Well, here's my two bits:
a) Yes, it's about jolly time that the leader of the Australian government apologised to a group of people who were deeply and undeniably hurt by a long running policy that was implemented by the Australian government. Even if it was a different government in a different time, and no one currently involved in any level of the government had any direct responsibility, it was something done by "the government" to "the people" for which "the government" needed to acknowledge and apologise for so "the people" can start trying to put that part of our history to bed.
It will never be (should never be) forgotten or forgiven, but at least now it's closed. Without that acknowledgement/apology, it was an open issue that needed to be addressed. It's been addressed now, so we can close that chapter and start writing a new one.
Rudd's managed to secure himself a place in the history books simply by being the first bloke to do what was a no-brainer, really.
b) Flippin' Brendan Nelson. What was he thinking? Sure, he had a lot of good things to say, but some of them were really out of place today. All of the Indigenous people converging on Canberra and glued to their screens/radios waiting for "their moment", and he goes and brings up the dirty laundry. The celebration is not the time to bring up the dirty laundry. That can wait for the day after.
I was listening to his speech (and the jeering that tried to drown it out) and I couldn't help but feel for all of the people who were expecting to be proud and happy today and just ended up feeling angry instead. Heaven forbid we give them a whole day to feel good about themselves.
"Right time and place" people. There's such a thing as a "right time and place".
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Are we really that pathetic?
So, I was in a staff meeting the other day where we were discussing the possibility of putting IT support personnel on the "Help Desk".
One of the points that came up in discussion (apparently a big one) was that the average punter doesn't know the difference between a library enquiry and an IT enquiry. As a result, the IT person will be dealing with library questions and the librarians will be dealing with IT questions, no matter how clearly signed they may be.
Fair enough, some of the library enquiries can seem terribly technological, while some of the IT problems can seem not quite technological enough. I can understand completely that someone who can't figure out why the database isn't giving them the page they want would think it's an IT question.
However, the "problem" with this is not that people will occasionally be confused by confusing things, but that we can't ask them to move to a different queue and wait for another five minutes.
The forgone conclusion was that people would get into the wrong line, and we wouldn't be able to send them to the right line without damaging our good will in some way.
Are we that pathetic, as a people, that we can't accept the fact that we were standing in the wrong queue? Is our time so goram precious that the thought of wasting minutes of it on a mistake, and then having to spend a few more minutes to get what we want is unthinkable?
What is wrong with us? It takes as long as it takes, darn it! And if it happens to take a few minutes longer than we thought it would because we miscalculated, then so be it.
It's no wonder we, as a culture, are so stressed out. If every minor inconvenience is treated as a tragedy (and allowed to be treated thus by all and sundry), then our lives must be full of woe.
We aren't that pathetic, surely? Can't we just take things in our stride and feel better for it?
One of the points that came up in discussion (apparently a big one) was that the average punter doesn't know the difference between a library enquiry and an IT enquiry. As a result, the IT person will be dealing with library questions and the librarians will be dealing with IT questions, no matter how clearly signed they may be.
Fair enough, some of the library enquiries can seem terribly technological, while some of the IT problems can seem not quite technological enough. I can understand completely that someone who can't figure out why the database isn't giving them the page they want would think it's an IT question.
However, the "problem" with this is not that people will occasionally be confused by confusing things, but that we can't ask them to move to a different queue and wait for another five minutes.
The forgone conclusion was that people would get into the wrong line, and we wouldn't be able to send them to the right line without damaging our good will in some way.
Are we that pathetic, as a people, that we can't accept the fact that we were standing in the wrong queue? Is our time so goram precious that the thought of wasting minutes of it on a mistake, and then having to spend a few more minutes to get what we want is unthinkable?
What is wrong with us? It takes as long as it takes, darn it! And if it happens to take a few minutes longer than we thought it would because we miscalculated, then so be it.
It's no wonder we, as a culture, are so stressed out. If every minor inconvenience is treated as a tragedy (and allowed to be treated thus by all and sundry), then our lives must be full of woe.
We aren't that pathetic, surely? Can't we just take things in our stride and feel better for it?
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Dream Car
How's this for sad:
At the moment, my dream car is a dual cab Holden Rodeo. Wait, it get's worse, I actually prefer the models from the mid to late 1990's. I just think they look better.
Now, I currently own a Mitsubishi Magna stationwagon from 1998, which cost me $7,000. It's starting to show it's age (and the fact that I've driven it up and down the continent and around Tasmania a couple of times, and the guy who owned it before me used to take it to Darwin regularly), and I'd be lucky if I got $2,000 for it.
So why would I look longingly at a 1996 model of a ute that would cost me $8,000?
I don't know either. I think there's something wrong with me.
Lunch - Our Mum's Café
This is not an advertisement, it is just me giving praise where due:
I managed to have lunch at Our Mum's Café today. It's been too long since I've managed to buy my lunch from that establishment, and it will probably be far too long until the next time I get the chance.
I'd just like to say, if you're ever in Townsville and in the Mount Louisa area (especially in the industrial area near Pilkington Street), and you find yourself in need of lunch, you should definitely consider dropping by Our Mum's Café.
I discovered them quite by accident a few years ago, and I have to say they make the best roast pork sandwiches in the country (at least, in my experience). The pork is neither dry nor dripping with fat, there's plenty of it and the gravy is pretty good, too.
Ever since I started buying roast pork sandwiches from Our Mum's, I've never been happy with any such sandwich bought from any other store. They all seem over-priced and under-stuffed by comparison.
Of course, roast pork isn't all they do. They also have a full complement of other types of sandwiches, hamburgers, fried food... anything you could want for lunch, really (well, within the usual Western fair - they don't do a lot of Chinese or Indian, for example). Apparently they're also open for breakfast from 7:00am, so that could be something to think about, too.
Being smack in the middle of an industrial area, they cater for the "working men" that surround them. That means good food and lots of it.
So, if you're in the area and looking for something to eat - or you just want to ruin your experience of all other roast pork sandwiches in the country, you should drop by Our Mum's:
Our Mum's Café - 46 Pilkington St Garbutt - Phone/Fax 4814(07) 4725 7000
I managed to have lunch at Our Mum's Café today. It's been too long since I've managed to buy my lunch from that establishment, and it will probably be far too long until the next time I get the chance.
I'd just like to say, if you're ever in Townsville and in the Mount Louisa area (especially in the industrial area near Pilkington Street), and you find yourself in need of lunch, you should definitely consider dropping by Our Mum's Café.
I discovered them quite by accident a few years ago, and I have to say they make the best roast pork sandwiches in the country (at least, in my experience). The pork is neither dry nor dripping with fat, there's plenty of it and the gravy is pretty good, too.
Ever since I started buying roast pork sandwiches from Our Mum's, I've never been happy with any such sandwich bought from any other store. They all seem over-priced and under-stuffed by comparison.
Of course, roast pork isn't all they do. They also have a full complement of other types of sandwiches, hamburgers, fried food... anything you could want for lunch, really (well, within the usual Western fair - they don't do a lot of Chinese or Indian, for example). Apparently they're also open for breakfast from 7:00am, so that could be something to think about, too.
Being smack in the middle of an industrial area, they cater for the "working men" that surround them. That means good food and lots of it.
So, if you're in the area and looking for something to eat - or you just want to ruin your experience of all other roast pork sandwiches in the country, you should drop by Our Mum's:
Our Mum's Café - 46 Pilkington St Garbutt - Phone/Fax 4814(07) 4725 7000
Monday, February 4, 2008
Girls will be boys...
Is your figure less than Greek?
Is your mouth a little weak?
When you open it to speak
Are you smart?
Of all the many crimes a woman cannot be forgiven for, one is being ugly, one is being smart mouthed, but far worse is daring to be both.
I was listening to Ella Fitzgerald singing My Funny Valentine on the way to work today. That's one of the many songs that were clearly written for one sex to sing about another, but for some reason people thought they could change a couple of words and - hey presto! It could change sexual orientation.
Not so much. In every song that was written for a man singing to a woman, or a woman singing to a man, there are little references to the expected roles of each that just don't translate. For example, in My Funny Valentine, there are several references to things that are considered unattractive in women, but no one really cares about in men (such as the "are you smart" reference mentioned above). Sure, you can change some of the lyrics to match insults levelled at undesirable men (I believe the word "goofy" was mentioned in the version Ella sang), but there are still some things that just don't quite sit.
Then you get songs like How About You, which have lines that don't make sense either way. "Franklin Roosevelt's looks give me a thrill"? Since this is an attempt to find things you have in common with your belle or beau of choice, this is a really weird line. What girl would want to date a man who thought Franklin Roosevelt looked thrilling? Have you seen Franklin Roosevelt? Okay, he was passably good looking back in his Assistant Secretary to the Navy days (during the 1910s), but by the time this song was written, he was definitely "Uncle Frank" material.
While this gender swapping may have been most noticeable in the "golden oldies", when gender roles were more obviously defined and therefore harder to ignore, there are any number of more modern songs that just seem odd when you try to switch the genders. I've noticed Alison Krause and Union Station often play songs that would make more sense if a man was singing about a woman, rather than, as recorder, a woman singing about a man.
What I find interesting about these gender swapping songs is that they help to highlight exactly what we think about the sexes. Why should calling someone "smart" be less insulting when applied to a "gent" than when applied to a "lady"? Moving up to more modern times, why does it sound weird when a girl refers to her boyfriend as "little boy", but perfectly normal when the boy refers to his girlfriend as "little girl"?
Of course, most people probably don't care and are just happy to listen to the song.
You get that.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Neenish Tarts
It's about this time of year that I start having strange discussions with people regarding neenish tarts.
For one thing, there's something about the name "neenish tarts" that just lends itself to strange discussions. It seems vaguely nonsensical in a quaint, nostalgic kind of way - almost like you'd expect it to turn up in a verse by Edward Lear or Lewis Carroll:
For another thing, it seems the country can be sharply divided into those who know what a neenish tart is, and those who don't.
People who know what a neenish tart is (usually from the southern states) regard them as a fairly boring, run-of-the-mill bakery item which can be found in any average bakery or cake display. The tarts are so ubiquitous and "standard" in certain states that these people don't even notice that they can't be found north of certain parts of New South Wales. When travelling north it doesn't even occur to them to look for neenish tarts in, say, Queensland, so they are always rather surprised if you point out that we don't usually have them. In fact, we don't usually know what they are.
The people who don't know what a neenish tart is (usually from the northern states) are the most peculiar part of this dichotomy, because they often refuse to believe that such a thing exists. I have had many a dubious Queenslander look at me as if I had flown off my rocker when I try to explain what neenish tarts are. I think it might have something to do with the name sounding so quaint and odd, something to do with the contents of the tarts (why would anyone want a tart filled with mock cream?) and something to do with the fact that I often start my explanation with the phrase "it's a classic Australian pastry..."
People who have lived in Australia all their lives find it difficult to accept that something can be a "classic Australian" anything if they've never heard of it. Because the contents of our grocery stores is so surprisingly uniform across such a vast space, it occasionally misses our attention that we do have regional variations. For example, if you went to a deli in Queensland you would find cocktail sausages are referred to as "Cheerios", while the same meat product in South Australia would be called "little boys" (something I personally find a bit disturbing).
So I have to explain to the disbelieving northerners that neenish tarts are, in fact, unique to Australia. There are two legends about how they came to be. The first is that a humble housewife invented them for a Country Women's Association do some-time back in the 1950s. The other is that they were created by a woman who owned a bakery and tried to remember some of the recipes her family used to make back in Germany, but ended up producing something with a uniquely Australian twist.
(I love the phrase "uniquely Australian twist" - it implies we have enough of a widely applicable culture to be able to recognise when something is particularly "us", when we all know Australia hasn't had anything resembling a unifying cultural identity since we noticed the White Australia Policy was a bad idea, our cultural cringe kicked into overdrive and we started making a conscious effort to forget anything ever done by British descendants between the years 1770 and 1980. The joy of modern Australian culture is that it isn't really any thing at all - a multiculture is not, and really cannot ever be, a single culture. Unless we use it to hunt marsupials, I'm not sure how "uniquely Australian" a pastry can be).
So, what is a neenish tart? Well, it's a small tart, lined with jam and filled with mock cream, then topped with duo-tone icing - one half is chocolate, the other half is either vanilla or white chocolate. What does it taste like? Fairly unimpressive, actually. The problem with mock cream is that it can be good, but most of the time it's pretty average. Thus a tart which consists of mock cream and jam can have some drawbacks.
If anyone's interested, you can find a fairly decent recipe for neenish tarts here. The recipe forgets to add the jam, though, so for a true neenish tart experience you'll have to remember to drop about a teaspoon of pink jam into each tart case before adding the mock cream.
Why do I find myself having conversations about neenish tarts at this time of year? Because it's Australia Day this weekend, and every Australia Day the conversation turns to typically Aussie cuisine. Neenish tarts may be pretty average, but they're also ours, and belong on any dessert table at an Australia Day function.
So, this weekend, if you can, find or make some neenish tarts, revel in the pointless sugar of it all, and imagine you're "uniquely Australian".
For one thing, there's something about the name "neenish tarts" that just lends itself to strange discussions. It seems vaguely nonsensical in a quaint, nostalgic kind of way - almost like you'd expect it to turn up in a verse by Edward Lear or Lewis Carroll:
The Queen of Hearts ate Neenish Tarts
While the fimble-bamp played the bamzoo
And down by the sea danced the quirrelly-quee
With a snake and a grey kangaroo
For another thing, it seems the country can be sharply divided into those who know what a neenish tart is, and those who don't.
People who know what a neenish tart is (usually from the southern states) regard them as a fairly boring, run-of-the-mill bakery item which can be found in any average bakery or cake display. The tarts are so ubiquitous and "standard" in certain states that these people don't even notice that they can't be found north of certain parts of New South Wales. When travelling north it doesn't even occur to them to look for neenish tarts in, say, Queensland, so they are always rather surprised if you point out that we don't usually have them. In fact, we don't usually know what they are.
The people who don't know what a neenish tart is (usually from the northern states) are the most peculiar part of this dichotomy, because they often refuse to believe that such a thing exists. I have had many a dubious Queenslander look at me as if I had flown off my rocker when I try to explain what neenish tarts are. I think it might have something to do with the name sounding so quaint and odd, something to do with the contents of the tarts (why would anyone want a tart filled with mock cream?) and something to do with the fact that I often start my explanation with the phrase "it's a classic Australian pastry..."
People who have lived in Australia all their lives find it difficult to accept that something can be a "classic Australian" anything if they've never heard of it. Because the contents of our grocery stores is so surprisingly uniform across such a vast space, it occasionally misses our attention that we do have regional variations. For example, if you went to a deli in Queensland you would find cocktail sausages are referred to as "Cheerios", while the same meat product in South Australia would be called "little boys" (something I personally find a bit disturbing).
So I have to explain to the disbelieving northerners that neenish tarts are, in fact, unique to Australia. There are two legends about how they came to be. The first is that a humble housewife invented them for a Country Women's Association do some-time back in the 1950s. The other is that they were created by a woman who owned a bakery and tried to remember some of the recipes her family used to make back in Germany, but ended up producing something with a uniquely Australian twist.
(I love the phrase "uniquely Australian twist" - it implies we have enough of a widely applicable culture to be able to recognise when something is particularly "us", when we all know Australia hasn't had anything resembling a unifying cultural identity since we noticed the White Australia Policy was a bad idea, our cultural cringe kicked into overdrive and we started making a conscious effort to forget anything ever done by British descendants between the years 1770 and 1980. The joy of modern Australian culture is that it isn't really any thing at all - a multiculture is not, and really cannot ever be, a single culture. Unless we use it to hunt marsupials, I'm not sure how "uniquely Australian" a pastry can be).
So, what is a neenish tart? Well, it's a small tart, lined with jam and filled with mock cream, then topped with duo-tone icing - one half is chocolate, the other half is either vanilla or white chocolate. What does it taste like? Fairly unimpressive, actually. The problem with mock cream is that it can be good, but most of the time it's pretty average. Thus a tart which consists of mock cream and jam can have some drawbacks.
If anyone's interested, you can find a fairly decent recipe for neenish tarts here. The recipe forgets to add the jam, though, so for a true neenish tart experience you'll have to remember to drop about a teaspoon of pink jam into each tart case before adding the mock cream.
Why do I find myself having conversations about neenish tarts at this time of year? Because it's Australia Day this weekend, and every Australia Day the conversation turns to typically Aussie cuisine. Neenish tarts may be pretty average, but they're also ours, and belong on any dessert table at an Australia Day function.
So, this weekend, if you can, find or make some neenish tarts, revel in the pointless sugar of it all, and imagine you're "uniquely Australian".
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Strange Dreams
I had a really odd dream on the weekend. I dreamt that I had two tattoos on my back.
One was this huge thing that went almost halfway across my back and almost down to my waist depicting the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. It was done in the style of those old line drawings that used to be really popular in the 1920s - especially for illustrating light novels - and the scenery was building structures from early 20th Century New York, so I guess it was more West Side Story than Romeo and Juliet.
On the opposite side of my back, high up in the corner, was a Japanese kanji. It was one of those things that every Tess, Dee and Harriet have on the back of their shoulder - just a small, simple tattoo of a Japanese character. Really run-of-the-mill in this day and age. Only I didn't know what it meant. In the dream I had this feeling that it was something almost random that I had chosen on a whim, and someone had once told me (or I had once read) what the kanji meant, but I had forgotten.
Everyone (and I mean everyone) asked me what that stupid kanji meant. It was like every single person I met had only one "small talk" question when they met me, and that was "what does your tattoo say", to which I could only reply: "No idea. I did know once, but I've forgotten. I haven't bothered looking it up again". No one (not one person) asked about the huge, honking depiction of the balcony scene I had taking up about a third of my back.
This could have been because it was self-evident, while symbols written in another language need explanation. This could have been because large tattoos on women are still considered a bit odd and no one wanted to draw attention to it. It could have been because it was a dream, and dreams are weird. What I can't figure out is - what the heck was I wearing? I don't make a habit of backless garments...
Seriously, though, I think I know what some of the pieces to that particular puzzle might have been:
1. A friend of mine at work has a small, simple Japanese kanji on her ankle (she actually does know what it means and how to pronounce it), and that type of tattoo is exceptionally common. I see them all the time - it almost seems as though one out of every six twenty-something-year-olds have them. Of course, the first thing you can think of saying to them in "small talk" is "what does your tattoo say"?
2. I was working with another librarian on Friday (a woman born in the first half of the 20th Century, and therefore of a demographic that considers tattoos to be distasteful - especially on women) when she pointed out one of the twenty-something female students had this large, decorative tattoo that took up the outer-half of her calf. This particular librarian thought it was terrible, and made a point of mentioning that the young woman would have to live with it for the rest of her life. More on this later.
3. I've reached this wonderful point in my efforts to learn Estonian where I recognise a word as something I think I should know - but I can't remember what it is. The other day I couldn't remember how to say "goodbye" ("head aega"), and I'm still looking up the same words in the dictionary, even though I know I've looked them up many a time before, and I have previously remembered them without needing to look them up. Very frustrating.
4. Probably some latent fear common to all humans involving people reading something on your back that you can't quite see. Probably stems from that wonderful childhood game that involves putting signs on people's backs that they can't quite see. I've never understood why anyone would want a tattoo on their back. a) You can't see it, and if you were going to go to that much effort to have a piece of art follow you around for the rest of your life, wouldn't you want to be able to see it without a mirror? And, b) Eventually it's gotta be like one of those "honk if you..." bumper stickers. You more or less forget it's there, but people are still honking at you for no apparent reason.
One was this huge thing that went almost halfway across my back and almost down to my waist depicting the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. It was done in the style of those old line drawings that used to be really popular in the 1920s - especially for illustrating light novels - and the scenery was building structures from early 20th Century New York, so I guess it was more West Side Story than Romeo and Juliet.
On the opposite side of my back, high up in the corner, was a Japanese kanji. It was one of those things that every Tess, Dee and Harriet have on the back of their shoulder - just a small, simple tattoo of a Japanese character. Really run-of-the-mill in this day and age. Only I didn't know what it meant. In the dream I had this feeling that it was something almost random that I had chosen on a whim, and someone had once told me (or I had once read) what the kanji meant, but I had forgotten.
Everyone (and I mean everyone) asked me what that stupid kanji meant. It was like every single person I met had only one "small talk" question when they met me, and that was "what does your tattoo say", to which I could only reply: "No idea. I did know once, but I've forgotten. I haven't bothered looking it up again". No one (not one person) asked about the huge, honking depiction of the balcony scene I had taking up about a third of my back.
This could have been because it was self-evident, while symbols written in another language need explanation. This could have been because large tattoos on women are still considered a bit odd and no one wanted to draw attention to it. It could have been because it was a dream, and dreams are weird. What I can't figure out is - what the heck was I wearing? I don't make a habit of backless garments...
Seriously, though, I think I know what some of the pieces to that particular puzzle might have been:
1. A friend of mine at work has a small, simple Japanese kanji on her ankle (she actually does know what it means and how to pronounce it), and that type of tattoo is exceptionally common. I see them all the time - it almost seems as though one out of every six twenty-something-year-olds have them. Of course, the first thing you can think of saying to them in "small talk" is "what does your tattoo say"?
2. I was working with another librarian on Friday (a woman born in the first half of the 20th Century, and therefore of a demographic that considers tattoos to be distasteful - especially on women) when she pointed out one of the twenty-something female students had this large, decorative tattoo that took up the outer-half of her calf. This particular librarian thought it was terrible, and made a point of mentioning that the young woman would have to live with it for the rest of her life. More on this later.
3. I've reached this wonderful point in my efforts to learn Estonian where I recognise a word as something I think I should know - but I can't remember what it is. The other day I couldn't remember how to say "goodbye" ("head aega"), and I'm still looking up the same words in the dictionary, even though I know I've looked them up many a time before, and I have previously remembered them without needing to look them up. Very frustrating.
4. Probably some latent fear common to all humans involving people reading something on your back that you can't quite see. Probably stems from that wonderful childhood game that involves putting signs on people's backs that they can't quite see. I've never understood why anyone would want a tattoo on their back. a) You can't see it, and if you were going to go to that much effort to have a piece of art follow you around for the rest of your life, wouldn't you want to be able to see it without a mirror? And, b) Eventually it's gotta be like one of those "honk if you..." bumper stickers. You more or less forget it's there, but people are still honking at you for no apparent reason.
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