Wednesday 31 December 2014

..remembering when...


...we used to think of ourselves as fair and tolerant and civil … you may now laugh…..or cry. That’s at least one common choice we have left to us…. unprivatised.

G’day Possums.


Well what a year…eh?

Some favourites from shoots and outings, various….
Garden of St Erth
Garden of St Erth

Frogmore,  Trentham
Frogmore,  Trentham.  Prairie Garden
Once when young

BTA
Erin, BTA

"Discus Thower" Bendigo Fine Art Gallery
"Discus Thower" Bendigo Fine Art Gallery




BTA
BTA

                          Wombat Droppings

or The Chronicle of a Country Sliding inexorably into Feudal Fascism.

 Many moon’s ago I commented on the policy paucity of this rabble now in government.
Except for the100 thought-bubbles published by  “The-Coots-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe,” (aka the IPA) there was nothing you could actually see.
At the time I likened “Coots” wish-list to the rantings in “Mein Kampf” as being a guide to what we could expect if the Liarbrils’ won office.
Sadly this is now true.
Sadder, is the fact that having spent most of their time making up three word slogans and lying through their teeth about the failings of the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd regimes and not making any policy they also lied their way into government.
Thus, with no coherent policy idea that had been put to the public, Prime Miniature Rabid-the-Hun and his rabble immediately began implementing the “Coot’s-With Queer-Ideas…” fascist, free-market agenda.

Demo, melbourne
Unhappy Campers in Melbourne

This has had unintended (for them) consequences.
Having spent three years coaching the public in the incompetence of government with their three word catch phrases and saying how the “…Adult’s Were Back in Charge…” they were mangled in the Senate, attempting to allow everyone “the right to be a bigot,”  excoriated widely when telling us “.. the Age of Entitlement is Over” whilst rorting the perks system to a huge degree and bringing down a budget that whacked the poorer ends of society to the benefit of the wealthy and were then reported throughout the world as the Village-Idiots at Davos in Switzerland.


They have had one achievement though: they’re the first government in Australian political history not to have had a “honey-moon” period. Immediately they gained power they began to go ”On-the-nose” with the public and have continued that downward slide ever since.
When you hear dyed-the-wool conservatives bemoaning the stupidity of the leader, Rabid-the-Hun and the corruption that seems endemic ( bye-bye, Arfur “Da Spiv” Sinodinas) throughout the party ;  when people are beginning to talk of bringing out the tumbrels and finance commentators (hardly ever raging “lefities”) are not only querying the veracity of the figures put up but also the economic consequences of this rabbles’ actions you know things are getting very interesting.
When the lies keep coming and the statements are more stupid and the rorting keeps being uncovered and when the manufacturing sector is being demolished and unemployment is rising and education is being bowdlerised with “Happy-Clappy-Born-Again’s” preaching myth not fact in primary schools and University is only for the wealthy and climate policy has gone the way of the Dodo you know the country is in very deep trouble.


With our Medi-Care system under siege and the one decent public broad-caster and news service eviscerated even the die-hard supporters of this lot are beginning to wonder if it was really meant to be like this and what will Australia end up looking like?



One horrible thing is certain: these Opus Dei and IPA led mongrels will not let up until they have destroyed every social service and reduced the place to a feudal system.
They will not allow discussion.
They will certainly not entertain dissent. They have no use for a civil society.



This is a government solely for big business.
It is not a government for the nation and as it has lied its way into power has no legitimacy.
Opposition to these ideological mongrels has to be as brutal as what they are meting out to what used to be a great nation.  Democracy in Australia is in a real crisis.

Hoo-Roo, petals,
It’s going to be an interesting year
Shane



Tuesday 23 December 2014

Finding A Complete Balls-Up and Another Year Wasted.


Shane with Balls-Up
Shane with Balls-Up





G'day Petals,

Here are a few shots from a rehearsal for a performance .

I decided that I would shoot the whole thing with slow shutter and think that the results are rather indicative of the performance title: "Esprit de la Dance"







Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia

Ballet Theatre Australia
Ballet Theatre Australia

Wombat Droppings: the chronicle of the Demise of Australian Egalitarianism and the Rise of Fascism


In a failure-fuelled funk our Prime Miniature, Rabid-the-Hun has taken to throwing his cards in the air as a hubristic method of shuffling his cabinet.
Scott ”The Drone” Morrison is out of The Department of Inflicting Pain, Suffering, Torture and Death on asylum seekers (formerly, Dept. of Immigration) and has been asked to wreak his mis-apprehended Xtianiaty on the poor souls who have to deal with the Dept. of Social Security. 
Being in the S.S. will allow Scott to don his fetching Black uniform when whipping the unemployed into shape.
Rabid-the-Hun has doubled the number of women in cabinet. There are now, two!
Peter “Dodo” Dutton, of let’s destroy Medi-Bank notoriety has been allocated Cruelty to Refugees, which given his utter lack of talent should overwhelm him and thankfully cause his early demise.
His Un-Health portfolio will be taken by Sussan “Snarler” Ley.  Although lacking the humorous touch of “Dodo” she will finally mend the insanity of a public health system and completely privatise it for individual profit.
A non-entity climate change denier has been made science minister.  Yep, we now have a science minister… or a Wizard…. or something.
I think his role will be to keep the Wikkipedia learned Environment Minister “Ozone-Hole” Hunt from straying into the heresy of thinking the earth is not flat and holding his hand so he doesn’t fall off the edge.
Senator “I’ve-Got-that-Sinking-Feeling” Johnston has had his toys soldiers and canoes taken away from him ‘cause he wouldn’t play nicely and kept poking his tongue out at the toy-makers. His toys have been given to Kevin “Medieval” Andrews to play with and it is expected that new crossbows will be issued to all army personal within weeks, and that four man Coracles have been ordered for the navy from a Welsh supplier. 
Kelly “Motor-Mouth-Shaddupa–ya-Face” O’Dwyer has been sent down to the front bench to drown out  “Commissar” Peta Credlin and Julie “Asbestos” Bishop and their interminable arguing.
Arfur “Da Spiv” Sinodinas has stood down as assistant finance minister after forgetting who paid who when moonlighting for ex-Labor pollie Eddie “Brown-Paper-Bag” Obeid.
It is widely thought that Arfur is looking forward to telling his life story in detail to the judiciary quite soon.
In his excitement of re-arranging the Deck Chairs, Rabid-the-Hun noted that the repeal of The Price on Carbon which although bad for the environment, slightly disastrous for the budget and the opposite of what the real world is doing was really, really good for women.
This has been one of his best jokes for months and everyone had a hearty laugh at his non-misogynistic sensitivity and deference to the little ladies.  
We look forward, too, to the Chinese and Korean workers coming here on 457 visas to assist in employment.

 And then there was Graeme Morris’ joke: blathering on about how "Magical" the changing of the deck-chairs on the rabble's sinking ship was... role-playing an utterly deluded, off into another paradigm libertarian, his sheer manic thoughts made more people laugh….. but it did rather  seem to have been similar in mood to the bunker in Berlin in May '45.


And with its ending 2014 provided the sad realisation that trust given is mostly abused and that ego is prime.

Hoo-roo Possums,
Shane.

Wednesday 17 December 2014

It’s Xmas after all.

G'day Possums... well it's not really...
Shane, Xmas 2014
Shane, Xmas 2014
Man Haron Monis murders two in tragic finale to a 16 hour siege in a Sydney café and sparks more race-hate from Xtians.
Press and TV turn it into a 24 hour "reality" entertainment stimulating faux emotion to be piled on faux emotion for bogan empathy justification. 
It reminded me of scenes from Ray Bradbury's Sci-Fi novel, "Fahrenheit 451"as it was letting loose the media Right-Wing trolls spouting about too restrictive gun laws, Towel-Heads and Muzzies and Death cults and those peculiar "Tea-Party" values.


"Little Johnny" Howard had certainly prised open the can of worms with "Tampa," Reith's "Children Overboard" and his refusal to deal with the nascent racism of Pauline Hanson. We are a morally diminished nation with these Liarbril fools.  Now we have the present incompetent incumbent, Rabid-the-Hun getting  facts about the Sydney Cafe  killer wrong in an interview... which sort of begs the questions: who was this nutter being protected by and why? And who in the NSW judiciary was being "leant-on" by ASIO? 

Proving it really is the “Silly Season,” ”The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) has just released it's new fiction,  "Climate Change: The Facts 2014".
Edited by A Moron, oops, Moran and with contributions from highly opiniated people like Andrew” Blot-on-the-Landscape” Bolt, blogger Anthony Watts, and climate denialists Ian Plimer, Richard Lindzen and Robert Carter and others in lieu of scientific experts in climate, it is sure to be an eye-watering, side splitting frolic through the Parallel Universes they inhabit.

Daylesford
Daylesford
The "Coot's-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe" always do write a very interesting range of Sci-Fi.
I assume this $25.00 pamphlet is to book-end their other near best-seller "Voodoo Economic Principles of The Free-for-All Market?"
It does cap off a very successful year for the “Coots” though, as the chief Office Boy, Rabid-the-Hun and his money box holder Joe “Cereal/Toyota-Killer” Hockey bludgeon Oz from a relatively egalitarian state to nastily free-market oligarchy.
It’s a pity the OECD don’t agree, questioning just where Oz is headed and seems doubtful of its success. http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/oecd-slams-australian-budget-measures-close-monitoring-required-20141216-1285ip.html#ixzz3M7LAukXS

Daylesford
Daylesford
Hell-bent on destroying his nation on the myths of his mis-apprehended Catholicism, Rabid-the-Hun’s destruction of  our cultural diversity well suits his limited imagination.
He then goes on a rant when his CoS is attacked by his own ministers calling it a gender attack of unprecedented proportions…

Daylesford
Daylesford
Ohhhh …Dear Rabid-the-Hun, do you think we should call Ms Credlin "Barren" as your lot did Ms Gillard?
Do you think, Rabid-the-Hun, we should call Ms Credlin a "Witch" as your lot did to Ms Gillard and be burnt at the stake for her influence?
Rabid -the-Hun, should your party be lining up to slit Ms Credlin's throat as your Senator Ciobo said of Ms Gillard on national TV?
And one other thing, Rabid-the-Hun, do you think you might apologise to Ms Gillard for your relentless hypocritical attacks on her as a liar over ONE issue when have broken so many more?

Trentham
Trentham
Poor Peta "Bloody Idiot" Credlin. Commissar to a lying nincompoop. Wrangler to a hideously inept Environment minister; who cant get her own make-over shots in Vogue like "Asbestos-Death Stare" Julie and who has to deal with the mangled English of “Horse-Shite" Coormann. With the others in cabinet (unmentioned due to space requirements) as dismally untalented to deal with, she must feel like she's running a kinder full of ADHD / Asperger toddlers... I mean have some pity..... or perhaps we should just revel in the schadenfreude as a little bit of yuletide joy.

Trentham
Trentham
The world lives within us, we live within the world. By damaging the living planet we have diminished our existence. (George Monbiot)

Hoo-Roo Petals,
Shane

Tuesday 9 December 2014

Seeing people of privilege…

Shane at ballet Studio
G’day Petals,
Japanese Photographer Moriyama Daido has said the photographs are memories of light and deposits and traces making up a kind of archaeology and he likes Tennessee Williams' thought “….that worthwhile memories lie somewhere between fact and non-fact.”






Photos taken recently at class and rehearsal for Ballet Theatre Australia... They have a performance soon.. check their facebook page for details... https://www.facebook.com/BalletTheatreAustralia


Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

These are not documentary photographs, yet they are…


Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

They are a fiction but still true.

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class


A dance performance is ephemeral, it is always enjoyed after the event.

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

Ballet theatre Australia Class

 They are not “staged” images but manipulated truth.

Ballet theatre Australia Class


Wombat Droppings

Scott “The Drone “ Morrison has used refugee children on the Manus Island concentration camp as bargaining ploys to get legislation passed through the Senate under the pretence that it is “humanitarian.”
Rabid –the-Hun with his usual warped values applauded this a fair and honourable thing to do.
That he has a brain is without doubt.... but it must be very small, hence the repetitive simple three word slogans. They’re repetitive because it’s almost as if he's trying to convince himself of their "rightness" and viability.

What a bastard nation we have become. What a venal, selfish, intolerant and stupid people; a Nation so without a set of moral values that we are going to be easy pickings for the next huckster that comes along.
A young cricketer got hit on the head with a ball during a State match and tragically, died.
A young woman with severe physical disabilities who was a forceful advocate for seeing disability for what it is died, suddenly.
The Australian Cricket Board and its cricketers had the cricketer's funeral televised (politicians of all persuasions attended) and "Milked" at every opportunity the situation.
I don't think the disability advocate will get the same attention.
Advance Australia ...where?

Then there was the rather sad spectacle of our newish taxpayer funded $330,000.00 p.a. ”Freedom from Something” Commissioner, Timmy “Twat/Freedom-Man” (ex-Liarbril, ex-Coot-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe”, aka IPA) bouncing around the set of “The Chasers Media Circus” on the soon to be financially gutted, ABC.
Looking, according to Mrs Wombat’s analysis, like a dippy school–girl invited to a party where she knows no-one and senses she is not liked but is so, so desperate to be involved, Timmy offered little of substance but seemed blithely happy to be a clapping wallflower to everyone else’s contributions.
Perhaps more than a real civil servant working for the betterment of the nation’s civility would do?
Me?   I thought Timmy looked more like a dim-witted Labrador dog happily sniffing new bums in the hope a being accepted by the peer group.

Timmy’s previous employment was with that rancid organization the IPA  which in its paid advocacy role espouses abolishing the very commission for which Timmy is now being paid by the nation to speak for. That is the real problem and his appointment rather, foisting, without tender into the role, by pretend Federal Attorney General, “Bookshelves” Brandis, makes a mockery of Democracy.
He can never be trusted in this role.

 Almost on cue as the wheels begin to fall off their ramshackle government; we are treated to more news “shock, horror, feel afraid”,  70 or so Australian Muslims are fighting with ISIS in Syria & Iraq and Mandy “Il Patrone” Vanstone bounces up to opine how hard-done-by her rabble are being treated by the press and Labor.
Geez, Mandy do you now sympathise with the viciousness your lot meted to Gillard and Rudd in the past few years? Do you think Mandy, that your rabble’s top level infighting is the press’ and Labor’s fault?
The infighting is getting worse as their wholly unfair budget is in a mess, their ludicrous tertiary education dismemberment is stalled in the Senate and Rabid-the-Hun’s popularity deteriorates.
Julie “Death-Stare” Bishop then has a hissy fit when told she can’t go the Climate Change talks in Lima.
They weren’t going to have Australia attend as “Ozone-Hole” Hunt is useless as Environment minister and besides “…climate change is crap…!”
 “Death-Stare” with one look, irradiated a cabinet room of colleagues and gets her way but is further informed (probably by Rabid-the-Hun’s most favoured partner, “Commissar” Credlin) that Andy “Reboxetine” Robb was to chaperone her, lest she swayed from the righteous doctrinal path of  “…climate change is crap…” and not hinder the de-railing of the talks.
It was reported that “Death-Stare, “…went Bananas…” Not, that she was Bananas.
That Julie “Death-Stare Bishop’s star is in the ascendant is not disputed but that is a bit like a flag being run up the mast of the Titanic as it sinks.

“People of privilege,” said the economist JK Galbraith, “will always risk their complete destruction rather than surrender any material part of their advantage.”

And so it goes Down-Under.

Hoo-roo Possums,
Shane

Wednesday 3 December 2014

with weeping and gnashing of teeth

with weeping and gnashing of teeth...

Shane with books of negs




G'day you two,

we've spent the last couple of weeks scanning all 591 negative sheets from the Ballet School from many years ago... a somewhat large task










negative sheet
old shots


Not long after the “The School’s” 50th Anniversary get-together one of the participants, Deanna Watson contacted me to see A/ whether the photos of her she saw displayed were mine and, B/ did I have any more?
Answering “No” and “Yes,” I invited Deanna to view the files I had but as the majority of the early work had never been “proofed” it could only be viewed from the original negatives, which is difficult particularly for anyone not used to reading B&W negatives.

Then a couple more contacts followed also enquiring about their time at The School and at the launch of Maggie Scott’s biography, writer Michelle Potter evinced sufficient interest in this archive, as did some other notable alumnae present to warrant scanning all the work and making it available for those interested in viewing it.
There has since been a deal of interest in this archive and I'm pondering what to do with it ...
Australian Ballet School 1970
Australian Ballet School 1970
There's more info at  danceatthearchive.blogspot.com.au

Then we happened across Troy Barrett performing nicely at the Royal Mail hotel in Bacchus Marsh and took a couple of pics...

Troy Barrett
Troy Barrett

Troy Barrett


He's also online at  www.troybarrettmusic.com  where you can have a listen and download some samples.


Wombat Droppings
a chronicle of the disappearing of Egalitarianism and the inexorable rise of Fascism in Australia.

Well, Pretend Premier Dennis "Dodo" (Genus: Inutilus Rusticus) Napthine has been put to sleep. With Labor's Daniel Andrews administering the possible cure of the "Tardis" State's (Where-All-Goes-Backwards) woes... even to the extent of the Nationals looking like they will lose party status, also losing a seat held for 47 years to an independent.

Of course Rabid-the-Hun and his rabble take no responsibility for any of this but then telling "Porkies" is about all they're good at.
But there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth....
A defence Minister who talks down his own defence workforce, an Education minister who can't pronounce the names of those he's trying to bully into accepting $100,000.00 University fees, a Health Minister attempting to wreck one of the worlds best health systems and an Environment minister ...Oohh, just let's not go there....but let's not forget our Trade Minister, Andrew "Reboxetine" Robb giving away Oz jobs to the Chinese and signing off on having Multi-Nationals tell us what we can and can't do.

To say that the country is becoming a shambles is not overstating it.
The finest example of this shambles is the Federal parliament's Speaker, Bronwen "Kerosene-Pompador" Bishop who has ejected Labor opposition members a total of 285 times to Government members 5 times. Sometimes they are just asking a question... I know I have railed and ranted much about this putrid lot but there in no untruth in what I've said and unfortunately I've been pretty accurate as to the way I said things would turn out.

On election day I spent four hours handing out "How-to-Vote" cards at an Electoral booth
as well as having fun "winding-up" the Liarbrils  doing the same.
This has become a very divided country. A place that is fearful, reactionary, selfish and let's not mince words, stupid!
The Liarbrils had no plan for government. All they had was ideology and the far right "Free-Market" handbook supplied by the "Coot's-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe," the IPA.
It doesn't work.
Only as a recipe for social dysfunction... that 's the only bit that's working for them!

Even their polling and tactical Svengali, Mark Textor knows that the hole they have dug themselves into is now almost too big to get out of .
The problem with that is that their hallmark nastily feral, brutish, and vindictive characters will extend to slashing about at anything in frustration, bloody-mindedness and sheer malice.
There are dark days ahead.
Hoo-roo Petals,
Shane



Monday 24 November 2014

With Galahs, Ning-Nongs and the Fascist Poltroons

With Galahs, Ning-Nongs and the Fascist Poltroons all running amok it might be time to gird for the forthcoming havoc.

Shane at John Curtin Hotel
Shane at John Curtin Hotel




G’day, you three…

Been for a bit of a wander around the  town...  and today it's all Wombat Droppings (or the chronicle of a  once Egalitarian nation sliding inexorably into Fascism).







We’ve had the G20…..  all $500,000,000.00 of it.
Obama and Chinese leader Xi Jinping spiked “Rabid the-Hun’s,” We-will-not-mention-the-Weather” cannon by announcing a climate change deal and Australia announcing that that our territorial sovereignty is up for sale particularly for Chinese workers. 
Andrew “Reboxetine” Robb, Minister for Trading Off the Nation, denied that paying Chinese wages to Australians was also part of the deal and that Chinese investment in industry probably would not override O H and S, and environmental standards. “Look how we are caring for the Barrier Reef “ he said, “Besides you can’t make Popiah and not break eggs….I think.”
Rabid–the-Hun then enthralled the assembled 36 of the G20 (gate-crashers?) by bemoaning just how recalcitrant we all were in not wanting to fund private medical research out of our own pockets, or wanting to retire at 95, or not  turning the ABC into another Media psychological Basket Case like Foxtel or let his Pretend Education Minister Chwissie “The Whyne and Perfect-Prat-of-a-Prefect” Pyne charge $100,000.00 for a degree in barista-ology.
Busker with Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo
Busker with Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo
Which shows about as much sense as this picture.... 
How do you get a Busking Licence to have a bird spread it's wings?
I mean, that's all it did.
The mural is by Mirka Mora: born in France she arrived in Australia as a young woman and the French Romanesque influence is very apparent in her work.
 Lordy... if this government were a horse you'd have to put it down.... but at least “Rabid-the-Hun” came close for the first time, to admitting to the "free-market" agenda they never want to discuss publicly...and was forestalled in repeating that ”…. Climate-Change is crap.” 

"The Ugly American," Murdoch and his minions, “The-Coots-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe” at the IPA must be apoplectic at his incompetence in "selling" their message and instead, exposing it to the full glare of public ridicule for the selfish anti-social medievalism it is. They even went to the ludicrous extent of allowing Rabid's business advisor and trenchant climate-change denier Maurice "Addled" Newman to quote some wacky American Senator called Inhofe who thinks that the bible refutes climate change.... all together now: Place finger on lips, wobble up and down quickly and blow!
John Curtin
John Curtin

This is John Curtin a Labor Prime Minister who led Australia through WW2.
He took over from the founder of the present day Liarbril Party, R.G.Menzies, one of whose claims to fame were his nick-names: "Pig-Iron-Bob" and "Ming."
The first was because as PM he was trading Iron to the Japanese at the beginning of WW2. Which apocryphal legend has it came back to us as bullets and shells! The second was based on the Flash Gordon Cartoon character "Ming-the Merciless."
See the similarity with the present Liarbril rabble? 
Curtin was born just up the paddock from the Wombat's burrow.

Two mares from “The Ugly American’s” stables, Janet Albrechtson and Amanda Devine were showing an unusual lack of confidence in their ability to stir an audience by refusing to be panellists on Q and A. which was a pity.  Granted, it may only inspire people to throwing rotten eggs, tomatoes, cow-pats and such like but it still is a genuine response. Perhaps if these women could only come across as intelligently civilised as Ms Wong or Ms Plibersek do and of whom, they feel they can’t compete, things might be different. But then, spitting vitriol from the Murdoch Bunkers and paddling in the bile of those who share their one-dimensional view of the world like Andrew ”Blot-on-the-Landscape” Bolt is far safer. 
In their opinion anything other than their view is “left,” and wrong. And like “The-Coots-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe” at the IPA who falsely espouse free-speech and libertarian views; speech is only free when it agrees with them. Everything else is biased … and bias is wrong unless it’s their bias. These Neanderthal thinkers from the IPA have yet to discover the value of a pluralist society
8 Hour Day monument
Memorial to a notion that is sooooo C19th.
Although pluralism and fairness is what Senators Jackie “Bogan” Lambie and Ricky “Diff” Muir have been practising. 
 With other cross bench Senators they voted to repeal legislation thought up by the partially disgraced Arfur ”Da Spiv” Sinodinas and Matty “Atwerp-Horse-Shite” Coormann.
 It was bad legislation made for corrupt people but at least there are some in Parliament who are thinking of “The People!”
People assisting refugee kids in Oz Concentration Camps
People assisting refugee kids in Oz Concentration Camps
This is another interesting read as the ABC’s budget is being cut to ribbons and comes under quite furious attack from many sides for being impartial and pluralist thinking.  
One of the funniest criticisms was one bloke on radio bemoaning how the ABC wasn’t “…lateral thinking enough” and …“we should all listen to Macca!”  
For you three overseas readers, Macca is a quite Right–Wing Bumpkin who travels by phone to rural areas to let them vent their hatred of anything smelling vaguely socialist. 
Except of course for Farm subsidies, Fuel Subsidies, and other agrarian socialisms. I’m not sure the caller had any real idea of what lateral thinking really means… perhaps he could ring Foxtel  or" Le Jongleur" Roskam and ask them for a definition.
 "Le Jongleur"  doesn't think the Government should fund the ABC  as not all use its considerable services.  But when a caller suggested reimbursement for the "Tax" he pays in advertising fees on the products he buys which fund commercial stations he doesn't use ... "Le Jongleur" went a bit quiet for once.
David Wilson Sculptures
David Wilson Sculptures
These are sculpture by David Wilson in the grounds of the old Melbourne Jail. (DW was my tutor at Art School)
His "Romantic Brut"works look rather good in this setting.




Bar, Curtin Hotel
Bar, Curtin Hotel

And this is the bar at the John Curtin Hotel, now known as just "The Curtin" and not really a place for Unionists from Trades Hall, opposite, any more but a live music venue...



seagull

Hoo-Roo Possums,
Shane.

PS, before we go one more graphic to put our conservative, right-wing government in its real perspective...

Australian