THE MEANING OF OZ - All you need to know!

Sort of raining today - intermittent spit and drizzle, really.
Perhaps I'll go and park it out the front.

This is the worst car I've ever had for showing dirt!

BUTCH?


This car doesn't HAVE a butch.

It has a little trap for the unwary, though.

If you close the hatch the car locks automatically.

Once I have my two keys separated. I'll check whether it still does that with the key in the ignition!

That was a rather horny post spendi - you need more wildlife noises and less city noises in your life, I think.

I find city noise comforting these days after many years of country living. The roar of the traffic, yobs shouting, glass breaking and wailing sirens are nothing compared to a dry twig snapping in the eerie silence.

Hi TF, I struggled for a day trying to figure out what you meant by this, and then I realised you think I cleaned the car because I was in Canberra! - You wouldn't realise, as the A2K aussies who've been here for a long time do, that I lived in Canberra from the late 80's to very early 2005.

Back in northern california, my sweet volvo needed care that my local tire + garage couldn't help with, so off to the dreaded volvo dealer. Thus the guy there drove the chancy volvo and I drove his truck, a stick shift. Cripes, I've driven stick shift for decades, but had lost competence. Lurch! Lurch!

White is good, my last two have been white - a million year old toyota and now a million year old volvo.

On horns, at least a while ago, some horns in Los Angeles played La Cucaracha..

this one is fancy - I remember more primitive versions:

I think we should discuss the pros & cons of various car wash products next!

Admit it, hinge, Canberrans (especially those who are/were public servants) are known for their poor attitude toward these things!

(I'm not sure what tenderfoot meant, either. Perhaps s/he meant the comment to be humorous ? )

Did you see Nick Vujicic on Gordon Street tonight? I felt vague stirrings of nationalism - could he have been who is if born in any other country?

He's a preacher for FFS, and atheist that I am I thought he rocked completely.

I didn't see the program, but read the Wikipedia entry, hinge.
What an amazing person he is.
Wow!

(not having seen the program) I don't know the answer to that.
Could you tell us a bit more?

He just takes the piss out of himself, making bad puns about his physical condition, but it's not a pathetic cry for praise or reassurance, or an attempt at personal abasement - he's combining his own coming to grips with who he is and attempting to connect to who he's talking to at a human level - breaking down that automatic fear thing many of us have when dealing with obvious physical abnormalities. It's like he's saying 'I know I look weird, and it makes you uncomfortable, but I'm still a person in here, in fact I'm bright, funny and this condition has given me a view on life that I think you might find interesting, if not useful. Let's have some fun.

It reminds me a lot of two Australia paralympic skiers after the last winter paras, Michael Milton, who lost a leg to cancer as a boy and a blind guy who's name escapes me, being interviewed by a sportscaster who asked if they'd celebrated their respective medal wins. The visually impaired guy says 'Yeah! I got blind!' and MM says 'And I got LEGLESS!'

That sort of completely irreverent laconicism seems so bloody aussie to me.

If you can see it iview stick around for his car seat trick - only seeing it will get across have freaking funny it must have been when he did it....

Thanks, hinge.
He sounds a truly amazing human being.
Good on him!


It does indeed.
If ya didn't laugh, you'd cry cry, as the saying goes.

I also hold those first, ground-breaking "ethnic" comedians, from their respective cultures, in very high regard. Very brave to be so funny about issues which were/are so "sensitive" at the time. At last, Muslim comedians! And what a blessed relief!


Not sure about iview, but I'll see what I can do.

Absolutely, did you ever see Steady Eddie? He did standup with pretty confronting Cerebral Palsy.



I always loved Akmal Saleh since post 9/11 when the 'Be alert not alarmed' fridge magnets were circulated in 43 languagues. He used to say "Do you know what the fridge magnets say in Arabic? 'WE'RE ONTO YOU!'"

Yep, I've seen Steady Eddie.
And yes, I found the experience pretty confronting, too.
But good on him for having the guts to do it, I say!


Ha ha.
You should post that to the bad jokes thread, hinge!

I guess the likes of Effie (I loved Effie!) & the wog boys were the ground-breakers in this sort of comedy.
I was pretty amazing, how it turned into "wog pride" for so many (kids especially!) & so popular, too!

Mind you, only a Vietnamese comedian would dare joke about eating dogs! (What's that guy's name? It escapes me this minute. Anyway, he's very funny.)

I'm thinking that that ability to laugh at yourself & see the humour of your own situation , with others, seems a pretty good indicator of becoming part of Oz society. Sort of moving from "outsider" to "insider" status. What do you say?

DIARY OF A POMMIE IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

August 31 - Just got transferred with work from Leeds UK
to our new home in Karratha, Western Australia ..
Now this is a town that knows how to live!
Beautiful, sunny days and warm, balmy evenings.
I watched the sunset from a deckchair by our pool yesterday.
It was beautiful. I've finally found my new home. I love it here.

September 13 - Really heating up now. It got to 31 today. No problem though. Living in air-conditioned home, driving air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun every day like this. I'm turning into a sun-worshipper – no blasted rain like back in Leeds!!

September 30 - Had the back yard landscaped with tropical plants today. Lots of palms and rocks. No more mowing lawns for me! Another scorcher today, but I love it here. It’s Paradise!

October 10 - The temperature hasn't been below 35 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least today it's windy though. The wind Keeps the flies off a bit. Acclimatizing is taking longer than we expected.

October 15 - Fell asleep by the pool yesterday. Got third degree burn over 60% of my body. Missed three days off work. What a dumb thing to do. Got to respect the old sun in a climate like this!

October 20 - Didn't notice Kitty (our cat) sneaking into the car before I left for work this morning. By the time I got back to the car after work, Kitty had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag and stuck to the upholstery. The car now smells like Whiskettes and cat ****. I've learned my lesson though: no more pets in this heat.

October 25 - This wind is a bastard. It feels like a giant Bloody blow dryer. And it's hot as hell! The home air conditioner is on the blink and the repair man charged $200 just to drive over and tell me he needs to order parts from bloody Perth ....The wife & the kids are complaining.

October 30 - The temperature's up around 40 and the parts still haven't arrived for the bloody air conditioner. House is an oven so we’ve all been sleeping outside by the pool for 3 nights now. Bloody $600,000 house and we can't even go inside. Why the hell did I ever come here?

November 4 - Finally got the ******* air-conditioner fixed. It cost $1,500 and gets the temperature down to around 25 degrees, but the humidity makes it feel about 35. Stupid repairman. ******* thief!

November 8 - If one more smart bastard says 'Hot enough for you today?' I'm going to ******* throttle him. ******* heat! By the time I get to work, the car radiator is boiling over, my ******* clothes are soaking ******* wet and Ismell like baked cat. ******* place is the end of the Earth.

November 9 - Tried to run some errands after work, I was wearing shorts, and sat on the black leather upholstery in my car. I thought my ******* arse was on fire. Lost 2 layers of flesh, all the hair on the backs of my legs and off my ******* arse. Now the car smells like burnt hair, fried arse and baked cat. ****. ****. ****.

November 10 -– The Weather report might as well be a ******* recording. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny, Hot and ******* sunny. It never ******* changes! It's been too hot to do anything for 2 ******* months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week. ****!

November 15 - Doesn't it ever rain in this damn ******* place? Water restrictions will be next, so my $5,000 worth of palms might just dry up and blow into the ******* pool. The only things that thrive in this ******* hell-hole are the ******* flies. You don't dare open your mouth for fear of swallowing half a dozen of the little bastards!

November 20 - Welcome to HELL! It got to 45 fuckin' degrees today. Now the air cons gone in me car. The repair man came to fix it and said, 'Hot enough for you today?' I wanted to shove the ******* car up his ******* arse. Anyway, had to spend the $2,500 mortgage payment to bail me out of jail for assaulting the stupid prick. ******* Karratha! What kind of sick, demented ******* idiot would want to live here!

December 1 - WHAT?!!!????? The FIRST day of Summer?!!?!! You are ******* kidding me!

People don't realise what a wonderful climate we have in England until they try something else.

Those two Aussies in the Masters were unlucky dp. The guy who beat them had fluked two shots into the hole early in his round, one from 200 yards, and he finished with four birdies.

CRAP!

I was there for about a month last year - and it rained every day but one! That's not weather - ain't no whether about it - it'll bloody rain!

It's the same in Ireland. It's all that rain that makes things so green and lovely when the sun shines.

Don't you mean IF the sun shines?

Hingehead.... Just poking fun... Worked in Canberra many years ago, laid vinyl floor tiles in the new Government printing that was being built there.... OOOOOH!!! so many years ago.

I remember one skit of his where he won a dance contest trying to cross the floor to the bar.....very funny guy .