C'mon (et al)

When I was a smaller person, we used to have summer holdiays at Dromana on the Mornington Peninsula. The house was (and still is) an old weatherboard beach shack that belongs to the extended family. They were wonderful holidays, seemingly eternal weeks of sun, swimming and beach. Fish 'n' chips, pizza, cordial with ice in it. No TV, lots of boardgames, cricket (endless cricket), tennis, bikes - just ace.

While all that stuff was blissful, nothing was quite as exciting as getting taken by Dad to the brand new tennis centre to see the Australian Open. Looking back, it was an ideal opportunity to give my Mum a break - can you imagine the luxury of no kids for a whole day when usually there were at least three and often several more.

We would get in the van and drive to Frankston, get on the train and sit impatiently all the way to (then) Flinders Park, a white, glistening, almost religious icon in the centre of the city. Tickets to the outside courts in the first week was standard - hundreds of games, the soft thock of tennis balls filling the air. Occasionally we'd see someone famous, Stephan Edberg, Pat Cash, Stefi Graff - but mostly we watched lowly ranked qualifiers and doubles on the back courts.


One year Dad got a rush of blood to the head and bought us tickets to Centre Court. I have no idea who we saw, it doesn't matter in the slightest, all I remember was the stunning stadium. Modern, compact, shiny, colourful and so astonishingly quiet, any sound dense, like talking into a pillow.


I've been to the tennis most years since then but I've missed the last few Opens. I'd forgotten how wonderful it is to see the best in the world doing their "thang". So it was with some anticipation that me and Pete went along last Wednesday to see the night session of the Men's quarter finals - Rafael Nadal versus Fernando Gonzalez.

Anyone with even a passing interest in the tennis will know that the highly favoured Nadal was summarily dispatched by an extraordinary Gonzalez on the night. He was truly amazing with a forehand that really shouldn't be legal it's that good. We got tickets courtesy of a friend with inside contacts right next to Gonzalez' players box, three rows from the front. We could pretty much smell the players they were that close.

We saw the little interchanges Gonzalez had with his coach, watched Nadal struggle to find a chink in his armour and watched the best tennis that certainly I've ever seen.

Rafael Nadal adjusting his famous wedgie - Yes, I actually got a photo of it!

In a couple of hours Gonzalez will take to Centre Court to play in his first ever Grand Slam final against Roger Federer, possibly the greatest tennis player that has ever played the game. Both won their semis with terrifying efficiency, but no-one expects Gonzalez to even come close to Federer - in the words of Dr Evil, "no Mr Bond, I expect you to die". But having watched him on Wednesday and after seeing what he did to poor Tommy Haas, I reckon he's in with a chance.

So tonight I shall be sitting back and enjoying what could be one of the best games of tennis played in recent years. And I wouldn't be surprised if Gonzalez can do something quite extraordinary. I really hope he does.

Having said all that, I can now forsee and absolute thrashing being dealt out by Federer, but in the meantime, get behind Gonzalez - if nothing else, he's much cuter and considerably more charming.

Go Fernando!!

At last!

It makes my heart swell with pride when friends of mine do extraordinary things. Sophie is not only an author of some note, but has recently turned her hand to nature photography with quite stunning results. I've been pestering her to post this for some time and now she has.

So I insist you visit her site immediately, grab a comfy chair, settle back and marvel at her spectacular footage of the truly magnificent sea eagle.

...and bells on her toes...

I've been having a light hearted yet ongoing argument with Snooze over whether or not bells on bikes are compulsory. Well, turns out I'm wrong as Snooze has discovered courtesy of the Bicycle Victoria website.

Traffic regulations require a rider to have a bell fitted. The penalty for riding a bicycle without a bell is $50. The penalty refers specifically to a bell. The old definition of an audible warning device no longer applies - so you can't argue that your voice meets the regulations.

A bicycle for normal road use must be sold with 'an efficient bell or some other suitable audible warning device'.

OMGWTFBBQ indeed!

I can understand the point of cars being required to have horns, trams to have bells, trains hooters and emergency vehicles sirens, but bicycles!?

OK, so a bell on a bike might be handy to warn pedestrians of an approaching bike, BUT RIDING ON THE FOOTPATH IS ILLEGAL, so THAT can't be the reason.

So why else would you need be required at the point of a $50 fine to have a bell on your bike? To alert cars to your presence? As if anyone in a car is going to hear a pathetically pinging warning bell from a cyclist.

It's a silly rule.

Alexander Downer is a contemptible prick

That may come as a shock to some of you I realise, but not only does his smug private schoolboy voice make me want to smack him in his soft and spongey face, he has a habit of saying things that are so enraging that I...I...just can't even...

Needless to say, I was pretty much floored this morning listening to an interview recorded with Downer on ABC radio. In it, he assured the Australian public that David Hicks was just fine and that there was "no suggestion that he was suffering from mental illness".

If you haven't been keeping up, Terry Hicks, David's father, has recently been deeply concerned that David's mental health has significantly deteriorated in the last several months. It is a concern that seems to have been confirmed when David refused to take a phone call from his family at Christmas (an event that had taken months of arranging). They have had no contact with him since mid-2006.

So it must be a great comfort to be told by that simpering fuck-knuckle Downer that David is, in actual fact, just dandy.

And how does Dolly know this?

Because somebody told him. That's right.



Humanity: Oh, fair enough Alex. Was this a Psychologist?

Dolly: ...

Humanity: Some sort of impartial observer?

Dolly: ...

Humanity: An Australian official at least?




No, apparently, this "source" that Downer is flinging about as evidence that an Australian citizen who has been held more-or-less in isolation for five years without charge is not going insane, is not someone who can just be identified (duh), except to say that it is "a person" who comes from "another country" and that apparently David Hicks had agreed to the meeting.

But that's not the worst of it. I'll just let his words do the, well, talking:

*adopts best mincing voice*

There was no suggestion that he was suffering from mental illness, though no doubt he doesn't like being in Guantanamo Bay but that would, I suppose, be a definition of mental illness.

No, I don't imagine he LIKES being in Guantanamo either. But really, that's hardly grounds for mental illness is it... (!!?)

When asked about the dubious nature of this unidentified source, quoth he:

I'm not asking you to rely on it or not rely on it. I'm just letting you know what observation was made and you can take it or leave it.

I'm just going to, you know, say it and get it out there. I'm not asking you to BELIEVE me. Ha! Why would anyone take anything I ever say even remotely seriously. Silly sausages. Believe me, well I never *chuckles*.

The Australian Government's handling of David Hicks is simply disgraceful. That this smirking toad of a man can imply that really all that's wrong with Hicks is that he "doesn't like being in Guantanamo" and that he has been treated perfectly fairly, is repugnant.

I hope Downer enjoys the rest of his jaunt around New York. Gosh, it must be tough being him. Let's just hope he gets home OK and can enlighten us with further brilliant snippets from the annals of "things his friends have said to him".

I can't wait!

Arse hat.

Storm, meet teacup

I realise this is a couple of days late, but the excessive hysterics over the "ethnic violence" that "erupted" on the opening day of the Australian Open, has really annoyed me.

According to news reports based on an evidently small group of witnesses, a bunch of young men of Serbian and Croatian backgrounds (or at least wearing the flags) decided to get stuck into each other in the grounds of the Tennis Centre on Monday.

I've seen two lots of images of the "ethnic violence" - the only ones that appear to have been recorded. One is a series of still photographs from a Getty Images photographer, the other a more-or-less unviewable mobile phone video.



In each case, there seems to be a large number of shouty boys standing around trying to look tough, and (at most) eight or nine people actually DOING anything. Not only are the numbers involved small, but the "ethnic violence" looks to me very much like the famed fight scene from Bridget Jones Diary - lots of flailing of arms and legs and not a lot of substance.

Not that I would be doing anything remotely different in those circumstances, but it's not exactly Kosovo is it.



Reading between the lines (and I'd be happy to be corrected by anyone who actually SAW the event) it looks very much to me like a bunch of pimply adolescent boys have dressed up and gone to the tennis with the express purpose of antagonising another group and secretly hoping to get in a fight. When push has literally come to shove, only a couple of them have been brave enough to get involved and even then, the fighting seems to have taken the form of some half-hearted kicks and that's about it.

The Age, clearly trying not to overstate the situation said "the violence is believed to be unprecedented in the history of Grand Slam tennis" (!!!)

Now, I don't know if that's true or not, but I would be surprised if this was the first time ever that a fight has broken out in the grounds of a Grand Slam. The fact that these little turds were draped in Serbian and Croatian flags doesn't make it "ethnic violence" - it makes it a fairly pathetic schoolboy scrag-fight.

Seriously. It really has been a slow few weeks of news.

Alas!

Terrible news!

The most beautiful woman in the world and my not terribly secret love, Aiswarya Rai is to be married.

Curse you cruel fate - I held out such hope.



*sigh*

Wottup dawgs?

So, 2007 hey. How about it. Pretty exciting so far.

If anyone has found my blogging mojo, please return it forthwith.

Yours etc, Tom.