is 'so what' by pink the worst song ever?

hmmm.. probably not, but it's certainly up there.

speaking of dreadful songs, how bad is that new katy perry song 'hot n cold'? i thought she'd plumbed the depths of bland, soulless dross with 'i kissed a girl' but the aural spam being flogged on commercial radio at the moment proves that her well of mediocrity runs truly deep... as does the well of unthinking simpletons who buy whatever they're told to by the corporate music 'biz'.

and don't even get me started on gabriella cilmi..

arrrghhh.

the dream becomes reality

there's gonna be a lot written about barack obama's ascension to the presidency and most of it written by people far more eloquent and insightful than me. still, i may as well add my two cents worth.

the thing that struck me most today is the sense of history and potential. it was the same sense of awe and excitement felt when nelson mandela was released and also when he was subsequently elected as president of south africa. it was the same feeling of history i felt when the berlin wall was torn down. i felt the same when our prime minister finally said sorry to the stolen generation. these moments are so rare that when they occur they're to be savoured.

george bush jnr has done incredible damage to the reputation of the usa around the world and leaves the country in a mess with a staggering national debt and two unsuccessful wars. barack obama brings hope and a chance for america to rediscover its soul. i only wish martin luther king had lived to see this day.

bring on the change

it's been 8 years since george bush jnr literally stole the 2000 usa election. in that time we've seen the tragedy of the terrorist attacks on the world trade centre and pentagon in 2001 and the moral bankruptcy of the invasions of afghanistan and iraq. we've seen the insidious corruption of the values we claim to hold dear through the evil of the guantanamo bay detention camp and the associated use of torture techniques and incarceration of people without charge for years on end. we've seen the usa using 'black sites' to bypass their human rights obligations. we've seen levels of rhetoric against foreign nations at levels not seen since the cold war.

it's been a tumultuous time and one in which the hope for a return to honourable government seemed a long way off. a year ago we managed to give little johnny garden gnome the arse and all polls indicate the people of america will tomorrow give the worst warmonger in the world today the same treatment. i truly hope america votes in barack obama as the next president. whilst the idea of an african american president is exciting in itself, it's the potential obama brings to the role which is inspirational. he's got a lot of work to do in order to restore the reputation of the usa after the bush years but if anyone can do it i reckon obama can.

little pleasures

how often it's the small things that bring such pleasure. i've just been listening to lou reed's masterpiece 'transformer' and found myself rejoicing in david bowie's angelic 'bom bom bom's in 'satellite of love'. pure brilliance from a musical genius.

my new additions

a little over a week ago the population of my flat tripled when i brought home a couple of cats. they are both from the cat haven and would've been put down if a home hadn't been found for them. they have very different personalities but both are very cute and it's great having them around.

DYLAN

dylan is one of those cats that very quickly makes friends with anyone around. she's not overly clingy and doesn't like to sit on one's lap, but she does like a bit of attention. she was around 10 months old when i got her and quickly established her dominance over oprah. she's gradually accepting oprah's insolence and engaging in some play with her. she also loves spending time out on the balcony watching what's going on in the world around her


OPRAH

oprah started out as a very timid cat who was frightened of her own shadow. she's still quite skittish but not nearly as bad as she was. as i type, she's curled up on the lounge next to me which would've been inconceivable a week ago. although dylan's trying very hard to maintain her dominance through hissing and growling i get the feeling that in time oprah will become the dominant cat. she's already become very cheeky to dylan and is certainly the more inquisitive of the two. she has also developed an unnerving habit of jumping up onto the balcony railing and walking along it.

so, that's my two new housemates. i'm still a dog person but it's not really feasible to have a dog here and mum said she'd look after the cats for me if i ever want to go away so it made the choice pretty easy. besides, cats are a helluva lot easier to look after as they're not so labour intensive and quite happy to amuse themselves... usually by sleeping.

nothing in particular

it's been a couple of weeks since i last posted so i feel duty bound to put something up. life goes on through many little enjoyable experiences rather than any big bangs. tonight is poker night at the stamford arms so i'll be heading off shortly. it's free to play and a pretty good night with a cupla pints and a few hands. i made the final table on tuesday night so hopefully tonight will be another good one.

it was good to catch up with katie, reg, kath, nath and marco on saturday night for a chat, a debate over daylight saving and some poker (hmmm.. do i sense a pattern emerging?). i've also volunteered for a couple of shifts as parking attendant at claremont oval for the show parking. this is the biggest money earner for the footy club each year so i thought it was about time i did my bit as i've been a member for 21 years now and not really done any voluntary work. it turned out to be quite enjoyable as i met some of the club stalwarts and we had some good chats. it was an especially big thrill to have a beer and yarn with john o'connell who is a legend of the claremont footy club.

so, time to head off to poker and hope for that elusive royal flush

well done hawks

what a fantastic win by the hawks today. i decided to barrack for them a week ago when the saints were knocked out as i wanted to see crawf finally get a premiership. it was sad for the cats who such as blake and lonergan who missed out last year but the hawks were the best team on the day. there's no doubt they can improve from here as blokes like buddy, hodge, junior rioli and bateman continue to mature. it's just a shame for them they've gotta overcome freo next year.

chair sniffing inc.

ok.. i'm laughing a lot right now. i'm watching 20 to 1 on channel nine and they're counting down the top twenty 'all aussie scandals' and guess who's come in at number 4? yep, our very own chair sniffing, bra snapping, drunk-at-work state treasurer..

.. TROY BOOZEWELL

whilst it did have me laughing, i realised very quickly that i'll be laughing out the other side of my face when this buffoon gets his hands on our state economy. he's just lucky he's not working in a normal workplace as he'd have been sacked long ago.

graham maybury was asking tonight what we learned from the state election and what i've learned, or rather had confirmed, is that wa voters are not particularly bright.

don't blame me...

so the national party has decided to support a minority liberal government. personally i believe this to be the worst decision that could have been made for our state but i appreciate their reasoning. it appears that the key factor in their decision is that the support of an independant will also be required and they don't want to have to work with the greens as would be the case if they'd supported labor. during the past week, supporters of both main parties have tried to claim some sort of mandate from the people that would obligate the nationals to work with them. this is simply a load of rubbish. neither party won a majority of seats and therefore neither party has a clear mandate.

my own belief is that the liberals have shown in the leadup to the election that they're not even capable of running their own party in a mature and professional manner so they're certainly not in a position to run the state properly. still, they are now in power for at least the next four years so i hope they are able to surprise me and run this state in a compentent manner. still, i may as well say this now as i reckon i'll be saying it a lot over the next four years...

... don't blame me, i voted labor

go the saints

it's finals time and, as usual, freo's started the offseason early so i should nail my colours to the mast for who i'll be barracking for in the finals. i love watching the cats and the hawks play but nothing would give me more pure joy that seeing robert harvey walk off the mcg on grand final day with a premiership/norm smith double. the man is an absolute inspiration and deserves to be a premiership player. obviously it'll take some sort of dramatic divine intervention for anyone to stop geelong and i won't be upset to see them win as they've clearly been the best team for most of the season but my heart is with the saints.

gold coast football club

what an absolute disgrace. not since the west coast eagles slithered forth from the sewers in 1986 has a new team been handed a premiership on a plate as blatantly as the new gold coast footy club. it's been announced that they're to have 9 of the first 15 picks in the 2010 draft, including 4 of the first 5. they will also start the season with 48 senior players (10 more than anyone else) and an extra $1 million in total player payments. the whole idea of the draft and salary cap is to provide an equal playing field for all clubs and for them to be compromised to this extent is nothing short of obscene. it particularly irks me when i think back to the raw deal freo got when we joined.

it's been announced on the footy show tonight that they don't even have a nickname. what sort of club is this? at least their gay lifeguard mascot makes ours look like marketing genius. i'm just waiting to hear their club song now cos i'm hoping like mad it's even worse than ours cos at the moment only the port bogans and e-girls are worse than our dirge.

howard sattler: man of the people

if this was 1992 i'd have added the word 'not!' at the end of that title, but it isn't so i didn't.

it's been reported that poor howard the coward has had to reduce the asking price on his house from the "high $6 million mark" to just $5.75 million. now, i don't have a problem with someone being wealthy and readily accept that many wealthy people have earned their money. howard is different. the man is a parasite who feeds off the misery and dissatisfaction of his listeners. he presents himself as a man of the people when the reality is the only time he's likely to encounter people who fall into his listener demographic is when they serve him his food or service his car.

i've had the misfortune of listening to his malevolent diatribes whilst waiting for the sports programme to come on and it is truly the most base of gutter journalism that shamelessly appeals to the lowest common denominator. the sooner this cancer is removed from our airwaves, the better.

the end of footy

well, it's the last weekend either of my teams are playing this season and it's ended on a high note. i headed to subi oval on friday night without any great expectations given the number of injuries and retirements the club's had. the most enjoyable wins are the ones you don't expect so to see my boys give collingwood a good hiding was very satisfying. it's been a pretty disappointing season (yet again) but the future's looking up. we've got some pretty promising kids who are hard at the ball and prepared to do the gutsy things. we've got a lot of room on the list and an early draft pick. i just hope the club takes this opportunity for a fresh start and plans for the future rather than following our past of trading for a big name.

yesterday was a big day for claremont. we've been anchored to the bottom of the ladder for a lot of the year and were looking at getting our first wooden spoon since i started barracking for the club as a 10 year old in 1981. we were also coming up against the second placed team on their own dungheap so things looked grim. it turned out to be a tight game and my boys acquited themselves very well. the game was up for grabs at 3/4 time and kerry gave a pretty inspiring talk. the last quarter was a see-sawing affair but my boys held their nerve and fought back every time souths kicked a goal. the win lifted us off the bottom and the form of the young players bides well for next season.

so, it's into the finals for the next few weeks and then i'll have weekends all to myself.. and i'll be counting down the days til next season starts.

tigers, a derby and shauny mac

what a great weekend for footy. on saturday my tiger cubs kept alive our hopes of getting off the bottom of the ladder by beating east freo by 64 points. i've been quite critical of roger kerr's coaching this year but i reckon i may have judged him a bit early as his game plan seems to be coming together. we've got a lot of first year players who are starting to show some very promising signs and as long as they don't all get drafted to victorian afl clubs, we should get some great service out of them next year. ian richardson's the pick of the bunch and is a real ball of excitement. every time he gets anywhere near the ball, he draws huge calls from the members' stand and is becoming a real cult hero at tigerland.

sunday was a bittersweet day as we trounced the e-girls but said goodbye to shaun mcmanus. shauny mac is one of those old fashioned players who's not particularly blessed with silky skills, doesn't have a pretty haircut and will never be described as 'metrosexual' but has a heart like phar lap. he's worn his passion for the club on his sleeve and over the past 14 years and has eked out every last bit of ability in his quest to make the club successful. to my mind, macca was part of a trilogy that also contained troy cook and dale kickett. all three were passionate about the freo footy club and they were all hard as nails but exceptionally fair players - the demolition derby of 2001 excepted in kicketty's case (although it could be argued that phil read deserved everything he got and probably more). i'm really going to miss watching macca play. it was always an adventure when he got the ball and i'm sure a small part of my hair loss is his responsibility.

while we said goodbye to an important part of the club's past on sunday, we got another look at the future and it's looking pretty rosy. the new young players are hard at the ball and exciting to watch. palmer is always willing to get under the packs while mayne and ibbotson seem to have no fear. i'm really looking forward to next season as things can only get better.

great win

what a fantastic win! to lose pavlich before the game was always going to put us at a disadvantage and could have been disasterous. instead, i reckon we learned an important lesson about going forward and spreading the goals around. there's no doubt pav is the key forward for us but i feel we often tend to be a bit 'pav-centric' which can be costly. today the young fellas really stepped up and showed that this club has a positive future. we still need to work on our skills as we turn it over a bit too much but hopefully that will get better. now we just need to recruit well in the draft and we can be looking at a spot in the eight in the near future.

bring on the slime next week!

finally a good footy weekend

finally i have a double reason to cheer after the weekend with claremont and freo both notching impressive wins.

my (once) mighty tigers have kept alive our hopes of avoiding the wooden spoon as we're only a game behind east perth but ahead of them on percentage so only have to win one more game than they do for the rest of the year. i've been barracking for claremont for 27 years and in this time we've not finished bottom so it would be great if we could avoid it this year. what made the win on the weekend even more meritorious was that it was over a side that was in the top 4 at their home ground and without browne, mackenzie or wilkes who were all playing for their afl sides.

the freo game was a strange affair. i watched most of the first quarter through my fingers and certainly had my head in my hands at quarter time. we were simply woeful. thankfully harvs performed some magic at the first break and a completely different side came out for the rest of the game. suddenly the boys were attacking the bloke with the ball and forcing errors. this is something the good sides do each week whilst we've been playing a game where we simply run alongside the ball carrier and hope that our psychic powers will make him trip over and drop the ball. strangely our approach thus far hasn't worked. the final 3 quarters were the sort of football i expect from an afl side and if we can continue that level of intensity i'd expect us to win a lot more games.

i was also really happy with the games of some of the younger brigade. ibbotson and mayne played the same way they have all year.. bloody hard. each week they seem more at ease playing in the premier competition and are really showing a great deal of potential. also showing really good signs were browne and o'brien who were both very hard at the ball. o'brien is a player i was hoping to see a lot more of this year as i believe he provides great value for the team in his willingness to get under the packs and do the hard work that we used to rely on troy cook and shaun mcmanus for. speaking of mcmanus; he was fantastic. i'm sure he'd be the first to admit that he's not overly blessed with silky skills but he makes up for any skill shortfall with an excess of heart. his retirement in imminent and i'll really miss him.

courtney love is the devil

i was horrified last night when watching tele to see an ad for the nintendo ds using the song 'breed' by nirvana. now, my understanding is that courtney has control of the nirvana back catalogue which passed into her control when kurdt died and this would mean she has the power to decide how his songs are used. i'm sure kurdt would be turning in his grave (if he'd been buried in one) at the thought of his songs being exploited in a commercial and courtney, more than anyone, should have worked to ensure this never happened. after all, she constantly stymied attempts by krist and dave to release a box set with some unreleased songs and generally was a 'spaniard in the works' so for her to allow 'breed' to be used in this way is unforgivable.

woosha vs brownlow brad

woosha's attack on brad hardie on 6PR last night was nothing short of disgraceful. hardie played in a premiership with south freo in the days when the wafl was as strong as any other competition in the country so for worsfold to denigrate him for not having played in a vfl/afl premiership side was not only uncalled for but also a slap in the face for all the wafl premiership players. great players such as bill walker, haydn bunton, stephen michael, graham moss and 'bomber' peake played in wafl premierships without being vfl/afl premiership players and to now call their status into doubt is simply wrong. still, what should we expect? it was a cheap shot from a bloke who built his on-field career around running past the ball to take cheap shots on opponents who weren't expecting it. why should we expect his off-field behaviour to be any different?

no sympathy for corby

i'm pretty sick of hearing about schapelle corby. the woman's a convicted drug dealer. end of story. in my opinion drug dealers are about as low as people come. unlike the other people generally reviled in our society (murderers, rapists, child molesters, drink drivers etc), drug dealers directly and indirectly impact and destroy the lives of huge numbers of people and they do it with the sole motivation of greed. i don't believe in the death penalty but i do believe in long gaol sentences. corby was trying to make some easy money and got caught and now deserves every day she spends behind bars. there's an inherent racism in the championing of corby's cause. it's a racism manifest in the belief that a white australian girl must be a victim of a corrupt indonesian legal system and incompetent lawyers rather than simply being guilty of the crimes she's been convicted of. well i don't buy it for a second. i believe she's guilty and the media should stop giving her constant publicity. i also believe any money raised by her selling her story when she's released should be subject to the proceeds of crime legislation as she shouldn't be allowed to profit from her crimes.

tanking

so st kilda have dropped del santo and milne for tonight's game against the mighty dockers and replaced them with two debutants. i find this pretty interesting from the perspective of a member of one of the teams already being accused of tanking. tonight's game is a quite winnable one for the saints and being played in melbourne so one would expect them to field their strongest team. i'm sure if freo or the e-girls headed into a home match against low ranked opposition by dropping a key midfielder and their leading goal kicker, the cries of 'tankers' would be deafening. yet, presumably because they're four spots on the ladder higher than us, there's no such slur aimed at the saints. nor should their be. i don't believe for a moment that they're tanking but neither are we. it's time the afl stepped in, preferably today, and announced changes to the way the draft picks are allocated to the bottom teams. i remember a lottery system for the bottom four clubs being talked about in 2001 when we finished bottom and yet 7 years later the problem's still not fixed. i have no doubt that carlton tanked last year and reaped substantial benefits for doing so but i don't believe it's common. nevertheless, the temptation to tank and the opportunity for it to be a topic of discussion needs to be removed by the afl. in my opinion.