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If there is one thing I have learnt since moving to London is that to survive this city you must have money, the other is that it is generally not acceptable to openly fellate a thalidomide sufferer in Leicester Square, in fact such behaviour results in a collective frown and a beating. Perhaps there then, lies the allure. To get money, one must have a job, this is generally harder said than done as, unlike most places I have lived, in London even the most flea-infested incest-derived piece of scrotum meat able to balance upon its legs long enough to spread its filth into the fruit isle is capable of landing a job at ASDA. As luck would have it, I landed a job with the elderly, providing meals on a daily basis. This then, requires a car. With £150 in my pocket I trawled the pages of eBay for the perfect automotive solution, or at least one that did not smell of cats piss and sex. Many days later I took collection of my Skoda ‘Rapid’, an ignominiously title surely derived of hard-brow Czech engineers attempting to get one back at the soviet game plan through calculated irony. Such malcontent can be the only explanation for a sideways opening bonnet ensuring easy loading of the boot from the road. In my short ownership the malevolence of this car has known no bounds. Like a six year old high on sugar and parental indifference in the hot Australian sun it continually threatens to overheat on my frequent motorway journeys only to pester me for fuel, oil and a good bollocking. On one particular trip to south Wales, while I was tied up plotting vengeful pain on my transport in such a way as to not leave me stranded, I hit a squirrel. Screaming like a mental on helium I took it inside and placed it atop the dash. I decided to call him Jeremy and tried to make it comfortable with a wiring loom and some left over condoms from the Skoda’s previous chavy owners and set off for the Swansea Animal Rescue Centre. Along the way I noticed that my friend’s dazed and twitching demeanour had given way to something more limp and glass eyed, no longer could I wait. Immediately I pulled to the side of the road, yanked on the handbrake (remember this, its important) and commenced resuscitation. I clutched his tiny, blood-soaked, body in my left hand and raised slowly, carefully to my mouth taking care the wipe the crusted snot from around its staring eyes and newly dry snout. I puffed delicately filling its fragile lungs then taking time to massage its heart with my right index finger on a repeating loop, but it was no good. Its lungs were full of blood now and my work had only aided in the further spilling of its intestines. A result less pleasing than the one intended. I concluded then, that burial might be appropriate. It occurred to me as I walked amongst the tombstones of a nearby church that smeared with blood as I was, I might be mistaken for a mental. The fact that my coat pocket contained the mashed remains of a squirrel was also likely to support this conclusion. I would have to undertake this alone. There was a shed nearby I suspected likely to contain useful gardening implements like a shovel or some such thing. Lacking a key I flung myself at the door to break it down only to be humiliated by my gaunt frame as I rebounded onto the pavement skinning my knee. I lay there a moment flat to the bitumen behind a privet bush should the vicar be looking for the source of the ruckus, before slinking my way round the side of the hut, there I found a window, and a brick. My entry was assured. In one swift move I delivered the brick into the hut neatly taking out the window in a satisfying tinkling of glass, as quick as I could I scrambled through the frame into the darkness. Feeling around in the dank, sun deprived room my hands feeling about frantically, I was sure any moment I would be discovered by the proprietor of this holy place who might very well grab me by the scruff of the neck and with his sweaty little hands introduce me to ‘the body of Christ’, the dirty fiend. Soon enough though, I’d located a shovel and in one swift motion I’d thrown it out of the shed and followed it through the newly broken window. Time was against me, the light was drawing dim, so I dug keenly by the grave of a woman who died of an unpleasant skin disease, stopping only as I reached the standard six feet. I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out Jeremy and tossed him into the hole. As he lay there, a tangled array of meat and fur, I began my eulogy, remembering how we met on the M4 near Pontarddulais it was an exciting time, I’d never done a eulogy before, traditionally I’d been band from funerals. I walked off down the trail toward my car almost overwhelmed by an inner peace similar, I imagined, to those people you see walking dogs early in the morning inanely discussing the weather. As I rounded the turn I discovered that in my haste I had broken the handbrake and rolled down the hillside and into a tree.
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I have decided, as it would appear, to change the nature of my blog here from being simply a place to post my made up ramblings that accompany my stand-up, but to mix these with actual snippets of me, my last post being testament to this. This is, however, not the only thing that has been occupying my mind of late, the following is an example: Recently I read an article which got me thinking of the concept of diminishing returns with respect to society. As I understand things this is essentially the idea that as systems become more complex not only is more wrought from them, but so less is derived from any unit of energy similar to spreading butter over increasingly large pieces of bread. The analogy for this in society could be our habit of solving problems that face us: rain is unreliable, so we irrigate to produce crops, the canals experience silting so we start a dredging regime, this success affords more people and more irrigation is needed, then we need a management team to coordinate the dredging. What we see now is that we have amazingly complex societies requiring innumerable levels of bureaucratic management systems (none of which, obviously, can directly be producing consumerables). Eventually the complexity reaches a point whereby it is impossible for a single individual to comprehend making a head person, with absolute control, unworkable, so we network splitting responsibility between various hubs. Possibly the ultimate current example is globalisation where there is a vast interconnecting of systems worldwide. This is potentially a vulnerable way of doing things. It is well known that ecosystems (natural, self-regulating networks of often enormous complexity) can be devastated by the introduction, or extinction of a single organism. For instance, kill the bees and you kill the plants that rely on them for pollination, then the animals that feed on those plants, then the animals that feed on those animals, and so on resulting in a new, much more simple ecosystem. The same could be for society. As we deal with diminishing returns in we increasingly stretch supply chains to cope and squeeze our more wealth the systems become tighter and more highly stressed so if there is a failure at one point, it impacts on the next, which impact on the next so on and so forth until a major breakdown is seen. One of the drives for this is profiteering. Capitalism demands profits, which demands efficiency, which demands housing small stocks of goods at the point of sale supported by numerous, small and frequent deliveries from increasingly distant, and centralised points of manufacture. An imaginary example could be a single factory manufacturing antibiotics world wide with an inexplicably complex array of supply chains criss-crossing worldwide supplying hospitals and maximising efficiency. Should a flood hit the factory shutting it down, the demands of efficiency demand limited stockpiling resulting in the world running out of antibiotics within a couple of days. Worse could be a similar example regarding energy production, the power grid collapses due to the knock on effect of a fault at one hub, and the petroleum refineries stop working. Since stockpiling is inefficient fuel supplies collapse in days resulting in no deliveries to the power stations, causing an inability to restart them. And so as further problems and challenges as seen as we increasingly try to strip more from less greater complexity is created to manage or solve these issues exacerbating the need to derive more from less. I thought that possibly, one way to deal with this could be to abolish the price system of capitalism we have, instead having an informed and decisive way of partitioning resources to ensure equal supply of need. This leaves me uncomfortable as this infers some form of technocratic society, or the formation of a technate whereby decision making and partitioning of resources is decided upon by experts who’s knowledge and expertise most qualifies them to do so in combination with the usage of technology to increase efficiency: worryingly reminiscent of Orwell’s 1984. However, this is a false pretence anyway as it implies greater management of resources, meaning increased complexity contradicting the original purpose. Damn it! I’ve thought myself redundant!! Otherwise, we could systematically reduce our complexity. Should we reduce complexity to the point of everyone living in small, rural communities existing by subsistent farming, if we get a breakdown in the system in one community, everyone else continues as before and is unaffected. Unfortunately, I like the benefits if living in this society, in the city of London, and don’t fancy growing my own crops and slaughtering my own pigs. Look at me, all serious, analytical and deep! And doesn’t even get me onto the ramification of a pandemic in such complex systems, or the obsession our world has with irrational beliefs in various sky-fairies that serve to distract us from the important and focus on ritual and who’s bits you may play with, and how! At least then, I will be saying my nonsensical funnies at the Funhouse Comedy Club later this week. Thoughts anyone?
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Following reading Chris's post on the subject I was inspired to do the same. It is my hope that, upon reading this, you will have a mildly enjoyable time followed by a sense of not feeling that you should shun me in public. Either way, Chris: be this on your head. What city did you grow up in? Depends on how anorak you want to be about it. I was born, raised and (presumably) conceived in the town of Gawler which, in later childhood, was incorporated into the city of Adelaide. Gawler was a quiet place, nearly an hour north of central Adelaide wedged between the Barossa Valley (wine) and nothing in particular (wheat, dust). We had a river that, on occasions, had water and a high street on which you could, on occasions catch a train. I spent much of my childhood running about the creek behind my house, climbing almond trees, and playing ‘wars’ with a couple of other local childhood fans of non-conflictual violence. It was a few years before I understood the inherent irony in this, I’ve oft wondered how many hours I spent in the sun dedicated to oxymoronic behaviour as a child not realising that it all only made sense when your six and hold fake guns. Still was better than ‘heading for the hills with a yabbie bashing stick’, seemingly the only other group activity, outside of sport, available that did not make you a girl.  Did you enjoy your childhood? Partially. Platinum blonde and blue eyed I would have been popular with Hitler if it weren’t for my persistent questioning of the origin if God kindergarten (at age 3 I’d been driven around the local kindergartens to choose which I would prefer, evidently Lutherans prefer lavish sand-pits) and his earlier death. I can remember spending extensive periods nailing random pieces of wood together to watch adults attempt to supportively interpret the results and, on at least one occasion, standing on all fours in the sand-pit practicing how to alternate which ‘feet’ touched the sand at any one time just in case I should grow up to be a lizard in the Sahara. At primary school my popularity waned despite my attempts to impress them with my Saharan-lizard imitations. I did not realise it then, but as a boy I was supposed to like sport and fighting, instead I was more interested in the natural world and pretending. To me sport meant standing in a paddock for hours in 40 degree heat waiting for someone to hit a small ball with a piece of wood into my forehead. Or, alternatively, trying to kick an oblong ball the results of which would mean me landing on my back with a fist into my nose. Either way I considered it a sweaty misuse of my face. I had a deep curiosity of the world mixed with a philosophical mind, fuelled by this I asked a fellow student to explain what he meant when he called me a ‘nutcase’. I was disappointed to learn it did not have anything to do with a game involving me being a new type of nut-delivery system, but instead meant several years of running and bleeding, or as they described it ‘hardcore chasey’. Fortunately I was of slight frame and thus good at running and hiding. Consequently I tended to go my own way, provide my own company (for better or worse), watching British comedy on TV, climbing trees, keeping tadpoles, and, at age 7, taking up Violin – not a popular move. This was made worse by my hair’s decision to spontaneously go curly over night leaving me a hair-do that made many an 80’s woman jealous. I then demanded a hair cut and a parting inserted like dads. I did not know then that this, when I would reach my teens, would darken and make it look as though I had a comb-over. When you were a kid what did you want to be when you grew up? A ‘ranger’, working in national parks, or a funny person on TV. Or a cartoonist. What was your favourite toy when you were little? Slate. With this I would construct houses, towns, communities in the rose garden. Then the idea of playing with cars took a purpose: they had homes with people. It allowed me to be my own socialist dictator. Interestingly I became quite adept at creating drainage systems to keep my ‘roads’ free from flooding when the sprinklers went on in the evening. Did you suck your thumb? No, I knew a kid who did in kindergarten. His front teeth stuck out because of it. There was also a kid who ate sand; this too struck me as a poor recreational choice. Proof positive that religion is a bad idea? What was your first best friend's name? David Skafidi (sp?). Unfortunately he too was a nutcase and disappeared with his mother after reception. After that few saw need to compete for my friendship. Until high school that is when my artistic abilities, inherent non-conformity and ability to think were considered to be good things. Are they still your best friend? No. Ultimately my most true ‘best friend’ was Stephen Gauci in high school, although dissimilar in many, if not most, ways we shared similar liberal social attitudes. He was also willing to walk for an hour in the Adelaide sun, and back again, to hire a video to watch for a weekend sleep over. There was little else to do, neither of us owned a yabbie bashing stick. He was also unconcerned about rumours that I may be gay when I started sleeping with ‘Ben’ at 16. Our friendship continues to this day, now that I am openly bi and he is a sales rep. He is, to this day, the closest I have ever had to a brother. Can you name all the schools you ever attended? Yes. Including university/colleges! Who was your first crush? Laura Something Something. I met here in year 8 when I started high school; she was the first girl to speak to me without the intention of spitting on me or distracting me for some boys more violent (though non-sexual) ends. She eventually grew bigger breasts and ‘cooler’ interests. I later moved on to men, then women, then not defining everything by genitalia. Were you a shy quiet kid or a very wild and rowdy kid? Mostly shy, with occasional vocal outbursts. Usually when cornered behind the bike sheds. I was an only child and socially unpopular, through this I learnt the virtues of quietness, caution and band aids. When you were little what did you do for fun? I liked to explore. I would explore up the creek behind my house hiding behind the gum trees from the farmers who actually owned the land. I also loved nature a lot, spending time looking after tadpoles from a small creek nearby (the aforementioned river) that I’d caught in the winter and watching them grow and change. I also loved to travel to the Yorke Peninsula with my grandparents in summer and spend hours on the rock covered beach exploring the tidal pools and catching crabs (ill not qualify this). As a child I wanted to live there, fortunately I later learnt the meaning of ‘redneck fuckwits’ and didn’t. Were you closer to your mum or dad as a kid? Closer to my mother. She would drive me to school talk to me and generally take I direct interest in my world however much she could not fathom it. My father did his best, though his Victorian-style upbringing had taught him to exclude emotion, putting some limitations in. However, we connected well through the enjoyment of british comedies such as Blackadder and the Young Ones. As he was a mechanic I was supposed to take an active interest in cars, however this did not extend beyond minis, beetles and (ostentatiously) Rolls-Royce. I was applauded for liking minis. Little did he know that I would later drive a socialist-styled Skoda.  I was also very close to my grandparents, especially my grandfather who took an especially strong interest in my artistic endeavours. This was made even stronger when my mother went back to work (the financial hardship of relying on only the wage of a mechanic being to much in the end) meant that they would pick me up from school every day, then I would sit down to watch cartoons with my grandfather, or ‘Fufu’ as I called him (I already had one grandfather and he was short, stern and Barbadian like my father). He sat through literally every violin practice between the ages of 7 and 16 (when I started driving), except once, when my uncle was arrested for armed robbery. My uncle latter attempted to steal egg-cups and got shot 8 times. What was the first record, tape or CD you remember buying? As odd as it may sound I took little interest in music beyond understanding music theory and actual performance until my teens. By then I had developed a deep-seated insecurity in revealing my actual likes should they lead to beatings, but had an innate disposition for resisting heard mentality. Fortunately I discovered the radio station Triple J which was popular enough to be safe, but unpopular enough to be ‘alternative. I then bought my first CD by little-known West Australian band 78 Saab and, shortly after, my first CD player. What was your favourite class in school? Drama. I loved delving into the artistic world of telling stories and make believe that was acting. I also discovered that I was good at being a twat in the just the right way that impresses high school drama students and pleased the teacher alike. Win-win! Broke any bones or had any freaky accidents as a kid? Although decidedly accident prone and clumsy I managed to avoid breaking a single bone. I did, however cut my head open slipping off a church pew and got my finger caught in a chair. Fortunately I drank a lot of milk and had a propensity to bounce.
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On my way I saw before me a young girl, overcome with distress it seemed, at the loss of her pussy cat. Quite why the parents of such a child so young should let it loose on the city centre, and why they should teach her to refer to mammalian friend as her pussy, left me bemused. Surely a family so motivated could only hope to bring greater scars into the psyche of one so young than the loss of one solitary cat? I told her so as way of consolation. She stared at me a while, eyes unblinking, before re-doubling her efforts with a shrill wail as she ran toward the Torrens Lake jostling for position with the local traffic. 'God speed little one' I thought to myself as I advanced on the city proper.* I arrived at the Urban Cow Studio above which lives the infamous Rhino Room, my place for saying things tonight. Briefly an image of suburban lesbians constructing dairy scenes from used tampons and corrugated iron flits through my mind. I picked a fight with a passing local to rid me of this imagery; it was a partial success the lesbian art is gone along with one of my cherished teeth: fight lost, but battle won. Smugly I wrested my twisted and bloodied carcass from the trash receptacle whence I found it upon retaining consciousness and hauled it up the stairs to the Rhino Room's entrance where I was greeted by what appeared to be a Colombian drug lord with a notable South Australian Drawl. This then would be Craig Egan, the godfather of the Adelaide Comedy scene, I gave him a sneeze and headed for the toilets; a good place for washing off blood, for it has taps. Later that night, the Rhino Room filled with people, it was truly 'time for the Monkey to do its business' as they say in the business**. Justin Hamilton took the stage to make his utterances, a very funny man, he once wrote and performed a small radio series for Triple J radio, and celotaped a mobile phone to a cat*** As the night progressed Justin introduced a myriad of funny people and Santa, a mythological character used to psychologically manipulate children into conforming to irrational rule setting through the vestiges of fear and oppression similarly depicted in Orwell's 1984****. Why he did this escapes me, him, and the audience till today, a fitting prelude to me. I got on stage and said some things to the comedic delight of people in front of me, I'd hoped as much, but prepared for less. No need for my wood with a nail in it then. The night finished well with Dave Callen regaling us with funny observations of Australians, Tasmanians, the Iris and people who could not understand him, which was great as I didn't. * A misnomer yes, for Adelaide is no proper city. I make no guarantees of factual accuracy, or ironic fallacy for that matter ** Animal poaching *** To give is head cancer. **** Like a friendly Jesus
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After a weekend of vomit and unmentionables, I dragged diseased corpse to Andrew O’ Neil’s comedy night ‘The Troy Club’, impressed that I had recovered enough not to cancel I was elated to find out Sarah Kendal was headlining! Yes, I was on the same bill as Sarah Kendal, it was awesome; I used to watch her in all her ginger glory on TV in Fortunately I make an ugly woman; in fact just the mere sight of me in make-up makes me want to stab me in the eye with a hair-curler if it weren’t for the loss of depth perception and unspeakable pain. Consequently, given my general dislike of my crossdressed self, and the sheer impossibility of the whole procedure, dear Sarah’s rights must be respected. Pity.
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Well, it has happened, guess the time had to come eventually: I have arrived at that pestilent juncture of narcissistic self promotion and flagrant copyright flouting that is YouTube. Some months back, in a little room in the aptly named "Spitalfields", I was foisted upon an unsuspecting crowd and, apparently filmed. Turn forward a few months and spliced with vacuous babbling and stock footage of a wayward, jury toting bus, there I am! My hard work, blood, sweat and tears cut to shreds and inserted into the dank throws of some man's 'work' like so many Victorian whores! The bastards! Filthy, fucking bastards! Defecating on my salubrious creativity for their licentious aims, as can be seen here:
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During the fetid years that were the '80's I spent many a childhood hour in Gawlerian classrooms surrounded by gormless human refuse that populated that carbuncle on the picturesque wine-toting world, the
There once was a man from Nantucket Sat in the dark cried "fuck it!" He took out a knife And caused some strife As into his arm he sunk it
I got detention for using a cuss word. Was I wrong?
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Recieved a nice comment on myspace today: "WHAT A HERO YOU ARE SIR! You made a great joke with my drunk friend adam, about how you wud piss in his toaster!" I can but make my family proud.
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Tis the day after the night before (the day being now, or then, and the night before being literal. However all irrelevancies aside it seems a productive night was had by all, but what of the day I hear you ask? I guess that depends on your perspective, and to who’s day you refer. For instance: should you be taking the relativist stance regarding the day of a six year old sacrificial virgin her day was clearly highly productive and of the utmost importance to her cosmologically speaking (culturally relative) or a terrifying experience of ritualistic murder (six year old sacrificial virgin relative). So make your mind up for fuck’s sake*. Last night the stage at the Soho Comedy Club was primed by the increasingly incoherently humorous ramblings (primed seemingly by using wine to lubricate the subconscious utterances of his mind to bring together an impressively competent, and uniquely eccentric, take on running a comedy night**) of the lamentable genius <lj user="chris_coltrane">, the audience, and four members of my family lay in wait. I suspected they had been lured there by the propensity for me to die on stage, literal or metaphorical as their interpretation may have been, I apparently did not: death is as life isn’t, and so am I. Apparently. Head held high I bid them farewell by the family custom of attempting to wrap one another’s head in cling film*** and they skulked off in the general direction of Russell Square as, triumphantly, Chris Coltrane, Joy Acharjee, the guy who broke Russell Brand****, and I charged into a night of psychosis tinged with wine. A fitting end. * Ugaminor Fuck, six year old sacrificial virgin: you owe her that much or not. ** ie well done *** it is oft said that asphyxiation makes the heart grow fonder. Mostly by Douglas Screet-Mc Twickenham of Yatala Labour Prison, **** law suits pending
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Today is another day, time gets predictable that way. Chronologically it plods on inevitably reaching the next after the last is past; such is life outside the singularity. Similarly does the number of blog views increase, ever pressing forward, now reaching that most inevitable of numbers: 666. A beauteous demonstration of the much maligned dulladry that is numeric advancement, and one oft listened to by the devoutly religious, and mentally ill alike. That this milestone should land on the same particular day as my car, bulbous and abhorrent, stumbles into an lumpy idle would seem only natural, expected even, of the above mentioned*. Each asthmatic cylinder misfiring as if taunting me, mocking my mechanical ineptitude like a contemptuous art teacher convulsing from the larynx in retort at my charcoal sketch of a goat. blood vessels swollen with glee almost to the point of bursting, displaying my failure to the class in an act of disdain he yells ‘no stars for you’, fellow students extolling their derision with a cacophony of linguistic asides such as ‘Tyson’s a wanka!’. While I sit, expressionless, psychological balance dripping from every orifice. I bide my time, nobody shall insult my goat. This time however, the ovine insulter was merely a faulty fuel gauge rather than Neolithic aggressors sitting rank and file in art class and one quick siphon from a nearby Astra and I was on my way. *Perhaps a moot point as both groups often enter into a state of arrogant rapture over such coincidences, the difference appears to be one saw it coming reading between the lines of a particularly popular literary work, the other saw it coming reading between the lines of Blankety Blanks.
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Today is D-day. Had an interview for a new job working with the elderly and vulnerable on Monday, today they call me to offer me the job, or rip my heart out like callous employment vultures. Heartless bastards, how dare they pervert the course of vocational justice? But I digress, or more accurately: pre-empt. I put in a fantastic interview performance, my hair newly cut, a freshly cleaned suit complete with matching cummerbund, not a blood stain to be seen, or explained for that matter. Things went well; I answered their questions, quickly concisely and with a minimum of irreverent expletives. Showing leg suggestively I explained my impetus toward highlighting the horrendous issue of elder abuse in society (the Venus Razor surely gave me an edge here methinks). The look on their faces showed I had truly made an impression as I regaled them with my story of how I highlighted this issue to a reluctant public by brutalising an 80 year old in a nearby park, not one person came to her aid: what better demonstration is there of public apathy? Appalling. I knew I had done well as they thanked me for my time and escorted me out of the building, they did not even have to complete the interview; as they say in Iceland: þessi er minn mittisband!
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irate
contemplative
accomplished
ecstatic
morose