flashman181

There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
Would he join the wild bush horses even if frost be on the ground,
And all the lips would be cracked that day ?
All the tried and noted forecasters from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the news station overnight,
For the clowns said nightly temps could fall to single digits
So Horsie went back to his stable “I aint going to be Frigit”
The End

It was a slow news week admittedly with only the spectre of WW3 hanging over our heads so it was natural that copy editors scrambled for worthwhile news. I believe in their contracts there is a clause requiring that at least 10% of all reporting is weather related and with the thrill of record heatwaves all but a distant memory they were panicking. Still difficult to justify the headline on Wednesday – you know the day after Anzac Day – in the local Fraser Coast Chronically Ill “What does the cold snap mean for the Fraser Coast” ? Hard to say which is more of a concern – the headline is considered news or that there were 347 comments and likes. For investigative purposes only I clicked on the link – and taken to a subscription page if I wanted to read the article! Ya cant write this stuff. Hey, I could be a news reporter too then 😉

Speaking of Maryhole the Pub Fest is on tomorrow so Bogan Central on Dole Day suddenly expands city wide with many blow ins to make up the numbers. Use to be June Long Weekend and now punted to May Day weekend. In a few years it will be an extended lunch on Sunday August 3rd so get in quick and see if you cant get those weather updates of the front page by dressing up and making a fool of yourself hanging from a Mary Poppins statue with an umbrella back door adjacent.

Anzac Day continues to gain gravitas each year which is of course a great sign in this otherwise me me me society we live in. Me me me stayed in bed but my thoughts were with them – at least until Sexie Coffee opened at 6 am. I was able to listen to the live broadcast of the wreath laying ceremony and observe my minutes silence. Well 3 actually – not sure that new drive through system is working well fellas 😉 Of course it wouldnt be Anzac Day without some “controversial statement” and Anthony Mundine was out of the country so passed on that baton. Good folk were suitably shocked and horrified and then we moved on. If I were to make the effort again sounds like the Elephant Rock ceremony at Currumbin would be the one to attend which would have a certain symmetry to it given all of the wonderful childhood memories associated with said place. Sadly Tony Abcess was there so lets address the elephant in the room. Oh, rocks cant talk? Ok lets move on.

In sporting land Broncs got rub of the green second week in a row. Now the QT man could whine for Australia but his comment about accepting bad calls as part of the game is still valid. Coaches will always blame bad decisions rather than the teams 33% completion rate or a Burgii committing more foul play etc. The best wins are always those against adversity. Just ask the Gallipoli veterans. Whats that – we didnt win that one ? Ok, bad example but you get my point. Some of our best SOO victories were in such circumstances but there have been so many now hard to recall exact year #10isthenew11. One thing we do know though is that Broncs need Jimmy the Jet on the field to advance far into any end of season shenanigans. Much like Cowboys with JT etc. Only exception to the rule is Rabbitohs – end of season success is inversely proportional to how many Burgii play each week.

In TV land Bosch Season 3 was great and simply put is the best cop procedural around at present. Cleverly blends a couple of Connolly novels into one story – much like a batch of Anzac biscuits – and also continues story from previous season. Bates Motel finished a mostly great 5 season run with a suitable conclusion at least for those who knew it was based on the Ed Gein yarn rather than Anthony Perkins doing a spell in the looney bin in between spells of mayhem and naughtiness. Has limited the chance of a revival – never say never – down the track unless Norma comes back in Disneys Frozen 2. I’m here all week, try the veal. But make sure it is thawed out. Billions continues to impress and Gotham returned with the final emerging of The Riddler. Just need Catwoman to emerge out of her suit next week and it will be compulsory viewing in this household

In Travel news Qantas have announced direct flights from Perth to London starting next year – one week after we fly over. Now I dont consider this bad luck per se as not convinced that the Dreamliner is all that great especially in the cheap seats caper. We like a stop over in Dubai anyway so all in all lucky we were still able to do our trip with Qantas as Emirates dont offer PE of course. Speaking of travel I usually scan the travel forums like TA in the late afternoon over a glass of Chateau de Chasselas. Here I am with a few mates just yesterday

Now these forums can be very useful but are also the haunts of many assholes who delight in derogatory and sarcastic replies to simple questions. Guess it is the pinnacle of their pathetic lives to appear to know something more than someone else. I have set myself up as a Maryhole TA expert but as yet have had no enquiries . Odd eh. Speaking of assholes I do hope this new trend takes off like a Qantas Pantyliner direct to Timbuktoo

http://www.ufunk.net/en/insolite/cheeky-exploits/

Speaking of Ireland in 2018 I think this is the famous Ring of Kerry everyone talks about ?

My FB feed has way too much junk in it but every now and again one jumps out from some obscure source that raises a chuckle. Here is one I prepared earlier. While the Anzac Biscuits were cooking

I also made the mistake this week of joining a FB group “Dad Jokes” for a few hours only to have my feed flooded with some of the lamest stuff you could ever hope for. In between the crap of course always a couple of nuggets which will leave you with this week.

No new celebrity deaths aware of, no mushroom clouds and no splinters from my cross work. All in all a good week I guess

Did kick off with a chocolate festivus cleverly disguised as Easter and the start of a run of about 3 months of short weeks. Can I just say as a reduntiree I hate public holidays – really cuts into the time available to do my 15 mins work a week on the Golf Course. Um, hours I mean. Easter of course means a gathering of the Della Clan at Burbank, minus the young campers. As always plenty to eat and drink – including marshmallow a la ash – but was amused when Ant bought out a bottle of White. Yeah we will drink that rather than hook into the perfectly cellared St Hallet Shiraz. Duh. Also began a new tradition of the 500 Cup. Now 500 for me is a lot like Chess with their strategies like the Chekhover Variation of the Sicilian Defence. For me it was the Maryhole Variation of the QUT Luncher . Like CLP, honed my 500 game at QUT but then was able to refine it sligltly while working at Maryhole Pathology in the early days. It is amazing how you can fit in 17 games in your 10 minute tea break when everyone knows what they are doing. And they were QUT boys to start with. They cleverly split CLP and me though and I played with Ant while CLP took on Claude. Claude learnt in Sicily and Ant I think in a winery between bottles of red 🙂 Only joking MATE! Now this is not real 500 as Misere is not allowed which makes for rather tepid bidding in my view. In Maryhole , things didnt get interesting until 9 No Trumps as a blocking move started. Fondest memory is Dazza going 9 NT, picking up Joker and Ace in the kitty and still lamenting “Damn, one trick short “. There is of course no right way or wrong way to play (rules not withstanding ) but partners need to understand each others play and we will continue to work on that. At present stands at 1 all after 3 hours of 7 spades bids 🙂

Easter , sadly, is also associated with road chaos which amazingly seems to get worse each year. I leave early and travel in opposite direction to the masses. There was a tragic fatality just south of Maryhole on Easter Monday for which exact reason not quite known but it isnt the quality of the road folks. However many, including politicians, still call for money to be spent upgrading a perfectly acceptable road. They wont be happy until it is 4 lanes from Cairns to Brisbane. Never happen but if people keep complaining about it then they will do what they did around Gympie. Buy 4 road signs for $20 and bung a 90 with a red circle around it for the “trouble spots”. Then see the impatience and frustration increase on busy days. And of course they will throw in a radar or two and actually make money!

In sporting world sick and tired of all the NRL player movement news, fake news and click bait. Worst proponent in my experience is Triple M on FB with screaming headlines like “Massive News out of Wests Tigers” and the accompanying comment “Wow” . Click……and…….. “there could be news as early as next Monday on the fate of Tedesco and Woods” . Unfollowed. Not sure why Tiger Woods is even news anymore. More back surgery, not playing again this year. Did he play this year? I forget.

Holiday wise has been a bit hectic with trying to finish plans for “Between a Rock and a Soft Red” in September and cement plans for “Galway, Guinness and Gorges” (note early days, reserve right to change when have more time to think of something smart AND hilarious) in February 2018. Just worried may have booked a wine tour in Clare Valley only to find it is the one in Cork, Ireland and not South Australia! Uluru is certainly looking like a jam packed few days with Field of lights, Olgas and even a Segway around the base of Uluru to name a few highlights. Dublin and London Accomodation sorted and all flights booked. Now just wait on North Korea to stuff it all up

In TV land Broadchurch Season 3 was weak and 24 Legacy left none. Billions Season 2 is looking the goods as expected and Girls finished a mostly enjoyable 6 season run well. Just glad to get one lasting image of Lena Dunham naked to keep me warm this winter. Veep returned with usual quality and looking forward to Bosch Season 3 this weekend followed shortly by new House of Cards. Its a busy life on the couch. And not just the one in the Doctors office trust me.

Today though is most memorable for an event 10 years ago. I went to work. Ah sorry, no I meant the wedding of Number One Son (and only one actually, thus making it easier to remember) Tony and his lovely wife Leigh. They now have 3 wonderful kiddies and well settled into full on family life in Toowoomba . Don’t get to see them as much as I should or would like but know they are doing very well and that is all a parent can wish for. And plenty of photos 😉

In stunning news this week we are still heading to Ireland in February next year.

The blurring of “news” reporting and social media was never more clear than yesterday afternoon when my local weather feed on FB sent out an alert. The temperature would drop to 14 degrees overnight! I realise these folk get a tad forlorn when no apocalyptic event on the horizon but this is a new low – bit of weather humour for ya there – even for them. Speaking of a disappearing bar the folk at Today have done it again. Your average viewer is a bit thick so we need to have someone – lets call him Karl – sit in a dingy and row up and down the street because the fact that the top of the street sign is only 1 cm above the water level isnt enough evidence about how much water is there. Being your typical ocker millionaire of course he had to row past the pub and ask for a beer from the men on the verandah – classic Mike Moore cringe. Now if they really wanted to portray a true Aussie image have a croc jump out of the water and swallow him whole. Alas, even though they evolve slowly even your average croc cant swallow Karl. Then we had the image of the 9 dingy almost hitting the 7 dingy heading the other way. Ya cant write this stuff.

It was a week that would always be dominated for me by the best Sports viewing all year – the final nine at Augusta – and it did not disappoint. There are players you never want putting for your life – Greg Norman , Adam Scott, Sergio Garcia to name a few. Every now and again though they do putt well and become world beaters and there was never a more mixed bag then Sergio over last few holes. The putts on 16 and 18 were woeful while in between some clutch putts on 15 and 17. Jordan Spieth , who you would like to putt for your life, still has some demons at 12 and does some strange things at times for such an experienced player. Once Scotty missed two relatively easy putts in first 3 holes it was all over. And of course once again a couple of multimillionaire golfers showed all other multimillionaire sportsmen how to behave with class under pressure.

Homeland finale was ok but also a bit disappointing after a promising season. We know it has at least 2 more seasons and it ended with that in mind. Broadchurch has been pretty good this season as long as you can accept every man in the town is clearly an asshole. It is clearly a ploy writers use to expand the suspect pool but it does jar a bit in this particular instance. Prison Break is back ? Familiar faces too. Tried Prime Suspect 1973 but it was cod ordinary. Prefer to see Helen Mirren at 73 to be honest. Line of Duty on the other hand continues to shine

It was also a week that the world lost Don Rickles and for once there was not an outpouring of emotion – “oh gawd he was only 90, taken so young” – but rather a celebration of his peculiar comedy. I always found him hit and miss but when he hit he hit with the best of them. And then the curtain fell. Yesterday came the terrible news of the passing of John Clarke. This one hit hard. Some people love his early work like Fred Dagg and some prefer his later Clarke and Dawe gig but for me it will always be The Games. In a Melbourne Cup field of memorable episodes cant go past the 100m track. These episodes are so chock full of gems you can easily forget that apart from the classic dialogue surrounding the 100m track this is also the episode with Robbo’s Press conference and Kevin Nowra!

John Clarke: I don’t understand then, Mr Wilson, why in the construction of a 100-metre track you would want to depart too radically from the constraints laid down for us by the conventional calibration of distance.
John Clarke: Mr Wilson. Do you know who is the current 100 metres all-comers Australian record holder?
Mr Wilson: Can I guess?
John Clarke: There’s not much point in guessing.
Mr Wilson: Is he an African American?
John Clarke: He’s not an African American, no.
Mr Wilson: Is he that Canadian from Jamaica?
John Clarke: No, he’s not a Canadian from Jamaica.
Mr Wilson: I give up.
John Clarke: The 100-metre record in this country, Mr Wilson, is currently held by Bryan.
Mr Wilson: Bryan?
Bryan Dawe: Yes.
Mr Wilson: Congratulations.
Bryan Dawe: Thank you.
John Clarke: A new mark, Mr Wilson, set at a blistering session last Wednesday. I wish you’d been there. We were down there and we had a bet.
Mr Wilson: Was this wind assisted?
John Clarke: No, and we’d had a couple, and in my view Bryan is not in quite the nick he was in at the same stage of last season.

On Monday as usual caught up with latest Clarke and Dawe on You Tube – Cyclone Malcolm. Clever as always but there is likely concensus that the most memorable one was “The Front fell off” Here is one I prepared earlier – circa 1991.

Both of these classics show the typical Clarke humour which, in my experience, was unique. Luckily we can always sit down and catch up with them at our leisure but it is sad to think there will be no more new material.

Not as sad of course as for his family and loved ones. All things are relative. RIP Fred Dagg