The game of chess is a classic: simple, elegant and open to all sorts of bizarre permutations.

We were on a post-Christmas mission - slumming down at the nameless monster-mart in search of a way to waste the afternoon. We had to get off the street as soon as possible. It was crazy out there. People were in a returning frenzy. "Goodwill to all men" goes out the window during the January sales. There was road rage in the express lanes. All we were after was a game, a simple game. Something for two or four players. Something that evoked memories of youth and intoxicating summer laziness.

Then, like an oasis of calm in the middle of the mall, we saw it - the tobacconist's. On one side smokes, on the other side games. I'm not sure what games and cigarettes have common but here they were, united in splendour. We ducked out of the slipstream of shopping trolleys and cruised into the store.

The tobacconist, a pleasant man with yellow fingernails, wheezed his shock at our approach. No one had crossed his threshold the entire Christmas season (for gone are the heady days when the gift for anyone over 16 was a cartoon of Winnie Reds). Ah, the tobacconist's, the last bastion of smoky bad taste. Dusty shelves clustered with seamy adult games all within the reach of an inquisitive eight-year-old. Here Cluedo vied for space between walking peckers and soap-on-a-rope. The place was stacked to the roof with stuff that hadn't made the cut for the two-dollar shop. No store in existence presented a more desperate or disparate array of goods. Ramses-inspired "art works" printed on authentic papyrus-look cartridge paper jostled with "smokers' paraphernalia". Turkish hookahs stood by strangely unappealing ceramic cats. But where else would you go for some fine-leaf, easy-rolling Arkansas Port and porno playing cards?

Amid all this mess there were dozens of chess sets. I love the idea of chess, although I've lost every game in recent memory. It's the finest of all games; the simplicity of 64 squares and the elegance of 32 pieces honed over centuries to perfection. But chess is being marketed for a new generation. The game has been updated and the pieces have undergone an extreme makeover. You can now purchase The Simpsons chess set, the Stars Wars set, The Cuban Missile Crisis set or the West Side Story set. And ploughing into the pile they became more and more bizarre.

I was both fascinated and appalled by this phenomenon. How long before other classic games are corrupted in this manner? Will 'Go' succumb? Or backgammon? In a thousand years will semi-contemporary classics like Galaga or Tetris be treated with such disrespect? Will they need to be "updated"?

An exclusive Philippe Starck design had all the pieces looking like variations on extruded and elongated spermatozoa. There was a Reagan Years themed set where I discovered the king can move in any direction - including off the board. The Balkans chess set allows anywhere between two and five players and the only objective is to get rid of all the other pieces. The most recent addition was a Dr Phil version of the game where there's absolutely no conflict and all the issues are resolved before you even start the clock. This lets the pieces quietly mingle in their box in the hope of discovering worthwhile life partners. This set was in stark contrast to the most offensive product - The White Supremacists chess set. In this particularly odious adaptation there are no black pieces, just two armies of whiter-than-white, white-trash pieces. The best ending for this game would be a stalemate where two sad, lonely white kings pursue each other, one square at a time, around an empty board.

After being in the store for over an hour we were forced to admit there was nothing we wanted to buy. The storeowner lamented his business was a disaster. In his homeland everyone smoked and everyone played chess and everyone wanted to grow up to be a tobacconist. But not here. He'd not make the same mistake again. Next year he hopes to open a day spa. A day spa that caters for cigarette-smoking chess players. Sort of like a Turkish bath, he said.

Afterthought: A confession.

I once soiled my hands in India on an antique miniature set where all the pieces were carved from ivory. I know it was wrong. The pawns were delicately shaped yet barely five millimetres high and even the Queen, who towered over the rooks, was no taller than a thumbnail. The friend I was travelling with was appalled to be playing on a set peopled by the remains of a protected and endangered animal but she consoled herself because the pieces were so small. She convinced both of us they must've come from the tusks of very, very tiny elephants.

What is it that makes people feel they have the right to suggest “improvements” to a total stranger?

I was working recently and a gentleman walked up to me and asked a question. It was a simple question and it was not meant to make me immediately reassess my physical appearance.*

However, this is precisely what it did because it was a question with a subtext. A subtext that suggested there was something wrong and, more importantly, that something could be fixed. Other examples of this sort of question include: Have you thought of rhinoplasty? You know that could be lasered off? Have you considered Prozac? Why don't you brush occasionally? It may not be my place, but which eye should I be looking at?

Normally you're prepared for these sorts of questions, they don't come gunning for you out of the blue. Normally you’re not surrounded by a small eager crowd waiting to hear the prognosis. There’s only one thing worse than someone sincerely suggesting you need a little work on you head and that’s a group of strangers overhearing someone suggesting you need a little work on your head.

The question: “Have you ever thought of Botox for that?”

My face froze, not in an injected way but as a natural reaction to the query. The gentleman was taken aback my expression. It was something he may not have seen for a while, especially if he had a hands-on relationship with the product. I felt around for my catalogue of comebacks and found nothing save a dumbfounded “what?” To my continued astonishment he asked the same question again, this time proffering a card. He was a doctor. A doctor should know better.

“Have you ever thought of Botox for that?”

“For what,” I cried, “Botox for what?”

I was of exposed neuroses. Why did I ask? I knew what the Botox was for. It was for my sagging jowls, for my grotesquely lopsided ears. It was to bring life back to the pale orange scum flaking off the corners of my mouth. It was for my non-existent upper-lip and the way the skin beneath my nose runs headlong into my teeth. It was to cull the crow’s feet, the ones that made my sockets into a high-density nest. Or maybe it was to lift and separate my eyebrows which have been growing together with a Kahloesque zeal for the past three years? Can Botox cover grey? Is it good for wayward nasal hair? His response: “For the sweating.”

You may be unaware that another of the miracles of Botox is it stops you sweating, depending on where you have the shots. You’ll still sweat an equal amount just from other places. I wondered if you could choose those places.

For instance, could you seal off all the sweat glands apart from the ones around the groin? And if this worked, and you wanted to freak people out even more, could you design a sweat waterfall round your left ear? Or make your nipples into sprinklers? Perhaps you could find a creative-artistic-doctor-injector-type and modify yourself to only sweat in patterns. You could begin with simple designs, maybe a perfect circle on your back or a tetraskele on your torso. You could experiment, refining your style, creating more challenging and complex pieces: your family’s heraldic crest, the curvilinear interlacing of a Celtic cross, a blaze of snow crystals.

With the small crowd pressing closer I claimed I was happy with my sweat. “I may sweat like a pig sir,” I snorted, “but at least I don’t behave like one.” Then loudly scoffing I sent the emissary of vanity packing. There’s only one problem, I can’t let go of the card, it’s fused to my hand, constantly tempting me. Tempting me to see the “realer” me - not as I am, but how I could be: better, stronger, faster, drier than before. I keep thinking about the wonderful worlds awaiting a man with patterned sweat and after all it’s only a little botulism.

*Writing is my first love but, sadly the financial gain is not commensurate with the amount of time one spends labouring. Thus, occasionally, I’m forced to find other forms of employment so I can afford to buy myself luxuries like tap water.

#Botox, I’m reliably informed, never disappoints. But if it did, how would you know? Ninety per cent of our communication is still visual. It’s similar to when you receive a gift you dislike and even on cross-examination maintain the deceit you love it. Your family/friends only know you’re trying to protect their feelings when you inadvertently scrunch up your face. What happens if you can no longer scrunch your face? How do you voice your disapproval if you’ve lost your facial body language?

Try not to fret about missing out on a place at university. There are plenty still available at the school of hard knocks.

A CLOSED LETTER TO THE MUMS AND DADS

It's important the youngsters don't read this. Hopefully they tuckered themselves out by the second paragraph and have gone to hit their Nintendo. There's another more insidious reason why unis are dangerous. I think we all know what it is. . . .

The image of the libidinous academic in a tweed jacket with patch sleeves preying on vulnerable minds and nubile bodies is as pertinent today as it was yesterday. J. P. Sartre, one of the ugliest men to ever wrangle tenure, still managed to "get it on" quite regularly because impressionable pre-fems thought he had it "up top".

Universities are the province of the elderly rake and these predators do not limit themselves to gender. Let us not deny many of these "lecher-ers" possess the Wildean wit. Which is to say, they don't beat around the bush, they're well-versed in the Samurai code, exponents of early Greek philosophy and in the words of some Roman fella have discovered "oysters are not the only fruit".

By refusing entry to so many of the underclass this government is in fact protecting their virtue. It's ensuring their sexuality isn't up for grabs and virtually handing you your grandchildren on a silver platter. Think of the heartache and soul-searching saved by this forward-thinking forethought, think of the shame it avoids. It's a brave and courageous plan and should be applauded.

There's another benefit: your children won't leave you to "live on campus" and return at Christmas with strange diseases and weird friends.*

The future looks bright for the clever country. I'll leave you with this thought - never forget that universities are "institutions", which places them in the same category as prisons, closed facilities and leprosy hospitals.

*There's no reason, with the current state of home entertainment, why young people cannot remain in their bedrooms well into their 50s. This will also allow them to take care of you in your dotage. All it takes to be a great nurse is a good attitude and a kidney dish. Work Ethic - Edukashun 2

Once again young folk are whining about not being allowed entry into university. Has this topic not run its course? Are we not merely raking over the grass, turning over newleaves and opening old doors? Is it not better to just let it lie?

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE KIDS

So you didn't make it to university? Boo-hoo. Why should the taxpayer pay for you to get smarter? In 20 years' time you'll be the ones taking their jobs with your little bits of paper. Anyway there's nothing you can learn at university you can't learn at home, all it takes is dedication and application (or D n' A, as we used to call it). Who fostered this notion that it's the birthright of every person to seek a higher education? It's for the privileged few who have it in their blood (or DNA, as we used to call it).

Try not to get down about it. There are so many other opportunities, so many windows are about to open. Think about it for a second: you'll be with all your mates who didn't get in. And after all, life is for living, not for staying at school writing dumb papers until you're 37. What could be more depressing than that?

I've seen the best minds of my generation excited by the prospect of mental labour, of putting in a solid nine hours, getting a real day's pay for a real day's work. Get out there and toil, don't just sit around shining your arse on a leather Chesterfield smoking Gauloise and spouting Foucault. Become part of society: fewer students crammed into the packed corridors of academia means fewer long-haired louts yabbering about meaningless issues. It means fewer layabouts clogging up cafes with political diatribes. And it means a few less people the police have to quell and contain come riot time. Do you really want to go to a breeding ground of dissent where anyone with half a brain can gain entry? It was on university grounds where parasitic concepts like communism, feminism, equality and sexual freedom found willing hosts. (I'm fairly sure none of the Kennedys was killed somewhere near a university.)

The statistics suggest you were going to fail anyway. All this does is save you four years of struggle and hope. Students from lower or moderate income families always "drop out" and most of their time on campus is spent selling "crack" and attempting to corrupt the more fortunate kids. These "fortunates" are children whose only crime is to have been born to parents who loved them, worked a little harder and put something aside.

Why are we so hell-bent on sending school-leavers off to university when they may possess other talents?

There has been a flood of letters to this desk after last week's column concerning university entrance and the failure of many young Australians to make the grade. It was suggested in that column that university is not for everyone. Who could disagree?

Universities are loathsome institutions who dump on our doorstep two of society's greatest evils - the lawyer and the doctor. (Both distantly related to the banker, who is merely the bastard offspring of the real estate agent and the car dealer).

Still, I digress. Although many commended the strident approach, some were upset there was nothing of a constructive nature in the piece. I've taken these letters onboard and address them now.

CREATIVE COUNSELLING

Many students desire a further education (and there's nothing wrong with this), but who put these thoughts of a higher education at university level into their heads? The answer: teachers.

The blame must be placed obtusely on the flanks of these slovenly merchants of book learning who deliver to their charges this notion they can better themselves by attending yet another institution. It's teachers who mark exams handing out gold stars and A-plus with frivolous abandon.

In league with these exploiters are the scoundrels known as counsellors. It's the job of the counsellor to instruct and aid the wayward child and to define the future role of that young person as a constructive member of society.

Telling every kid who wanders through their door to go to university smacks of sheer laziness. Counsellors have to become more inventive when suggesting careers.

They could take the cue from reality TV where it appears anyone with a bit of get up and go can go out and get it. Why not become a pop star, a grade A cricketer, supermodel or world leader? Teachers and counsellors with their negative attitude always claim these jobs aren't for everyone - well, why aren't they for everyone? Surely they're a far more attractive proposition to impressionable youth than sitting behind a desk for another four years?

How many times can you recall, seated before a counsellor, being offered anything more dynamic than the public service or university? Did a counsellor ever say to you, wow, you can really ride that skateboard, what about becoming a professional board rider? Or you're always distracting the other students with your GameBoy so why not become the general manager of a multi-million dollar computer games company?

Counsellors need to tailor the job to suit the students' needs. For example, most counsellors would see you as just another tragic Goth but you seem to know a lot about the zodiac and telemarketing, why don't you become an exploiter of dreams?

It's also patently clear some people are destined, from an early age, for a life of crime. Why fight it? With the right instruction not only could they pursue their dream but they could do it out of harms way in another country.

With your knowledge of pharmaceuticals and your anti-establishment tendencies perhaps a chemist for a drug cartel? Or, you've always displayed an aggressive disposition at school and you're very good with explosives. Why don't you look at becoming a mercenary? Here's a list of unstable governments with the addresses of rebel bases you can contact for work experience.

The beauty of these left-of-centre ideas is that some of them will accept kids as young as 12.

To illustrate the point: a few years ago I had the good fortune to meet a man who'd found his own path through life. He'd rejected all the normal avenues of work and decided to become a hypnotist and masseuse. He also discovered that he could use these skills separately or in tandem.

It'd been a dream of his since he was a small boy to live and work in the neon playground of Las Vegas. So he honed his skills, making his main area of expertise the sprains and strains endured due to the difficult working conditions of showgirls. Whether it was a simple neck rub or a pulled groin muscle in the can-can, Ron was always ready with a swinging fob watch and jar of warm oil.

I've never seen a man more filled with job satisfaction. This was one man who followed his heart.

Let us open up those avenues for the youngsters. I can say with certainty that when I attended school and was filled with conflict about job choices no counsellor ever proposed masseuse for Vegas showgirls.

It's just something to think about.

For years you could get your fix in public and no one blinked an eye. But for many, saturated fat has become a secret vice.

I once knew a fella, great bloke, with a loving family and a caring, devoted wife. Every morning she'd cook up a banquet fit for a king. On a dinner plate as large as a child's head she'd sling fried eggs straight from the griddle, strips of fatty bacon, onion rings, diablo snags, two short loin chops and a chunk of av.

On the side, four pieces of toast drowned in butter. The entire meal had the salt content of the Dead Sea. It filled the house with an amazing smell, like you were ringside at a pagan spit roast, and it tasted like manna from heaven once you bunged a bit of dead horse on it.

Lunch and dinner were equally as wondrous. Here was a hard-working man who was always happy, until that fateful day he went to see his doctor.

By jingo, that day changed everything. He came home paranoid, scared to enter the kitchen. He knew what she was up to. He was sussed to her game. Fifty-five years of being happily married down the tube. The old bird was a poisoner, one of them Medici types. And it wasn't a rush job; she was taking her time.

She'd forgone the expediency of arsenic in favour of the slow burn. Any day she could've nipped out to the garden and whipped up a foxglove salad, but no, she was enjoying hardening his arteries, coating his heart in a layer of fat. He was convinced, and nothing could dissuade him from the belief that his wife had been killing him softly over five decades - with cholesterol.

The old fella's still kicking around, living on a diet of bran and raw vegetables. An uneasy truce exists between himself and his wife. He doesn't smile as broadly any more.

There comes a time when the body has had enough of taking care of itself. It sits up one day and demands attention. It wants you to focus on its needs. It tells you it's had its fill of smoky, late nights and five hours' sleep over 24 in half-hour power naps. It's had enough dietary excesses. It says it in the only way it knows - with strange and profoundly unsettling burbling noises during moments of intimacy.

You know you need to change your ways, but you need to take small steps. My first small steps led me to the dairy section at the supermarket.

As I gazed at the marvellous array of cow byproduct, I knew in my heart we'd soon have to part ways forever. I took one last, longing look at the cheeses, then headed for the health-food section. It was there I discovered some nut-based, man-made substitute claiming to be the doppelganger of butter. The label proudly boasted it had half the fat.

I rushed home jubilant at my ease in embracing a new lifestyle, but smearing the stuff on raisin toast I quickly discovered it also had half the taste. As a consequence I ended up using twice as much. I went through the whole tub in three sittings and I still needed a butter fix.

You are what you eat and it's always difficult when someone in the know tells you it's crap. Everything has been killing you for years: the coffee, the tea, clotted cream, all slowly eating away at you like food assassins.

You start fixating on weird things. The ingredients on the side of a pack of chips have all the thrills and terrors of a Stephen King novel. If you want to live you've got to stay away from the sugar, knock off the salt, avoid the crackling and sweet, fragrant fat of the duck. And lose butter, oh the butter.

I ran into the old fella again and I must say he looked a lot better apart from the permanent frown, but the pressure had got to him. He couldn't cope with the diet of a mule. So here, on a side street away from the prying eyes of the neighbours, he'd found a little culinary sanctuary.

When I caught up with him he was happily tucking into a Boston bun smothered in thick slabs of butter. He'd decided to live on the edge, occasionally. It was his secret vice, his potentially deadly pleasure, all washed down with a strong, sweet and creamy coffee. After a few agonising minutes watching me sipping my dirt-infused beetroot juice and gnawing on a turnip, he leant forward, broke off a chunk of the bun and said, "You want some?" I lunged at the opportunity grabbing the bun on the way. Ah, the El Dorado of spreads, pure butter, none of this manky sunflower rubbish. He offered me another chunk with Faustian glee and, smiling broadly, said, "Go for your life".

What's so wrong with a roasted Chihuahua or Yuletide labrador that eating pets has been outlawed in South Australia?

It's a continuing dilemma and we all go through it. The despair of finding the cupboard bare, with nothing there, not even a bone. The kids are hungry - they're crying, some moralist bunkum is blaring out from the TV and without even knowing it you snap.

Suddenly you're miles above yourself, looking down at an empty Scanpan hearing yourself say "here boy". It comes at a different time for everyone that moment when you think, I know, Rover, something different.

Adelaide, that jewel in the crown of states on the banks of the Torrens, has been awash with controversy this week. The debate has raged not over some politically challenging Korean mime troupe or a morally bankrupt festival attraction, but over the recent decision to fine the folk of South Australia for eating dogs and cats.

Now, for my money, the cat is not a good eating pet. It's a hedonistic and self-obsessed animal and you can taste it in the meat. This is a creature who'll walk through a house of soft furnishings to take a dump in a gravel pit (although cat lovers see this ability to locate a kitty litter tray as a sign of genius).

The cat may have certain benefits by way of companionship but the capacity for culinary creativity with this particular animal is very limited. You can dress it up as much as you want but you still know it's cat. It's like the meat has a mind of its own, it'll lazily sit around in your stomach and only make an appearance when you're trying to rest. Then it comes back at ya.

The dog, however, is a different story. Man's best friend is often called upon to make the ultimate sacrifice to prove that friendship. The dog is a trusting creature who'll come right up to you, wagging its tail as you sharpen the butcher's knife.

Picture the group of foolhardy alpine trekkers attempting the difficult north summit, now hopelessly lost with poor weather mercilessly bearing down upon them. Just as all hope is gone, imagine their joy at seeing a Saint Bernard bounding through the snow. Its thick pink tongue lolling outside its mouth, the heavy damp fringe obscuring those twinkling eyes. Delirious, their minds tumble with thoughts: we're rescued, we're saved, dinner.

This is a group of hungry desperate men, who'd have no qualms about tucking into the rescuer, if they haven't already started tucking into each other.

In some cultures it's thought remiss not to give the loyal animal this final honour. The best thing about the Saint Bernard is the happy-go-lucky beast comes with a whisky chaser.

Or you can attempt the difficult, yet delicious, flambe Bernard. The only drawback is the disturbing feeling you're chowing down on Beethoven, (although some aficionados of hound see this as a bonus).

The Saint Bernard is an extreme example but across the globe certain markets favour certain dogs - the chihuahua for instance. In Mexico (and some parts of North Adelaide) this plucky little champion is considered to be the quail of the canine world. They taste extraordinary roasted with a honey and lemon glaze and you just can't stop at one. I can see them now arranged on a plate and cooked so well the meat slides off the bone.

And let's not mince words - the bulging, dark eyeballs, dropped in a bubbling cerveza batter, are a real delicacy.

You can see the problem Adelaide is facing. What happens to the proud parents who bring out the fattened labbie on the return of the prodigal son?

And what will the season of joy become without the Christmas Doberman? The dog is an essential part of the human story, it's always been a faithful companion and it represents our longest and most successful relationship with a wild beast. We've invited this creature into our homes, we've given them glossy coats and good breath, we feed them better than our old people but, as I'm sure a dog understands, there comes a time for payback.

I think pet lovers are deluding themselves when they say they're not in some way responsible. You see them out there every Sunday, preening and parading, what to many are mobile meals. And what do you honestly expect if you own a sausage dog?

For the moment there are those who do and those who don't and those who do will now have to pay the price. The Adelaide community remains divided over this contentious issue. Have we, as one scholar, veterinarian and hound gourmand put it: come to a fork in the Rhode-sian?

Beware: the annual migration of buskers is near and when they 'pass the hat', hang on to your wallet and lock up your children.

There's a plague of sorts sullying the Festival City. Buskers are taking over the streets. These gaudily painted refugees from the reality of nine to five are everywhere, occasionally outnumbering the civilian population. Street performers, circus acts, urban artists, call them what you will, they are a blue-green algae threatening to destroy the calm monastic life of our malls. It's getting so bad that any time you pitch a tent you're in danger of being inundated with carnie folk.

The paved and open shopping mall (an initiative of the Whitlam government adopted by the world) was a utopian dream to mingle heavy human traffic intent on commerce with people-friendly environments. How naive we were? In creating these spaces we cut an open wound into our cities. These shopping precincts festered and human bacteria poured in - human bacteria in the form of the busker. Now they threaten to contaminate us all.

THE FACTS:

1) Buskers are nomadic. They, generally speaking, have no allegiance to any street corner or city, preferring to travel to any country that's turned its folding currency into coin. The current plague has come from all over the world and Adelaide will not be their last stop. Their journey will continue. In late March/early April they'll hit the massively unprepared city of Melbourne for the Comedy Festival. From there they travel north along the east coast destabilising the economic balance of townships and exploiting for their personal gain fairs and fetes. Some time about May they'll congregate in Sydney's Darling Harbour before heading north to endearingly loot the people of Brisbane and the top end. Then it's back to Perth and out.

2) They'll drag millions out of our floundering economy and carry it back to their palatial haunts overseas. And they're rarely stopped as they flee the country. A humorous tune on a ukulele, a bit of stilt walking or a touch of face painting are often enough to distract even the most ardent Aussie customs officer. Every single one of these talented vagabonds then heads over to Holland to spend their ill-gotten gains on "ganja" and partake en masse in the Festival of Fools. (Although it's rapidly becoming clear who the "fools" are.)

3) The most essential gift of the busker is not the useless skills they've amassed (plastic bag juggling, riding a unicycle, drinking beer with their fingers, swallowing flame or doing all of them at the same time) it's "milking the punters", "passing the hat", "filling the guitar case". To achieve this goal most acts rely on the consistent application of guilt to a primarily middle-class crowd. "I do this for a living, I have no other means of support." Perhaps they should add "and I pay no taxes". The street performer will also use the ploy of "abducting" a member of the audience to use as a warm prop in their show. The hapless onlooker will be made to belly dance, wear wigs, remove articles of clothing, and be mocked and ridiculed for their physique and intelligence. The tragedy is that some people used in this manner enjoy the experience and prowl malls hoping to be chosen again.

4) Busking is diversifying. The number of pasty unskilled guitarists playing uncool, good ol' tone-deaf note-missin' Dylan covers is on the decline. On the incline are mimes, statues, belly dancers, flute players, bongo ensembles, feral drummers, face painters, rice calligraphists, jugglers, contortionists, sword swallowers and spruikers. These are people who've spent years forging their unnatural talents into a career. No matter how good they are you must avoid them. Walk on by, keep your eyes fixed on the distant Best and Lest and never turn if a mime follows you down the street.

5) Children are weak. They'll get to your purse and wallet through your children. Leave the children at home (or insist they wear "blinkers" while they're out. "Blinkers" are now available with most child-harnesses). The most important thing is not to stop, keep moving, because if you stop and watch, believe me, you will pay the price.

An obnoxious fellow passenger is the unlikely romantic lead in a tale of suspense spanning two continents.

I 've caught the red-eye back to Adelaide. Actually it's a mid-morning flight but everyone is wearing the mask of the 20th-century civility. Someone forces a smile but it cracks at the corner of their mouth and they give up. The Muzak cuts out as the stewards commence the death-dive boogie - "masks will drop from the ceiling". Businessmen are coughing, papers are unfurling, more tragedy, more horror. I need to retreat from the world. In the crowded and cramped plane I want to find some splendid isolation. I want to cocoon myself in a blanket, grab an eye mask, some earplugs and fall back to sleep, only waking at touchdown, incredibly rested and refreshed just like in an ad. But you know fate has other plans.

The man who'll eventually be the last passenger is one seat away from me. He's seated in A, I'm C and we're separated by B. Most of the time, especially on short flights, you never get acquainted with the people next to you. There's an immense distance from A to C, from the window to the aisle, even when you're crammed together like sardines in the cattletruck. But A has torn down the barriers between us and he's done this because he's so damn loud. Sleep is no longer an option.

B's become a human baffle, taking the full brunt of A's vocal assault, words are ricocheting off her head and falling in my lap. A's headphones are leaking music, he doesn't realise he's wearing them or perhaps he just needs a soundtrack to speak. His gruff, Yankee voice is booming and without even realising it I'm drawn into the intrigue. And not just me, I feel the row behind us craning forward and the row in front leaning back. I like to think Australians are good at listening but, in fact, we're just a nation of proficient eavesdroppers.

A has come "all the way from America", he says, the longest trip of his life, to meet a woman he has only spoken to, a woman he plans to marry. He must achieve this whole marriage thing by a certain date, otherwise he's out the country. He's left everything behind to start a new life in, of all places, Adelaide. (A says all this with a slightly frantic and unsettling demeanour which we kindly put down to the exhaustive journey.) He hasn't even paused for breath when the snacks arrive but he unstereotypically refuses his "special meal". The attendant, being ever attentive, asks if he wants anything else. A drink he replies. As she pours he begins shouting a word at her, just a single word, a statement - DIET. He's overcompensating for the headphones again and he's so loud people three rows back can hear him above the roar of the jet engines. The only person who can't seem to understand what he's saying is the attendant; she has a horrified expression on her face. She isn't making the connection that he's talking about cola and self-consciously tries to obscure herself behind the drinks trolley. Passenger E intercedes from the far side of the aisle and a potential disaster is avoided.

Then A nudges B to get out and B nudges me. To our surprise A has bypassed the bog and is hammering on the door to the pilot's cabin. This sends an undeniable ripple of fear along the length of the plane. Relief follows in its wake as a helpful hostie redirects him to the toilets. We're only minutes from landing when we realise she'll be there, she'll be waiting for him. And though we've no idea what she looks like, we have to see her, we have to finish the story. Strangely, hers is the first face I see at the gate, she's instantly recognisable because she's staring beyond the passengers to something greater. She's on her tiptoes. Passengers keep leaving but none of them are him. It's an interminable wait, and if it feels uncomfortably long for us, what must it feel like for her? Neither of us can believe there were so many people on that flight, they just keep coming and coming. More families are reunited and the little crowd dissipates as their loved ones return. There are hugs and kisses and amid the joy one lonely woman looking increasingly crestfallen. The final passengers emerge in dribs and drabs, then the pilots nonchalantly wander out, swinging their briefcases, then nothing. B wonders if A's reconsidered, made a run for it across the tarmac or sealed himself inside the toilet.

Then he appears, the very last passenger, and you can see her heart leap in her chest. It's the perfect conclusion to the flight. We leave them there embracing in the arrivals lounge. As B and I go our separate ways I notice a spring in her step and my eyes are no longer red.

What's to be done about the plague of young doof-doofers worshipping at the altar of their dashboards?

The super-mean, machine-man, testosterone popping like Rice Bubbles, pauses at the give-way. Oakley sunglasses shield his awkward youth while reinforcing his aggressive sporting nature. As other cars happily idle, his impatiently revs. Spudhead can't wait to get out of this pissy side street and teach the bitumen a lesson. Despite the gaudy outward appearance of his vehicle you can feel a spiritual vacuum when he passes. An emotional barrenness emanates from the car. It's a feeling reflected beneath the rear-view mirror. Suspended in a mesh sack is a diminutive soccer ball, swinging beside the driver's head like a single, impotent, two-tone testicle (it's a familiar theme and one we'll to return to within the course of the article).

He spots a break and thuds out into the jam. Is there anything sadder than a single male sitting at the traffic lights with his car dressed up like a metal peacock waiting to be noticed?

Admittedly, there are thousands of things. For one, the over-cool occupant languishing in a soup of noise, deafening the native wildlife with an overproduced white take on black rap. Or cranking it with some sexed up R&B, praying his recent purchases of baseball caps, bandannas and basketball apparel will obscure national boundaries and he'll be perceived by the Ladieees as a street-wise African-American, a playa.

They've reached plague proportions in our cities and towns, young men wearing their cars like leisure suits of tin, lost and directionless at 170-k an hour. Needing to be seen, needing to be loved. Back on the street, onlookers gape but not as the occupant hopes. They're not consumed with envy, they gape in disbelief and annoyance. The reasons are:

1. The high-gloss, deep-purple finish is a colour not found in nature;

2. The chrome wheels glinting in the sun could damage a child's eye with a blinding spike of photons;

3. The bass rumble from the high-response, super-external, surround-sound speakers are causing crockery to fall in nearby homes;

4. And the song, if you can call it that, is absolute unmitigated (excuse the Scottish) shite.

A single youth, rocking alone, will have the bass pumping with enough decibels to blister his eyelids and cause his retinas to bubble. The same volume will suffice for two or three occupants but will sound damp from the street. The super-absorbent, spongiform skull of the young male soaks up much of the music and contains it within the car. With six or more occupants the level drops significantly.

In his rambling and colourful treatise, Machine-Ismo: A Discourse In Modern Auto-Motives, Father J. P. Overton suggests that furry dice, the standard accessory of the hot rod, harken back to the days of the horse. He postulates if the car is a phallic symbol, the rightful descendent of the stallion, then the dice are the fluffy, bloated repository of seed. They dangle from the rear-view mirror as a comic interpretation of the animal's scrotum. If we accept this then the arse of the beast, especially on a tight, right-hand turn, is in the driver's seat.

While Latham and Howard wax on and wax off about the mental and emotional state of our young men, one thing is certain: the lads of this nation are in desperate need of some real spiritual guidance. Lone men in cars looking for love need an emotional navigator*, a rev-head with a halo, a Brahmin Jack Brabham, a Mother Teresa of motors, a cruising Krishna. Someone who can map out a course transforming them from a social menace fuelled by reckless abandon into a driving force to be reckoned with.

Father Jay (as he's known at the mission) suggests charity work: "it's in the act of giving not speeding that a greenhorn lead foot can go from zero to hero in a few city blocks". He also suggests avoiding Meals on Wheels - the dangers are apparent.

Next: Wimmin and the VeHERcile: The Car As A Substitute Venus.

* To clarify, this is a navigator capable of guiding his young charges through the treacherous landscape of their emotions (nothing compared to the twists and turns of the Bathy 1000 but still tricky). It's not a navigator prone to excessive emotion. We've all experienced that.

P.S. I must apologise for last week's column, which amounted to a lump of over sweetened tripe. I was investigating issues of happiness and depression and got sidetracked into someone else's bliss. It won't happen again.

The "queering" of society continues apace - or is it just the innocuous popularity of a group of homosexuals on TV?

The fabric of our society has been torn apart by a single television show, then lovingly re-assembled with daring slashes of colour, teamed with up-turned stovepipes and sent back to the public. Better, brighter, more fascinating, the fabric of our society seems destined for big things. So some say.

Reject Satan and all his works. One of the cleverest of his works was to make people of the same sex attracted to each another. It was an idea the Dark Lord was so proud of, he replicated it. There are creatures with homosexual leanings all over the planet - this doesn't make it normal. Gay wildebeest, gay lemurs, gay whales are herd animals yet often find themselves isolated and alone. The gay crickets of the Amazon basin are seldom allowed to join in the locust plague and gay elephants never forget the pain of their decision.

We've all seen the recent footage of gigantic, gay penguin dance parties that occur as a same-sex response to seasonal mating. But every one of those "bachelor birds" getting "out of it" on an ice flow will never discover the spiritual joy of guilt, or the reproductive responsibility of family. Every group of animals has a few that like to play a bit harder than the rest, but they should do it off to the side like they've always done. Witnessing travellers on the road less travelled is not the same as condoning them or giving them a lift to their destinations.

The concern here is that if many more young men "jump the fence and join the other team to bat for Holland", it may well spell the end of civilisation. "You're so gay", has already replaced "you're so fine", "you're so fly" and "you're so stupid" as the "you're so" of choice for primary school children. When asked to explain her behaviour in the playground, Deborah (last name withheld as per school policy) a six-year-old from (name of school withheld as per government policy) replied:

"Gay is a term of endearment noting a person's people skills, their dress sense, colour acuity, and flare in the kitchen. It's no longer constrained by notions of sexuality. If we choose to demean someone in that way, we use the Australian standard 'poof'."

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, a deceptively simple title with an alluring internal rhyme, has catapulted its five presenters into the stark light of stardom. Graced with an innate sense of style, they've won over people of all ages, religions and sexual persuasions. They're the high priests of a new crop of American religions based on salvation through external transformation. Here outward appearance has a profound effect on the inward existence. The Fab Five as they're affectionately known, are witty, urbane, self-depreciatory, hedonistic sensualists and, let's not mince words, SODOMITES*.

These gents opened the passageway and now "musical men" are liberally sprinkled throughout every new TV program. The love that dare not speak its name is shouting it on prime time, lisping its way through a dozen different comedies and roaring up the charts. Already, this phenomenon has spawned from its unnatural loins a club hit. The song, espousing the fun of the "homosexual lifestyle" with an accompanying video, is played every Saturday morning to a primarily pre-teen female audience.

What will its long-term effect be? What if these future mothers find their young suitors less appealing than their gay counterparts? What happens if no one wants to make babies anymore? We must stop the "queering" of our country. Parents, concerned heterosexuals and scoutmasters across the globe must ask: what's the world succumbing to?

And when does the ugly underbelly of homosexuality rear its head? When do line dancin' and quilt makin' suddenly find a crossover audience? How long before our grandparents are throwing on a pair of chaps and, arses swinging in the breeze, heading out on a Saturday night? How long before other sexual aberrations such as nappy-men, lesbians and bestialists secure their own breakthrough shows? We're in a time of turmoil. We must turn ourselves away from the TV, otherwise we're in danger of ending up like Lot's wife. And pillars of salt around the lounge room will just be another humorous chore for the Fab Five to clean up.

* In 2005, the Fab Five hope to embark on their most ambitious project yet - the Catholic Church. With their popularity at an all-time high, they head to Rome to hit the Vatican with neutral tones, replace pews with bean bags and try to squeeze the Pope into a pair of moleskins.

Don't count on any divine intervention when it comes to finding that heavenly abode. Real-estate has taken a dive.

You wouldn't call it so much a vision as a hallucination, and perhaps a little less like a hallucination and more like a dream or a long, visual thought with an accompanying oration.

The whole incident may've been brought on by the proximity of Easter, by my partially "wrapped-in-plastic" Catholic guilt, or most likely by the mould-encrusted hot cross buns I consumed prior to bed. Regardless of the reason, in the wee small hours, the ceiling above where I slept burst forth with radiance. A tunnel of light appeared, a halo of luminous gases, resonating with a voice both gentle and commanding. "By the time you kick the bucket there'll be no room at the inn."

"Hey?" I sleepily replied, with a dry mouth and my throat on fire. The figure perched on the end of the bed was smallish in stature. Looking unerringly impish and dressed neatly in a two-piece, grey suit, he peered over the rim of his rimless glasses. There was something familiar in his demeanour and I felt I'd made his acquaintance before. As he spoke he lightly fingered an ivory cane, hand carved with delicate writhing figures.

"I go by many names," he said, "but you can call me - Ron. And I like making house calls - it's good for business."

I recall thinking the patch pockets on his jacket were a major concern, what was left of his hair was working far too hard and that he was obviously embarrassed by the fact he had the feet of a goat. He kept attempting to hide them under the cushions.

"It's coming up for Easter and it's important you folk know what's going on up top. There are no more of them Elysium fields, it's concrete wall to wall, Heaven's so overcrowded, so tight, you couldn't squeeze another anorexic Carmelite in there." He continued, swinging his cloven hooves against the edge of the bed: "A number of factors combined to create the overcrowding of Heaven. The Industrial Revolution basically took everyone by surprise. The old fella knew it was coming, just not that quickly. Then there was the continuous stream of innocents turning up at St Peter's Gate from about 1901 onward. A couple of world wars, constant battles and blues and Bob's your uncle - Heaven went to Hell in a handbasket. And what are you gonna do? Move to the country?

"There was no elbowroom for all the new inductees. And sleeping rough on marble wasn't what they expected after a lifetime of kneeling and good deeds. There's no doubt they were peeved. The civic planning committee threw their hands up in disgust and the hierarchy of angelic architects folded their wings. Team that with the Son of Man's growing interest in totalitarian statues of self-glorification and you have a recipe for disaster.

"Many who found the ultra high-density living in Heaven too extreme began looking elsewhere for accommodation. Limbo was the first choice, with a few of the larger families opting to sit out eternity with the unborn. Then they started packing into Purgatory. It became so overcrowded people couldn't even do their penance. There was no room to flagellate, if you wore a hair shirt it was bound to get up someone's nose. Sort of defeated the idea of the place, but the final straw was when the baby boomers started carking it. They're ruining it for everyone, but I'll give it to them, they're a ballsy lot, think they own everything. Baby boomer settlers started snatching parcels of land in the 1st and 2nd circles of Hell. They're down there now, mixing it up with the gluttons, adulterers, users of vulgar terms and people who dress poorly. They're gentrifying the place. Instead of fire and brimstone, there's natural mud baths, a hot spring, a skin-care centre, a whole body purification plant and every morning about 150 of the lesser demons practice tai chi near the ol' human smelt. I've never seen such fine looking devils. They're growing citrus trees, for God's sake. And I gotta tell you, a bit of grapefruit in the morning gives you a fresher outlook on life."

The fella on the edge of the bed kept talking. His message - bypass Heaven, go straight for the 1st and 2nd circles of Hell. Nice lifestyle, easy for the family and yoga classes start in August. He was nice but there's something about that fella I don't like.

Truly disturbing fact: The first time I checked the word count, I'd written 666 words exactly. Seeing that particular number caused me to pause. Was it a sign? Was I tampering with worlds beyond my ken? I checked the world count another six times before finishing the piece and three of those times that same number appeared. Now I'm not a betting man, but that's gotta be a rare occurrence. Still, there's nothing to be concerned about, it's only coincidence.

What a difference a day makes - especially during a holiday weekend in Melbourne.

Easter in Melbourne. Easter Sunday - what a beautiful day. Families strolled together along the broad avenues around the Botanic Gardens or they sat on picnic blankets in the sun, simply celebrating. In the city, close-knit couples shuffled past closed shop fronts or gambolled along Southbank hand in hand, smiling. On the banks of the Yarra, they watched waste collect in open-mouthed barges while, on makeshift stages, Christian bands sang bright full-voiced songs of redemption and handed out water to the thirsty and lost.

What a beautiful day. It was a message repeated over and over in the course of those 24 uneven hours. As the clock rolled lazily towards midnight, even my cab driver couldn't help but let praise for the day slip from his lips.

There was only one person to thank, and His name is Jesus. Sometimes, even though you don't really want to, you're forced to think about Him. The big Lord J, the main man, has given us so much to celebrate (not to mention Mel's sterlingly bloody and violent depiction of his final hours). We top our year with His birth and His death arrives as we slide in autumn as a timely reminder of our own impermanence.

Occasionally, His message is obscured by the accompanying pagan pageantry of chocolate eggs and bunnies, of holly and fur trees, of birth and re-birth and jolly, fat, red-frocked fellas who hand out presents fuelled by milk, cookies and altruism. But why do we focus on Him? There must be so many other examples of glorious births and great sacrifice. Admittedly, the Son of Man is the Son of God and his two big yearly dos are going to set a fairly high benchmark for festivities, but there's no reason why we can't open it up a little.

How wonderful it would be for visitors to our shores to discover not only do we rock out with the Christian celebrations, but we also get down to Ramadan. We love all the different foods of the world: let's savour all the different festivals. We could all take a day off to rejoice in the birth of Krishna (there's a miracle there because, normally, if you see a blue baby, it's a cause for worry).

Let's hit the parks, eat vegetables and chant the maha-mantra. We could lose oodles of working hours for a plethora of other gods from Bacchus to the idols of Yucatan or the wonderful woodland creatures of Shinto. And, if we're going to hold so tightly to England's apron strings, then let's get something funkier out of it than the Queen's birthday weekend.

What about Di-Day? A day we set aside to contemplate her sacrifice when she wed that inbred heir with the architectural aesthetic and African elephant ears. The poor thing went through a particular form of suffering that definitely lasted longer than three days - no disrespect. Or we could have a Dodi-Di Day. (Although it sounds like something a cricket would sing, as in zip-a-dee-do-da-dodi-di-day.)

We could have a day off for Mother T and Mister T while we're at. And breaks for the great pantheon of TV heroes - for Rockford, Samantha, Mighty Mouse and Buffy. I, for one, would like to bring back the day off Hawkey gave us for winning the America's Cup. Why aren't we still celebrating that? Or when Thorpey fell off the blocks - wasn't it amazing to realise he was human and capable of faults? It made us all primordially aware of our own humanity. Surely there's a holiday there?

The bottom line is - if we applied ourselves to the task of getting more long weekends and religious breaks, we need never work again. I was thinking this, with my heart was full to bursting, when I noticed in the bustling human traffic a lone figure unmoving and unmoved. She stood outside Big W, a diminutive lass with full blue eyes, a golden braid and a face fixed like granite. Her lips bore a stern reproach for society, an enjoyment-cooling judgement on the passers-by. She was handing out salvation in the form of small rectangular comics. Her eyes spoke of the burden of worship, of the heavy weight of the world and, although at first I refused her offer, I turned on my heels and took the Christian propaganda pamphlet from her. (I hadn't actually seen these things since I was a teenager in Canberra. In those days, I used to souvenir the comics hoping some day to turn a hefty profit by selling the complete collection. But seeing small-boned, big-hearted Crispies are still giving them away on street corners, that's one dream of financial security that's slowly fading).

"This Was Your Life!" the pamphlet cried and it informed me that worshipping false idols (and, I suspect, having days off in their name) would bring a gnarly death and eternal damnation. And man, that brought me down, but not for long because it was such a beautiful day.

A funny thing happened on the way home from the Comedy Festival . . .

The other night, just as morning broke over the city in a drunken flush of red, someone followed me home. The Comedy Festival had just come to an end and, as fortune would have it, the final-night festivities coincided with that most spectacular of Australian television events - the Logies.

Over the course of that eternal evening the two disparate groups (only differentiated by the lavish ballgowns and immense beauty of the Logie attendees) would collide to rejoice and lament.

I made my goodbyes sometime near dawn. As I wandered along the tree-lined boulevard beside the Yarra, I became uncomfortably aware mine were not the only footfalls I could hear. I picked up my pace but every time I paused at traffic lights that infernal clatter drew nearer. My keen hearing detected four thin metal legs (which seemed to move in unison) quietly pursued by a set of comfortable shoes.

It was baffling, confusing, and, when the tension grew too great, I turned to face my stalker. I was confronted by a gentle-faced elderly woman about the same shape, size and, surprisingly enough, colour, as Yoda. She supported herself on a Zimmer frame and pushed a roll of papers into my hand. I looked down for a second and by the time I looked up she was gone. She moved like lightning. In the distance I could hear the wild clickety-clack of the walking frame speeding to another appointment.

The roll of papers unravelled and I realised she'd given me a poem, written in a shaking, spidery hand. (I don't normally present other people's work but it was easier than writing something).

THE COMEDIANS' GRAVEYARD

The Comedians' Graveyard,
(Strike me down if I lie),
Is a cemetery for comics,
Where they all go to die.
It's not marked on a map,
It's not easy to find,
And the search I've heard takes,
At least a lifetime.
It's a land of the spirit,
Not governed by senses,
And the graveyard's nomadic,
Not bordered by fences.
It's shaped like forever,
But longer and wider,
And the sky is an ocean,
Only higher and drier.
But if you made people cack,
If they cried for encores,
If they pissed themselves laughing,
Then your place is assured.
And you'll find yourself girdled,
By your comic ancestors,
Amid mountains of mimes,
And generations of jesters.
Amid writers and poets,
And purveyors of schtick,
Beside tangential thinkers,
Both the brilliant and thick.
There are mimics and dancers,
And assorted pretenders,
And jugglers who juggle,
With political agendas.
There's all types of performers,
From the jaded to the bitter,
And even some folk there,
From musical theatre.
They come to this place,
From all over the place,
The young and the old,
The acclaimed and disgraced.
For all the funny men lie here,
And the women of mirth,
Shoulder to shoulder,
In the nurturing earth.
And they're all born again,
(If you give them a mike),
For death's nothing new.
When you've died every night.
Then nothing restrains them,
No cask made of oak,
For there's no force in nature,
Can withstand a good joke.
And it's then that you'll hear,
A million different routines,
From the cloyingly moral,
To the slovenly obscene.
The material of ages,
Stretched thin like a gauze,
Still in search of an ear,
Or some gentle applause.
Carried swiftly towards you,
Over dark moonless hills,
By the whispering wind,
By indomitable wills.
And you can see their skulls grinning,
God, they're a damn happy lot,
For now they've got time,
In fact, time's all they've got.
So they spend endless hours,
Just perfecting a line,
Or toil forever,
On the perfect tight five.
How joyous to spend,
The sweet binding Hereafter,
In the presence of mates,
Resonating with laughter.
The atmosphere's thick,
Just like walking through lard,
'Cos it's dripping with jokes,
This Comedians' Graveyard.
There's one thing I must tell you,
'Fore I take flight and go,
One thing to assure you,
One thing you need know.
Above the graveyard there sits,
A curious formation,
Unnatural to mortal eyes,
A strangely simple constellation.
For hanging in that lonely sky,
There is no sun nor moon,
Just five bright celestial bodies,
To pervade the greying gloom.
Yes, dear friends, hung overhead,
Five stars eternally shine,
In a neat, crisp little row,
In a horizontal line.
And every heart is happy here,
(And I know this to be true),
For when they gaze into the sky,
They see their last glowing review.

Photographs are only ever an aid to memory, never the real thing - that's right isn't it? Are you still there?

Our memories can fade faster than an old Polaroid left out in the sun. The edges of our photographic history yellow, the sympathetic cyan disappears and contrast is slowly lost. Over time, we're left with a hazy image suffused with a greenish-grey hue where the tones meet on a field of blandness. The camera doesn't lie: it's as honest as the day is long (so obviously more honest in Scandinavian countries where the days stretch past midnight and less honest where darkness descends early). The problem has never really been the camera - it's with the all-too-human operators.

In the past few months, there has been a spate of tiny, affordable machines claiming they can pump out memories at a rate of knots. The accompanying advertising proudly boasts that if you home print your snaps, they'll last a lifetime. The only trouble with this notion, and it's not immediately noticeable, is that a photograph should last longer than a lifetime. Hopefully, a generation or two longer.

Where a painter would take months, if not years, to capture a likeness (Whistler, and his legally vouched for, hasty brilliance, being a notable exception) a digital camera and printer can spit you out in a matter of seconds. Your soul can be captured so expediently it doesn't even have time to dry, and technology also allows manipulation on a hitherto unprecedented level. There are programs for everything so, before you know it, you've entered the world of the domestic falsifier.

We're not talking about taking out a touch of red-eye here. There's a darker, insidious side to home printing. News has reached my desk of one family whose eldest daughter has been erased in a Stalinistic purge of the happy snaps. After an altercation concerning a goldfish, feng shui and a ceramic pot, the demonic dad went back through the faithfully catalogued family history and, using nothing more than the rubber, magic lasso and cloning tool in PhotoShop Elements, had his own pictorial night of the long knives.

He removed his rejected offspring from weddings, gatherings, Christmas festivities and even, callously, from her own pre-teen birthday bashes. She no longer appears beside her siblings as they crowd into a viewing post above Kangaroo Valley; she no longer awkwardly kneels in front of Luna Park with friends, unconsciously gamin and insecure.

And the smile that, reputedly, cost the entire family the price of a holiday in Barbados, no longer appears in those tricky years from 13 to 16 weighted down by strips of metal. It no longer appears at all. The others dare not argue with his decisions as none is sure who'll be next to find themselves in the trashcan.

Clearly, her father is not the full quid and certainly not a perfectionist. Inconsistencies abound: a fabulously taut yet curiously empty bungee cord? A bodiless splash in a backyard swimming pool? If you look closely, on some prints, her slingbacks still poke out between wedding guests, or her bodiless arm floats by dinner companions ruthlessly gripping a Chardonnay.

The moving finger having moved, the mouse has moved on, and, in its invisible wake, history has been modified. This is by no means an isolated incident.

Another friend, who always hated her own nose, tried to set the past to right by altering every image that existed prior to her rhinoplasty. She scanned and cropped and cut, replacing the monumental Roman snooter.

Her later work is cleverly deceptive, but her early work was a disaster. Due to her heavy-handed use of the gaussian blur, the centre of her face would appear as a ghostly smudge, as if her nose was the only part of her that had fallen headlong into some sort of time tunnel.

Another old acquaintance has been sending me emails documenting his two-year journey across the globe. The only trouble is I know he's not left the country. He's become totally obsessed with creating the existence he never had, documenting and cataloguing a false history. A wall in his lonely, misanthropic home is covered in pictures of himself arm in arm and cheek to jowl with people he's never met.

His grade four school photo, which he's blown up to a preposterous size, is a case in point. Once, every head stared at the viewer, stiff backed, socks up, fists on knees. Now, each head is slightly inclined towards the radiant being sitting mid-shot in the lotus position. His teachers include Gandhi and Malcolm X.

Once every slightly yellowy blue moon do I look at the old snaps, but now, when it comes to remembering the past, history is what you make it.

In these days of rising rents and enormous collections of broken household objects, it's easier to just pack yourself into storage.

I'm a collector of sorts, mainly paper, scraps of paper, dizzying amounts of paper. Not of anything worthwhile. Occasionally I find things, broken things, I one day hope to fix. But now there are more broken things behind me than days before me.

The trouble is, I feel so attached to these things that when I'm separated from them I feel a sense of loss, as if part of me is missing. When I travel I keep returning to houses of ever-decreasing size. So I started to store the storable part of myself in self-storage sheds. There's one in Sydney and one in Melbourne. I feel that if one day I can unite all these strange possessions under a common roof, I may make sense of who I am.

My current accommodation is little more than a cramped cave with floorboards. More of my belongings languish in storage than in this present hovel. In this very city, in a neatly stacked rectangle of pressed tin with an obedient lock, are a bed, a TV, a cracked record player, scratched LPs, a fridge, canned foods, books and books and bookshelves, a microwave, Russian stick pins, malfunctioning watches, surgical equipment, bent spectacle frames, games with missing pieces, and paper, mainly paper.

I could easily find the home I can't find in my house in either of my storage sheds. All the creature comforts are there - including a ball and claw bath - waiting. I visit my sheds once in a while to pay homage to the past and remind them that, one day, when I can afford the space, we will all be united again. Until that day, we must be patient.

During my visits I noticed industrious people working out of their sheds. In spaces too neatly ordered or too charmingly chaotic, they're typing away, making calls, photocopying. I saw them selling carpets or electrical goods, and one woman, on a green level, tirelessly filing.

Another morning, surrounded by fading photographs of their magnificent youth, two old Greek fellas sat playing cribbage on a folding card table. Then there were the two brothers in Melbourne (27-35, happy, well-fed, short-sighted and dim) who just loaded up a shed after their pa died.

They did the hefty, sweaty, man-work then they took off in the truck to get a sausage roll. When they returned they couldn't find their particular shed in the surreal maze of the storage facility. They'd lost their bearings and, more importantly, the shed number.

Sadly, their ma, overcome with emotion, couldn't part with the old man's memory and locked herself in. Somewhere behind one of the two and half thousand identical orange rollerdoors a woman was weeping.

It took them five hours to find her and when they did she was so changed by her experience they weren't even sure if she was the mother they left behind. But it had been a long day so they took her anyway.

It's strange, but that's when I thought I should live in there. With the money I'd save on rent I could be a jetsetter, winging it from shed to shed. This flat is too small to put anything in and, while the shed's small, at least everything's there. It certainly makes moving easy. That's when I decided to make my shed my castle.

DIARY ENTRY, MAY 1, 2004:

Spent my first night in self-storage. Crept in before closing and locked myself inside. All my things are stacked up to the roof and I have slowly been familiarising myself with them. I'm dwarfed by my stuff but it and I go together; we feel like a giant.

It's good to return to the old bed ('82-'93). It has kept its memories like stains, and they are flooding back (the memories, not the stains). Fell asleep exhausted 9.20pm. Strange noises round 12. Rose, a bit frightened, opened the shed to find the corridor filled with people. Hardly anyone could speak English and yet we talked for hours. A large Macedonian family residing in 1134 on level blue performed traditional dances. We toasted our good health and drank sangria beneath the time-halting fluorescents.

All the doors were down again by five, as if nothing happened, as if no one was here. Woke again round six to the sound of a woman weeping, struggling to suppress her cries in the strange tin labyrinth of the orange level.

The cost of housing in Australia has shifted from prohibitive to obscene. Too many innocents have wandered into the beaming fangs of the keeper of a sub-branch only to find themselves skewered on the bloody pikes of the banks, their loans exposed to prying eyes, their wallets ruptured. Rents are soaring, smashing through every glass ceiling; it's enough to drive you up the wall that's owned by someone else.

Estee Lauder, the cosmetics queen from Queens, has left this island earth for a place where enlarged pores, fine lines and wrinkles and the burden of dull, lifeless skin are no longer a concern. She departed this land of mirrors just over a week before Mother's Day. For one of the world's most gifted and articulate businesswomen, it was yet another moment of uncannily brilliant product placement.

And was it the cold-hearted cleverness of a distant corporate elite or a more prescient personal calling that led to the naming of her current campaign? Whatever the cause, it was profoundly bizarre, as advertising cranked up for the first weekend in May, to see promotions for Estee Lauder's newest range - Beyond Paradise.

But why did this have to happen? If anyone was aware of the seven warning signs of ageing, it was Estee. If any of us were armed with the knowledge of how to defeat them, it would've been her. Where were the age-defying creams when she needed them most? Where were the intensive restoration treatments? Why didn't the scientists from Olay, Nivea and the other great cosmetics companies pool their resources to aid one of their own?

Where was the world-renowned Ponds Institute? (Ahh, the Ponds Institute, a research facility shrouded in mystery. It is, I imagine, a place where women with flawless complexions, decked out in crisp white lab coats, pore endlessly over disease-encrusted petri dishes. They ruthlessly observe and control bacteria or discover enzymes capable of giving each one of us a more youthful complexion. It must be the most extraordinary working environment where every employee achieves a radiant, balanced glow before heading off for a minuscule lunch of tossed green leaves.) Why could they not help? Perhaps it's because seven signs just aren't enough.

EXPANDING THE SEVEN SIGNS

Although the seven visible signs of ageing are seen as industry standards, there are other very visible signs I've personally witnessed in geriatric relatives. The seven signs could easily be expanded to include:

Sign 8: Thinking Mike Walsh (or any contemporary TV personality) is talking directly to you and then responding to the TV as you would to a mentally deficient person.

Sign 9: Believing the testimony of the cat in the matter of the Missing Slipper over members of the immediate family.

Sign 10: Insisting siblings are members of the Mormon faith eager to coerce you into bigamy - or are out to "get" you.

Sign 11: The most visible sign of ageing not included in the seven (and if I had my way it would be top of the list) is standing in the local mall selling invisible tickets for a raffle that never existed, wearing absolutely nothing under a transparent raincoat. Not a good look as you cruise into 87 and definitely an overlooked visible sign.

CONFUSION OVER THE SEVEN SIGNS

There's a lot of confusion over the seven signs of ageing, but they should not be confused with the seven signs of Christ's return. Although it is of interest to note that while most of the signs of Christ's return deal with Armageddon, Apocalypse and the Anti-Christ, the fourth sign is more cosmetic in nature. This, the most esoteric sign of Christ's return, predicts an unprecedented explosion of oiliness (and thereafter pustules) in the T-zones of many men. Any decent fellow who has followed the right path will remain "spotless", while those scabby lads who failed to accept His message will sport this new and unattractive "mark of Cain".

For these transgressors, however, there's hope in the form of a recently developed skin-care range exclusively for men. Daily application may see many bound for hell sneaking through the Pearly Gates with their T-zones "completely balanced, energised and healthy looking".

BACK TO ESTEE

We may delude ourselves, but the creams and lotions that do battle on our behalf every day know in their very make-up this is a war they can never win. And yet each day they fight the seven signs of ageing with the commitment of a warrior-king. They're there on the front line, at the very cold cream coalface of the epidermis, keeping the ravages of time at bay. But time waits for no woman.

On the day Estee Lauder died I overheard a conversation between two women. The first lamented how this doyenne of appearance had been suddenly stolen from us at the age of 93. "Ninety-three?" Her friend quickly corrected her, "Estee was 97 when she died." The first woman's eyes were frantic for a second but then she recovered her composure and replied confidently: "Yes, my dear, but she looked 93."

There's nothing like a Dane - and now we've got one in the family. Australia may well rue the day.

On Friday, families across this proud nation tuned into the royal wedding of this new century to witness a suburban miracle. On Saturday and Sunday, they gushed over their eight-page liftouts and souvenir posters. By Monday, shop fronts sagged under the weight of potent images of the regal couple's intensely beatific embrace.

Now, as our personal connection to the Danes is cemented in the matrimonial bed, we eagerly await the following chapters of this modern myth. The years lay open before us, craving to be filled with legend and romance, not mired by scandal and intrigue. As a nation, we're in the honeymoon period of the marriage, caught up in the pomp and majesty of old-world splendour and bathed in the radiance of two people in love.

But, like any fairytale, there's a dark side to this unbelievable story - a dark side that may very well blight our future and hang like a deathly shadow over these once bright and brilliant lands.

One can only guess at the impression left on the malleable minds of our youth. We may unwittingly be giving false hope to the flowers of a generation and corrupting the fruit of our loins. For every little girl dreaming of being a princess, there's now a precedent. Overnight, we became a land of "princesses in waiting". Every parent is aware of the "fairy phenomenon". Will the delusion that has gripped young girls continue in adulthood? Will they end their days unfulfilled spinsters? Will our country be barren and black with grief as we collectively slide into misery vainly awaiting another Mary?

And what of the forgotten gender? What will be the effect on our testosterone-fuelled adolescents? Australian males are sliding uncontrollably backwards on the rocky terrain of education. (In a recent test many thought "root beer" was something you do.) How will they compete in a marketplace where Aussie chicks are hell-bent on nailing a prince?

Australian men are not generally regarded as princely material. They may be charmers and larrikins, scruffs and good blokes, but they're not handy in a waltz and look like dills in epaulets. In front of every pauper aching for a life partner, we've placed a psychological barrier as imposing and terrible as any ogre. And, let's be honest, not many will have the beans to overcome it.

There's always a festering underbelly to any fairytale: we need only cast our minds back to the last one we dubiously celebrated. It ended in death and disaster. One moment of magic may result in years of anguish for our young nation. How many other "princes" will now travel to our once isolated island to plunder the genetically sound material of our women? Will our economy be damaged by some ol' krones? Will we become bloated on sickly sweet pastries? Will Tamworth become Copenhagen's sister city? Let us, for the moment, overlook the poisoned apples, the savage spindles and the tempting gingerbread.

Let us focus on heroic journeys and dwell, for peace of mind, on a happy ending. But it may be wise to realise, with this fairytale, we're just at the beginning.

THE FABLE OF THE WEDDING

None who watched the wedding and reception could fail to be moved - it was a grandiose affair, although it lacked the intoxicating inbred wonder of an English matrimonial gathering. The art direction of the occasion was taken directly from the classic My Fair Lady. This film was present on so many levels: the transformation of the flannelette-wearing, VB-sucking Mary into the future Queen of the Danes. The Danish Royal family attire, complete with sashes and military brochures, was derivative of the great visionary of cloth and costume, Edith Head. Sadly we may never know if the evening ended with Mary pitching Frederik's slippers at his crownless head.

Tragically Australians clamouring for a taste of Dimboola would have been disappointed. The only hope of an upset was Mary's father John (for those eager to hear our thick garbled 'strine on a foreign shore - another let down). There was early promise when he opened his obligatory address with an undisguised Scottish accent (a good drinking people not known for their deportment). It was immensely upsetting he didn't regale the assembled throng with bawdy tales of Mary's past, stumble blindly into some ferns or grope any of the elderly Danish matrons. His poise, grace and speech were deeply un-Australian.

It's of interest to note that Dr John's early work in Texas included the mathematically brilliant, academically dense and zoologically bizarre, Statistical Probability of a Successful Union between a Great Dane and a Tasmanian Tiger, recently reprinted and available from all good university bookstores.

Delve into the op shop of life, and what do you find? A bunch of people selling expensive crap you don't need.

There's a new store down our way. Well, it's the same ol' store, with brand spanking new owners. The only difference is there's more stuff now. Once it was just a few old couches (nasty, fabric'd, 1970s jobbies, a lot of anger in the weave, with battle-scarred cushions that took a pounding in a decade of failed therapy sessions); now it's all faux-ritzy, so you have to dig deep.

Amid the rotting pine furniture, rusted chrome stools and chipped, black, lacquered chipboard tables, I spot a lamp. A standard lamp cobbled together from body parts of other lamps - a Frankenstein lamp. It's industrial looking: all metal, adjustable neck, a slightly dinged shade, three-wheeled base, sturdy (apart from the wing nut on the shade which allows the whole thing to slump forward with the resignation of a condemned man).

I look for the staff. Two middle-aged harridans fascinated with each other and more interested in pricing everything than selling anything. The third time I query the cost, one replies with annoyance, "$135".

"One hundred and thirty-five dollars for this lamp?"

Without missing a beat, or even looking at the article, she supplies the validation. "It's an original."

I survey the mongrel light.

"An original what?" I respond.

"An original lamp." There's no trace of sarcasm in her voice. So what can be said? Conversation cul-de-sac. An original lamp, I replay it again and again in my head, baffled by her off-the-cuff brilliance. Leaving the store I hear her voice trailing off - I'm sure they make copies of them in Ikea or something.

We hit the mall and we see the headlines and wonder if this war could get any worse. Didn't it end six months ago? It's the first major combat to incorporate camera phones and digital cameras. The happy snaps of your inhuman activities don't even have to be taken to be processed and you can chat to loved ones back home between bouts of torture.

Meanwhile, popular culture hasn't responded as it did in the socially conscious '60s and '70s. Every song in today's charts centres on the perennially pertinent theme of pulling in the disco. Britney Spears's Toxic was a lost opportunity; it could've been a damning indictment of chemical weapons.

There are government-sanctioned assassinations and wedding parties are hit by gunships as we're distracted with reality TV that has nothing to do with reality. We see pictures of detainees, uncharged yet chained, being sexually ridiculed in the news, then spend the rest of night watching programs where people are prepared to humiliate themselves for a crack at a bit of cash. It's getting freaky. But first things first, I had to find a juicer.

"Have you got any juicers?"

"Yes, of course," the assistant proudly states, then leads us on a six-state tour of the store, stopping at all the major points of interest. We pass the cutlery stand, the coloured-glass vases, the Italian design kettles and a marvellous array of garlic presses.

"But where, oh, where," she laments, "are them pesky juicers? She finally stumbles across a neatly arranged display. She points at the nearest example.

"Is this a good one?"

"Yes." The assistant does not feel compelled to furnish us with more information but we feel compelled to inquire.

"Can you tell us a little bit more about it?"

"Well . . ." She pauses. "The fruit goes in here . . ." She pauses again. Her eyes feverishly scan the white plastic juicer as she announces triumphantly, ". . . and the juice comes out here."

After battling on the buses, pushing past hordes of shoppers, soldiering through the kitchen utensils, we're confronted with the bleeding obvious. With such a detailed description I felt grateful she wasn't the assistant in a pet shop.

The crowded mall is bristling with humanity. There must be a way of linking each and every one of us regardless of colour, religion and beliefs to attain a world where mutual respect is paramount. Someone must find the world's greatest humanitarians, philosophers, thinkers.

Dr Phil can head the team, he can solve any conflict, and they must begin work immediately on the Grand Unification Theory of Mankind. It'd be easier than solving the riddles of the universe. Just a single idea to connect us all through dialogue to honesty, forgiveness and understanding. We could achieve an earthly perfection based on rational discussion, appreciation and love for our neighbours. And we could seal this document of salvation with trust. Because the pen, although mightier than the sword, is no match for a laser-guided missile.

The day ended. I didn't get the juicer, and when I returned for the lamp the price had leapt to $245. And, grand unification theories aside, I felt like throttling someone.

If you feel like you're not responsible for your actions then you could be the latest victim of Brain Hijacking.

Born in the courtrooms of Texas a mere six months ago, a legal phenomenon has taken the US by storm. This strategically brilliant, and yet-to-be proven medical condition, has propelled the arguments of lawyers, captured the imaginations of jurors and left prosecutors at a loss for words.

Those whose trials have been overturned using this testimony are hailed as survivors, many securing lucrative television and book deals.

The newest craze in defence testimony is destined to hit our shores before the end of the year. In the terror-conscious US it's commonly referred to as BH. Here we can give it its full, frightening yet concise title - Brain Hijacking.

1. Brain Hijacking occurs when the mind of an independent, free-thinking adult is momentarily seized by thoughts beyond their control. You may have experienced this. An inability to explain the reasoning behind your actions.

With Brain Hijacking someone else is clearly responsible for your actions. The "hijackee" is a victim - whose "person" and "personality" have been mentally abducted by a "person" or "persons" unknown.

Thus far the hijackings have been predominantly political in nature leading analysts and Pentagon officials to postulate that they're the work of "Freedom's Enemies".

Donald Rumsfeld, who may be forced to use the defence soon, claimed, "There are numerous skills possessed by the mystic seers of the Orient and their Eastern brethren, mind tricks and games that precede Western civilisation. Who's to say these inscrutable peoples are not employing these dark crafts again?"

2. This view is backed up by the sworn testimony of an unnamed US Senator. "I felt unsteady, not myself at all. I recall my eyeballs rolled back in my head and where the optic nerves intersect at the chiasma I glimpsed a tall, dark shadow wearing a turban. I can't remember anything after that, certainly not signing any document."

3. It appears the objective of these shadowy interlopers is to control the cerebrum. It's here within the intensely convoluted folds of grey matter that a hijacker and his cohorts can hide out for hours, days, even years if not discovered. It's also from here that they can manipulate memory, thought, mental ability and intellect, effectively controlling our leaders without their permission or even their knowledge.

The redeeming feature of a Brain Hijacking is that no brain tissue is destroyed or harmed. There's no danger, as there often is with temporary insanity, that the accused will repeat the offence. With Brain Hijacking, it's currently believed, the survivor suffers no long-term effects and can be released immediately back into the community after trauma counselling with a registered, courtroom-approved practitioner.

Look around at some of the bizarre events of recent years and no explanation fits as neatly or conveniently as Brain Hijacking. Our entire past may have to be reassessed with this new knowledge.

We may be obliged to rewrite history. Who knows how many hijackings have occurred without our knowledge? How many villains are truly victims? How many of us are already invaded?

We do know one thing - to date none of the hijackers have been apprehended to stand trial.

1. A vacuous collection of left-wing academic pansies has criticised Brain Hijacking as a defence for the indefensible. But, as many of their opponents have already pointed out, these oddly vocal and aggressive intellectuals may well be victims themselves. What better way for the hijackers to disguise their presence than to claim they do not exist? Many of these - let's not dally with words and call them what they are - university-educated, anti-social misfits and rabble rousers, have been taken into protective custody pending exhaustive medical studies.

2. The initial targets of Brain Hijacking have been politicians (proving even the most robust intellect can be brought to heel) but over the past few months there have been widespread reports of this phenomenon occurring in common people. In Arkansas, two priests have used the defence in matters far more pedestrian and bestial in nature, as has a woman on Judge Judy after a violent, life-threatening altercation over a parking space.

3. The Senator managed to foil the take-over of his brain. Through continual use of internal dialogue he lured his assailants along the grand longitudinal fissure, passed the central sulcus and eventually trapping them in the motor cortex. The hijackers were holed up for days in his left cerebral hemisphere. The only noticeable consequence of this was the complete loss of co-ordination on the right side of his body for the duration of the hijacking.

STORIES MY FAMILY TELL

No. 1: The Ballad of Zorro

Some stories should never be told. Stories offering no comfort or insight into the human condition. Stories told by doddery old folk that only cause the youthful protagonist immense embarrassment. These stories circulate in the warmth of the family nest, occasionally breeding the sporadic exaggeration. They're fragments of the past that should lie in peace undisturbed. Such is the story I now tell. Such is The Ballad of Zorro.

I've forgotten how many times I've heard The Ballad of Zorro. Every year there's another embellishment because, unlike their contemporaries, my parents' memory for inconsequential detail from half a century ago continues to grow. They don't just love telling the story, they rejoice in it, especially at weddings, funerals and to strangers at leagues clubs. They tell the story and I listen - it's one of the few comforts I afford them in their twilight years.

According to my parents, and backed up by incriminating snapshots, at the age of three I became Zorro. No, not just became, I was Zorro. Once I adopted the persona of the swashbuckling rapscallion, I answered to no one, at least, no one who called me by name. I only answered to Zorro. This always causes my parents great mirth because it lasted several years longer than it should have, by their recollection, into the early stages of adulthood.

Zorro's blade they remember as clearly as if I was still wielding it to save the peasant farmers of the Sierra Madre. It was a black plastic rapier with a domed hand guard. I treasured that fine blade; it was always by my side.

At night it defended me against the oppressive forces that lay beneath the bed. These days, the anti-fun agents of safety would have it banned. The finest attribute of the blade was its point. Here, a small moulding at the very tip enabled the wily Zorro to place a piece of chalk.

This design improvement allowed Zorro to leave his mark without shredding the lounge. With cat-like stealth, he marked every piece of furniture, every wall and even some of the more stationary neighbourhood kids. The only moment of shame occurred when Zorro ran out of white chalk and was forced, around the age of five, to dip into a coloured pack. This meant he left his mark in candy shades of soft pastel pink and blue, which stripped the mark of much of its majesty and all of its threat. As dad says, a mauve Z on suburban red brick ain't gonna shock no one out of their nefarious South-of-the-Border, anti-proletarian activities.

My mother, he claims, fed my obsession. Though, she responds, she was an unwilling participant, forced at plastic blade point under threat of a chalking to fashion Zorro's disguise.

The outfit consisted of a black cape and matching eye mask - to this day I regret not having the heavily stitched pantaloons favoured by the Spanish aristocracy, and the knee-high leather boots with jingly-jangly spurs were beyond the reach of the pedal-powered Singer.

The way they tell it, the freshly bituminised Canberra suburb of Garran bore an uncanny resemblance to the harsh terrain of Durango. It was here Zorro fought tyranny and injustice, traversing the lawn on his faithful mop. They were dangerous days. Zorro almost lost his life once, in a shopping mall, when his cape was eaten by an escalator. I was Zorro 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and my parents couldn't believe I missed the major component of the original story - Zorro had an alter ego.

My long-suffering Da's greatest joy in retelling this story concerns the night he arrived home believing the situation could get no worse, only to discover his eldest daughter, my twin sister, no longer existed. In her place stood Zorro's kindly grandfather. And she remained Zorro's grandpa until Zorro finally hung up the spurs he didn't have.

Over the years I managed to drag all the members of my family, their friends and some of our more gullible relatives into my unhealthy obsession. We lived in a world where everyone was a friend or foe of Zorro. Zorro was my infantile Quixote and over time I transformed my parents into a stereophonic, bi-gendered Sancho Panchez.

We laugh about it now. Well, to be completely honest, they laugh about it. But I listen. I'll always listen. (I didn't want to mention this, it was too excruciatingly shameful, but I had a special Zorro hat as well.)

With power and passion spilling from the stage to politics, why not enlist more show-biz talent to govern the na tion?

There's no telling where it began or where it may end, for show biz and politics have always been intertwined. More often than not they're two separate entities but sometimes show-biz pizzazz and political savvy join forces in the form of one person to create an unstoppable force.

Many have forgotten that the recently deceased Ronald Reagan began his illustrious rise to power as a lowly actor, and that the current Governor of California was once a humungously disproportioned body builder.

No country, no border, no political party can withstand an onslaught from the artist with an agenda. In Britain, Margaret Thatcher, known in her later years as the Iron Maiden, enjoyed a youth as Clapham Common's most beloved burlesque dancer. It was the same raw sexuality, learnt in those early jazz ballet classes, that would smoulder for five decades, turning political heads on every clack of her heels. The Pope, spiritual leader to millions, admits he began his mission as a poet - though it's a while since he has touched pen to paper and he's a bit shaky now. While just down the road from Vatican City, Ciccolina, the bleached blonde queen of hardcore Euro-porn (in an empowering reversal of positions) entered parliament. Sonny Bono, the greatest of the greats, negotiated the difficult passage from singer/songwriter to top-selling double act, to TV variety co-host to gifted politician - all with skill, precision and aplomb. He was destined for bigger things until his career and life were cut short by a tree (there may be a political lesson in that for all of us). (1) With the appointment of Pete Garrett, the drought-stricken terrain of Australian politics received an unexpected splash of life. We're all acquainted with the power and the passion of Pete's musical work with Midnight Oil. (2) We're familiar with his unique and idiosyncratic dancing style. It gave birth to a million bevvied-up imitators but could only ever be truly interpreted with the song of "The Oils". (3) When attempted with tunes by The Thompson Twins or Tears for Fears the dance became an epileptic tragedy.

There's a wealth of untapped talent in all fields of Aussie performance, from stage to screen and Garrett is the chrome dome tip of the iceberg. Who wouldn't vote for Bert? And is it too much to hope that Barnesy might make a run? Or Doc Neeson? Or Christie Allen? Or Brian Mannix from the Uncanny X-Men? He was always articulate and no one wore a pair of Lycra rock tights like Brian. With some cleaver promotion and careful orchestration. Australia could have the world's first all-singing, all dancing, hard-rocking parliament. You coud sell tickets. Hansard woud be collectable. And maybe, just maybe, Molly woud throw his hat into the ring?

Peter Garrett, the quiet achiever, appears to be a man of conviction and conscience and that, more than anything, makes him a strange bedfellow.

(1) Americans, to this day, remain incredibly grateful that Cher didn't follow her ex-husband's lead into the political arena - a view not shared by military analysts who claim if US might was marshaled behind Cher no force in the universe could stop them. They believe nothing could prepare the enemy for the sight of her sitting astride a cannon dressed in a costume of transparent goodwill, vanity held together by dental floss. That vision alone could've ended the first Iraq conflict. And as a consummate professional, Cher could stop straight from the boat to the benefit show without missing a beat. After a high octane Cher concert even a defeated people could head back to their bombed-out hovels with smiles on their faces. But Cher turned her back on politics, in a prized collection of tinseled thongs, and the world breathed a sigh of relief.

(2) Recently a commentator stumbled over the name of the band pronouncing it "Midnight Soil", which brought with it images of darkly troubled teens, satuated sheets and accusations.

(3) The Prime Minister has confessed a love of the Oil's classic Beds are Burning. Although, as anyone who knows Head-Banging-Howie, it's all about the beat, and the pointed subtext of the song may have been lost as he thrashed it out with the kids in the mosh pit. Many doubters have asked the PM to hum a few bars to make sure his extensive knowledge of The Oils back catalogue is not just the work of some adviser trying to boost the "I'm still hip" profile.

There can be more than one answer when the darkness rolls in - but first take a moment to consider the global power.

THE VISIT (part 1): the warming nature of artificial light

An old friend came to stay with me a while ago. She desperately needed a place to escape for a week, some time to get away, to rest and recuperate, and I had an air mattress and a patch of floor. The first evening she was in the old place we kicked back, cracked a bottle of red and got stuck into nattering.

We were both tired, exhausted from the day and found ourselves washed up on the couch like so much flotsam and jetsam. We turned on the telly and fell head-long into that illuminated rectangle. We had a bit of a bite, and a bit more of the red, and sometime after Friends your man comes over all melancholy-like and begins the world-weary lament - "I feel as if I'm hemmed in by blackness", I said. "living in eternal shadow".

She turned and she felt the same, for years she felt the same. She couldn't remember the exact date but over time she was aware of the light receding.

Only recently had everything changed. She told me about her home and how the feelings of bleakness related to the house.

It was an older-style property with a large backyard surrounded by modest conifers and gums. A great place to raise a family, with decent-sized rooms, beautiful high ceilings and one endlessly long corridor. It was in a pretty fancy dancin' suburb as well. It was a bargain when they bought it and house prices around the area kept skyrocketing, but those high ceilings - it's something you don't see these days, space for your head to breathe, a bit of room about your bonce.

So they moved in and they gave the place a lick of paint and they loved it. But over the years she felt herself growing darker and darker beside the lime-white walls. The rooms seemed to shrink around them, getting smaller with each passing day. As the children grew and the family amassed more junk, the house became cramped, cramped and grey.

She felt like she was wandering around in a heavy all-obscuring cloud. Objects had lost definition while underfoot the delicately patterned carpets and hallway runner had become confusing tonal puddles. Even with every defiantly found shadow. Light had decided not to cleave the darkness, it had retreated from their house and surrounding world, shrouded the occupants in gloom. She was in a deep emotional pit.

To make matters worse, one or two of the lights in the rooms and a couple in the hallway had blown. She lacked the means to get anywhere near the roof and just kept promising herself that she'd replace them when she could. With two kids in tow it was always hard to find the time to buy a ladder, especially one big enough to reach the ceiling and small enough to fit in the car.

The last straw came when the remaining defiant globe in that achingly long corridor gave up the ghost. After that, even in the middle of the day, you needed a torch or a kero lantern to navigate your way along the passage.

It was time to become proactive. When the kids were at school she grabbed ladder off a neighbour and ascended the dizzy heights to the ceiling. It was here she made an amazing discovery. Tetering on the ladder high above the fading hallway runner she found the original lights were all 40-watt weak-arsed pearlers. No wonder she been depressed. She immediately replaced the loathsome 40-watt pearls with glorious 100-watt clears and with the flick of a switch her world changed. There was the light she'd been lacking.

With a snap the rooms were bright and airy, so airy they filled her lungs. Suddenly she could locate things - keys, jumpers, blankets, chairs - everything that had been lost, even ideas, were now easy to find.

The patterns returned to the carpets. There was an abundance of space (much of it had been hiding beneath the shadow). She was filled with happiness. Until she noticed other things revealed by the light - like dust, and mess and dirty fingerprints everywhere.

"So you see". She said, "I, too, thought I was hemmed in by darkness, but really, I just had the wrong globes." And I realized the way we related to the world was similar, it's probably something we share with many people. At least she had a beautiful metaphor to explain hers.

An old friend, who we shall call Miss K (in honor of Kafka and in order to obscure her identity), came to stay with me last month. My previous article described her first night in my house. This piece details the second. They are linked by the themes of chaos and light.

THE VISIT (Part 2)

The following evening I was occupied with some mind-dulling but obligatory meetings in town. I called to inform my houseguest, Miss K, and far from being upset she was clearly elated that I wouldn't be home until later.

Miss K, alone in the home, told me she'd take this opportunity to spoil herself. Within the sanctuary of the empty apartment, far from the constant demands of family, she'd have a glass or two of red and a long relaxing bath. She'd been to the Body Shop. She may even crank up the spa.

(The spa is a pink tiled malfunctioning monstrosity, which may or may not leak into the apartment downstairs. I've never been brave enough to try it myself as it looks like it was installed in the mid '70s during the height of the disco era by a tiler who'd been hitting the Quaaludes. It even bears the memory of those fun times as a permanent scum mark that no abrasive cleanser can remove.)

I get back around nine and the normally sedate street is all a flurry. The first disturbing noise I hear is the familiar creaking garden gate slam and slam again. Then I catch the sound of gruff Germanic voices and a bloodhound wildly yapping. Somewhere inside the house I can hear a woman's voice frantic and emotional.

My heart lurches into my throat and begins choking me with fear. The front door is swinging open and in the corridor are two bespectacled men I've never seen before. They're shouting commands at each other. There's water everywhere. The corridor looks like a short, straight, thin river. Beyond that in the lounge room my next door neighbour is trying to calm his dog. And beyond that I see Miss K looking terrified clutching a towel, damp but dressed, and I realise I've walked into a Bavarian Marx Brothers film.

I can barely move around the people I don't know but I finally get to the bathroom to find the spa has freaked out. The jets are pointing towards the ceiling and fountains of water are arcing across the room.

There's a stocky man in bermuda shorts, soaked from the thighs down, grappling with the push button control. He cannot contain his amusement and over the deafening thrum of the engine he shouts, "eat's not verking". The noise from the spa engine is explosive. I'm concerned if we don't stop it soon, it'll blow and we'll take out half the suburb in a cascade of water infused with a Body Shop foaming Bliss Bomb. Another foreign face appears in the doorway, "Elek-trickle!" he cries, "Vearis der fuses?"

Within seconds the four of us, each with our own personal puddle, are pulling at the fuse box. And, as is traditional in this sort of enterprise, it was the last fuse we pull that stops the madly humming spa. Before we reach the final fuse we've plunged the house into darkness and turned off every electrical device. There's a collective sigh of relief as everything in the house dies and the only noise remaining is the over-excited hound.

Leaving my rattled houseguest on the lounge I walk my dripping wet neighbour and his mates back home. They're old friends, ex-building site brothers, who were having a quiet night on the Jagermeister remembering "der crazy daze", when the night air was shattered by "der" blonde damsel on the balcony crying for help. They finished their shots and, more or less, immediately came to her aid - a fine example of chivalry in the suburbs.

It's fairly clear as stability returns that the dog and I are the only ones who haven't had a drink so Miss K kindly offers me the skerricks of the red. We're left on the couch, in the darkness (see THE VISIT, part one), gently laughing. *

* There are another two components to this tale that make it even more bizarre, however, I thought it unwise to write about them without first seeking legal counsel.

Epilogue: I've tested the spa several times after this event and discovered - there's absolutely nothing wrong with it.

Its origin remains a mystery, its future as uncertain as its past. What can be stated without doubt is that a love affair that began more than 40 years ago has been rekindled. The flokati rug has returned to our homes in splendour.

The flokati first appeared in the West in the mid-60s. The 100 per cent wool pile has an unkempt barbaric feel, yet it was contained in the form of a perfect square or rectangle. This duality, chaos and control, was central to the flokati's success. By the closing years of that turbulent decade it was one of the most popular floor coverings spreading from wall to wall, coast to coast and bridging the Pacific-Atlantic divide.

This was a carpet that was on a roll, achieving cult status as a minor celebrity after appearing in the opening sequence of Barbarella. The erotically charged moment between woman and carpet paved the way for the coming sexual revolution, but would return to haunt retailers, miring the rug in scandal and innuendo.

The rug was also a scene-setter, not just s scene-stealer, as its sedate role in Peter Seller's The Party proved. This worldly mess of wool had cemented its reputation as the carpet to watch.

By the mid-'70s the flokati was literally crawling up the walls. If a club or RSL needed an edge they found it in this sexy shag. It mastered every space it was placed in; only the ceiling, the most unnatural habitat for a floor covering, had avoided its now almost suffocating effect.

In the '80s the flokati died out. Numbers across suburbia rapidly declined. They were torn down from public venues with a vengeance never before metered out against a carpet. In a shameful display of rejection, local tips and junkyards became the final resting place for these once beautiful pale fleeces.

Mass burnings weren't uncommon. There are two theories for the decline:

(1) A disgruntled populace simultaneously reacted to the high maintenance cover by ejecting it from their homes. Perhaps because its numbers had reached plague proportions. Perhaps because, if you entered any hip and happening house dressed in black you left as an albino yeti.

(2) The rise of feminism, Although originally loved by women the flokati became the carpet of choice for the rake and seducer. It was for the lounge room what the waterbed was for bedroom - a statement of intent.

As families rose around them, it's thought their purpose was lost. Or perhaps the temptation was too great - despite its relatively recent appearance, its believed more children have been conceived on flokatis than any other rug. The moulting magic of the shag.

The flokatis is the rug that keeps on giving for there's more to it than meets the eye. The dense weave of strands possess an iceberg-like ability to conceal the rug's true bulk. Months, even years, after installation, tuffs of balled wool float across the floor like tiny earthbound clouds collecting in their fibrous net dust, dirt and the carcasses of insects.

It's a carpet that longs for liberty and will smuggle itself out of homes on clothing and in dustbins, or it'll wait patiently for freedom in the form of a friendly breeze. And herein lies the wondrous, almost divine gift of the unassuming wool pile - through moulting (or flocking, hence flokati) it seeks to control.

Exhausted and humiliated by partners, friends and, particularly, mothers constantly picking loose strands from their clothing, owners undergo a radical process of change, forced to alter their attire to attain a peaceful co-existence with their fragmenting furnishing. Gradually dark clothes were lost from the wardrobe, soft pastels increase and, when the transformation is complete, the devotee will greet the world clad entirely in white. This outward change brings with it an inward emotional shift - form darkness to light.

In this way acolytes of the flokati become subservient to the carpet. It's perhaps the only incidence where a home furnishing controls the look of its human captors. Today a new generation has discovered the flokati is an untameable carpet, made to be downtrodden but with an indomitable spirit that lifts this humble floor covering to the very heavens.

Extreme was once a word to be feared. It was murmured in the corridors of power to define an enemy whose mission and motives transgressed reason, it was a type of prejudice exerted against those who deserved no mercy and it related to abhorrent sexual behaviour.

It described situations or events that pushed the boundaries of our existence. It was a word whose strength lay in its lack of use. Dropped casually into conversation it could bring gasps of stunned amazement or lose you friends. But extreme no longer is. The first stumbling block for this word came when a soft-rock outfit plundered it for the name of their bland band. Extreme - the band - were anything but, with their one contribution to the music of yesterday being a lame-assed love ballad with multi-layered harmonies! As the song clambered up the charts the back of the adjective had been broken by radio; from here this titan of terms was on a one-way trip into the waste bin of lost words.

How long until it was being spruiked by mainstream advertisers? In the past 12 months anything and everything has been transformed by appropriating those two meagre syllables. We've been regaled with extreme sports, games, makeovers, renovations, vitamins, fizzy pops, even cookery shows. There's so much overkill with extreme it's in danger of becoming the norm. Then where do we go? Mega-extreme? Super-mega-extreme?

Frighteningly, last month it made the most dangerous leap of all as it infiltrated the children's market with the bizarre notion of extreme toys. Surely the mention of extreme toys should ring warning bells with any protective parent? But there were no protests, no cries of outrage, because the word has been stripped of power. We've bound it like a bonsai to make it popular and acceptable.* So acceptable is extreme that the world's most desirable replica woman is about to assume the title and go under the knife with Extreme Makeover Barbie. Yes, even Barbie, the plastic embodiment of female perfection, the contemporary Venus of Wittgenstein, needs a makeover. v

You can cosmetically tailor her to give her a little more in the breast department or arm her for some occasional action downstairs. Accessories include a gaping surgery gown, enabling the lucky purchaser to gain the full effect of her darling dolly dots, a campervan that converts instantly into an opulent operating theatre and, most daring of all, interchangeable heads that allow you to see her before, during and after the op. (Nurse Ken, wasn't there another swab?)

Some consumer groups are concerned but at least with Barbie plastic surgery does make sense. (E-M-O Barbie is slated for release prior to Christmas.) As the toy makers pay homage to this most vulgar extension of our ludicrously wealthy and vanity-obsessed culture, it would be remiss of them not to present a balanced view of our world without representing its opponents, thus Extremist Barbie is almost unrecognisable in her full-length chador.

The only give-away is the thigh-high split revealing a shapely turned shackle. Ankle, that should read ankle. She comes complete with a list of known accomplices (sold separately), the location of various cell members and maps of major capitalist whoremongering tourist destinations, electrical sites and water supplies.

As a bonus, the original packaging can double as a detention centre, where Extremist Barbie can be kept in solitary confinement away from the other toys until such a time as she is no longer a threat to society. Legal counsel Ken is studying hard to find out how this blatant abuse of the constitution is possible. It may take him years so, unlike her cosmetically enhanced sibling, her release date remains uncertain.

(I must apologise for using the tired and tiresome Barbie analogy. In the realms of comedy, the use of Barbie replaced sarcasm as the lowest form of wit approximately 15 years ago.)

* In Holland (see Holland Today, White Rhino Press, Amsterdam) there's a course in extreme flower arranging. One can only guess at the horrors perpetrated against the poor tulip in this most odious of state-sanctioned classes.

We live in a time of hybrids where the best of all possible worlds can be assembled from the scrap and crap of the past. Across the globe, new agents of invention cobble together old ideas to create ever more tempting visions.

American seers led the way in the '50s by combining aspects of aggressive business theories with social skills. Later they blended new-age mentalities with fitness regimes and grew mutli-million dollar empires. We can see these influences in the world of fashion and architecture, where the plundering of ethnic looks is interpreted as homage.

The breadth and depth of this diversity can be most easily seen in food. Greek and Lebanese restaurants have capitalized on the success of yum cha by making minute gyros and kebabs. They currently offer a surf-and-turf doughnut, a savoury combination of prawn, crab stick and calf tongue which has become a hybrid hit in the outer suburbs.

Inner-city dwellers continue to be besotted by the ever-expanding choice in gourmet pizzas. Astute chefs have combined the basic Italian pastry base with a confounding array of delirious taste sensations: a Thai-style haggis with a topping of seasonal tripe has been walking off the shelves.

This global phenomenon is not restricted to the foods we eat but permeates every aspect of our existence. The most fascinating area of study presently lies in the realms of "combination" religions. These incorporate the best ideas of the best creeds out there, and many young folk bored with the rigid structure of organized religion have decided to design their own faith. It's something that could never have happened in our parents' day and, to many, it is still unthinkable. This type of smorgasbord spirituality allows you to mix and match the tenets of any faith for a better fit. It's the Sussan of belief systems and has the added bonus of making a follower into a leader.*

You could shake it up by grabbing the Quaker look but keep it real by praising Krishna. Or give the playful spirit creatures of Shintoism a hard Lutheran edge. You can mix and match aspects of Christianity and paganism (hell, that's been happening for years) to create really fun ways to spend Christmas. Just let your imagination run wild, go for it, some things will work and things won't. The main idea is to play, be inventive, discover your inner voice and let it shout. There's really no limit to fun you can have.

The only downside is that a few unhappy reps from mainstream doctrines have said that if you choose your own path you may not gain entry to Nirvana, or the Kingdom of God, or any other paradise, but to completely honest, even with your best religions, that's always been a bit of grey area. And with DIY faith you no longer need to be mired in days, months, or even years of devotion and sacrifice. With the notion of personalized religion you only sacrifice those aspects of the faith that don't interest you. It's the pop-star mentality of eternal life, blending the philosophy of Warhol with the teachings of the church so that in the future everyone will be immortal for 15 minutes.

Combination religions, much like combination meals, give you the perfect tasty assortments of treats. And adapting a doctrine to suit certainly worked for my friend "Mary" (not her real name). Mary is a hardcore vegan Catholic who doesn't believe in eating the "body and blood" of Christ. Because although it's part of her religion. It's also against her "religion". For years she has been attending a vegetarian Catholic service where they have a tofu Eucharist. It's the body and blood of our lord Jesus Christ transformed into an easily digestible, bowel-cleansing meat substitute. She's said it's difficult to stop at one.

* For the absolute in perversity, an album of Christian devotional songs has just topped the charts across the nation. "Sex, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll" has been replaced by a new generation with "Faith, Hope and Rock'n'Roll". Where did it all go wrong?

What can I do to save this world? It's a big question those of us with hearts ask ourselves every day and yet despite its frequency it's a question that rarely gets an answer. Now there is one.

We're losing cultural differences faster than endangered species. Mankind is set on the slow blend, mixing into a generic human soup, and eventually all individual traditions will be lost. It's a wonderful time to be alive, if you are, and witness such transformations, but certain cultures have no hope of survival unless they're properly protected.

We need only look around at the history of the world to see that pop-culture imperialism is an unstoppable force. This is why it's essential to support the Universal International Heritage Trust for Other People's Ideals, Cultures and Traditions. The UIHTFOPICT seeks to permanently safeguard the ways of the quaint and colourful folk who didn't make it to the industrialized age.

In a recent lecture on Traditions, Indigenous Civilisation and Sustainability, the co-founder of this organization, Dr C. Lorenz, suggested a form of Inverse Imperialism. You can't save all the world at once, he said, but you save a little bit at a time.

His concept is fairly simple take small family groups or tribes of up to 250 persons and purchase them. Incorporate within this cultural buy-out package (CBOP) homes, contents, livestock and native flora and fauna. Then transplant the lot to Australia. Once here they're employed to be themselves. What could be less challenging than that?

We bring these slices of the world back home, keep them safe and turn a sizeable profit running them as open-plain human zoos. Seeing a lion from the car is one thing, seeing a clan of Kalahari bushmen in a life-and-death struggle with the beast is another. Now that's entertainment.

It's the Amish existence with a twist. These God-Fearing land-tilling Mennonites have stayed firmly fixed in the mid-1800s. Why not offer other people, who are suffering or in danger, this opportunity? We've the ability to create a Living Museum of Humanity where no one gets stitched up or stuffed.

There are always some stick-in-the-muds who complain about progress: here they're given the opportunity to stop time and stay trapped in the good ol' days forever. If you can avoid the obvious moral ambiguity it's almost humanitarian - like sponsoring a child from overseas you actually get to see occasionally.

Lorenz suggest setting up these gated communities as protectorates where the clanspeople or villagers retain some autonomy. (There's no need to worry about this aspect of the plan as the owners or investors can always cut off supplies externally.) These communities would be self-contained, productive units with no contact or knowledge of the outside world. Think of it as Big Brother set in a whole-earth theme park. Best of all, within a single generation none of the occupants would even question their existence.

Why bother going abroad, to misquote SBS: the world is a dangerous place and every year it gets worse. Doesn't it make more sense to keep the family here and have these destinations in our own backyard on a 1-1 scale; here where you can always chow down on a meat pie and suck back a VB.

It also gives us an easy out with the refugee crisis. If boat people arrive from culturally rich environments with something to offer by way of family entertainment they can stay and those who don't - straight back on the boat with no taste of turf.

We could start small, collecting some endangering cultures close at hand. What about a few hill tribes from Papua New Guinea or some of those long-necked Burmese, or rescuing the occupants of those islands that are slowly sinking?

Eventually, we could dot the desert with geodesic domes, biospheres filled bursting with fascinating peoples in perfect replicas of their homelands, wonderful microcosms of existence.

You know it makes sense. It's a big idea for a big country, both heroic and potentially profitable, and if anyone can do it we can. Australia, truly bringing the world back home.

4/8/04 Mite-mitigating eco pad but not as we know it Every one of us has inside a number of inner voices: sleepers lying dormant in our unconscious until the moment they rise. Last month, I somehow awoke my insomniac. My inner insomniac likes to apportion blame and has been giving me an earful about my sleeping habits, focusing a great deal of bile on my trusty ol' pillows. I think I found them in a skip in carefree students days and, suffice to say, they're showing their age.

The corner mega-mart-shopping-complex was the first port of call, where everything you need for anything is under one suburb-encompassing roof. After an hour of losing myself, I stumbled upon The Great Wall of Pillows, one of the few retail aisles visible from space. I was dwarfed by immensity of the range, the diversity of the products and the terminology. Obviously, while I was sleeping, there was an explosion in pillow technology.

There were too many different styles and designs. Some no longer looked like pillows as we know them. There were specific pillows for neck, back and body problems and some just for Europeans. They were composed of different materials - polyester, feather, down, latex. Some of these materials were combined in varying percentages and then packed to different densities. There were pillows that we honeycombed or breathed and were designed exclusively by computer.

There were orthopedic eco-pillows, hypoallergenic, anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-microbial, anti-mould, anti-mildew, anti-odour and all of them were pure and white. There were recently developed, exhaustively researched textiles with scientific names such as Vitalatex, Dacron Hollofil, Viscoelastic Memory Control Foam. I realised with despair that I lacked the language skills necessary to purchase a new pillow.

(My yellow-stained monstrosities were beginning to look very shabby indeed: no wonder they never came out of their room.)

I looked at the pictures and found myself mesmerized by cross-section diagrams demonstrating how this product would lift and support your head and not separate your neck from your body. But then my eyes were drawn to the plastic slip and three frighteningly simple photographs sitting side by side. The first was the human nose - fragile, weak and invitingly unprotected. The second a sunflower, overcoming all it's natural beauty to look sinister, with each grain of pollen a threat to humanity. And finally an electron microscopic snap of a bed mite, hand-coloured in heat vision to propagate terror. Its mandibles wide, its grotesque body ready to pounce and, worst of all, it appeared to be grinning. I can tolerate a great deal, but I draw the line at using fear tactics to sell sweet dreams.

Zapped of any willpower beneath the scrutiny of the fluoros, confused and dazzled by the array, I sought the aid of a shop assistant. He approached me with caution; lip twitching, twin coal pits for eyes. The name pinned to his blouse was Beryl, but let's call him Kurtz.

"What's the best pillow?"

"Gotta keep the bugs out," he wheezed.

"You're just a cold meat platter rotisserie as you turn in your sleep. And your drool is like champagne to them. Every night, they're having a party in your pillow, feasting on your waste, the flakes from your scalp. Dandruff, dandruff is dust mite cocaine, they go off man, they go crazy, every night - you can't imagine the horrors."

Then he turned on his heel and ran and I realised I'd been saved by a red-light special somewhere in Manchester. That night, after all the torment I endured, at least my inner insomniac had a restful night. We both slept on the couch.

Natural pillows are also available. From my brief research these products are filled with nap-inducing buckwheat hull, seeds of assorted soft stones. All of which sounds delightful. But could you have a restful night placing your bounce on densely packed seeds? Knowing any drip of saliva or accidental spillage might cause the seeds to sprout, to germinate, to burst up through the thin cotton covering the engulf you in an alfalfa science project, your own personal Night of the Triffids? Could you ever sleep knowing you could wake up in an edible Elysian field?

Closing time. The local pub has disgorged its contents, throwing up the occupants of the saloon bar in the visceral dummy spit at the pavement. The sidewalk can't contain them. The braying herd spill onto the road, corralling themselves between the front and side door of the establishment.

They've yet to understand they're outside. Soon the winter chill will reach their bones and the fact they haven't been sipping on a bevy for a few minutes will hit home. There'll be a chorus of tuneless laments. If we're lucky they'll rip into song. If we're unlucky they'll rip into song and some burly arm will wrap about our necks in an affectionate half-nelson and we'll be trapped wailing "What about me?" until the police arrive.

My companion and I have about 30 seconds to pick the gaps, negotiate a path and clear the area. Instinctively we realize we must protect the takeaway (twin slabs of parmigiana, damp vegetables and salad). If we consciously avoid the swilling crowd by heading to the other side of the road they'll sense our fear and assault us with callous jibes. They may even throw their shoes at us - its happened before. I'm hoping if we stay away true to our course we'll make it through unscathed and, God willing, be rewarded with the three signs of a great night out, the tragic triumvirate: a fight, a frottage and a confession of love.

WE make it past the first chicane of boozy louts, skirting the potential menace by heading straight down the centre. It's a gamey call. We both know if they smell the food we're done for. Then we're in the thick of it. It's another 20 metres to freedom but we find the spaces in the inebriated minefield with expert precisions. Maybe it's because they've been drinking and we haven't but its Matrix time. The world's gone all Neo and we're ducking and weaving, sliding fast past every danger on the footpath. The whole scene takes less than a minute and within that time we come up winners with the trifecta.

1. The Fight

Two young bucks go the pretend biffo to attract the ladies, they grapple, lock horns, more jest than joust but you know how these things go, someone puts a foot wrong and, bang, you're at casualty till four in the morning. A young heifer catches the display and, lured by the antics, breaks from her group. She's giggling and, you can tell by her tone, a wee bit flattered. "Boys," she admonishes, "no fighting round here." With that it stops and the boys' attention is instantly redirected.

2. The Frottage

He's trying to get to grips with her hips while she's skirting away. Ah, there's the rub. King and Queen of their own personal card castle slanting supportively towards each other. All it'd take is one gust of wind to bowl them over and, judging by the way he's clutching his tum, it'll probably be coming from him. Each is tilted 45 degrees, heads touching. She's cooing "no" (or she could just be impersonating a pigeon), he's murmuring and grinding the air. It's the last chance of the evening, the mating call of the drunk, plaintive, desperate "C'mon? c'mon".

3. The Confession

Two down, one to go. And just when you think it's not going to happen, it does. I hadn't even noticed this fella. The very last guy in the group.

Standing alone, facing away from the brawlers, his arms are up and by he look of it so is his gander. His emotions are running high and he's speaking to a garbage bin he thinks is an ol' mate (obviously a very, very short stocky ol' mate with a hole for a head and a severe body odour problem). He's shaking his head in disbelief at his honesty. "I love youse, he almost weeps into the waste, nah, I do love youse."

The boozy crowd ambles off in a Burke and Wills search for another watering hole while we find the safety of home. Those offhand moments on the footpath were highlight of the evening because as we tucked into the takeaway we discovered there are worse things than singing What about me?

The Olympics are heating up like bacteria in a health spa. Scandal again threatens to swamp the pool, soil the track and spoil this joyfully competitive meeting of nations. Athletes are missing, the exponents of pedal power cycle under a cloud of accusations, there are cheats, bribes, conspiracies and the drug problem has made the jump into the stands (some of the on-screen Greek officials looked Botoxed up to the eyeballs. Nothing in the opening ceremony surprised them at all).

Each of these issues is worthy of scrutiny but while we're fixated on the larger problems we allow the smaller ones to slip by. One of the most insignificant of these issues, yet potentially no less damaging, concerns the promotional campaign McDonald's is running with the Olympics. There's no doubt that of late this company has had its share of problems and it's unnecessary, even vindictive, to kick the big fella when he's down. But it's also poor form to procrastinate.

In this current series of sponsorship ads we're presented with the red and yellow corporate clown as weightlifter, as sprinter, as Olympic hero. This must be confusing for children whose limited understanding of this craft (the craft of the clown) would be to associate it with some form of humour (albeit a low level of humour steeped in slapstick and often violent and unremittingly cruel. A clown, so attired, rarely resorts to cerebral high jinks). Yet here, in clear defiance of our knowledge of clowning, we witness Ronald as victor, triumphant in his athletic undertakings with no attempt at merriment.

He powers home in the 100 metres, he effortlessly cleans and jerks. But why? This organisation has chosen a clown as its visual representative - to personify its corporation - and to not allow him to be funny is to take away his very reason for being.

In the sprint the viewer must question why Ronald's not clad in the obligatory oversized floppy red clown shoes. Pounding down the hundred metres with the big step necessary to negotiate the floppy footwear would be gut-wrenchingly funny. Perhaps metres from the line he could slip on a McDonald's trademarked banana-based product. If that's not available - a hot apple pie. Or, as he sprints to the lead, besting the world's best, he could pause centimetres before the tape, bend and tie up his shoelaces - equally classic.

What of the missed opportunities in the weightlifting arena? Ronald stumbling back with the enormous weight threatening to pin him to the mat. Or falling forward and seriously injuring the worlds' cameramen. Or (and this is a wee bit grotesque) voiding when the pressure became too great.

He could make it difficult for the other competitors by swapping the dusting chalk for grease (and like he couldn't get his hands on a bit of grease?). And if he looked scrawny beside his rivals he could beef it up a bit, shooting a wry self-deprecatory wink to the camera and demanding to be supersized.

There may be many more in this series of ads to be released over the course of the Olympics. If we're fortunate we'll get to see the Hamburglar pinching a few worthy winners or the Grimace uncovered as a Chinese women's swimmer - but only after taking gold. Hopefully we'll see Ronald mimic Thorpey, tumbling off the blocks, or doing a Dawn and stealing some flags. As a discus thrower he could hurl one of the heavier burger combos (by the usual method, of course). He could have a crack at the artistic gymnastics in a tight and overly revealing red and yellow leo or hit the balance beam and do some serious damage to the McNuggets attempting a Standing Arabian.

However if Ronald continues to win these events, with his poor physique, questionable diet* and performance-decreasing yellow jodhpurs, one must question how he's doing it. There may be one unsavoury explanation. It's understandable that no poorly paid general practitioner wants to take a urine sample from a clown, but given Ronald's previous record he's not going to try anything funny. And who knows we might get to find out what makes that meal so goddamn happy.

* Though it must be stated not questioned by this writer, The Age or any of its affiliates.

A nondescript afternoon on a dull day in a bland week. Oh sure, there were moments of glory - mainly for others. The Olympics were in full swing and, far from trapping folk in front of the TV, it forced them onto the streets.

People were everywhere, cluttering up the vistas. They were happy, smiling, clad in their nauseatingly smug hasn't-summer-come-early outfits. They crowded out the landscape, blotted out the sky, ruined the beautiful simplicity of the horizon line. I watched in envy while they cajoled around on my scenery.

For days, I've been shadowed by a dark cloud. These feelings of negativity are due to the purchase of a faulty product. The product was cling wrap. But it was cling wrap that didn't cling, didn't wrap. It just sort of lay limply over the top of objects like really, really tired transparent lettuce. It was my own fault, apparently, as I'd gone for the less pricey option. But why shell out your hard-earned (non-existent) coppers for a slightly prettier box, or be swayed by a familiar brand name? What was the saving? A coin or two? I reasoned, in hindsight wrongly, that all cling wraps are the same.

What a fool! Engaged in folly, married to misery! Do not think for a moment the stupidity of my actions was not a boon to my overly vocal and opinionated friends. It's true, I purchased a cheaper, inferior, lesser-known brand of cling wrap and in the end the true price I paid for that mistake was humiliation.

You did what, you stingy runt? Where's your head at - idiot spawn? (This from a 65-year-old woman named Beryl who was seriously unimpressed with my frugality.) I'd tried other wraps before, but thought I'd give something new a shot.

There were a number of articles in the fridge, your basic leftovers and assorted liquids, that needed immediate covering. Proudly taking hold of my cheap new wrap, I commenced. After four or five attempts on each item, none was closer to being sealed like a drum. I'd smooth the film down on the china only to have it lift seconds later. No, not just lift; physically pull away like it was ashamed to be touching the bowl. Maybe it had food issues. I did notice it was thinner than other wraps. It would've been more effective to cover the bowls with old bits of hessian, tie 'em off with some stringy bark and bury them in mud.

Is it wrong to believe that any product bearing the title 'cling' would?Is it wrong to believe that any product bearing the title "cling" would? With this deceit, a major building block has been torn from the foundation of trust I placed in words. What of other promises? Dishwasher safe? Microwave safe? Unbreakable?

In my teens, I witnessed first-hand the breaking of an unbreakable plate. I'd just managed to deal with that after years of therapy and now this. How is it possible? Maybe it was a bad batch? A random, if upsetting, aberration. I mean no budding entrepreneur could dare embark on the strenuous journey to create cling film if he/she knew the vital element of clinginess was absent. And how scientific can it be, it's CLING WRAP!

Half the world has nuclear weapons but, on the upside, we've managed to keep the secret formula for cling wrap from falling into foreign hands. Who knows what the evil hordes from somewhere else could preserve with that knowledge? Did no one test this product? How difficult would it have been to just set an afternoon aside and check out whether it worked? Get Ma's day-old salad, seal it in a bowl, tip it upside down and, if it hits the floor, go back to the drawing board! How difficult can it be? It has no moving parts.

In the end, the only thing it sealed was its own fate. Furious at its belligerence I did away with the damnable roll and tossed the cardboard carcass into the bin, wrapped in plastic. A few days later in the same store I overheard a couple talking loudly. She was furious about a non-slip bath mat, apparently.

Imagine, just for a second, you were fortunate enough to get a piece of work that took you up north to, just for argument's sake say, Port Douglas. And, imagine you had a few days free, no reason to run back to the world, no work hassles, no commitments. You could give yourself an impromptu long weekend.

And just say you're joined, in the first few hours on your holiday, by the four horsemen of your own personal apocalypse: Headache, Fever, Weary Bones and Niggling Cough. How would you feel? A little bit sick? Would you go into battle? Get yourself a double-action, non-drowsy formula to kick a hole through the lung butter and knock Weary and Niggling from their steeds?

Fortify yourself with ibuprofen and pseudoephedrine - thankfully homeopathic remedies haven't made it this far north, which means you're confined to the classics. A friend suggests Oscillicocinum; you try and get some but the pharmacist asks if it's Latin. "Looks like Latin," he says again and again.

He's speaking to you slow, real slow, freakishly slow. You can't decide whether it's because he thinks you're a foreigner or if it's just the way they speak up here. By the time you return to your three-and-a-half-star prison you've got enough drugs to cure cancer.

Outside the fronds are beckoning. Their leafy fingers gently graze the window. You don't dare open the curtains because happy sunlight would pour in. That'd be unbearable; even the muddied glow of the TV is scorching your eyes. How did this happen? Maybe the flight? The cabin was filled with micro-organisms big enough to see with the naked eye. They floated through the air disrupting the in-flight movie. They were crazy big and lived in the air-conditioning system; then through the hallucinogenic cocktail of pharmaceutical wonder you seem to remember a conversation you had had the previous evening.

"Are you OK?"

"I'm terrible."

(Co-worker shaking, forehead dripping sweat, eyes delirious.) "What are you doing here if you're so sick?"

"This is a big night. Nothing could keep me away."

"That's the spirit."

(Pat on back, laugh. Brag about how you haven't had a cold all winter, how you're invulnerable to bugs and virus. Yabber on about how you feel fantastic.)

"That's great," the co-worker coughs (inadvertently?) all over you.

From your sick bed you contemplate how this may be the first recorded incident of pride coming before a cold. You remain in your hermetically sealed hotel room on the doorstep to paradise condemned to live off room service. A whole week's wages have gone in four sittings. If you hit the mini-bar you know your whole business will go into receivership. But the cashews and chocolate are calling with their promise of sugar and salt and momentary bliss.

Halfway through your break and you've jettisoned your body weight in phlegm. The box of tissues, softened with aloe vera for sensitive noses, is depleted. In its place stands the Phlegm Baby (all rights reserved). The Phlegm Baby is a mindless creature composed entirely of tissues and toilet paper fused into life by nasal waste. You can't be sure, but at night, in the grip of your delirium, it moves around the room hiding the matches.

Your 24-hour flu has just kicked into its 72nd hour and there's your long weekend gone. You'll be just well enough to get the flight back. You will, however, be minus the top layer of your epidermis, which you left in the hotel bed.

When you first arrived, you strolled down that beautiful stretch of beach and fried to a crisp. You let tropical sun warm your bleached winter bones for an hour, just an hour in the midday sun. By five that afternoon, you were bright red. Roasted on the outside, filled with snot on the inside - a human Kiev, a slip, slop, slap failure, a lobster with a sniffle. Sunburnt with the flu. You console yourself with the thought that even the most imaginative hypochondriac couldn't come up with that diametrically opposed mix of symptoms.

Only one good thing came from this experience - a new appreciation for bed. Ahh bed! The stuff dreams are made of.

There are few moments of genuine warmth in Australian politics. The revelations over the past two weeks that the hallowed halls of power are awash with schoolboy nicknames and childish monikers was incredibly refreshing. At a time when we look for leadership from leaders, it's good to know they, just as us, are mired in the everyday and their water-cooler conversations and morning teas are rife with secret codes and pet names.

The election battle of the century is beginning and this captivating name-calling is our first taste of political foreplay. The only tragedy is that the general public will never hear many of the nicknames murmured in the corridors of power.

Journalists have been aware of the tag "the Rodent" ever since it spilt from the well-tanned lips of the Peacock back in the hedonistic seventies.

Even as a tyke, I remember the oft-overused tag for the diminutive Liberal treasurer - Honest John. My faculty for irony was not strongly developed as an infant so one of the older lads, already used to the rough and tumble of the playpen, was obliged to explain it to me.

If Little John is a behemoth, Honest John is a . . . modesty and the possibility of prosecution prevent me from furnishing you with more information. Suffice to say that my companion's grasp of the vulgar vernacular was extraordinary. Years later, he'd make a number of names for himself in federal politics, but primarily be known as the Bankstown Ripper.

What other names have the people of Australia missed out on and, more importantly, what names are we yet to hear? In reckless pursuit of the truth, I set off in search of other unfamiliar monikers for our prominent politicians. It was a short journey to the phone and a conversation with a former senior public servant (who asked not to be named).

This man, who was once privy to the back rooms of Canberra, managed to furnish me with nothing of any worth. When asked whether Howard and his cronies, or members of the Opposition, were regaled or encumbered with other terms of endearment or derision, he claimed he was not at liberty to answer. The only conclusion one can draw from such a meted response is that insidious forces control his silence.

One might also assume that there exists in some secret government agency a vast repository of cruel and clever names. All catalogued, kept safe and hewn in marble by Czech stonemasons. A wall, perhaps, of the not-well-remembered.

We are, and have always been, a proud nation of name-callers. It's something we should revel in because a nickname speaks volumes about its recipient. At birth, we're named before we're known and we carry the curse of our parents' whims and fancies over a lifetime. With a nickname we're born again and gain a new lease on life.

The simplicity of the tag often disguises its complexity. Even a seemingly cruel yet beautifully descriptive term like the Rodent is filled with compassion and affection for its subject.

Will our champions ever reach the dizzy heights of nickname greatness? Will we ever find a name for one of our pollies to rival the lyrically acerbic and perfectly balanced Tricky Dicky? Will one our party boys or girls ever carry the heartfelt thanks of a butchered population with something akin to the kindly, familiar Uncle Joe?

Those in the know believe our best hope for nickname greatness lies with John Howard, AKA the Rodent, AKA Honest John, AKA Lazarus, AKA the Accountants' Accountant - (although I might've misheard that last one).

Afterthought: many believe in this era of international terror it'd be dangerous to get rid of John Howard; after all, he's the closest thing we have in this country to a biological deterrent. On the other hand, there's something a number of liberal-minded Australians have been waiting a long time for John to say and he hasn't said it. His refusal to say this one thing has made many people, especially members of the indigenous community and their supporters, hard-knuckle commies, artists, nurses, priests, academics and other rabble-rousers frustrated and annoyed. A lot of people are simply waiting for John to say: "Help, I've fallen and I can't get up."

THE LOST JOY OF FOOT BINDING - (Body augmentation part 3)

When Fred Astaire crooned everything old is new again to Ginger Paddletoes Rogers, it's doubtful he comprehended how pertinent the lyrics would remain. Half a century on we continue to live in a revisionist society constantly plundering the past for ideas.

Most recently the mystic East has provided exotic fashions and philosophies which are reinterpreted and updated to suit our modern lifestyles. So would Fred, as one of the world's finest tap dancers partnered to a woman he often referred to as Bigfoot, be horrified or pleasantly surprised that the latest craze to grip the US is the ancient Chinese art of foot binding?

Foot binding found a toehold with the impressionable youth of San Francisco where Wrap Parties were all the rage last year. But backyard practitioners eager to replicate the glories of this tradition may be doing more harm than good. Most of these contemporary fetishists are oblivious to the immense difficulties they face.

Foot binding lasted for more than a thousand years. In that time it became one of the most complex and desirous forms of mutilation that permeated every aspect of Chinese society. Poems and songs were written celebrating the practice including the raunchy Sung dynasty hit The Golden Lotus Stomp (though scholars are divided on the exact translation, with some preferring The Golden Lotus Stump).

Foot binding also supported an incredible array of craftspeople, all professionals and respected pillars of their communities. These artisans were so devoted to their handiwork that even in their down time they would tirelessly - and often for no financial gain - bind the feet of those less fortunate. Sadly many of their skills have been lost, particularly those of the Master Foot Binder. This was a man, usually a eunuch, with an incredibly poor olfactory sense and not easily swayed by the visual horror of gangrene.

Already feminist groups are up in arms, citing the custom as a barbaric subjugation of women, and it's generally agreed if foot binding is to have a future it must be genderless. In a free society girls and boys around the age of three should have the right to choose their shoes and if their choice is to have their feet soaked in animal blood and herbs, with eight toes broken, while the arch of their foot is constricted until it's perversely concave and permanently confined to four-inch pumps, so be it.

Almost 100 years have passed since this practice was outlawed and who's to say how these unpleasant side-effects may be alleviated with modern medicine - a splash of antiseptic to obscure the odour or a dash of penicillin to keep infection at bay. The lifetime of pain associated with binding could be alleviated by the continual application of prescription drugs. And with the constantly growing field of cosmetic surgery why stop at the feet? Why should above the ankle be off limits?

Still opinion is divided. Some ignore the positive aspects of foot binding (the sense of community, the delicate embroidered slippers, the enhanced musculature of the jade temple, the fun of never leaving home) preferring to dwell on the negative (you can no longer run for a bus).

Celebrities have not been shy in coming forward to give it a shot. Watch out for Jessica Simpson's first binding experience in a coming episode of The Newlyweds. Her stylish bandages are supplied by that bad boy of design and ethnic fashion thief John Galliano and you can witness the true beauty of a bound foot as she seductively totters along an ultra-thin catwalk.

In Japan the beautifully cruel art of bonsai (nearest relative to foot binding) is being introduced to the animal kingdom with surprisingly fascinating results. Although early test cases did not survive the hardship of strangulated limbs, tenacious researchers found that with the right combination of love, care and attentive, purposeful torture marvellous results can be achieved. A miniature petting zoo has opened in Osaka.

The star attraction is a white rhino the size of a foot stool. Even animal lovers who were initially appalled by this project had their hearts melt when they saw a family of ultra-tiny-pygmy hippos cavorting with a minuscule elephant on a petite table- tennis-sized slice of the savanna.

Television is an evil, loathsome medium. It attracts the most odious, fawning egomaniacs to its suppurating breast and allows them to sup on its withered paps. Even the creator of the medium described it as an opiate for the morons. Then there are times when the old cathode ray tube and its descendants deliver brilliance straight into the home, illuminating mundane lives and giving hope to millions.

One such show is Australian Idol. The first series gave birth to, thus far, six or seven recording careers. First off the rank were Guy and Shannon with their gloves-on, friendly battle for the hearts, ears and hip pockets of the Australian people.

More recently Paulini and Cosima have churned out the tunes, not far behind them are Selwyn and the guitar-playing-human-beat-box Joel Turner and then there's that other fella whose name I can't remember.

Another two contenders (who apparently lost) secured jobs as TV presenters and there's an attempt to mimic America by elevating the most excruciatingly embarrassing performers to the level of quirky-untalented-but-loveable-and-freaky superstars. Thankfully we're all in on the joke so no one will carry any permanent emotional scars from the experience.

If we allow ourselves a little leeway and assume about half these careers go from strength to strength, and as the show progresses it produces more performers who are invited to enter an increasingly diverse range of media-oriented jobs, it doesn't take long to see how Idol candidates could easily have a monopoly on the music and TV industry.

Lounge rooms across the nation are contemporary coliseums where the fate of our vocal gladiators is decided with a phone call. Barring a hideous coach crash, by this time next year one can safely project that another six or so of our chosen champions will be turned loose in the studio to pump out the hits.

If this trend continues then in five short years the show could spawn roughly 30 singers. This is a conservative figure as it does not include the freaky singers who might be convinced to squeeze out the odd novelty track, the other loser performers momentarily sidelined into presentation who still harbour the desire to release a zinger, or any of the efforts by the very talented judges (I know many of us are waiting for Holden to have another crack at it). Thus we can predict within 15 years over 90 singers all born on the box will be jostling for pole position in the Aussie Top 100. This may not affect the Top 10 at all but it certainly doesn't leave a lot of room down in the pack for anyone else. And this is in Australia alone.

Consider then we're not the only country in the grip of Idol hysteria. The entire world has succumbed to its dizzying spell. American and English Idols have already had success here, can the Idols of Latvia and the slowly sinking, guano-covered islands of Nauru be far behind?

With 27 countries producing Idols and each creating six or more acts capable of releasing three singles per album, then conservatively speaking there could be 486 songs by 162 Idol artists on the charts in a single year.

If they all release a Christmas track, which in the music industry is considered obligatory, then who can guess at the numerical and musical anomalies that may arise. Project these statistics over 15 years and you arrive at the staggering figure of 7290 songs by 2430 artists. Remember again these are conservative figures. If we add to this mix the other random elements previously mentioned (losers, freaks, judges) our graph rises steeply.

By my own calculation, and please take into account that I'm no mathematician, by 2020 the Idol phenomenon would have created enough music to fill all the iPods in all the world with nothing but songs from the series.

Some pessimistic analysts predict that by 2025 no other form of music or television will exist. They suggest the Idols will totally dominate our understanding of entertainment, filling every position available including the role of newsreaders. Is it frightening or beautiful to think that in the future there may be no room for Elvis, the Beatles or Cisco?

Do rhododendrons flower in ice-shrouded Inuit villages? Is Tarquin really a type of stringy but edible goat? Is it possible to have an inguinal hernia in an unnatural opening in the skull? Every day, hundreds of thousands of people sit down to commence work on what they believe will be their great novel. What many of these hopefuls don't realise is the extraordinary amount of disciplined research required to write the modern novel (more so if that novel has a historical bent).

Today's author must build their mythic world with interlacing facts and these facts can take years to cobble together. It's this work at the coalface that will validate their efforts, but traps and pitfalls abound for the unwary. An intimate knowledge of all things is essential. For instance, if this article were better researched, you'd know who first uttered those now immortal words, when writing about stuff you need to know things.

It's a brash author who embarks on a course without the requisite amount of study. The hardships awaiting the foolhardy are immense. When writing a novel, danger lurks at every turn, especially every turn of the page. One must endure weeks of thumb-numbing tedium leafing through the ol' Dewey system, or court potential blindness flashing past years of shrunken information on the microfiche.

If they venture into the world of old wood and books, then they run the risk of raising the ire or the unwanted attentions of library staff. Stealthy and quiet from years of servitude to the written word, librarians, with their well-documented voracious sexual appetites, are creatures whose Velcro-eyes follow your every move.

We've all experienced the unwanted amorous advances of library staff, in our youth, and this is probably why many potential authors feel nervous and vulnerable in the stacks. Today, aspiring authors feel safer scouring the net for information, but, be cautious, the melodic hum of the line connection has been termed the devil's doorbell.

I recently read a historical novel for which little or no research had been done. It was set in the court of Palladin (sic) the Great, but the first moment of real annoyance came with the arrival of two wayward crusaders. Their names jarred as few members of the nobility were christened Benny and Bjorn in the 11th century. The novel continued to disregard details from the past, but the final straw came with a recipe for flan de cerises. Sir Bjorn set about consuming this French pastry commenting on the ingredients with a Proustian relish (which for the unliterary among us, is not a condiment).

He savoured the bittersweet taste of Morellos soaking in brandy. The tragedy is that Sir Daniel Hall could not make that recommendation for this particular dish for another four centuries. Such an oversight can cause a reader to instantly abandon a work. I know I did, flinging the tome across the room in a fit of pique.

There's one way to avoid all this bother: set your novel in a fantasy future where there's no need to reference anything. The future is an open book waiting to be written and you can just make up any old crap. Once again, caution is advised because in creating something from nothing you could inadvertently be shaping the future. This effect, once the domain of Jules Verne, has now been termed the Star Trek Conundrum.

The fanciful projections of the series writers has spawned not only languages, but machines. The household remote control and the mobile phone both owe their existence to Star Trek, and NASA has just completed work on an ion generator, the imagined Star Trek propulsion unit, that may one day take us beyond that final frontier.

Afterthought: people are writing more, but reading less. A close acquaintance of mine working on his own unresearched novel takes pride in the fact he's never read a book. He does, however, read the TV guide regularly and is seldom without a copy. He enjoys the Reader's Digest-like descriptions of films, where three or four lines can adequately describe most features - which he correctly asserts are based on books. Last week alone, over a single cup of coffee, he read such classics as Crime and Punishment, On Golden Pond and Caddyshack 2.

The nightmare window.

Beyond the pane, traffic slides to a halt, a truck coughs and a bus grumbles as ivy splinters the light spilling into my bedroom. In dappled greens it plays upon my eyes rhythmically at the precise frequency to induce hallucinations. That's what I'm thinking, when I wake. The last few nights have been extraordinary, it has taken me most of the days to get over them.

In this regard the bed has been my protector, friend and saviour, unmade, unwashed, accepting. No one but carrion would want me in this state. I've rested in its protective rectangle for hours but there's something different about today, about this morning. Even the patterned flowers strewn across the doona are looking withered.

The buttery atmosphere outside is edging past the curtains. It's an almost thick orangey grey. Light enough not to notice, dark enough to be aware of. When I shower I wash it off but as I dry it joins me again. In my mind's eye I can picture it integrating with my epidermis on a molecular level. When I dress my clothes trap it against my skin.

Another unwanted guest is the pimple on my nose, nestled in the very corner where the nostril meets the cheek in one of those impossible to get to positions. I was conscious of its presence while I slept, now the bathroom mirror reveals its full splendour. Angry, red, infected with no real centre.

I attempt to think of it not so much as a blemish but as a metaphor. My next act is to smear toothpaste over it in the vain hope something in the chemical mix will cure it.

It's late morning by the time I catch up with the day, departing my home for a dockside stroll to collect my thoughts. The wharves around here have a lovely Britain during the Black Plague feel about them. Every block, on the waterside, has a bunk bed. The beds are made of a heavy old pitted and weary wood, like the wood from railway sleepers. They're much higher and wider than normal bunks. They're like queen bunks. The bottom of these bunks contain compressed living quarters festooned with cushions, bed sheets, half-eaten foods, empty bottles, cigarette packs, muck on muck and bill spikes.

Business transactions happen here. Another form of business transpires atop but it's a far more fleshy affair. This is where the women of the wharves take the catch of the day, if you get my drift. The merchants here call it unloading the dock. This sort of open-air activity, nocturnally or in daylight under the veil of the smog, is so much the norm these days it's hardly worth noticing. Only the older kids get a thrill out of it and with the state of education around these parts, at least they're learning something. For the rest of us it's just good to know the economy is on track. On the second floor of the buildings opposite, giggling urchins with whatever is the contemporary version of coal-caked faces watch as another week's wages gets blown.

I find myself at the church. It's architecturally old school, steeple, spires, etc. All covered in a once-white plaster - like this filthy city has been rubbing off on it. Inside a quasi-punk-gothic-rock-ecumenical-outfit practise for the local youth group mass. The lead singer is wailing something indecipherable. Either his voice is distorted to billy-oh or he's singing backwards. There's a plump goth chick; I smile to myself, thinking of her as Mary Maudlin. She's managing to hit just off the off beat with her tambourine but it's good to find some peace and quiet. A couple of people are humping in the pews when one of the goths points at my nose and laughs out loud. I've forgotten to remove the white crust of Colgate and realise, with regret, we live in a world devoid of flesh coloured toothpaste and/or mint flavoured pimple cream suitable for brushing teeth. This must be addressed. Exhausted I head back to the safety of my bed with the overwhelming feeling I should have voted for that Family First party.

That's when I wake to find the pimple is real. Please explain.

She tells me, with eyes wide and splintered with exotic greens (littered with histories, sagely wise, yet bright and exuberant), there is a way. She tells me with a voice as seductive and low as the Devil's chimes (but only the bass notes and black keys) ringing with lead-induced whimsy and fragility (yet capable of holding the blood red wine of desire).

She tells me clear as crystal, conspiratorially. Leaning forward, captured by her tone, clinging to my own knees for support she tells me - nicotine patches.

This is her and me at a table and our discussion concerning: Love - How To Ensure a Lasting Commitment.

This, she tells me, is a chemically proven spell purchased from most pharmacies, a bypass operation for an affaire de coeur, alchemy for young moderns, a potent potion to secure ardour, Shamanism for the post-post-new-age. It is available now.

Within weeks the ferociously independent become conspicuously co-dependent. Friends will be amazed and wonder at your secret. This will prevent the loved one leaving (it's horrible to be left alone).

When love is on the wane, when your fancy dancer, your only future, begins to waiver, when with each full moon the tidal plane of devotion seeps further out to sea, when your paramour no longer laps at your shore, when the distance between two lightly breathing bodies in a bed becomes too great - affirmative action must be taken.

THE TECHNIQUE

The loved one must be at rest, preferably asleep, and regularly partnered in sleep to the one less loved but more in need of loving. The loved one, whose own desires must be sublimated for the greater good, will be brought to heel and realise the true depth of love through the following (and easy to follow) instructions: Each night, as the loved one slumbers, attach to any easily accessible and/or reasonably exposed limb, chest or back (avoiding the face) a transparent nicotine patch. When morning comes, before the loved one wakes, remove the lovingly applied patch and dispose of it with care, taking provisions to ensure the loved one is none the wiser concerning this minor (minuscule) transgression.

THE APPLICATION

A minimal dosage can be administered between two full moons (being the heavenly body, not the personage). After this time the effect of the nurturing becomes apparent.

THE RESULT

When absent from the company of the lover, the object of affection (now afflicted) will succumb to dark cravings and unconscionable urges. You will be aware of the altered mood of your partner: dismissiveness replaced with irritability, ennui with vexation (all emotions will eventually be replaced with devotion).

Sleeplessly battling stomach cramps and inexplicable cold sweats the loved one's addled mind will lurch out in search of reason and, finding none, will invariably deduce their physical cravings only abate in the presence of you - the lover.

Daylight hours become intolerable. Beset with fatigue and yearning the loved one discovers work and play banal, impossible. Blood bagged eyes and damp, they will feel the need for something (something unknown and unknowable) and lacking the good sense to realise they have been touchingly poisoned, will transfer these attentions to you.

They will press you to their lips to savour you in their lungs, for it is only in your company that they feel normal. They may call on evenings when you're separated, (one last pathetic flight for freedom) bursting into tears, claiming to be addicted, fixated, obsessed.

Painfully clouded and confused and despite their earnest efforts, unable to place their finger on what it is (if you've carefully removed the lover's little helper) they need, they will be led, habitual, to your open door and true love.

You will notice the power positions of lover and loved one change. Transference will lead them finally willing and wanting to turn the corner into commitment.

THE TWIST

She smiles - as the ol' saying goes there may be plenty of fish in the sea, but if you want to land 'em, you gotta get 'em hooked - her eyes arching serpentine, she ashes and steadies my trembling knee.

And for the hundredth time today I inadvertently itch my arm.

A week off, no kids, no responsibility. Seven days of sunshine and laziness. The only duty being to the self and an obligation to work on the tan. Oh, she wants a tattoo as well, but she's worried about the pain. That was the plan anyway.

K (she of the Spa Incident '04, and the House of New Lights) arrived on a Monday. With K there's always the hint of imminent disaster, but nothing could prepare us for what was about to occur.

Monday passed with little incident (see below), but when Tuesday arrived, it brought stomach cramps, vomiting, dry retching and intense crippling pain. I felt healthy as hell and was working in the lounge on a batch of humorous songs for the critically acclaimed and eagerly anticipated new GUD show with my cohort Cameron.

K continued to retch horrendously in the bathroom, the noise rattling through the house and making the task of arranging harmonies very difficult. After seven hours of this pantomime, Cam and I stop work, bundle K in the car and head to the medical centre.

Her condition (loud weeping, inability to stand) allows her to jump the queue (who all look pretty sick to me, but now have the added bonus of being pissed off). Screens are pulled, she's examined and then given a nasty needle in the arse for a case of suspected gastro. The shot leaves her limp, almost asleep, eyes rolling back in her head. Cam and I carry her through the chock-a-block room past the suffering punters who still have hours to wait to even get a glimpse of a physician (I'm sure I can hear some of them cruelly murmur "druggie").

The night is excruciating: I doubt I've seen anyone in such pain, which makes me wonder what it must be like beyond my door, in the real world. I try and get K whatever she needs, offering comfort where I can, but I'm fairly ineffective as a mother figure.

K: I need a water bottle!

P: I have no water bottle.

K: (Crazy angry with pain) Who the hell doesn't have a water bottle?

P: Maybe I could heat up some ice and put it in towel (much laughter followed by intense pain).

The next morning, in agony, back at the medical centre. The queue leapt again, a referral to a private surgeon and we're on the move.

In the doctor's surgery, K is doubled over. She's decided the floor is more comfortable than the seats and starts curling around the leg of the low table. The other eight occupants in God's waiting room, who all look a bit closer to knocking on the big door, are taking it all very well. We're sent straight to casualty. (K is beside me as I write this. She finally realises, with her poor choice of attire for the day - short skirt, black boots - she was flashing her knickers at the eight oldies. She laughs so much I fear she'll tear her stitches.) She's taken up to the ward around seven and I head home.

The next day, K is bloated like a flesh-coloured watermelon about to pop. She was taken into surgery at eleven at night; three hours later stitched up and sent back to the ward. Every part of her body is hooked into something: there are tubes delivering precious chemicals and draining evil fluids.

She'll not eat for several days and above her head is a sign saying NIL BY MOUTH (this doesn't stop her talking though). She's annoyed because there's one nurse who only comes round when I'm nearby. K is angry; I'm a little bit flattered. I ask her how she is and she tells me, "After two caesars, hospital and a burst appendix, this is nothing. The doctor told me, 'You're gonna be sore for a while because your innards have been man-handled'.

"Man-handled! And my appendix was gangrenous, black and couched in a pool of pus. HA! Instead of seven days of sun, 16 days of hospital. Can't eat, shit or piss. I'm skeletal and, instead of a tatt, I've got a great bloody scar. Came for a life, ended up on death's door. Wonderful holiday."

We laugh until it hurts. And it hurts her a lot. (Before her hospitalisation, the mini tornado managed to smash five glasses. Thank God she got sick or there'd be no crockery.)

Of late I have been visited almost daily by a blackish cat. It crosses my path. It sits and purrs, almost flirtatiously, cleaning its darkish (not quite black) fur. In certain lights however, most particularly the Turnerish mid-morning, escorted through shadow, my visitor takes on a Poe black, a lamp black, jet black.

This being said I'd stake my life on the fact that this cat that keeps crossing my path is grey. Definitely grey and posing no threat. It's seated opposite me, legs splayed in my direction. Cleaning and eating, deceptively hungry (as expected, as always). It walks towards me (good luck), walks away (bad luck), then curls around my legs (what luck!) allowing my hand to trail along the ridge of its back. Shivering, tail held up, shaking like a fluffy grey rattler. What is there to fear?

We live in a modern world, a world that should be beyond the reach of childish superstitions. Yet they surround us, from acorns to yawns, while doors, coins, clocks and dandelions all help create their own unnecessary complications. Superstitions should be shunted away to nursery-rhyme homes and forgotten, along with the old wives who propagate them.

The cat stretches and tears at the modestly expensive Persian carpet. Bad luck for the carpet. Is it still bad luck to walk under a ladder? Does this saying apply to all ladders? What about mobile maintenance platforms? These ladders are reportedly as safe as houses with multi-lock, anti-slip casters and tubular steel construction. What about folding ladders, stepladders? Can it still be bad luck to walk under a rolling walk-thru ladder, a ladder purpose built to walk through?

An annoying, red welt has risen on my finger. It corresponds in creepiness to the tiny line of red blemishes that will shape over the next hour across the back of my hand into my own personally pustulant Pyrenees.

People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. Why not? What about homes constructed with triple-A, standardised and approved safety glass? Super-toughened bulletproof glass that can protect a prime minister or a president can easily deflect a few pebbles.

Bad luck from a cat? How could this cute ball of fluff pose a threat to anyone? Devoting, as it does, its languishing life to aloofness, eating and cleanliness. It has no natural predators, save the car. The domesticated cat is the only creature, apart from man, who kills for sport. The popular suburban tortoiseshell tabby loves nothing more than dropping the drooled-over and perforated remains of king parrots at back doors. It's an Aussie tradition. So is it bad luck or stupidity when a blinded-by-love lover of cats becomes an accessory to murder, an accomplice after the fact, forced to dispose of another brightly-feathered body?

Is it still bad luck to let milk boil over if it happens in a microwave? I'm burning up now. My nose is running uncontrollably. My eyes have become unbearably itchy. I want to claw them from my skull, pop them out of the nestling security of the sockets. They need to be rinsed. They need a bit of spit and polish on the pupils, just to clean 'em up and get that sparkle back.

I've come to the conclusion it's not dangerous for me to have a black(ish) cat cross my path, though, clearly, it's incredibly unlucky for king parrots. My nose is madly itchy, both nostrils, so, if you trust the old girls, I'll be kissed by a fool. An alarm chimes unexpectedly on my mobile phone. I know from personal experience I can expect a death in the family. I sneeze. The devil can get to you when you sneeze and there's no one around to say God bless you.

The fear is mounting. There are 13 letters in my name. A dubious honour shared with the likes of Charles Manson, Jeffery Dahmer, Jack the Ripper and Pauline Hanson. But I'm not troubled by the grey-black, blackish cat anymore. I'm not afeared of cats, regardless of their colour, although I am allergic to them, worst luck.

We must not succumb to hysteria. We must be calculated, weigh the options, measure the results and find a solution. How long must we, the taxpayers of this open-armed, caring community, tolerate the influx of these - and I must call them what they are - foreigners? What is to be done about backpackers? Backpackers: not those visitors who arrive barefoot cradling their damp, half-drowned offspring in the secluded bays that notch this adored land; the ones walking proudly through our customs with their hiking boots and their passports duly stamped.

They land freshly sprayed from the economy cattle truck with one purpose: the mindless pursuit of the legless fun. They are the human blue/green algae clogging our arterial systems, destroying our way of life.

Have you ever tried to get on a bus with a backpacker in front of you? Their cumbersome in-your-face luggage clustered with obnoxious little flags restricting your movement. Their baggage is more important than your comfort. We've all seen babes in arms and widowed women forced to stand while odoriferous and bulky satchels steal their seats.

Some of our own towns are overrun with these 18-to-26-year-old invaders. Every man, woman and child working, living and loving in Cairns is a backpacker. Locals no longer exist there. While some approve of this Menzian solution to the backpacker problem (give 'em the top half) true denizens of the red earth are appalled. Major metropolitan centres are so crowded you cannot hear above the deafening roar of accents from elsewhere. The attractive whine of strine has been lost. And who with any sense of mercantile pride can deal with the disparity in wealth? They mock our ever-dwindling dollar, laughing out loud whenever/wherever they order a meal or a beverage at the minuscule amount of coins they must dispense.

I've witnessed them bellow, hands to hips, heads thrown back facing heaven, unable to believe their luck at finding digestible food at affordable prices. Does this happen when our own boys and girls travel abroad? No, they must content themselves with the crumbs from the table and the drunkards' swill. We were once numbered among the great backpacking nations, now we cannot even afford to leave these shores while British offspring (who have only ever received a trifling few pence pocket money from their doting mater and pater) can live as kings and queens. Why are so many of our young people unemployed? You know the answer. Look no further than the nearest coffee shop.

For these travellers, it's a lark to undercut our youth. They'll often work for as little as nothing to be around the sweet stench of Aussie cookery - their own lands lacking the full fruits and fat meats we have in abundance. Linguistically proficient foreigners with English as a fifth or sixth language have acquired almost every position in our service industry and yet meat pie, dead horse, cheese jaffle and a cup of char are as alien to them as cordon bleu.

While here, they cram into hostels. Hostel is just Hotel with an s and we all know what that stands for. And is it mere coincidence that if you take the word Hostel, add a vowel and slightly rearrange the letters you are left with Hostile? What if The Backpackers are The Terrorists? It would be a perfect way for them to sneak into the country. And by the by, aren't soldiers just backpackers with guns?

When these tourists leave they take with them more than mere memories. They jettison the rubbish from their own countries and fill those disgorged packs with gifts, clothes, tiny clasping koalas, oodles of opals, kanga scrot coin bags, sacred papyrus scrolls handpainted with seemingly indisputable indigenous art and tea towels. Tea towels - our history in cotton. Next time you have dirty dishes it might be too late to ask why.

Macbeth, Macbeth why hast thou abandoned me? 'Tis best in the short space we have to be brutally honest. These tragedies must be viewed in the cool light of reason. Hysteria and hyperbole will find no berth here. Nor will this saga be spruced up with a fine coating of witty verbal lacquer.

Two weeks ago in this very column I courted fate and have spent a fortnight in hell. I allowed a (blackish-grey) cat to crisscross my path (on one particular evening I danced backwards and forwards before it, lasciviously mocking the elemental forces of the universe, literally calling on bad luck to strike me down: which it has done).

Wednesday, November 1: a friend drops by and informs me that the pretty, green, monstrous shrub growing profusely all over the concrete front yard is a highly toxic native, a grade 2 noxious weed that must be removed. I tell him it's to keep the hawkers away and, besides, I never sit in the front yard.

That night I lose my keys. At 12am I'm forced to sit in the grade 2 noxious weed waiting for a locksmith. He arrives sometime later, having just stepped off the set of The Sopranos and, in the glow of his high beams, breaks into my house with a stealthy lethargy. At some point in this process I became unreasonably itchy.

I'm in bed by 2.30am, up again at 6am to begin two weeks of a regional tour. At the airport we're informed our "aircraft cannot be repaired", which fills everyone with confidence.

We're given another plane, a recently renovated 30-seater buzz-bomb which I'm sure has crashed a few times (or would have done if the ground was a little closer). Hours after we're meant to, we safely touch down in country Victoria as the forces of darkness descend. No sooner have we left the security of the airport than we are set upon on all sides by hideous beasts and/or members of the constabulary. By Thursday night it becomes apparent that I'm a beacon radiating disaster, a relay tower for human suffering. My cohorts, my compatriots, are all touched in some way.

What occurs over those next few days is the stuff of legend, although I've been advised it's unwise to discuss the events in print due to pending legal action. (My apologies to the good people of Wagga, Albury, Echuca and Griffith.)

Day three and my wisdom tooth (right side, bottom jaw) decides to make its presence felt. It skewers the soft flesh of my gum searching for daylight. There's no time to find a tooth-puller so I'm forced to numb the pain with alcohol. Sometime after this I begin to drawl.

From here on in the situation (or what I can remember of it) worsens. My mobile phone experiences strange otherworldly activity, Bush romps it home in the States, I find a rental DVD in my bag that's seven days overdue, weeping women and heroic men are brought undone, there's a bloody truck filled with rabbit pelts following me from town to town and a rattle in my chest I take to be consumption.

I've misplaced my special cream and each motel room is designed by the Hammer-House-of-Holly-Hobby-Horror, there's immense sadness, a little death and - I'm pretty sure at some point - leeches.

Two weeks ago, I sought to write an article about the oft-reported power of the black cat to wreak havoc with one's life through the act of haphazard strolling. To my eternal detriment I used myself as bait.

If I'd broken every mirror in my home and danced barefoot across the shards while opening an umbrella indoors and shouting the name of the Scottish play it could not match the ferocious intensity of the calamity that has visited me these past two weeks. And the situation could get profoundly worse; I'm still awaiting some test results. But having conducted this experiment into superstition I can assure you even a fluffy grey cat crossing your path can and will array the forces of nature against you.

Last night I returned home, alone, keyless, with an abscessed tooth, emotionally and physically exhausted and guess who was waiting.

Postscript: All of this happened exactly as I have described; though some of the names have been changed to protect the guilty. The cat in question is one Mr CAT and is definitely not a scapegoat.

Fear again replaced tranquillity in the Australian community with last week's shock decision by the NSW Health Department to one day consider random drug and alcohol testing of doctors and nurses.

We've experienced how this random testing has all but destroyed the sporting elite across the globe. We've seen athletic heroes ostracised just because they wanted to be the best. Are we prepared for the devastating consequences of discovering our leading medicos and their nursing staff (including top plastic surgeons) are off their faces when they're scrubbing up?

To further understand the depth and complexity of this issue, we invited people to submit their personal experiences (apocryphal or not) of substance abuse among members of Australia's medical profession. The response was overwhelming. We were inundated with letters although many of them were unreadable.*

Those that were readable resolutely ignored the brief and we now possess irrefutable evidence that substance abuse is abundant in every profession within this country. It is, as we've oft suspected, rife within the veterinary fraternity. One horrified dog-owning dame claimed she witnessed her pet practitioner coming down from a three-day bender.

She said, "He was shaking so badly I thought he must have Parkinson's had it not been for the unmistakable whiff of cherry brandy every time he burped over my schnauzer." No pet lover should ever have to witness the suburban veterinary surgeon dealing with the shakes.

By comparison with most domestic pets, we humans are sturdy creatures easily capable of concealing a drunkenly forgotten scalpel or sponge in a chest cavity (see below). How does a touch of the post-party quivers affect the far more delicate and fiddly system of a budgerigar undergoing a pulmonary bypass?

Another concerned scribe points an accusing finger at all staff manning the perfume and make-up counters of major department stores. He contends, "It's as clear as an unblocked nasal passage that some of those ladies have no olfactory sense left at all. They may consider themselves high-class hotties, but it's like walking into a potpourri cesspool. Even if you ignore the mind-numbing stinky fragrances, you need only check out their make-up for visual confirmation of abuse. Judging from the density of the foundation, the combination of colours and, in some instances, the application itself, those ladies are into some pretty heavy s---".

One writer, who asked not to be named, supplied information concerning the suspected use of cannabis among skydiving instructors. Miss C. (not her real initial) was involved in a tandem jump with an instructor who, she claims, was "high as a kite".

Now it's one thing leaping out of a plane with a person strapped to your back, it's quite another leaping out of a plane with a person strapped to your back who may not remember where the earth is.

Miss C. was terrified when she realised the red-eye express she was about to catch was her co-jumper. The only bonus was that, at the end of the day, the hooch-hungry, badly shaven relative of the Furry Freak Brothers forgot to charge her for the experience.

Finally, on a practical note, until the day when drug testing of health workers is compulsory, it's advisable to avoid hospital. If you do happen to fall sick, experts agree it's unwise to have surgery around the Easter holidays, the Queen's birthday weekend or anywhere between early December and late January.

Perhaps we can all learn a lesson from Mr J. K. of H. who was horrified when medical staff had the office Christmas party during his operation. When he woke, he was informed there were complications from the procedure as two smallish items had been accidentally left inside. They were a sprig of mistletoe and a party popper. When the patient verbally attacked the physician responsible, the curt response was, "Don't make it into a big deal, just kiss someone or blow it out your arse."

* After closer scrutiny of the unreadable letters, it was revealed they were illegible confessions of substance abuse. Frighteningly, many of them were written during business hours. What has confused handwriting specialists is that the letters were all penned by the same hand and all emanate from the same hotel room in downtown Geelong.

Overheard at Brisbane Airport. The morning of November 30, 2004.

THERE were five, yeah, count 'em, five of these freaks. I mean, sorry, "suspicious-looking characters" which we duly detained in accordance with regulations and placed in the interview rooms. No, it's OK! Let me tell 'em Johnny, you go and fix yourself some breakfast.

This fella right, the first one, the fat one, he's decked out like Santa Claus and while he's got all the younger security guards in stitches he's not pulling the sheep over my eyes. He sets off the alarm on the metal detector.

We're in the red. I get him to take off this big stupid black belt with this massive golden buckle, his pants fall down and we send him through again. Off it goes. So off come the boots, the specs, the mobile and the keys to "the sleigh". And it still goes off.

Then I reckon he's got something under the cap so that comes off and there's nothing and everyone's getting real tense, I mean you'd be reaching for ya guns if you had 'em.

He's standing there in his smalls and what's his excuse? He's claiming he's older than the hills and 'cos where he lives, North Pole of course, he's been tucking into the fish for eons, and due to the "polluted oceans" he reckons he's got so much mercury in him, 'cos it's cumulative, and that's what's setting off the machines.

Pull the other one, I said. Johnny reckons he's got a thimble of semtex up the back passage, 'cos he saw it on some film, so Johnny starts reaching, a bit early by my estimates, for the rubber gloves.

This Santa guy, meanwhile, is going on about starting "early this year" because there are too many war zones and the "reindeer are frightened about flying through flak". Yeah, they got some reindeer union now. He's in interview room No. 1, won't stop crying, keeps wiping his hand over the frosted glass like he's gonna get a better view through it. Utter nutter.

Here's the second one. Don't know if you can see her in there, she's tiny. In from Europe, dressed in a tutu, those kid's fairy wings on her back, off to some rave probably. No money, no passport, no ID, just a bag filled to bursting with human teeth. Freaked out Sheila on No. 1, I tell ya. She puts the bag through the X-ray; next thing Sheila's dropped it and straight off to the bog to be sick. Johnny opens the bag and some of them teeth, most of them, were baby teeth. I reckon if we cross-match them with the DNA database we might be able to get some of them back to their original owners. Though what they'd want with 'em I don't know.

Number three, yeah? Some costume, huh? Looks real and we can't get it off the bugger. Johnny got a bit narkie and threatened to cut him out of it. At that point the bunny in there lost it completely and started blindly hopping into the walls. Don't know what charity he's working for but if the kids could see him now, he's real messed up. If ya wonderin' why he's got all these broken chocolate eggs and bits of tinsel in his lap it's 'cos Johnny said we had to check 'em all just in case one of them had a "surprise". Yeah, they all thought that was pretty funny.

THEN in the last holding pen there's the fella I told you about, the one no one wants to deal with. He's got these eyes that just look right through you. I described him, you can check it out in the admissions book, as having a Middle Eastern appearance, but it's more Middle Eastern than you can poke a stick at, it's real Dead Sea shit.

Can't get a word of sense outta him, answers everything in riddles, mad as a cut snake, thinks we're all part of his family, some Mansony-murdery connection there if ya ask me. And this is the scary bit, right. Keeps talkin' about doin' his "fathers will". Not like his father's will but his father's Will! If you catch me? Like who's his dad, yeah? He's the one to watch. Bugger me, where's he gone?

Read no further if you're a child. Read no further if you're an adult with a child's perception of the world, for we're descending into dark, troubled and uncharted waters.

The 2004 Yuletide Tsunami is about to engulf us, drowning us all in an ocean of personal debt as we joyfully, carelessly spend money we don't have on gifts we can't afford to give to loved ones who don't care what they get as long as it's exactly what they want.

As we're immersed in the overhyped, crass commercialisation of the Christmas period, we're forced to wonder why so many dichotomies exist. Why in a time of such joy do we witness so much grief, greed, loss, violence and terror?

Can it be because Satan and Santa are one and the same? This notion, which has fascinated theologians for centuries, is only now reaching the general population. I'm not an intimate of the Devil, but feel, from my limited knowledge of his devious activities that it would be just like him to try to pull off something like this.

For, unlike God, the Devil is a lateral thinker. This has previously given the foul fiendish underdog and archenemy of humanity an edge. Would it be possible for the Dark Lord to adopt a persona that's more attractive to the modern family? Let's say that of a jolly fat man distributing presents from the back of a reindeer-driven floating sleigh that can traverse the world in a single night?

Could it be that this heinous, yet brilliantly conceived, hijacking of Christmas has already occurred?

It's curious, is it not, that both names, Santa/Satan, are composed of exactly the same number of exactly the same letters? This must create a dilemma for the dyslexic child about to pen their first petition to Santa, or conversely the dyslexic Satanist. The similarities don't stop there. In Dante's Inferno, the definitive lyrical text on Hell, the Demon Lord of the Underworld is encased in ice. While much of Santa's life remains a mystery, we know for a fact he lives at the North Pole.

Also, both figures predominantly wear, or are, red. They invariably team this with black patent leather, knee-high boots, and they both enjoy a bit of fur trim. The women in their lives are largely ignored, while they devote themselves to a monastic existence, one making menace, the other making toys.

Yet every year, menacing toys are rushed from the shelves. Does no one see the connection? Could being an elf be the winter job for succubi?

Santa is traditionally paid off for his kindness with milk and cookies; a reference not lost on New Testament scholars, who refer to the moment when Beelzebub tempts Our Lord in the desert. The first thing Lucifer offers, before he lays bare all the kingdoms of the world, is a plate of cookies and glass of milk.

Mephistopheles is referred to as Ol' Nick; Santa's original name was - wait for this - Saint Nicholas. The Devil hates the front door, while Santa loves the chimney. And why does Santa always wear a hat? Are his Satanic Majesty's horns hidden beneath that conical Christmas bonnet? Also, no one has ever seen Santa and Satan in the same room. They've never attended a social function together or been photographed at a gallery opening. The evidence is frightening.

Has the Abbadon managed to distract the world - at least the Christian world - with his alter ego, Mr Claus? For in the weeks leading up to the celebration of Christ's birth, we're consumed with avarice, envy, desire and covetousness. Before the 25th, rather than being sequestered in acts of penitence and deeply enjoying a touch of self-flagellation, we'll be:

1. Obsessed with spending money (the root of all evil);

2. Bunging up a Christmas tree (pagan image of rebirth);

3. Buying more food than we can eat (gluttony);

4. Hoping against hope we receive what we want and not those damnable socks again (greed); and

5. We'll all spend Boxing Day in the grip of uncontrollable flatulence barely able to move, watching the cricket (sloth).

We know the Devil goes by many names, including the slightly humorous Clootie, (others are listed above). The question we must now answer: Is one of them Santa?

A true story based on actual events.

"It doesn't even feel like Christmas."

Four people, midweek, five past midnight ushered out of the cinema and onto the street. "Let's get a drink."

A hen's night of antler-wearing, tinsel-draped minxes ploughs into the nearest pub. Seeing the signs, the only one of the four who needs to work in the morning states his intention of sleep.

"Bedtime for me," he intones forcefully, followed by a string of feeble justifications (full day tomorrow, must organise a million things, up from six etc, etc). But before he can round off on the excuses, before the air can dry about the words, the rallying cry of the party people is raised.

"One drink."

It's less a question, more statement of intent. A demand. He's caught in the grip of the politeness bug and, after all, it is family.

"One drink."

The words fuse together in a slurry of vowels. They're joined now and chanted ad nauseum with increasing incredulity until the victim relents.

"One drink," he repeats (adding heavy emphasis on the one). His captors deceitfully nod.

Two drinks later and on the way to the third he pulls the pin. His SARCs (sleep and responsibility calculations) are now out by 45 minutes. With a quick recalculation he realises if he can get to bed by half-one he may still be all right. Be good. Stay on track. Home time.

They head for a cab but unbeknown to Mr Responsible, the party agitator is about to set the night alight. The four bundle into the nearest taxi but instead of heading homeward to the sleepy suburb of his desire, the cab is redirected by the now officially designated party girl to a suburb known for its salacious nightlife. A neighbourhood filled with loose women, brawling men and bubbling, dumb-arsed, Christmas revelry.

Mr Responsible has been kidnapped by Christmas cheer. He protests but he's met with a chorus of disapproval.

"Aw, come on Paul, it's Christmas."

"It's just one (more) drink."

Affected by the hysteria and siding with the kidnappers, the young Chinese cabbie jumps on board.

"Yeaaah, wat wrong wit chew, Porl?"

The victim realises that being seen as a Grinch is only a matter of perspective. The other occupants encourage the driver's involvement. He gleefully continues.

"Yeah, yeah, hab a-dink, Porl! Cum-oooorn, iss Kiss-marsss!"

Much laughter as Jingle Bell Rock bleeds out the speakers.

"Kiss-marsss, Kiss-marsss, Partytime Porl! Have some fun, yeahhh!"

Someone has started flashing the overhead lights in time with the music. The victim, agitated and annoyed, begins to chew the inside of his mouth. At each set of traffic lights he tries to leap from the cab but he's trapped, wedged between the two party-police accomplices. From the front seat the Christmas carols are cranked up to deafening and a flashlight appears, giving the night a Studio-54-on-wheels feel. The victim is also sure he can hear someone offering to dance on the hood of the cab in lieu of pavement.

The kidnap victim's fury is compounded by the driver's delight. Over the top of the giggling women the cabbie yells "Corners". The next second the three occupants of the back seat are forced into a tight jumble of limbs on the left-hand side of the cab. "Corners," he yells again.

Everyone slides to the right. By the fifth corner, the driver's abandonment of the road rules and his almost ecstatic lack of concern for the safety of his passengers has managed to force a smile on the angry face of the kidnap victim but the happy host of the cab has saved the best for last. Only minutes from the destination he turns again: "You know dar James Bon?"

"James Bond," the car excitedly repeats.

"Yeaah, dar a(d) for dar James Bon mareican x-bess car(d) with dar tuk-tuk diver?"

"Yes," we eagerly respond.

He pauses for effect, then, twisting his head 360 degrees with a Linda-Blair-like flair he cries: "That diver is ME!"

You had to be there, but it was hilarious, even the victim couldn't stop laughing. You know sometimes when you're taken for a ride it's best just to enjoy it. So Mary Kiss-marsss to you all, especially the cabbies.

Holiday fever, summer madness, the exhausting idyll commences. The car is packed, loaded with all ages of children, the dog has been doped and we're heading north and south and to all points other than our own. Niggling doubts have been suppressed (Did I leave the gas on? Have I sorted the mail? Do we even have gas?).

A year has passed since the last trek and your mind has erased the classic monotone travel mantra, until you hear it again. Young bladders will be tested to the limit by time-conscious dads who'll only allow the passing of urine at predetermined service station stops. The endlessly vomiting dog has brought up the animal-only anti-nausea pills in a glutinous mix of medicine and meaty bite.

Mother knows there is a saboteur aboard. She issued express orders that no one feed the dog. The ol' girl suspects the three-year-old, but as that child is currently wailing and wading through the disgorged contents of a dog's stomach, she figures, "Perhaps the little one's suffered enough".

These proud parents, whose skin has turned grey from the 2004 year of horror, sadness, and occasional joy, head now for the sun in the hope of warming their tired grey flesh into a torp - if not a tan. When they arrive at the holiday house/caravan/tent, it's all wrong, but all right, and for a day or two, somewhere around the middle of the holiday, it's just perfect.

The fun throttle is set at full tilt, and months of backbreaking work will dissolve in a flurry of coins at the local amusement arcade. If the arcade has bendy mirrors, cash-strapped parents will employ "the-bendy-mirror-distraction" with limited success. Dad will insist on a father-son, last-man-standing, rite-of-passage, no-holds-barred air-hockey comp. The banality of playing in the real dimension will wane on the young. Exuberance turns to boredom. Especially when the perforations are silted with rust, the machine wheezes like an asthmatic and the puck refuses to hover.

Meanwhile Gran, or any other elderly osteo-endangered rellie, is attempting to impress the kids by busting some moves on the crazy arcade dance machine. Disapproving of the unrelenting video violence, Ma shakes her head but experiences a release in tension, an almost sensual high and a hitherto-unrealised skill in slaughtering alien hordes.

Maybe the rain'll break tomorrow.

When it doesn't, you momentarily rediscover the joy of playing cards. Tragically, great maiden aunts (some of whom have madness in them and many of whom I fear now only exist in memory) are the only ones who can recall how to play games like whist, muggins, skat, sevens, klaberjass, gleek and strip poker (that last one's always a danger with the oldies). There'll be curiously pawed books by Harold Robbins and Jackie Collins and hidden board games in dusty boxes held together with twine and tape. You'll find Scrabble more difficult to play than ever, until you're reminded a sibling borrowed a few vowels and all the 'S's to make a name bracelet for their "boyfriend". There's Battleship, Cluedo, Trouble, and that sure-fire fight-starter, Monopoly. You might even have a crack at Twister, if the sun doesn't come out.

It doesn't.

Day three and any Christmas gift of any worth is forgotten, broken and half-buried in the sifting sands round the holiday humpy. Around this stage, everything, including the food, smells like damp rattan. For the rest of the break you'll feel like you're living in mid-'80s designer mildew. Then sun comes out and everyone is instantly burnt. Oceans of aloe make no difference. Your skin is so sensitive, the breeze becomes your enemy. You can't move, no one can move, the sun is shining and no one can move.

On the last days you'll find it endearing that the human residue on the skanky tiles of the caravan facilities communal bathhouse and/or the beach toilets can still eat through the rubber of your thongs. In the last hours, you catch the best wave in the history of the world and it doesn't matter that no one even noticed. It's the great Aussie break, and whether you're gone for a weekend or a fortnight, it's always the trip of a lifetime.