The Number of the Beast
Some many years ago now, following the delivery of direct-dial capabilities to the majority of homes with a telephone, television and movie production companies began instituting the practice of using “555” as the exchange prefix in all telephone numbers spoken or shown on screen. This was made the general practice pretty much for the obvious reason: people call the numbers to see what will happen, especially if there’s a good laugh to be had doing it. Calling God is obvious, so why wouldn’t Bruce Almighty use “555”? Too close to “666”? (Andrea pointed out to me recently that Bruce was filmed in Buffalo, NY, just like The Natural, but my favorite is still Buffalo 66, because it’s just like that. Go Bills.)

Benefits of the Space Program
It is not the result of anything NASA’s actually done, except insofar as it’s inspired a variety of artists, but Copernica is a very nice little on-line application, fun to play with a little when you’ve got time. Try to find the Robert Rauchenberg and William Wegman.

Furniture
The weather forecast says it will be clear by Saturday, so I’m hopeful we’ll be able to spend a little time sitting at the new table on the balcony sipping coffee. This is the one key piece of furniture (other than a bed in the guest bedroom) we’d been waiting for, and it looks great. The manufacturers warn that it will continue to exude sap for days on end unless we hose it down, which we can do, luckily, as there’s a drain in the floor. But I’m getting a section of newspaper and spending an hour before we start, sap or not.

Thanks for Helping
Just in case Australians didn’t already feel their participation in the war on Iraq cost them enough in security, the US is billing them for the bombs, too. Also the chow and the phone calls. All on the principle “user pays.” I’m sure John Howard will make good on the bills, but if I were Simon Crean, I’d be playing this one big. Except he’s not in favor of a republic any more than Howard is, so I don’t really expect this to go anywhere at all.

Work
Reading some ‘blogs is an exercise in self-restraint so as not to post too critically too often of the endless silliness we as a web-community, the so-called “blogosphere,” perpetrate on the internet (enough that Google will filter ‘blogs from their main search engine, an enhancement, as far as I’m concerned, because I use Google as a research tool, not for entertainment per se). In other cases, I’m intrigued by the content in an employment-related philosophical way, even though the only “lawblog” I actively read is my brother’s. The posts related to the profession are profuse, and rightly so, if the ‘blog is to belong to its category. The “warblogs” have probably had their moment, and were, in any event, just ‘blogs that became devoted to particularly focussed ranting, and can now get back, perhaps, to just being ‘blogs, more likely than not rather boring ones anyway. Lawblogs, however, offer an interesting perspective because they are about work. Given that we spend upwards of 8 hours per day working, those of us who are not dole bludgers, anyway, it ought to be in some measure surprising we don’t post about our working lives any more than we do. But not really, because most of us are not engaged in thinking beyond the immediate demands of our jobs, that is, being truly creatively engaged in our lives. I’m not knocking work. I like working. The harder the job, the better I like it. But that’s because the more difficult the task, the more problem-solving thought is required to perform it. In law, work is not simply the process of churning out briefs, and even then, the briefs can demand a significant effort. In my job, although I often have to trace and solve problems both technical and functional, to use the distinction drawn in IT circles, I am not creative. This is a very middle-class problem, a bourgeois dilemma, to use the Marxist dialectic. When I think about work, I am disengaged from the product, and my thoughts tend to run toward only the immediate requirement of the job (except when I’m thinking about getting a new one). My creative moments come outside of work, when I have them. I have wondered once or twice in my younger days when family would pester me about going back for a law degree if perhaps I made an error in not doing so in the first place. But I don’t think I did. I think I made the right choices in education, by and large, if not always being anything more than lucky in my employment history. Now in Australia and faced with an alien marketplace for my skills I think about these things a good deal more. The conditions I face as a working person over 40 are much the same, regardless of the significant social services available here (once I’ve been here two years). I have to think about what happens after I stop working. I have to think about being employable. I have to think about the breadth and depth of the marketplace available to me. I have to think about not ‘blogging at the office so I don’t get fired. Meanwhile, I can ‘blog what I think, when I’ve got time for either.

Movies Made . . . Cheap
EasyCinema is an idea I’d like to see implemented all over. Especially near me. I’ve been hearing for years how ticket prices go up because it’s so expensive to run a theatre, but I think it’s just as much about those record-breaking weekends you hear about with every new release. This system seems a lot more sensible to me. Charge more for new releases than older movies, less for booking in advance than waiting until the last minute, use the internet instead of the glass booth, no popcorn, and so forth. Do the studios have to gross so many millions of dollars? There are problems with all of this, of course, because – let’s face it – people aren’t reasonable. But the only significant issue as far as I can tell is that there will be audience members who insist on bringing really stinky food with them. Bad enough the crunchy stuff sold in theatres as it is, but wait until it’s a picnic. If only the VCR hadn’t deluded so many people into believing that whenever they watch a movie they’re at home. (Shh. No, you shut up. Mom!)

Winter Won’t Come
When we decided to buy the Surry Hills apartment, we were delighted by the air conditioning installed throughout the unit (although appalled at the multiple condensers sitting out on the balcony, a situation we’ve remedied by installing a box over them, which will look pretty nice once we’ve painted it). After the long, hot summer – and we had two in a row, having moved at the end of one to the beginning of another – we knew cool would be hard to live without. These machines are reverse-cycle, which means they run both hot and cold. They’re way up on the ceiling, however, so I’m not entirely sure how effective they are, even though we’ve had them running for the past couple of days. It’s a characteristic of Sydney housing that no one has yet been able to admit to themselves or others that the weather isn’t perfect all year ‘round. In fact, it’s damn hot in summer and gets a bit chilly in winter. Since no one admits this, no one builds for it either, and the result is that it can be hotter or colder inside than out. We think the apartment will be much cooler in summer than apartments usually are, but we’re already finding out it’s colder than we thought it would be, so maybe we’re delusional. It’s a fairly modern building, and having discovered the existence of insulation (purely by accident, but no harm done, even if it was the result of a power tool incident), we thought we were one up on winter. Judging by the behavior of some in the household, notably the cat (which creatures are known for seeking comfort), we’re not. I, however, am still waiting, nevertheless, for anything much more than rain. I know it won’t snow, more’s the pity, but it isn’t even cold, although you’d never know it listening to the natives.

Bring on da Funk
It’s a matter of interest to me, because our friend George is a collector of soul music, his home stacked with original 45s and 33s, which he’ll play if you’re really interested. (My own collection is sadly limited, and all reissues, although I’m still glad to have the Sam Cooke.) There’s a pretty lively interest in this music around town, too, with “soul nights” at a variety of venues, and a coterie of DJs spinning the vinyl. So reading about the latest music documentary leads me to wonder when this movie will make it here. “Standing in the Shadows of Motown” was terrific, but I’m inclined to think this one will be even better, even if it doesn’t include Bootsie.

Homework
List mania continues unabated, but at least this time there’s something to be said, on my part, for the list as resource: The Australian Society of Authors has complied the top 40 Australian authors, ranked according to the public’s taste for particular publications, among which I’ve already managed to read 5 (a whopping 12.5%). Of course, none of the Australian novels I’d ever read before my international romance commenced are on the list. Native guidance is clearly indicated in selecting from the literature of a country, and now I have the nation’s definition of where to begin. I suppose I’ll continue my Peter Carey, Tim Winton, David Malouf progress, but I’m surprised Thomas Keneally isn’t on the list at all (even if all I really know of him is his movies).

City and Town
We’ve been travelling to the Inner West a lot lately, as I mentioned in an earlier post, and this weekend’s track work has given me an opportunity to see a little more of the towns we pass through on our way out to Windsor. Sometime after Blacktown, the train travels along a single track, so if you know anything about rail systems you know you’re quite a ways from town at that point. On this line, we pass through a few suburbs, some of which are city centers in themselves: Strathfield, Parramatta, Blacktown. Like many larger suburbs, these form satellite cities, having been incorporated, and gathering up the surrounding towns under their governmental aegis. On this trip, although we didn’t pass through any towns different from where the train stops anyway, we did travel along a different route, of course, having to swing around and through and therefore seeing some different neighborhoods at least by a few blocks around from the stations. Parramatta, for example, isn’t much of a place from the train, but driving along the main drag it’s one car dealership after another, with no more distinction between them than the dealer’s name and the brand on sale. Blacktown looks much grander from the station than it does when you actually drive through. One important feature of the towns we drove through, however, is how much they are the same as every other suburb in the world. Whereas each city has a distinct character from every other, suburbs appear to be a kind of place unique in human society. They are nearly classless, and I mean that socioeconomically, rather than culturally. There is, after all, in nearly every town a theatre group, even if all they put on are amateur productions of Les Miserables. I have never been in a suburb where the biggest, most garish house in the neighborhood doesn’t include pillars flanking the front door, and the more pillars the more likely the house is owned by a newly affluent immigrant family, second or third generation. Every suburb includes a hillbilly district, with at least three cars on the lawn, one of which is being used to supply parts to the other two. The more cars, the more likely that one of them is nothing more than a shell no one’s gotten around to selling for scrap. Lawn furniture will range from nice to cheap to indoor furniture too raggedy to endure in the living room anymore, and often enough an appliance or two too big for the available indoor space. (These pieces aren’t out the back, either, but right by the front door, I suppose so you can get a clean shirt on your way out to work or a cold beer on your way to sitting in front of the t.v.) Many of the houses will be made of cheap extruded brick, mostly of the same orange color all over the world. There will always be a strip mall, and there will always be a fast food restaurant, although the smaller the population of the town, the more likely these will be out at the edges, whereas in the larger suburbs, they’ll be scattered up and down the main drag, too. I’ve seen this on Long Island, upstate NY, out in the Midwest, down south, and in England and Europe. I’ve been seeing it in Australia, too, and I’ll bet when I get to Jakarta I’ll see it there, although it may be on stilts. I am very glad to be living inside Sydney proper, where architecture is distinct and the population throbs with urgency around me. It’s not NYC, sure, but that has it’s good points. In Manhattan, you’re never out of the city, despite Central Park. In Sydney, you can step aside whenever you like and be at the beach or just cooling off with the breeze off the harbor. It’s not smelly and it’s not crowded and it’s not noisy. It’s a civilized city, tamed by a gentle climate and a lower density. It makes a nice balance between city and suburb, so while I grew up in the ‘burbs, and I’m a city kid at heart, I get the best of both right here. Nice.

Dinner
I don’t care to engage in debate for its own sake, although discussions between reasonable people who are willing to at least listen and argue on the merits can be fun, interesting, and educational. I have figured to leave the comments alone, unless they were to violate the terms of service I’ve agreed to in using Blogger or Blogspot or (now) Squawkbox, but I’ll just say one thing about a particular line of debate receiving comments, among them a recent anonymous remark which misses the point it attempts to make. Vegan refers to the practice of declining to consume any animal product of any kind, whether as food or clothing, whereas vegetarian has come to be more broadly inclusive, focussing on the protein sources among foodstuffs. I am not vegan. I like honey. Butter and cream are still among my preferred ingredients. I am, however, very lucky indeed that I can make the choices I do without compromising my health. That I can make the choice is one of the best reasons for doing so. By declining to participate to the extent I do in the agricultural practices that are currently increasing the salinity of Australia’s cultivable soil reduces the impact of such practices by an admittedly very small factor, but not negligible, as it is cumulative. And that’s just one rationale. The argument, like the terms and the lifestyles, don’t begin here, so you have to start from within a larger context if you’re going to contest the choices, because that’s what you’re arguing: the merits of choosing. (PS: bravo, Meera, or – to be ironic – olé.)

Theories of Power
Some time back my brother and I started categorizing super powers. Some super powers were inborn, some were bestowed, some were found. Among the found, other than the panoply of radiation treatments available to choose from, there were also the clothing-related. Iron Man is an obvious example, Tony Stark having built a set of super-powered armor he’d climb into periodically to fight evil, often enough The Mandarin, who is not a small, orange fruit, but who happened upon a UFO conveniently stocked with a set of jewelled rings, each of which projected a ray of some kind. Now, thanks to the space program – just kidding; not everything is attributable to NASA, it just seems that way) – we have the first real-life super powers suit, available only for women. I really, really want one of these, even though I am not inclined toward crime or crime-fighting. I mostly want it because it crackles when it’s charged, and the electric arcs are visible through the lining. It would be like dressing up as Lightning Lad, only cooler. It’s pretty cheap, too, for such a nice suit.

Johnny Tremain
This is a reference that’s going to go right by any Australians in the audience, as it is a “young adult” novel of the American Revolutionary War, wherein an apprentice silversmith has the fingers of one hand fused in an industrial accident. Or pre-industrial, I guess, given the era. In any event, accidents will happen, and one unfortunate member of the household (we won’t say who, but it’s not the cat) has her hand now swathed in bandages to the extent that it is pretty much useless, placing her on the disabled list for some days to come. This is the result of a kitchen incident and leads me to many recollections of those occasions when my chef friends, acquaintances, and family members exhibited a variety of cuts, burns, and other physical impairments resulting from their occupation. It’s a dangerous place, the kitchen, which is probably why my cooking skills tend toward the pre-packaged. I’ve had my share of solo knife fights where I’ve come out the loser, although most often involving the use of x-acto™ blades wielded carelessly. Don’t even get me started on power tools. Still, there’s dinner yet to prepare, so I’m very grateful indeed that our favorite convenience food items, Tasty Bites, is available in this country, providing as they do a nutritious and delicious range of Indian meals, just waiting for some rice and the application of microwaves. The servings could be a bit larger, though, as they are meant apparently for one-and-a-half persons.

World Wrestling Wildlife
Zoos are a problem. Back when they started they were little more than circuses, roadside attractions, but even though the trend has moved us toward creating habitats in miniature and focussing on preservation, I’d bet they don’t do nearly as much for the animals as would just leaving them the hell alone and staying out of their way. That’s not going to happen, though. We are the most opportunistic species on the planet, and we expand to fill every niche available, evolutionary or geophysical, whether it is learning to eat sea urchin, diverting rivers, or building an apartment block. Sectioning off great swathes of Africa or South Dakota is nice for the elephants and the bears and whomever else, but it won’t last. I remember hearing about the leopard who paced back and forth in his enclosure every day of his life, which may have been longer than in the wild, but it wouldn’t have been free of the fear he must have been suffering. Even though the animals in the Bronx Zoo seem quite relaxed, they’re still trapped and the handlers still effectively harass them, and that’s not alleviated by also being fed. This is why there are animal-inflicted human workplace injuries and deaths even at the “best” zoos. So what about the orphan elephants? Where do they go? San Diego may have pioneered the modern zoo, or at any rate done the best job of it at the time, but surely there’s something can be done to eliminate poaching so these creatures can stomp through some natural savannah, something more than has been done, which has been effective, but not nearly effective enough. Meanwhile, I expect the zoos are the best we can hope for.

Staking a Claim
No television show of my memory has exhibited the qualities that have led me to hang on every episode with the devotion I bring to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a confession I make unabashedly, even though I know exactly what 99% of the people hearing me say so will think. Yes, it involves teenage girls and kung fu and vampires, but these are MacGuffins to the themes explored across the series as a whole and within the individual episodes. Buffy deals with relationships on an adult level, with issues of ethics and morality, with politics both social and sexual, and it does this humorously and gracefully, even at its most camp. It’ll all be over soon, and that’s probably for the best, but whatever will I do until someone else produces another quality t.v. program on this level?

Catching Up
There’s an issue of the New Yorker sitting on the coffee table at home, and I’ve just finished reading the last two that came through, including the double-sized “money” issue (an innovation Tina Brown introduced and for which I have been grateful as it afforded me an extra week to get through all the articles). The Atlantic will probably turn up any day now, putting me further behind. Lately I’ve taken to carrying both a magazine and a book on the train and picking up one or the other according to whether or not I’ve reached a stopping point in either. If I finish a chapter, I pick up an article, and if I finish and article, I go on to the next chapter. I maintain progress this way through what would otherwise be an ever-growing stack of things I want to read but never do. This situation may resolve itself before long, however, as the international subscription costs are pretty steep. We’ve been working on what amounts to a forwarded subscription, but it just won’t last. Once we have to pay the full cost . . . well, maybe I’ll get a raise.

No Saints for “X”
If you use the Christian pantheon like they’re voodoo loa, Patron Saints Topics provides an alphabetic index to the relevant saint having oversight of the area you’re looking to have divine intervention on. Just in case you need help with baking a cake or you’re being chased by wolves.

When I Get Older
For Lennon and McCartney, 64 was a nice age to rhyme with and probably seemed sufficiently ancient for their purposes at the time. As life expectancy increases for many developed nations, governments seek to adjust the retirement age so as to protect their inability to deliver on promised payouts. And the “boomers” get restless – We’re the “me generation,” remember? Dad retired when he hit the cut-off, and I’d sure like to do the same. Not that I’ve been such a very good boy in all this, so thank goodness I’m in a country with some real social services. (Expecting that to last is fantasy.) Capitalism isn’t very kind to the 75% of us without masses of money (not that communism turned out any better), so you need to be in the game. I used to groan when I’d get stuck in a queue behind some pensioner with twenty dollars and a grand, complex lottery scheme, but now I can see how a couple of scratchies might keep someone off cat food when all else has failed. Gambling is gambling, whether it’s lotto or stocks (or life insurance for that matter), the only differences being that stocks are a safer bet and a long term return (and you don’t get to keep the insurance). Isn’t that always the way? The safer the option, the longer you have to wait to win, but that’s because the house wants to keep your money, as much of it and for as long as they can.

Sentience
Dictionary definitions are a poor argument in themselves but are nevertheless useful in distinguishing the point of an argument. I haven’t completed my decision, but I think I’ll have to forego fishes as a dining option just the same. The idea posited among the comments on this site that fish are not sentient, that the pain it was recently determined they feel is non-conscious, seems incomplete. Sentience is not thought, but feeling, even if it is qualified as requiring perception, so pain is pain, and pain experienced beyond a certain limit is suffering. If God didn’t want us to eat the animals, he wouldn’t have made them delicious, right? That’s just despair. If humans are different than animals it is in the choices we make (shades of Jonathan Livingston Seagull), and we can elect to eat soybeans and little vitamin pills, or we can compromise and reduce suffering but still factory-farm, or we can join the red-in-tooth-and-claw crowd. What we cannot do and claim anything more than tool-maker status among the apes is to remain disconnected from our actions. St. Paul says we are to judge the angels and therefore are authorized under the laws of heaven to judge among ourselves, but I’m not really prepared to start handing down edicts. I’ll just forego the prawns, thanks.

Editorial Decisions
I’m thinking that with an evidently limited audience, and little enough utilization of the comments feature so far, it would be worth attempting a small-scope format change, wherein I post individual entries separately. Because I compose off-line, it’s been easier to amass a few paragraphs and post/publish all at once. But so long as I’m experimenting. . . . I’ll see what happens.

My Life, and Welcome to It
Otherwise known as “Why Weblogging Is Not Journalism”, those of us out there doing this need to ask ourselves sometimes: why do I keep a weblog? The term, journalism, clearly has reference to the diarist activity of nothing down the periodic events occurring in or around one’s life, with the specific intention of publishing these notations for public consumption. So weblogging is journalism, but only insofar as that definition can take it, and that’s not really very far at all. I prefer a level of discretion in my own ‘blog. I don’t believe the details of my personal life are all that interesting to others; I’m only trying to be entertaining and to process my experiences among the immigrants of Australia as (ultimately) the product of immigrants to America. I also don’t believe I have any right to broadcast the details of anyone else’s personal life beyond what they publish themselves, on-line or elsewhere. By ‘blogging, I make myself a public figure, but I cannot do so for anyone else in my life without committing a violation of their privacy and betrayal of their trust. If you can’t say something good about someone, it’s better to say nothing at all. Unless they’re a politician, and then they deserve whatever they get.

Am I a Dupe?
More meta-blogging. So Salam Pax is real, but fooling everyone, just the same, at least according to David Warren of the Ottawa Citizen. Next I’ll find out that Isabella V. is “Raed.” The internet is not to be trusted, alas.

It’s in the Bible; It Must Be So
The college degree inflationary effect on office work eligibility is a real problem for a number of reasons, and I bear witness to them. A colleague of mine, for example, was held at a particular level within one organization for years, and reminded at every opportunity that her lack of advancement was the result of not having a degree, whereas what really held her back was college education prejudice, as was eventually shown when she got the gumption to quit and find the job and pay her ability deserved. I’ve also known many IT professionals who never went to college or dropped out part way through but managed to obtain and hold high-paying, responsible jobs. Then, too, there are the college-educated idiots of my acquaintance, who deserved nothing more than the job they managed to scrape by in, whether it was “administrative assistant” or some other sub-managerial position. Credentialism can be a problem, o.k., but ignoring references and background isn’t going to help anyone. If I want to hire a college-educated receptionist, this may be the result of a perception on my part that persons with a degree exhibit more professionalism than high school dropout yobbos, thereby leading me to add this filter before I start scheduling interviews. Nevertheless, the worker is worth his wages, so long as he gets the job done. (There’s also the biblical admonishment not to begrudge the kine the grain it consumes in the course of turning the mill, which means God says I’m allowed to use the internet at the office.) This is something I’ve tried to take to heart. If it’s worth paying me for the work I do, it’s worth my hiring others for their expertise, whether it’s for electrical work, painting walls, or screening resumes and scheduling interviews.

Intimations
Last night I made a special trip out to historic Windsor, one of the oldest towns in NSW. We’ve only recently encountered the historic district, having previously spent all our time in South Windsor, where the government deposited most of the housing commission units, or more lately the Hawksbury Hospital, where Meera’s grandfather is undergoing treatment for various conditions, most of which appear now to be complications of each other. I went out to deliver a CD player and the recent Elvis collection. John is a life-long fan of the King, only in the past months ending his practice of wearing the trademark pompadour. I also hauled out “In the Wee Small Hours,” one of the top Sinatra albums of the Nelson Riddle era, and a recentish Johnny Cash record that is among the most heart-felt collections of songs I’ve heard. John has been in hospital with little more than a newspaper now and then and four television stations, and visitors notwithstanding, probably needs a bit more. I hope the music will alleviate a little of the boredom outside of visiting hours. He’s very ill, gravely, even, and our best hopes are hard to hold on to. There are many complexities, and although I’m usually too preoccupied with my own quotidian concerns, I’m often thinking of what we’ll do, or at least the decisions we’ll face sooner than we’d expected. John’s only 71, and my father’s health at 75 has led me to consider that quite young, all things considered. I think of what he’s going through and listen to what he says. John’s not one to give much away, but he lets on enough.

Muir Island
As one of the world’s foremost experts on the Merry Marvel Mutants, I have to pronounce X-Men 2 very entertaining indeed. Despite my long association Professor X’s brood, I was in no way disappointed with the “revisionist” approach to the characters – even in the first movie, Wolverine’s height, for example, was purely a non-issue. Never mind; I’m sounding too much like a 16-year old, pimply nerd. The 1st instalment is not a prerequisite, but recommended, as key elements of the plot are otherwise glossed over a bit more than works otherwise. Knowledge of the comic books is also a good idea, but not to the point where you can’t tell the players without a score card (and there are lots of them, more all the time). How the ending isn’t a set-up for the Phoenix saga, you’ll have to tell me, although I do see that it would be about the most confusing and audacious thing Bryan Singer or Fox might attempt with this product. Hugh Jackman, the Australian set to play Peter Allen on Broadway, is terrific. Damn Aussie actors are taking over everywhere.

Cuisine Adventures
Although I have dined out at Lebanese restaurants from Atlantic Avenue to Cleveland Street, I have to say that Almustafa was about the finest Middle Eastern restaurant I’ve been in to date. The falafel was not only terrifically fresh, it was plainly homemade, and by someone who’s been doing it for a long time. One of the more eye-opening elements of our meal there were the pickles, much different than what you’d get at Katz’s, let alone on a hamburger. Cucumber, of course, by also eggplant and turnip, and all brined with just the right proportion of hot peppers to make your tastebuds light up. We went to their new location on Glebe Point Road, as it was close to the movie theatre we were going to, but we’ll try their Surry Hills original sooner than later, I’m sure.

Like, OMG, LOL
I haven’t tested this tool in the field, so I can’t vouch for the functionality, but the AOLer Translator appears to do a fair job translating English into the argot of the chatrooms. Further study is indicated.

Sketchbook
The number of on-line art-related pages grows by leaps and bounds, the latest I’ve seen being the The 5-Line Portrait Project, which is meant to provide a compendium of self-portraits produced using only 5 lines. Their site appears to remain unfinished, but don’t let that stop you from submitting your finest efforts. (Via Flynni’s weblog.)

Dark Side
I’m going to have to wait until next year to see a total lunar eclipse. If it isn’t raining then, too. Of course, if I wait another twenty years, the effect will be even better.

Edits
My thanks to Rob W. for pointing out some linkage problems in yesterdays' posts. These have been repaired. It's what I get for composing in Word prior to posting. Bloody auto-HTML.

Migrations
Sydney increasingly becomes home to me, largely, I suppose, as a matter of routine. The expectation of taking part in specific activities from day to day or week to week allows the unfamiliar to become habit, and it is the disruptions that upset equilibrium. I continue to encounter other foreign nationals making their homes here (but no Americans, at least so far), often as a result of the same or similar sequence of events as my own, i.e., they’ve married in. It’s at least a little interesting to observe the attitudes toward their adopted homeland that my fellow aliens have adopted, particularly insofar as I have observed others from their countries of origin in my own, and the points of view they brought to the US are not so different from those I observe here. Everyone seems to take a degree of proprietorship, first of all, that is, they are more Australian than the Australians. This is particularly true of the British I’ve encountered, but is offset by a national pride regarding their place of origin. The British, again, are pre-eminent in this, but they are closely followed by the Americans. Russians, too, take this pairing, but with a twist in that their pride is ironic, often based on the failings of their country. Middle Easterners, however, like many from the Third World, take a different approach still. Their pride in the motherland is dominant in their attitude, maintaining a separation from the society in which they find themselves. These are, it should go without saying, broad characterizations, and not drawn from a scientific sampling of the population. I find in my own culture-clash tantrums that the issue raising my ire usually stems from non-adaptive frustration, those occasions when I act from habit and am met with, usually, blank stares (“Shrimp? What’s that?”). I’m very sure that most migrants would consider my position enviable indeed. I start from English, for one thing, and the long-standing assumption between Australians and Americans that they share many aspects of their respective cultures (a false assumption, by the way), usually only results in humorous mix-ups rather than the why-don’t-you-go-back-where-you-came-from nonsense immigrants get to one degree or another wherever they move to. I am much more sympathetic than I have been previously to those whose choice to relocate has placed them in truly alien circumstances. The urban environment is daunting enough for country mice within the same overall national culture, so the assumption that the infrastructure is more accessible in cities to alleviate the transition is often mythical in practice. In any event, what is most frustrating to me here really comes down to how little time I have to gad about and gain the kind of in-depth familiarity I am accustomed to having. This isn’t like college, when I could roam the town virtually at will, wherever I was, and learn its length and breadth. I have to go to work now, and while that has certain satisfactions (I know the trains very well and can orient myself quickly so long as I’ve been in a locality at least twice), I have to wait for the weekends to dig through the city, and I’m limited then by domestic requirements. It’s hard to be a grown-up.

Insert Theme Song Here
Is it like Neighbours? Oh, yeah, just like that. Thank you, Shauny, for relieving me of the notion that the question is usually “Is it just like Friends? (which has no similarity to NYC, living or dead, except perhaps a very few place names). All right, that was extreme, but I had to say something, I was compelled to say something. I have been asked about places and such from television and movies, but not often, not usually seriously, as 99% of the people I deal with are with it enough to understand there’s a distinction between real life and not. My impetus to post on this really stems from the fact that after only six months in Sydney, I nearly have the Neighbours lyrics down by heart. “That’s when good neighbours become . . .” good grief.

Time, Gentlemen
The question has been raised more than once: Where do you find the time to post all this stuff? Well, the truth is probably that I don’t really have the time. However, it’s also in the nature of ‘blogging that the contents are usually quite brief. Assertions among ‘bloggers to the contrary, this isn’t journalism, and it sure can’t be considered essay-writing, either. As style becomes content and themes recur and develop over time, the possibility of mining a ‘blog for material towards an essay is conceptually possible, but unlikely, newspaper columnists notwithstanding. As I say, this isn’t journalism, at least not usually, although some ‘bloggers do approach by-line status, especially insofar as they mine the ‘net for news, even if usually to offer acerbic commentary. I have particular trouble, nevertheless, characterizing ‘blogs as journalistic when they can’t spell or manage syntax consistently. Clarity of communication is essential if you’re going to set yourself as a pundit.

It’s Tasteless
Although art is often transgressive and I believe that this can be one of its functions, the work in question is unsupportable, the “artist,” James Peterson, is a creep, and this offensive bit of graffiti needs to be taken down now. What a jerk. I hope he’s arrested and prosecuted.

A Commutation First
Commemorative plaques and statues will be raised to Judge Louis York, of the New York Supreme Court, in honor of his action yesterday in rolling back the subway fare hike. The MTA’s finances have been troubled from the start, even before there was an MTA. The recent dispute over accounting raised by Alan Hevesi seems to have had a positive effect for the public, unusual at any time. But NY’ers have been hearing threats of an increase beyond $1.50 for some time now, even during the fat years, when the MTA was operating in the black. It’s going to cost them some dough to roll back prices, and I know just where it should come from: every NY’er is well aware of the rich executive pay for the top tier of the MTA, so it sounds like it’s time for a little corporate fiscal responsibility-taking in the upper echelons.

Annals of Crime
The US $20 bill is reportedly among the most frequently counterfeited, another being the US $100 note. I haven’t seen any reports of a redesigned $1, other than the coin upgrade from Susan B. to Sacagawea, but the last reissue of $50s, 20s, 10s, and 5s was mostly notable for nothing at all, although there was the apocryphal “folding money prediction” of the WTC murders. One of the most frequent complaints about US money, however, has been its blandness, so many other countries employing multi-colored currencies. That’s all going to change, with the addition of blue and “peach” highlights. This is going to make J. S. G. Bogg’s previous output more valuable, and his future efforts that much more difficult.

Just in Case . . .
you want to kill some time with a cartoon, there’s Fly Guy, an interactive and entertaining bit of web junk. I enjoyed the rockin’ alien dude and the space robot choreography. (Thanks to Isabella V., who’s probably too busy hiding behind dark glasses to notice ‘blog-nods.)

Home Improvement (cont’d)
When I bought my NYC apartment I didn’t do any work on it (except to make a mess of the painting), but it probably could have used some anyway. For my sins, we find ourselves having to deal with minor repairs and enhancements in our new, luxurious Surry Hills apartment. So with the kitchen out of action for the day, we were forced to dine out. The Clove, a local Indian eatery, provided a delicious and satisfying repast, bringing to mind one of the more welcome aspects of Sydney living: all the varieties of Asian cookery. Thai is on offer to such an extent as to be ubiquitous, as is Indian. Vietnamese seems less common, but that’s all to the good, as the options are therefore more often upscale than down (at least until you head out to the suburbs, Ashfield, Strathfield, Lidcomb, etc.). Since getting married I’ve been an at-home vegetarian, using restaurants as an excuse to have a bit of other-sourced proteins, but now I’m pursuing a more fulsome lifestyle change. O.k., I’m only a “pescetarian,” but the prevalence of Asian options helps me quite a bit. I suppose, however, that I will transition even from my current level of food-dissent, now that I must confront sentience among the non-mammalian.

Tama-chan Rescue
The Japanese are a mysterious people. A bearded seal shows up in a river where he’s not supposed to be, and they make him an honorary resident (the complexities of which are documented by a political group known as the Friends of Tama-chan). Then Pana Wave, a doomsday cult, springs up around the little fellow, hailing him as the solution to avoiding the apocalypse. Well, the magnetic poles have not yet reversed as promised, so I’m going with the assumption that Tama-chan is o.k., and the world will not end today. I sincerely hope there’s no repeat of any Aum Shinrikyo activities, just the same.

The Plight of the Employed
Perhaps the heading should read, ”The Plaint of the Employed,” but never mind. The company I work for is the target of an acquisition back in the U.K. This is not something tracked in the daily papers here, so I have to search the internet for news. It’s not imminent, but it’s not good news from my perspective. I was with Shearson when they took over Hutton, and it was less than a year before every Hutton staffer was employed elsewhere or on the street looking for work. Sure, Shearson, too, is no more, having been acquired themselves by JP Morgan (who have since merged with Chase), but that’s no consolation. Here in Sydney, the marketplace for what I do is very small, and the project I’m on is very big, which has resulted in the company taking up a large part of the available resources. If the purchase proceeds, we stand to flood the market with specialized talent, making it pretty tough all of a sudden for some of us to find work again. Still, it’s a long way off right now, so there’s time to consider options, take advantage of what I can, and prepare for what’s next. As they say, it’s easier to get a job while you’ve already got one than when you really need it. An enviable position, then, to be in, although there are some in the world who find their own position to be better still, as for example, the Dole Bludger, a self-made unemployable. I’ve been following his adventures, or lack thereof, for a few weeks, and unless he’s having us on, Meika von Samorzewski has got to be the worst whinger on the web. I’ve encountered plenty of working men and women who complain bitterly of what they do for a living, how much or how little, but I think there’s more to the Bludger’s lack of work than he’s letting on. It can’t just be residence in Tasmania or applying for jobs unsuited to his experience or expertise. In fact, I’m not sure what his skills consist of, unless it’s berating “the system” for failing to entice him into the workforce with anything other than money, or insulting working professionals for finding him an unattractive colleague. Certainly spelling and grammar are not among his strong suits. Well, it’s entertaining anyway, and helps me keep things in perspective. I think I should get some work done now.

’Za
Outside Counsel brings up the issue of the world’s most perfect food: pizza. Well, I suppose there are those who would claim burritos, but I still say pizza; it has everything necessary to sustain life, or can: bread, cheese, veggies, fruit (if you include some chopped pineapple, and I insist on it). While WCA references the dearth of good pizza north of the Bronx, I have found that the pizza-dining experience in Sydney is, by-and-large, superior to that of NYC. In fact, Sydney may be the first place I’ve been in the world that didn’t offer “NY-style” pizza, as either advertising or in content. The wood-fired oven is the most common, and although crust quality may vary, it’s never less than crisp, and the toppings are intensely flavorful. Although I’ve enjoyed deep-dish in Chicago, and have endured more than my share of Penn Station pizza (and if the Roma-style I’ve encountered is representative of what’s on offer there), I’m giving the prize the Sydney’s Italian community for best ever.

Cold Nights, Full of Rain
It’s supposed to continue all week, so tomorrow night is my new favorite to spend indoors, because I get to watch Inspector Rex. Alright, yes, it is Lassie, ultimately, even though the drama usually involves at least one murder. It’s still immensely entertaining. I particularly enjoyed the episode where Rex had to be recertified as a police dog, and beat the course time even though the trainer cheated. He’s an uberhund, that Rex. Unfortunately, I don’t have any faith the show will continue much longer, since outside of Hollywood I doubt anyone really has the money to run a series into the ground before wrapping it up and moving on to something new.

Speaking of Which
Rain, in Sydney, in winter, is torrential. The stuff comes sweeping in, pours down all day, and soaks . . . the harbor. Yes, NSW continues in drought, for over 90% of its area, even though it’s pouring here. The catchments are still under 50% of capacity, and require to be over 60% before we’re relieved of our concerns. On the other side of the equator, I could always look to the weather upstate if the city’s winter had been dry, but here there’s no snow, so no relief. All the rain seems to be coming down on the coast, but it’s the interior where it’s needed most. Outside our (ironically enough) Reservoir Street apartment, the rain pelts down. We’re on the first floor, so we are situated just above the aluminium awning overhanging the ground floor shops and building entry. The rain is therefore hugely amplified in decibels, so very dramatic indeed. The cat sits staring at the windows, her ears twitching like radar antenna, trying to home in on the source of all the noise, as if large mice, millions of them, were scampering just out of sight.

Inland
We took a trip out to Windsor, visiting the grands. We’d been out over the summer from time-to-time, and it was pretty sere. The fire damage, however, showed up very strongly on this trip, the blackened trees and burned-over ground showing up more against the newly freshened green brought about by all the recent rain. This is an odd trip, in some ways, perhaps similar to riding the Long Island Rail Road out to Montauk back before the Hamptons were so built up. Windsor and the towns preceding it along the line are dotted across the landscape, separated by stretches of farmland and countryside. It seems as if Windsor was dropped out in the bush and the other towns built up later. Given the course of development, I suppose this is very possible. Nevertheless, it is the apotheosis of suburban (veggie burger, what’s that?).

Missing the Point
Gearing up in a flight suit and riding in for a photo op on an aircraft carrier isn’t the first time the usurper-in-chief has acted tastelessly to his own advantage (there were those photos for sale of the Prez looking thoughtful as he flew on AF1 to safety back in September 11, remember?), but making a fuss over the accounting misses the bigger picture. After all the talk about being “liberators” and the orders against hanging out the flag in Baghdad, The Idiot couldn’t help himself from acting out of at least one of his ulterior motives: having a war and winning it. Dopey’s flight privileges were revoked back [when he was hiding in plain sight with the Texas Air National Guard] during the Vietnam war. The Dems might want to be taking public issue with the conduct itself, but politicians are generally cowards, so I’m not surprised they would prefer to appear petty rather than principled.

Feedback
In my eternal quest to find out if anyone other than friends and family ever read this thing, I've added a "comments" feature. Below each post is a hyperlink, initially reading "No Comments," but incremented as any such are appended, which is done by clicking the link and filling in the fields on the pop-up comment box. An experiment, for now. Nothing rude, thanks.

Halt (hack, cough, sputter), or I’ll Shoot
The War on Terror™ continues to expand in scope. First we toppled the Taliban, then Iraq. But while the talking heads have been pointing to Syria and North Korea as the potential next targets, it turns out it’s really going to be Post Nasal Drip. O.k., yes, SARS is a real worry, and I shouldn’t joke. I am sympathetic to the dead and their families, and I’m sure those who have suffered through the disease were very frightened by their experience. But authorizing the use of force on travellers exhibiting cold symptoms, as Tom Ridge has now done, seems excessive and deserves to be mocked. Calling SARS a “national security” issue invokes a precedent I’m not sure should be made. These things have a tendency to outlive the administrations that impose them. The “front lines” in the nation’s health consist of the same high school dropouts currently making airline passengers take off their shoes, and even if the National Guard is still being used in airports for security, I don’t have much confidence in ordinary soldiers, let alone the weekenders, to make the kind of fine judgments this kind of situation really calls for. The issue is being represented as a response to groups of infected persons potentially trying to storm their way past the gates into our densely populated cities: germ warfare, in a decidedly lo-tech fashion. This is beyond ludicrous. Has diplomacy been relegated to such a disreputable condition that even the idea of treating people with courtesy and respect is lost? Diplomacy? What about just plain customer service? Remember that one? Hire someone capable of speaking a bit of Mandarin, or Cantonese, and have him or her available. Recruit and educate the flight staff on the routes serving Asia and have them talk to the ground staff. Before we whip out the nightsticks and manacles we really ought to try talking to one another.

Made to Measure
In my former life I would sometimes guess or be called upon to estimate the ambient temperature or the size or distance of something, and despite the best efforts of government, I would do so using the units I’d learned: Fahrenheit, pounds and ounces, feet and inches and yards and miles. At the behest of the Congress, the US made a half-hearted attempt to convert to the metric system back in the ‘70s. Remnants of this persist: speedometers include miles and kilometres, canned goods include ounces and grams. I don’t know what the schools are doing these days, but we were taught rote formulas to use in converting our accustomed measurements to the new system. Probably there are many who learned these things, but I’m not one of them. In fact, I thought the system was, well, stupid. Perhaps my brain was already less amenable to change or my apparently inborn resistance to all things mathematical proved too intractable. Nevertheless, I prefer my current method: give in and accept it. I try now to judge size in meters, weight in kilos, temperature in Centigrade. The hardest thing to relinquish is miles, but I’ve discovered there are many Australians who are similarly stuck. On-line devices are available when I require them. Some are less useful than others; some are comical.

Sense Memory
Although the weather had seemed to be undergoing a warming trend the last two days, this morning it was back to colder, if still sunny. Walking along the footpath to the office from the train station, I could see my breath, prompting me to look for other signs of winter, none of which were apparent: a cockatoo flew overhead, screaming, the paperbarks’ leaves still green (and attached). On the other hand, the green of the leaves drooping from the gum trees was distinctly frosty. I recently finished reading a book called Eucalyptus, by Murray Bail, a prize-winner back in ’99 or ’98 (and like so many books awarded prizes of similar nature, it wasn’t all that), which had some poetic bits about the trees of Australia. One point that registered was the sun/shade issue: Eucalypts are not generally shade trees as such. Even in crowds, the sun penetrates, permeates their leaves and branches. This contributes to the sense of brightness in the air, the “white light” of Australia, as I’ve described it previously. I suppose it’s part of the semi-arid conditions that the trees should be this way. They are open, expansive; their foliage is flung out into the air, as if scattered. This has contributed to my presence here to begin with a nearly unrelenting sense of dislocation, to be present in an alien landscape. Now that the weather has cooled, while the persistence of green may be unusual, it isn’t unexperienced by me, having spent time in winter in Atlanta, which is located along about the same level of latitude in my previous hemisphere, so sense memories haunt me occasionally, most commonly those from days of previous exilic conditions, such as when I was in college. This may be a contributing factor in my persistent nostalgia for Ann Arbor, Michigan, rather than any truly comparable experience or acquaintance.

Alive and Posting
Salam Pax is back, if not on-line yet, and Dear Raed has been updated with what we’ve been missing. I’ve been checking in every morning, and I’m glad to see he made it through. Now if some new entries appear for Isabella V., all my favorite [maybe fictional] diarists will be proven safe [if not sound].

Hardy Stock, Transplanted
Unlike its forebears, the Irish Hunger Memorial has failed to thrive, or at any rate to endure a tough winter in New York. The usual NYC litany of blame and finger-pointing has ensued, but so has the repair work, so I expect the site will be brought up to spec soon enough. I visited there with Mom & Dad the summer before I followed my own immigration destiny and the memorial is indeed very powerful and an unquestionably remarkable work of [public] art. I recommend visiting it, although I’m betting the targeted June completion will not be met.

I Want My HBO
O.k., I stole the line from MTV. Still, after reading Maureen Dowd’s column on Ali G, I really want to see this guy in action. Who do I have to give carrots to?

Sin, Remorse, Penance, and Redemption
It’s a bit over-done, but the on-line tests can be fun now and then. Via Mind the Gap, the Dante’s Inferno Test. I suppose Mom and Dad will be disappointed to learn I am doomed to the second level of Hell. I should have fudged my answers more.

”Find It”
Despite recently uncovering of egregious fiscal mismanagement, the subway fare hike is in effect. I’ve been there many times over the years, and even if I’m not subject to the increase I do sympathize. I have actually been one of those persons who increases the coffers of the MTA by keeping back one token from when they’d change them out: I’ve got a bullseye, a solid, a retro-hole punch. I have only once gone into the subway with only enough to buy a ride a hour earlier, so I understand that frustration, too. The MTA’s philosophy is clear, expressed by the token booth clerk in this article, even if we only pay attention when they up the ante. Somebody in Albany, if not the city itself, ought to be paying more attention.

Representation
I wonder if the present scandal isn’t an opportunity for someone to raise the issue of forming a republic again?

Red Dogs
When the Red Dogs come to Sydney, I’ll be ready.

Quality Time
I dislike the write-up, but I dislike the prospect of the Family Time [and Workplace] Flexibility Act even more. I haven’t worked an overtime-eligible job since I was 14, but I’ve been working these last 30 years, so I think I can still consider myself a working stiff, even if I do wear a tie. This is a wrong bill, and if the Senate hasn’t rejected it out of hand, that strikes me as steps toward enactment. I don’t trust any Senator or Congressman of my former state to fight on this. Frankly, I think Hillary and Chuck are more likely to vote for than against. Politics is all about deal-making, when it isn’t about getting re-elected, and the deals that get made are simple vote-swapping. Don’t count on your elected representatives doing the right thing. They all have websites and email, so get right on it.

Transmission
Would working from home be any help: one thing an office environment is sure to provide is the communication of viruses. After an enforced four-day weekend, I’m probably still as much a danger to others as they apparently were to me. The “down time,” however, did provide opportunities to complete a few of the lesser household chores required by moving in to a new home. It’s been two weeks, and the end is nearly in sight, thank God. The furniture for the balcony should arrive soon, but so, too, will winter, although that doesn’t have the same connotations as it does back in the Northeast, and we’ll likely have an opportunity to enjoy it prior to September.

or Lack Thereof
I’d have liked to have seen the Democratic candidates debate on Saturday, even though C-SPAN appears to be the only channel where it would have been available (and a day later). When last in NYC, we had broadband internet, and it came with a host of additional channels, but I don’t remember seeing these. They must have been there, unless they were replaced by one of the many MTV spin-offs. Here we’ve only got four channels, one of them usually subtitled, one consisting nearly exclusively of the worst US programming, and we find it a lot easier to shut off anything that isn’t news, Buffy, or a movie we’d actually like to watch. This is all digression, isn’t it? The Democratic disarray is to blame, or my present lack of ability to concentrate. I think it’s a bit rich to hear Al Sharpton calling for unity, a “cheap shot” in its own right, as it can only be considered opportunistic in these early days to expect nine candidates to meet for a debate only to agree on everything. I’d also have enjoyed watching Lieberman, that mealy-mouthed creep, if only to boo and hiss whenever he turned up. Really, if you’re going to be a Republican, register with the party. Nobody’s fooled (yes, they are). So far, from previous reading, I’m leaning in favor of John Edwards, but I’d even vote for Gephardt if he was the only one on offer.