Intricately

It's been a while....

2006-05-12T21:21:00.000-07:00

This quote of a quote was found on www.dudesnude.com, which is like gaydar but more honestly focussed on hookups. The user was "remi" from Belgium. (So many hot boys on that site :)

During a show on teenagers and homosexuality on National Public Radio on April 10, call-in guests and listeners insisted on using quotes from the Bible to justify their position that homosexuality is anti-Christian and a sin - depraved behavior that can be "cured" with the right attitude and hard work. On April 12, CNN focused on homosexuality and the Roman Catholic Church.
In that spirit, a friend of mine, Susie Gross, sent the following message that she had received just recently via e-mail.

"The Bible tells us so. !
"Laura Schlessinger is a U.S. radio personality who dispenses advice to people who call in to her radio show. Recently, she told an observant Orthodox Jew that homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22 and cannot be condoned in any circumstance.
"The following is an open letter to Dr. Laura penned by a U.S. resident and posted on the Internet:
'Dear Dr. Laura:
'Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and I try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate.
'I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other specific laws and how to follow them.
'a) When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord (Lev. 1:9). The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
'b) I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?
'c) I know that we are allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness (Lev. 15:19-24). The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but for some reason, most women get very offended.
'd) Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?
'e) I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself?
'f) Another friend feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination (Lev. 11:10), it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this?
'g) Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room there?
'h) Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?
'i) I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may my husband still play touch football if he wears gloves?
'j) My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/poly blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them (Lev. 24:10-16)? Couldn't we just burn them with their in-laws (Lev. 20:14)?
'I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.
'Your devoted disciple and adoring fan.'"

The other bits

2005-11-16T12:40:00.000-08:00

What a hopeless travel journal keeper I've been. Now I must fill in the gaps for you all, on the edge of your seats with anticipation of the juicy details of my 5 day vacation. Ha.

All five days were great. Really. Even when I wasn't doing anything I was happy, and when I was doing things I was very happy. I arrived in Byron on the bus from Brisbane, at 11pm on Sunday the 6th. I'd already made my booking at the Arts Factory, which I found in my trusty (ha) Let's Go - Australia travel guide. Just to give you some idea how fucking hopeless this book is, it lists the Coogee Bay Hotel as being on the North Shore. The CBH is one of the biggest backpacker drawcards in the Eastern Suburbs. On the South side of the bridge. So yeah, I trusted this piece of shit right, and I get off the bus, stumble round for a bit, trying to make sense of the very vague directions in the dark, and find myself at the end of a street, at this nice looking place, with kooky sculptures in the backyard, very open and friendly. I head towards the screen door, and look inside. Ah, a common room, I say to myself. The reception must be around here somewhere. Someone's watching TV. I open the screen door, which is unlocked. I look down to my left and say hello to the middle-aged pack-a-day prune sitting in a very comfy-looking armchair. She looks up at me in shock and says "Hello. Who are you?" and then her big stocky husband comes at me from the right, bristling with rage and indignation, ready to bash my head in. And I ask timidly "Isn't this the backpackers...?" True story.

So after finally finding my way to the Arts Factory, feeling very stupid indeed, it turns out they don't have a key for my room. There's already a sense of happily organised chaos. So I sleep in the library, but not before these two nice British fellows come in and watch Spirited Away on their computer. Luckily I really like that movie.

The Arts Factory is a really cool place. It's what I expected a backpackers' hostel to be: a bit rundown, full of young, spunky chicks and dudes from all over, all relaxing and being friendly and shit. The only other two hostels I've ever been in sucked arse, but I think they were pretty standard. The Arts Factory is known for its kooky accommodation options, which include a large double decker bus, an ancient camper van, various shaped tents & cabins, plus your standard dorms. I, however, slept in a very large teepee! Ten people, it was hot and smelly (sweaty shoes I think) but I loved it anyway. My one gripe with the place was the ridiculously expensive ($6/hr) internet access, but when you've got a small lake, and a forest, and many scruffy young lads in their boxers to wake up to, it really wasn't that big a deal.

More to come.

What I saw along the way

2005-11-13T15:39:00.000-08:00


1.World's greatest firetwirler having lunch 2.Clockwise from left: Jana, lovely German hippy; Simon, spunkrat Canadian singer/songwriter; very tall Dutch guy, travelling with...; Mikal, very friendly Dutch guy; Sam, super spunkrat Canadian drummer; Antoinette, supercool Dutch bird; Jessica, supercool bird from the Channel Islands 3.Jim's bus to another dimension, heading for the Nimbin launchpad

Jim's Alternative Tours to another dimension

2005-11-10T17:30:00.000-08:00

I'm typing this a few days after the actual event, so this retelling may not capture the exact quality of said event. Actually, words aren't enough anyway.

On Thursday the 10h of November, we boarded a crappy minibus at the Arts Factory. The eponymous Jim was away, so Gerald (or something) took the bus over instead. And off we went, to pick up more backpackers. At the last hostel we picked up a rather handsome Irish boy called Ciarin (or something) who, as the sexiest bitch on the bus, decided it would be wise to sit next to me. The further depths of his (un)intelligence were revealed to me slowly but surely as the day progressed.

Immediately, it was obvious that emphasis of music on this tour was justified. Great track after great track, pumped out of not small speakers lining the inside of the bus, helped soothe our sweaty impatience to reach our destination.

Lismore didn't seem as awful as Mr. Bus Driver made it out to be, but we were only there for 10 minutes to pick up snacks from the wacky tourist information centre, which had a spiral ramp leading up to it. The attendant was nice enough. But I doubt I'll be spending too much longer there in the future.

The bus rode on through rolling hills stripped of their beautiful rainforesty hair to make way for failing dairy farm after failing dairy farm. This seems to be the affliction of the Far North Coast of NSW. This is how Nimbin was born-again in the 70s. In his slick, highly trained TV-travel-show monologue, Gerald (or something) told us about the University of Canberra students who set out back then to save the Far North NSW subtropical rainforest of which there was only 3% left! To try and raise awareness of this sorry state of affairs, the dirty hippies organised the first Aquarius music festival in Nimbin, in 1973, which was attended by over 5000 people. Of those 5000 people, roughly three quarters of them were smoking pot. Instead of trying to fit that many people in Nimbin police station's two person cell, the authorities decided to overlook it, just this once. This turned into a lucky little loophole for Nimbin, cos now the police couldn't arrest anyone within the town for possession or use of marijuana. They couldn't tolerate it one week, and then punish it the next. So now Nimbin is the easiest place to get the strongest pot in the world, according to Gerald. And there are 4 "Nimbin Lifestyle" cafes, where you can enjoy a little toke 'n' chips. Neat huh?

I had it on good confidence that Elsabeth (or White-Haired Lady, because I cen't remember her real name) made the best hash cake ever. We saw her waving at the bus as we drove past. I can picture her cackling and rubbing her hands with glee at the daily busload of cashed-up English and Irish backpackers gagging for some weed. Before letting us run riot through the streets, (actually, there was just the one) Mr Bus Driver gave us the four golden rules of Nimbin: 1. Be Polite 2.Don't Overconsume 3.Drink Lots of Water and 4.Um...Eat lots of Vegetables? Well anyway, it was good, commonsense advice. And off we went.

I didn't enjoy Nimbin. Because of the hordes who are at you from all sides, trying to relieve you of your money for "a bit of smoko". Because it was really hot. Because everyone was on edge, even the poor middle-aged dears who seemed to be completely straight and only visiting Nimbin for its delightful country quirkiness :P What annoyed and upset me the most was the fact that these people, who tended their marijuana crops with the same or greater love as any other farmer, were reduced to desperate, furtive criminals by the law. The law which says that we as human beings cannot take what is given to us by nature and do what the fuck we like with it as long as we don't harm other human beings. But I guess that law is keeping Nimbin the bustling tourist attraction it never could be without it. Regardless, one day, I hope to return to Nimbin, to attend the Monthly Marijuana Markets. Cops will smile benignly at us, strolling through stalls selling a delightful selection of cookies, slices and cakes all with a dash of hash love, while we lounge around on woven hemp mats, passing dutchies in the sun.

I headed fairly quickly towards The White Haired Lady's Big Red Car, dodging a host of dodgies, and stood there in the queue which wasn't a queue, clueless as all buggery. When it was my turn, I sat on the convenient cafe stools beside the White-Haired Lady's car, and looked expectantly at her. She was cool. Probably mid-fifties, dark wrinkly skin, white hair flowing free, pink and lilac everywhere, she was the most perfectly hip hippy I'd ever met, I reckon. She asked quietly and professionally how often I smoke pot, and on my response told me sternly to only have an eighth of a piece of her cake at a time. Bear in mind that each piece is roughly 5cm cubed. Also, she was very paranoid, which was amusing and perplexing. I mean, why else would people be lining up, all day every day, beside a dilapidated old station wagon belonging to a dilapidated old hippy, in the main street of Nimbin? She certainly ain't giving out no kisses.

Ok, we'll leave out all the boring bits now, and fast forward to an hour or two later on the bus. I have had a lot of Elsabeth's cake (thanks to the munchies), and I am becoming increasingly disconnected from the bus, from the rushing landscape, from my self. Almost everyone is completely silent. Ciarin, the gregarious young sexpot, is trying vainly to engage me in conversation. However, despite the pleasure of watching those luscious lips spilling forth Irish mead for the ears, I just can't handle his inane chatter. Sad but true. So I'm looking out the bus, loving how I'm thinking three hundred different things at the same time, and how the music is directly connected to my soul, and how good is reggae? (Unstoned, it's one of my least favourite genres.)

Next stop is Dr Paul Recker's Fruit Spirit (?) and the trip intensifies. This crazy American has bought 83 acres of dairy farm and over 27 years has hand-planted the whole lot with various exotic plants. If you can just imagine a very tidily arranged jungle, and imagine the effect it was having on my poor kooky fruit cake intoxicated brain, you would still have no idea. While we're just hanging out at his lovely shack, gorging on these delicious plum thingies, I'm thinking lazily about how Dr Paul is now drugging all of us, and I'm thinking he's probably gay (I remember a giant carved penis in the garden on the way in, and right beside my head there was a Peter Pan figurine creatively glued to a Batman figurine's arse) and I'm thinking about how slow everything is in comparison to my brain. And now he's talking about how we should eat more insects. I get the impression he's very intelligent, but then I'm reminded of my beloved callers back at the SBS switchboard, and in particular that one man who was adamant that he had proven that the speed of light was not the fastest thing in the universe. He was fucking crazy.

In The Channon, which sounds so Irish, we stopped at the showground. I talked to this insanely cute British boy. He was skinny and shortish and had floppy hair, which is so not my type at all, but I liked him a helluva lot. He was kinda like Igby (in Igby Goes Down - you should see it). I felt so stupid while I was trying to talk to him, trying to explain what I was feeling, but he was still so so so nice and patient. I can't even remember his fucking name. I lost him once he got back on the bus. The end.

And then, the absolute fucking highlight of this trip into another world: Minyon Falls. A hundred metre sheer cliff face. With me and some other stoners on top, gripping the handrail and trying hard to breathe. The beautiful mountains were flattening and zooming off into the distance, and then jiggling back into place. The trees at the bottom of the falls were massive, which made my sense of scale even more useless. Everyone was laughing nervously. Everyone was feeling it. It was unbelievable. I really can't describe it any better than that.

I know it was "just" pot, but I don't think I've ever felt like I did on that trip (I've had a few other drugs). This probably sounds like every other bloody drug experience. But it was fucking amazing to me. Everything was vibrating wildly. All this extra crap was playing over the top of the ordinary world. I kept thinking about how I was seeing the world as it really was, and it was all just flooding in. There were times when I felt decidedly uncomfortable about it, like I was losing my grip. I still feel a bit out of it.

Burning with happiness

2005-11-08T22:57:00.000-08:00

Today was a good day. But first, last night.

Started off with 4 Becks. Then there was the Arts Factory talent show. It was sound engineered and co-hosted by a very gorgeous Lebanese hippy musician with dreadlocks. We certainly need more of them in the world. And all the acts were outstanding bar one. And me. I read Small Note in Jacket Pocket and told a naughty joke. I won a t-shirt and some good laughs for the joke, and a bit of hearty applause for the poem, which is the only one that I have here that doesn't make direct reference to my fondness for men. I wanted to read some of my "gay" poems, especially after this purple-headed dyke got up and recited some fucking awful poetry about all the different kinds of love, but I chickened out. Ah well.

The highlights of the talent show, for me, were these two unbelievably cute Canadians who did some very nice songs, and this band of Japanese guys played very authentic sounding Aboriginal music. And this other Japanese group that did very haunting instrumental stuff. After the show, a lot of people and me ran off to the Buddha Bar, a lovely bar and restaurant situated right at the Hostel. It was there I got to meet one of the Canadians, who said I should come to Vancouver, where he was from. He also said he was thinking of using the tour to Nimbin he and his friend won on Thursday, the day I'm going. Maybe he was just saying it to be friendly. I was pleased nonetheless. Oh. My. God. He's gorgeous. Don't worry, I got a photo.

I made a friend, Jessica from the Channel Islands, and then I came out to her. It was mainly because she was nice, and she reminded me a lot of my other friend Kate from Wagga Wagga. I just bitched to her about how hard it was to be a gay backpacker, you know, being surrounded by all these amazingly attractive straight men and so on. She sympathised etc. We had a nice chat. And then I met her friend Antoinette, a lovely Dutch girl with this wierd cockney English accent.

Then Julia from work turned up. She's a lovely girl with a lovely Norwegian boyfriend, and they're up in Byron just having a nice time. I saw them two days previously while I was trying to force down this incredibly delicious, incredibly rich Macadamia Cheesecake/Caramel Tart type object in town. But I didn't expect to see 'em at the Hostel, despite the fact the Buddha Bar is open to non-backpackers. She's gotten a job at the ABC, a pretty good one, and she kept saying the main reason she got it because she had worked at SBS. That made me feel happy, if slightly doubtful. So me and her and her lovely boyfriend kinda banded together and made our way to Cheeky Monkey's, Byron's premier backpacker hangout. She asked me if I thought he was hot. I was guarded, saying he was very cute, but she was so wanting me to say that I want to have sex with him. She said all the gay boys are all over him. She seemed to like that.

Anyway, at the Cheeky Monkey, they have $2 meals on Fridays, and a pretty crappy music policy. The crowd is, as expected, was gorgeous but boring. But, Mr German Supermodel, or Hansel as I call him, (I still don't know his name) was there. And not only was he there, he surreptitiously grabbed my hand and squeezed it when he saw me. Let's disregard the fact that he was fucking spastic, and that he was all over two girls on various occasions throughout the night, and let's just look at that sentence again. He surreptitiously grabbed my hand and squeezed it... What completely heterosexual man does that, I ask you? So anyway, I'm going to get his number/email, at the very least.

So I got bored of Cheeky's and went home, after trying to find Julia and Jurgen without success. I'll call her before I leave. Maybe.

Now, today. I woke up with a pleasant hangover. I'd only had 4 hours sleep, but I felt okay. And I started walking towards Tallows Beach. It was a long walk, but God it was worth it. This beach was, no joke, so long it took me half an hour to walk halfway along it. And it was just perfect white sand and lots of smooth pebbles. And the water was the most beautiful glassy green. And there was hardly anyone else there. So I sat and meditated for a little bit, and had all these visions of flying over a gorgeous landscape of my own imagining. Everything was gold and green and white. Then I made a large picture in the sand, using pebbles. It took me forever but I liked it. It ended up looking like an angel. It will probably stay there for a while, getting covered with sand, but those rocks won't move anywhere unless someone moves them. I didn't bring my camera but I was only half disappointed about that. I reckon it was just nice, useless thing I had to do on my holiday.

Then I walked for half an hour, north towards the lighthouse, and went for a swim, and realised I was sunburnt but very happy.

Wet Season

2005-11-04T11:51:00.000-08:00

Its gloomy and showery again, for the third day of my Sunny Queensland Coast Vacation. The forecast doesn't look promising, but then again, I'm still in Brisbane til Monday. Maybe the strong pressure ridge along the southern Queensland coast will weaken sufficiently to make this crappy weather go away. And if not, I'm gonna have fun anyway, even if it kills me. It might actually, cos this is kinda drink-yourself-into-oblivion type weather.

Sorry for the lack of insight.

Steppin' out.

2005-11-01T19:59:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, I begin, for real, my travelling career. Sure, it's only up to Cairns, but this is the first time I've ever really travelled anywhere. I mean, I've been to various places in Australia, but somehow, they didn't feel real. I felt like I was being herded to these places by my friends or family. I always knew the people I was travelling with. There was no sense of adventure.

By contrast, tomorrow I am flying to Brisbane. I stay with my family for a very short while, and then I get on a coach to the Sunshine Coast, and from there, 10 or so days backpacker cliches, by myself. Unless of course I find some cool travel buddies. But the point is, I am doing it on my own. My own (non-existent) itinerary. I can't wait. I've bought a 2000km bus pass, which should cover the coastal trip. And then I'll fly back to Brisbane. Although I did want to duck inland for a look at outback Queensland. Not just so I can ogle the cowboys...I'm not sure why exactly. It'll probably be like Wagga, but crappier :)

Not only will tomorrow be the exact Ground Zero of my explosion out of Sydney, it is the birth of my Travel Journal (notice the capitals). This day wasn't supposed to be until March next year, but I realised that I had to take a break from work, otherwise I would definitely go mental. I realised I had to get out now, and make the most of my holidays. Staying for two weeks with my family would not have been a holiday. And now: My Travel Journal.

I promised my workmate Tahli that she would be one of the leads in this first run, and that she could even play herself in the movie that will eventually be made of this Travel Journal. I told her that this Travel Journal will be updated regularly during my Travel Career. Even if I'm hanging from an exceeding high precipice and about to fall to my death. By that stage it's likely I'll have a handsfree voice-operated dictaphone in my pocket. I hope to God Blogger doesn't go bankrupt or get attacked by a secret terrorist organisation of blog-hating hackers. I'll work out a convenient way to back it all up, eventually. So anyway, I now need to write a lead role for Tahli...

Tahli entertained me enormously on the three night shifts we worked together. She's a funny gal. An actor. Should explain a lot. She's just come back from doing Important Things for Important People, and is now back at the Switchboard of a television station. I can only imagine the indescribable joy she must be feeling. She also apologised for not taking my food, which I offer to her repeatedly. She swore that it wasn't me, or my food. It was her, she said. But today, she did munch on my nuts, and also my very special secret recipe of Tahini and Fig Jam and Baker's Delight bread, and also my very special Extra Tasty Vintage Cheese. She liked all of these things, she said.

How's that Tahli? One and a half paragraphs out of five. You've done well, my wordy yes Janelle.

Anyway, I've typed too much. The End.

What am I building?

2005-09-14T12:24:00.000-07:00

I decided fairly recently that I am not going to go overseas to live for an extended period of time. I'm finding it hard enough to "establish" myself in Australia here I've lived my entire life, without the culture shock, home-sickness, loneliness, ridiculously high cost of living etc I'd experience in another country. Now the question is, what exactly do I want to establish?

Mediocre Epic(P)

2005-07-28T23:12:00.000-07:00

PART I

He takes a knife
From the fifteen dollars
Seventy-three cents knife block
On the greasy Laminex
In the massively empty kitchen
In a blandly horrific
Three bedroom home
In a suburb far far away
He takes the brightest knife
To dull the pain

An incision from left to right
Accentuates his eyes
Makes him look
Beautiful
Reflected
In the unwashed stainless steel
Or clownlike
Like the sideshow that he is
It makes him look
Happy
Like he is laughing
Or screaming

In his favourite dreams
Everyone
Hates his intestines
The doctors shake their heads
Off their necks
Freud is silent
(Thinking about his mother)
His girlfriend leaves him
His teachers peer gingerly
Choke back their wisdom
And point out instead the brilliance of the sky
A pale shade of something
Reflected twice
In his brimming laughing
Mind’s eyes

Furrowed painted faces
Not as beautiful as his own
Mouth verses from the Bibles
(Available in a variety of designs and colours)
The sacred word of contract prophets
Unheard over the roar of mediocrity
A deluge rising from their cracked skulls
Drowning

Feeding time

PART II

God was great.
He’d achieved so much
In less than a week! and
Still had time for a break
From His busy schedule

Years wasted away
Hunched on special
Ergonomically-designed
Instruments of torture
Tracking mounds of life
As they stumble through
Fluorescent labrynths
Piled high with riches

Built by God’s own hand
These divine truths of commerce
Outlined in glary neon haloes
Blinding

A Life
Full of pages
Tattered buckled with the years
Bound with countless ropes
Around countless poles
On countless street corners
Forgotten torn wildly inaccurate depictions
Of nottobemissedevents
He had missed

He’d been busy

To be continued.

Small Note Found in Jacket Pocket (P)

2005-07-28T23:05:00.000-07:00

You know me
You must remember
Half-hearted questions
To half-stammered answers
Trembling eyelash and twitching mouth
Causing earthquakes and tidal waves
Down further south
While your teflon glances
Left me conveniently incontinent

You must remember
An arm sliding softly
And skilfully towards you
As I kept my gaze balanced
In the space in between you
And your other reflected
In the glass that would hold you

Remember when
Your face
Pressed against this cradle
Slumped on the edge of sleep
As close as you were able:
Spirals unnumbered
Overlaid the fields
Luminous in my wake
On a day that would break
If I loved it too long

In luscious pain I
Asked water and sky
To give you to me
Then I left and…
You don’t remember?

Stone (P)

2005-07-28T22:38:00.000-07:00

In darkness I call
My fluorescent dove
To light the way
Along this lonely shore

From a thousand stones
Laid bare at my feet
I pick the one
Most unsure of its place

The shape of this stone
All it can tell
I smell its cracks and
Listen to its weight

I speak to it
With plastic fingers
Draw its name
Wait for its stony silence

At last, a pattern,
Hints of morphologies
A familiar theme
Buried in its flesh

Thoughts fly from me
In bursts, in furies
This stone decodes and encodes
And my eyes widen.

You are a Saxophone, Solo (P)

2005-07-17T11:07:00.000-07:00

Three steps in and already
I like your shapeless hair,
And your stubborn belly,
Where your music comes from.

Your arms
Are trunks, downy and
Your stubble sparks
Red lights.

I sit down.

You open your eyes too filled with
Bright water blue glass and
Your fingers are moving too fast and
Your lungs are breathing two vast and
You scream listen through
The articulate brass –
I can’t look away.

Toilet break.

Tip your world
Upside down and
Your spit slips out
Of that pale golden horn,
Hammered with flowers
Before you were born.

Saxophone solo.

Smokey wooden
Air pressure
Builds inside me
Just watching you.

I can’t get up.

Your sisters smile,
You laugh silent and
Blow my brains out.
Your brothers smile and
My wide eyed traps
Wait for you to fall in.

Superior Vena Cava (SS)

2005-07-17T11:00:00.000-07:00

Blue Line. The lights on the wall of the tunnel flashed past and flashed past and flashed past and they made me dizzy and I started thinking about my Mum sitting in front of the window with the sun making her old tired face neon bright like the Coke Sign in Kings Cross, and Oscar kneeling obediently stuffed at her feet. It made me start to cry and then I blacked out. When I came back there was a stupid bitch with her legs crossed sitting facing me and she was wearing a fucking tight snakeskin dress that was so short I could see her skid-marked mauve panties which were probably from Target. I gagged loudly at her and she gave me this look that made me want to rub a kilo of Ajax Oven Cleaner into her pussy with a scourer, to try and get rid of that fetid smell. I jumped up and pushed past her dirty big potato knees and lurched down the aisle, and I turned around and shot evil into the back of her head, and the cockroaches crawling around in her nasty Nice 'n' Easy Platinum Blonde hair got excited, started swarming all over her face. Then her phone rang; sounded like Greensleeves or maybe it was an icecream truck grinding her sagging arse into the ashphalt in front of my primary school.
I sat on a short seat facing away from everyone because I really couldn't handle any more fucking ugly people today. I really couldn't. I sat and I pulled out the timetable and opened it to the middle, where the map of the world was. All the different coloured lines snaked all over the page and I got hard so I put my hand into my pocket with the hole in it and touched myself. I could've come right then and there but I'd lost my Gowings handkerchief on the Red Line last week and I hated being sticky, especially on Thursday, late night shopping.
Some faggots were drinking Bundaberg Rum for fucks sake and the shit that came out of their mouths was embarassing to say the least. I turned around and they were right behind me, and they had some girl lodged in between them, she was staring straight ahead while one of the chumps had his hand on her tit. All three of them were wearing South Sydney Rabbitohs jerseys, and they stank like Bundaberg Rum and I felt the MacDonalds Happy Meal that was slowly rotting in my stomach do a backflip. I shot each of them in the head once with my Thompson Auto Deluxe and sprayed their carcasses with Glen 20, which kills the bacteria that cause bad smells. The big turd on the left honked like an ass and a fleck of spit landed on the girl's face. She didn't even notice.

Pink Line. I woke up and we were stopped at Campbelltown and there was no one in the carriage. I sat up like a rabbit and grabbed my bags and ran down the steps and out the closing doors. My arm got stuck but I pulled really hard and then my bag got stuck but I really yanked it and the handle ripped and all my timetables were in that bag. I screamed at the fucking guard to stop the fucking train my timetables are still on the train but the fuckhead didn't hear me and it was then I felt very, very sick. I cried and punched the train as it pulled away and I threw a 5 kilogram bag of Jiffy Firelighters at the guard's stomach. He doubled over and fell, but his belt got snagged on the handle just outside the door and so he got dragged upside down along the platform and his face was a bloody mess by the time he finally fell free, 50 metres away. And as the train picked up speed it suddenly slammed into the pylon holding up the overbridge, which collapsed crushing the driver beyond recognition and that night his wife was being fucked in the arse by the Russian delicatessen owner from next door and when she got the call from the station office at 5:37am she screamed for three hours and then when their only son was finally asleep in his own room she took 29 Zyban Tablets with a bottle of Midori Melon Liqueur while staring at herself in the unwashed pans in the sink.
I watched the train disappear into the night and I wondered how the fuck I was going to once again get the timetables for every single bus, train, ferry, tram and monorail service in Sydney. I threw up into the pot of a large artificial plant and noticed stringy bits of something that may have been the lettuce in my KFC Bacon and Cheese Tower but I wasn't sure.

Yellow Line. There was a Sydney Ferries ferry chugging along in this gorgeous pool of white light, and I closed my eyes for a second. I saw the inside of the ferry, actually inside it, into the engine, and the engine was a glowing rod of energy that pushed the ferry through the water. I felt my hand touch the engine, and these lines started crawling over my skin, marking the routes that my blood travelled, each stop carefully inscribed, timetables rolling out into infinity, precise, absolute, no margin for error. And the trains and buses and ferries and taxis and trams and monorails and cars all interlocked and flowed as one, always on time, no peak hour, no traffic jams, no road rage, no accidents, the streets paved with golden neon signs and green lights and buildings covered in gigantic smiles complete and whole.

Green Line. A really campy Lebanese fag sat next to me and lit a Peter Jackson Ultra Mild and then smoked it while staring out the window onto the main street of Guildford in this horribly vacant way and you could tell that there was nothing behind those glassy green eyes. But he was so beautiful and I tried to smile at him but all I could manage was a sad smirk. So instead I grabbed the cigarette out of his hand, and while it was still lit I ground it into his Nivea for Men cleansed and toned complexion and when I took the cigarette away there was a dark, smoking black hole which turned out to be his mouth and what it said was: Do you mind not sitting so close to me you like smell really bad do you ever even shower? And your teeth are like green jesus!
So I kissed him on the mouth and breathed in the smoke that was billowing from this gaping hole and I could see inside him. He was a hollow shell filled with smoke and the inside of this shell was lined with thick black tar. It was then I realised that I knew this cocksucker, that his face was 12 foot high and was right now smiling down on a seething mass of Sunday shoppers in the Central Business District of Sydney. I fell in love with him not long after that.

Grand Opening

2005-07-17T10:43:00.000-07:00

This blog will now double as my writing showcase, because I'm too lazy to create my own. And it'll be convenient too, once I head overseas.

Wheels in motion

2005-07-13T06:46:00.000-07:00

I have my passport. Tomorrow I will be injected with Hep A, Hep B and Typhoid. Friday I get paid quite a bit money for doing something. In a month I should have enough money to buy my plane ticket. Things are happening! I am going overseas! I'm a bit excited. :)

In other news, I will be beginning my free Producer/Presenter Training at the FBI (radio that is :) next week. I think I'll start off as a producer, and then if I've got the balls, Sydney may be treated to my dulcet tones in the not too distant future. Yay.

I've decided the best way to learn German is to use it, so as often as I can, I'll be posting things in German. They'll start off fairly silly and irrelevant, but who knows, in a few months I may be writing novels and posting them in Deutsch! Über yay.

Guten tag. Ich heiße Philip. Ich arbeit in SBS TV. Ich mag mein arbeit nicht! Aber, ich werde aufenthalt bis ich wegfliegen!

Yes, I can see all the German speakers doubling over with laughter, but at least I'm trying goddamit!

This season, try on a new good cause: Free Tibet!

2005-07-11T01:34:00.000-07:00

I just watched Kundun. For the past few months I've been under the Tibetan spell. It all started with that damn Austrian skier Heinrich Harrer and his book Seven Years in Tibet. And now it's a major motion picture (which I haven't seen yet). Of course, many of you now know all about Tibet and have bought the book and seen the movie and wept at how wonderful Brad is. We'll come back to Mr Pitt, but first, I'd just like to say how annoyed at myself I am for getting swept up in the Tibet-mania that's found its way into the public consciousness.

Yes, it does seem that Tibet has been given the sharp pointy end and that China is very naughty. Well, actually, it's the Chinese Communist Party that's very naughty, and it's not only fucked Tibet, it's also fucked the Chinese people, including, but not limited to practitioners of Falun Gong. But these things, and all the other human rights abuses, genocides, civil wars etc go through stages of popularity, don't they? For a few weeks (sometimes even months) the Hollywood producers pose next to the brave, visionary filmmakers, the reporters mob the heroes, everyone reads the book and sees the movie, there's a gala dinner to raise money, and we all pat ourselves on the back for caring for our fellow man. And then we move on to the next earth shattering news. Like Michael Jackson's wandering hands. Months after the Dateline "world first" story on the Darfur crisis has been forgotten, the people in Darfur are still suffering, and only the committed lefties still pay any attention.

**Why is it that being "left" means giving a shit that people are killing other people for believing in one type of god rather than another? It never ceases to amaze and sicken me that a lot of people - a fucking shitload of human beings - are more interested in who's shagging who on Big Brother, than about the hundreds of Iraqis dying under their occupation by the Bush Regime. And they're 'the right'.**

Wow, what a diversion. All I wanted to do was complain about Martin Scorsese. Kundun was great, ok, I enjoyed it, it brought Tibetan culture to life for me in a way no book could. But my god, do I hate the way he over-over-over uses cross-fades. What's wrong with a simple, elegant, nicely-timed cut, for god's sake! And that superfast pan thing he does. Jesus. It seems this guy has appointed himself as the spiritual and secular leader of Hollywood. Like he's the only bloody American making 'important' films in this day and age. He's almost right, but then he forgets P.T. Anderson, David Lynch...and a few others who I can't think of right now. I have to say though, I also liked the only other movie of his I've seen, Gangs of New York. But again, those fucking cross-fades. Grrrr. They make me not to watch any of his other 'masterpieces'. Someone should introduce him to Mr Kubrick, or Mr Tarkovsky. Those boys knew a transition was no toy to be waved around willy-nilly.

Back to Brad though. I love the guy. I really do. He's incredibly hot, not even taking into account that he's pushing 40. He's a very good actor and has almost never made a bad film (I refuse to see Thelma and Louise, so I can continue to make that claim). He has excellent taste in music (during the audio commentary for Fight Club he mentions that both he and Edward Norton were pushing to have Radiohead on the soundtrack. Can you imagine how much cooler that already cool movie would have been with, say Lucky playing while that very major thing at the end of the movie happens?) *Sits in ecstacy for a moment* Brad is now on a tv commercial for the Make Poverty History campaign, looking very nice in black and white I might add, along with 32 other famous people. I have some issues that I've been wrestling with on this whole campaign. Firstly, stars lending their names to any 'good cause' has always made me flinch a little. There's something a bit tacky about the whole thing, no matter how besplattered with cow dung while hugging malnourished children in Rwanda they may be. Also, this article by John Pilger in the Green Left Weekly certainly puts a dampner on the whole Live 8 Bono/Geldof party atmosphere. The Live 8 concerts, the G8 promises to eradicate third world debt, and Brad, are all intricately linked. (I knew I could fit it in somewhere) It seems celebrities can tell lies too, not just politicians.

Just to wrap everything up. You've witnessed first hand that how even someone who gives a shit about the world can be distracted by a ruggedly handsome man in a white t-shirt and jeans, or the overzealous use of dissolves, or any one of hundreds of other things. You've also seen how confused I am about everything. One can only imagine how those poor people in all parts of the 'free' world must feel, being bombarded with beautiful, beguiling images of a commercial Utopia while their leaders tell them everything is going to be ok, and no-one even trying to tell them otherwise. Even the 'lefties' don't know what they're doing most of the time, regardless of their good intentions.

My, I've had a nice rant in my blog this evening. If only I was this talkative in real life. I'd have real friends then, I know it.

I Might Be Wrong (Actually I Probably Am)

2005-07-06T22:42:00.000-07:00

Listening to the live recording of Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood at KRCW Studios in New York. The show is called Sounds Eclectic, which I listen to over the internet, and for the most part I like it. Every week they have a special guest who plays live. The guests are usually excellent. Radiohead spoke to the host, Nick Harcourt, who annoys the hell out of me with his American-tinged British accent. Call me superficial, I don't care. I can't take anything he says seriously. During the interview, Thom Yorke sometimes strikes me as being very slightly arrogant, but then, when you've got a voice and a mind like that, I guess you have the right. And he's rather cute :)

All the songs sound great. There's a small audience that cheers occasionally, but most of it is just Thom and Jonny sounding very real. I love the little extra lines Thom throws in, like in Punch Up at a Wedding he sings "Don't infect me with your poisons (of which there are many)".

I now have a German Language CD-ROM. I WILL use it at least 15 mins everyday.

Time to sleep

2005-06-30T03:30:00.000-07:00

So i'm awake and I'm awake and I'm asleep but I'm awake. And I can't sleep. I'm seeing mosquitoes where there's none but I can't sleep. My ass is numb but I can't sleep. I'm awake. I'm typing. I'm reading what I've typed. I'm typing. I'm reading. My neck. I sit next to myself and look over my shoulder at what I've typed. The screen's glowing too much. The screens got all these epileptic mayan squiggles underneath the colours. "Luka" comes on and I groan quietly because I hate that song but I love that song and I love Susan Vega but I hate that song. I think. "Tom's Diner" comes on and I love that song and I can see the woman who doesn't really see me but she sees her own reflection. Coffee makes me ill but I want coffee. I want that addiction. It's so romantic, being a coffee addict. Maybe I'll marry a coffee addict who will love me despite my caffeine intolerance.

Eyes wide with ambition

2005-03-04T18:00:00.000-08:00

This blog is where I will pour all my travel aspirations and - hopefully this time next year - my travel experiences. I'd say that's when I'll begin my very first journey out of Australia since I was 2-and-a-half. It'd be a sickeningly romantic thing for me to arrive in Egypt on my birthday, May 9. I'll be 25.

Almost a quarter of a century, I've been alive. But I don't know if I could really call myself an almost 25 year old. Age is such a concept. Years alive doesn't translate to maturity. My father, for instance, 45 and still claiming to be a victim of circumstance and the malicious intent of the people around him.

I think travel is definitely a maturity accelerator. Even my brief trips over the years to non-Sydney locations have made me realise that Sydney is not the most important city in Australia, and that beautiful, interesting people can spring out of the most unassuming places, like the inland town that insists it's a city, Wagga Wagga. My best friend, a complex and intelligent girl, spent her whole life in the suburbs of this town/city, and has decided to stay there, at least for a little while longer, resisting seductions of the big city she got a taste of for a year. I can only imagine how mind- and soul-expanding my trip is going to be.

I suppose now is a good time to tell you where I'm going. Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey, Greece, Italy, Germany, the Czech Republic, The Netherlands, Norway, Iceland, France, the UK, Spain, and Portugal. Here is a picture of me, just so I can test out this thing.