This will hurt me...

Fish from Venice. Geilston Bay, September 2016. No, you can't do that. You can't do that with that shirt on. Not with those shoes you can't. Not with that look on your face. Not with that attitude. Not with your frame of reference. Not from you. Not by the likes of you. No, you can't do that.

Triffids blooming. Arthurs Circus, Battery Point. August 2013. As you know, the Internet is a wonderful place filled with the rich and varied treasures of the world holds (and RSS feeds.) The following are some things that I've had a look at in the last week. I call this: a Compendium of Click-throughs for Monday Morning... In our work-ethic-as-self-worth culture, we ignore the importance of laziness to a life well-lived… Public urinal users face fine for poor aim. It’s a bad time for psychology, a field rife with fraud, bogus maths and murky concepts. Happiness research, for example… Go on, get reading! "In 1998 men in the Health Care and Social Assistance category were being paid only 21 percent more than women. But that gap now stands at 48 percent - the worst figure for any industry in Australia ." Should we judge people of past eras for moral failings? On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs.

Starfish. Flowerpot Point, Blackmans Bay. July 2013. A horrible Sunday Top Five today: Five Words That Fit Most Appropriately Into The Sentence "Martin Clunes' Extraordinarilly [...BLANK...] Head"! Abominable Unpleasant Beastly Abominable Grotesque

Spikey plant. East Derwent Highway, Lindisfarne. July 2013. Sunday Top Five today sees Henry and I compile our Top Five Tracks From The Late Great Dusty Springfield (This Sunday)! The Look Of Love You Don't Have to Say You Love Me I Only Want to Be with You Breakfast in Bed What Have I Done To Deserve This (with the Pet Shop Boys)

Rope. Sullivans Cove, Hobart. June 2013. Sunday Top Five ? Of course. Here, have my Top Five Records By Paul McCartney After He Left That Band That He Was In Before He Was In Wings! Maybe I'm Amazed , Paul McCartney Let Me Roll It , Paul McCartney & Wings Jet , Paul McCartney & Wings Mull of Kintyre , Wings Coming Up , Paul McCartney.

Mollusks. Little Coningham Beach, Coningham. January 2013. A wonderful Sunday Top Five today. How Jen And I Spent Last Night (As Expressed Through A Sunday Top Five)! Midnight: Jen catches vomit. Jen cleans vomit off carpet. I clean vomit off two (2!) toilets and a couple of floors. Jen changes vomit-soiled child. I load washing machine. I spend half hour consoling vomiter. 1:15 am: Jen catches vomit a second (2nd) time. I clean vomit off toilet and floor. I change vomit-soiled child. I load washing machine. Jen consoles vomiter. 2:20 am: Jen cleans vomit off toilet. I change vomit-soiled child. I load washing machine. Jen consoles vomiter. 5:10 am: I clean vomit off toilet. I clean vomit off floor. I console vomiter. 6:15 am: I clean vomit off toilet. I change vomit-soiled child. I console vomiter. I get up. All night: No sex.

Go to sleep forever berries. Waverley Flora Park, Bellerive. January 2013. Bring the Jubilee , Ward Moore: A long-considered classic of alternate history, this novel envisages a world in which the Confederacy win the American Civil War, and then serves up a rather large twist in the final quarter. Interestingly, Moore chooses to do so through the eyes of the archetypal “passive hero.” I liked it. B .

Cacti. Royal Botanical Gardens, Hobart. February 2013. Wordless Wednesday.

Look at all that grit on his face. That's the fun of bushwalking!

The darling buds of March. Princes Street, Sandy Bay. March 2013. The Sirens of Titan , Kurt Vonnegut: I like Vonnegut very much, but must admit that I found this one a bit of a chore. It has an impressively woven sprawl, but I dunno, seemed a little to contrived for my tastes. C- . I Am The Clay , Chaim Potok: An American Rabbi explores the Korean War through the eyes of an old couple and a young orphan. You wouldn't think that it would work, but I thought that it was first rate. I thought that you'd struggle to find a bleaker work than The Road , but this hits you harder because the journey is so depressingly plausible. Not for the faint-hearted. A- . Mrs. Hollingsworth's Men , Padgett Powell: Okay, I hated this book. Really hated it. Call it surreal. Call it post-modern. Call it meta. Whatever. I call it self-indulgent rubbish. F .

Bug. Douglas-Apsley National Park, Tasmania's East Coast. January 2013. Another day, another bushfire(s). Why oh why are we forced to choose between pleasant swimming weather (plus bushfires) and miserable wet days (minus bushfires). I mean, really, it is so uncivilised ... The Skirt , Guillaume Apollinaire Hallo Germaine that's a fine skirt you have A fine skirt for a queen A cruel queen Let's feel the silk of it Silk from Japan And trimmed with wide lace made on no machine Your skirt's a silken bell whose double clapper Your legs have struck the passing of my fancies O Germaine now I ring it my breast heaving My hands press down upon your willing haunches Your bedroom O my bell is a fine belfry My hands touch silk and seem to tear my ears Those pegs are gallows on which skirts are hanging Those hanging men are dazzling my eyes Motionless as an owl the oil lamp watches

Native flower. The Domain, Hobart. December 2012. Sunday Stealing: The Social Meme 1. Where was your profile picture taken? Halfway across the Tasman Bridge . 2. Name someone who made you laugh today. Melvyn Bragg. He can be a right prig sometimes. 3. Do you believe exes can be friends? It depends on the exes. I'm not sure I could manage it. 4. How do you feel about Dr Pepper? Loathsome. Repulsive. Abominable. 5. Who was the last person you took a picture of? Ezra. 6. Are you upset about anything? I'm upset about lots of things! Let's leave it at "man's inhumanity to man". 7. Do you think relationships are ever really worth it? Of course. 8. Are you a bad influence? Quite the opposite. 9. Night out or night in? IN! 10. Has anyone ever called you perfect before? As a noun adjunct they have. 11. What song is stuck in your head? Honky Tonk Woman by the Rolling Stones. 12. Someone knocks on your window at 2:00 a.m., who do yo...

Fronds or buds? East Derwent Highway, November 2012. Sunday Top Five and Christmas is coming! Which reminds me, Five Words That Best Sum Up Christmas To Me! Anticipation Ferment Delirium Exhaustion Astringency

The the reproductive structure of an Angiospermae. Napoleon Street, Battery Point. October 2012. Eighth Air Force , Randall Jarrell If, in an odd angle of the hutment, A puppy laps the water from a can Of flowers, and the drunk sergeant shaving Whistles O Paradiso!--shall I say that man Is not as men have said: a wolf to man? The other murderers troop in yawning; Three of them play Pitch, one sleeps, and one Lies counting missions, lies there sweating Till even his heart beats: One; One; One. O murderers! . . . Still, this is how it's done: This is a war . . . But since these play, before they die, Like puppies with their puppy; since, a man, I did as these have done, but did not die-- I will content the people as I can And give up these to them: Behold the man! I have suffered, in a dream, because of him, Many things; for this last saviour, man, I have lied as I lie now. But what is lying? Men wash their hands, in blood, as best they can: I find no fault...

Rosemary. East Derwent Highway, Geilston Bay. September 2012. Wordless Wednesday.

Flowers. Launceston City Park. July 2012. As you know, the Internet is a wonderful place filled with the rich and varied treasures of the world holds (and RSS feeds.) The following are some things that I've had a look at in the last week. I call this: a Compendium of Click-throughs for Monday Morning... Here's Peter Singer's take on an old theme: how far should the state limit our freedom to protect us from our selves? Shit Apple Fanatics Say... Anne Summers presents a rather disturbing account of the misogynistic attacks currently being waged on Australia's female Prime Minister (some NSFW content on this one). Minnesota Vikings' Chris Kluwe takes on anti-gay marriage politician. My favourite bit of his reply? "...I can assure you that gay people getting married will have zero effect on your life. They won't come into your house and steal your children. They won't magically turn you into a lustful cockmonster." Did you know that mor...

Seeds. Princes Street, Sandy Bay. July 2012. Another Tuesday, another Q and A. Another stolen from Sunday Stealing. This week, The Useless Questions Meme . If you have any questions (useless or otherwise), I'm always up for answering them! Have you ever written a song? I’ve written poems that could be presented as songs, but no, I’ve not explicitly written a song. Have you ever been in the opposite sex's public toilet? Many years ago now. It’s not that exciting. Are you superstitious? Not in the least bit. What's the most daring thing you've done? Having children. By a long stretch. Did you have a baby blanket? Do you still sleep with it? I assume that I did. I do have a blanket that I used as a child. It’s on Ezra’s bed at the moment. Have you ever tried to cut your own hair? If yes, how’d it work out? No. That would not be a wise thing to attempt. Have you ever sleepwalked? Not to my knowledge. If you could be any age, what age would you be...

A little something in another something. Quayle Street, Sandy Bay. January 2012. I had the privilege of taking the full group of kids out for their warm up jog at Auskick training yesterday afternoon/ evening. I consider my rigorous training methods a success, given that I had a good fifteen or so 5 and 6 year old kids reduced to wheezing lumps prostrate on the turf afterwards! Henry, of course, was spritely and smiling, having had the good fortune to have undergone a brutal, systematic, Soviet-style training regime since he was six weeks old. If only he could kick... Sad Steps , Philip Larkin Groping back to bed after a piss I part thick curtains, and am startled by The rapid clouds, the moon's cleanliness. Four o'clock: wedge-shadowed gardens lie Under a cavernous, a wind-picked sky. There's something laughable about this, The way the moon dashes through clouds that blow Loosely as cannon-smoke to stand apart (Stone-coloured light sharpening the roofs ...

Turning over an old leaf. Royal Botanical Gardens, Hobart. April 2012. > The Cinnamon Peeler , Michael Ondaatje If I were a cinnamon peeler I would ride your bed And leave the yellow bark dust On your pillow. Your breasts and shoulders would reek You could never walk through markets without the profession of my fingers floating over you. The blind would stumble certain of whom they approached though you might bathe under rain gutters, monsoon. Here on the upper thigh at this smooth pasture neighbour to you hair or the crease that cuts your back. This ankle. You will be known among strangers as the cinnamon peeler's wife. I could hardly glance at you before marriage never touch you --your keen nosed mother, your rough brothers. I buried my hands in saffron, disguised them over smoking tar, helped the honey gatherers... When we swam once I touched you in the water and our bodies remained free, you could hold me and be blind of smell. you climb...

The succulent's edge. Quayle Street, Sandy Bay. January 2012. This Blinding Absence of Light by the Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun is a very dark book, in more ways than one. Its narrative is essentially a reconstruction based on the testimonies of the former inmatse at Tazmamart, a Moroccan secret prison for political prisoners that operated with the harshest of conditions. A hole in the middle of the desert, Tazmamart was a place where prisoners were give us subsistence level of food and water to keep them a live, but deprived them of every aspect of life, including that of light. Thus, we the reader are primarily left with the voice of a solitary prisoner, a voice all the more powerful for being draped in darkness. As one might expect, there is a starkness to the crystalline, pared-down prose. The author certainly rises to the challenge of maintaining interest in such a limited environment and utter hopelessness facing those characters held here. Thus we are treated t...