My friends Grant, Graeme and Gustav enjoying the show from the front row.
The world is far too small.
I was just going through some clips on Youtube of one of my favourite bands, Alcazar.
They’re a Swedish pop group whose most successful hit song in Australia was “Crying At The Discoteque”. It’s also one of my all-time favourite songs.
They also did a terrific cover of “This Is The World We Live In”.
And I just came across some amateur footage of them taken in Stockholm this week and guess what?
My friends Grant and Graeme can both be seen (back of their heads), enjoying the show from the front row.
Graeme has written a brief note about on his blog about meeting Petra, by the way…
Petra Mede sat at our table during the show – I was subtle: ‘OH MY GOD, YOU’RE PETRA MEDE, YOU HOSTED MELODIFESTIVALEN THIS YEAR, YOU WERE FANTASTIC!’ Like I said, real subtle. Petra ate calimari and had a coke while sitting with us and watchinbg Magnus. I asked her for a photo later and she asked about coming from Australia etc. Told her that we watched Melodifestivalen final in a pub in Sydney on the big screen. She is a genuinely lovely lady.
For about a year now, I’ve been using a temporary prosthetic leg, thanks to Enable NSW. It’s a state government initiative, though it’s actually funded by the Federal Government. The temporary leg was necessary for a few reasons, primarily because residual limb volume can fluctuate significantly in the first few years after an amputation. To manage this, I wear a shrinker at night to help my residual limb maintain a consistent size and shape.
Today, I received my brand new prosthetic leg! It’s lighter and smaller than the temporary one, and I’m hoping it will be more flexible thanks to a new foot and ankle.
While many people choose to personalize their prosthetics with designs featuring everything from spider webs to their favorite bands or sports teams, I opted for a more natural look. I thought of it as a flesh tone, but my prosthetist called it beige. (So boring!) The past year has taught me that it’s more fun to accessorize with seasonal decorations for holidays like Christmas or Mardi Gras than to commit to a permanent design.
I’ve been warned that breaking in a new prosthetic can be uncomfortable, but so far, so good! I’ve decided to name this leg “Albert” after my dad, and I plan to name my future waterproof prosthetic “Bertha” after my mum. They’ve both been instrumental in helping me walk, both literally and figuratively.
For some people I kinda get the impression “Yum Cha” has become the modern version of going to church. Not so much for the religious aspect (obviously), but for the way in which people gather and socialise.
I got a text-message from Damien (TOD – The Other Damien, as he shall now been known as) to join him and a few friends for a catch-up this morning. Along with his wife, there were two or three people I’ve met previously, and some other people (work colleagues) I’ve never met before. It’s something he organises from time to time.
Fifty years ago, we would have been meeting at church. Now we’re meeting over pork buns and mango pudding.
It’s Sunday afternoon and I think I’m still getting over last night. We had a planning afternoon/evening for our School Reunion which involved a fair amount to eat and a fair amount to drink. Although I went to bed reasonably sober, and I don’t feel as though I’ve pushed by body to extremes, it was a full night, nonetheless.
The last week has been reasonably interesting.
On Monday night, Graeme and I went to see a movie called, “Spellbound” which was about the National Spelling Bee Competition held annually in America. Although I was never really “touched” by the movie, I did find it fascinating and found a couple of the characters to be genuinely endeering.
Tuesday was spent mostly at home, and doing a bit of cleaning here and there in preparation for this weekend’s School Reunion Planning Meeting.
On ABBAMAIL this week some of the discussion has centred around media coverage of the Agnetha story and in particular a newspaper article in the UK which many have labelled as indicate of the “worst of the British press”. Yawn…
So I wrote to the list
I’d just like to offer a brief word in defence of tabloid journalism.
Although I work at the so-called “quality end” of journalism, I have a great deal of respect for tabloid newspapers for several reasons.
1. They’re usually packed full of news. Most of the articles are very brief and to the point. If you’re just looking for the basic facts so you can make up your own mind about an issue they have a lot to offer.
2. They’re usually very entertaining. Many of the articles are written with toungue-firmly-in-cheek and with a great deal of humour. They’re also usually the stories that get people talking.
3. They cover entertainment news. The so-called “serious press” often considers discussion of ABBA, Kylie etc. to be very low-brow. When they do write about some of our favourites it’s usually in a sneering tone, unlike the tabloids who generally write about our favourites with a degree of fondness. For example, my ABBA scrapbooks contain countless articles from the so-called tabloids, yet very few from the so-called quality press.
4. They’re very widely read. Just because someone reads a tabloid newspaper, it doesn’t mean they’re an idiot who unquestioningly accepts everything they read. The figures indicate tabloid papers are read by a very wide spectrum of the public for a broad range of reasons.
That said… I recognise there are some problems with tabloid journalism… and that’s why I don’t work in the industry. But I’m not about to generalise and say it’s all trash, when there are many good things about tabloid newspapers.
This ambivelance that some ABBA fans feel towards the tabloid newspapers reminds me of a scene from Absolutely Fabulous… the one where Patsy is being hounded by the press for her affair with the politician. To Edina and Patsy’s comment that the press are scumbags, Saffie responds: “One minute they’re scum and the next your pouring booze down their throats in the name of PR. Which one is it gonna be?”
On Thursday and Friday, I mostly stayed at home, not doing very much at all. Just enjoying my holiday. Sue and I went to the video shop earlier in the night to pick up a few movies, since we have now entered the non-ratings period for television which is now total crap.
Anthony arrived from Canberra on Friday night and we spent most of that evening just hanging around at home watching episodes of “Tales Of The City”. While Sue went to university on Saturday, Anthony and I spent most of the day hanging out around Darling Harbour, having a beer or two along the way which was fun before finally coming back, watching more Tales Of The City and then preparing for the arrival of Jacqui and Louise.
We had a lovely afternoon/evening of chatting, reminiscing, eating, boozing and watching “Muriel’s Wedding‿?. Present were Sue Bazzana, Anthony Baker, Louise Brooks (and her partner Don), Jacki Muir (Podd), James O’Brien (and via teleconference link – Pat Ryan).
We decided on the Queen’s Birthday Weekend (June 12/13) so that people have time to travel, but it’s a weekend that people don’t often go away. Drinks on Friday night, Activities/Tourism on Saturday, Dinner/Disco on Saturday night, Family Picnic on Sunday at venues in one town so that people can book accommodation themselves if they want to stay over.
We discussed a range of ideas including a disco, a power-point presentation of old photographs and trivia questions on programs for the night.
Richmond River High School
Locating Students: Thanks to Year 12 Yearbook, we have a list of all of those who completed Year 12 and many of those who left earlier. It was agreed we’d set December 14 as a cut-off date to get the list as complete as possible. We also compiled a list of all of our teachers.
On Sunday morning, Anthony , Sue and I had an informal discussion about the importance of having money for dinner etc. early and raised the possibility of someone who works in a bank/credit union etc in Lismore being the main point of money collection. Janelle?
Anyway… we have an action plan which we intend to implement over the next four weeks, so by Christmas we should be well on our way.
You know what I hate? TV promos where they don’t actually tell you when the show will actually screen, aside from the fairly generic “coming to this station soon”. I don’t watch enough television, and I don’t go through the television guide regularly enough to be able to keep an eye out for something that looks good, unless they can tell me when and where it’s on. As soon as I see a TV promo for something that looks good, I want to be able to go straight to my recorder and put in the details, or at least make a diary entry. If I don’t, I forget all about it. Thankfully, the promotion for the Boy George bio-pic, “Worried About The Boy” was quite precise, and it’s been in my diary as a “must watch”. A couple of years after it first screened on UK television, it was screened this week on Australian television, and I watched it last night with some anticipation.
I’ve always been a bit of a fan of Boy George. I remember the first time I heard “Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?” as if it was yesterday, and I have strong memories of playing it on community radio as a teenager. I remember there was quite a bit of anxiety about it at the time. “He’s the drag queen, isn’t he”? people would say, even though it went fairly quickly to the top of the charts. After the end of Culture Club, I remember with fondness his involvement in the song, “No Clause 28” and then later, songs like “Generations Of Love” and “The Crying Game” became firm favourites. I’ve always liked his music, and I’ve always liked the rebellious George. And when he got hooked on heroin, and when he went to gaol, I felt genuine sadness.
“We’re worried about you George” is the phrase I most remember from this bio-pic. It’s from a scene where the paparazzi is standing outside his house in the midst of the “George On Heroin” controversy. It’s a phrase that rang true. I think the public was genuinely concerned about him. He seemed to be an ordinary working class boy – not one of your middle class pop stars – who succeeded through sheer talent and then found himself in the midst of all the terrible addictions that can go with pop star status. It’s a phrase his father re-iterates later in the movie.
I haven’t read his autobiography which came out a few years ago, but from what I can see the movie was pretty much based on that. I notice, however, from a bit of background reading, a few of the characters from his early life have been left out, and some of the names have been changed. In particular, the name of one of his great early loves. In his autobiography, for example, George claims a relationship with Kirk Branden from the band, Spear Of Destiny (who I LOVED, by the way, possibly mostly due to Kirk). In a celebrated court case, Kirk denied the relationship, though the character remains in the film. Interestingly, the character of Marilyn is evident in the film, though I was never really quite sure about the nature of their friendship/relationship from watching the movie. I suppose that’s part of the problem of any bio-pic, isn’t it? How do you compact ten years of someone’s life into ninety minutes?
Despite its weaknesses, I really quite enjoyed the film. I loved seeing scenes from The Blitz (the club run by Steve Strange) which, as a teenager in a small Australian country town, I’d only read about in magazines like “The Face”. I loved getting an insight into relationships within the band, including a better understanding of George’s relationship with Jon Moss, for example. And I also loved hearing some wonderful tunes from my late teens which I haven’t listened to in quite some time.
So if you get a moment or two to watch, I think it’s worth keeping an eye out for.
If you can’t find ninety minutes, try this five minute video clip from a couple of years ago. It’s a GREAT SONG which revisits some of the Boy George story also.
P.S. It’s not Boy George in the clip, it’s a modern recreation.
It was the end of a memorable night at The Andrew Olle Media Lecture, the annual cross-media shindig in Sydney.
The lecture was delivered by Ray Martin whose central thesis was that good commercial television journalism is often supported by passionate media individuals, the likes of Murdoch and Packer. When media companies are run by banks and other financial institutions only looking at the bottom line, he argued demonstrably that journalism isn’t well supported in the commercial television sector. As I walked around the room at the end of the night chatting to people, the general vibe was that it was an interesting, well-timed, and well-delivered speech.
One of the funniest lines, though of the night, was delivered by the ABC’s Managing Director Mark Scott, who spoke about last year’s controversial decision to pull the feed from Channel 9 because of their use of the “debate worm”. Steadfastly denying it was his decision (as briefly reported), he said it just wouldn’t happen at the ABC. “I’d dare say any decision to pull the plug would have been mitigated by several committee meetings, until eventually a few weeks down the track the plug would have been pulled”. I’m reasonably sure the loudest amount of laughter in response came from our table, as we all knew exactly what he meant.
After the event was well and truly wrapped a few of us ended up at Ivy, arguably’s Sydney’s grooviest place at the moment, via the Marble Bar.
“Hey James, this guy’s an ABBA fan”, my colleague said to me last night on the fringe of the dance floor at Ivy. She’d met him moments earlier and they were getting along famously, it seems.
It was then she told him I’d been learning Swedish and had recently been to Sweden. “Let me tell you mate”, he said. “If you’re gay and that’s true, that’s really cool, and good on ya, that’s great stuff. But if you’re straight and that’s true, that’s kinda weird”. With apologies to straight male ABBA fans, we both laughed in agreement. “I’m guessing it’s more likely the former than the latter”, he said, and we laughed again.
A few minutes later some cool music came on the sound system and so I thought I’d leave them alone for a moment and go have a dance. “Tell me honestly”, I said to my colleague. “Do you think I can hop on the dance floor for a bit of a groove or am I just gonna look like a tragic 43 year old man in a dinner suit trying to look young?”, I asked.
Generally it’s a bad look, though, isn’t it? A group of well-dressed adult to middle-aged men and women who’ve just been to some sort of corporate function and then find themselves at some groovy bar surrounded by young folk. I kinda think we carried it off okay, though, and had a great time.
I felt like a double-agent as I sat and quietly had a beer at one of the local pubs in Lismore this afternoon. It’s a pub which has been traditionally a very “working man’s pub”, but which seems to have embraced the LBTIQ+ Tropical Fruits celebration this year, with lots of rainbow flags. They also seem to be running regular LBTIQ+ drinks on Fridays, at other times of the year.
As I walked in, I could seen in the eyes of the barman he wasn’t sure if I was here for Tropical Fruits, or if I was there, because it’s a pub I regularly visit when I’m home for Christmas. (It’s on the way home from town). In the end, I think he worked it out that I was home for Christmas (I knew too much about Lismore to be a blow-in from Sydney), but was probably here for Tropical Fruits as well.
And that’s my dilemma. I’m here for Christmas, but I’ll also be here for Tropical Fruits NYE, though I haven’t bought a ticket yet. Though I quite enjoy parades and exhibitions (which are part of Tropical Fruits NYE), I’m not one for big big dance parties. Part of me says, “hey, get over it”, though part of me also says it’s quite an expensive night that may not be worth it.
All around Lismore, shop windows are celebrating the Tropical Fruit festival.
There’s an exhibition of Tropical Fruits themed photography at the Fox Photo Den on Union Street, South Lismore. (This was the venue I grew up knowing as Hurfords Saw Mill)Even the Merry Christmas sign outside the City Hall pays tribute to LBTIQ+ culture.As the Tropical Fruits festival gets underway in Lismore, I wandered past this house in South Lismore and remember in the 1980s, when this was the first gay venue in the area, Double Dutch restaurant.
As I sat and listened to the blokes in the pubs, they spoke about the changes they’ve seen in their lives. “My dad always used to say…”. This was generally followed up with, “I don’t mind, so long as they don’t…” And then finally with “It’s good for the town’s economy, and God knows we need some help…”
Will I go to Tropical Fruits NYE? Maybe I should, if only to support the economy of the city in which I was born and raised?
