Person A: Who broke my favourite vase?
Person B: A freemason came to the door and before I could stop him, he rushed in, smashed the vase and ran away again.
Person A: Bloody freemasons!

Or:
Person A: Where's the remote?
Person B: That freemason who was mending the cooker must have taken it.
Person A: Bloody freemasons!

Etc.

3. Mixing your drinks will make you ill
If you've had three pints of Sparkling, a Jagerbomb, a fizzy beaujolais, two cardonnays, a flaming Sambuca and a creamy cocktail with a dirty name and you feel ill, do not whinge to me. I am not holding your hair.

If you're going to mix your drinks, at least stick to Redcap's Rule: if it's the same colour, it's (probably) safe. Beer goes with bourbon and scotch. White wine goes with Stoly, Havana Club and gin. Red wine will, at a pinch, go with cosmopolitans, but it's better not to push it. Pisco Sours go with deposed Chilean dictators, so I'd probably steer clear of them.

4. "AB" does not stand for "absolutely beautiful"
This is probably an Adelaide-only thing. The rest of you, thank your lucky stars and say an extra Hail Mary or something. An AB masquerades as food and is beloved of uni students and pissheads. It involves a waxed paper box, several forks, an arseload of hot chips, half a cow's worth of greasy yiros meat and a variety of reflux-inducing sauces, usually garlic, barbecue, sweet chilli and tomato. Separately, these things are innocuous. Together, they are lethal. A bit like Sonny and Cher, really.

Two cafes in North Adelaide claim to have invented the AB. One of the cafe guys says it stands for "absolutely beautiful". Any uni student who has lived in one of the two nearby residential colleges will tell you it means "abortion". I prefer to think of it as an abomination.

It also comes wrapped in pitta bread, masquerading as a harmless, tummy-settling yiros. I found myself with one of these monstrosities in hand late one night and took a bite, expecting refreshing salad and tabouleh with my greasy lamb. Nup. Chips ~shudder~ If you've accidentally swallowed strychnine, forget the Ipecac and get an AB yiros down you.

5. Low-fat ice-cream is crap
Low-fat ice-cream is just like the low-fat Mars Bars that can cause unpleasant gastrointestinal problems if you eat more than one a year and those weird-arse vegetable crisps that claim to be healthy because they haven't been triple-fried in ox lard. None of them is worth the effort of chewing.

6. It's called work because it's not meant to be fun
Until I can get someone to pay me handsomely for lying in bed and reading books, or possibly for blogging about rubbish like this, I will continue to believe this. Most jobs have their bright spots, such as wading through knee-deep flood waters and taking tours of chocolate factories, but these tend to be depressingly irregular.

7. The cat will demand to go outside any time but when he's about to throw up
Instead he will puke in your slipper. Where else?

8. The picture on the Crap Cuisine box bears scant resemblance to the box's actual contents
Mm, grey sponge with smudge-coloured gravy and khaki peas. My favourite!

9. Offal has no redeeming features
There is a reason it's called "offal". You could stuff it with crayfish and truffles, poach it lightly in pernod and put a nice creamy little sauce on top, but offal is still something's wee filter. Do you want to eat something's wee filter? No. Of course you don't.

10. The law of gravity may be optional, but Sod's Law is inescapable
Don't struggle with this whole positive thought crap. If there are two options and one of them is shitty, that's the one you'll usually get. See cats and slippers.

11. Sometimes you will get unusual Christmas and birthday presents
Like this:

Apparently, you shove a candle up his bum.

And this:

Yes, it's life-size

And this:

What's better than one resin tortoise? Two resin tortoises, of course.

Avoiding these gifts is like trying to hold back a tsunami. Just make a pile somewhere out of the way.

This has been a community service announcement brought to you by the letters "F" and "O" and the number "shiteteen".

James Joyce is like raw oysters

That should probably be "You're whit stupid".

A few weeks ago, one of the Guardian Books Blog contributors wrote a post about not liking things that one is expected to like. I can't find it now and I can't remember who the contributor was, so I'll just have to hope I'm not plagiarising him/her all to buggery. The upshot of the post was that there are some things that you simply can't admit to not liking if you wish to be taken seriously. So I thought I'd make a little list for your jeering pleasure.

I hate James Joyce with a passion
There. Said it. Ulysses was one of the most miserable reading experiences of my university life. I coped with Dubliners and found A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man mildly annoying, but nothing cold have prepared me for the horror of Ulysses. I disliked it so much that I sold it. Bloomsday leaves me pale and traumatised at the thought of Joyce buffs the world over merrily scarfing kidneys and Guiness.

I suppose I should be thankful the lecturer didn't add Finnegan's Wake to the curriculum as well. I understand that it makes Molly Bloom's punctuation- and grammar-free rant seem clear and concise.

The Coen Brothers leave me cold
Another one of those ol' sacred cows. Thinking people love the Coens. Well, I hated Fargo. It was just so damned predictable. If you hire petty criminals to kidnap your wife so you can collect the ransom from your father-in-law, there's a fair chance that things are going to go arse up, though I will admit that I didn't see the woodchipper coming. But Frances McDormand's accent annoyed me and I wanted to give William H. Macey a good slapping.

I found Barton Fink incomprehensible and not even George Clooney could incude me to watch O Brother, Where Art Thou? That said, I didn't mind Miller's Crossing, but that was only because Gabriel Byrne was in it. Even then, I don't think I'd bother watching it again. Sorry, Coen Brothers, but that's more strikes than hits. I'm afraid I'm voting you off the island.

I don't get Stanley Kubrick
Bloke and his mates love Kubrick. They adore 2001: A Space Odyssey. I think watching it is like being licked to death by a sloth.

"Open the pod bay door, Hal."
"Sorry, I can't do that, Dave."
Repeat ad nauseam. Add some flickery lighting effects and a bunch of monkeys.

I like Vietnam War movies, so I don't mind Full Metal Jacket and I can see why The Shining has a cult following, but Dr Strangelove and A Clockwork Orange just don't do it for me. Give me a good monster movie or some of Peter Jackson's old schlock films any day.

Opera, musicals, ballet and modern dance bore me senseless
The pain threshold is very low here. Perhaps I just don't have much of a concentration span. Oh, look at a the pretty moth! Sorry, what was I saying? Oh, yeah. Musical things and dancey stuff. I know I'm a philistine, but I just can't do it. The last time I saw any modern dance, ADT was still called Australian Dance Theatre and Meryl Tankard was the supremo. From the look of that particular show (the name escapes me), all the dancers had been having a collective tantrum over who would get the solos, so Meryl rounded them up and said, "Don't fret, my darlings - you shall ALL have solos!" It made me want to injure myself just to get away.

As for musicals, I can't even sit through all of My Fair Lady or The King and I, and Moulin Rouge made me want to slash my wrists after 10 minutes. You can keep The Boy From Oz and the bloody silly Lion King.

Oh, and if someone could manage to set fire to that dirty great white Cirque du Soleil tent, I'd be much obliged.

Brad Pitt is not attractive
Yeah, yeah, wash my mouth out. Sorry, he looks like a scruffy little guttersnipe. Angelina (who is known in our household as "Crack Whore" for the simple reason that Bloke thinks she's a bit of a all right) can keep him. Give me Hugh Laurie or Clive Owen any day.

Jamie Oliver is a prat
I can't tell you how bored I am with Mr Naked Chef. I don't care what he has to say about school dinners, or whether he takes miserable little street kids and turns them into miserable little apprentice chefs, or whether he has the biggest, bestest restaurant in the world. He's a wanker. Anyone who accepts 15,000 pounds to put Heinz Baked Beans on their restaurant menu and is then mortified when people find out deserves everything he gets.

Bono has a lot in common with Jamie Oliver
Sure, I don't mind a bit of U2 from time to time, but a very small bit. I started to turn on Bono last year when he enlisted that caterwauling horror Mary J. Blige to help butcher One. I was thoroughly bored with U2 by the time they finally played in Adelaide, especially since everyone in the world seemed to be going and spoke of nothing else for a week beforehand. When I heard that the guy sent his private jet to collect a hat he had forgotten, that was the finish. You have no right to bang on about saving the planet when you pull stunts like that, old sport. Go and stand in the corner.

Goat's cheese tastes like crap
I know I'm supposed to appreciate goat's cheese, but it smells and tastes like creamed sweat sock. Just give me a chunk of cheddar and a Jatz biscuit and leave me the hell alone. Oh, and while we're on the subject of food that I should like but can't stand, oysters au naturel have the texture of chewed-up snot. If you want me to eat them, you're just going to have to cook them.

Beer smells
I realise that for an Australian, admitting this is sacrilegious. It's even worse to be a journalist who doesn't like beer. I really have tried to like it, just like I've tried to like coffee and red wine, but I've finally given up. I just can't stand any of them.

I guess that's enough to keep you smirking at me for a while. When you've finished jeering, though, make me feel better - tell me some things that you feel like you're supposed to like, but can't stand.