If you want to know how Kevin Rudd treats women then read this. Continue reading
So you think you’re cultured?
What’s with the mothers and their battering prams?
I find myself cringing as a couple of yummy mummies head towards me with their prams. It wouldn’t be so bad if they looked where they were going.
But they don’t.
Here they come, oblivious of anyone one else on the planet. They won’t see me because they are talking to one another and it wouldn’t matter if there was an abyss lying before them. They would keep on hurtling towards it because they just don’t give a damn.
If I don’t jump to one side they would mow me down with their battering prams. And they wouldn’t even notice.
And if they are not having a chat then they are texting on their smart phones. You often see a solitary pram pusher looking down at the phone, walking along blindly while her baby screeches its head off.
Now it’s times like these that I wish there were some abyss in front of these creatures. Of course this will not happen [unfortunately] but it explains the smile on my face as I imagine them texting whoever. “Fell down a hole. Thank God my phone is okay.” And then they might remember the pram.
Why Prime Minister Rudd hurried to Canberra
You would have to be an absolute twit to believe that Kevin Rudd has scurried back to Canberra because of the Syrian crisis. This is the excuse he gave today for diverting his election campaign. He tells us that he has to confer with other world leaders (ha!) about what’s happening in the Middle East.
Apparently without our glorious leader the rest of the world would not know how to handle the latest developments in Syria.
Not bloody likely, is what I say.
My take on this is that the polls are looking downcast for Rudd; so he has skedaddled to Canberra to reassess his modus operandi in the campaign. Why he is doing so badly is what he has to discuss with the rest of the Labor mavens. What can be done to salvage an election campaign that is floundering.
Okay, so I’m a cynic about it all. I don’t believe the Rudd excuse that he intends to solve the Syrian conflict and that the people of Australia are waiting on his report. After all, it’s been going on for TWO Years now. Surely he cannot be that arrogant as to imagine that he has a contribution to make when it comes to the Middle East.
Not even Prime Minister Rudd can have such delusions of grandeur. And that’s saying something.
The Saga continues and our credulity is stretched even further.
It turns out that amidst this Syrian security panic briefing the Prime Minister found time to film a two-hour episode of Kitchen Cabinet. It’s a cooking show with celebrities being interviewed. Apparently, according to Rudd, the other participants in the Syrian saga roundup were not available, so Rudd had to wait for them and during that period he starred in a TV show.
So we are supposed to believe that the Syrian briefing was an emergency but not enough of an emergency, apparently, to make certain that everyone of the people involved turned up at the appointed time. That’s why Rudd had plenty of time to film the cooking show.
Clear as mud or is that clear as Rudd?
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd cheated in the debate!
Imagine you turned up to an exam with some notes on which you relied. Not nice or fair or honest, is it? Especially if you had been told that notes were illegal.
Well, guess what? It’s what our desperate Prime Minister did last night during the “The Great Debate” with Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott. Rudd referred to his notes all the time and this created a terrible impression. He appeared unsure of himself and became boring as he tried to include every point he had ever made.
He simply would not stick to the subject and answer the specific question that had been posed. Nor could he help himself about making long lists and enumerating them with the aid of notes.
Australians feel strongly about “a fair go”. They respect people who play fairly, who play by the rules or else it’s simply not “fair dinkum” and they disapprove vehemently of being conned. Unfortunately, Rudd is not above cheating in a debate as he demonstrated last night.
On being questioned about this unethical behaviour Rudd explained that he did not know he could not rely on notes. Hard to believe isn’t it? But let’s say that he really did not know, then how come his advisers did not tell him not to cheat?
Was it because they didn’t dare correct him since he is known to be such a tyrant who baulks at advice? Or was it perhaps because his advisers did not know about the prohibition of notes because they hail from the U.S.A? You see Rudd did not think that Australian advisers were good enough for him?
He could be right.
I don’t give a damn about football!
If you choose to live in Melbourne, Australia, you will be living in the most liveable city. So they tell us in their logo.
What they don’t tell you is that this city is a sportocracy. You had better watch sport, breathe sport, and follow your favourite team or else. If you actually confess like the witches of Salem might have done that you don’t care, you will be shunned or drawn and quartered. Or even thrown down a well to see if you sink.
All this and worse will happen to you because you will be accused of being an heretic. In summer you will have to talk cricket and horse racing. In winter it’s the good old football and heaven help you if Monday morning comes, as it does after Saturday and Sunday, and you are not prepared to discuss the scores.
Now you would imagine that the followers of football and other games are athletic. You might imagine that they partake of exercise now and then. Maybe on their birthdays perhaps. But no, that is not the case for the majority of fans. Their athletic prowess consists of painting their faces in the team colours and then carting food to the matches where they will hoot and chant in support of “their team.”
So it’s really nothing to do with sport and everything to do with belonging. These fans want to belong to a tribe of supporters of a certain group of gladiators, say. They want to be in on something that will make them feel as if life is not so dreary.
And there’s nothing very wrong with that except that in Melbourne you will be given the results of the sporting match before you hear of any other news.
For those of us who really, honestly don’t give a hoot about this tribalism, things can get pretty tedious.
I am now aware that there is drug cheating going on in football. Now there’s a surprise! I am aware of someone called Andrew Demetriou whose name is mentioned more often than our publicity-seeking Prime Minister’s. No mean feat I tell you if you are familiar with Kevin Rudd.
What I am truly surprised about is that there is surprise at all?
After all, sports is about big business, big money, brief careers during which you have to earn as much money as you can because in a few years’ time you will be forgotten.
So why not do everything to achieve success for yourself and your team?
Do we honestly believe that people will stop cheating in this world of supplements and sophisticated sports medicine?
You can’t stem the tide now even if you have a thousand inquires into cheating etc.
But if it’s a circus you want then by all means follow sport. It’s just another religion.
And anyway, it’s safer than holding demonstrations in some square or other, I guess.
Wow! “Still Mine” – Another depressing film about dementia!
I just heard a review of a film which is catering to the senior market. It’s called “Still Mine” and is, wait for it, another film about an old person with Alzheimer’s. Now that makes more than four films in the past year that have dealt specifically with one of the characters going bonkers and how everyone copes with it.
The reviewer said that this film is for the senior market because seniors don’t want action movies or silly teenage romances. He is correct there.
But do we really want to see yet another a film about dementia, euthanasia and other depressing subjects when we go out on the town?
I prefer “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” which did not deal with the so-called morbid side of life. It was fun, uplifting and a pleasure to see.
I’m not avoiding the serious issues but I would rather enjoy my outing to the theatre than be confronted by the spectre of death and misery. If I want to see that I only have to switch on the TV to a news channel and I can access all the hopeless reality of this world.
Enough is enough! Give us something positive, worth going out for and spending our money.
“Final Answer?” How Eddie McGuire prompts contestants in “Hot Seat”
It’s so blatant that I wonder how Eddie McGuire can look himself in the mirror. His quiz show, “Hot Seat,” (Channel 9 at 5.30pm weekdays) consists of a set of four possible answers, A,B,C and D. The contestant has to pick the correct answer and then be allowed to move on to the next level.
What Eddie does is to prompt the contestant to make another choice by asking “Final Answer?”. This actually means, “pick another answer because this one is wrong.”
I know he does this because I have recorded the programme after I became suspicious about the possible manipulation of answers.
There is definitely a discernible pattern in Eddie’s responses to the answers. The only exception to this pattern occurs where there is insufficient time to ask “Final Answer?”
It’s possible that Mr McGuire is not aware of his habit, but one has to remember that this show is first and foremost “Entertainment” and sometimes its producers just want to keep the ball rolling instead of having a series of drop-outs.
After all, too many losers could mean a fall in ratings.
Aldi tells it like it is. Sad but true.
It’s no secret that I’m an Aldi supporter. But even yours truly was slightly bemused when I picked up a packet of cleansing wipes for removing make-up and read the Germanically matter of fact description of the product.
It was for “Very Mature Skin”. Not slightly dry skin or even skin in need of nourishment to combat the seven or perhaps twenty signs of aging. This product is strictly for the geriatrics, according to the directive. It even has a diagram which shows that it is suitable for the over sixties age group. I kid you not. But then neither does Aldi… lol.
So you have to give the Germans credit for telling it like it is.
Let’s face it, if the Germans can describe that tantalising bit of feminine underwear as a holder of bosoms, ein Bustenhalter (with the two dots on the U) then I guess a cosmetic for “Very Mature Skin” is a fair description.
Not for them the sophistication and B.S of French cosmetic products which sell fantasy. Not for them the advertising slogan “Because You’re Worth It” whatever that means.
Apparently, Aldi’s message is “Because You’re Past It”. What chutzpah!
Giving up your seat for an older person is very un-Australian
We have just come home from a trip on the tram and, as usual, an Asian stood up to offer us a seat. We accepted gracefully and yet we were sad.
Why? Well, it’s because Asians are the only young people to give up their seats nowadays. They are still respectful of elders and that comes from their culture.
It’s not the first time this has happened. In all the times that a seat has been offered to us, there has only been one occasion when a Westerner has stood up for us and he was a man who was getting off at the next stop.
While Western teenagers remain spreadeagled in their seats while fiddling with their I-phones, the Asians will stand up for an older person.
Of course, it all comes from the home, doesn’t it?
Anyhow, I made sure to thank this Asian couple in a very audible voice. This is what I said to them:-
“Thank you very much for giving up your seat. I hope that you don’t become too Australian by forgetting manners. Stick to your culture which still shows some respect.”
Yom Kippur! What a day for an election!
You can really see the hand of Foreign Minister Bob Carr in setting the date for the coming Federal Election. How about the holiest day in the Jewish calendar? Well, that’s what the Prime Minister of Australia has done. It shows how little respect she has for the Jewish community.
I bet that she would not have dared to choose the most holy day for Muslims to hold an election.
p.s When a Jewish member of parliament queried the selection of the date on Judaism’s holiest day, Julia Gillard said that it was hard to choose a date because of some international commitments and, wait for it…Football finals. She chose football over franchise.
LiliGans.com 