Phil Gomes kindly suggested on another thread that I should stop blogging for the evening and go fishing or go to the pub. At least I think he was being kind. But I had to decline his suggestion.
I detest fishing with a passion. Yes, I know it’s utterly un-Territorian to confess to such a thing, but it’s true just the same. It comes from my childhood when we used to go to my grandmother’s holiday shack at Empire Bay near Gosford every single bloody school holidays and be taken fishing day after bloody day. I have quite pale skin and used to get sunburnt red raw, get hooks stuck in my fingers and fishing line tangled around me. Once I even fell through a rotten board on Empire Bay wharf and cut myself really badly and needed stitches.
And I was really ticklish when I was a kid (still am for that matter, but only on the back and not all the time), and my cousins used to trap me at Empire Bay and tickle me unmercifully. Once I even spasmed so much that I put my head through my grandma’s best china cabinet while the cousins were tickling me. All these memories mean that I associate fishing with pain and extreme displeasure and discomfort. If I want fish I buy it at a fish shop.
As for the Bark Hut or Humpty Doo pub, I’m a city boy. Sipping a Tooheys Old on the veranda at the Beachfront Hotel at Nightcliff is as uncivilised as I want to get. And anyway, jen and I are both too tired to go out tonight. I’ve had a long week and a stressful day fending off the CDU senior admin’s latest plot to cut back the Law School’s staffing and resources below even their current abysmal levels. I think we succeeded, but worrying about it over the last few nights (and seriously contemplating walking out and going back to private practice even though I hated it for my last few years before I escaped) is very stressful indeed. Blogging is quite a good way to take my mind off it for a while.
all that history is very touching Parish – has it not occurred to you to get to the point?
the ‘girlfriend’ bit would have passed you by entirely
I am not a girl and I’m not sure just how far the definition of friendship can be extended before it becomes something else.
Future approved monikers could include, woman, partner, jen, unbelievably fantastic and I’m so fortunate jen that you are with me, etc,etc,etc.
‘girlfriend’ indeed! huh!
Haven’t touched a drop tonight, or a blog very often – watched JP2’s funeral and then the doco on sbs about disability & sex. But I had a few merlots Wednesday night and saw a jazz band so it’s all good.
Ken – after almost 6 months not working in academia, I can assure you I’m not missing the stress.
Rule 15 of the bloggers handbook states, and I quote: It is never wise to allow one’s significant other to read one’s blog.
But … but … but … It wasn’t me who called you ‘girlfriend’. I just ignored the misconception because it was silly and irrelevant to the topic under discussion. And anyone who actually bothers to pay attention to what you and I write here is well aware that we’re partners/spouses etc not “girfriend/boyfriend”. Am I really required to answer for the errors of casual blog readers? Apparently so. I must have missed that rule when skimming the handbook. Oh well, it’d been at least a week since the last domestic. Who needs domestic peace when life at CDU is so calm and pleasant? And who needs privacy when you can air personal issues on a blog?
well there’s no talking to you these days, since you’ve fixed your arse on the most important chair around here. I HAVE to resort to communicating via troppo. It is becoming increasingly clear to me that unless I appear on a screen I just won’t get noticed around here at all. Except as a functionary (all the usual female functions) that is.
Mark
To respond to your very sensible suggestion on another thread, I’m pleased to tell you I’ve charged my mobile AND turned it on AND I answered my first call for months just yesterday – so it works I still don’t know my number, but Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Growing up in a seaside town in Pommie land close to the sea, a swag of years ago and then some, fishing was an excuse for a variety of childhood exploits and now fond memories. Fossicking for rusty fish hooks around the huts of the professional fisherman to be used with line that no self respecting fish would deign to favour was part of learning the gentle art of doing bugger all with a purpose. I still enjoy contemplating the meaning of life, and understanding the truth that comes from the odd mug of wine, at the beach or along the banks of the Swan, ever wary of the Waugyl. Each to their own, I suppose!
I cannot imagine what is in the mind of CDU trying to reduce the staffing level in the law school, it seems to teter on the brink of marginality at best. For God’s sake, and for that of a few others as well, hang in there! Whereas “fishing 101” , or perhaps based on your past experience “301” can be viewed as an optional subject; but probably far less important than sorting out an endearing sobriquet or title for Jen; primus inter pares must be dispensing wisdom and understanding in public and administrative law. (Jen is probably aware that selfishness is an endemic male trait!) The most important maxim therein being “don’t let the bastards grind you down”. There’s a weekend of footy on the box, and the Territory hasn’t to the best of my knowledge and belief run out of grog yet – so avagoodweekend.
“unless I appear on a screen I just won’t get noticed around here at all …”
Now don’t be like that, love of my life. Your virtual self is omni-present. How could it be otherwise? Shall I compare thee to a wet season’s day? Sweaty armpits and a big noisy thunderstorm? The Sistine Chapel? What’s that you say? Just a fucking building? Where’s the romance in your soul, my poppet? … Oof! (covers crotch a split-second too late) … So, it’s spaghetti on toast and the couch in the spare room then, is it? Sigh …
John,
Now you are obviously a man who knows how to communicate with a woman. Expressions like ‘sobriquet’ will melt the most fearsome termagant. Thankyou John, for just being you and restoring my faith in the horrors of mankind.
Yes Parish I’m coming to you, or perhaps I have better things to do. Like watch you make ONE cup of coffee.
See what I have to deal with? This man is beyond selfish this man is OBLIVIOUS …. and sometimes so sweetly so. He does do his best in his own academic middle aged way, but all too often leads me to understand why every other woman in his life has had to leave.
Yes Parish. Harsh words indeed.
As you well know by now, ‘parting is such sweet sorrow’.
However, you are fortunate in that I am not just any other woman. I am jen the magnificent. A post feminist woman. Who can absorb and observe all your personal peculiarities with interest and impunity. Who can leap high chapels and adore sweaty armpits. Lucky you!
I can’t tell you all how worried I am about Jen. It’s that vicious, deluded bitch side that emerges from the depths of her psyche every time she has a drink. And hitting the gin at this time of the morning? It’s looking ominous indeed. I noticed only in this morning’s news how Princess Caroline of Monaco’s third husband has just been admitted to hospital with pancreatitis. And we all know what causes that don’t we, Mrs Latham? And Jen often claims to be the illegitimate daughter of Prince Rainier, born after a night of illicit passion with the delectable Margot Fonteyn after he tired of the ice maiden-like delights of Grace Kelly, and abandoned outside Spencer Street Station to be raised by Paul and Patsy of Glen Waverley as their very own. But that high-strung artistic temperament just can’t be denied. Judy Garland without the singing talent. Woman does not live by Zoloft alone, though, or Gordons and tonic either. It’s the dreadful suburban ordinariness of it all. Her tortured soul rebels. We have to make allowances, but sometimes it tries the patience of even a saint like moi.
Confucious say “Man in hole should keep digging”
Wickstein say “Parish in da shit again!”
I thought everyone drunk tonic for the quinine to ward off the ravages of mosquito borne disease. Do people actually drink it to get rid of the taste of juniper?
And the very sad thing Scott, the thing you may not be aware of, is that Parish is never happier than when he IS in the poo. His scatological tendencies are very private but exceedingly pronounced. Now, just last weekend the man had the time of his life with a severe bout of diarrhea, much to the discomfort of myself and jes.
He loves the bog and is currently installing a small terminal in there in order to facilitate his deep thinking on the weighty issue of federalism.
Which brings me to my next point.
Chris on another thread has called for creative thinking on this issue. Well let me assure you Chris there is not a creative bone in the Parish corpus.
Not ONE original idea in that bleat above.
But you would already know, his retention level is very high and information sticks to him like the proverbial (excuse my language) shit to a blanket.
So he fondly recalls my verbal wanderings and meanderings. And then has the hide to regurgitate the lot. And paint my dear self as a vicious, bi-polar, alcoholic who doesn’t appreciate the fine upbringing I was afforded by my foster parents in Glen Waverley.
Honestly, if Patsy was to read this she’d turn in her grave. She would! After all the love she and Paul have poured into me.
Unlike the random splatters of affection I’ve come to expect from Parish.
Oh John, I knew you were different. Thankyou for warning me. It has all become so terribly clear. The sounds that have been emanating from the bathroom are not his bowel movements at all. They are the insidious gurgling of the test tubes in which he is distilling foul poison.
Yes, now I understand. The constant plying with delicious beverages, the occasional blogpost acknowledging my existance, the regular chewing on the insane root, the resignation I took for tolerance.
Yes, life is indeed a tale told by an idiot and I, it would seem signify, nothing.
Turning in her grave? My goodness! Patsy sounded perfectly well the last time I spoke to her on the phone a few days ago. You see, this is what I’m up against, the frustrated creative spirit for whom truth is just a flexible commodity, grist to the mill of the endlessly evolving melodrama of life. As sands through the hourglass … How must it be to live with Wen or Sophie and see vignettes from last month’s tiff appear in distorted form in some novel or short story?
But I must confess that the co-dependency drama triangle is strangely addictive too. The role of patient, eminently reasonable rescuer fits me like a glove, and can so easily segue into the even more satisfying patronising persecutor persona. Even the self-abased victim role, lashed by the razor-sharp tongue of a pitiless beloved one, is strangely piquant. Who doesn’t identify with the wise judge who steals away from his chambers twice a week to be whipped into pleasurable submission by a leather-clad dominatrix?
Of course, prudence might dictate silent, suffering forebearance of the semi-fictional trials and tribulations of suburban domesticity. People might take them literally (like Scott, for instance). But then how would we manage to postpone without guilt tasks like vacuuming the house or sewing cushions or planting lawn?
that’s right, chain me up to the mop. Call me to account, Rationalise play.
‘jen, are you gonna move your shit off the table anytime soon?’
‘I’m doing it!’
I thought troppo season was over up north?
I turn him into an arch villain and he persists in being a suburban husband.
Troppo?
Scott. If only!
Ken I thought that your musings of the past week were of an eschatological nature in contemplation of the void to be. Now Jen suggests that they are scatological, I’m confused!
The two may be closer together than you think, John. I certainly felt like I was dying at one stage of last week’s diarrhoea bout (that bit wasn’t fictional, unfortunately). And Christ may well have thought “shit happens” shortly before he got his act together and said “forgive them, father, for they know not what they are doing”.
I thought that you were seeking matriarchal forgiveness (sewing cushions et al), rather than patriarchal foregiveness, but then again, maybe he’s not the Messiah, maybe he’s just a naughty boy after all? At least we now know that you are not anally retentive.
On a more serious note, the “West Australian”, a local advertising sheet that sometime carries news, carried an AP article today: “Court finds mercy for suicide helper”. A man, Huntingdon Williams, who helped his cancer stricken frined commit suicide, has been given special probation by a Connecticut Court. All records of his conviction will be erased after a year if he meets the terms of his probation. His friend, Welles was dying of prostrate cancer, and Williams provided him with a gun and discussed the most effective spot to aim the weapon. Welle’s sister said that she thought William’s “is a wonderful man and he did a wonderful favour for my brother.” The article also mentions a retired UK police officer who was given a suspended sentence after admitting killing his terminally ill wife. The article notes that currently under WA law, patients are allowed to refuse medical treatment, but any active involvement in a person’s death is illegal.
The saga continues: mors janua vitae
Ken,
I’m interested in the law faculty biffo. Have you talked to the Law Students Society? It’s now the largest student group on campus, far outstripping my modest little band of do-gooders and ruffians.
I expect that with a little assistance from old student politics hacks they could perhaps get the Council to rethink its position.
Jacques
It’s hopefully mostly a transitional situation pending recruiting additional staff, and I think we have agreement on something that’s vaguely tenable, so let’s not get too carried away.
Well that’s good news. Let us know if it changes.
Here’s a sweet ballad that jen might appreciate:
The Lament of the Computer Widow
(Holly Tannen)
John Anderson, my jo, John
I wonder what you mean
To sit awake so late the noo
At that Macintosh machine
You’ll bleerit a yer een, John
Oh why do you do so?
Come sooner tae your bed at e’en
John Anderson, my jo
John Anderson, my jo, John
When that you first began
You had as good a tail-tree
As any other man
But noo its waxen wan, John
And wrinkles to and fro-
I blame it on that Macintosh
John Anderson, my jo,
And oh, its a fine thing
To have twelve megabytes
But its a muckle finer thing
To see yer hurdies fyke
To see yer hurdies fyke, John
And strike the rising blow
Tis then I like yer system tools
John Anderson, my jo
I’m backit like the salmon
I’m breestit like the swan
My wame it is a dovecote
My middle you may span
From topknot tae my tail, John
I’m like the new-fa’en snow
And you can’t say that o’ your Macintosh
John Anderson, my jo
The music’s here:
http://sniff.numachi.com/~rickheit/dtrad/pages/tiJOHNAND2;ttJOHNAND.html
Ken,
Given that CDU law’s current budget-slashing round is symptomatic of what’s happening in Australian higher ed generally, you may be interested in blogging on this recent HC case:
Koehler v Cerebos (Australia) Ltd [2005] HCA 15 (6 April 2005)
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/high_ct/2005/15.html
As a matter of narrow, “black-letter” law, it’s pretty unremarkable. The broader bottom-line, however, is that the High Court is truculently oblivious to the modern realities of enforced over-work (the unsuccessful appellant was suing for stress related injury after being retrenched, then re-employed as a part-timer to do her former full-time job).
To quote the neo-Dickensian Callinan J:
“If asked to do more, or if what she agreed to do was more than she could do, then it was for her either to refuse to do it at all, or to relinquish her position. Every responsible position makes its demands upon the person occupying it. As Lord Scott of Foscote succinctly put it in his dissenting speech in Barber v Somerset County Council:
‘Pressure and stress are part of the system of work under which [people] carry out their daily duties. But they are all adults. They choose their profession. They can, and sometimes do, complain about it to their employers.'”
Paul
I found Callinan J’s comment:
“With enough imagination and pessimism it is possible to foresee that practically any misadventure, from mishap to catastrophe is just around the corner. After all, Malthus in 1798 famously predicted that the population of the world would inevitably outstrip the capacity of the Earth to sustain it. The line between a risk that is remote or extremely unlikely to be realized, and one that is far-fetched or fanciful is a very difficult one to draw.
In my opinion, it was far-fetched and not foreseeable that the appellant, a competent, seemingly well woman [26] would suffer within six months of taking up a part-time position, a disabling psychiatric injury, or indeed, any psychiatric injury by reason of the work that the position entailed”
equally disturbing as the quote cited. It suggests a peculiar insensitivity of the Court to work induced psychiatric illness. The Japanese, amongst others, certainly have been aware of the link between psychiatric illness and overwork – karoshi (see http://www.apmforum.com/columns/boye51.htm.
If overwork can result in the estimated deaths of 10,000 salarymen a year in Japan (1990 statistic), despite a certain insularity surrounding the Court, it is hard to imagine that the Court would hark back to Malthus, when more relevant information is readily at hand.
Finally, someone who understands the futility of fishing and would rather be somewhere else entirely. I hear you Ken.
Soy satisfying but if you drink saki you will be soyrry!
Very sake pun, Homer, and in the wrong thread – d’oh!
Me, I’m waiting for the Soylent Green Beer. Mmmmh…soylent green…
Green beer, yellow snow
Makes unattractive prospect
Please reconsider
Now that Homer has derailed this thread, I wanna share with you some of the kinda hot guitar pickin’ I reckon he’s really into.
http://www.ifilm.com/viralvideo?ifilmid=2668101&bw=56
Don’t thank me, thank the godlike genius of Tommy Seebach and his Hot Porno Sideburns Quartet.