Tuesday, December 28, 2004

monster bawl

The child thought all his Christmases had come at once. Auntie Tina had come to stay--he loves Auntie Tina! For three days the child held Auntie's hand and showed her his new house, his new toys, his new beaches. They went for lots of drives in Auntie's car. At Oma and Opa's house he showed Auntie how he could pat the yellow chickens, and how the brown ones wouldn't let him, no matter how much he chased them.
Now and then he complained bitterly to Auntie about how Mama made him wear nappies when he didn't want to, have sleepies when he didn't want to, come in out of the sun when he didn't want to, and so on. Auntie would never make him do that, would she?
In the mornings as soon as Mama got him out of his cot he marched, pointing, around to the spare bed where sure enough, there were those black curls peeking out from the bedclothes. Auntie! The bedclothes stirred and Auntie smiled sleepily and he climbed up to have cuddles. He encircled her nose with his mouth but didn't bring his teeth together like he sometimes liked to on Mama's nose.
On the fourth day, Auntie's friend arrived with her two-year-old daughter. At first, the child was excited. He loves other bubbas! Sure, this one was very big and very loud, and she had something her Mama referred to as "Persian blood" which apparently made her "fiery". But he loved to play with other bubbas.
Pretty soon though the child realised that this bubba was not in fact a bubba but a monster. Every toy the child picked up to show It was ripped out of his hands, usually accompanied by mad shrieks in his face. The child stumbled off, disconcerted, only to find It following him, clobbering him with a rubber hammer and pulling his hair. And all the while laughing!
The monster's mama finally dragged It off and the child sat in a corner clutching his willy nervously.
"Don't worry, Harley," his Mama said. "That's one toy she can't take off you."
The child appeared doubtful.
There was one last, rather traumatic trip to the beach with the monster who, the child was surprised and gratified to learn, greatly feared the sand and the ocean. There was a lot of shrieking.
Then everyone disappeared except Mama and the house became silent. Mama put Angelique on and was dancing as she picked up all the toys the monster had distributed around the house. Normally the child would like a little dance himself, especially to Angelique, but right now he was concerned because Auntie appeared to have gone missing. And Mama didn't even seem to care! The child wandered around looking for a long time, but Auntie was nowhere to be found.
That night after milkies, the child lay thinking as Mama sang to him about twinkling little stars and then she said,
"We had fun today, didn't we, with Auntie--"
The child gave a big smile at this, and looked around in case Auntie had come back, but she hadn't.
"And little Nilufa--"
The child abruptly stopped smiling, then burst into tears. He cast anxious looks about, as if the monster might reappear to clobber him. Mama quickly cuddled him and said it was OK, they were alone now, just him and Mama.
"And she didn't mean to hurt you, sweetie. She was just...excited to see you!"
But the child sobbed. Mama didn't get it. The monster had stolen the child's favorite toy.
The monster had stolen Auntie.

Footnote: Auntie's only gone up to Bellingen, and will be back in a few days, sans monster.

Monday, December 20, 2004

best of times

Best year of my life: 2004
Best thing I ever did: have Harley
Best address in the universe: Boomerang Beach, NSW.

Best to all bloggers and their families for the festive season. Thanks for reading me.

love,
Gianna & Harley.

Saturday, December 18, 2004

knit happens

LONDON: A British mathematician has made a crochet model of chaos, the BBC reported yesterday. Hinke Osinga of the engineering mathematics department at Bristol University needed 25,511 stitches to represent the Lorenz equations that describe chaotic systems.

--theOz.

Monday, December 13, 2004

traitors

A newsreader and a pulp magazine writer, both female, are discussing Nicole Kidman’s supposed new romance with billionaire Steve Bing:
Newsreader: I wonder, what does Nicole see in him? I mean, he’s scruffy, he’s ugly, he’s a love rat…
Journo: Well, he’s a billionaire of course, so…
Newsreader(smiling indulgently): Ah, gets a girl every time, doesn’t it?

thank god we met lizzie

Yeah, I reckon I can understand why Pride and Prejudice makes women feel good to be a woman (subscription). Don’t we just all want to be Lizzie? She’s kind of the ultimate female character: intelligent, assertive, funny and attractive. And—-contary to the stereotype perpetuated in our modern media, see next post--she doesn’t settle for anything less than love. (To anyone who might comment that Darcy ends up being conveniently loaded, I contend she would’ve loved him even if he had been a pauper. She turned down Mr Collins, didn’t she?) And OK, we want to be Miss Lizzie because of Mr Darcy...We love Mr Darcy...so sue us.
Anyway, I don’t get why Julie Burchill doesn’t get it. So what if Austen and her peers didn’t sit around discussing clitorises? I don’t even think we talk about them all that much anyway.

Sunday, December 12, 2004

replay

I've got a bit of an ethical dilemma. As some of you might be aware, for the past year or so I've been hosting a couple of unobtrusive text links (down there in the margin under 'sponsors') for which I'm essentially reimbursed the cost of my internet connection.
So far it's all been links to sites selling lovely Audrey Hepburn-esque motor scooters and stuff, but the other day the advertisers asked me to update their links and now I find I'm advertising...online gambling! The pokies.
I'm not real comfortable with this. My views on gambling have been aired before on this blog. Basically, I loathe and detest the pokies. A friend's marriage and almost their whole life was ruined by a gambling addiction. They're an insidious evil. What are the pokies but machines that blatantly hypnotise vulnerable people into throwing their money away? So I started thinking I'd email the advertisers and ask for a different product to link to.
But then I got to thinking that maybe in a way I was getting a tiny bit of revenge for the common man. I mean, out of my discerning readership I doubt that many (if any) will be remotely tempted to clickthrough to an online gaming site. So the money is flowing the opposite direction for a change, isn't it?

just play me john coltrane

There's a certain blogger trading music with other bloggers (great idea) and I've just emailed him my choices. He's got a helluva lot of good music there to choose from. Anyway, I've asked Santa to bring me two Lucinda Williams CDS - one called "Live at the Orpheum Theatre" from 1999 and something Santa has described as "Crossroads on Country Music TV - interviews, station promos, great talk, singing with Elvis Costello and Lucinda" from 2002. Should be interesting. And just cos Lucinda mentions John Coltrane in one of her songs I've also asked Santa to chuck in some discs from the extensive John Coltrane list as I'm unfamiliar, but interested, in the territory.
Waiting with bated breath.

Thursday, December 09, 2004

bully for you

So is Mark Latham really an irredeemable bully, as Adele Horin argues? My problem with Labor is that they'll probably stick with Latham for a good chunk of this term but then turf him at the last minute, again not leaving enough time for whoever the successor is to sell him or herself to the public as opposition leader. Or does Labor really believe Latham can bring it home next time?

Tuesday, December 07, 2004

cod piece

The delivery man handed me his clipboard. In big red capital letters above where I had to sign it said STRICTLY COD.
"Strictly cod?" I said, signing. "What's that mean?" The man looked at me and said that I was blonde.

phone line between pleasure and pain

Jeez, talk about dramas getting the phone on here--bloody Optus! Grrrr. Wasn't much fun not having a phone for a week. Anyway, as I am fond of promising, "more soon". And hope to catch up with everyone's blogs soon too.