..“Geordie” (which the Danes renamed ‘Skotten svinger hammeren’), “The Belles of St Trinians” and ‘The Titfield Thunderbolt’ were soon to delight us with their gentility and niceness. No, these were films of gritty realism, difficult subject matter and controversy. Films that made one think rather than leave the cinema with a warm fuzzy feeling. I…
..and roost there? In the spirit of inquiry I paused under the first talking tree and looked up. Yes, there they all were. I couldn’t really tell what brand they were, and just as I was thinking that they started to get nervous and about half of them fluttered noisily from the canopy in some…
..marking Australia’s ‘coming-of-age’, should be seen as a quite brilliant Turkish victory against superior forces that led to the creation of the modern Turkish state led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk – the country’s first president. It would be better to say that Australian forces really distinguished themselves on the Western Front under the brilliant General…
Mike’s Pith & Wind cont. .. under my breath, I eventually opted for XL, and then spent another five minutes trying to find a Bonds’ five pack in the right size. I eventually found a pack of gaily-coloured XL cotton hipsters down the back of the L rack. By this stage I just wanted to…
Dick’s Toolbox cont. .. the Iraqi population believe that they are worse than before their country was ‘liberated’. No matter – we now have a new democratic Iraqi government that represents the forces of truth, hope, and unification but which, as ‘The Age’ noted, took five months to elect a Prime Minister who still hasn’t…
As a young person I read some of the writings of Carl Jung. There was a section in it that I couldn’t quite come to grips with about how inanimate objects are living, sentient beings in a living, sentient world. I think that my story demonstrates that my scraps dish and bread board, otherwise perfectly…
.. of the aluminium dinghy, vacuuming the Axminster or bathing the pigs. The watch’s movement is composed of either 686 or 694 parts (depending on whom you believe) that come together to form twelve of the most allegedly consequential horological complications**; the tourbillon, perpetual calendar, moon age, leap year cycle, day of the week, month,…
..as my Latin teacher for the last two excruciating years of Latin – and so I found it expedient, if not absolutely necessary to become a conniving plagiarist rather than bear the brunt of Harry’s ire or, God help me, actually do some serious study. It was in my last year of Latin when I…
.. we don’t for that matter. One of my more amusing NYE experiences was in Christchurch a few years ago, when the weather was so miserable the council cancelled the planned public celebrations and everyone went home early. New Year’s Eve is just not that big a deal. However, ticking over into 2007 does give…
..a bigger audience than TV. The second series ‘The Red Planet’, the one of which I have the best vague recollection, was optimistically set in the early ‘70s, a choice of era that showed a refreshing trust in the rapid and useful advance of technology heralded by the V1’s one-way trip from Peenemunde to London….
I’m personally not convinced that vitamin supplements are a vital adjunct to modern living and I decided to give up taking vitamins more than twenty years ago with no noticeable ill effects – which didn’t entirely surprise me as they’d had no noticeable positive effects over the period I took them either. That’s not to…
..somehow there was a feeling of restrained animosity which no other religion engendered, probably because other religions existed only in the coloured pages of The National Geographic, in countries far removed and absolutely foreign. Many did not even speak English or wear proper trousers. To be frank, Christchurch in the 1950s and 1960s was not…
..would be wool blend socks because pure woollen socks do tend to hole rather quickly and the little woman darning your socks by the light of the fire late at night is way out of fashion, not to mention totally un-PC. They do blend wool with some exotic materials these days, such as possum fur…
.. in the first century BC and capture by pirates might have been described as ‘an occupational hazard for Roman aristocrats* . Among their more celebrated captives was Julius Caesar who, when the pirates demanded a ransom of twenty talents, indignantly claimed he was worth fifty. He also told his captors that that he would…
S P E C T R U M S P E C T R U M S P E C T R U M M I K E R U D D B I L L P U T T . C O MM M I K E R U D D B I L…
It has been a hard won battle to gain a universal suffrage and all the associated democratic rights and responsibilities. It is imperfect, but to bring out the Winston Churchill chestnut yet again ”…. it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried…
.. to be some sort of ‘interruption in the data flow’ and that somebody would look at it over the next two working days. So, when I can make an excuse to go to somebody’s place with a working Internet connection, I’ve been sending off another instalment of our monthly e-mail on their PCs. That’s…
There is no doubt that the Sydney CBD lacks the culinary variety that Melbourne has in spades and alleys. This particular alleged restaurant was located on the third floor at the top of an extremely steep set of stairs, which ended up being my most strenuous exercise for the week. Malcolm is a bit larger…
.. tour I’m involved in at the moment – even older than Brian Cadd – and I was reminded of this fact when having one of my several chats with fellow MOTE guest singer and ‘male, independent Australian singer-songwriter based in Melbourne’, Lior. I’m nearly twice Lior’s age, (he turned 36 a couple of weeks…
..serviced in anticipation. I was about 10,000 k overdue, which is unusual for me but reflects the precarious state of my income stream. I had it done here at home for the first time by a mobile mechanic, and so far it’s all good. It was probably half my usual cost and I know for…