There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child..

Jen leads Ezra a merry dance. Opossum Bay, South Arm Peninsula. December 2012.

A very special Christmas Day Sunday Stealing: The Not So Manly Meme

1. Boxers? Briefs? Boxer briefs? Thongs? Bikinis? Commando?

I'm on holidays, which means commando!

2. What’s your fussiest personal care routine?

I can't say that I have one. Shaving is always a chore, but having a beard is worse.

3. Do you have a favourite tool? Power or manual?

A computer. It uses power.

4. Can you change your own oil? Do you?

I cook in fresh oil every time. That's what you mean, isn't it?

5. What’s the “manliest / womanliest” thing you do on a regular basis?

Manliest? I get a slightly contemptuous feeling any time shows an undue level of emotion. 'Womanliest'? Do you mean 'effeminate'? I'm very clean and I like to cook.

6. What’s something “manly” that you never learned how to do?

Drive a car. Or even be even remotely interested in cars in any way.

7. Do you ever cry? If so, what’s your trigger?

Unfortunately it's not an art I've mastered. A really good book might be able to trigger a solitary tear every couple of years.

8. Do you have a chivalrous streak? How does it manifest itself?

I have lots of old fashioned manners that reveal themselves: waiting for others to begin eating, serving everybody else first, opening doors for ladies, not bashing them. That sort of thing.

9. Do you have a chauvinistic streak? How does it manifest itself?

I don't have a patriotic bone in my body. I find the whole notion of flags and anthems embarrassing. However, I suspect that this question was angling towards male chauvinism. I don't think so. I don't believe that men are superior to women (or vice versa). I suspect that the closest is when the first part of question 5 rears its head.

10. What’s your favourite movie?

I like Kieślowski's Dekalog, but it's not really a movie. If you're asking that, one of Three Colours: Red, The Life of Brian or Das Boot. I really enjoyed The Thin Red Line, too.

11. What’s the dumbest, testosterone-inspired thing you’ve ever seen?

Anything involving a dickhead in a car.

12. What quality do you think makes a good man good? Do you have that quality?

The same quality as makes a person good: thinking of others, getting on with it, pulling one's weight etc...

13. Toilet seat up or down?

Down.

14. If your significant other is away, do you cook for yourself or eat out of cans and boxes (or rely on local drive-through and delivery)?

HA! I like to cook.

15. What societal expectation of being a man / women do you most resent?

That caring for one's children is somehow worthy of extra commendation.

16. What’s the best part - societal-wise - about being a man / women?

It seems to be slightly more acceptable to not care what anyone else thinks about you.

17. Will you stop to ask for directions?

If I need directions.

18. What’s one thing about your significant other that you just cannot understand, no matter how hard you try?

Why she seems to care so much why people she otherwise has little time for think about her.

19. What do you need to have in the shower?

Soap. Shampoo. Toothbrush and toothpaste.

20. Do you burp/fart/scratch? Do you do anything stereotypically male?

I do all of these things, but try to do so with some discretion. Forgive me for thinking that ALL people do this.

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

This is the moon. Have I mentioned how much I adore the zoom on my camera? It's Theme Thursday you see, and after last week's limp effort, I have been thinking about how I might redeem myself. Then I clicked on the topic and discover that it was BUTTON. We've been hearing a lot about the moon in the past couple of weeks. Apparently some fellas went up there and played golf and what-not forty-odd years ago. The desire to get to the moon, however, was not simply about enhancing opportunities for Meg and Mog titles and skirting local planning by-laws in the construction of new and innovative golf courses. No, all of your Sputniks , "One small steps" and freeze dried ice cream was about one thing , and one thing only : MAD Now, I don't mean mad in terms of "bloke breaks record for number of scorpions he can get up his bum", no I mean MAD as in Mutual assured destruction . When I was a young man you see, there was a lot of talk about the type of m...

But when the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave.

Can you believe that it is time for Theme Thursday already? Today we are not talking chocolate , toddlers , mess or ignominy . No, today we're dealing with ANIMAL . Now I could have posted a picture of a possum, numbat, wombat, wallaby or any other furry killing machine that roams our fair isle, but I figure that I'd use a far more deadly creature as an example of an animal . Some people - I know them as fools - have chosen to embrace that highfalutin idea that human beans are for some ungodly reason superior to animals. Of course, what these imbeciles seem to forget is that were are simple animals ourselves ! Anyone with a baby, toddler, teenage boy or Queenslander in their household could tell you this. Look at Henry [above]. One chocolate frog in the back of the car on a sunny day and all of a sudden it's Elagabalus meets Bacchus for a quick shandy in the Serengeti and we're down on all fours carrying on like a cat in heat. Fair dinkum, anyone who chooses to ...

This will hurt me...

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