What a croc !

After a recent post about Croc Shoes and the fact that they are an abomination unto mankind, Fi sent me this website.

WWW.IHATECROCS.COM

Whoda thunk it? A whole site dedicated to hating and making these nasty little pieces of polypropalene extinct!

I love it. I particulary love the "Burning of the Crocs" video

Go check it out and give your support if u 2 hate Crocs.

What? No shoes?

Walking around Sydders on any given day, you'll see lots of people, also walking. The difference between me and them however, is that I'm wearing something on my feet. Shoes, trainers, boots. Call them what you will but I do have something on my feet.


Sydneysiders have a habit of leaving the house and walking to wherever it is that they're going, barefoot.


When I first noticed this, I thought it a bit odd given that this country is home to some of the worlds most deadly spiders. What would they do if they trod on a funnel web spider? Die is what they would do. Die in about 15 minutes. Its not like they could avoid this little beast of satan, its so small you'd hardly notice it there. It's only about the size of a thumb nail! Also the red back spider, bit bigger, more noticeable, but just as deadly.


OK, spiders aside, what about broken glass or small stones? Small stones are the worst for treading on. They hurt like a bitch! I just don't get this walking around barefoot thing.


During summer I asked a mate "why?." His reply was something to do with summer and it being too hot. Well, its not summer now and today, walking to work I saw two people walking barefoot in the rain. They went into a local shop, bought milk and walked back to their flat about 20 yards up the road. Barefoot.


Good heavens!


However, the upside to all this is that walking barefoot is actually better than walking around in Crocs.


Have you seen these monstrosities? Pieces of plastic in colours so bright and vile they come with a visor and a vomit bag. Why would anyone wear these things in public? Come to think of it why wear them in private? Or at all for that matter?


If you are ever stood in a bar, minding your own business, drinking your little beer and a big burly man approaches you and asks "Are you alone?" whilst wearing purple plastic shoes with holes in them, say no, you are not alone. Tell him you are waiting for someone, even if its not true. Wait till he goes to the bar and then run. Run like the wind.




It should read bitch, as in you look like one wearing them

Shoes with holes? Avoid them at all costs.

Chatty Chewsday

I recently posted a pic of me in Vanuatu playing with the local kids. Fiona sent me the pic below and said I look like Madonna.





Spot the difference

I'm quite flattered that I was mistaken for a glamourous rock star who at 49 still looks like she does.

Have you ever been mistaken for anyone famous?

In your dreams

I had a dream last night that seemed so real, that even in my dream, I thought to myself "Thats really funny, I'll blog that!"

Naturally, when I woke up I realised my real dream wasn't real and in hindsight was a bit weird, so I wont bore you with all of it, only this little tantalising detail which will leave you wondering "WTF?"

dream sequence:

So, I'm on a tram, going around Sydney, sitting just behind the driver and I look out of the window and see a huge display for McDonalds. All lights and flashes with Ronald McDonald in the middle of it underneath a huge '60' to celebrate 60 years of MackyDees. Ronald was singing a very loud, celebatory song. At the top of his voice.....

"My penis just got bigger"

I try not to analyse my dreams.....

Neighbours Meets Little Britain

There I was, watching Neighbours (sad I know) when who should turn up in the background?

Some Pictures from Vanuatu

Kevin Bloody Wilson

Kevin Bloody Wilson is an irreverent Aussie singer who swears a lot. Though he really is bloody funny....this is his ode the the English Cricket Team, might offend some, but get over it....

Auntie Em, Auntie Em...A twisters a comin'

As the risk of sounding sterotypically English, I'm gonna talk about the weather. Being English it comes naturally to me. We English talk about the weather constantly.

"Oooo, innit 'ot, I'm sweating like a blue arse fly 'ere!"

Can someone tell me what a blue arse fly is and why it sweats so much?

"Bloody nora, you could freeze the balls off a brass monkey outside!"

Have you EVER seen a ball-less brass monkey?

Anyway, the point of this post is not to discuss the various metaphors (similes?) used to describe the UK weather patterns. It's more to let you know whats been happening here in old Sydders.

You see, for the last three weeks, pretty much the whole east coast of Oz has been battered by tropical storms. New South Wales itself has been the victim of three storms that has seen rivers run.

Note that I say rivers run and not overflow because those 2 million acres of dry, barren land that runs past your sheep farm and hasn't seen water for 20 years actually starts to run. These vast open river beds actually have names like Barrorwa river, despite the fact no water has been seen in living memory. In fact, one farmer took his 8 year old boy down to the now flowing river and had his picture taken with it incase it never happened again. The young lad, from the back o Bourke (out in the sticks) had never seen a body of water before!

Not all rivers were so lucky. Quite a few of them did burst their banks and caused major flooding, sweeping people out to sea. In one area the coastal highway was washed away and swept a family of five down a river in their car.

They were all buried yesterday.

Up near Newcastle (Hi mum!) a huge bulk carrier was beached and has quickly become a tourist attraction.

Down in Canberra, snow fell for the first time in 20 years.

The Hunter Valley (wine growing country) became the Hunter swimming pool

Yesterday, a cyclone was predicted to hit Sydders but thankfully it didnt reach us.

I wasn't particularly looking forward to wearing a gingham dress, having my house ripped up from under me and then dropping in on your sister!

Anyway, I'm off to take Toto for a walk....

Disco here, disco there

I got a text from MSM on Monday last week telling me he was not working on Saturday so did I fancy painting the town a shade of pink on Friday? My first thought was "yay!" which was quickly followed the next day by "boo!" cos I got a cold and didnt feel much like painting the town any shade of anything.

It then turns out that he wasn't sure if he was working on Sat and would let me know so I spent most of the week secretly hoping he was so I wouldn't have to cancel due to my runny nose and blocked sinuses. I sounded like that bloke from the Vicks Sinus Spray ad on telly. Remember Malcom saying to his mum he couldn't go out cos he was all blocked and she would hand him a nasal thing to help him breather better!? "Of course you can Malcolm!" she would reply.


Anyway, I felt like poo all week and then late on Thursday, I got a call confirming he had got Saturday night off...."boo" I thought.


MSM arrived at my placed about 11.30 on Friday and we went off to meet Tina. All three of us hopped into a taxi to Oxford St and wondered which club to go too. There are a few on this street, but MSM said we should go to Palms. I'd never even heard of it but off we went, climbing downstairs to a basement nightclub.


It was small, but really busy and unusually for a gay nightclub everyone had their tops on! But it did however have the obligatory mirror ball. Is this a staple of all clubs or just clubs for poofs? The dancefloor was 'rockin' and the music was a mix of 70's trash to 90's disco. I even had a bop to Who put the bomp in the bomp-a-bomp-a-bomp? It felt good to be getting down with my bad self......

"getting down"

.....Alright, my 'bad self' is a little too contemporary for me, but it did feel good cutting a rug.

I've been here nearly 3/4 of a year and it was a nice surprise to find somewhere where I didnt feel like old father time. Though it has to be said that by the time I got home I felt like I needed a hip replacement so I got into my "Thora Hird Stair Lift" and went to bed.


Not Thora Hird

Conquering the world

Harking back to a previous post I can now say that I have a dot in the South Americas. Sounds like a euphanism for a disease.

Onward to Russia for world domination...

Wanna game on the pokie?

Another Addiction

When I first landed on these fair shores some 18 years ago most pubs had a pokie or two. A pokie is an electronic gambling machine on which you play…you guessed it, poker. Maximum prize $500.00

These machines are now pretty rare. In fact I haven’t seen a single one since I got here eight months ago. All the pubs still have pokies though, but they have morphed into what us Brits would call a fruit machine or in the US, slots. They have now evolved into a whole arena of flashing lights, whizzes and bells where, in NSW, you can win $10,000.00. In some bars, the machines are ‘linked’ and the prize gets bigger, quicker!

So popular are the pokies that pubs build special rooms for them where the avid gambler can relax with a ciggie (until 2nd July at least) a beer and basically feed coins into the machines. Not content with only accepting coins, the machines also take all paper money too. Well, I say paper money. Here the paper money is actually plastic. They are dead easy to play. There are no holds or nudges. Push the button, you either win or lose.

Back in the UK, I never gave these machines a second glance, only occasionally dropping a couple of quid in whilst I wait for the idiot behind the bar to realise why he’s actually paid to work there. “Hello! Service!”

I digress.

So you can understand my surprise when I realised that since coming here, I actually enjoy playing these machines now. Whilst I haven’t got to the point where I would sell the silverware or rob an ol’ dear for her pension to pay for my addiction, there was the one occasion where I walked home cos I had fed my bus fare to the big greedy machine in the corner. It flashed it’s lights mockingly at me as I shivered in the pouring rain outside, destitute.

Alright, alright, I’m hardly destitute but there are many who are. You see, gambling is another major problem here. The machines have stickers on them. CALL NOW – WE CAN HELP. Of course the numbers are so small you can’t actually see them, but plenty people get their wages and immediately spend it on the pokies. The unemployed get the social cheque an immediately spend it on the pokies. You pop your $5.00 in and look over to the machine next to you where a man with cobwebs on his chair as he hasn’t moved in days has just popped another in $100.00. You check out his credit and it says something like 2514653 ! Holy Mother of God, that’s like, err, umm, well, loads of money!

You see, to ease the pain of losing your money, the machine doesn’t actually register your hard earned cash in $$$$, it turns it into points. Just like casino’s take your cash and give you chips. It makes losing your money so much easier. This weekend, my flatmate saw a guy lose $3,000.00 !!

Anyway, once again I’m not sure where I’m going with this post, so I’m off to the pub to lose a few dollars on my favourite machine, The Queen of the Nile.

Vodka & Ice please...

Ice. Ice is frozen water. We have ice here. You just need a freezer and some water. Of course we have ice here. This isn’t the Kalahari ! It’s the stuff you place in drinks to cool them down. It’s the stuff that celebudantes have at their weddings carved into the shape of a swan. It’s the stuff that is melting at an alarming rate in the Poles.

Ice

Well, not in Sydney.

Ice is the common name for methamphetamine hydrochloride and in Australia this drug and its useage is absolutely huge. The problem isn’t confined to homeless junkies, drunk winos or Eveleigh St residents (think Thamesmead, but worse). The problem is everywhere. In no other country have I seen needle disposal boxes (NDB’s) in the toilets of a pub. It’s not just small grotty pubs either. The NDB’s are in most of the pubs, from your posh “I’m too good for this place” bars to the slummy “I’m a drunk” bars.

Ice box?

Of course the governement is trying to combat this epidemic, but I’m not sure giving users a safe place to dispose of their needles is necessarily the best way to go about it. Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather see a needle in a box than on the street where it can be trodden on by kids playing with wombats.


I live fairly central in Sydders and just around the corner I have (not me literally) a methadone clinic. From the early hours to late at night you can see people of all colours, creeds and classes running in and leaving 20 minutes later with a serene look on their faces with not a needle in sight. Of course, this is drug useage approved by the Fed Government as we can’t have those nasty heroin addicts on the streets whereas the ice addict can “do his thing” in any bar!

Ice

Just a few of the symptons are extreme paranoia, violent behavior, rapid weight loss, grinding of the teeth, hallucinations, hearing voices, pale complexion, symptoms of Parkinson's disease, rapid speech that makes no sense, depression, sleeping or sleeplessness for long periods of time, suicidal ideation's and different forms of schizophrenia. Ice users are also known to see shadows that move and feel that people are after them. Sometimes Ice users accuse their family members and friends of being with the Police, MI5, CIA or other government agencies and express extreme anger and violence to their loved ones. These side effects can often remain permanent if not treated; this is called “Meth Psychosis”.

Not at all sure where I’m going with this post so I’m off to the pub for a vodka and coke (no ice).

So long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Adieu

It's with a heavy heart and noticably shorter fingers that I type my last blog entry. My life-adventure down under is still going strong but I no longer have the "urge" to write.



Maybe I have writers block or maybe I'm just a lazy git.



Day 210 - In Gazza'a house. You decide.



Cheerio and thanks for reading!