Toilet paper planes

"So, what's been happening?" asked an old friend at the weekend. Hmmm - not much, I had to answer. I haven't blogged for a while, as things are just drifting along in that humdrum way that they do when you are middle class, middle-income, middle-aged and your lawnmower is broken. Everything is pleasant enough, but there are not many actual events worth taking up storage on a Google server on their secret island in Lake Geneva.

Our big dog is getting bigger. The weather has been wet. The toilets at work are as far away as ever, but they have been innovating - today there was new toilet paper, a bit like that typing paper from the old days. Really crisp, and I think it would take a fineline pen pretty well, without bleeding. When you scrunch or fold it, it crackles. You could probably make fine paper planes with it also.

I have been continuing to draw houses hunkered down below the road, with the dark steep bushy hill behind them, and their chimneys up like periscopes.

We had a very nice get-together with some old buddies at Nick and Anna's on Saturday. Our privacy-loving friends X and Y are moving back to Tasmania from steamy Queensland. X is slowly driving all their stuff down to Melbourne to bring it over on the boat, while Y and the girls have flown ahead to Hobart, to stay with her mum and dad and have tea with pals. They are actually settling in the tiny town of F in the far north-west, where X will be teaching at the district high school, starting pretty much immediately.

They are really sweet people and we have missed them since they've been away. They have been on the lookout for jobs here and something finally came up. The heat has been killing them. Y, also a teacher, described how the only room in her school with air conditioning was the computer lab, so she booked it for every single period  she could get her hands on. Mostly she didn't need to use the computers, but she sat each kid in front of one anyway, with strict instructions to get typing if anyone looked in.

I have just finished a book dad gave me called Imperium by Robert Harris. It's a novelisation of Roman history, which I'm pretty sure is an established genre now. Didn't Colleen McCulloch do three or four of them? I have never been attracted to them, but I really enjoyed it, and I feel like I have caught up now to Michael, who at six is the family Roman expert. The other day he was telling me something about the Parthenon in Rome - I started to butt in that I think it's in Athens, when he corrected himself. "Pantheon - the Pantheon I mean. That's in Rome. The Parthenon is in Athens". The kid seeks out his own books at the library, brings them home, reads them, remembers the stuff, and can then lecture on it. (As does Marcus, but he is still hooked on the Horrible History series, so much of what he is memorising is to do with maggots. He's pretty strong on the Tudors though.)

Anyway - Imperium. It follows the early career of Cicero, with cameos from Julius Caesar, Pompey, Cato and Crassus. Also it's chock full of Marcuses. Near the end of the book, after many ups and downs, election day has arrived. Cicero's secretary and slave Tiro is the narrator, and he describes matter-of-factly the standard procedure for getting an election underway.

...the entrails were inspected, the skies were checked for suspicious flights of birds, the blessings of the gods were invoked, all epileptics were asked to leave the field (for in those days an attack of epilepsy automatically rendered proceedings void), a legion was deployed on the approaches to Rome to prevent a surprise attack, the list of candidates was read, the trumpets were sounded, the red flag was hoisted over the Janiculum Hill, and the Roman people began to cast their ballots.

 Maybe our last federal election would have been over in less than two weeks, if someone at the AEO had just thought to ask the epileptics to take a raincheck.

Your tech reporter

OK. I Am writing this on an iPad. That,s right. I,m in the future now. I have had to bluTak it to the desk as it is ndot very desk=friendly, what with the curved underside and all. Not very typing=friendly either. You may notice I am having trouble finding the hyphen. In fact this is hellish == I am going to save this and resume with a real keyboard.

Hello again from a proper keyboard. Phew. We have a client who isn't sure what he wants us to do for him, but he knows he wants it to look iPad-y. Even though there are many, many photos available of the iPad and its interface, he has bought one and given it to us, so we have a really good idea how it looks.

So far I have installed a few free apps (as we young people call them) on the pad - a chess game, a very simple paint thing, and a handy one that gives you a real time feed from all the traffic cameras in New Zealand. Brilliant.

For an outlay of $1.99 I could get the iPad Horse Name Generator. This is, no kidding, their best effort at selling it:

Want to name your new horse? Now with this handy app you can carry around a source of inspiration in your pocket. If you're an author looking to name your characters' steeds, then this is the tool for you.

 As it happens, I am an author working on a 16-part series of novels about equestrian vampires, and I am totally blocked on the very issue of what to call the ponies. So far I have got "Warren", "Snack Attack" and "The Dude". Help, Horse Name Generator!

The thing that is slightly worrying me is that in the AppShop it says it is rated 9+ for Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humour. I can see how this is going to go. Some netherworld demon is going to end up riding Arse Bandit.

Phone salesman of the Serengeti

Work colleague just bought an iPhone4 at JB HiFi, from a salesman named Ken Zebra.

Don Quixote, Sydney, 1974

The pic came from my Auntie Wendy, who has written on the back;

While his two sisters watch admiringly Chris, accompanied by his two faithful followers sets off to "Clean Up Australia" (Years later someone else will claim to have originated the idea).

Ms White Socks at left must be Sally, although it doesn't look like her. Wearing the very daring stripy number in the doorway is Jacki. In the Sancho Panza role behind me is our cousin Helen. I don't know who the happy guy she's strangling is.

Houses below the road

Cascade Road runs along one side of a valley. Our house is above the road, but all along the other side there are houses below the road. Behind them the land slopes down to the Hobart Rivulet, and beyond that rises steeply up to a hill called Knocklofty. I am trying to capture the strange appearance of the very low-lying houses just peeping over the footpath, with the dark steeply wooded hillside behind.

Working in an arts centre, I am surrounded by exhibitions and artists all the time. I am given plenty of opportunity to ponder what the hell I am doing with my art. I quite like the idea of mounting a guerilla exhibition, without actually organising it with anyone. I will just start taping drawings to the walls in the bathrooms and see how things go. Hopefully the all-pervading reverence for anything that is presented as "art" (no matter how crappy) will protect my work. I will not put my name on them, but the titles will be evocative and the prices will start from about $15,000.

Of course, thanks to the unisex toilets policy, I will have double the audience.

More drawings here.

Chess Success

Twelve of my chess kids took part in another tournament on Thursday, and did really well. The gun team in town, Princes Street Primary, did not attend, and this made our task a little easier. The hosts, Goulburn Street Primary, won pretty comfortably, but we came in second. Our top seven players shown above all collected medals, but we had five others who contributed wonderfully, two of them in their first tournament. I think everyone really enjoyed the day, although for the new kids playing seven games in a row was pretty demanding.

The top eight players at the end of the day were all Goulburn St kids, but next was Marcus. He won 5 of his seven games, and was the only one to beat the eventual champion. Angela (in the centre of the pic) is only in Grade 2 but was equal top girl in the tournament.

One of the dads, Rodney, volunteered to be there all day. By the end he was really fired up, and has announced he wants to help me with the Chess Club next term. Which is terrific because unlike me, he actually knows a thing or two about chess.

Round 22

I have kept my silence about football since May 2009, when I was so fed up with my team I decided to just put them on ice for 12 months. Exactly one year later, after round 6 this season, I sat down and looked at the pros and cons of going back to supporting the Richmond Tigers.

(Er - I just checked and I did in fact blog both the AFL and SFL grand finals last September. But those were more cultural event than football matches, right?)

After Round 6 they had lost every game, and were fielding a side that was being called "the worst AFL twenty-two to take the field since the days just before Fitzroy folded". I made some notes, and my expectation was that they would somehow win one game this year, and would actually never make the finals before 2020, when the club would be merged or relocated and cease to exist. That was my prediction.

So I decided to come back to Richmond and stick with them to the bitter end. I'd had my blissful 12 month holiday, where their problems weren't my problems. It was the respite I needed to build up my strength.

After 10 rounds we had still not won a game. My prediction was looking pretty accurate. The former drug addict big news recruit was suspended by the club for a week for punching a drunk teammate, then was hospitalised with "stomach problems". It all seemed to be sliding downhill as per the script.

Then the Tigers cracked their first win, and followed it up with four more over the next five weeks. After that they only managed one more win, but generally were competitive. Today was their last game of the season - after a valiant comeback from 54 points down, they fell short by 10 points. Our young full-forward Jack Riewoldt came good so spectacularly that he won the league goalkicking award. Our list which looked dismal in May now looks incredibly promising. The former drug addict recruit finished his footy career today, so the club will be all about youth and the future, rather than a sideshow to his smugness.

To be honest - just about everyone at the club has been unstinting in their praise of his efforts on and off the field. I have never liked him, didn't want him, and am glad he's gone. That's just me though.

As the Tigers never make the finals, Round 22 is the end for them. Each year on one weekend eight clubs bow out, and a number of champions are farewelled from the game. (The sad truth is that old players who aren't champions are usually elbowed aside earlier in the season, and make their last appearance playing in the Ballarat Bombers or the Preston Bullants in front of a crowd of 1377). The smug one has pulled a lot of focus this year, but it's really wonderful to see the warm and generous tributes that all these guys get from opponents as well as team-mates.

And I am optimistic for the Tigers next year. Will I never learn?

Zero gravity chinwag

Yesterday, Marcus spoke to an astronaut! He and nine schoolmates had the opportunity to talk to Colonel Doug Wheelock (above) on board the International Space Station, in orbit 350km above the Earth.

About 12 months ago South Hobart Primary applied through some kind of NASA/international amateur radio initiative - there was a lot of paperwork and negotiations. I think all the kids in the school wrote a question to ask and ten were selected. Marcus's question was "Which countries are involved in the ISS and where are the astronauts from?" Other questions included "How long does it take your mind to get used to zero gravity?" and "Is it frightening doing a spacewalk, and how many have you done?"

We crowded into Marcus's classroom with about 30 other parents, kids, some people from the local paper. One of the dads named Justin is an amateur radio aficionado, and he was running the show at our end. Up on the Smartboard he had a graphic showing the Earth's surface, the areas in night and day, and the current location of the ISS, indicated by an oval on the Earth about the size of South Australia. At 4.15 it was over Hawaii - by the time of our scheduled connection at 4.43 it was over the US midwest. The relay station that was contacting the ISS for us was Goddard Space Centre, near Washington DC. From there the link was coming via a radio operator in Kingston, South Australia. We listened to a lot of chit chat about the weather and so on while waiting for our astronaut.

The kids lined up and one by one Justin had them come to the mike, say their question clearly, then say "over". Colonel Doug gave long and detailed answers to the questions, and said to each kid "that's a great question!" (Marcus afterwards said "he should have varied what he said to each of us a bit, so it sounded more like he really meant it")

Listening to him addressing Marcus, I was just thrilled. He mentioned an astronaut from Australia, Andy Thomas, and then said "Maybe one day Marcus you will be an astronaut, and you'll be up here where I am now". Andy Thomas had to become a US citizen to get up there, though.

For the record, the ISS is a collaboration between the Space Agencies of Europe, USA, Japan,and Canada. The astronauts there now are from Russia and the USA, but previously there have been Canadian, Japanese, German, French and Belgium astronauts. Colonel Doug said yes, it is frightening to be out in space on a spacewalk, but you have a job to do out there and that takes your mind off it. He's done six of them. He also said the body gets used to zero gravity before the mind does, but that the transition is much easier than than going back the other way. After six months in space, once back on earth your feet and your back find they are unused to carrying such a load and can take three months to adjust.

Marcus was buzzing afterwards for hours. He had been anticipating the radio link for days and it lived up to his hopes. Unfortunately by the time Colonel Doug had given his extensive answers to seven questions, the ISS had moved out over the Atlantic, heading down towards Portugal, and reception started breaking up. The last three questions were answered by the man at Goddard. Then we had an extended farewell session where everyone thanked everyone on behalf of everyone they could think of plus a few others. It sounded a lot like when you are trying to get off the phone after a call to your deaf-ish grandma.

Duck in a basket

Pato is a game played on horseback that combines elements from polo and basketball. It is the national game of Argentina. Pato is Spanish for "duck", as early games used a live duck inside a basket instead of a ball.

 Thanks Wikipedia.

Another hung parliament

Our nation voted on Saturday. As of dinnertime Wednesday we don't know for sure who our government is going to be. It's a hung parliament, with something like 72 seats going to the Labor Party incumbents, 73 to the Liberal/National Party coalition, 1 Green (the first ever) and 3+1 independents. I say 3+1 as three of them are talking about voting as a bloc and the other one wants nothing to do with them. The conventional wisdom is that the three will back Labor, and the Green has already said he will do so, so they will retain power - for now.

Some countries (more flibbety-gibbet than our own, obviously) deal with this sort of thing all the time. We haven't  had a hung parliament since 1940 or something, so its a big deal. Record numbers of newspapers are being flogged to a populace desperate to hear the latest, and news sites are logging record visits.

There are two schools of thought about all this. One is that it is Uncertainty that will be bad for business, scare off investment etc etc. There is a grain of truth in that, but I think it also presents an ideal excuse to anyone looking for a reason to postpone something. "I know I said we would employ 1000 new people on this project but in the current environment of uncertainty we just can't take the risk, so we are only hiring twelve people and a robot".

The other school of thought says "Hooray! The big parties have been given a backhander for their lame policy-free election campaigns. Now some people from outside that shallow pool have the balance of power. They can not only influence decisions but make some fundamental changes to the way decisions are made."

Something that has not really been mentioned in the papers is that the recent Tasmanian election produced a hung parliament. After a cagey 3 or 4 weeks of talks, the Greens and Labor put together a working arrangement that seems to be going along fine.
 
One irritating aspect of the national campaign was the major parties deciding to blithely ignore the safe seats. We live in Denison, which has been a safe Labor seat for the last 7 or so elections. The long-serving member is retiring, and it was assumed by both sides that his replacement would just slot in - so they didn't waste any energy talking to constituents, or bother trying any pork barreling. Their candidates were no-names.

I decided to vote for the independent candidate Andrew Wilkie -  a guy of great integrity with an interesting background in the military, then civilian intelligence, who resigned in protest when Australia joined the war in Iraq on the basis of some fudged-up fakery. He moved to Hobart, got married and had some kids, and bought an antique rug business. It now looks like he has outpolled the Labor heir apparent. I am thrilled that we will have a voice in Canberra who answers to Denison voters and his own conscience, rather than to a party platform that has been triple-tested and focus-grouped to be popular on talkback radio.

As it happens, he is the one independent who is determined to go it alone. It will be a big challenge for him to have the eyes of the nation on him, without even some fellow travellers to share the burden, but I think he can do it.

On Monday some colleagues and I were walking back to work from the bakery when the local stringer for The Australian stopped us and asked if anyone voted for Wilkie. I said I did, and was interviewed for my trouble. At the end, as a throwaway line, I said if my vote for Wilkie resulted in the Liberal leader Tony Abbott becoming Prime Minister, I would feel pretty sick. In the next day's paper it came out as "I would be sick" - ie vomit on the spot. Which is a bit strong, but there you go. Next time I will type up a press release to make sure they get it right.

Robot Fight 2!

Robot Ten vs All Comers from chris rees on Vimeo.

Here is some footage and pics from Sunday's robot workshop. At this point Marcus had a very clear vision for what he wanted to do, and Nicholas and his dad Kim's suggestions were being politely rebuffed.

That's Super-Duper

Here is a list of various good things, to balance out my somewhat whingey list from the other day.
1.    Marcus is officially Australia's 12th ranked under 8 chess player. He is practically unbeatable at school now.
2.    Today I bought the Assassination Vacation audiobook with my iTunes voucher from my birthday in March (thanks Sal and Matt). It is John Wilkes Booth-tastic.
3.    In related news, the World Book encyclopedia (1979 edition) calls confederate general Stonewall Jackson "the bible-quoting lemon-sucking infantry genius". How much work do I need to do before I die, to earn a description like that? Lots.
4.    I like the quiet moment when you drive under a bridge in a rainstorm. A hiatus.
5.    There She Goes by The Las - perfect pop song from 1988
6.    The Devil With the Green Eyes by Matthew Sweet - perfect pop song from 1993
(I have tried and failed to embed little samples of these tracks - I'll try again when I am not doing it over dial-up).
7.    Hattie is a very predictable miaow-er. If she hasn't seen you for a while, you get a miaow. Pat her on the head - another miaow. Pat her again - another miaow. This goes on for about another 4-6 pats, with diminishing returns. Lately I have been taking advantage of her predictability, and dueting with her on Downtown by Petula Clark.

8.    I like the fact that "cyborg" sounds a lot like "sideboard". I can see a day when I have a long, low cyborg, maybe with beautiful walnut veneer. When someone asks 'where are the salad servers?' I will say "top drawer in the cyborg there" - and they probably won't notice a thing until the cyborg's drawer opens automatically, and it maybe does a bit of a dance.

That's Ridiculous

Some things that have got my goat.

1. Encore Edition. Tonight on ABC1, before the start of Foreign Correspondent, a little disclaimer came up saying "Due to our election coverage, tonight's Foreign Correspondent is an Encore Edition". Come on ABC - if it's a repeat, just say its a repeat.
2. Faux Republican. Julia Gillard, supposedly a republican, says that the time to talk about an Australian republic is when this queen has passed on. But, ahem - then there'll be a new monarch. Possibly a younger, more exciting one. There'll be dancing in the streets, bunting, a big coronation, new coins and stamps throughout the Commonwealth. The tradesperson with the paintbrush will just be heading out to re-do the monograms on all the letterboxes, when Julia will say "Excuse me - can I have some shoosh - sorry everyone. Hello? OK. I'm ready to ditch all this anachronistic rubbish now! Who's with me?"
3. Hazard lights. Quite often in traffic I see a truck by the kerb indicating, and I think "I'll just help out that fellow by letting him in" - then I see that the fellow has actually just run into the shop for some fags, and does in fact have his hazzies on. Is there any electro-mechanical reason why the same lights that go "blink... blink... blink" to indicate, couldn't go "blink blink.... blink blink.... blink blink..." to say "look out -  I really just needed some fags" or "I have broken down" or "I think I just ran over a quoll, I've gone back to check"?
4. My new phone. I lost my mobile some months ago and have just got around to getting a new one. The cheapest handset you can get with 3G coverage cost about $65, and includes a video camera, still camera, audio recorder and MP3 player. Which is pretty amazing really - even cheapskates like me are now carrying around the equivalent of a radiogram, a telephone, a Betacam, a tape deck and an Instamatic, in their pocket. That's why whenever Paris Hilton, a fatal earthquake or any other hideous phenomenon happens, everyone in sight gets out their phone and points it at the action. I have started using mine to take happy snaps and, yes, OK, I have shot a bit of sub-Dad-with-a-borrowed-Betacam-in-the-80s footage of the dog, sure. Yesterday I tried to get all that stuff off the phone onto the Mac, using the included Mac-compatible software. Wasn't happening, so I emailed tech support to ask why their "How To" bore no resemblance at all to what I was seeing on screen. The answer today: actually, the Mac version of their software doesn't do any of those things. I think it lets you back up your phone book, full stop. All that other "media" is there on your phone forever! Although I can send it to other people, so if you want grainy footage of a substantial labrador, let me know.
5. Trivial Medical. I had to have a medical today - all fine BTW. I have been trying to get an appointment to see this guy for months. My appointment was definitely for 10, but when I arrived, reception told me to come back at 12. Never mind, I had a nice walk. At 12 I was back - doc took my blood pressure, all good, then asked me my height and weight. And that was it. So, two nice walks.
6. A cafe write-up in The Australian last weekend. It's a vegetarian organic cafe, and the article talked about their winter comfort food. Restaurateur: "People often cry when they try our food - the flavours remind them of when they were little". People often cry? I simply do not believe you, sir. Someone, slightly imbalanced, may have cried in your cafe, once. At the end of a really bad day. Your polenta may or may not have had something to do with it.
7. Flag proportions. The US flag should correctly be in the ratio 19:10. Come on - is 2:1 really too long, America? Meanwhile, if you don't mind, Denmark would like to be 37:28. Well I'm telling you now, Denmark - it looks ridiculous. (Even though I can go to jail for saying that, since Princess Mary is actually in town as I write, visiting her Dad. I like to think he's cleaning out the garage and is making her take back home a carton of old Dolly magazines and mix tapes).

Talking toast

Michael has been inspired by an activity at school, where they had to design a poster promoting the good food in the canteen. He did one poster at school that we haven't seen, and has knocked out a few at home featuring things that I'm pretty sure they don't actually stock, such as hamburgers and cans of Coke.

This one was further inspired by us running out of milk this morning. Marcus was put out that he'd only had one bowl of cereal, then Elf suggested some honey on toast.

The message of this motivational poster is:

It Dosen't Matter! (just have honey on toast.)

Bakers Bread: Put me on a plate!
Bakers Bread (afterthought): But put me in a toaster first!
Soft Butter: Spread me on Mr Bread!
Golden Bee Honey: Spread me on Mr Butter!
Knife: Use me!
Spoon: Use me too!
Toast: You herd em! Man!
Mouth with legs: Yum!

I am thinking of nominating this as the best thing ever. Seconded?

The Damned Utd by David Peace

This is a novelisation of real events in the world of English football, in the late sixties and early seventies. It's told in the first person by Brian Clough, who in these years managed (coached) Derby County successfully, then Leeds United very unsuccessfully.

Leeds are the "Damned Utd" of the title. Clough had a seething hatred of Leeds Utd, and especially their manager over fifteen years, Don Revie. Revie and Leeds were the dominant force in football, and widely reviled for their "anything to win" attitude. Revie once brought a deliberately weak side to Derby for a match, saving his better players for a more important match a few days later. After Derby beat them easily, in front of a thunderously booing crowd who had come to see the champions play, Revie refused to shake hands with Clough.

Years later when Revie was chosen to manage the England team, Leeds asked Clough to replace him, and incredibly, he accepted. The Clough character in this book moves in, chops up Revie's old desk with an axe, then takes it out to the carpark and burns it. He addresses his new charges:

As far as I am concerned, the first thing you can do for me is to chuck all your medals and your caps ... into the biggest f***ing dustbin you can find, because you've never won any of them fairly. You've done it all by bloody cheating.

44 days later, with only one one win from six games, he is sacked.

That's the background. I found the book unputdownable, gripping, in spite of the writing style which is painful. The tension in the telling of the story is remarkable, and it may be that it is actually thanks to the style. The first two words in the book are "Repetition. Repetition." You could say that professional sport is intrinsically repetitive - each week you do the same things. David Peace winds the repetition up to a level where I suppose it's meant to be a bit like a mantra. But I was always just flipping the pages maniacally to see what happened next.

Although I was alive in these years, its seems like an era I have never given any serious thought to. The scene as set here, the English Midlands and Yorkshire in the early seventies, seems incredibly grim. Poor people had nothing else in their lives but football. Rich people had no better way to express their wealth than football - as chairmen or directors of clubs.

Clough is an alcoholic. He spends days in the claustrophobic world under the grandstands, a world of corridors and offices, changerooms and lounge bars. He seems to be constantly walking down corridors and around corners. Constantly drinking and smoking and swearing. Cup of tea, bacon and eggs and chips, swearing at Jimmies and Johnnies and Alans, Jags and Vauxhall Victors, bottle of scotch, a week in Majorca, sideburns and ducktails and Brylcreem, Match of the Day on the telly, then more tea and cigs and a couple of pints and eggs, beans and chips, champagne, brandy, more swearing at Johns, Billys and Roys. Then sack a tea lady or two for laughing when the team has lost.

Clough is such a bastard, but I found myself willing him to succeed, even though I know what really happened and that it must also end in tears in the book. (Years later he was astonishingly successful with another club, Nottingham Forest).  Unlike Australian Rules football, players are bought and sold every week of the year. After months in the reserves they might be given a game just to showcase them to potential buyers. Everyone has a price.

I haven't had a book in a long time that I have read so avidly, yet couldn't really imagine anyone else enjoying.

Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

I first encountered Sarah Vowell on the This American Life podcasts. She is scholarly, interesting, wry, quirky and has an amazing sort of 11 year old girl/munchkin voice. You may well have heard it - out of the blue she was called up and asked to do the voice of Violet, the daughter in The Incredibles movie. If you haven't heard her, she's a little bit Lisa Simpson-y.

Which would be relevant if I was consuming this work in its audiobook form - one day I would love to do that, as apparently its got all sorts of guest stars doing cameos as famous dead people. Now though, I am merely reading the printed book.

But, its a cracker of a book. She is a memorial addict - she spends all her holidays travelling around the many, many sites related to the four* assassinated presidents. She is an assassination expert  - at home she has a dedicated book collection in what she calls her Assassination Nook. Apart from reading all the books, she has visited all the sites, talked to the guides, and actually listened to the guides, which probably not many people do. She says she is always either the youngest or the oldest on the tours - which are otherwise made up of either senior citizens or schoolkids.

*Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Kennedy. President Warren G. Harding died in office of food poisoning, however it has since been widely rumoured that he was bumped off by his wife.

Two fabulous facts I want to share with you;

1. John Wilkes Booth, who shot Abraham Lincoln in 1865, was from a famous acting family. His elder brother, Edwin Booth, was America's foremost Shakespearean actor. During the US Civil War, years before Lincoln's death, he was at a train station in New Jersey, when a young man fell onto the tracks. Edwin Booth saved the young man's life. The young man was Robert Todd Lincoln, eldest child of Abraham Lincoln.

2. Although Lincoln is widely venerated today (with some scary but interesting exceptions), he was a controversial figure in his lifetime. The current state song of Maryland, describing Lincoln as a "despot", was written during the civil war. Although Maryland stayed in the union, and was notionally on the Northern side in the war, sympathy for the Confederate cause and antipathy to Lincoln ran hot. Incredibly, the song was not chosen officially as the state song until the 1930s, and despite pressure to modify it, it never has been. So now, sing it with me! (to the tune of O Tanenbaum). Some of the nine verses are omitted, but  feel free to look up the whole thing.

The despot's heel is on thy shore,

Maryland! My Maryland!

His torch is at thy temple door,

Maryland! My Maryland!

Avenge the patriotic gore

That flecked the streets of Baltimore,

And be the battle queen of yore,

Maryland! My Maryland!

Hark to an exiled son's appeal,

Maryland! My Maryland!

My mother State! to thee I kneel,

Maryland! My Maryland!

For life and death, for woe and weal,

Thy peerless chivalry reveal,

And gird thy beauteous limbs with steel,

Maryland! My Maryland!

I see the blush upon thy cheek,

Maryland! My Maryland!

For thou wast ever bravely meek,

Maryland! My Maryland!

But lo! there surges forth a shriek,

From hill to hill, from creek to creek-

Potomac calls to Chesapeake,

Maryland! My Maryland!

I hear the distant thunder-hum,

Maryland! My Maryland!

The Old Line's bugle, fife, and drum,

Maryland! My Maryland!

She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb-

Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum!

She breathes! she burns! she'll come! she'll come!

Maryland! My Maryland!

Ignoring the cries for help

Every afternoon at about 3.45, the cries for help start. Through the wall behind me, two men yell sporadically, one after the other, things we can't understand. Then after a bit of that, they yell together "HELLLLP! HELLLLLP!" There is a very old firedoor there, and so I guess the sound comes through there rather than through the foot-thick sandstone walls. One of our neighbours somewhere in this labyrinthine Arts Centre is the Terrapin Puppet Theatre, so we have guessed that it is they, rehearsing some ground-breaking whimsical hi-jinks. I can tell by their voices that they have beards and ride old fixy-gear bikes.

Across Salamanca Place there is some heavy construction happening on the Princes Wharf shed. Meanwhile, a very strange ship named the Maria has replaced the Aurora Australis. The Maria has another very large boat on top of it. That's right, on top. The Maria has absolutely enormous cranes, and it seems like it has been trying to unburden itself of the hitchhiking boat, but to no avail so far. There is endless banging, sirens, boops and whoops. Every now and then people down on the wharf shout "Left, left, LEFT, STOOPPPP!! STOP, FOR F*CKS SAKE!"

So every time we hear "HEELLLLLLLLLPPPP!!!!" through the wall it takes a little while to process that no, no-one has been crushed by a boat.

Towel news

Things have been a little busy at home. Elf's parents, my parents, Karri, Miah and Fred have all stayed on and off over the last two weeks. We had 9 for dinner a few times, then slimming down to 7. Last night just 6, and tonight just 4. Sigh.

We have a big house, and we certainly don't have to worry about having guests sleep in the kitchen the way we used to. But one of the main areas where it causes mayhem is towels. We own probably about 20 towels, yet at the moment there are about 47 of them hanging here and there. As we don't have any actual towel rails, this means; the exercise bike, doorknobs, desks, chairs, the typewriter, and the scale model of our old house (which is just big enough for a bathmat).

Net down

The internet has been down intermittently at work today and yesterday. At some stage this afternoon we started doing internet things in real life, for chuckles. I Liked some things. Dave Followed me and started Liking them too. Then I started Unliking them to spite him. Things looked like getting creepy when Nathan came in and I tried to Friend him.

Just walked up to the bakery…

… for a spiced goat and lentil pie. As you do. $4.80 take away (with superb relish). Question: at what stage do they spice the goat?

Some daily rushes from my new documentary

It will be titled I Hear Your Nose (Do You Smell My Ear?)

Snake archery, knot-related putdowns

Michael is very good at a game he invented, using a soft rubber snake. He uses it like a bow and arrow, and gets very impressive range and accuracy. If it goes into a washing basket about 3 metres away, that's a goal. He made it up some time ago, but this afternoon announced that it is called Snarchery. He has also invented Snakenastics - you can probably imagine.

In the bath this evening the boys traded mild insults while I read a book. I was tuned out. Until I heard Marcus sneering "Michael - you can't even untie a granny smith knot".

Robot fight! Robot fight!

This morning at Lego Robotics, the Mindstorm NX-1s were set against one another in a series of sumo battles. They had to try to push another robot off the mat, which is black with a 2-inch-wide silver strip around the edge. The teams were given ten minutes to modify their bots for combat, by removing any unnecessary parts (if something falls off you lose) and strengthening them with bull-bars and so forth. Marcus and Nicholas had already fine tuned their operating program, so their bot (Nº 10) went full steam ahead on black, but when it reached the silver stopped, reversed, then turned 135°. This turned out to be a pretty good strategy. Nº 10 still looked pretty much as it had last week though - a bit weedy.

They won their first bout, against a stronger looking bot that only went forwards and back. Nº 10 caught it at just the right angle and biffed it off the mat. Next there was a thrilling battle between two very well-matched bots that had hold of each other and circled for some minutes. This sounds boring but it was quite tense. Finally one got the better of the other, and lurched forward, heaving it's foe off the mat.

When Marcus and Nicholas had their next bout they were up against a tank-like arrangement with a sort of shovel nose. The shovel got under Nº 10's wheels and he went upside down - the end.

Next week the robots need to cook a meal for a family of four in under 20 minutes, for less than $10 a head.

Cask wine and tracksuit pants

I am a tightarse generally. I have been for years, but particularly so since we've had a spectacular mortgage. The list of things I don't buy includes books, CDs, DVDs, alcohol, toys for the kids, (of course alcohol for the kids), newspapers, magazines, and clothes.

I am not a snappy dresser - my resources in winter are essentially plain black and white t-shirts, some dark blue flannelette shirts with the collars removed, and jeans. I have one standard grey woolen sock x 12, one pair of shoes that gets worn almost every day. I get by with all that and a strict washing program.

I had one outstanding sartorial problem, and I dealt with it yesterday - I bought a truckload of underpants. I would like to here champion the cause of Alpha brand gentleman's undergarments. It is a K-Mart house brand, and they last a lot longer than a certain fancy brand that rhymes with Schmavenport. I was able to put a bunch of those in the rag bag yesterday.

I am a member of the trackpants-wearing community (I would never go visiting in them, but I am prepared to pop down the road for the milk). While in shopping mode I decided to upgrade my TPs. Unlike, say, a felt hat, academic gown or puffy pirate shirt, the tracksuit pant does not have higher status when it's obviously been through a lot. Mine have started sliding towards the "homeless person" or "recently dumped and mildly depressed" end of the TP spectrum.

Now that I look back, I realise I have been on a little spending spree this week. I have broken the shackles and participated in the cash economy. I think it started when I ran into an acquaintance I'll call The Fewst. I boasted to her that in 4 weeks down at Salamanca, a noted café strip, I have not paid for a single coffee. Her reaction was "Geez, can I give you five bucks?" I mentioned this to Elf, and she agreed with The Fewst, that rather than a straight edged hero of new-age small-footprint economical and simple living, I am in fact just a sad little man.

Since then I have bought myself a book. I bought myself a song (yes, one) on iTunes. I went out to dinner last night and did not order the cheapest thing on the menu. And one night on the way home from the supermarket, I decided I was sick of having an empty wine rack, so I bought four bottles and also two casks to keep around the kitchen and just, y'know, have a glass of wine when we don't even have guests. Wild.

Regarding underpants - I think this is what our prime minister-before-last had in mind when he commented that he wanted Australia to be a "relaxed and comfortable" nation. He wanted us to have good support, stretchy breathable fabrics and long-lasting elastic. A country that is constantly hitching up its daks is not a happy country. A land of people who are having to yank foundation garments out of their buttocks all day, is a land divided in half. Then there is the issue of fashion - how much youth crime is directly caused by low-riding jeans with exposed shiny boxers? I would say maybe three quarters.

So whoever wins the coming election, I think they should start by posting out some underpants vouchers to every man, woman and child in the country. And, once we are all comfortable, then we'll get some progress on the price of carbon, the dying rivers and paid maternity leave. And if that happens, I will celebrate by going out and paying a barista to make me a flat white.

We're in trouble - get me Churchill's teeth!

A set of Winston Churchill's false teeth have just been sold for £15,200. Says Jane Hughes, head of learning at the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons in London: "These are the teeth that saved the world."

NOTE: Teeth above not actually Churchill's. In fact these are Stalin's.

Double safe

The metal stairs here at work are super-slippery when it rains. There are yellow signs on each level saying "slippery when wet", with the classic bobble-head man going "whooooooaaaa!" Steve, my boss, decided that wasn't enough, and asked the centre maanagement to do something to fix the problem. I think he had in mind some kind of non-slip coating, some GritStrips* perhaps - something involving a guy in overalls putting in a few hours.

The Arts Centre people had a brilliant labour-saving idea - just tape another sign to the first one. I guess that's why they get the big bucks. Stairs are still super-slippery, but.

*I just thought up that brand name - what do you reckon?

Academic niceties

I had an old dummy book from a printer, which is just bound blank paper with no covers. I gave it to Michael, and he started a book about Egypt. So far it has a cover, a map of Egypt (with grid lines) locating Thebes (D5 in case you were wondering), and an elevation of the Sphinx (66' 8" high, 240' long - Michael can quote that on demand). This barely-started book has been lying around for ages, and yesterday Marcus found it.

Marcus: Can I fill in a chapter of your Egypt book?
Michael: NO! That's all my research.

Winston and the Dragon's Treasure

Michael sat down yesterday and wrote this story out, as he thought of it. It stars Winston, in the role of a cunning jewel thief.

Winston and the Dragon's Treasure

Okay. Winston the Dog (from the S.N.J.T.s [Secret Network of Jewel Thieves]) is on a mission to steal the Dragon' Treasure for his company. It's worth 1000$.

To get to the cave, Winston will have to take the ferry to America. Then he'll have to take the path to the cave at 20:04PM.

So, off he goes on the ferry to America. When it stops he gets off. Then he took the path to the cave. On the way he meets Barney. Barney is another theif from the S.N.J.T. He once stole the Pegasus Sapphire from Clare Sparkies. It was worth 200P [pounds]. Winston went back to work.

He gets in the cave after the Dragon leaves. He saw 5 Treasure chests, 1,010,500 coins, 25 skulls, & 20 jewels and gems. He stared.

Then he pulled out his sack and stuffed all the treasure into it. Then he ran out to a ship heading for Launceston. When he got to Launceston, he took a taxi back to the S.N.J.T.

Michael also did these two fantastic drawings of Winston yesterday, but they aren't illustrations of the story. He said that when he was out walking Winston with Elf, he walked along looking at Winston's head and planning how to draw it. After we went crazy over his first drawing he did another one.

A big catchup - Robots to Lizards

I have a big Sunshine Harvester deadline today, so I have a been a bit flat out with getting my head around the winnower, the riddles, the "bush eccentric for adjusting long rack stay" and so on. You know how it is.

The weekend was very busy with visitors, actual events and a fair amount of just kind of pointless bustle. Here is a handy guide you can cut out and keep.

ROBOTS: Marcus and I went along to session 2, in which Mindstorm NX1-C Nº 10 was programmed to walk if he is put down on something black, but stop if he reaches something red. The next step was to get him to speed up if he reached something silver, but he never quite mastered that. This time Marcus did most of the programming, while Nicholas concentrated on fabricating a part that will be needed for session 5. Nicholas's dad and I tried hard to say glued to our seats and let it all just unfold, but I have to admit to a tiny bit of helping/interfering/project managing.

SOCCER: My team, champions of the hack division, have been promoted to the fit-and-skillful division, where we will be found out. We have a couple of new players, both dads from school, who look like they can do the business - so maybe we'll be able to take it up a notch.

Marcus's team are still unbeaten.This week they had another titanic struggle against a team they had never met before, West Hobart Red. They are well coached, and play like a proper soccer team even more than our lads. I actually saw someone in possession run into trouble, and turn and pass back to someone who called for the ball - that's unheard of in under 8s.

It was a very tense struggle. We were up 2-1 for a long time, then with not long to go, their star player Antonio make a big run right through and belted a goal from long distance. I thought 2-2 would be a fair result for such a tough and well-balaanced game. Antonio was subbed off. Suddenly Marcus scored, and suddenly Antonio was wheeled back on again. Bizarrely, his team seemed to have completely used up their energy, and in the last two minutes of the game South Hobart scored again, and again, and again. A very even game unfortunately ended up 6-2, but I don't think their kids were too disappointed. They had a number of girls in the team who played extremely well, and slide-tackled ferociously. Marcus was upended by one of them on a few occasions.

FULLAGARS: During the game, when the tension was at its peak, Elf's brother Fred arrived, visiting from Melbourne. Sport is not the Fullagars' thing, so I had to try to be warmly welcoming and also explain the situation on the field while not missing any of the gripping action. Elf's parents Bill and Felicity arrived later that evening, and are still with us now. There is always a certain amount of shuttling back and forth to Imp and Ed's place at Kingston - there are 4 grandchildren to dote on and most activity while they are here is based around that. Also crochet, sudoku, crosswords and usually eating a lot of chocolate.

CHESS: South Hobart's chess team did very well at a Southern schools tournament yesterday. I spent the morning out there at Sacred Heart College, encouraging and coaching in my actually-not-that-good-at-chess way. At the point I left, Marcus and two others had won three out of five games, and the others were all doing OK. It's very common with kids, for a strong winning position to suddenly become a draw with one false move, and I saw that happen with our players a number of times. Sometimes they were the lucky one snatching a draw from an impossible situation, but a few times the boot was on the other foot. If you trap your opponent so there is nowhere they can move, but they are not actually in check, that's a stalemate, and a draw.

One of the rules in tournaments is that if both players repeat a move three times, that's also a a draw. I saw a very funny scene where two kids who presumably had lost all their prior games, were playing each other. They went back, and forth, and back, and forth, about fifteen times - while their hands were flying about, one looked up at me and said "is this a draw?" I said yes, definitely. They were both jubilant. "YESSSSSSS!!!!!!" Their first half-point each. Elf took over from me and was there at the end. South Hobart finished equal third, and Marcus got a credit certificate, but he was a bit overwrought and crazy by that stage.

LIZARDS: In the car on the way to chess, Marcus was showing the other kids his Ripley's Bizarre! book, in particular the two-headed lizard. Bradley blurted "I've got three one-headed lizards!"

Some drawings

Recent work by Marcus (beach items, top) and Michael (Pegasus, above)

An old drawing of the Mt Nelson sempahore station that I just found.
Full disclosure: it was wonky and I straightened it in Photoshop which had not been invented yet when I drew it.

A very quick walk in Battery Point

I walked up and took these while my monitors were warming up this morning. When I get to work it takes about 3-4 minutes for my computer screens to wake up. usually  I spend that time making coffee - this morning I went for a 4-and-a-half minute historic walk. The first pic - the cream-coloured house with the barge boards, is 35 Kelly St - the attic room was mine, in about 1991.

We get to our office via the alley, the courtyard and the jail-like metal stairs. Inside we have this interesting foil-lined barn-style ceiling. It will be interesting in summer - a bit like being in a solar cooker.

Winston at 8 weeks

He is now three times the height and four times the length. And no longer just weeing wherever.

Twelve robots and a chicken

This morning I took Marcus to the first session of a Lego robotics course, put on by TAG. We often see flyers and ads for these things but they are usually "age 12+". This one said "age 8+", so I signed him up for it. We have mixed feelings about TAG and about the whole world of "gifted children" and their care and handling. But if they are putting on something fun that gets a bunch of these particular types together, where they can share their particular-ness and feel normal for a while - we're all for that. 

The first challenge was pairing-up with a robo-building-buddy. There were 24 kids, and some had arrived already paired-up. The co-ordinator just twinned everyone else on an alphabetical basis. Marcus got a boy called Nicholas, and they got on fine.

In no time they had assembled a recognisable robot out of small parts and cables. These are pretty sophisticated little units - they are called Lego Mindstorm NX-1s or something like that, and they have audio detectors, colour detectors and probably even smell detectors for all I know. You connect them to a laptop by USB cable, and can then program them. I believe they retail for something like A$500.

By the end of the day all the groups had their robots together, and doing a few basic robo-things. Next week they will start programming and modifying. I am keen for Marcus to mix it up a bit during the week, by making a nice hat for the robot out of our ordinary Lego. I don't know if that is allowed.

In fact I shouldn't even suggest it. Parents are there purely as observers - we are not allowed to help, as it's well known that we'll just take over - particularly dads. I noted today that some of the dads were observing very closely indeed. I sat (on a tiny primary school chair) and chatted to Nicholas's mum and one of the other dads I knew slightly. They didn't need our help to build the robot, but even better than that - they didn't need us to tell them to calm down, or share, or not be bossy, or anything. They were just absorbed in the task and the teamwork happened naturally.

As we were driving through South Hobart to the course, we passed a chicken scratching on the footpath in Macquarie St. It's a well known chicken that sometimes visits the boys' school nearby, but I have never seen it out on the main road before.  When we returned a couple of hours later, it was still there, apparently finding whatever it needed in life to be in good supply just there.

Battery Point

I have a few pics taken around the new office and the surrounding Battery Point neighbourhood. I explored a bit more today, in the course of finding a parking spot. There is 2 hour non-resident parking (stick with me, this will get less boring) which means we have to keep coming out, running 3 floors down the fire escape, then the same height up Kelly Steps and then however far to the car, move it enough to convince the council parking guys, then return. I get more exercise when I walk rather than take the car, but only just.

I only take the car on Fridays so I can nip up to the school for Chess Club. Today I had to move the car at 11.30, and scored pole position, right at the top of the steps. I had to abandon this at 12.30 to go to chess. When I got back, Kelly Street was full, and due to the amusing one-way system it took me another fifteen minutes to get a park in parallel South Street, some way off from work. But, as I was grumpily stalking down the incredibly narrow street, I looked around and thought - actually, this is pretty nice. Heritagey. (I will StreetView it and throw in some pics next week). As I walked down Kelly Street pole position was suddenly free again. Sigh. Urban angst.

Did I mention I lived in Kelly Street nearly twenty years ago? I worked nearby, and at knockoff time on Fridays I jogged home, grabbed some stuff, jogged down the steps and across the docks to Franklin Wharf, and there caught a tiny ferry to my then girlfriend's house in Bellerive. She flatted with a guy whose girlfriend also spent all weekend there. After some months of this, the no-nonsense landlady, who lived next door, said enough is enough: one of you couples is going to live here and the other one will have to go. She chose K and I more or less at random. I felt pretty bad for the guy who was suddenly kicked out, but ... not that bad. Anyway - my share house in Kelly St was so poky, you could fry an egg in the kitchen while turning on and off the shower.

Just around the corner is Arthur's Circus (a small circular residential street with a park in the middle, not some kind of tent-based amusement). Apparently in colonial times Governor Arthur granted himself this tasty bit of land, and came up with a novel way of  getting the maximum number of house lots out of it. Each lot is a wedge with a tiny frontage on the Circus. I drove around the Circus twice while hunting for a parking spot - it does start to lose its charm after a while.

I once designed a CD-ROM for some kind of Education Department history program about Battery Point. The point is named after the Prince of Wales Battery - an array of cannons erected in the 1890s to repel the Russians. The CD-ROM had little captions such as "Each Sunday the Queens Own Worcestershire Rifles fired the cannons at the Prince of Wales Battery for practice". One of the questions to be answered was "What would have happened if they had hit it?" The Caption Division and the Question Division of the D of E must have been in different buildings.

Opposite our office is the berth of the Aurora Australis, a bright orange icebreaker. My boss moans that it blocks the water views, but I like it - surely a large boat is a water view. Of sorts.

Pupdate 2

It's safe to say Winston is now house-trained. We still shut him in the downstairs bathroom at night, but things have moved along nicely. Up until a week ago I was carrying his increasing bulk down the stairs to the bathroom, as he was reluctant to go. That was obviously a terrible habit to get into, so I changed to coaxing, cajoling and just slightly shoving him with Elf's help. He is now trotting down the stairs happily, right into the bathroom. He seems to be happy to know that that's his place for the night. We still put down newspapers in there, but we have had 5 or 6 dry nights in a row. I think soon we might start to leave the bathroom door open at night so we can go in and use it during the night. I think he will just stay on his bed, hopefully until at least 6am.

He and Hattie mill around together in the kitchen at feeding time and basically ignore each other. Winston actually touched Hattie the other day while he was transfixed by his food bowl being carried past - she turned on him to hiss, then realised that he didn't even know she was there. They regularly get close enough that you can slip between them and pat their furry heads at the same time. A little electrical current runs through you, its kind of special.

Dominating the Bandicoot League

Today our friend BJ came to spend the day with us. She used to work with Elf years ago and and they have kept in touch - she gets on well with the boys and we love to have her around. She arrived in time to walk down to soccer at the school with the boys and I. Elf was down there already, supplying sausages and coffee to the populace.

BJ had never watched live soccer, let alone an under 8 game, but she was keen to give it a go. I told her she would be seeing a good show. Marcus's team are still unbeaten this year, and could be said to be the giants of the Under 8 Bandicoot league. The visitors Taroona have been their toughest opposition historically, and would ensure South Hobart had to produce their best to win.

After a tense opening, our boys scored first, and again shortly after. Taroona answered and it was 2-1 to us at half time. Aden had a great game in goals, and made a point blank save. With a few minutes left it was 3-3, and I thought that would be a fair result. The boys kept going right to the end though, and Corey and Marcus together scored in a goalmouth scramble to put them in front.

Taroona threw everything at them, but lost the ball, and South Hobart moved it downfield, with passes, like a soccer team, and it ended up with Marcus who rounded a defender and shot from a wide angle. Goal! And it finished 5-3, with the boys still unbeaten. BJ was impressed with the whole thing. It was a lovely sunny day, all the parents were polite and friendly and (apart from me) not yelling, there was instant coffee and sausages - what's not to like?

Elf had an early pass to leave the sausage stall, so we packed up BJ and the boys and came home for an expansive lunch, then took a long walk with Winston while the sun was still out. And then, BJ bought my big drawing of Cascade Brewery. What a top day.

SOLD!

Teapot hat

From an old work sketchbook, circa 1995. I had a beard then, and, in this picture at least, a functional teapot hat. Nice.

Brown Material Rd

Somewhere in California is Brown Material Road. Is it made of brown material? Is it the main route between Brown and Material? I just do not get it. Now Tank Destroyer Boulevard in Texas - that I get.

I sneak into and out of the Art School

Today Marcus' and Michael's classes both went on an excursion to the Art School, where the Young Archies exhibition was hanging. (There is an annual portrait prize for grown-up artists called the Archibald Prize, hence the name). Michael's portrait of his teacher Mrs Parker was chosen to hang in the show, but didn't win any prizes. Here would be a good place to have a photo of him proudly standing next to it, but I don't have one. As I work down near the Art School now, I nipped across to be there with the school group, and have a look myself. They walked down from the primary school. That's a great thing about the modest size of Hobart: weather permitting, the school always walks the kids to excursions unless they are way out of town.

There was some really great stuff, as there always is when you have a bunch of work by motivated kids. The grown-ups were thrown by some of the work that was chosen for prizes but - I guess it's just like grown-up art prizes: unless you know the criteria they are using to judge, you can't say if you agree or not. Should "good" kids art look like grown-up art? Should it be naive? Should we be giving out prizes at all? When I was at school I remember being praised for painting all the way to the edge of the paper. Anyway. Michael was proud and the other kids were proud of him too.

It was weird for me to be back where I studied for three years, over twenty years ago. I said to Marcus and Michael "I went to school here after grade 12 and before I started working" - they looked at me like I was mad. When I said "before that it was a jam factory" they actually backed away from me a little.

I gave Marcus a mini tour - I pointed out where the Graphic Design studio was, but it's part of Photography now I think. I have actually avoided the place almost totally since I finished there in 1989. Sometime in the 90s they went security-crazy, and as a casual visitor you really felt you weren't wanted. You are supposed to report to the uniformed guard at the entrance, state your business and sign in. The big welcoming glass doors are always shut now, and you creep in apologetically through a small revolving door to the side.

The schoolkids were looking at another exhibition on the ground floor when my lunchtime was up, so I excused myself and tried to walk out into Hunter Street. You can't even get out without a swipe card. I waited for someone to come along and they believed me when I said I wasn't smuggling out anything.

The mulch economy

Elf had a load of mulch delivered down the front of the house on Friday. Her masterplan to get it up to the backyard was to pay 25¢ per bucketload to the boys and any other kids we could press-gang on the weekend. On Sunday morning Marcus, Cameron and Lana got into the task eagerly, in fact so eagerly that Elf soon decreed a $10 cap on what she would pay any one urchin. I acted as foreman/tally clerk. I was also preventing Winston running out the open gate, and reading news off the internet, cumbersomely copied from the net-connected computer downstairs onto this offline laptop.

I think all three kids got up to $10 in the end. Michael participated occasionally, but kept swapping his bucket for smaller and odder containers, culminating with a medium-size jam jar.

I am also paying Marcus 10¢ a time to blow his nose at the moment. Before I "monetized" the situation, every time I would ask him to blow rather than snort disgustingly (he was usually reading or playing games on his i-pod at the time) he would complain that blowing his nose hurt. Apparently it hurts a lot less when it gets you 1/30th of the way to a pack of football cards.

Imp and Ed buy a house

Elf's sister Imp and her family have just bought a house, and today they are moving out of the venerable sandstone pile that is Firthfield and into Nameless House, at the top of Boronia Hill in Kingston.

After coming to my soccer match, the girls stayed the night with us last night. Today we took them to their soccer, and now we are all back here. When Imp and Ed have worn out their first set of helpers, they will come for the girls, and we'll convoy down there to help them with the next batch of moving. 

Although I am often a grumpy and remote uncle, I do like the girls and I like the fact that our families lean on each other, help each other out and spend so much time together.

We are really pleased that Imp and Ed have made the leap to buy a property here - they came from Canberra two years ago and have been renting Firthfield since. There is a good chance they will go back there in the not too distant future, and rent out the new place. In any case, our boys and the girls have established a bond that hopefully will be renewed regularly and last their whole lives.

Knackered 8 d DotWS 5 - Indoor Soccer Grand Final

Last night we won our first championship for a couple of years, with a very good performance against Defenders of the Wooden Spoon, who were missing a couple of good players. We were up 5-2 at half time, and running along nicely. One of our first-half goals was a lovely bit of patient passing. It was something like Brett to Paul to Cam to me to Paul to me to Cam to me, and into the net.

DotWS kicked off in the second half and scored inside 10 seconds. Their gun player Andrew was just too slippery for any of us to track him. Unfortunately he couldn't do it all himself. From 5-3 we went goal for goal for ten minutes - we just couldn't shake them off. After scoring a few in the first half, I was just muffing every opportunity in the second half - taking one touch too many and getting too close to the keeper. The other guys stepped up though, and Ed, Paul and Brett kept the scoreboard ticking. With 90 seconds left we were still only two in front, when I finally found my touch again and scooped one into the net, for 8-5, and we had it in the bag.

All wives and kids were there, so we won in front of a large crowd of supporters, which made it even better.

We really like the DotWs guys, and they always give us a good game. They have stronger and weaker players, but everyone gets equal time, no matter how important the game. They enjoy playing together and that's more important to them than results, in the end. Having said that, they beat us only a few weeks ago, and they weren't far away last night.

Netherlands 3 d Uruguay 2, World Cup Semi Final

Well, rather than a serious recount and analysis, I'm just going to rework a cheap Caster Semenya joke I heard [to recap - she is the controversial South African athlete breaking all sorts of women's athletic records]

Now that the last South American team has been knocked out, and their supporters are leaving South Africa, it must be a relief to Caster Semenya not to have people all over her country chanting "Uruguay, Uruguay".

But how about that first goal from van Bronckhorst? Woof!

Television

I have just sat down to watch TV but forgotten that we only have 4 channels again, for the time being. A week ago our set-top box remote control broke. We can change channels with the buttons on the front of the box, but at present there is an alert filling the screen - to dismiss it we need an OK or EXIT button. Nnnnnng.

To be honest, i have just about lost the art of watching any TV, except sport. Without a scoreboard in the corner to make things crystal-clear, I find I just lack the will to follow any plot or argument. I hear Julia Gillard's first speech as PM was outstanding, but I haven't seen it. If it had been a debate v Kevin Rudd, perhaps held in a stadium in South Africa at 4am, I would have tuned in with alacrity. (Note to self - look up alacrity - might it do instead of a set-top box?) Especially if there were some statistics in the corner to remove any ambiguity about who was winning.

So, here I am at the time when I usually watch my one non-sport show, Important Things with Dmitri Martin, and as that's on ABC2, I think I am only left with a) a heartwarming yet challenging documentary, b) a cook-off, c) a dance-off or d) Mythbusters.

I would like to see the Mythbusters bust some really heavy duty myths, like the existence of an all-powerful loving God. Let's set up some explosives, some roller skates and a shop dummy, then see how you explain childhood leukaemia. Anyone? No, that's not fair, you're right. A half-hour show that will appeal to Gen X is no place for that sort of thing. How about something like "the sun is towed across the sky every day by Apollo in his chariot" - some blue-ribbon, card carrying myth myths? Too easy I suppose.

Anyway - now Bear Grylls is parachuting into a swamp. Next, he will eat it. Can you tell this is a rest day in the World Cup?

Sunshine harvester parts are a hoot

I have just been sent a copy of the parts catalogue, 1911. As you'd expect, it's a laff riot!

Each part has a code word, to make it easier to order by telegraph. The code words all start with S, and include (strangely) a lot of seemingly French, Italian and Spanish terms, as well as … well, I'll just list some.

SOOTHFAST (Shaker crank, front)
SOPBROOD (Pulley for headings elevator, top; 1 and one-eighth inch bore)
SPODESTO (Arm for seven-eights inch square riddle adjuster bar)
SPAINO (Trace eye for one horse swingle tree)
SPOELWORM (Collar between 148 & H156)
SPALTBAR (Trace hook on one horse swingle tree, Argentine only)
SPASTICUS (T Head bolt, 6 x five-eights inch, for plummer block 83a)
SPASMATIS (Bolt to fasten fan bracket to winnower frame, one-a-half x three-eights inch hex, with lock nut)

Just to confirm, I did not make up any of that. Oh, and SPASTIC is there too (1 shilling), as is SPONGELET(6 shillings) and SPLITGAT ( 2 shillings and sixpence).

You can well imagine the irate telegrams coming in to HQ at Sunshine from Ouyen, Manangatang, Warracknabeal and beyond, when the goods train arrives with the urgent part, and it's the SPONDE (off side bracket for broad elevator bearing, bottom) rather than the SPONDEBAS (near side bracket for broad elevator bearing, bottom). Those were the days.

8% "special time"

About 2.30am I was thinking about the ridiculous hours I have been keeping through this World Cup. Of course you console yourself that its' only every 4 years. But then I did the sums - it's one month every 4 years. That's 1/48th of the time. A bit more than 2% of my life has consisted of World Cups. Similarly, the summer Olympics take about a month, every 4 years - another 2% (too many of the winter Olympic events fall into the categories of "sports where you score points for costumes" and "sports that are simply sliding downhill"). The AFL finals take 4 weeks every year, but they are only on weekends - say 8 days of the year. That's another 2%. Then there are Ashes tests played in England. That's 5 tests of 5 days each, every four years. Throw in the occasional one-day match and you might as well call that another 2%.

So that's about 8% of my life so far that I have treated as a special case, when you can bend the rules, sleep in, be obsessive, draw up little tables in the back of notebooks, and never be short of conversation with complete strangers. Hey mate - did you see that bloke from Equatorial Guinea in the 1500m freestyle - wasn't he something?

Netherlands 2 d Brazil 1, World Cup Quarter Final

Brazil took a few minutes to get into their front half, but for the next forty they looked so dominant, their odds to take the Cup would have shortened even further. When Robinho netted twice in two minutes (the first was disallowed for offside) you would have been forgiven for popping down to the all-night TAB and putting your house on them to win the whole shebang. As it was they were only 1-0 up at half-time, but looked certainties. Maicon was running the show on the right, Robinho on the left and nothing was working for the Netherlands in the middle. Their only target up front was Robben, and each time he got it he looked like he wanted to beat five men rather than even consider a pass. Just before half time the Dutch keeper Stekelenberg made a miracle save, floating through the air to bat away a delightful curler from Kaka which was homing in on the top corner.

After half time things were turned on their head when Julio Cesar the Brazil keeper came out for a high ball, didn't get it, and it came off his defender Juan and into the net. That made things much more lively. Brazil were still looking pretty silky, and Netherlands were still looking shaky, but at least we were promised a game. Then the unthinkable - Robben took a corner, Dirk Kuyt flicked it on, and Wes Sneijder got enough scalp on it to put it in the net, then ran around slapping it (his scalp) for some minutes.

Cue mad scramble, desperate lunging, confusion and mayhem. I think from memory a Brazilian was straight red-carded for a tackle? Hell, it was 2am, I don't know, I seem to remember Brazil trying to throw men forward and almost giving up another goal as they were one man down. The Netherlands actually looked really impotent up front to me, and their semi opponents, (if you don't want to know yet look away now ... OK?) Uruguay, will have been heartened by what they saw.

Final whistle, 2-1. Favourites out.

Uruguay 1 d Ghana 1 (4-2 on penalties, after no score in extra time)

I tuned into this one at 1-1, early in the second half. The teams seemed pretty evenly matched - Suarez and Forlan were creating chances for Uruguay, and Gyan was looking very impressive for Ghana.

Kevin Prince Boateng apparently was a hero for Ghana against USA in a game I didn't see. But each time I have watched Ghana, I have been amazed by his uselessness. He has the physique of a someone who's been in jail for ten years, and who is not a big reader. Perhaps most of all I hate the tatts  - why would anyone get large dice tattooed on their neck? He is famous for taking one of the worst penalties in history in this year's FA Cup . In the part of the match I saw he did nothing of value.

The last five minutes of extra time were pulsating, with both teams throwing on attacking substitutes and really going for it. Incredibly, Ghana's best attack of the 2nd half came in the last seconds. Suarez saved off the goal-line with his shins, but it was turned back in, and he had no choice but to flail at it with his arms, as did the Uruguayan beside him. Suarez connected, batted the ball out deliberately, and was sent off.

The final act of extra time was the resulting penalty, taken by Gyan for Ghana. If he could put it away, Ghana would be the first ever Africans into the World Cup semi finals. He had all of Africa sitting on his shoulders, and he hit the crossbar. The referee whistled and that was full-time. Suarez, on his way to the showers, was like a condemned man who gets a reprieve. Uruguay were not through yet, but at least they wouldn't go home on his account.

So to the penalty shoot-out. Uruguay had got out of jail, and must have gone into it with a mental advantage. To his credit, Gyan stepped up to take the first for Ghana, and put it away confidently. Uruguay equalised. Ghana scored. Uruguay equalised. Ghana's next penalty from Mensah went too close to the keeper Muslera, who guessed the right way and saved. Uruguay scored again - all theirs had been well taken conventional cannons into the top corner. Under tons of pressure, the Adiyiah did the same as Mensah, and Muslera saved again. Notably no-one asked Boateng to take one.

Now Uruguay led the shootout 2-3 with a penalty in hand, so their next kick could clinch a place in the semis.

Sebastian Abreu took the deftest, cheekiest and most confident penalty I have ever seen. He patiently waited for the keeper to commit, then dinked it over his diving body. Uruguay, twice winners in the early days of the World Cup, are into the semis. I think if they and the Netherlands bring their quarter-final form to the semi, Uruguay will find themselves in the World Cup final for the first time for sixty years.