Always Keep A Dead Idol Handy

All your life you have worshipped little idols. Even if the administrators of your main faith – the rabbis, priests, ministers, and mullahs – have cautioned you against it, you have still carried on. Clothing, entertainments, relationships, possessions, arts and crafts have all served as objects of worship at some stage of the game. And they have all fallen by the wayside eventually.

This is called getting older. Some people call it growing up, but that is more of a taunt than a tag-line. Maturity is the best way of looking at it, and if you can do so in a childish fashion you are winning.

The sport you loved, the car you desired, the culture you worshipped…they all pall in time. And this is as it should be. No-one can enjoy a smorgasbord if they just stand at the shellfish counter all the time – they need to move to the breads and the pickled herring and the princess cake, though not all at once…variety is needed, and you would do well to make sure that you get the same variety all the time.

When something falls away from your desire – when it becomes de trop instead of de thing – by all means usher it out of your life. You need not wear fluoro bell-bottom hipsters a moment longer than it takes to get you into bed with someone. Bell your bottom, if you will, but spare us the sight. Get over it – I assure you that the rest of us will. We are all too busy burying our own dead idols to worry about yours.

But keep a memento of the time. If it is only a badly taken Polaroid of you in the 70’s, it is at least a reminder of the hippie days and a talisman against them returning. You need not look at it more than once a decade, but don’t lose sight of where you came from and remember why you left.

Even dead idols have a place on the altar.

The Little World – Applying For A Fun Licence

” This is a free country, isn’t it? ”

Fine words, and perfectly appropriate at the polling booth or in the public bar, but hesitate before uttering them in your local hobby shop. Because the answer may turn out to be ” No “.

I’m driven to this conclusion by looking at the goods on offer in the shop. Fine models, glorious kits, magnificent engines, and more trouble than you can pack into a Gladstone bag. In many cases you may be free to purchase the fun, but you will be forbidden to have it…or at least you will need to go a’begging to someone for permission to play somewhere.

If that sounds over the top, consider that here in Perth – the most isolated capital city in the world with hundreds or thousands of kilometres between us and other cities – we need to go to one special secluded spot on the outskirts of town to fly a toy airplane. We need to go 20 kilometres to sail a toy boat, and we can go to Bunbury or buggery if we want to run a toy car.

Noise, pollution, disturbance, wildlife, public nuisance,etc. etc. Councils jealously guard their parks and schools jealously guard their ovals, and woe betide the trespasser. The drone flyers have it even worse as they are the bete noir of everybody. Doesn’t stop the hobby shops from trying to sell lots of different drones, but when it comes to clubs flying them…?

So far the toy train people can escape most of the contumely and control as their layouts are inside, and on their own property. If they take them outside they can be harassed for creating an attractive nuisance or for spoiling the council’s view of what the garden should look like.

The toy soldier, car, and doll collectors also escape most of this problem…but this is probably only because the police and council haven’t figured out an angle that can either fee or fine the collector. Have no fear…they are probably working on it. They already have a stranglehold on the militaria collectors who just want to trade old muskets.

I am not going to worry too much. I’m sure I contravene a number of regulations by collecting toy cars and taking pictures of them and a zealous enemy could put in so many council complaints as to make the hobby miserable, but collecting enemies could also be a lot of fun.

Particularly if you pin them to a board or press them between the pages of a thick book.

Hold Me Close – Stab Me Deep

I am somewhat amused to see that Bette Midler and Donald Trump do not like each, though I am not surprised by it. Even if they shared the same political affiliations – which I take it they do not – there would still be ample cause for them to be at each other’s throats – the chief of which is they are both overbearing…and do not appreciate it when they cannot dominate each other. As it is, they both have a very good thing going in their animosity – it assures them of a place in the news sheets and the social tweets. And they both want to be in all the news all the time.

This closeness that they do not admit sharing is also seen in many other arts and crafts – dancing has it, painting has it, sculpture has it…as does any other art you care to name. I can find you collectors of model cars who would stab each other with a 1:43 scale Morris sedan if they could get away with it. Rivalry, angst, bitchiness, treachery, and deceit can be found everywhere.

It can be petty, like the person who falls upon spelling or grammar errors to score points. It can be serious, like the glaring matches that break out at amateur dramatics between sets of parents. It can be useful…though frequently useful only in starting an even bigger fight. And sometimes it can be profitable.  Send me $ 15 in used notes and I’ll tell you how…

I used to be horrified when a friend betrayed me. Then I discovered that after the world had come crashing down around my ears it could be set back upright – and frequently looking a bit better – within days. And the terrible act was somewhat of an inoculation – no-one could ever do exactly the same thing again. Oh there would be new betrayals to conquer, but that particular one was a dead issue. One less person and/or circumstance to worry over.

Is this to be taken as an encouragement to be horrible to others? No, you should still be as kind as you can to everyone. But it does put a lot of the things we see into perspective, and if it helps us to genuinely shrug off a hurt, it is valuable.

 

” You’ll Be Sorry… “

” You’ll be sorry…”

a. ” When I’m gone. ”

Yes, probably I will be. There will be things missing and ugly discoveries in the back of cupboards. There will be more work for less reward. But I will see it through.

b. ” If you eat that chocolate cream stuffed lamb chop. ”

Undoubtedly. Pass the maple syrup, eh?

c. ” You ever met me.”

Yes, and I am starting now, while you’re here – so it’s fresh. No good trying to get the same consistency in stale sorrow.

d. ” If you don’t buy it now. ”

Possibly, but I am betting on a greater probability of sorrow if I buy it at all. You own it now and you don’t look any too happy…

e. ” With the fringe on top. ”

NOW I know what happened to my OLKLAHOMA LP! Give it back!

The preceding was brought to you by the National Council For Regret. If the Australian Government cannot make you sorry, then nothing can.

 

A Pile Of Pooh

The news that Communist China is banning pictures of A.A. Milne’s characters from internet use came up as a slightly hilarious story in Facebook. Apparently the character of Winnie The Pooh is used as a substitute for the head of the Chinese government in mild political satire. The Japanese Prime Minister is likened to Eeyore and the former American President has been depicted as Tigger. None of the drawn messages are rude, but the fact that they allow the Chinese people to poke fun at authority is considered too dangerous.

I am not surprised at this attitude in Asia. The perceived dignity and prestige of the mighty are so very much more valued than free speech, that no deviation from any sort of party line can be expected to be tolerated. It’s as much Confucian thought as it is Communist.

Personally I think the Chinese leader is making a mistake. If you are going to be seen personified in anything, a child’s favourite book character would seem to be a charming and lovable image to put forward. The world is full of enough monsters as it is… take a good name when you can get it.

Returning To Somebody’s Roots

I am prompted to write today’s column by an advertisement that appeared on a Facebook timeline. It touted some form of cultural cringe session entitled ” Return To Roots “. The images fronting it suggested that the participants would be from Central American jungles, but I suspect that this was nothing more than graphic designer’s code for ” Come along and get drunk on expensive beer. ”

Nothing wrong with that, as many of my friends will attest, but using it as a catchphrase was damnable. If you REALLY want people to return to their roots, you are going to have to accept that the roots that they return to are neither exotic, erotic, or interesting. The crowd you are going to get is going to have to revert to being teenagers in the 1980’s in outer city suburbs…and you can get fresher versions of that at any servo on the Albany Highway right now.

No – what the advertisement was calling for was for a to return to someone else’s roots. What exactly it wanted us to do there is questionable. Root around? Dress up? Play act? I can do that in the traditional garb of my forefathers – a shirt and trousers – while drinking the mystical potion of the tribe – the highball. I do not need to put warpaint on my cheeks and shake a spear to be warlike. Our tribe put on khaki clothing and shook rifles…and it worked.

I’m as guilty as the next re-enactor of aping something that none of my family ever remotely enacted in the first place. As far as I can tell, none of the Steins or Sheedys were ever at Waterloo – except me – and I was 180 years late, thank goodness. What I did then and others do now is not re-enacting…it is acting. If we were better at it we would be paid money and solicited to give our political opinion on CNN.

But as far as returning to roots? I hardly remember some of their names, let alone addresses or faces…I still have a rash, however…

Featured Image: Fake Petzval lens effect. Real geezer.

Detrolling Your Life – Part Two – The BGA Way

The Backstabbers Guild Of Austalia is nothing if not public-spirited. When we see a wrong we right it. No dragon can threaten a fair maiden when The Guild is present. At least not first.

Ignoring and blocking the troll is still the best legal way to cure the problem. Remember that as you read the list of alternatives.

a. Most trolls are misfits. But that having been said, even the least socially active will have some contact with other people. A job, perhaps, or a family. A club or organisation that they belong to. These are known in the general world as “outlets” for them – to a Guild member they become ” inlets “. Places where the armour of trollery is weakest…

b. Find this place. Make friends with the troll’s friends. In sight of the troll. But do not include them in the discussion.

c. Bad language can be a specialty of the troll and a way that they shock and bear down on their victims. But trolls frequently have only one language to use…at most two. There are many more for you to choose from.

Find a teacher or speaker of a language that the troll does not know. Latvian, Urdu, Samoan…whatever you fancy. Pay them well to teach you some choice foul expressions in their tongue. Real corkers. Curses that would make native seamen blanch and lean against walls. Practise these until you can deliver them faultlessly, and then deliver them faultlessly. Your tone of voice will cut as deeply as if you were speaking English, but you cannot be frowned on for bad language. Occasionally you may horrify a tourist, but that is the price you pay for sophistication.

d. On no account go to a furniture auction and purchase a sturdy kitchen table. Do not wrench off one of the legs and then go and beat your tormentor about the head and shoulders with it. This is illegal. And it spoils what may otherwise be a perfectly good table.

e. Even trolls pay tax. But do they pay the correct amount? The ATO has hot lines over which you can raise this very question.

f. If your troll is physically findable, do so, and go to them and forgive them. Do it publicly, and do it sincerely and in detail, with others listening.

Then do it again the next day. At the same time.

Repeat this for a month – day by day. That hour – the Hour Of Apology – will be come an accursèd time for them for the rest of their life. Once a day your ally, the clock, will haunt them.

g. Do you like to eat and drink well? To dress fashionably and in comfort?  Save up some cash and then arrange to do just this within the sight of your troll. You need not acknowledge them, but you might want to listen for the sound of their teeth grinding together.

In all of the above remember that whatever comfort there is in the sight of an enemy discomfited, there is far better enjoyment to be had in actually forgetting about them. They wither and fall away if not attended, and leave the earth clean for better growth.