australia, who do you think you are?

over the past few weeks i have given a lot of thought to tomorrows national holiday. australia day, synonymous with bbqs, beers, fake/real flag tattoos and the wife beater. sad really, i have no real inclination for celebration. why? i mean, it's our nations day of celebrating uuuummmm yeah we commemorate the...., well that is to say, there is triple j's hottest 100 and yeah.... ok so i had no idea what the day was meant to be about and i assume not many others do either so i researched. the day is in an effort to pay tribute to the arrival of the first fleet in sydney cove in 1788, when the british hoisted the union jack and claimed the land under their sovereignty. wooooohhh!

this act is the reason why various aboriginal people declared the day, 'invasion day'. seems fair enough really but, my problem isn't with history so much as it is with the present. the day is seen as nothing more than a bank holiday in the sun and an excuse to get completely trashed and bitch about angus and julia stone's song 'jet plane' reaching the number 1 position of the hottest 100 (yest that's my ominous prediction btw). not that there is anything wrong with such past times, especially the last, but it does indicate how this country is missing something. a sense of national identity.

another criticism of the indifference that occurs on australia day is the fact that it falls during the school holidays. some teachers believe that due to this children are not as engaged as they are with other national holidays, like anzac day, and have no real concept of the importance of such an event. this lack of engagement in my mind has cemented the one dimensional hedonistic self image of australians. we like sport, having a laugh with a drink our hand and chilling on the beach. surely, there is more to us than that?

be it a result of our countrys short history, or our connection to britain and the united states, we haven't been given a chance to really branch out on our own. no civil wars or wars of independence, we haven't had the opportunity to grow as a nation by ourselves. not that wars are good things, but they do see change and a rallying of people behind a cause. we are still a member of the commonwealth because we seemingly can't be bothered or want to become independent knowing if we do, we can't win gold medals in sport at the commonwealth games. sad really.

getting back to my original gripe. australian tattoos have become a bogan trait. either through un-originality or a lack of understanding many aussies will proudly show off their 'patriotic' ink whilst subtly trying to say they have gone through pain for their noble homeland. now THAT pisses me off! mostly because i'm quite convinced that they have no idea what it means to be an australian. i know this, because i'm not even sure what it means anymore. but, having 'australia' or the apparently 'un-british' part of the flag (the southern cross) tattooed with abandon across your ass is about as offensive to me as burning the flag right in front of my eyes.

ok alright so, maybe it isn't all that bad, but it no longer posses the ideals it once encompassed. a symbol of perceived patriotism and egalitarianism was hijacked by racist thugs and well, the brand seems to have been irreparably damaged. blogger henry stones described the average southern cross tattoo holder in a smh article as possessing many traits, including: "you call rum and cokes 'rumbos' and you drink a minimum of two cartons a month"; "you have started a conversation regarding matty johns' innocence" and "you have a rat's tail".

perhaps a bit harsh, still it is concerning. this is how we show we care for our country? widespread apathy i fear will be the theme for tomorrow and whilst being wholly depressing is also scares the bejesus out of me. what's going to happen when the day comes we have to stand up for what we as a nation believe in, and can't think of a single thing worth fighting for?

back and begging for stuff.

so i'm back. feel bad for my extended hiatus, but it was essential. my last month has been hectic. full of assignments, exams, physie highs and lows with some work mixed in for good financial measure. all except the latter are over now for another year and i can't wait for 2011 to begin. EXCEPT for chistmas. it's pretty wrong that my first post back is grubbing for presents but as my sister is scared of shopping for my gifts i now present you with my updated list of summer/christmas must haves.... well things i must have.

i'm known now for my love of internet shopping and it really is a simple reason. i like stuff no one has or, maybe even didn't think they wanted until they saw it. 'hipster' is a disgusting word, but i really am one. combined with a huge dollop of geek for good measure. which is where i will begin.

battlestar galactic was and will always be my favourite show of all time. when it ended my sadness was cushioned by its sister show caprica. a few years ago bsg released 2000 limited edition cylon toasters. they sold out and to get one now you will be looking at a price tag upwards of $500. so, instead of maxing out mums credit card, you can now get cylon toast from a caprica toaster here. on sale for a measly $65.   

MODEKUNGEN are an amazing swedish brand. although, their site is entirely in their native tongue it is reasonably easy to navigate. this is their handvaska med nitar undertill bag.... no idea how to say that but has me going, oooh pretty. the brand suits my post-punk loving self but is still classic enough to be rocked with a cardie. will set you back 899 SEK or $132. another reason to shop online, our dollar rocks!

i'm a bit confused as to why i want these israeli desert boots. maybe i think they will make me look like ziva off ncis. meh for $70 it's well worth the consumer indulgence. palladium boots have some other rather less conventional shoes going on here and they are all very well priced considering how well made they are.




it just isn't summer without new swimmers and sunnies. this year black milk will supply the former and ray-ban the latter. the red galaxy one piece really does sell itself. just look at its amazing weirdness, and will set you back $85. quite reasonable, no? the black milk brand really is amazing, it's site is a print lovers dream. check out their other swimmers and leggings: R2D2, Astronauts and Skeletons.

ray-ban's have been on my christmas list for years and years, and i haven't really ever bothered to ask for a pair because they were simply too expensive. well the american dollar sucks and they aren't as out of your reach as you may think. a pair of wayfarer 2's will cost you $145, have a look at their many many colour options for two tone magnificence.


'think geek' really is nerd heaven. as someone who habitually loses book marks and even the book itself, this find could not have come at a better time. the book rest lamp is everything i have ever dreamt of and more. well, not really but it is very cool looking and more importantly nifty. combine this with a pac-man alarm clock, going to sleep and waking up will never be the same again.


now, please excuse my indie indulgence but i just must have these shirts, to turn into singlets.... well for mum to turn into singlets. kurt cobain and count duckula. bit of a questionable combo but still, these both make me squee with love in two very different ways. firstly, the daniel johnson shirt worn famously by kurt cobain is the personification of my disenfranchised teenage years. ooh the angst. and count duckula, well it's count duckula! possibly the best children's show EVER!

onto dvds and books. stocking stuffer essentials. let's pretend for a second that i have room in my apartment for anymore box sets and/or novels. hypothetically, it's not surprising that i need every season of waking the dead, peep show and jam and jerusalem. the english really do comedy and serial killers better than any other nation in the world. ebay is always worth a look for box sets, even after you consider postage, you can save a considerable amount of $$$. penguin classics are always a cheap and cheerful addition to any christmas morning. 'wind and the willows', 'madame bovary', 'journey to the centre of the earth', 'middlemarch', 'mrs. dalloway' and 'decline and fall' by evelyn waugh have been on my ebay watch list for the past month or so.

lastly, as i sit watching the first day of the ashes i'm reminded of the fact i have never EVER been to see live international cricket. for something that played such a big part of my childhood summers. so i'd love tickets to go watch the english FINALLY get what is coming to them. ticketek have some very good deals for families and even a concession price for us poor university students. a silver ticket as the SCG will cost you $90 for an adult (and $77 with concession).

well that's it. hope these sites give you some ideas for presents (not just for me, though keep me in mind) that might be a bit out of the box but fit someone you know and love.

the commonwealth games, the olympics retarded half sister!

if you are a member of a post-english empire country you may know that the commonwealth games are on. its all very unexciting. not a sports fan myself, spent the nrl grand final asleep. still, there is one thing i have noticed that quite often occurs at events like this, and that is the shitness of most national anthems. australia's really is rubbish, but i am comforted by the fact that new zealands is worse.

although, there is one that is quite clearly worse and to add insult to injury they are pretty good at sports now. 'god save our gracious queen'? oh please, does she really need that much saving? she does live in a big house behind barb-wire fences with guys with guns standing in front of that. now, that is one fucking saved queen! why does she need 'her people' to stand on platforms and sing to her good health? maybe she should be put in peril, send her off to afghanistan in her pyjamas. THEN maybe then the british would have something to sing about.

so this isn't my joke, can't remember where i saw it. but, it stuck with me and today made me angry all over again. do not even get me started on the pointlessness of flags....

soccer v football. not that it matters here.

i seem to be missing some sort of 'australian gene' that causes me to give a crap about sport. i am also not ashamed to say that at 4.30am yesterday morning i was dead to the world and having a lovely time in dream land with prince william. not up and cheering on our national world cup team to defeat against the germans. what a spectacular defeat.

so there really isn't much more to this post other than my expression of abject disappointment in my fellow australians. we don't play soccer! we play cricket and rugby and even at one stage were the best team in the world in those sports. seriously, someone who bothered to get up (and no, it doesn't count if you were up all night drunk off ya ass) and watch the early morning match needs to explain to me the off side rule. because, if you can't then why the hell did you bother!?

also, on a side note victoria beckham is a waste of very little space. i really hate her! she is rich and famous and skinny but hey, have you ever seen her smile...? she is nothing to aspire to, she doesn't contribute to society at all. moreover, i'm pretty sure she has had THAT much work done that when in fact she does die her corpse will probably never decay! little bit like a cheeseburger....

chevron seven locked.

quick re-blog. my dear sister has her very own blog shaped play thing. check it out and follow her as she travels around 'the land of the free'. a recent day trip, for example, saw her experience the boring sport of baseball.

link link link -> here.

i hate that i live in a country that would give matty a second chance!

as you may or may not know i hate rugby league, almost as much as i hate the foo fighters and the red hot chilli peppers. the whole game and the culture that surrounds it glorifies recreational violence, binge drinking and elevates brainless steroid riddled sexist 'athletes' to the status of gods.

this all comes from my anger that i live in a country that would give matthew 'matty' johns a second, wait third, hang on sixth chance. how many times are australian league fans willing to look past sexual impropriety because....well the guy is funny? he can make a penis joke AND insult the sexual revolution at the same time. and who said men can't multitask?

though this has larger ramifications in my mind as none of this raises any alarm bells anymore. no one really cares or is even remotely surprised when our great athletes are caught in a hotel room with cocaine and prostitutes! just so long as the police don't lay charges it's all ok. rugby league is perhaps not the only or even worst offender in raising athletes with the emotional range of a teaspoon. but, as i live in new south wales they are all over the media i consume. now i'm not saying that all of the members are like this but, they are happy to play on teams with men who at very worst rape women and on the tamer side strip down to their undies, dance on a table top then drive home with a blood alcohol reading three times the legal limit.

these are the men who are role models to young new south waliens! teaching young boys that if you train real hard and show up every saturday morning at your match you could grow up and get paid hundreds of thousands of dollars. then you can run people down with your car and be famous enough to get away with it. not to mention the way they will look at women. as objects to use as an attractive date to some sort of awards show who really love them for their winning personality, ability to quote episodes of the footy show and not their cash.

there is some 'hope' though. the balmain tigers have implemented etiquette classes for its players. how to ask a question without ending the sentence with a proposition and using unfamiliar words like 'please' and 'thank you'. it is also frowned upon calling a date a 'hoe' and instead telling her she looks pretty and holding a door for her. this isn't in my mind enough, but it is a start. it's a bit like teaching a monkey sign language and how to not throw faeces, difficult. moreover, it is a bit late. by the time these men reach the professional level of the game they aren't likely to change their behaviour. and why should they? they are at the peak of their physical fitness, are rewarded handsomely for that and are getting laid by cheap flooseys. they don't need to change the habit of a life time. not when it's working for them.

the australian rugby leagues institutional sexism needs to be stemmed earlier in these athletes careers and men like matthew johns should not be given an unlimited amount of second chances. the real world doesn't work that way. not for us poor folk at the very least.

"fuck off germany", yea i said it, what of it!?

i'm australian, and as such i crave the joy that can only be found in beating other, larger, countries in any sport. the type of sport seriously doesn't even matter. curling, swimming, cricket, base jumping, rugby and/or women's mud wrestling.

still, this need for national pride and gratification seems when pondered for all of 5 seconds slightly weird. i'm not entirely sure where it comes from, but it is rife in this country. we spend millions of dollars each year on making our athletes the best in the world, for what? a few gold medals every four years (that are 92% silver btw), that aren't actually worth much. they might b able to get you a few weatbix tv ads but other than that. who seriously cares!?

this all came from a funny scottish bastard, frankie boyle. who with regards to the upcoming summer olympics in london said, 'they say that the 2012 olympics is going to rekindle english national pride. i mean, for £9.2 billion they could have written "fuck off germany" onto the moon.'. not only is this HILARIOUS because well, germans are still free game to comedians. you never hear people say, 'oh leave the germans alone, the have been through enough!' but also because it speaks to countries motives when hosting and competing in the olympics.

tourism dollars and beating our past foes in synchronised swimming is lets face it, our political leaders real motives. all this celebrating our culture and good will amongst nations is a lot of old bollocks. we need to come to terms with our real motives in australia! we need to stop putting all our time and effort into the idea that we can get some international kudos and self worth from winning a few games or world records.

perhaps, we could put some money into stopping the welfare cycle or hospitals or public schools OR even just give the money to me and see what i come up with. it has got to be better than spending a few millions bucks a year shipping our douche bag cocaine prostitute loving top sports athletes around the world to win at sports that so many of our tax paying citizens don't give a crap about. perhaps we could find some semblance of national identity elsewhere. might keep the bogans off the street at the very least.

my little corner of its world is doing just fine.

now i don't usually blog about physie because well, my strong opinions tend to get me into trouble. it's a comparatively small community, i guess. now i understand my angry rant-like post tend to be more popular but in this one ive decided to be positive and mature. because kissing ass tends to be a more successful way of getting what you want off a judge....but that's going in the getting yelled at, agent86 'physie.comesq' territory.

so physie class is tonight and this year i did honestly consider not going back. now before some people start wigging out, there were very specific reason for this. it is my firm belief that some aspects of this sport are broken. methods of judging has been a much loved gripe of mine and i think as a result, i have come off as bitter and well slightly nuts in the past. but all this is second to the fact that last year i worked my ass off (two teams was super fun but my body hated me by december) and competed in the individual competitions hoping as usual for a place in the national final. now i've missed out on this final many many MANY times but last year was especially difficult. now i think there were a few personal factors for this but you can ask mel, i lost it. quite embarrassing now really and i'm not sure that i can do that again.

BUT having said all this i have gone back. i'm a glutton for mental and physical torture it seems. still, the only reason that i did choose to go back this year was my physie classmates. i have listened to physie elders/associates for years spouting the sports mantraish tag-line, 'physie is about fun and friendship' and always thought it was a cover for fierce competition and general girly bitchiness. it was not until this year that i actually bought what the boss' were selling.

physie might have its serious problems but my little corner of its world is doing just fine.

european football is believed by most texans to be a commie plot!

so when i was watching the super bowl today (for the first time ever) two things struck me. the game itself has very little to do with the players using their feet and what was with the half-time show?

so the game, this was may first experience of gridiron btw, was interesting because it was different and new. BUT come on these players, that the commentators insisted on comparing to gladiators, were complete wusses. yes the game is high impact but if they didn't insist on wearing armour and intricate protective head gear there would probably be less inguries. ALSO, they don't even play a whole game. different players for offensive and defensive, one group is hard at it getting a 'touch down', that does not actually require the ball to touch the ground, whilst the defensive group are doing what? getting a massage? having a nap? pft lame!

secondly, the half-time entertainment. now i love the who, rodger daltry is a god. but im not sure the stadium of spectators in miami knew they were from england. now thats ok, i presume they were drunk but could the organisers not get another band who was at least age appropriate and the personification of AMERICAN football. maybe im nitpicking, it all just seemed a bit mismatched to me.

oh well, another thing to add to my list of bazar american pastimes that i don't think i will ever understand. it can go right under midget wrestling and their method for electing government officials. though, this does get me excited. i can't wait for their 'worldseries' of baseball. america always wins....huh, weird.