Arachnophobia...

I was almost killed in my bedroom yesterday.

Woke up ("YAWWWWN"), stretched, got out of bed, and went to open the bedroom door stopping when reaching for the doorknob. "What the heck is that?" I wondered to myself as I bent down for a closer look. Some spider-looking shiny black spider had taken up residence in the space around the door jamb. Thinking of your garden variety American house spider, I paid it little mind thinking I'll just sweep it up after work.

When I finally did get home and went to take care of it, I decided to just have at it with the broom and kill it. In the final stages of the struggling to best the eight-legged monster, I noticed the rather bright red patterning on it's back. Quickly running my mind back over Bill Bryson's "In a Sunburned Country" I realized that this was actually a DEADLY SPIDER! And I ain't talking about Spiderman 3's alter ego either.

The mind shies away from how close I came to being spider fodder.

All I could see around my house all last night were visions of the spiders clicking their oozing mandibles and coming at me. Like when Robin Williams' character was trapped in the attic floor in the movie Jumanji. Chittering their nefarious chittering about how much more tasty Americans are than Australians because they don't taste like Vegemite.

Shudder.

As one Australian I related the story to said to me, "Ah mate! That's just the one you saw!" A second helpfully said, "Yeah, I tried to spray insecticide outside but that just meant they came inside to get away from it." While another added, "You're lucky it wasn't in your bed. Oh and I'll bet you'll shake out your shoes before you put them on too, huh?"

So, just how did they kill the beasties in Arachnophobia. Dr. Ross Jennings? I think I need some help here!

- Farmer Ted

"Bart! Stop pestering satan."

It's like you're always paying the devil.

What I've found here in Australia is that the entire economy appears to be run by very few large corporations or concerns. Practically like in the movie Rollerball. A contraversial TV/radio commentator here, Alan Jones, has been quite on a tear lately that one of the reasons prices in Australia are so high is because of this lack of true competition.

This was brought home to your ex-pat Farmer Ted when I went into a Tandy store to buy a clock radio so I could actually get up on time for work. Now, all Americans know that Tandy is where you go to buy no-frills items at no-frills prices. So I was suprised to see a veritable stable of Dick Smith Electronics branded products available (Dick Smith is a huge retailer of electronics goods at huge prices). So I asked the clerk why there are so many Dick Smith products in the store. "Oh, Tandy is owned by Dick Smith. And Dick Smith is owned by Woolworths," he replied, adding, "it's all the same these days, mate."

So trying to get away from Coles, Telstra, and Woolworths grip on competition in Australia is tantamount poking a stick at Satan. Like in The Simpsons episode "Treehouse of Horror IV":

Bart: I'd sell my soul for a formula one racing car.
[Satan Ned appears with a race car]
Ned: Heh heh heh, that can be arranged.
Bart: Changed my mind. Sorry.
[Ned vanishes] Cool!
Marge: Bart! Stop pestering Satan.

Just substitute "true marketplace competition" for "formula one racing car", and the CEO of Woolworths for Ned and you get what it seems like it would take here.

But sometimes the price is just too high.

- Farmer Ted

Becoming Mac-cool...

Now that I'm here, I ordered a Macintosh. And can you blame me? With all the press today about Vista already being targeted and hacked. Plus maintaining my XP machine takes hours, what with antivirus software, disk scans, anti-spyware, and endless "Click here to download the latest update" balloons.

I've given up.

We all remember fondly using Mac's in school. How simple and fun it was and so... well, kiddish. Then we graduated and went out into the big wide world. Replete with suits, paychecks, rent, and Microsoft. Was this really the price of growing up?

Well, I've decided to go back to what I learned in kindergarten. I've ordered a Mac mini with all the trimmings not just because it's not Windows but because it's so f*kin' cool I can't stand it.

What I didn't count on was the difference in price in Australia versus the US. Now I know about exchange rates and all, but how Macintosh in the US can cost half again as much Down Under is beyond the pale. Even in cheerful Australian dollars it's a ripoff. Someone is making money on this and I'd like to know who. I was thinking at first it was that very droppable "Mac" guy in the Macintosh ads (Apple? Are you listening? John Hodgman is freakin' HILARIOUS and you got a drip to play your product) but since he hasn't changed his grey monochromatic togs in for FUBU, I figure it must be the Australian government.

Johnny? John Howard? Where's my refund? Psh! No wonder you're smilin'...

- Farmer Ted

Farmer Ted, on station...

Well it finally happened. Your Farmer Ted has officially become, er, Farmer "Aussie" Ted after having emigrated to The Land Down Under. Here for a few years.

It's really odd thinking about being an American in Australia after all the posts I've written since my first "Observing the Aussies". Will I continue to observe these differences? Well, from my vantage point on the porch of the station, I certainly hope so. Even though Pinchy (a great mate from Sydney) seems to think I'm developing a rather lopsided view of this land by not living in the great state of New South Wales and more pointedly, Sydney.

But I don't think it's going to be a problem since it keeps smacking me in a face with rather a lot of vigor. For example, what are those round rubber air-filled things your car drives on? Here they are called "tyres". Something which caused giggles amongst my American co-workers here for meetings since the last time we saw that in the US it was a reference on The Discover Channel to an extinct city in Phoenicia.

Truthfully, I'm enjoying being here. I've gotten the usual "We're gonna visit!" from my countrymen all the while knowing they won't (after all, being American I know that and count on it). I've also gotten several stunned "So you really DID do it!" from my Australian friends along with an offer of their liver to help me keep up in the pub (see my post "They Make the world go round...").

I think I'm gonna make it after all.

- Farmer Ted

Six degrees...

By now everyone around the world has heard about the massacre at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg VA. Big questions will always remain about why this happened, how it could be prevented, and which entity is culpable for what are arguably missteps by authorities all around.

But it took on a more personal note for me when I realized a co-worker had a daughter attending the university. Upon checking with the person last night, I found out to my great relief that their daughter was fine; but that she was the roommate of one of the students murdered.

That really set my mind back.

I remember similar fears: when I was in Paris attending classes in the 90's a subway bombing happened in a train at the stop by our residence. I remember us all counting our classmates, trying mobiles to locate the missing folks. Were any on that train? I remember when the last group of students came rushing in. How we all started hugging each other crying tears of relief - males & females. You just couldn't help it. Turns out this last group had been on the doomed train but had gotten off the stop before and were still on the platform when it exploded shortly down the tunnel.

The memories this event stirred up made me realize how much we are all connected and sometimes by a very short social distance. It's that "six degrees of separation" theory made real. Like between me and the happenings at Virginia Tech? 3 degrees of separation. Myself and a victim of the WTC on 9/11? 2 degrees. Me and a victim of the OK City bombing? 3 degrees.

But I have more delightful associations too: Between me and a participant in the 1963 March on Washington where Martin Luther King delivered his "I Have A Dream" speech? 1 degree. And between me and a person who held one of the balloon floats in the 2006 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in NYC? 2 degrees.

Which just goes to show that for good or ill, we are all in this together.

- Farmer Ted

Vegemite? Vege-not...

Ok. I've heard enough about Vegemite since I've been here. Australians seem to view their love of vegemite with all the seriousness of Americans and their TV remotes.

Take a guy I know, D-Man, who's physical conditioning is something even Lance Armstrong would envy. I came upon him at lunch spreading the noxious brown goo on toast (THE definitive way to have it, according to those here) waxing poetic about it's virtues.

I don't know about all that.

What I do know is that I've seen the current commercials on TV depicting a kid trying to do his homework under the eyes of his harridan mother. Suddenly through his bedroom door come the ghostly flickering black and white images of the kids from the 1950's "Happy Little Vegmites" ad; screaming their unholy theme song with the lead "little girl" threatening to beat him senseless with her baton. As the mother looks on indulgently from the doorway, our little hero is feverishly trying to complete his homework before our Little Vegemites, looking for all the world like pop-and-lock escapees from the TV in the movie The Ring, threaten to take his soul and imprison it down a dank black well.

No wonder he gets his homework done in record time. It's a small price to pay to get reprieved from Vegemite hell.

- Farmer Ted

They make the world go round...

The Farmer had to say goodbye this week to one of my first real friends in Australia: Speckie left this week with the four rosies for a position in another state.

What makes a friend? Well, one that when you show up all alone having never been in a country before takes you by the local version of a supermarket just so you know what milk looks like. Or one who makes sure the folks they know should get to know you as well. Or something as simple as making sure you have someone to have a pint with when you're sitting in a hotel on a Saturday night.

It's fascinating how in different countries of the world, each culture has dealt with personal relationships with strangers in different ways. Let's examine three of them: the US, England, and Australia.


Everyone knows how making friends with Americans work: Big as all outdoors, hearty, with a its-been-great-meeting-you-my-friend-and-yes-call-on-me-anytime attitude; and yet when you do phone, the number's been changed.

The English? Stoic and cold outside that comes from living in unheated rooms, but inside they are a firestorm of pent-up emotions. This amply evidenced by the fact that Page 3 of The Sun continues to be the most popular form of... ahem... entertainment. But be careful of the British! Once you get past the stoicism they melt all over you.

The most complex of the lot are Australians. Not satisfied with having two personality layers, they have no less than four.

First, the outer blustery layer - the one that will drink with you until the bars close, and stay after the both of you being thrown out into the gutter, falling asleep singing "Swing Low Sweet Chariot". As dawn breaks and you both wake up covered in roo spit, comes the next layer: amnesia. Not that they don't remember you, just they don't care what your shared experience meant. This allows them to drink with you all night, yet brain you at a business meeting the next day. If you do manage to get past this layer you enter the next one: wary acceptance. This may be evidenced by the use of the phrase "no worries, mate" and have them actually mean it. And finally we have the soppy emotional core. The place where even if you were on fire they'd put you out with their last pint of James Boag. That's when you know you're a true mate.

Yes I owe Speckie a lot, I reckon. And if he's reading this, let it be known that you are the best kind of human being. The best kind of Australian. And you will be missed.

- Farmer Ted