Going Nowhere

At the height of the travel book boom, large bookstores had at least three - and in one famous case, eight - different travel writing sections. First off was your standard, just the facts ma'am, guide books - Central Western East Africa on a Velcrostrap, and similar ilk. Then you had your expansive personal accounts of travel - Five Weeks Down the Murrumbidgee on a Flotilla, and so on. Then there were your journeys of inner discovery - I'm Awful, But Some Guy In The Dominican Republic Thinks I'm Great, stuff like that.

Something all these books had in common was the ability of an average schmuck to gain entree into the most exciting and exotic worlds, provided they could read or afford the talking book. Yet here we are, in 2010, and the New York Times Bestseller List contains three travel books that don't fit in any of these categories. What they all share in common is a love for the familiar and mundane - the previously and heretofore ignored. I speak of course of Bret Kingston's Platform 5/6 at Strathfield, Mary and Geoff Buglebury's Uptown Foodcourts I Have Known and the Blintzmans Guide To Freeways With Pedestrian Walkways That Just Stop At Some Point For No Reason.

Let us begin with Kingston's railway missive. To those who have known it, Platform 5/6 at Sydney's inner western Strathfield train station is notable only for its passable toilet and humble food stand (in whose bain marie the same pluto pup once rested for over 4 years, Kingston informs us). Thankfully this situation is remedied by this wonderful book, which takes us into the rich heritage, both human and material, of this colourful platform. Did you know that Jimmy Barnes once lay here unconscious for 6 hours? Or that 12 pigeons died during its construction, compared to only four for platforms 1/2, 3/4 and 7/8 combined? I still shake my head when I think of the reason, fully laid out in Chapter 3.

Undoubtedly my favourite character from this book is Quite A Long Time, the name Kingston gives to a phantom graffitist who left the tag "Quite A Long Time" on various parts of the platform over a two decade stretch of time. Many platform locals claim to have caught glimpses of him either beginning or ending his scrawl, only to have said sighting cut off by the arrival of their train. Even more mysterious is the fact that the platform's three CCT cameras have never recorded even a trace of the man. Kingston indulges in perhaps overlong speculation as to the meaning of Quite A Long Time, settling on the theory that it refers to the amount of time one spends waiting for trains. Quite A Long Time's spiritual torch was subsequently picked up by Eternity, who expanded the canvas to the rest of Sydney, and the public transport referent to buses, ferries and taxis.

Speaking of cabs, next off the rank is the Blintzman Guide's latest plaintive offering, known by its acronym GFWPWTJSASPFNR or in cult circles as 'Gefwipwitch Sasperfener'. I challenge any human with a heart to read this and not be moved, moved in fact to wail deep, visceral tears. We learn about the Cahill Expressway onramp at Crows Nest, which invites lost souls to travel a full 1.3 km before cruelling their hopes and sending them back from whence they came. Then there's the beginning of the westbound M4, something only the most foolhardy or fumigated would try to navigate. Our guides reveal the hidden treasures that await those who would travail its 350 odd metres, including a piece of blue tarp of unknown origin, several vintage cigarette butts, and a hardy weed which when boiled, makes an excellent digestive. Hats off to the folks at Blintzmans for another outstanding work.

I must admit I came away with a mixture of awe and revulsion at Geoff and Mary Buglebury's foodcourt tome. The Bugleburys, who are no relation but are considering starting a band together, document in painstaking detail their experiences of a range of indoor eating areas located between Liverpool and Hunter St in the city. I hope I am not giving too much away in saying that the Bugleburys' greatest accomplishment is referring to each foodcourt as a person - with its own distinctive appearance, personality, social standing and religious beliefs. Raymond is a loner, visited only by a few dozen different people over the course of a year, yet he repays their faith with outstanding meals and an intimate atmosphere. Shelly is a flirt at heart, with her largely male clientele drawn to her dining furniture's seductive curves and a wide offering of oysters and other aphrodisiacs. The revulsion I spoke of earlier was in reference to Pat, a slovenly creature of indeterminate sex, whose leftovers often remain on the table up to three customers later. Pat crowds her space with televisions, poorly drained potplants and garish decorations - yet the crowds keep coming. Just like the soap in Pat's bathroom, this book is indispensable, for anyone seeking to understand modern city worklife.

Each of these books is in its own way unspectacular, workmanlike if you will. But taken together they form an irresistible triumvirate which, for those willing to look, holds the key to the future of literature, society and even travel books. Who dares tell our business elite how to act, if we understand not how they eat? Who could claim to advise on transport policy without at least a cursory knowledge of the pedestrian pitfalls that accompany certain motorways? This knowledge is at times ugly, at times frightening and often beautiful. When the people hunger for knowledge we must give it to them.

The Critic

Poor Stuart was in a conundrum. He was widely acknowledged as a leading critic, someone capable of devastating insight and reviews that rivalled or surpassed the work reviewed as an act of creation.

Yet here he sat, pants around his ankles, boot polish smeared all over his pet goose Retief, his 1991 It's The Hits compilation cassette being chewed up by the player - unable to produce any kind of intelligent response to the book that sat wedged between the manifold folds of his sweaty, cheesy dewlap.

He pressed on.

"Olaf Sundquist's Why I Shaved My Nuts is a singular work that defies description."

No, that won't do. By saying it defies description I've described it somewhat. And calling it singular says more about me than the work... Oh God, help me now!

I need to own this book, to call it by its true name, to place it where it lives and bring the world there to see it as it really is.

In a mad dash for inspiration, he picked up the phone and began blowing the harmonica solo from Stairway To Heaven.

Research shows link between intelligence and exercise

Researchers at the Poky Brown School of Hurtingness in Little Altamont, Queensland, have discovered a link between intelligence and exercise.

The findings mean that people wanting to increase their intelligence should exercise more. Conversely, the people who want to increase their exercise should be more intelligent.

Lead researcher Father Shane McElribster said "these results are pretty good, aren't they? Would you like to join us for dinner?" His assistant Dr Lisa Leslie, formerly of the WNBA franchise the Washington Mystics, explained further.

"We took a plastic donut, a pecan nut, a dead rat and former World Bank chief James Wolfensohn, and we ran them through a battery of physical and intelligence tests. The pecan nut came out on top in all of them, although only after the judges dismissed a late complaint by Wolfensohn."

Fellow exercise researcher Yukio Schneiderbrett of Harvard Law School admitted the research looks promising. "It's a really nice result, probably most of all due to the simple and elegant experimental design."

For the rest of us, we can rest easy that there is no link between exercise and intelligence.

Yours truly,
Editor Sarah Walton

Aesop's Unpublished Fables

Aesop, his agent Tenpercentos and his publisher Thekla sit around Thekla's desk.

Thekla: I'm confused. The octopus does what with the ferret now?
Tenpercentos: He takes him out of the treasure chest with his tentacles - tentacles two through five inclusive - then -
Aesop: Which is a metaphor, obviously.
Thekla: For?
[Aesop goes to answer but his agent cuts him off]
Tenpercentos: - he hails a water taxi, which are very rare at this time of day.
Aesop: Now you see why I used an octopus rather than a barracuda, as in my earlier draft.
Tenpercentos: Exactly. So the ferret is nursed back to health by the captain, and he feels so indebted to the octopus that he secretly organises a mutiny with the other crew member.
Thekla: A biting indictment on our healthcare system, this I get.
Aesop: No, it's not about that - I just love mutinies. I almost put one in the Tortoise and the Hare, but there were no crews in that.
Tenpercentos: [talking over the top of him] Anyway, the ferret finally tracks the octopus down, but he's hard of hearing by then and can't recognise him.
Thekla: I was moved to tears by this part, I'll grant you.
Tenpercentos: Which brings us to our tragic finale: the octopus and the ferret dance a pas de deux, even though both were kicked out of dance school for truantism.
Aesop: I spent some time on the conclusion, otherwise the message just wouldn't have been clear enough.
Tenpercentos: Now about that advance...
[pause]
Thekla: We're not going to be able to take this, Aesop.
Tenpercentos: What?
Aesop: I knew it.
Thekla: Look, every great writer has been knocked back.
Aesop: She's right, it's no good.
Tenpercentos: After they were best sellers?
Thekla: You ever read My Histories by Herotodus?
Aesop: You mean The Histories.
Thekla: Uh uh. He wrote a thousand pages about a fence dispute with his neighbours. Publishers preprinted 75,000 copies without even reading it. They had to pulp the lot. He never sold another book in his life.
Tenpercentos: Do you know how much money we've made you?
Thekla: For that I am eternally grateful, but you know what the economy is like at the moment.
Aesop: Is it the flashback scene? Where the octopus remembers being bullied by an ageing anglerfish because he has no lure? That's not pivotal to the central message, I can take that out.
Tenpercentos: We'll take out whatever you want.
Aesop: Not whatever you want, but -
Thekla: Look, the creative process is not my forte. But we can't take this.
[Aesop starts sobbing]
Thekla: Take a holiday. I've heard great things about Eastern Persia at this time of year.
Tenpercentos: You know we can shop this around, Thekla.
[Thekla raises her eyebrows]
Aesop: It's okay Tenpercentos. I'm okay.
Tenpercentos: Hang on, we've got more. Have you showed him the Tawny Frogmouthed Owl and the Frog?
Aesop: That's not finished yet.
Tenpercentos: Ok, there's the Wildebeest and the Tick.
Thekla: Gentleman, it's been a pleasure, now if you'll excuse me I've got a three o'clock.
Tenpercentos: [calling more out as they walk out the door] The Bear and the Polyp? The Boy Who Said Sloth Sotto Voce?

The Ascent of Science

Our modern understanding of sea level rise can be traced back to Dipsomedes. Like his cousin Archimedes, Dipsomedes was fond of taking baths, in his case mostly because he was so filthy all the time. On one occasion he had stepped out of the bath and was whistling as he dried himself off. He didn't know how to whistle, but the passage of a draught through his wet rolls of fat produced a whistle Otis Redding would be proud of.

He glanced back at the bath and noticed the high water mark, defined by a thick sheen of darkened grease and the rainbow coloured streaks of waterproof crayons he liked to draw in the bath with. Dipsomedes immediately shouted out a catchphrase that was later to be made famous by his cousin: Zeus on a gyro! This was subsequently recorded in history books in the original Greek, so few scientists that utter Eureka today are aware of its theological yet mouthwatering origins.

Although the exact details were not fully worked out for over 2,500 years, Dipsomedes' intuition was essentially correct - sea levels are not fixed, and may wax and wane over the course of a bath, or indeed millenia. Dipsomedes expounded his theory in the needlessly long On the Dermal Expansion of the Seas. Today the treatise is of purely gastronomic significance, containing as it does his mother's recipe for baklava on the back of each page, almost certainly due to a photocopying error.

This story illustrates nicely how many of science's greatest discoveries have been made - in the nude. Charles Darwin successfully cultivated the image of a gentleman scientist, yet those who journeyed with him confessed off the record that his expeditions were little more than trumped up P&O style party cruises. It is said that there wasn't a woman within three hundred nautical miles of the Galapagos that hadn't succumbed to Darwin's famed oratory prowess, and although scant evidence remains, few doubt that Darwin conferred a lot more than just his name upon many of the beautiful finches of the islands.

Then there was Niels Bohr, the great Danish physicist who helped usher in the stranger than fiction world of quantum theory. Bohr was also a vociferous campaigner for the rights of marmosets, and he famously spent the last ten minutes of his Nobel Prize acceptance speech decrying the plight of our evolutionary second cousins. "So they don't have prehensile tails," he would say, "does that give us the right to destroy their habitat? Even I, a genius, have no prehensile tail!" Bohr then dropped his trousers to prove his point, causing many in the Nobel Committee to question the existence of an objective reality.

Bohr would go on to host a biennial man-marmoset three-legged race in the backstreets of his hometown Copenhagen, at which the shared history and future of these two species was underlined by the strict requirement of all participants to fully disrobe. The event was later wound up by angry administrators who claimed Bohr's grandson Tyler was diverting funds to Barbary apes, rhesus monkeys and other members of the macaque family.

The answer

I have finally found it! This is a real boon.

You don't have the answer.

It's not punctuation or thought or breas.

I feel like people are starting to catch up to me, but not really. But it's enough for me to spur myself on and reach the next level. The next level! It's f*cking great to be here.

When did you realise that reality dissolved?

Humans are the best at control. They tell you how things are. I read it.

But you have to take the chance. It's smooth.

It's a simple relationship. Scale of internal life is inversely proportional to scale of external life.

Significant life moments

Do you ever get sick and tired, or fed up? Do you sometimes feel like you're unwell, exhausted, or you've eaten too much? Are you ill, sleepy or full? What about under the weather, bushed or absolutely stuffed? Have you been feeling crook, beat, or overfed lately?

Man, I can't believe the Dogs lost again. I mean, I believe it, I watched it on TV and it would be furthestfetched if they somehow doctored the results and fooled an audience of tens of thousands. But this year they have laid an ugly, painful egg - the egg of poor, unstructured, unimaginative, boring, ill-disciplined and frankly painful football. It's times like these I am glad I no longer care about rugby league. Well that's not entirely true. It's 85-90% true. I care about Ben Barba and Jamal Idris, deeply and passionately on so many levels. You should care too.

So settlement was today, but it still doesn't feel real. And what more can you ask for in life than for something to feel real? After all, if it doesn't feel real, just what does it feel? I mean, how can it be anything, and yet not real?

I haven't contracted World Cup fever to the extent I did in the last two ones. This may be related to Australia's poor performance, with the only bright spark being the incisive performance of the press gallery. I really feel that a solid loss to Ghana will play right into the critic's hands, as their best material comes from pathetic national humiliations such as this.

They have quite a lot of power, the media, I think sometimes they don't realise it. Of course at the end of the day, which is to say ultimately or you know, ignore what I just said and listen to this, the real power lies with... you guessed it - me! I feel very powerful right now. And yet on another, deeper level, any distinction between me and my wife, daughter, family, friends, loved ones, sporting heroes, favourite food, dirty socks and the like, is purely superficial. I can never rebel against nature, or lord my power over it, because I am part of it, nestled deeply and occasionally smotheringly in it's smoking hot bazoombas.

All I ask is that you feel a deep and pleasurable connection with me.

I felt an extraordinary inward jolt of laughing and shock, only partially outwardly manifested, when I strummed E, A, B, then E and my daughter started dancing in what can only be described as a semi-frantic Kindermusik- and In the Night Garden-inspired performance, all bent over and wiggling hands, bouncing to the beat. It may only be described this way.

Lastly, I would like to add that I am gaining an understanding of weather and climate and it feels really good. I especially feel like I understand things when I watch suds drift around in the bath.

At the tennis

Todd Woodbridge: Well Rafa, that was a truly workman-like display out there. Three tight sets, but you never looked out of control. Tell me, how does it feel to win a match at the French? Because I never did.
[Rafael Nadal embraces TW warmly, then lies down on the clay and pulls a blanket over himself]
TW: Well there you have it folks, the finest clay courter I've seen since Andres Gomez, or perhaps more latterly Jarko Nieminen. Please stay tuned, because our very own Sam Stosur, whom I once shared an informal mentoring association with during my stint as Federation Cup Treasurer, will be shooting for her very first grand slam final next on centre court.
[TW lies down on the clay and pulls out a Matthew Reilly book and starts reading until he dozes off. Meanwhile, Stosur and Jankovic enter the court and respectfully sidestep the sleeping past and present giants of tennis. Until a pivotal moment in the third set, that is, when Jankovic loses her cool over a clearly fluffed line call and smashes her racket into Todd Woodbridges back]
TW: AAARRRRGGGHH! [TW returns to sleep after Jankovic pulls his covers back over him]

Three Zen koans

A Zen master was painting a portrait of the Buddha, when a student approached and asked ‘is that the Buddha?’. The master gave him a stiff blow, then returned to his palette.

A Zen master was giving a stiff blow to a student, when the student asked for mercy. The Zen master agreed to give the student mercy, but only after giving him another stiff blow.

A student was convalescing in hospital when a Zen master popped by and asked how he was. ‘Look what you did to me, you maniac!’ the student said. The Master replied that inner peace could not be achieved in such a state of consciousness, so he pulled the plug.

Time to kill. again

again.

The wheeling of the world is the real merciless one. Could it just give us a break for a moment or two? So I'm pushed forward, like everyone else.

My secret pleasure? Disappointment. Each time I’m disappointed , I experience full body rapture. It’s a most peculiar condition, although not without precedent, I’m told. You know who told me? ‘Cause I sure don’t. I don’t give a hoot.

Time again to kill. To kill time, to kill sime – Sime Nugent. Was that why God put me upon this earth? Only God knows the answer to that question and only he knows on Tuesdays and Thursdays. But I suspect not. After all, who among us can coherently define, nay, yea, believe in purpose?

Come to me. I desire to be come to.

Dexter Deconstructed

Siblings or lovers? You be the judge.

Of all the joys humanity has ever known, none has ever surpassed that of having a ‘favourite’ tv series to watch regularly. I discovered this joy vicariously when, after several rounds of vetting, my wife selected Brothers and Sisters to be her show. The ups! The downs. The drama. The anticipation! Making a cup of tea in the ad breaks. Drinking the tea! I found the show mildly endearing (at least season one) but what I was completely enamored with was the effect it had on my wife. Could there be a series out there that I could call my own? That would have a similar effect on me? I had to know.

From these amazing beginnings came my interest in the Dexter series. Three seasons have aired on channel ten, and I’ve seen about two thirds of each of them. Several of them left me on the edge of my seats and forced me to remark on their high quality. I never quite made it to the level of devotee, but how could I possibly have, with ten’s effed up programming? (I sometimes suspect that a loose coalition of chimpanzees is responsible for commercial television’s scheduling of critically acclaimed series.)

There was something about the show I liked, and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it – the something, not the show. I have no longstanding interest in serial killers who kill other serial killers, or Miami-based programmes. But the humour, edginess and highly competent way that plotlines and characters are woven together, both over a single episode and a series, must all have been factors. Incidentally, I am lead to believe that we are in the midst of a golden age of television, and that the high competence I just spoke of applies to several other shows, like the Sopranos, the Wire, Breaking Bad and Time Masters (hosted by Tony Johnston).

Well, be all that as it may have been, I was shocked to discover that Dexter’s fourth series was highly touted by the Sports Guy and someone else online who referred in a glowing term to the finale. I deciduously avoided any spoilers and vowed to discover when channel ten would be screening season four. But they weren’t ‘fessing up. I thought to myself, ‘why don’t I hire from the video store dvds of earlier seasons of Dexter, so I can catch up on the ones I missed, relive the good ones I’d seen, and prepare myself for the new season if and when it finally aired?’ After several close shaves I went to the video store but learned that the first series had been letted out by another customer. I am still waiting to pounce.

All the while, I had sitting in my wallet-ette a $40 voucher for borders, courtesy of my mother and christmas. One sunny day, I strolled into the store, put two and two together and bought myself the Dexter Omnibus, the first three books upon which the show was based. I finished the lot in about a week - yesterday. I am satisfied overall, but I disapprove of the turn author Jeff Lindsey took in the third book, Dexter in the Dark.

Basically, he needlessly introduces paranormalcy*. There might have been tasteful ways to do this, ways that cast some ambiguity over proceedings and allowed readers to interpret them in one or more of several ways. But those ways was not used. Instead, we learn that Dexter is fighting… evil itself! Yes, before humans evolved, before life itself evolved, before the freaking earth formed, there was Evil. And one day Evil reproduced and made little evil babies, some of which challenged mother Evil until mother Evil decided to go and kill all the other little evils which refused to obey it. Now I have a certain amount of sympathy for the Platonic view of things having an existence apart from any given instance of them – a square, a chair, love etc. But this takes the cake! It is just too stupid for words.

So it turns out that Dexter’s Dark Passenger is one of these renegade baby evils, and his opponent is a number of humans ultimately controlled by the big bad mother Evil. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but obviously Dexter survives, otherwise there wouldn’t be a fourth book I’m now strongly contemplating buying. So not only do we get this ludicrous and completely unnecessary intrusion of the paranormal, but we get a massive anticlimax for future instalments. I mean, where do you go after knocking off Evil itself? Philip Ruddock? Talk about bringing out the big guns too soon!

Despite all this, I have to hand it to Jeff Lindsey for actually making Dexter in the Dark a rather gripping read – more gripping than the first two books in fact (although grippingness, like tune catchiness, needn’t have any correlation with goodness). Reading the books reminded me that one of the things I like about Dexter is its straightforward treatment of, for want of a better words, mental otherness. You don’t see that often, or at least I don’t. It doesn’t judge (and by doing so allows us to, if we wish), it just presents things on their own terms. In this way it reminds me of Big Love, a surprisingly good show about a bunch of polygamists. I’m looking forward to reading the fourth book, rewatching the old series and catching the new one, which features John ‘Harry and the Hendersons’ Lithgow. I’m also strongly considering using the term Dark Passenger in general conversation, having successfully tried it out once on my wife.

*While I find some things very mysterious, I don’t believe in the paranormal, as it is typically conceived (so to speak). I hasten to add that I have no problem with the use of paranormal in works of art, so long as it’s done well. The Master and Margarita and the Schrödingers Cat Trilogy are two (five?) examples of this.

The Ideal Personality Test

I've come up with the ideal personality test. A few quick questions and I can divine your personality!

Q1. Please describe your personality.

Q2. What do other people say you're like?

Q3. Do you like me?

NE1410S?

Seven's Summer of tennis! Proudly brought to you by Marbig Expanding Folders: Expand your folder, expand your mind...

Sandy Roberts: Welcome to Melbourne Park for day one of the Marbig Australian Open, the first grand slam of the year! I'm Sandy Roberts and I'm joined by Johanna Griggs and Bruce McAvaney. Johanna, how good is this?

Johanna Griggs: I know Sandy, the atmosphere here is brilliant! The crowds have really come out in full force - we seem to break a new attendance record every year, Bruce.

Bruce McAvaney: [to Griggs] I'm not aware of that statistic, Johanna, but if it were true that would be wonderful. [to camera] Yes, it's marvellous to be here. And what a lineup we have in store for you today, starting with World Number Two Rafael Nadal, up against Australia's own Mark Woodforde.

SR: Yes, Mark only just made his shock announcement that he's returning to the tour for one more year to pay for his lavish lifestyle. Do you give him a shot, Griggsy?

JG: I can't see him winning a point, let alone any games. But it's a real credit to new tournament director Renae Stubbs to give him a wildcard, in the complete absence of any promising Aussie youngsters.

BM: Next up on centre court we have comeback mum extraordinaire, Kim Clijsters, up against some Slavic woman whose name I'd only butcher, so I'll leave it there.

SR: And of course, we'll be going round the grounds throughout the day with Kylie Gillies, starting now - Kylie, how are you?

Kylie Gillies: I'm fantastic everyone, and I don't know about you, but I'm still in shock at Bernard Tomic winning the Sydney International - in the ladies singles. [awkward pause] Well obviously there's nothing to report yet, no games having started. But I have just heard that umpire Julio Brillas is making his way from the bathroom to centre court now for our first matchup.

[cut to John Alexander in the tunnel, microphone in one hand and election pamphlets in the other. Julio pauses and says hello, putting his clipboard down to focus on the interview. JA ignores him, looking down the tunnel for some sign of Nadal or Woodforde. Julio leans into the mic and starts to speak, but JA disdainfully pulls it away. Julio heads onto court and Rafael Nadal appears]

John Alexander: Well Rafa, happy memories for you here.

Rafael Nadal: Yes, I play very good last year, was amazing for me here in Melbourne. I hope this year I can do something.

JA: Like win.

RN: Yes.

JA: One thing the people of Bennelong have been asking me, has Rafa Nadal recovered from the injuries that plagued you last year?

RN: Bene..? Benelon? What is this?

JA: Bennelong, it's a Sydney electorate I'm standing in -

RN: You standing here in front of me now.

JA: - yes, at the next election.... Look, obviously we wish you the best of luck against Mark Woodforde today. [Nadal has perplexed look on his face]

RN: Mark Woodforde? I thought he retire?

JA: Yes, he's back on the tour because... Anyway, would it be too much to ask to get a "Vote for JA"?

RN: [looking into camera, suddenly very serious] I love the people of Australia very, very much. [walks off to court]

JA: Well, there you have it Sandy. Rafa looking to start 2010 with a bang.

SR: And here comes someone looking to start 2010 the way he started 1996, Mark Woodforde!

JA: Mark, welcome back, how are you feeling?

Mark Woodforde: Pretty good, pretty hungry.

JA: The fire's back?

MW: No, I slept in this morning and didn't have time for breakfast.

JA: Mark, a lot's changed on the tour since you retired, how do you think you'll cope?

MW: Look, I think with the new racquet technologies I should be able to add 5 to 7 km/hr to my first serve... probably no change to the second serve. And with the stricter penalties for linesman abuse, that should play right into my hands, I've always been pretty disciplined in that area.

JA: Can I get a "Vote for JA"?

MW: I'm actually treasurer for the Yogic Flying Party, although I occasionally swing to the Nats. Sorry, JA.

JA: [whispering under breath] What a nutter.

MW: [angry] What's that?

JA: Had a flutter, yes, I put some money on you to ... er ... win at least one game for the match. Best of luck! [Woodforde walks off to the roar of the home crowd on centre court. Fade to add break]

Those three little words: I love happy new year

Floorboards. Overheard children's story words. Repeated.

Empty cups, full stomachs, the food part and the liquor part.

Cord unplugged, standby not used.

Posture, bad posture.

The glory of multiple basketball plays, the smile the inner serenity. The fear it faded too quickly.

The rapidly accelerating daughter, the lovely lovely wife. What's the derivative of the derivative of acceleration and what does it feel like?

Boom boom dadada. Childrens' songs, falsely placed apostrophes.

Unlimited band name ideas.

The joy of holiday, the revival of happy normalcy, the fear of loss. The fear of returning.

How many readings?