~ slavery in the virtual universe

I've been participating in facebook for about a month now. At first it mystified me. Then it fascinated me. Now it scares me.

Some of the best people I know [in real life] are in there, talented, brilliant people who I can commune with at a touch of the keyboard. That's a good thing. But there's another side I'm suspicious about. In fact, last night, with the help of Robert's THC concentrate, my doubts flared into paranoia ...

I have only one facebook friend who is truly random, with whom I share no other friends. I'll call her Heliotrope. She's South African, owns a racehorse and is 'besotted' with helicopters. She identifies herself with a cute Brat-like cartoon and has become my owner on Human Pets, calling me 'Dr House'.

Human Pets is a cheeky facebook app in which one buys and sells people as pets - and, in some, it brings out the latent slave-trader. I guess because of her sultry photo, Jenny - a snail - is currently priced at 620 points. As for me - an octopus - I am only worth 80 [so far]. Jenny's owners have nearly all been men with many pets, all of them beautiful women.

Heliotrope has been a good owner. She 'pets' me often and has taken me on a trip to Egypt. But her owner is another matter. Heliotrope is now worth 42,000 - and it seems a near war has developed over her ownership. Various men - perhaps the same kind who have owned Jenny, the collectors - have gotten vicious in their efforts to 'possess' her, turning the whole thing quite weird ...

"At first it was fun to be fought over, well let me tell you the fun is over. It has resulted in two men dumping the application saying they are not going to fight over me; worse, some of the others started buying each other's pets so that the person buying me would have to spend points buying their other pets back, and thus be unable to afford me! It's a major blow up with me in the middle!! ...These people have created multiple accounts too and I don't now know who is who... Was warned that being owned is a competitive and emotional thing, now know it to be true!"

and...

"Lol, these men have never met me, have had them telling me they love me, am in love with me, want to marry me, want to get on planes and visit me, you name it!! (Please send airticket, I need a holiday!!!!) Funnily enough it happens to me in real life too, Facebook has become an extension of my real life, cannot tell you why ..."

I ask myself, these men, are they in love with a cartoon? What are they fighting over exactly? Do they know? Is it even real? Is it virtual power-tripping? The whole thing makes me feel like a neophyte. There's something going on here that is beyond my ken. Last night, I realised I knew nothing for certain. Even Heliotrope herself. She certainly seems like a real person, but how can I be sure? Is she even a woman?

Interesting, isn't it?

*

Late last night, I put on a DVD I'd hired earlier in the day. It was a second choice, as I'm desperate to see Jesus Camp - but the local Blockbuster has decreed that Mt Waverley residents are not interested in the evils of ecclesiastical Christianity. What I picked was Neverwas. I've had really back luck with hiring off the shelf lately, but this time I hit the jackpot.

It affected me as viscerally as Children of Men, but in a wholly different way. I was actually expecting something like The Never Ending Story, instead I got a beautifully weighted film about hope, redemption, self-belief and the power of the imagination... I won't go into the details; I just want to recommend it.

Ian McKellen is the best I've seen him [Yes, superior even to Gandalf]. Aaron Eckhart ... I don't usually go for matinee idol types, but there's something about him. And to his credit, he's almost indistinguishable from Nathan Fillion [SLiTHER, Josh Whedon's Serenity/Firefly series]. He's great in this, as are Nick Nolte, Jessica Lange ... Even Brittany Murphy. I don't know how I missed this movie when it first came out.

* 10 February 1981, 11.10pm

Generally, I don’t have much truck with censorship, but I have to be careful with this ancient diary [and, indeed, the current one] – especially when names are mentioned. Basically, I don’t want to hurt or abhor relatives and friends who nurture sweet memories, nor do I necessarily want to freak out any net readership.

Upshot is, I’m going to blank out some ‘sensitive’ passages. Use your imagination…

I’ve also corrected some uses of uncouth US spelling.

This second diary entry was made late on the same day as the first.

*

And so I rush to the kitchen and frantically paint, feverishly adding to my film jungle, not daring to stop and think what else I could be doing – what other constructions I could be involved in – forever thinking of phrases to supplement this diary.

I don't think this cataloguing of myself is self-indulgent. I take far too little time, of late, to examine my actions. The diary will hopefully help me keep an eye on myself – rejuvenate my hold on myself, my vision of myself.

Or is that all passed now, with my adolescence? I suspect it may be, though I cannot be sure.

My memory for instance. Once, when I fashioned a sentence... I cannot remember having the trouble I have now of forgetting how the terrible thing began as I came to its conclusion…

Grammer! There must be something wrong...

As my group [The Ears] becomes more recognised, so do I. And in this way I learn to recognise myself... Again, after first I lost my dignity... my self-esteem... when I bared my naivety to those naïve faces... But only music. Not even that, I suppose…

[? The above paragraph may refer to some event my earlier self was so embarrassed by he could not bear to put it into words.]

I am tired and I am confusing myself.

Today we practised without [bassist] Cathy. It was not a fulfilling rehearsal. We drank in The Office afterwards, frustrated. We played some pool and I left, determined to achieve something – I don’t know what. Christine and I tried to buy some heroin, but it seems at this stage that we’ve failed. She ___ ___ as we watched TV with Troy.

I completed a crossword, but faked two words.

I’m considering using the World Series Cricket theme in the group. The melody, though, is hard to figure out …

*

What a marvellous idea …

At least it seemed to be at the time and, who knows, maybe it was? Gus, the best technical musician in the band, sorted out the notes and, for at least a year, the Ears opened their set with a highly orchestrated cover of Channel Nine’s theme for the Wide World of Sport. It did seem cool, somehow.

In this period, I had cultivated at least half the kitchen with a ‘film jungle’. Strips of 35mm film hung thickly from the ceiling like vines. It was a good effect, if I remember correctly. You could sit at the kitchen table and examine frames by staring through them at the light …

George - my best friend in secret craziness – was always my partner in projects like this. He was, at that stage, a photographer, and his maxim was – if you get enough of a thing, it’s going to always look good. We collected a lot of a lot of things. Cats, kitchen chairs, roast chickens… In crimson, we painted the word ‘photo’ on the ceiling in Milton St so many times, it did, indeed, look good. But I’ll talk about George in a later post …

The Office was a pub across the road from Gus Till’s house, in the basement of which we rehearsed. Gus's was a double storey terrace that has long since disappeared under a widening Punt Rd. The Office has transmuted into a Seven-Eleven.

One last note. Though there’s much mention of heroin, it was still a recreational thing for most of us. We were innocents. The real slaughter was yet to come.

Diary of 1981 - index

~ a hostess of unalloyed magnificence

Often, you have no idea how entangled you are with humdrum of daily life, until you step outside it. I've just spent an elysian weekend in Shoreham with Polly, Jenny, and various components of her family.

Jenny's mother, Di, recently sold her half share in a house down there, which had been in the family since the Seventies. It's been thoroughly renovated since, but still retains its special charm and its healing properties. We had only one night, but it did the trick, releasing the sour stale air from the grossly over-inflated balloon that was my soul.

The artist Joy Peck once owned the house and left her mark with a half dozen beautifully painted windows and a fridge that beggars belief it is so lovely - even if it no longer operates. Joy is very ill now, closing on an end to her earthly residency.

Di is a hostess of unalloyed magnificence. Ostensibly in celebration of her daughter Sarah's birthday, she prepared an extraordinary feast - prawns, trout, chicken - which in combination with alcohol & THC made for an evening of refined decadence. [In stark relief to the other coarser kind.]

Most of us wandered down the seaside track afterwards. It was a black night lit only by stars and a small white dog. I talked to Polly about the stars. About the planets that orbit many of them. About the alien civilisations that must exist out there, but which we will probably never meet.

- There's always astral travel, offered Jenny

Polly was frightened of the dark and we took the opportunity to explain that everything was the same as it was when we'd been down there earlier in the day - except there was no light. She told us she had once seen a 'skeleton with red' in the dark. Then we explained how the imagination can create monsters from the shadows of trees and branches... You forget what a young mind might or might not know. It's awe-inspiring that we are the ones gifted with the responsibility of educating her.

And then I think of the ecclesiastical vermin in the US who indoctrinate their young with creeds of fear, hate and mindless obedience ...

On that same walk, I thought I heard an owl. I went to say - that's a powerful owl - but I thought again and went to say - that's a boobook owl. What I actually came out with was - that's a powerbook owl. Jenny told me it was a seagull.

Over dinner, Di reminisced on the subject of deluxe cigarettes. She spoke lovingly of a brand named Passing Clouds which her husband had once smoked. They were oval, rather than cylindrical, and came in seductive pink packaging. She believed their provenance to be Greek. Her daughters spoke of gold-banded cocktail Sobranies with their delicate pastel shades of blue, green, pink and yellow. I remembered the filtered Gitanes I use to smoke, the swirling blue figure of the gypsy on the packet. Luxury cigarettes aren't what they were, at least where I live. Perhaps it's my age, my level of jadedness or my social status, but more likely it's the new outlook on cigarettes as ushers of death...

Allow me to be corrected by a brief look on the web. In 2000, Treasurer, 'the world's most expensive cigarettes' were released in Britain at something like AUD40 for a brushed soft-metal packet of twenty.

~ abnormal petting zoo

She has a dream in which she is half-fish half-slug half-horse. She is swimming around and around in an enclosed body of water, unable to escape.

The Spores are in abeyance, but the humdrum is coming into its own - and the humdrum has secret alliances with ancient demons. Now is a dangerous time, and - knowing she carries a neural implant that can steamroll her resolution at any time - I observe all things with great care.

I offer to look after her bank card, as she's getting paid the next morning. She complains that she feels like a child when other people look after her money. I stick to my guns. She suggests that we not pay off the Romanian tomorrow, but leave it a little while. I suggest that makes no sense. An argument ensues, and grows sufficiently intense to justify her spending the night at her mother's. I am left alone watching Blades of Glory, confused, miserable and unable to stop myself laughing. When she arrives home the next day, she reveals that she has her period. She admits that she was worried by her behaviour, thought she was actually going mad - but realised, thankfully, that it was only PMT, a condition that can affect her strongly.

- It's amazing what hormones can do, she says.

Later, I will find out if this entire scenario was a carefully drafted plan to facilitate a monstrous licking of the deadly honeycomb. Would she engineer an argument like that? Endanger the relationship? Just to seek traffic with the Spores? Am I paranoid? She is still asleep at 10.30 - a worrying sign. We shall see. ...

With Polly, I rode the train into town to participate in Children's Week festivities. The only thing of merit was an above average petting zoo. A penned in area lined with astroturf, teeming with highly exited children and resigned, almost soporific animals. I picked up a baby chicken for Polly when another set of little hands expertly divested me, briefly manipulated the chick, then threw it into the plastic yellow wading pool that was home to a turtle - a turtle whose head remained extended throughout the ordeal. What turtle would not take advantage of its natural abilities in such a perilous environment? A drugged turtle? A diseased turtle? Whatever. I plucked the chicken from the water.

Later, as I closed my briefcase, an official checked to see if I was stealing a bird or animal. I explained that a goat had been eating my papers. Polly really loved the rabbits. I liked the turkeys. I was kicked by a small cow.

Thinking about it, there was something off-beat about that petting zoo. There in the wildly post modern Federation Square Atrium - enslaved beasts; brought to the heart of Man's empire to be fondled by his young. Regard these creatures, any of you who doubt that we are the dominant species. We are superior to these guinea pigs in so very many ways. This turtle has developed none of the magnificent technologies we have. Our social structures are vastly more complex than anything these gobbling turkeys have in place.

Later, Polly told me that she had never seen a clown. Would that this state of purity shall last.

spasmo-vizier mercurius

Many combatants in the Ulterior Wars place an almost religious faith in the ability of Spasmo-Vizier Mercurius to rid the Earth of the Spore Menace.

Here he is seen preparing a substance new to the universe, which he tells us - when released into the water supply - will reverse the polarity of spore compliant tissue. We're with you all the way, Mercurius!

~ troy

Troy was stricken during the first wave of HIV infections, and, in time, contracted AIDS. Upon his death earlier this year, he must surely have been one of the longest surviving victims in Australia.

Troy's funeral was held in Sydney, where had lived for the last few decades, but in Melbourne, where he had so many friends and admirers, a second memorial service was held in the gardens of Ripponlea mansion.

This was a couple of months ago, when Melanie and I were still able to share a car without beleaguering each other with vicious squabbling. (Melanie is an ex-girlfriend of Ukranian descent, possessed of an extraordinary temper and a withering tongue). I gave her a lift to the memorial, and we were both nervous as we walked up the gravel drive. Most of the guests we would not have seen since Troy's departure to Sydney; it would be the opening of a time capsule, but the contents would have aged along with us.

Graciously, the event was organised by George Huxley, Richard Lowenstein, Bruno Charlesworth and others - and they'd seen fit to provide a liberal bar. This was my first port of call; I was unsteady, I was apprehensive of whom I might set eyes upon. There would be friends - there would also be those with who I did not part on friendly terms.

As mentioned in the previous post, I came to know Troy as his neighbour in Milton St. I'd known of him previously by reputation, but under a different name - Vanessa, allegedly the most gorgeous and authentic drag queen in Melbourne. At that time, the only drag queens I'd known were six foot tall Maoris on mandrax and the idea of an attractive one seemed a contradiction in terms.



When I first met him, Troy still had pert shapely breasts and was the most exotic and inspired individual I had yet encountered in my short life. Not surprisingly, it took me a little while to stop being afraid of him. To that point, most of my experiences with non-heteros had been in the form of older men trying to pick me up from the street, (on one memorable occasion, an airline pilot) - and in my naivety I expected that sooner or later Troy would put the hard word on me. Of course, it never happened, but one night we were up late watching TV and Troy, not wanting to outstay his welcome in my flat, politely asked if I wanted to go to bed. My response was 'No thanks, I'm straight'. Till the day he died, Troy was still embarrassing me by retelling that story to anyone who would listen and laugh. Indeed, it was his habitual pleasure to annoy me - once, he snatched up some of my unfinished poetry and, to my exasperation, I had to chase him around the flat for half an hour to get it back. You see, I was very sensitive about my writing back then...

Troy had sheer talent. He started with fashion and ended with sculpture. He would sew me up crazy outfits to wear on stage. Once, I remember him dressing Tobsha Learner in a magnificent garment that was also a chest of Daliesque drawers - and then blackening up her underarm hair with an eyeliner pencil. Jean Paul Gaultier, you say? This was well before him. Troy also served as my match-matcher, setting me up with inappropriate female after inappropriate female...

At one time he became obsessed with Dinah Shaw - a sort of white-bread Oprah whose show was on TV weekday mornings. I remember him speaking of her repeatedly and once he asked me if I found her attractive. I didn't really take him seriously, till I stepped onto his veranda early one morning and saw him through the window furiously masturbating with Dinah on the black and white telly next to his bed. I backed quietly away and gave him all the time he needed.

I recall entering his flat after the departure of an ambulance, concerned about what had transpired. Troy was the angriest I'd ever seen. He'd spent most of his dole cheque on heroin, immediately OD'd, been shot up with narcan by the paramedics, and now, he spat, was 'fucking straight'. I watched him trying to fix plastic gemstones to the bald sides of his head with super-glue. He was not fucking straight.



In time we became caring friends. Then we drifted, then he moved to Sydney. But I came away with a thorough and gainful appreciation of the perverse.

The occasion of his memorial put my head in a spin. A parade of friends and acquaintances I had not seen for twenty years: Anne Harding, sister of my dearest Christine; Lisa Dethridge, former lover and cheekily smiling imp, now with family; the gorgeous Suzanne Wales, with the sweetest nature in Nature, another lover, now a Barcelonan; Mark Warner, with who I'd fought the Slammerkin, now dead of cancer; Jeff Jaffers, who directed Earthbound, my only screenplay; Marie, an ex lover of both Troy and myself; Mim; Denise; Despina; George Huxley, on whom I relied to colour and cut my hair during my days in the limelight; Karen Hooper; Anthony Smethhurst; Barry Sherman - once a warlock for the local branch of Crowley's Ordo Templi Orientis; his Sister Sara, the fashion designer; Mark Seymour, Sean Kelly... ad infinitum.

I buried the hatchet and shook hands with Richard Lowenstein, who, since Dogs in Space, had been my declared enemy. Troy's spirit permeated the gathering, dissolving all enmities. I also spoke with Richard's partner Lynne Marie for the first time since those days. Little information passed between us - she speaks as softly as a mouse and I am half deaf - but there was good will in the air. Later, having lost the power of speech, I sat next to a dyspeptic Renee Geyer and tried to hold a conversation. Neither of us could make an ounce of sense. Renee, Mark Seymour and Tim McKew sang songs. George Huxley, Ollie Olsen and Bruno Charlesworth gave elegies. But it was somehow the gathering itself that honoured Troy.

I became dangerously overstimulated and it wasn't long before I was probably suffering from alcohol toxicity. I recall being in a car with my dear friend Paul Goldman, Suzanne Wales & Hugh Marchant (with whom I had had bitter words when last we met). We were on our way into the city, for what I suppose might be called a wake. I have few memories after that. The hangover of the following day was a sheer triumph for the Slammerkin.

It was a special congregation - a particular group who will almost certainly never come together again. As such, it was a final sacred gift from Troy - the genuine cult-figure. We came away feeling graced, our lives in a little more perspective. One last glimpse of Troy's blazing talent, the world he addressed with art and wit, the merciless disease that in later times defined his life. One last glimpse of his holy fire.

troy on youtube
troy on myspace

* 10 february 1981.

Over the course of my life, I have kept diaries. Sometimes in beautifully bound journals with marbled endpapers, sometimes on butcher’s paper. I start them, stop them, and start them again. Most I have preserved, and all, to my [almost] certain belief, have been read by no eyes save my own.

From time to time, I will include them in this blog. I’ll edit them as little as necessary, and provide an epilogue to put them in context.

I will begin 26 years ago. I am 20 years of age and in love.

*

February 10 1981.

It's nine in the morning; I am tired and disinclined to leave my bed. Christine has recently departed for her job. She is a nurse. I am contemplating what I can do with my day - perhaps paint? My bathroom's gaudy colour scheme is almost complete ... Perhaps I’ll call my mother and go shopping with her.

I am obsessed, to a degree, with my flat. I think that somewhere, deep down, I believe my mental and social state will improve as it improves. As Dick Hamer furnishes Victoria with Olympic bids, Art Centres and underground rail loops, so I will furnish my rooms.

Most likely I'll ring Lewis [Mick] and arrange a band practice, but first I shall certainly lie in bed and finish Deus Irae [by Dick & Zelazny]. Existentialists believe we may infer our states from our actions. Mine must be a ghastly and dissipated state indeed; unrelated actions leading to no common goal, executed with no conviction. But then, 'What takes place in love is beyond good and evil' And I am certainly in love. More intensely and more bewilderingly than ever before.

It has initiated some confusing changes in me. I am now a victim of such frustrating emotions as jealousy & masculine pride. [Not since my times with Margaret Waldron in the sandpit, have I felt driven to shield a girl from danger] Christine [Harding] is actually Margaret’s cousin and knew her well. Margaret is recently married. [She couldn’t have been more than twenty]

I more or less live with Christine at the moment - a new experience which has thrilled me, but also caused me to doubt. It's been so long since August 30, 1980 - almost 6 months have passed. So, thenceforth this shall be known as my longest and most important relationship…

… I have been contemplating writing a story, perhaps this diary is my way of getting round to it... But Terry has bookings already for after Cathy's return, and we're mixing down our tape on Thursday - things will start rolling again soon.

Last night I cooked a meal and my hands still smell of curry. I do things like this for Christine. My manners, my personal habits, are becoming vastly more sophisticated.

The day before yesterday, I came home sweating, and cleaned the whole flat in anticipation of Christine’s return from work. As I cleaned the fireplace, I continually glanced over my shoulder, hoping she would not come till I was finished

Where is the old scrambled, confused, palpitating Sam? He is still there, I think. Only he is happy.

But he’s neglecting his god-given gifts.

*

I can actually remember how good I felt the day I wrote that. And I am still trying to make women happy by doing housework. It is a technique that has rarely failed me.

The flat was in Milton St, Elwood. I moved there from the Berry St house immortalized in Dogs in Space. A friend, Leigh Hooper had been the previous tenant

Leigh was in with the Turkish Book Club who imported Turkish language books with the centres cut out and filled with heroin. One time, someone on the Turkish end mixed the gear with something brown that became a silty gloop when mixed with water. Strictly speaking, it was uninjectable, but that stopped no one. It became known as The Mud. For a time, peoples arms were covered with hideous weeping sores, Leigh’s more so than anyone’s. She appeared to have advanced leprosy. [Those interested in strangely adulterated drugs, click here.]

Anyway, the flat was on the ground floor of a once magnificent mansion. It was in pretty bad shape and the odour of Elwood Canal emanated from the sink, but I loved it. A gay couple lived at the back, and Troy was my immediate neighbour. Troy, I will speak of again, and soon. [He has recently perished from AIDS]. A warlock lived in the mansion next door and his crow could often be seen, perched at the front of our drive.

The band referred to is The Ears. Cathy McQuade was the bass-player. Terry Rogers, the manager. The fireplace had beautiful green art deco tiles. All gone



Diary of 1981 - index

~ Drive Me To The Dogs

My wife has returned from a bunker in Preston describing her experience as 'horrible'. The unisexual fortress was full of war victims with sour lips, fused minds and twisted bodies, many of them driven to madness by the depredations of the Spores. She described the sharp smell of antiseptic, and the stress of suddenly finding herself living in close quarters with so many wandering, murmuring, twitching reminders of what the Spores can do to a person. During her time there, she barely left her cell, as her own condition was somewhat critical; she was frail, cadaverous. paranoid, in despair, and wholly unable to manage her life - and it was here that she decided that preventative medication was the only thing that would save her.

It is a pity, as Spasmo-Dromoran is a harsh drug that mimics many of the effects of the Spore-illness in order to counter them. Under its influence, the bones and teeth may crumble, the love of music may die, one may sleep for upwards of fourteen hours, and the manner of the soul may become infantile. During my own time on this drug, I produced reams of writing, of which very little was useable. It was indulgent and hopelessly naff - my internal editor seemed to have lost its critical faculties. I dare not tell you what became of my teeth.


My wife, however, has come home bubbling. She has resurrected the house from its squalor; she has upgraded the contents of Polly's lunch-boxes a hundredfold, and has already mustered the confidence to go have coffee with friends. The household aura has shifted from piss yellow to restful blue. In recent months, owing to her emaciation, she has been too embarrassed to take on work as a life model. [her primary money-making occupation], but already, thankfully, she is putting on weight.

I wonder how long this pleasant part of the cycle will last? What I dread are the moods which Spasmo-Dromoran can generate. The bad, irritable moods, which come just after lunch time each day. Jenny is the sweetest creature with a delightful nature, but Spasmo-Dromoran gives her an acid tongue that can strip the flesh from my bones. When that starts, the best thing she can do is have a nap.

But for the moment we are all seemingly well, though impoverished. Soon, perhaps even today, I will have to return to my book-selling on ebay, an activity that drives me to the dogs. I am building the ant-pinata for Polly's upcoming party. I am in the yard cultivating nuVanilla. I am reading The Swarm by Frank Schatzing. I am thinking about a snooze, though it's only eleven in the morning...

~The Council of Grey Sentinels

A weekend that swept the cobwebs from my system, leaving me with the grim realisation that the cobwebs themselves had been holding me together.

I went with Lynne and Polly to see a character called Dan Zanes at the Meat Market. He fronts a band that plays a simple kind of blues/country mix designed particularly for children. Lots of catchy choruses and danceable rhythms. The venue was crawling with kids and, by the end, the whole audience, young and old, was on its feet dancing. [Save for the council of grey sentinels seated high at the back, consulting their wrist watches.] Zanes himself is a tall scruffy grey haired guy with a broad smile and a loose attitude. As I was walking through the crowd a woman pointed out that we could be relatives. Naturally, I was flattered.

I thought of the Wiggles, Hi-5 and all those trivial, prefabricated kids' acts. They seem so shamelessly commercial in comparison to Zanes. Actually, they seem evil, certainly greedy, and isn't the world just a big bloated repository for greed? Sure, Zanes had his CDs for sale at the gig, but not the bewildering array of merchandise pushed by these other bands: clothing labels, toothbrushes, canned spaghetti, yoghurt, breakfast cereal, yo-yos, stickers... this list could stretch to the end of the universe and it's all gomi. They are profit-making entities, [brands, as Naomi Klein would define it,] managing their images in high towers white the plastic gewgaws are manufactured in Chinese special taxation zones - angling themselves at kids' vulnerabilities, even at their budding sexuality, using colours, lights, action and canned cute.

Once, I saw an interview with the Wiggles in which they were asked about the reason for their success. Their answer? "We think it's the skivvies."

Dan Zanes' was just a band playing good, thoughtful music, and everyone had a superior time. It was refreshing to be free of all that other drivel.

I do what I can to expose Polly to materials with some degree of artistic merit, [of course, it's impossible to completely shield her from crap]. I think the films from Studio Ghibli in Japan are a good example of worthy kids' entertainment: Spirited Away, My Neighbour Tottoro, Princess Mononoke etc. - these are all favourites and hopefully stuff like this will help her develop some taste as she grows. Burn all Bratz, I command! Li'l Bratz & Baby Bratz too! Slash the plastic flesh of Barbie's impassive pink face! Force all Wiggles over the cliff at gunpoint!

After Zanes, I ditched Polly at her Grandmother's and drove to Mick Lewis's house, [For the benefit of ancient historians, he was the guitarist with The Ears]. With his partner, Donna, and the lunatic painter Pasquale we proceeded to the Nick Cave concert at the Forum.

And it was much as you'd expect - save for three things: [a] aside from Nick, the band, including Warren Ellis, sported bushy beards that reached their navels, - making them look like hoopleheads from Deadwood, [b] Nick stood and played a guitar - maybe he's done it before, but I've never seen it and he did it with style - and [c] his hairline was rapidly receding. People tell me it's been happening for a while, but now, in concert with his moustache, he has at last achieved the porn star look to which I believe he has always aspired. Funny thing, his jet black hair does not seem to have greyed, as one would expect, under the winds of Quinquagesima. But that's a topic for another day...

Be certain, I mean none of these comments to be malicious. I deeply admire Nick Cave. He's provided an ongoing soundtrack to my life and has always been a deep inspiration. The concert, naturally, was great - but, well, perhaps I've just seen him too many times over the course of time. A few songs stood out. Tupelo, for one... In my mind's eye, I saw that squalid room at the Bondi Cosmopolitan in the early eighties... My imprisonment at Propaganda at the hands of Mr Australia... The ride I took in the white Mercedes convertible with one of Sydney's more notorious crime figures...

A woman in the crowd gave me these words: "Fear is false evidence appearing real". She said it came from Oscar Wilde. I have been mulling over it ever since. Who can tell me what it means?

~ The Swarf That Penetrates

In passing, I have mentioned the scientist in my car-port. Now I would like to introduce him properly.

Robert is a shambling forty year old with wire rimmed glasses and wheaten hair that falls to the small of his back, and which he usually wears in a single braid. For him, clothes are simply a means of protection from the elements - he displays no preference when, each decade, he reluctantly burrows through the sale bins outside of op-shops. Often, Jenny and I offer him habiliments in an attempt to upgrade his decidedly shabby image

Robert is more or less a member of our family. We love him dearly. To Polly he is a patient and extremely tractable slave-uncle.

I first met Robert through Lorraine, who at one time was helping me procure prohibited substances. Lorraine was once an escort, before working in a brothel and then on the streets. Ultimately, the Quinquagesima tool its toll on Lorraine and she retired to her flat high in a housing commission monolith. Robert was her boyfriend until they separated about three years back. Lorraine still drops by the boarding house where Robert lives to drink tea, inhale concentrated THC, read the newspaper, and sometimes sample a little of my heavenly nuVanilla. She has mellowed in her later years and is also a good friend to Polly, who calls her 'Rain'.

Both Robert and Lorraine are rat lovers and used to keep them as pets. One day, I encountered them facing each other with deeply sorrowful expressions. They were jointly cradling a deeply beloved rat. It had cancer and was dying. With tears streaking their cheeks, they saw it through its last hours. I could not help but be moved by the commitment of these two old junkies to the poor little creature. Love. Simplicity. Respect. Care

Recently, when The Black and White Cat was dying, Robert did not stint in his efforts to comfort it. Kylie was visiting at this time and, observing Robert's dedication to The Black and White, she immediately classified him as a saintly spirit. Kylie is not the only friend of mine who judges people by their treatment of animals. I too see it as an indicator of the soul

The Black and White Cat had been with me for eighteen years.Originally it was named Chagall, but I could never use this name without feeling pretentious. [Mind you, my childhood cat was called Raskolnikov [see Dostoevsky], and I still recall being mocked [and hurt] by distant neighbours when I hollered for him at night]. Old Black & White cried piteously night and day and, because she was deaf, she did it loudly enough for the whole street to hear. Once contentedly plump, she was now an incontinent bag of bones - and quite plainly ready to die. Jenny and others were demanding that I have her euthanised, yet I was reluctant. One year previously, The White Cat had died in my hands at the RSPCA - and a young female vet had had to cope with a tall, slightly weird middle-aged man's uncontrollable weeping. I dreaded the thought of going through that again. What's more Robert was against it. He was certain he could somehow nurse the Black and White back to life, find a way to fix her somehow ... But, in truth, it was the Quinquagesima at work and - to quote Burroughs - that is the mark you can never beat.

In Robert's attitude, we find a clue to his character. Everything, to his mind, can be fixed, [though not the The Black and White Cat, who keeled over shortly after I resolved to take her to the vet]. Robert, personally, seems able to fix almost anything: Jenny's shoes, microwave, playstation, ratchet from my socket set, washing machine, about fifty components from Jackie [my beloved Renault 12 stationcar, who is the same age as Jenny and whom I'll speak of another time]. He's rewired the entire house and is installing rainwater tanks [Eight 220 recycled olive barrels raised high upon a wooden structure]. Every Wednesday, we have a working bee to keep our home from falling down about our ears.

Many years back, in pre-Jenny times, when I used Spasmo-Dromoran [rather than the Spasmo-Nemigron], Robert lost his flat and moved in with me. I was a different person then and though Robert was the perfect boarder, I had trouble with the noise he made cutting carrots and encouraged him to leave. His yacht was in the front yard and he spent all his time working on it. Lynne was a little fascinated by this, [she was my lover at the time,] and was certain that the yacht was symbolic - that Robert was expressing his desire for freedom. She believed that he would never leave on his dreamed of journey up the east coast of Australia, but would work patiently on the boat until the day he died.


When Robert left, the boat stayed. As it dominated the front yard, I urged him to move it and, a year later, he did. The yacht traveled from property to property until a particular friend moved out without telling him. Robert never found this friend, nor his boat... I feel guilt over this. The mast still lays on the roof of the car port, and I curse myself whenever I see it.

But now Robert has a new obsession. He is in love with metal. He has set up a working space in the car port and, since he has retired from the Ulterior Wars, [with the interesting ability to manufacture synthetic honeycomb,] he lives in dirt cheap accommodation, gets most of his food from a skip behind South Melbourne market, and is able to save nearly every penny of his Veteran's Pension. First there came a smallish antique metal-working lathe. Then a giant industrial grade lathe. Then a big bulky compressor. Then his beloved Deckel Tool Mill.

A tool mill masses more than a ton and this one was delivered onto the drive way. Robert spent the next month producing metal rollers with his lathe, so that he could move the thing into shelter [He also manufactured a heavy duty steel button for the toilet at his boarding house]. Once it was in place, he proceeded to dissemble the machine and - with the help of the online machine tool community - he set about cleaning, polishing, repairing and painting every single component. It has taken more than a year, but he has now begun reassembly and with each day the machine comes nearer to completion. It's not my usual kettle of fish, but I must say his Deckel Tool Mill is an impressive thing. Robert should be lauded - even if it is only by the members of the Model Engineers Association.

Robert is the only genius I know and I could speak of him at great length - but I shall save that for another day. Suffice to say he is wonderful to have around, despite the tiny shards of metal [called swarf which are scattered everywhere and which cause the most painful and deeply penetrating splinters in the feet of Polly, Jenny and I.

[Read 'the discombobulated genius' - another post in celebration of the artful Robert]

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phloadapod

Copied from an ancient Greek text, this image is the closest representation we have of the nanoscopic phloadapod , a symbiote known to accelerate spore dispersal. Note the rotating arms [presumably grasping Deadly Spores] and the long pedunculus [feeding tube]

Ω The Starman Succumbs to my Will

Each night, once I have finished reading, I turn on my side, pull a pillow over my ear and seek sleep. Because I know that my mind will inevitably grind on, reiterating the unpleasantness and stress of my waking day, I immerse myself in a fantasy scenario, in which I am safe and wholly disconnected from my real life.

I enter the body of a space traveller.

He has no ship and drifts aimlessly between the stars in a suit that can sustain his life indefinitely. The suit is possessed of an artificial intelligence able to describe the surrounding environment in fine detail.

A vessel appears on the suits sensors, a black shadow against the stars. I command my suit to fire its small reaction jets and I fall towards the looming form. An airlock becomes visible, outlined in luminous green. With a clunk I impact the hull. I attempt to use magnetic clamps to attach myself, but the material does not respond. My suit informs me that the hull refuses analysis.

The airlock reacts to my presence. It irises open and I pull myself inside. The hatch closes behind me. Indicators on a control cluster show that the lock is rapidly filling with gas. I inquire of my suit:

- Is it breathable?

- Perfectly.

- What are the chances that the biological needs of its builders match my own?

- They are negligible.

- Might it have... analyzed me? And deliberately provided the gases I need?

I feel the suit shrug around me.

The inner door to the airlock opens and I step inside the ship. Lights flicker on, though their source is not immediately visible.

- Again, comments my suit, the ship has chosen lighting that matches your visual requirements.

- It has analysed my eyes?

- And the relevant processing centres in your brain.

- Does it know I am sentient?

- That is a relative term ...

- I could be a space born parasite, the deadly Xenomorph from Alien...

- The ship, or its controllers have let you in. They know you are not dangerous.

There is no one or nothing to greet me. The chambers ahead of me are roughly semi-circular and match the contours of the hull. There are no bulkheads, merely circular apertures that lead in many directions. The design is neat, elegantly functional, yet comfortable: not sterile like the Discovery of 2001: A Space Odyssey; not utilitarian like the Nostromo. I find a doorway that opens towards the rear of the vessel, and see what must be a hangar bay: a surprisingly large volume, mostly empty but for four small scout ships or runabouts, each of a radically different design. And several machines, in varying states of disrepair, lie scattered around.

- Gravity, I say.

- The vessel is possessed of anti-gravity technology. The hangar deck remains in zero-G in order to maximise available space.

Before me is a ladder. i climb and emerge on what must be the bridge. Forward, there are two control stations, set beneath a large view screen currently showing the forward path of the ship. Behind them is what I guess to to be the captains seat. I test it. The upholstery is proto-sentient and instinctively compliant to the needs of my body. Above and behind, there is a sort of gallery, accessed by another ladder. I climb to find a bedroom: a capacious bed with huge down pillows and a coverlet of black, shot through with gold. The walls are lined with books from my house on Earth [including the Common Sense of Nudism, Olaf Stapledon's Star Maker, an Uncle Oojah Annual and my 23 copies of The Twilight of The Vilp]. Many of my favourite curiosities are here too: the stuffed chicken which, to my chagrin, is fast becoming my hallmark; my collection of antique syringes; my furry mangrove seed, my Henry Bolte candle, my hookah, my vagina vase, and my set of masonic aprons.


I notice a flexible urpolymer arm attached to an abbreviated control console. This is designed to extend and then hover above the bed. From here a captain could control the vessel, refuel from the atmosphere of gas giants, spar with armoured vacuumed-adapted gastropods, and rescue drifting Breeder Barges - all without leaving his bed. I realise that I could lie in this bed, dim the lights, pour myself some wine, murder a doobie ... and explore the boundless universe at my leisure.

Irresistible.

I shuck my suit. Ease myself beneath the covers. They are of an unknown fabric, yet comprise the most comfortable bedding I have yet experienced. Instinctively, I know that I need not bother sweeping the sheets for toenails, daggs and flea eggs.

For a time I watch the stars approach and fall behind. I watch the Triffid and the Horsehead Nebulae sweep by. I see ancient giga-structures built by lost civilizations of the Hydrogen Era. I see the vast wheel-like accretion disc of a black hole, orbiting a black hole I cannot see...

Then I sleep, having named the starship "Ørn"

spore zombie

~ The Devil's Hexagons

I woke in the late afternoon and was shambling into the lounge room when a huge barbed psychic harpoon tore through the wall, winged Jenny who was reclining on the couch, and buried itself deep in the opposite wall - where the surrounding brickwork changed in its nature to become a form of highly reflective crystal. The Slammerkin were silent, their vile scaled bodies huddled together in fear.

The air became dishwater, the surfaces around me softened, beginning the process of decay. The Deadly Spores were in the room - and in overwhelming force. A blitzkrieg so powerful there was nothing to be done but ride it out.

The crystalline substance was propagating, cracking along the fault lines, disgorging more crystal. Rays of light lanced randomly about the room, in searing colours from an impossible spectrum, seeking non-spore substance, seeking flesh.

Already, Jenny was speaking in an aberrant voice, of things she would not have thought to say prior to the attack. Wearisome things. Ghastly things painted to entice.

Myself, I could not speak, and impotently shook my head from side to side. All efforts resulted in an involuntary spastic flailing that left me weaker and further disassociated. I reached deep into myself for the power to resist, but found nothing. I was buffeted on an angry tide of those most deadly spores, the elite among their kind, the long-range infiltrators, called by some The Nebula.

We were locked in a crystal prison. I watched with resignation as the walls made popping and fizzing noises, briefly became glass, and then were lined with dripping hexagons, honeycomb, each cell oozing a viscous tan fluid sweeter than the mind could bear.

And I gorged on that irresistible slime, forgetting the sweet lies coming like a black stream from Jenny's mouth, forgetting myself, and my purposes.

Few can prevail against such an onslaught, but fortunately its very ferocity seemed to drain - at least temporarily - the distributed power of the Deadly Spores. There was, thankfully, time after that to regroup.

The following day, we participated in a small war council. Organised resistance to the Spores is rare. There are larger entities claiming to address the problem, but on the ground it is almost always a personal thing. Soldiers must fight alone, and are often too psychically compromised to risk friendly contact. Their tactics, also, are often too private to divulge.

But from time to time there are small, brief gatherings where intelligence may be shared, strategies evolved and heads bent in desperate prayer.

We left the council and lay together for a time listening to the new P J Harvey album, White Chalk. It seemed like we had made it through.

For one day, I continued to believe that we had survived the attack unmarred, but tonight I saw dark clouds in Jenny's eyes and a cold alien wisdom directing her desires.

~ I Meet With a Zoroastrian

After the third performance of The Liquid Tempest, I returned to the in-house bar for my second red wine. I was served by an unfamiliar person, perhaps a little older than the average Union Arts employee and of a curiously elusive ethnicity. Her name was Gova

I attempted to guess her nationality. Mediterranean? Mongolian? Burmese?

"I am Persian, but also Indian. I am a Zoroastrian."

I was immediately fascinated. I inquired about the plague that has driven the vultures of India to near extinction and Gova confirmed that it was indeed a problem. The Zoroastrians [also known as Parsees] leave their dead in Towers of Silence for consumption by the vultures, but since the outbreak there have been too few birds and a hygiene issue has arisen. I did not ask if Gova expects her corpse to be torn apart by vultures, but I would think she does.

She was flattered by my interest and my - albeit patchy - knowledge. I had never met a Zoroastrian and found myself a little in awe of this heir to a tradition so ancient it predates Christ, Mohammad and The Buddha. Indeed, it is the oldest surviving monotheistic religion and opens a dream channel to the accursed city of Nivenah; the bone-deep horror of winged deities with dour faces, wrought in old stone; ghastly demons rising from bleached desert ruins, summoned from a time before man gained knowledge of himself. Gova was not insulted that I found her religion terrifying.

She showed me the golden pendants that hung about her neck. One, an image of the prophet Zarathustra. The other: Ahura Mazda, their fearsome winged creator. She made no mention of the Zoroastrian Satan, Angra Mainyu, nor the hosts of fabulous angels, angel-like animals, and demons.

I asked how one became a Zoroastrian, thinking that if ever I embraced religion this might be an interesting path. Gova explained that one needed to be born into it, and that there were only 200,000 true exponents of the faith remaining in the world. Their most holy sites are in Iran: temples housing flames that have burned since history began. These fires are fueled by gas escaping from underlying deposits of fossil fuel.

A Zoroastrian Tower of Silence

Wonderful that this piece of living history should so enjoy the crazy Leigh Bowery inspired tomfoolery of The Liquid Tempest.

~ The Secret of The Moon Girl's Bracelets

At last the play is over. All those vital young new friends will pass, inevitably, into my history.

The sensual Flynn [Miranda] with his honeyed voice. Just out of school and ravenous for life. In a way, he reminds me of Michael Hutchence. Something about his soft, gentle manner... If it was a path he wished to tread, I could imagine him up there, under the par-cans, writhing in snakeskin.

The marvelously good-looking Ben played the Caliban - Michael Alig character [pictured below]. He has a clear and present taste for well carbonated beauty. Each night there was a selection of sparkling eyefuls. On the last night, he brought his girlfriend. She looked at me as if I was a stray, sauce-smeared paper bag which the wind had just flattened onto her dress. Almost certainly my fault, though I can't recall exactly what I did to elicit the reaction. You see, I just can't control my excitement around these people and - with some inducement from the Slammerkin - I start to believe I'm Oscar Wilde. Something similar also happened the previous night. A friend of The Moon Dancer [Kristine] began to cry after a barrage of weird comments escaped my big mouth. I tried to console her, but merely scared her. Again, I have no idea what I actually said, but the culmination certainly involved the word emo.

Kristine, who is from Norway, gave Polly her bracelets to look after during the show. I was a little worried as it seemed like fairly good jewellery, but Kristine was serious and Polly was treating them as if they were 24 carat gold. Afterwards, Polly reverently returned the bracelets and Kristine gifted her one. There was something sweetly emotional about this whole transaction, as if Kristine had been reenacting an event from her childhood. As for my child, it was a beautiful little lesson in responsibility & trust.

There was trouble with the trains late last night and we didn't get home till 12.30am. Very late for a four year old, but she had a whale of a time, twirling every adult she met around her tiny little finger with a subtle mixture of shyness and charm. I left her in the care of Camilla Z, while I dashed backstage to grab my brief-case. I returned five minutes later to find her preaching to a circle of eight cross-legged smiling adults.

~ The Pastilles of Cantharides

I am in the supermarket, regarding the long aisle of breakfast cereals. How long have I been here? I am unsure. But I am nearly certain I was also here last night, standing in this exact same place. Evidence: a gouged out box of nutri-grain on the coffee table at home.

I feel myself slipping into a trance state. I stare at the vast tableau of cereals and meditate upon them, seeking their essence. I observe that they are arranged by wholesomeness. On one end lie the froot loops, coco pops, then all the many gradations through to oats and muesli.,

Suddenly, I notice something out of place in this careful arrangement. One comes to the vita brits, the weet bix and then.... the crunchy nut cornflakes - a product no sane person could claim to be healthier than wheat biscuits.

I suspect this is not an innocent mistake, knowing that the shelves of supermarkets are disputed territories, that space is fought for, and paid for, by the food corporations. I believe that this minutely controlled display is attempting to convince me, subliminally, that crunchy nut cornflakes are not just another of the junk food cereals, but may be fed guiltlessly to my family - that they are, indeed, better for you than weet bix.

On my way home - another box of nutri-grain in my possession - I begin to doubt myself. Could the Food Moguls really be that subtle? Was the aisle really designed so cunningly? Then I wonder if I am being paranoid? Then I recall a quote from the movie Strange Days:

"Paranoia is just reality at a finer definition.'


*

The play is improving. People are relaxing into their roles. I had a few moments of sheer enjoyment.

Really, I am very lucky to have this opportunity to pout and pose. I can behave as grotesquely as I like, without the pressures one experiences in a more serious production. This one is fun, nothing more, nothing less.

There was a terrific vibe afterwards, though the audience was smaller than on opening night. I had some interesting and bizarre conversations. One with a photographer named Bret, who caught my attention with a line something like - 'I have to say, I thought your acting was absolutely fantastic'. Who am I to question his sincerity? He took some wonderful photos, some of which I'll display here, if I can. They look like stills from a Ziggy Stardust concert.

Also a fellow named Shea, an artist who has worked on Neil Gaiman's Sandman comics. And Kylie, who introduced me to concept which will disturb and sicken me till the day I die. A friend of hers was given to visiting the whores with all manner of offbeat requests. The strangest of his perversions involved flatulence. He would feed the women various foodstuffs - Kylie was vague on this. I imagined cabbages, onions; she mentioned lollies - then wait for their digestive processes to almost conclude. At this point, he would encourage them to fart and, burying his face deep in their buttocks, he would savour the diverse aromas.

The Marquis de Sade would feed women pastilles containing Spanish Fly in order to induce flatulence, but I don't know whether he went so far as to categorise and compare, as this thing of darkness apparently did.

*

Below are the photos I spoke of in the post entitled Doppelganger! Handsome devil ... The female is Mary Ellen Hill, sister of Allanah.

tempest

*
opening night

the monster Caliban

the mage Prospero

the beautiful Camilla

~ Bursting with Vile Fluids

It is opening night and my brains are boiled within my skull. You see, the lizard-like Slammerkin are swarming behind the walls at RMIT, transmitting their jabbering voices into my head. Unfortunately, Lynne has purchased a fat old wine cask, bursting with vile fluids, for Stephano to heft on stage in place of a hogshead - and very little telepathic effort was required by the Slammerkin to force me to the teat of that poisonous bladder.

I speak of the Spores and their dire evil, but during the comfortable intervals, when their influence is marginal, often the Slammerkin will come forth with insidious mind speech, creeping red miasmas and invisible beams of dehydrating orgones. Perhaps I will wear a defensive foil cap tonight. I need to do something, as this miserable lexia hangover has all but incapacitated me.

Jenny and Polly are home and we are a family again. Jenny is bubbling, sleepless and proud of her war efforts - as she deserves to be.

Also, I am becoming increasing concerned for the welfare of Posh Spice. Yesterday I saw her image in the MX, posing as stiff and as inhumanly thin as a barbie doll beside the other Spice Girls, who seemed mature, womanly and who were smiling, rather than pouting. Posh is an enigma. Can a human being truly be as devoid of personality as this woman seems to be? I wonder if there is some fragile nugget of character confined somewhere in there, behind the expensively maintained skull?

Could she have a conversation that stretched beyond furniture, beauty products and money? Or is she - as the evidence suggests - a replicant - your basic pleasure model - who has somehow made her way to earth from the Outer Colonies?

I was told an astonishing story this morning. Apparently Posh was photographed from above at one of her poor husband's soccer matches and a bald patch was noticed [and magnified, and scrutinised] at the back of her head. This is a sure sign of anorexia, I believe, but Posh's response was to fly swiftly to Switzerland, or somewhere equivalent, and have some kind of hair piece put in place. This astounds me. The woman is nothing but an image. An ambulatory manniquin. One tiny imperfection and she whips into emergency mode, calling up her strike team and burning carbon across the Atlantic. No matter that it is a symptom of illness. No concern at resources wasted on a thing that, in essence, is of absolutely no significance whatsoever.

~ Doppelganger!

After rehearsals for The Liquid Tempest, I took Lynne, [my rock and my true preserver,] to see Steve Kilbey and David Bridie perform at a nearby club. The experience was restorative - no whiff of Spore activity on the air - a little wine, a little scoob and friends I have known so long their simple presence is sufficient to boost my spirits. Bruce Butler was there - with his onboard bio-encycolpaedia of pop culture - Simon Pool with his ever more toxic tongue. And Steve with his wickedness, his sweetness, and his surrealistic bandroom antics. He has been reading a treatise on jealousy and tells me that if you come upon your lover in flagrante delicto with another, and if it is she/he you shoot and not the interloper - then you are not experiencing jealousy, but instead envy.

David Bridie [with Steve on bass] played a version of Another Girl Another Planet, a song which I used to love but had forgotten. I found I knew every word by heart, but couldn't remember the name of the band who played it until today; It was The Only Ones. Late Seventies. A singer called, I think, Pete Perret. All so long ago now ...

Excitedly, Donald Baldie showed me some photos he had taken with his phone of a young man named Sacha. I recognised myself immediately and so did everyone else. The resemblance was breathtaking - and I had a freaky feeling. I was immediately envious of his youth. There is someone trolling Melbourne with an updated version of my head. I did not ask about the body and the brain, but I surely will. Am I superseded? He couldn't be identical, surely? Did Donald catch a few lucky angles? Not at all, he states with certainty. And then there's the question of this Sacha's geneology. Might I have known his mother ... some twenty years ago...?

Because I had to catch the last train home, I left well before the end, but I left in a floating mood, my body suspended in formalin, my skull rattling with sapphires and emeralds. I arrived home to find Tweety Bird in an extremely heightened state, pursuing a giant cartoon rat about the house, balling it up in a corner, then chasing it again. The hunt was a long one. That night was punctuated by rat cries of fear ...

Jenny is at her sister's house in Crib Point, recovering from the recent skirmishes. I am optimistic, I can almost believe that we have quelled the moiling evil that lives in our hearts, but I know that can never truly be so. The house is well-defended, distant from known spore encrustations, and if Jenny can last the distance there, she will soon be eligible for the implantation of Brightworks. Oh, praise that day, if it ever comes ...


*

A note on The Sails of Oblivion - I'm aiming, at this early stage, for at least three posts per week. As I find my feet, I might increase that. Thanks for your comments Steve, gavgams, and Amanda. Encouraging.

PS - Amanda, I was recently alerted to the existence of three venerable Beargarden clips on YouTube. Very nostalgic. And very Eighties. I'm almost done being embarrassed by the haircut.