i tunes, you tunes

Having relented to buying music from itunes (due to a gruelling work schedule that means getting to work in the dark, spending most of the day in the dark and leaving in the dark leaving little time for those fun flicks through the record shop, then the not so fun paying for it when you realise just how much stuff costs these days) it's kinda fun. There are so many albums that you could never find anywhere and couldn't be bothered looking for! I have felt a bit of a longing for new exciting music lately, it's been almost a year since the last You Am I album, the Long Blondes were a short affair with that new New York kind of sound ( I don't think they are from New York, are they?) and I can't see the Stone Roses releasing anything new anytime soon. Even Aus Idol isn't filling the void.
I do feel funny not having anything to show for my 17 bucks other than another name on my ipod list, there's something comforting about getting home with a new album and reading the liner notes (except in the case of Jarvis Cocker), feeling the weight and quality of the paper and looking at all the pretty pictures. It's the way of the future the kids say.

qld Odyssey

Miss Ivy managed to wheel me on a flaming tube of death and we set sail for sunny Qld for Seth's christening ( I just had to ask her if I had already told you all this but she said no). There was some experimenting with drugs in the lead up week, that's when the fear sets in, to work out how much sedative is enough to keep me from running up the aisle yelling about all of us going to die but not too much so I can walk on the plane myself and no go all Hasselhoff.
All that aside it was an ace weekend, from Mermaidma discussing whether mortal sin is still relevant to the church to a bit of a morning cuddle with the little bloke. He is the cutest little thing and all the girls at work say so. I think our Seth has a career on Neighbours or at least as a catalogue model if he retains his cheeky looks.

nsw Odyssey

I'm off to Sydney on Sunday arvo for a work thing on Monday, I was hoping to have some time to catch up with absent friends and do some guitar shopping on Paramatta Road but no the Germans seem to find humour in booking flights at stupid times. I don't get in until late Sunday night, do my stuff on Monday, go out for hopefully sloshy work dinner on Monday night then go back to work on Tuesday. Friggen Germans. And I have to get on another plane, the humanity.

Sloshy

On the topic of sloshy Miss Ivy has discovered the joy of Friday after work drinks (bless her) . The after work drinks makes the weekend go longer. Miss Ivy has also discovered the joys of drinks. Not so much as me but she's known to get a little rowdy in her own way. No one can believe that a Polish Catholic doesn't drink like a fish but she's the exception. With some training I'm sure the community will accept her. We have been the most social we have ever been between the after work drinks, dinners and breakfasts lately. We are even going out on a school night tomorrow, Friday might be a slow start!

That's what friends are for...or...sucker


I am going to get "sucker" tattooed on my forehead, backwards so I can read it. Has been rather the tumultuous week with friends and colleagues, mostly because they are so closely linked. I am feeling really hurt by one of my work friends, again. She had a rather eventful night last night which ended up with her losing some time and location. The first call from her was that she didn't know where she was and what happened, the second, after an amount of probing it turns out she picked up and probably drank too much, passed out in a hotel room and woke up alone, dazed and confused.

This put me in a really awkward spot as my first instinct was to go help and make things better for her, in the second call when a bit more detail came out I began to feel pissed off. I like to think I'm good in a tight spot and can keep focus when dealing with something like this so it is kind of my area and I like to help but I find it hurtful to be dragged into feeling like this on a false pretence. It smacks of attention seeking and in the past I have given that attention willingly and too freely. The future starts now.

Last year there was a fatal car accident at the bottom of our street and I ran to the car and watched her bleed to death in front of me. She was drunk it turns out. And I was the sucker that watched her die and I was the sucker that tried to help, and I am the sucker that still thinks about it and does not sleep. Because of the actions of one careless person I have a bit of therapy ahead of me. I can see a lot of parallels between the situations, my wish to help is stronger than my wish for self preservation of the mental kind. This needs to be altered.


I rang mermaidgrrl this morning for a conscience check as I was feeling unsure if my feelings toward work colleague were justified, was I blaming the victim? How would I feel if it turns out her drink was spiked and she was abused? It's a precarious line. As always she was straight forward and called a spade a spade. I am a nice guy, easily manipulated, and all this stress will take it's toll on my relationship with Miss Ivy. It doesn't really matter what happen to work colleague, Miss Ivy shouldn't have to put up with an upset partner, especially if she didn't start the fight.


I have lots of great friends with whom I have fantastic relationships with, all with their own rules and quirks but there is an equilibrium within those friendships where I hope everyone gets what they need from it. I am going to make a conscious effort to back away from the people who are only in it for themselves. Sleep for me has become even more difficult over the past few weeks with work building up and I don't appreciate the added stress of a parasite friend keeping me awake any more than I already am.


Human relationships are that hardest of all things to define or confine and it makes me so upset that someone could apparently deliberately set out to fuck me around and play games with me. In the past I have done that and maybe as you grow up it gets easier to see what you were doing and where you went. I feel awful for some of the things I have done to friends and partners but I like to think that I am a good enough person to own up to it and apologise, it can never make it right but a sorry goes a long way. If I didn't make the right apology then please accept a blanket sorry now as I now think this could be some karma.

From now on no more mr softy. Work is work and friendships will be limited to that, no more getting to know families or partners if not necessary, no more chats about life in general. I am there to do a job, one which I am just getting by at, and not to make friends. If I get the feeling I am being manipulated I will step back and not get caught up, I am learning to recognise the signs and pay attention to what is happening to me.

Maybe the sucker tattoo should be just temporary cause I won't be nobodies bitch no more....

Fully Sick!

I have a staff member who is always sick. I mean always. She gets every disease, sniffle or malady going. And moans continuously about it. I am fond of a whinge, sick or not sick, but i like to think I inject some humour into it. Whenever a cold strikes I make sure my affairs are in order and spend quality time with the cats just in case I don't pull through. Miss Ivy tires of that quickly but puts a brave face on it, I'm sure deep down she knows that men can actually die from the common cold.

I have another staff member who is totally incompetent, I shall call him Dave, as that is his name. Dave just doesn't keep up. He has those "you remind me of a man..." kind of conversations with clients which Driftgirl, Tinkerbell and Sniffles find hilarious. We did spend the afternoon listening to Hilary Duff and doing some myspacing. I'm a good boss! Until I realised I had 2 deadlines and hadn't done any of the work I was supposed to do. Did a half arsed job and sent my stuff through late. I'm sure the boffins at the German car makers will let me know if there's a problem

Miss Ivy and I have a huge weekend coming up. 2, count em 2, yep 2, social events tomorrow. This is almost unheard of, especially as 30 looms. Like Aunty B pointed out I will soon be turning into a punkin at 12am.
Event 1 is a wedding, on the end of a shotgun. Apparently last minute and not full reception. Cool! Especially since some of the work I was supposed to do this afternoon was for one of Miss Ivys friend who will be present. No chance of getting stuck at next to her at the reception.
Event 2 will no doubt end up with me swearing off drinking forever. One of my friends is moving to Dubai for a bit and it's her going away drinks.

Stay tuned for a Sunday "i'll never drink again" post!

ok, this desk thing is getting out of hand. I had a report to vet today and had to do it on my laptop. Not computing style but old school, pencil and ruler. As a consequence my laptop was covered in pencil because i would go out of the lines. My entire work area has been reduced to the side of a Vaio!

Plan is to "unemploy" a not so productive staff member tomorrow. Then I can put Driftchick ("my" PA, not really but she answers my phone, she is into that abusurd kind of car racing) into his job, giving her a chance for career advancement and I get a desk, at last. May also slow down the myspacing. I think that will make us the only car place with a fully female front line. Yay for womens suffrage and all that stuff. Tinkerbell is excited by all this but feels bad for the one who is getting the arse. I also feel bad but I shouldn't. If you don't perform at work your employer shouldn't be obliged to keep paying you for substandard work and general insolence. Especially when I could be getting paid more. We have 2 cats and a turtle to feed dammit.

Miss Ivy is being courted for a career change but not too keen on it. So far there have been 2 job offers. One working in a pub which had my unwavering support. The pub supplies a tab for employees, as Miss Ivy doesn't really drink I would be forced to use it. As I am learning, if you don't use your budget the powers reduce it. The other is for an accessory company, meaning lots of lots of funky bags and earrings. Not so good for me but according to some I'm not the centre of the universe.

Big ups to mermaid girl and lil Mister on their new addition, we are looking forward to meeting the little frog. Also to Seagreen for making the trip up to perform auntie duties.

I'm having a whole half week off drinking, I actually swore off drinking forever on Saturday morning. I didn't feel too bad until I got into work and had to talk to people. Didn't even feel that drunk. A very wise monkey at work told me that I should have eaten dinner and shouldn't have been drinking Tinkerbells vodka and lemonades on top of my G&T's, thanks LuLu. After all these years I would have thought some of the drinking wisdom would have sunk in by now. It's Miss Ivy's turn on Friday night as she is having a night out with the Wicked Stepsisters and ......(we can't think of the right moniker for her, stay tuned)

Drinking may have been spurred on by the crashing realisation, not make any more subtle by my mum, that I'm turning 30. At 25 Mick Jagger was touring the US for the 5th time for the relase of Beggars Banquet. Admittedly, things went downhill fairly quickly after that and I can't see spandex and legwarmers in my future. Or a Jamaican concept album.
Fuck, I'm turning 30. Fuck.
This is probably made worse by the fact that a lot of stuff has changed at work. I got a new job title and somehow lost my desk and don't really know what it is I am supposed to be doing. I think it's reports and taking on higher level arguing or something like that. I do, however, get to indulge my interest in the English language and the correct use of words in my daily letter writing to clients and proof reading everyone elses work.. Yay red pen!
My desk is now kind of a, well, kiddie desk. I also get a kiddie chair too. My boss was trying to arrange a meeting for this morning and said "we need to spread all this stuff out and go through it, my desk is snowed, we'll use yours, oh yeah. Heh. You don't have a desk!". I also don't have a lot of room, if Beaker (new receptionist type now Tinkerbell has my old job) wants to get up from her (adult) chair, she needs to tell me so I can move my (kiddie) chair so she has enough room to stand. It's kind of a back to back arrangement, which works well for her because I can't interrupt her myspace activities. It's an epidemic myspace, all the kids are doing it and mine is crap. Mermaidgirl, do you know anything about myspace layout? Ask the lad, kids of that age can do everything on the indernet now days. Not like us thirty year olds....


We tripped down to the good side of the western subs on saturday night for Miss Ivy's uncles 60th birthday. Cool party. The birthday boy is a bit of a Keith Richards, staple diet of Marlboro reds and scotch. They hired some guy in a red suit to sing in 4 languages, 3 of them Polish. Not sure what the other one was. Half of Krakow's senior cits were there. There was 3 really great old Polish women sitting on the couch, probably been though both world wars, just taking it all in. Looking like those shrunken apple head doll thingies, but still taking it in.
I really admire the character of those people, to have been through one of histories darkest times and still able to sit and smile at everyone that caught their eye. Community is such a huge thing in human lifestyle, whether it be myspace or the group of migrants that all arrived together as refugees sticking together for over 60 years.

Apparently you can now blog in hindi, well bugger me. What's next, French?

Alright, mermaidgrrl you got your blog. So there's one less of us in the phone book now. Not that there were that many to begin with.

Have been thinking about all this stuff this weekend. I am going to enter the competition to programme rage, it may be the closest i ever get to being a rockstar! I can picture myself sitting on that couch, would think it'd be a tad sticky after all these years, explaining why I am playing "Sexuality" by Billy Bragg or "Close to Me" by Mr Bacharach. Got me thinking about all that great music introduced to me by some of the best mates I never make an effort with. Seagreen brought me the joys of Morrissey and Aunty B Sonic Youth. One of Aunty B's boyfriends introduced Ash one drunken, hair dying night. Merry Risa, I think, gave me the Housemartins but we shan't broadcast that. Another friend gave me the Stone Roses, the clap dancing I figured out for myself. What happened to the girl from high school where we would skip geography and buy a copy of NME and soak it all in. Then go to the pub.....
I am not dying, not that I know anyway, but I do miss all of my absent friends and I know I'm shit at calling, emailing, texting, telegram etc but I hope no-one takes it personally. My greater hope is that you all still care.

Renno's are back on the agenda at Casa Cheese. We now have a laundry door, thanks to some good advise from Little Mister. So much fucking dust. Dust mask did nothing, would have been better having a cigarette whilst cutting the bricks, may have filtered the air better. Miss Ivy spent the Easter long weekend in the garden whilst I made lots of noise and dust, looks fab.

Our neighbour has put his house on the market being a 2 story the potential new owners look straight into our post apocalyptic backyard. We are storing a termite mound for the in laws as well as all of the usual mid renno crap that accumulates, off cuts, the old sink, bricks etc. I was too embarrassed to go into sight. I would have felt compelled to explain all of the mess.

Well bugger me, it's been 6 months to the day since my last blog. Yeah I know, difficult 2nd posting and all of that. I'm not sure if i can top the artistic/comic genuis of my last whinge about my job.

Cliff notes;
1) playing netball for work team, go team. May make the finals if i can figure out the rules. We actually keep winning games. I do look hot to trot in a white polo shirt and blue shorts. Skinny white legs poking out and a hardcore smokers cough after 3 running steps. I'm not quite sure where i'm allowed to go on the court. I count on the referee to point such things out. I get blisters every game as I only have a pair of one stars to play in. Not sure they are too keen on RM's on court. May have to try tomorrow night.

2) Miss Ivy not well tonight. I even offered to cook, which was politely declined. Forced to drink imported beer, left over from christmas pressies from clients, and watch futureama. For the best i think, don't want the little missus getting even more ill.

3) Got out for a sail a couple weeks ago, wind shit, my ablilty shit but i could sit on the beach and drink beer and smoke. Maybe less beer and more sailing next time.

4) Had to go to laundromat on Sunday to do the drying. I love the laundromat. So restful watching all your washing going in circles. That danger that you may have left a lighter in your jeans pocket. Walking around the "court". Why are a completely non related bunch of shops called a court. As if King Lear had a Domino's, a lighting shop, bike shop, and pet food shop over there in the south-western end of his castle.

5) Feeling bad about feeling bad. So i never answer my phone. Ok point taken. Miss Ivy pointed out that I have no friends cause i'm not friendly. Harsh but fair, harsh but fair. Next time i will answer or find my phone. I have a habit of leaving it in stupid places, work or some such.

6) Yes January the 11th was special and i'm a bastard.

7) Got a new geetar. Fender 72 Custom Deluxe, 2 humbuckers, big headstock. As used by my man keef and not that dude from eskimo joe.

8) Went to the falls for new years. More urine that you have every seen before. Seriously kids. Wolfmother boring ( good hair thought Seagreen), youth group music to snooze too. Actually did sleep through Eskimo Joe, was tired from long drive. Heard a cool band but didn't watch them, I was sitting by our van (more later on that one) and having a beer and couldn't be fucked walking up the hill, past the urine waterfall. Called the Bamboos, a little james brown, little cat empire. Fuck knows what they look like, as i said, walking/beer tussle.

9) The van. We were the coolest kids on the hill in our Kombi beach. Lime green and chracoal, decked out with bed and airconditioning. No urine in van at any time. Everyone kept talking to us about it. I talk about cars for 60 hrs a week so i was a bit over it but Miss Ivy was proud as punch.

10) Going through the recruitment crap again at work. I think i took the vanity part a bit far last time. The guy I picked is too dumb, too ugly, too non funny, to cut it at our office. We advertised his job on saturday, he didn't come in on monday. Funny that. Now I am going through that whole cycle again. Someone at work said that i was the alpha male of the dept. Not really sure how to take that one. Really nice thing to say, until i think too hard about it. Is that a good thing? Or does that mean I am the biggest and hairiest?

11) Ok, i really need to fess up to this and I think you will all support me. I am actually getting into the OC. That Taylor is so cute, Ryan is all troubles and like a James Dean Lite. There, I've said it. To counter that, I'm with Merririsa. West Wing is still on top. That Donna is so cute and there is something about CJ. I wish my office was like that. The dialogue and wit is great. Much better than the grunting and crying in my office, and that's just me.

12) You Am I. My latest obsession again. Just like before. Convicts fucking rocks. Timmy is back in shape. Was worth the 9 hour drive to the falls just to see them. And they are coming for the BDO and the car race. YAY!!!

13) I went to the optometrist last week. Got the "so now you're nearly 30" talk from Dr Naidoo, sadly not Indira. According to the good doc i will be blind by 31 or something. Maybe not that bad but apparently it's all downhill from here. Then i got cc'd on an email describing me as the "senior (insert whatever my job title this week is". Senior, i'm twenty fucking nine. Is that senior now? Bought 2 pairs of glasses, i find it gives me more options. I can see better, and look better. Or so i think!

I think i've taken up enough of your time. Lets all meet up in the year 2000, and seven. I do solemly swear to think about doing this more often.

god bless the fucking lot of us.

Now it all makes sense......

During the week i scored about 50 text messages going back about 3 months, hence my last of communicado with absent friends....Milly- love to do the gig, Auntie B- football good, where were you thinking. Must apologise for general slackness in communication in general, life has taken over a little bit.

I have been interviewing potential applicants (that makes no grammatical sense!?) for my own job which is a little odd. I don't want anyone smarter than me or funnier than me or better looking than me (say Vanity....) for fear of destablising my position in the company pecking order. People put the weirdest stuff on their resumes and some people actually send their high school reports in. Maybe they took their teachers at their word that school reports are actually important. Buggered if I know where mine are.... It also brings out your prejudices in all the wrong ways. Oh you live at Salisbury, we'll call you......

Hasn't Big Brother this year been an emotional roller coaster and a publicists nightmare? Don't care? Me either. Am looking forward to Australian Idol this year. I love the way they include some "alternative" kids as cannon fodder for the first few weeks. They are soon sidelined for another backstreet boy or jessica simpson. Not Ashley Simpson, she's ok. Not too sure about the new nose though.

On celeb news great news that Bono has bought a Maserati, way to help those starving kids in Italy.....

Still on celeb news, what the fuck is "Skye Mangel" doing releasing a single?

Local celeb news now... The Creeps are having a rest and retooling. We have got rid on the rhythm section and running our own version of Creep Idol. We have a couple of shows to finish off in this incarnation then we start all the work again. Of course all your favourites like "Psycho Bitch" will be retained! Maybe we'll throw in some Yes covers or something...... Now i need to find something elso to do on Tuesday nights, will be a bit lost without band practice for a while. If anyone knows of a girl bass player send em over.

Have been asked (picked last just like school) to join the work netball team. Not sure if they know just how unfit I am, or the fact i don't own sneakers, or shorts, or any form of sporting inkling. Wonder how long this will last. At least the games are close to home.

The 3 B's

In the motor trade which i am somehow unable to extricate myself from there is a general rule for dealing with clients. This rule is known as the 3 B's. I didn't build it, I didn't buy it. I didn't break it. Recently I have been noticing a disturbing trend where clients try to tell ME what to do. That's not quite how it works. Especially with warranty.
Follows is an explanation of what warranty means.

"warranty covers a manufacturing defect, whether in assembly or workmanship" Simple huh?

Well no. All manufacturers have exclusions, from cars to cheese, some may seem obvious to us but not to the vast mass of retarded consumers.

Warranty covers manufacturing defects.

Warranty does not cover damage arising from you crashing the car into something.
Warranty does not cover your kid chewing the door trim, tasty as it may be.
Warranty does not cover your stupidity and or your partners stupidity, it's never the husbands fault unless the wife is bringing the car in.
Warranty does not cover the fact that you never service the car and have no intention of ever servicing the car.
Warranty does not entitle you to a loan vehicle, in fact the more you tell me that it's inconvenient not to have a car the more likely I am to NOT give you a loan car. It's fun! And it's not really convenient for me to be listening to your sob story about how you have 3000 children, buy a fucking TV and a bus ticket, you are going to need both.

However,

Warranty does cover crash damage if you supply the correct bottle of wine or carton or imported beer.
Warranty does cover stupidity if you're cute and call me nice names like "doll" or "honey".
Warranty does cover a whole host of other miscellaneous defects if you are polite, courteous and respectful of the fact that I am not personally responsible for the appalling build quality of the vehicle you purchased at an inflated price. Even better if you understand that the inflated price is keeping the boss's kids at a good school and these things aren't cheap.

So the moral of the story is, and eveyones mum said the same thing, you catch more flies with honey. Be nice to the poor jerk at the retail counter. He is really wanting to nick out the back for a smoke and look at the clouds, not wanting to listen you the shit that people come up with to make them feel better about the fact their own lives are a disappointment.

Back In Black

Listening to; Liz Phair, fuck off all of you who are rolling eyes. She's great, frank, tuneful and she plays a blonde Fender Mustang with tortiseshell pickguard

Feeling; Kinda full/ Kinda empty. Salad roll for lunch, some misguided health kick. Quiche for dinner, health kick temporarily suspended. oh and 2 stellas to take the edge off the day.

Career; Stationary.

Band; Rockin, we're fuckin huge in Thebarton, bigger than jesus some say.

So here we are, back on the web as part of a new years resolution. Was going to leave it for chinese new year but Exxon Mobil don't mark that occasion in my diary, gotta love corporate branding the whole year round. Wonder if they celebrate the grounding of the Valdez?

Quick update for those of you i haven't seen, alright that's all of you. Except Miss H who has to suffer this all the time.

We had a nice xmas in the car driving from relative to relative, uspide is we got to listen to lots of Hilary Duff (see below).
Much parental bonding, translated that means that my mum and Miss H's auntie got on the gas and had a grand ol time. Trying to convince the kids (us) to concieve so they can have little children to fuck up all over again, like it's something we can do over xmas lunch. I was tired dammit and the venue was at aunties house at the beach. We all know how much i despise sand. Then off to a location somewhere near the Australian antarctic territory, ok Noarlunga but it's close, you can see Scotts hut on a clear day. Much hilarity ensued, not for us but i guess someone enjoyed it. Got kickass presents from Miss H and family. Got a whole year of Daria ahead of me since i got the box set. I am rationing myself to 1 episode a day or i'd have to give up work just to watch Daria.

Anyhoo, that was then and this was before.

Went to 2 very different gigs in 1 week. I was Motley Crue. Vince Neil got fat and old quickly, Mick Mars looked like a fat Marylin Manson minus the burlesque wife, Nicky Sixx was cool, only cause Gibson gave him his own series of bass guitars. The real standout for me was Tommy Lee, always thought he couldn't play drums. Wrong. He kicks. Proper rockstar kit too with a bass drum the size of a cement mixer and more cymbols than prince. As a band they were awful but Kickstart My Heart is such a great anthem for guys of that certain age (my age). Brings back feelings of rebelliousness and sexual frustration. Like year ten again.

The other one was Hilary Duff. That was sooooooo fuckin cool. We were the oldest there without kids. The kids behind were complaining cause we were standing up, stuff them. I figured that there is a cut off time for me attending a Hilary Duff show. Any older and i'd be accused of being a dirty old man. Not that i like Hil (as I call her) in THAT way. She is cute, but like in a cute sister in law kind of way to me. The music also transports me to another place in time. A place of innocence and simplicity, like we all want our lives to be. As much as i like the grown up feeling of advanced conflict resolution and all the other grown up things i do at my job I'd kind of like to be back in Australian studies knowing that in half and hour i can go home and not worry about anything except will your parents let you go out on Friday night to go "clap dancing" (fuck you mermaidgrrrl, now that tag haunts me) at the proscenium. Of course i told them i was only going round to Seagreens house.
So if anyone wants a copy of a Hilary Duff Cd or movie let me know and i'll happily share the gift.

On the ranch there has been much improvement, the kitchen is almost complete. I took off overseas for the worst of it leaving Miss H to battle the retarded tradesmen all on her own. Seriously the guy was too dumb to work at a sheltered workshop. He was pretty good at leaving on time though. So after knocking out a wall and moving everything around it's almost finished, only another coulple of hours and we have an new kitchen.
In the backyard there is also much movement, of the dirty kind. We are in preparations for building the retaining walls so i can finally have a shed. I have it all planned, fridge, cd player so i can listen to Hil and Liz as loud as i like, comfy chair and a sink for homebrew beer production (maybe next years resolution?). But for now it's pick shovel and cement mixer for the next couple of months. People ask why i don't just pay someone to do these things, i ask have they ever known me to do anything the easy way, they shrug and walk off. Probably sniggering at the stubborn tightass with the bad back.

I think it fitting to close my return "journal" with some observations from 2005.


Hilary Duff is ok and it's ok for a late 20's man to enjoy the movies and music of a teen idol. Now it's off my chest i can admit to liking Ashlee Simpson and Avril Lavigne and Lindsay Lohan. To my credit, not that i care what you think, i do also listen to "real music". Have been flogging the New York Dolls lately (not a euphemism by the way)

Britney should divorce Kevin
Angelina and Brad (as Seagreen said) are going to struggle to top Apple as a baby name
Paris and Paris were never going to work
Nick and Jess is a shame (maybe he saw Dukes of Hazzard and was too ashamed)
I don't much like the look of the Misubishi 380 ( if that's their saviour Mitsi's are fucked in this country)
Shame about Hunter S Thompson (cool funeral though, ashes getting fired from a cannon)
Speaking of ashes, that was a disgrace

Best thing of the year was discovering that I have a "style", Miss H said so and she has style, but more on that later don't want to spoil it.

TTFN, hate to see you go but love to watch you leave.