I am feeling pretty self-satisfied at the moment. See, I wrote some lyrics for a new song and managed to squeeze in the awesomest, most literary reference of all: Basho. He’s the famous Japanese haiku expert, who wrote about frogs and banana trees. Hell, if Laura Veirs can do it, I can do it too.

I’m not sure what the melody should be yet.

Threshing Machine

There’s a far-away sound
where the people go down
It’s the clatter and keen
of a threshing machine.

Those teeth of cold steel
can take a man for a meal
Oh how many have died
in its endless insides?

If you saw this Basho
could you know what you know?
all the violence and sound
it’s shaking the ground

like nothing you’ve seen
this threshing machine
will make your heart race
with it’s reckless grace

I got the idea from that ‘Worst Jobs In History’ series with Tony Robinson. I believe Tony Robinson is the epitome of rock.

Hey, I can go to Canada now! I’m apparently getting something called PRSS: HDR funding, which I assume is just like LOTR: ROTK funding but with an added top-up of OMGWTFBBQ money. And less orcs. Anyway, woot! I should be able to book tickets in a week or so, and if you are Becky or Julia I will write and tell you all about it so we can hook up and watch some old horror movies in Bowling Green (or should it be Disem-bowling Green?) I might also hire myself a car in Canada, so does anyone know any cool things to see in Ontario? Things to steer clear of?

I promise I will write something interesting soon, btw. Need to have interesting experiences first.

So James invited me to the Newtown Hotel’s amateur strip contest. The picture above is of the host, but I can’t remember her name. Anyhow, it’s a night where amateur contestants, and one extremely drunk member of the crowd, strip down to their undies and dance around the pole for the chance to win a hundred bucks. The place was packed.

The strippers were:

A chick in a body suit. She had a whole ’skanky stripper’ performance, but she was more of a feature act than a contestant. Her suit had fake ladybits on it.

Mr. ‘Jack Boot.’ He wore leather pants and had lots of body hair. The guys I was there with didn’t like him because he took his clothes off too slowly and looked a bit stoned, but I thought he was okay.

Suzie Q, Miss Nude New South Wales. She was the only actually hot stripper, but she was another feature act so she couldn’t win. She expertly took her clothes off to some Goldfrapp song and to Nick Cave’s ‘Red Right Hand,’ which were pretty great choices. In fact, I can now only appreciate Nick Cave as music for hot strippers to shake their pasties to.

The bartender. Imagine Gollum, but with more body hair. He won, though, since Jack was the only other contestant.

Some drunk guy from the audience with a Star Trek communicator badge.

A professional male stripper who was, well, the epitome of cheesy professional male strippers.

So, er, it was very fun and there was lots of hooting. I didn’t hoot though. And Andrew was there.

Since I last updated I’ve been a) needing a haircut b) failing to do enough shopping c)… well, that’s basically it. Although the council did finally respond to my complaints, saying they’d talked to the contractor responsible for the roads. They also patched up the gaping holes in the sidewalk on my street so no more grannies will be tripped over. Civic duty done!

I’ve also been furiously downloading mp3s from Alwaysontherun.net. Well, ‘furiously’ in a 56k kinda way. They have lots of inde girly stuff like Cocorosie and Laura Veirs. I’ve got a whole bunch of early Marissa Nadler music now, and I’m not sure whether it’s wonderful or just really, really, really bad. It may take a while to figure it out. You see, she’s a folk singer who spends a lot of time telling stories about characters who have bad things happen to them and then want to kill themselves. Her voice is somehow both ethereal and bovine at the same time, and she is often accompanied by a banjo. So you would probably want to hurt her. I try to like things though, so I’m going to give it a week or two. At least she’s not as cool and intelligent and clinical as Laura Veirs, or as beautifully tragic as Cat Power. They both kind of irritate me.

Something you would probably like though is Neko Case. She sings crooning country songs. Some are about how she’s in love with the devil, some are just normal songs.

So what’s been going on? I went to a seminar by that fanciable girl with eight fingers. It was all about artificial intelligence and how it’s better to construct AI computer programs from neurological data than from abstract models of how thinking works. It was pretty good, but my subconscious was a bit preoccupied so I couldn’t think of any smart questions. I’ve been thinking about Schopenhauer’s idea of love, which is pretty amazing - he says that love is an expression of the irrational force of the cosmos as it seeks to perpetuate a fundamentally meaningless and painful human condition. It’s like an evolutionary argument, but more metaphysical.

Another thing that’s happened is that the thesis editing I thought would take until late October is almost done. Whoop! :D This isn’t the last round of editing, but it looks like it will be the second last. My mum’s wondering what to wear to graduation. Oh, it’s brilliant. Framed certificates and foofy hats! Pieces of paper telling you the day you are officially allowed to start calling yourself a doctor! Not dealing with the same old material over and over again! Gainful employment! So many prospects that will no doubt become boring and lame after a few weeks but are exciting to me right now!

OK, calm down. Long way to go yet. Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched… because… they might turn out retarded. And people will laugh. And then you’ll have to have another go at making them. And let’s face it, you can’t even use a common cliche without things going horribly, horribly wrong, can you?

It’s early afternoon. The warmest day in weeks. Maybe months. Some weird music is playing over at the Buddhist temple - there are loud noodling guitars, but no back-beat. It must be Indian or something. Except I’ve got Joanna Newsom on and it’s just about the best thing for this kind of afternoon.

Actually, I wanted to write something else about music. I downloaded the video of Wide Open Road by The Triffids, which is just unspeakably awesome and features some film shot out the side of a car travelling down Stock Road in… what the hell is that suburb? Naval Base? Anyway, it’s between Rockingham, where I grew up, and Fremantle. It’s the 1980s in the video, so the car yard and the bikie pub aren’t there yet, but you can tell it’s the place because of the old smoke stacks and the giant hopper. They must have been driving along that road with someone holding a camera in the back seat of the car. I have driven down the same road hundreds of times. Maybe thousands if you include bus rides. I know the curves and the gradients and points where someone might try to cut you off if they’re in a hurry. I don’t even look at the speed signs. Stock Road connected me to uni, to the bars and poetry readings and shopping in Fremantle, to band rehearsals, and to my friends when they started to move up there. Eventually, it was the road that took me back to my mum’s house when I moved up there with them.

I don’t quite know why this is interesting. I guess we think of roads just as spaces in between places we go to. Really, though, we know them. Know them very well, in some cases. We zoom down their hills and curse their red lights. We fear their tricky parts. We see the new buildings that go up beside them and think of how everything is changing. They are the key to our desires because they’re the only way to get anywhere. It’s funny really.

I’ve been writing about feminism, but I keep writing ‘partiarchy’ instead of ‘patriarchy.’ Therefore, I am now proposing ‘partiarchy’ as a new political structure, where whoever throws the best party rules. Like, totally rules.

This political system is the best because: a) it encourages heavy drinking and b) it’s obvious that John Howard will lose government immediately - he might be ousted by someone with a lampshade on their head, but I’m prepared to say that’s a better option.

In short, we know that democracy doesn’t work. Let’s find some cool people, put on Pavement and The Stone Roses, maybe have a toke, and see if we can’t sort this whole mess out.

UPDATE:
Speaking of patriarchy, this was Gmail’s “Funny Quote of the Day”:

Simone de Beauvoir - “To catch a husband is an art; to hold him is a job.”

You know what? I really don’t think she meant it as a joke.

To whom it may concern,

I have been thinking about we can make the streets safer for those exercise-loving, environmentally friendly and, above all, foolhardy people who ride bikes. The suggestions I have come up with are not just for Public Enemy Number One (ie. motorists), but for everyone. If you keep them in mind, you’ll be doing a service to your community!

Please look harder when you’re driving. Don’t just glance at the road, but really make sure it’s clear. There was a woman this afternoon that did a three point turn right in front of me, nearly making me run into the side of her SUV - that’s the sort of thing I mean. We all get lazy, but we have to fight it. Also remember that we might be going faster than you think, and that we can’t slow down as quickly as a car can.

Another important thing is to make sure our roads are clean and in good condition. Lumps and bumps are simply inconvenient for a car, but a rider can be toppled by an unexpected pothole or patch of gravel. This very thing happened to me yesterday, when I turned onto an unfamiliar street only to find it was a mess of holes and loose rocks. I wasn’t badly hurt, but I have some scrapes and totally looked like a dork. So next time you see a crappy road, write in and ask to have it fixed.

Finally, if you’re on foot, please look before crossing the road. Bikes are silent, but they may be travelling just as fast as the cars and they have the same right of way. Secretly every cyclist wants to be in a collision where they cause more damage than they receive, so don’t let them! Watch out!

Of course, I know that bike riders don’t always do the right thing. We often tear up the sidewalks and treat the road rules with disdain. Just coming back from the laundromat a few minutes ago I saw a man ride out into the middle of the road and almost get hit by two cars at once. Can you believe that he wasn’t even wearing his helmet? It was hanging from the handlebars. But nobody’s perfect, and there are people who’ll behave like idiots no matter what form of transport they choose. Just please remember that a cyclist can really get hurt in an accident, no matter whose fault it is.

Oh, and whatever you do, always look carefully before you open your door when you’re parked on the street! People have been killed this way. Many people.

Love, hugs and sunshine,

Mark

I have started converting to those energy-efficient light globes and, hey, no one warned me about this but THE TWO HALVES OF MY APARTMENT ARE NOW DIFFERENT COLOURS.

Fuck, it’s bizarre.

I had a dream that I was going bald. I had lots of hair but there was a bald patch in the middle, and I was trying to fold the masses of hair around the sides onto the bald spot to cover it up. But it wasn’t working. Then I think someone spilled a gin and tonic on me while I was looking in the mirror. Goddamn that was a crappy dream.

Also, I have noticed plenty of girls smiling at me lately. I don’t know whether I have become sexier or it’s just a female spring thing. They are still pretty weird smiles though. As if they see me and smile involuntarily, then catch themselves doing it and resume a normal facial expression. Maybe they are mistaking me for someone else. Someone who looks like me from a distance and is a massive hit with the ladies.

I must find him. And ask him for pointers on bein sexy.