Me? I stopped making resolutions years ago. Dunno why. Maybe I decided I didn't like the self-imposed pressure. Or maybe it all just felt too artificial: like these things should really be something you can resolve on March 23 or July 18 or November 1 and not just January 1.
Have you ever had one of those people sitting near you who talks - loudly and incessantly - about nothing at all an entire flight from takeoff to landing? I heard all about her medical problems, her travel travails, her shopping woes, her hair stylist. And this was only what I heard in-between the use of my noise canceling headphones (thanks to Bose for building a product that recognizes annoying travelers as "noise"). She stood up when the fasten seat belt sign was lit getting reprimanded by the flight staff. She rang the button to get water. Instead of any normal beverage she wanted "milk and amaretto, please - to settle my stomach," and upon getting it complained "don't you have 2% milk? I don't drink any other kind."
I've got a cold. During this holiday period. And lemme tell ya, there's nothing worse. Just when everyone is happy and boisterous and energetically reveling in the holiday all you feel like doing is sleeping. Well, after you move all the happy, boisterous people out of the immediate vicinity.
The only good thing about it is that, being in the US, a trip to my corner CVS had just about anything I could want in any combination. Fever+congestion? Got that. Cough + congestion? Got something for that. Fever + runny nose + cough? Got that. Congestion + headache + cough? Got a product for that, too. I stood in front of the dazzling array of products for 10 minutes running down my list of symptoms to find a product tailored just for what I had. I wound up - I kid you not - with cold pills you swallow (not chew) that nevertheless tastes like "berry burst".
First Runner Up: THE INFINITY RAZOR, "the razor that NEVER loses its edge!" screams the announcer. Now it's not that I don't really believe them, although I have my doubts, but I figure the chances of this coming to market with the likes of razor giants Gillette and Schick standing ready to quash anything that damages market share as being highly doubtful. But further research turns out why the Big Sharp Wars didn't even count this as a skirmish, earning this the Silver Snake Oil statuette.
Grand Prize: KINOKI FOOT PADS, "detoxify your body while you sleep" according to "ancient japanese reflexology..." Huh? The commercial shows tired people putting these sticky pads on their feet, going to sleep, and then waking up, peeling off the now dirty-looking toxin-laden kinoki pads and refining Einstein's theories over breakfast. Why sleep at a Holiday Inn Express when you can use Kinoki? But I needn't have worried: turns out the pads are embedded with a substance to begin with and moisture from your feet brings out the dark color; earning them the Gold Snake Oil prize.
I think I liked the days of Sam Popeil's company, Ronco, better - what innocence! Sure they may have been hyped to death, and may even have been a bit silly, but at least no one doubted their Veg-O-Matic really worked.
With sincere apologies for a previous post, your humble blogger has seen the actual Australian outback. Two friends at work, Stushie and Ash, own a plane and kindly offered to allow me to accompany them on a little jaunt to a place called Parachilna. Like you, I thought, "What the heck is a Parachilna?" But jumped at the chance to finally see what legend (and Bill Bryson) have made famous.
Our intrepid pilots. That's Ash on the right. Stushie was in the back trying to stop their little one from doing a Linda Blair on us from motion sickness (poor thing!).
The landing strip from the air. People tell me this is actually a GOOD landing strip. While the pilots were pointing to this and saying, "look Ted!" I was looking for a parachute.
Downtown Parachilna at its main intersection. Permanent population: 6. Rush hour must be a b*tch.
But it was fascinating; and Parachilna's Prairie Hotel has the distinct honor of being the place where I lost my "you must eat kangaroo meat" cherry. Also I had emu - which I didn't even know you could eat. So now I've consumed everything on the Australian Coat of Arms - but only because it was on the menu.
Or, believe it or not, pancakes and bacon. Australians view pancakes more as a dessert, and so putting bacon (a savory) which it seems is as distasteful a combination to them as having a slice of bacon with chocolate cake would be to an American.
The only thing in Australia that comes close to combining the two is a version of the pastie (pronounced pass'-tee), an odd pastry that can be made with a meat-filling in one half and a fruit filling in the other. I kid you not.
I can't believe it's Christmas Eve already and there I was, out doing the last-minute running around like everyone seems to do despite their most ardent resolution not to. As I was traveling down the interstate at 70mph (the legal speed limit around here) I was amazed at all the different license plates on the cars blasting past me: Kansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia and New Jersey, to name a few. A veritable checklist of states. People all hurrying to be somewhere special for the holidays.
Surrounded by loving relatives and a joyous congregation, Little Man didn't even fuss: just took it all in with his (from what they tell me) usual wide-eyed curiosity that he seems to view everything in this world, protesting only when the pastor anointed him with three splashes of water.
One of my favorite holiday movies is 1945's "Christmas in Connecticut" starring Miss Barbara Stanwyck. In it, she plays journalist Elizabeth Lane who authors a popular food column in a home style magazine. The movie opens as she writes an article about the perfect Christmas at her perfect country house in Connecticut when in actually she has a one bedroom walk-up in New York City. When she is supposed to host an elaborate party at her supposed house she wails,
That's how I felt trying to get into the Christmas spirit in Australia. I said the right holiday things to people but inside it just didn't feel right. Having only known a norther n hemisphere Christmas with cold weather and short days celebrated with lotsa lights and decorations, having long +90F days and Christmas bbq's just struck an incongruous cord that was simply hard to shake.
Or that despite the fact he's "married" he has an affection for toy dogs and a rather creepy obsession with Ryan Seacrest? What's that about?
The Ute? What? What?
morning light, standing tall
Fact is, in North America seasons are delineated using the crazy idea of the relative positions of the sun. So when the sun is lowest in the sky (solstice with the shortest daylight) marks the beginning of winter. Next time when the sun is midway in the sky, marking the equinox, is the beginning of spring. And so on.
Which is, I guess, as good an interpretation for them as any. But I think they might consider adopting one of the many aboriginal calendars. These can have 4, 5, even 6 or more separate seasons, depending on the particular region, due to Australia's rather diverse climate areas. However unlike the seasonal fiscal calendar in use tied to nothing in particular, these ancient peoples based them on natural yearly phenomenon.
They say you can tell alot about a country by the cars they drive. As my faithful readers will know, I've commented on driving in Australia before; but what I'm after here is not a comment on driving or what they drive, but how the people who drive certain cars are perceived.
For those who don't know, US Senator Larry Craig (R) of Idaho was recently arrested for solicitation of an undercover male police officer in the restroom of a Minnesota airport.
Pretty incredible isn't? Can you figure out what's causing such a striking effect in the photo?
She was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white couple on a crowded Virginia bus one hot July day in 1944, 11 years before Rosa Parks.
Australian rules football - footy - is the national obsession here. AFL, the Australian Football League, is analogous to the NFL in the US with it's own monopoly on franchises, royalties, and random drug testing. The AFL is also very glamorous, grabbing the headlines weekly with doings like "Mad Monday binge ends with man's skull crushed." Ah, those crazy kids.
It's arch rival is rugby, the key organization being the National Rugby League, or NRL. Rugby players can be distinguised by a) no neck from running into each other flat out using their heads as primary protection for the rest of their bodies; and 2) "Duh?" being their wittiest response when they have the unfortunate luck of being put in front of a TV camera. Observe:
But it's been almost a year since I arrived here in Australia for the first time and wrote about sports in Australia. Now I'm even in a footy tipping competition, which is sorta like a football pool in the US only way more organized. So there I am in a field of 3 dozen participants where I've twice won for picking the most winners in any week, much to the chagrin of the Aussies here.
Hmph.
Of course, being the pragmatist, I look and can't see anything. Even when I saw the version where what I was supposed to see was circled. And besides, I know DaVinci was one helluva clever guy but - C'MON! Don't you think if Leo were that clever Dan Brown would have already put it in the book?
But none of those products are available here in Australia. Not sure why given their ready availability throughout the rest of the civilized world. For example, NyQuil; for those with a cold or flu, the greatest invention known to man. One little cap full before bedtime and you sleep so deeply even Rip Van Winkle is envious. But here in Oz? "Sorry, it has both pseudoephedrine (decongestant) and diphenhydramine (antihistamine that also makes you drowsy) in it. You might overdose, or worse, you'll shoot your eye out, kid" the Australian Ministry of Big Brother Knows Best scornfully opines.
At this point Don Vito appeared in his white coat, sporting a huge signet ring with a diamond crusted Rod of Aesculapius. After calling me a troublemaker I was unceremoniously hustled out of the store.
I've determined that as Americans we have no idea what is meant in Australia by the outback. The first thing that springs to mind of most of my countrymen is, of course, Outback Steakhouse; little realizing that coming to this country and asking an Aussie for a Bloomin' Onion is like shaking a red cape in front of a bull.
into the only hardware store and asked if there was another supermarket in town besides the IGA (every town has an IGA). After an uncomfortable silence there followed such a sonorous "NoOooOOOOOo" it set my teeth to rattling. I felt like such a city slicker.
Let's face it, when it comes to self-assembled furniture no one has it down to an art like Ikea. In Pennsylvania, we had the privilege of having the first Ikea in North America so I've been shopping at the place for a long time. Heck my very first apartment was furnished pretty much courtesy of it.
3) Use WORDS on the assembly instructions. Sure I know it's supposed to show how friggin' international Ikea is, but a set of visual instructions like this pictured is why it took hours to get those damn glass doors on. Observe an actual step. Given there are two hinges, what does "3x" mean? And is the word "click" the same in Finnish? I don't think so. Hypocrites, the lot of 'em.
Farmer Ted has many friends in many professions: authors, jewelry designers, financial managers, window hangers, hairdressers - you name it. I also know engineers of all stripes, civil, electrical, and system. One system engineer I know was crowing about what he felt was a cute quote he gleaned from somewhere which he put in front of his customer to describe what he does:
But for a Yank settling here for the first time, they will always seem wondrous.
