l8terZZ

so, im going on this world trip thingy with a bunch of others, and thusly i will not be able to blog much, if at all.
truth be told, i exceeded our download limit about a week ago, so putting up a blog has not been an appealing prospect lately. the bloody online arts handbook at the USyd website is frelling huge.

speaking of handbooks, i had to choose the subjects i wanna do (already) next year to give to my dad, cos apparently usyd dont let you do online enrolment. which i can kinda understand, but its just really annoying. how the hell am i sposed to know what i wanna major in already? the whole point of doing liberal studies was so that i wouldnt have to decide lotsa crap. anyways. im thinking of doing psych (sorry ploy) and philosophy. and arabic. dont ask. i just thought it would be handy to know.

aaaand, last minute shopping for said trip. had to buy shoes, backpack, portable toiletries, batteries, etc. luckily my aunts had lots of foreign money lying around the house, so they just gave me whatever they could find. which was an awful lot, actually.

so merry christmas and new year and all that. or happy 'holiday of non-specific religion/ethnicity'.

ahaha. i will probably be missing out on seeing narnia at the cinemas (sigh) but i did manage to catch a couple of things:

batman begins (finally!) - was heaps, heaps great. and the support cast was drool-worthy. rutger hauer and liam neeson and watanabe and mr freeman, and wilkinson and that freaky doctor guy. sigh. and caine made a really good alfred. katie holmes was a little bit if-fy, but a 'girl' character was necessary, i suppose. and where were the roses that were meant to be a motif when the parents died? hello? oh - and gary oldman as gordon was the bestest casting decision ever. it was like all the kids who had watched the first bunch of batman movies had grown up to watch this new one. im sure the ppl who loved it were all the old gang, who have tapes of the kilmer/keaton/clooney batmans. i loved gotham, and the train and everything. and that guy with the nice coat. i just thought the policeman shoulda looked more like the drones from the other movies. but thats just me trying to simplify.

the new zorro movie - was pretty cool. no hopkins, so meh, but banderas was funny, and zeta-jones was kinda amusing. the fight scenes she got to do were really funky. rufus sewell was the coolest baddie, although what was with his accent... mix of english+try-hard spanish, and he was meant to come from france...? shoulda used whoever zeta-jones' voice coach was. and the kid was pretty cute. the storyline was what you would expect, if a bit too 'i wanna be american cos they are so cool!'.

the spicks and specks xmas edition was sooooo good. alan's drumming, and simon tedeschi in an elf uniform, refusing to do any 'schlepping'. and lano and woodley's child choirs doing substitute with the '12 days of xmas' and the fifth ashes test scorecard ('warne caught vaughn!'...'tait not out one / all out for 3hundred and sixty...seven'). and dave on the bike, and all the 'watch and learn, rove' moments. and that game when they threw those brian cadd cds at scod's head. and brian cadd as santa (simon: (looking at a cd) who's this brian cadd person? brian: what a way to hand in you resignation!) and the little drummer boy at the end with all the singers and musos. and hamish's grandma. and the adam/hamish kiss. teehee.

also watched kung-fu hustle and shaolin soccer. hah. pretty fun. easy way to while away my afternoon. the stories were lame, the girls dodgy and the fighting hilarious, but the production values were very flashy. and i finally understood why everyone kept laughing at the third star wars movie. omigosh how bad was the dialogue - what dialogue? expositionexpositionexposition. anakin narrating everything and poor ewan mcgregor trying not to sound like a power ranger. 'yeah!', 'thats not helping!' and do you remember the days when star wars movies only had ONE lightsaber battle per movie? that general grievous character was just ridiculous. the pictures were pretty, coruscant was shown in its full glory, samuel L got to jump around and the costumes were very cool, but the characters disappeared. what happened to senator amidala? 'i can do up the nursery on naboo', 'remember the lake on naboo?', 'lets go back to naboo and the way it used to be when there was only our love'. ick. poor nat portman.

since everyone is singing carols and whatnot nowadays... heres a tripod lyric:
tripod - oh george

gatesy: oh george,
why did ya do it?
the first two were great
then you blew it
hey george
if you're the eternal kid
why did the jedi
have to return
the way that he did?

number one
was a masterful piece of art
and the world
instantly took it to heart
perfectly paced
it had style, it had grace
the effects were used in their appropriate place

with empire
you could have lost the plot
as most sequels do
but you did not
you showed some control
made a movie with soul
forgive us, we thought you were
on a roll

tripod: oh george,
why did ya do it?
the first two were great
then you blew it
hey george
if you're the eternal kid
why did the jedi
have to return
the way that he did?

gatesy: the third one
sadly it couldn't compare
swapping mystery and romance with
teddy bears
blew all the secrets right out of the water
and traded for a father
a son, and a daughter

the scoundrel
turned instantly to a spunk
from captain, to general
and now leia's bonk
luke's personality
vanished for good
and sexually he would have grabbed what he could

tripod: oh george,
why did ya do it?
the first two were great
then you blew it
hey george
if you're the eternal kid
why did the jedi
have to return
the way that he did?

gatesy: as i await the next trilogy
i sit here and ponder
if i will see
a six hour story
condensed into two?
and a script that's so shit
it would make a dog spew....
or

tripod: are we to see the rebirth of what was
a fantastic universe
spoiled because
a producer who must have just simply lost heart
and allowed the production to take over art?

oh!
george,
why did ya do it?
the first two were great
then you blew it
hey george
if you're the eternal kid
why did the jedi
have to return the way that he did?

obviously, they were right about the dog spewing bit.

cya when i get back! stay safe, y'all...

mels

go-ho... the religious right!

yes. its *that* time of the year again, when the department stores go mental, mum makes us drive down hodge street (saying that THIS year is the last year the lights will be up), and i feel a bit like a stooge cos im not even really sposed to celebrate christmas. and yet, i still have that stupid smile plastered on my face from watching the christmas episodes of all my favourite tv shows, and from hearing too many renditions of 'we three kings' that dad always gets out about now.

ah. it is strange to be doing christmas without my family around. mum and joho are already in m'sia, my aunts are leaving for melbourne in a few days, and the rest of the family arent really the 'organising' type.

as an aside, i really actively dislike the 'days of christmas' song. whose idea was that anyway?

but, cos ive been so darned slack, waiting and then recovering from getting my uai, i watched a few movies that i meant to see but never got to...

kung-fu hustle: ahaha. about halfway through, dad went "hey, this is a comedy!". sigh. it was amusing. i loved the main character, he was the greatest. and the bendy landlord guy. teehee. that yellow shirt he wore when he went to confront the axe-gang in their casino was just classic.

ella enchanted: was pretty funny. the characters were so much funnier than the plot. anne hathaway is quite pretty, and the sets were so cool. that first shot through the castle and the landscape was mightily funky. jo and i went 'that baddie kinda looks like cary elwes, but it cant be him...'. and of course it was him, in his 'evil, scenery-chewing' mode. it was kind of odd to watch princess bride, then that straight afterwards. there was too little parminder, and too much expsition. and i am now going through a hugh dancy phase so just leave me alone. just gotta find that copy of king arthur now...

war of the worlds (tom cruise): very funky. then again, i didnt really mind the guy pearce time machine either, so i think im just a bit biased. wells is kind of hard to put into a movie, and i dont know why hollywood keeps doing it, but im not complaining. i love the story - war of the worlds was one of my favourite books from about yr7 when i went through my 'old sciffy' phase. and i dont care how badly done it was, just seeing those tripods and the people vapourising was good enough for me. for some reason my english 'analyse-this-text' skills just turn off when i watch some movies. the one huge problem i had was robbie living at the end. that just sucked.

team america: luckily, i couldnt force myself to watch the whole thing, so i saw about half of it (the end half). amazingly, it was worse than southpark. at least i like the characters in southpark. at least they are sometimes a bit believably normal. team america was stupid beyond all belief, and i couldnt get over the strings hanging down from everywhere. and the accents. and the swearing. and the 'imagine' puppet oral sex. thats just not right. the bagging out of the hippie movie stars was pretty funny though.

wanna know about my day? well, lets just say that no one sells turtle toys anymore. what is this world coming to?
and, i want the lego $199.99 millenium falcon. i want it NOW! and luke's x-wing, and all the other fighters that come in that set. and i want the new bionicles. and the new lego red ferrari-thing. goshdarn it. i want lego!

EDIT: somehow, bec read my mind, because i just got the snailmailed late-bday card she promised me, and the front picture (below) is of 'hot lego' ("because its been NICKED, you fookin eedjiet!!!") freaky...

mels

95.90

happy now?

mels

the burninator

so, today i turned 18.
erm, w00t...?

had icecream cake, hotdogs, and joho made us loverly milkshakes. finally, for jess. got much enjoyment out of pretending to whack joho in the arm as she is really quite extremely burnt. from the sun, not from the close call we had when jess thought it would be a good way to relive yr12 chem by lighting up about 5 giant matches at once at the dining table. all i can say is, whoosh.

genliajoh nearly destroyed the kitchen with their 'migoreng making skills', and much fun was had re-watching power rangers.

the 2-day shindig coulda been described as the 'dexter fletcher' marathon. in which we watched bugsy malone, press gang and band of brothers. all we were missing was lock, stock, which apparently divz had. and much squee-ing was heard.

a few unrelated things quickly:
how skinny is peter jackson now? omg he looks... normal. well, as normal as a full-on nerd can look.
the finn tribute album is the bomb-diggedy. no joh, that is how I spell it. love sarah blasko and the kasey chambers covers. and little birdy. of course.
ahaha. race riots in hursty. wherein the 5 lebs face off against the 5 skips in the area. and the asian gangsters stand by and snicker at their pissweak attempts at burning each other - now the riots in the middle east.... thats a riot to be proud of.
hicks-i-poos (ehehe. comedy unplugged ruled), has decided to switch countries. hell, anywhere is better than australia. i mean, this is a white man, with normal yobbo-looking parents, and the gov couldnt give a flying. meanwhile, all the immigrants want their old citizenships back. you get exactly no perks from being aussie. its embarrassing. can i take back that oath?
mums face went a funny shape when i said in passing that the al-jazeerah website was interesting. now shes worried about asio turning up on our doorstep. hell, if that happened we'd prolly be dead before we realised what had happened. either that or we'd be in another country. being toruted by the americans.
lots of tv news shots of a little white boy hiding under his eyebrows, wearing a batik top, surrounded by asians, looking for acceptance. something ironic there, i think.

okays, got cool dvds (thanks guys), cds, and a nail from caz (one of the ones she nicked from school, that i kept pestering her about), shoelaces (again from caz), pretty kitty-kat paper bag, book... oh, and adelia got some cute finding nemo candycanes which i have been ordered to share with the 'sisters'.

apparently i have passed a milestone. i feel like those 'superheroes' in those films, who wait for their powers to arrive, but nothing ostensible happens. ah well, i had my icecream cake, and i ate it too, so who am i to complain?

mels

vroom vroom..

so, an update on the whole 'manitou's shoe' situation: one of the members of joho's sydney tech posse claims to have got it taped, so we're thinking of nicking it off him quite soon. ive already made my declaration of undying love for him, so hopefully it will be very soon.

QAF is, once again, the best show on telly at the moment. also, i do not particularly like that 'tad' guy that has attached himself to teddy. and how sweet is emmett?

now, im not a revhead or anything anywhere remotely like that, but i found a very cool show on last night on sbs. it was called 'top gear', and i have no idea how long it has been running, nor how long sbs has been playing it without my knowledge, but bill bailey was on, he drove a car round a wet track really fast, it was british, their panel declared that aussies rule, and the host had to eat his own hair. im in love.
mmmm. pretty cars...

and, nat has officially opened up a new blog. yay. one down, a gazillion more to go.

tis my birthday tomorrow. mum has promised me icecream cake. all is good in the world.

mels

homonyms

ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-check this out.
apparently I took this photo:

(our noble saviour, and bringer-of-light, ickle georgie dubya. and some character named 'flat stanley'.)

"Accordingly, teachers nationwide have young students make their own Flat Stanleys which they mail to people they know in other schools, states or countries as a way to improve their writing and communication skills and learn about different places. "
http://www.house.gov/petri/press/flatstanley.htm

ahahahaha.
and, this is what happens when you take hillsy's advice and type your own name into google, after 6 years of thinking yourself 'too cool' and 'mature' to do it after that one debacle in yr 7.

mels

no way, jose.

so. lots of inneresting stuff going on in our neck of the woods. bunch of people bashing up a bunch of other people. but somehow i dont think just sticking more police down there is going to help very much. just recognising there is a problem is not going to make it go away.
actually its almost amusing, if youre not involved, that a country that prides itself on being so 'multicultural' and 'tolerant' can have riots like this, where the white community tells the ethnics to piss off, to get off 'their' beach, who sms each other to join in some 'leb bashing', while the allegedly 'middle-eastern in appearance' youth groups go around burning the flag and smashing cars and property.
and the wider community sits around and makes 'tut-tutting' noises about how all these actions are of the 'minority', and that they are the extremists, trying to push the whole problem under the table. but these kind of 'youths' dont just make up these opinions on their own. they see the way the adults around them act, they see news coverage and 'current affairs' programs, they watch tv and see in all fiction programs that the 'good' white people have to fight against sleeper cells, and terrorists. meanwhile, the government is attacking a country without credible provocation, refusing to sign a protocol that the whole world says is for the better of the globe, and showing approximately zero sympathy for people who are trying to flee troubled nations. and sending off perfectly legal citizens to foreign countries for a range of reasons. anyone noticed that most of the 'accidentally' deported citizens are not anglo-saxon in appearance?
not that it explains anyones actions, but theres definitely a deeper problem here than young people getting bored over the holiday break.

last night i was minding my own business, watching sbs and i found this seriously funny movie called manitou's shoe. i was watching the last hour of it (having come to it late), and laughing myself all over the lounge room, when someone mentioned that the lead character's name was 'abahachi'. now for a little background, my sis' catchphrase last year was 'abahachi, mein bruder', and having never done german, i had no idea what she was talking about. but now i do.
the lead's name was abahachi (a red indian) and he and his blood brother (named ranger, a ranger) had to go find some secret treasure, buried in a mountain/cave called manitou's shoe, because it (the mountain) was in the shape of a shoe. they also had to fight off a bad guy named santa maria, and there was a bunch of other funny characters, including abahachi's gay twinbrother named winnetouch (played by the same actor as abahachi), a greek fellow named dimitri (whose aim in life was to become a red indian) who wore glasses, and a woman named uschi (who ended up having ranger's baby at the end of the film).
the movie was really funny, punctuated with someone continually shouting 'jeffrey has farted again', at random intervals, a lot of long-hair flicking, and many references to indiana jones. oh - and a bunny suit.
at the end, the film told us of how santa maria's brother, santa claus, began to give out gifts to people to compensate for his evil brother's dastardly actions.
all of this, incidentally, was so abahachi could open up a pub in his traditional red indian village.

heres something fun:
http://fencejumpers.blogspot.com

mels

other acronyms

hi there. or 'wassup'?
finally saw the latest HP movie. twas okay, i spose. being a geek, i have a number of complaints as regards the transition from book to film, and being normal, some complaints about the hair. but all in all it made sense, was fun to watch and pretty interesting - more than i could say for some of the others in the series, namely number 3.

apparently, dan radcliffe is coming to oz to film some indie thing. erm. yay? and, according to the official harry potter colouring in book ( which marty and i saw in myer the other day, while slowly recovering from de-licious max brenner chocolate stuffs), danny-boy also likes the libertines and bloc party. yeah. ill let you figure that one out.

first things first. the music smelled. why bother making the first three movies have a common song and composer, why bother creating a HP theme, if youre gonna pretend it never happened directly after about one strain of the melody during the intro? its a-nnoying. i quite like the HP theme, and now its just gone, poof!, like that.

now cos im bored and while i still have it fresh in my head...

stuff i didnt like: hermi-own-ninny's pink, PINK, not BLUE, dress; ron's 'piss off' harry moment, neville getting back late after the ginny thing (i dont know, it was just unecessary, i think the director just likes neville); mad-eye (i dont think he was cast so well); dumbleydorre's robes; dumbledore's 'curtain' speech; ron's 'cedric!' moment in front of the GOF (i understand slash, but what the hell was that all about); the last scene of the golden trio walking down the corridor onto the balcony; the twin's hair; the distinct lack of creeveys; flitwick changing...everything; the patil twins in the same house; random trumpet fanfares; the hogwarts school song; no charlie; no actual quidditch world cup; sirius' face in the coals ( i thought the common room looked different); no actual gary oldman; cedric diggory (yes, i thought he was a bit ick, but then i thought they were gonna cast someone more like oliver wood); did i mention the lack of the actual world cup?

stuff i did like or just found amusing: snape's library monitoring, rita skeeter, noseless ralph fiennes, the twin-hermione-twin GOF confrontation (teehee), more neville!, david tennant wearing chris eccleston's old jacket, mcgonagall/snape situations, random!nigel (who the hell was that kid?), armani malfoy; sitting-in-a-tree malfoy; more-normal-looking goyle; more! of the weasley twins in general; keeping the same token black guy (dean) and token irish guy (seamus) for continuity; amos diggory ( was cast perfectly, i thought); harry's being-tortured-by-voldie-on-his-fathers-bones scene; madame maxine/hagrid bits cos it was bloody hilarious (and more than a little ick at the same time); ron's reaction to mione in his room at the beginning; the ethnic guy who was always standing next to krum (with the cool facial hair); the merpeople (too stoopid =P); harry's 'that doesnt even make sense. thats just mental' i-love-you-ron moment; token and slightly unnecessary moaning myrtle moment; and, erm, more neville, and david tennant. and david tennant. with that jacket. being crazy. sigh.

yeah. all in all, it was okay, cept for the music. lived up to my high (?) expectations else.
*twiddling thumbs and waiting for next one*

go find mistfuls' lj summary if youre bored, parodies rule.

mels

reSCAPE

so heres a bit of trivia for yas all:
i was watching the power rangers movie (the first one, cos apparently there were 2), and i was looking closely at not only the sets and locations, but also the supporting cast. and guess who played 'ned' the construction worker no.1 ?
paul goddard.
as in stark. as in the 2nd backup agent in the original matrix movie.
ahahaha.
and apparently 'angel grove' is another name for 'sydney'. and zordon and the command centre is within walking distance from tumbalong park.

yeah.

mels

on the uptake

yeah, i know im a bit behind, but hey, what am i sposed to do when aussie tv is only about 2 years behind the stuff going on in the states.

actually, i guess i should be grateful that sci-fi actually is only about half a year behind, i mean consider the latest bunch: taken, stargate, atlantis, battlestar... we're only about half to 1 year behind everyone else.

anywho, what i just saw was a bit on 'the triangle', a new mini that is apparently a bit like a sciffy-heavy version of 'lost', except ppl are stuck on bermuda. or something.
and guess who the producers are: devlin, singer and rockne s. o'bannon. huh? you ask, so what? lets see, theyre only responsible for the best sci-fi to have come out of the last decade or so: stargate, x-men, and of course farscape (in that order).

sheesh. now i just gotta wait a bit over half a year to see it myself.

mels

Never Eat Weetbix Soggy

so, having been very bored, and lamenting the fact that there was nothing on telly today except scrubs and some brendan fraser movie called 'monkeybones', i ended up watching a lot of news, some parliament, russian news, and some program on tvs called 'euromaxx'. twice.

this is how the world looks to mels this wednesday arvo:
we're all weeping and carrying on and having a minutes' silence for some convicted drug trafficker named van nguyen who i have never met, but was stupid enough to try smuggling drugs around a country well-known for their willingness to imprison ppl for spitting gum, not flushing toilets, not to mention, oh, lets see, understandably higher punishments for drug trafficking.

big kev died yesterday. now thats pretty sudden. whatever happened to that guy after all that 'im excited' nonsense? apparently, he had a heart attack. too much of said excitement, probably.

some guy is suing the CIA for a whole stack of things, after he was kidnapped, imprisoned without charge in afghanistan, tortured, and kept away from all civilisation. oh - and he wasnt even a US citizen. and the German government is simply going to accept an alleged apology from condoleeza rice, who wont even say it in front of the cameras. i agree with some of the bloggers, in a different time, and with different countries, i think this could have been construed as an act of war.

mr costello is an official idiot. then again, we all knew that, didnt we? meanwhile little johnny is just going to sit back and roll his eyes at the masses behind no2's back when he says johnny was 'enthusiastic' about the appointment of that gerard fellow.
so i guess this means theyve split up? check this out: http://www.ausculture.com/2005/12/05/pm_fingers_costello/

and, halfway into the channel 9 news (after said 3minute van nguyen story), a story about a stack of people who just got killed when a plane smashed into some highrises in tehran. the city planners over there have just realised that building an airport right next to suburban areas and city highrises might not have been a good idea.

we're smashing the kiwis in cricket. thank god. everything is right in the world again.

and apparently, today was the hottest day in sydney in, like, a year. no shit sherlock. this is what i tune in to news services for.

in the US someone with too much time on their hands has decided to open a millons of dollars australian reptile park/aquarium. inside its always 20-something degrees, while outside its snowing. meanwhile, ppl are dying all over the place every few minutes this year, designated 'africa year', from malnutrition and a basic lack of, urm, for lack of a better word, 'stuff'. and the higher ups reckon theres no classes. get your priorities right people.

also, something is happening over in banda aceh, but i couldnt really tell what because it was in the indonesian morning news and my bahasa isnt all that flash.

final bit of mels news of the day, is some genius over at parliament decided that we might consider thinking about having some sort of regulation of the government's advertising spending. bloody hell, you would think, seeing as they control the whole bloody country, they wouldnt need to spend 50millon dollars convincing us that we should support whatever-the-hell they want us to. speaking of which, those business council of australia IR ads are also pissing me off. really, they want to 'lower taxes' (for high earners only, im guessing), then 'increase infrastructure'. i quit commerce ages ago, but i am having issues understanding that. dammit. these ppl are running the country.

mels

ple-ea-ease mr postman

joho is about to have a heart attack after mee-chelle came to our place to do her makeup and ended up downloading even more russell peters, thus taking up most of our download quota, so im not allowed to post anymore pics for a while. not to worry, there're just a few dodgy of the cat empire and some extremely fuzzy ones of neil finn. and when i say fuzzy, i mean 'arty'.

so im going to just chat here for a while.

i caught the ep of QAF - omigosh it was so beautiful, and justin said 'yes'(!). i really thought he wouldnt, i mean, if i were him, i dont think i woulda taken brian back just like that, even considering the 'palace'. of course im not exactly a gay man either, so maybe that explains it. and lindsay and mel just make me want to scream. sheesh.

other shows im watching cos i am continually bored at the moment: that 70's show, less than perfect, scrubs, doctor who (even though i dont like the current doctor all that much, and the scripts are not as good).

links of the moment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_neologisms_on_The_Simpsons is a really cool take on the simpsons. obviously someone has too much time on their hands
http://www.forbes.com/2005/11/29/forbes-fictional-rich_cx_mn_de_05fict15land.html is also really funny.

right, i finally got the house to myself for a bit, seeing as how joho and her posse had to get all their last minute stuff ready for the stgghs yr10 formal (awww), so here are the lyrics (sorry i cant format them the way that i want to..):

tripod - no oil in the Congo

Tripod: do do doo

do do doo

do do doo

Gatesy: boo de bap

boo de bap

yeh

Scod: The coalition fights the war

In the desert a new regime

We fight for freedom

So they say

Scod&Gatesy: But what are we really fighting for?

And is everything as it seems

Scod: We just protect the USA

Tripod: Ain't no oil in the Congo

Only bloodshed and despair

Scod: We don't care

Tripod: Millions dyin' in the Congo

But we don't send our help there

Gatesy&Yon: Because there ain't no oil there [dancing]

Scod: Exploiting an opportunity

A convenient point of view

Did we invade, or liberate?

The corporations bend the truth

Can you tell if they lie...

[silence. Gatesy&Yon stop dancing]

Scod: Do you think that dancing's appropriate?

Gatesy&Yon: Yes. yes.

Scod: This is kind of a serious song, that's all.

Gatesy: That's it. It's real heavy. It's heavy subject matter, and we, you know...

Yon: I'm sensing you don't like the dancing.

Scod: Mm. Is that all right?

Yon: You don't want us to...?

Scod: Yeah, could you not dance?

Yon: Oh.

Scod: Just, do me a favour? Do me a 'solid'? And I'll, um you know, I'll do you a 'solid'. And round and round it goes. And that's how it works.

Gatesy: I think I'll pass on your solids, mate.

Scod: You know, whatever.

Gatesy: O-kay.

Yon: So no dancing.

Scod: Yeah, is that all right?

Gatesy: O-kay...

Scod: Ain't no oil in the Congo

Only bloodshed and despair

But we don't care

Millions dying in the Congo

Gatesy&Yon: Millions dying! [dancing]

Scod: But we don't send our help there

Gatesy&Yon: Yeah, yeah, yeah!

[silence]

Yon(to Gatesy): Yeah, they did like that.

Scod: What are you doing?!

Gatesy: We're lightening the mood, Scod.

Scod: It's a protest song!

Yon: That doesn't mean it can't be snazzy.

Gatesy: Yeah, a little bit of razzle fucking dazzle never hurt anybody.

Yon: You know what I'm saying. A bit of fucking this shit. You like that, dontcha?

Gatesy: Ha. You know?

Scod: I just thought that this might be a chance to make a difference, you know.

Gatesy: We ARE making a difference.

Yon: Yeah, we're changing the world one shit song at a time.

Gatesy: Yeah!

Scod: The politicking strongmen

In their ivory towers of money

They make a fortune out of suffering

[Gatesy&Yon start dancing again]

Scod(rapping): Extra, extra, extra

Read all about it

Elect a politician

They're turning out deficient

Are they there for Australia

At all?

I doubt it

I need a new edition

Or cancel my subscription

And the win of the right

Looks like a loss to me

Did you think before you voted

Hypocrisy

Cos there's a lot to see

But you have got to be

So sure

Before you send a man off to be

In a war

[Gatesy picks up another guitar, and starts to play a more upbeat tune]

Gatesy&Yon: Ain't no oil

Bamp!

In the Congo, honey

Bamp, bamp!

Only bloodshed and despair

So keep on smiling, honey

If there's a chance, just take it

Life's a ball, if you make it

And we're gonna make it,

Baby doll

Woah!

cigarettes and suitcases

i was promised new SFK songs, and i got new SFK songs. and they were good. slightly more hard rock than some off the last album, but still heaps good. cant wait for the new album.

clint and the 'other guitarist'. bec asked, 'why dont they just add him to the group?'.
how cool is his tie?!

clint, having a break.
more clint. nice watch, dude. *raise your fists up to the sky*...
there was the 'we love steph' group behind us, screaming at her in between songs. you could hear some of their friends telling them to shutup and let the girl play in peace, but the guy had to express his feelings.

now for the paul pics:

he grew his hair quite long. twas perfect for his head banging stuff, but looked like it was getting in his eyes else.

they did the anchorman, and say something, and deja vu and monsters. and i think they started the set with 3 dimensions.

more paul:

(is he looking right at my camera?)

band pic

okays. little yonny... no, scratch that. she's much bigger than i am. big yonny is getting a twitch under her eye about the download/upload situation. im gonna stop for today.

mels

i was backstage, at homebake...

i reckon he wrote that lyric knowing that it would be so easy to make the punters at any gig happy. you know, that bit where he can just go [insert place of gig here]. sigh.
at least all the females in the crowd were happy. what is it about him, anyway?

so these pics are for tina. and divz.

so yes. the flowers were out, and he was scattering petals at everyone. and where normal people throw drumsticks or water bottles, he threw long-stemmed flowers of some kind. goshdarn. he's turning into dame edna with her gladiolas.

then patience from the grates came to sing. ben's very into them. apparently.

everyone sing, 'we are all in this to-gether'.

mels

seeing red

heres a handy hint: don't spend a whole day in the sun at a music festival, get 5hrs sleep, then hang out at picnic by the beach, playing soccer, for most of the next day. i am ridiculously sunburnt, and my foot has begun to swell to twice its normal size. apparently, this is because joho's foot is 'more staunch' than mine. dont ask.

speaking of co-ordination, even ms blasko's hair matched her outfit:

her set was soooo good. there was a lot of instrument-swaps between her and her band, but it was all funky. she did 'always worth it' and 'dont you eva', and a cool version of 'sweet as november', as well as 'counting sheep' and 'beautiful secrets'. definitely one of the best sets we saw. the crowd during her set was really nice too. by then most ppl were getting nice and mellow from all the alcohol, so everyone was real friendly. no jumping around or anything ridiculous like that. =P

mels

for lorus

okies, tina made us stop at the evermore set for a
few songs so she could get pics for her bro. i was the only one with a digital camera so i was assigned the job of trying to snap off some fairly salvageable ones.
awwww. brothers.

they were quite good live.


and, although you cant particularly tell from this pic, the drummer boy looked a hell of a lot like scod. maybe it was just the glasses. gotta get me some of those...

mels

Smoke too much and nod your head

that line probably sums up the entire day.

okays. i got a couple of good end of fashion ones, but none of the bassist in front of us, who bec reckons looked a bit like derryn hinch. whatever, bec. gotta love the lead singer. hes so... cool.

they sang rough diamonds as well, which was my favourite song for about a year, and that was cool - everyone singing the chorus together. "i know, ive been away too long to ask"
sorry about that. the jumping up and down only started to get serious during their set, so the photos were a bit difficult.
okays, more tomorrow.

mels

gratuitous keyboard banging.

allrite. ploy was wanting to get good spots for end of fashion, so, even though we barely knew them, we decided to stay for the mess hall set.
it was pretty darned good.
the lead had a bit of a 'nic cester, but way better looking' thing going, and it was the drummer's birthday, so everyone sang him happy birthday.


he had a good screaming voice too. i dunno how those guys can scream like that on a daily basis.

i loved the totally 'just painted it out back' sign they strung up behind them. they were the kind of guys who could pull something like that off without being accused of being lame.

mels

falsetto:*you say it best*

kisschasy!!
and on time!!

they were a good pick for first act, got everyone pumped up. even the macho guys were singing along when they told us to.
i know the quality of the shots is dodgy, but i honestly wasnt really standing that far away. i think i just had the setting wrong on my camera. yes. that mustve been it.

they sang a bunch of songs. and even though i think i am part of their street team, i only knew about 3.


do-dos and whoa-ohs was last - after we all had to go through the first verse of the embarrassing ronan keating karaoke bit.

was this the band with the 'super-hot' shirtless drummer? cos i didnt get any pics of him. sorry bec, divz.

mels

sitting, waiting, wishing...

arite. pics, as promised. tina, i was gonna put it up on your photo thingy, but i think i lost the url. and i cant remember the username/password. yeah. go me!
im kinda confused about the layout when i upload these, having never stuck pics up on blogger before ( i know, what a noob), so bear with me:

waiting in the hot, hot sun.

more waiting. we got there at 10am and already there was a line down the road. didnt actually see the gates till about 11:10
tilt your heads. cazza in a photo for once without looking constipated/running away. jk. =P

my upload-y thing is really slow, so these pics are going to come in series of posts. ill try one post per band - itll be easier for me.

mels

1000 words.

went to homebake. was massively cool.
first saw kisschasey (pretty cool). they made us sing 'when you say nothing at all' by ronan keating. what was more disturbing was that the whole kisschasey crowd knew all the words. i think it was to make a point about 'do-dos and woah-woahs'.
then mess hall - the lead singer is the bomb + rock out tip-over-the-keyboard moment.
and end of fashion (which was ploy's pick). they were pretty cool too. although i agree with her, that 'oh yeah' is not particularly a moshing song. sheesh.
then it was toilet break - scary, scary portaloos. didnt know how ploy survived.
also, evermore was quite good - not as whiny as i thought they would be. and their drummer, who used to be the 'loser on with the glasses', has now taken a leaf out of another famous 'loser-with-glasses-muso-in-a-trio'. he looks like scod from tripod has been giving him fashion advice.
caught the endstrains of rogue trader's set, and bits of wolfmother - their set was rocking. man.
then evermore, sarah blasko (the best. seriously). she did her slightly unco 'dont you eva' dance, and it was all good.
ben lee was 'a faggot' according to some of the punters in the back. oh poor boy. he tries so hard. and all the girls were singing 'we are all in this together'. flowers flying everywhere, and kisses for all the band.
living end had one of the best sets. sang 'prisoner of society' with the entire 20000 ppl there it felt like.
something for kate was really cool. paul was so, erm, 'cute'(?) and played some new stuff. i like 'cigarettes and suitcases'. there was one group yelling 'steph rocks' at her, and this shirtless bloke in the front row had a one-man SFK moshpit. paul kept looking at him sideways.
cat empire - what else to say? better yet, how to explain? they were so cool - all the improv stuff they always do was amazing - who else has drum, keyboard, trumpet, sax and vox solos in one show. and felix and the horn section were so... in sync. harry is my idol. and this one dude with dreddies behind me knew allll the words. so everyone else, really.
last was the finn brothers. didnt do the songs i thought they would, but they were really cute and verrry professional. brought their parents along and everything.

everyone except us and the ten-yr-olds who got dragged by their hippie parents was either high or drunk by about 3pm. my hat still smells like ciggies and my shirt was soaked in beer. ah well.

pics up next post.

mels

lynda with a 'y'

yeah. just took a good hard look at the stuff i want and noticed they were all pretty old things. its cos im too lazy to buy shit myself when i want it first off. so it stays in the back of my mind till i think about stuff i still want but dont have. the fact that i dont even have princess bride on dvd is weirding me out a little.

and, yon saw a dvd of the power rangers movie. she really wanted to get it, but thankfully she didnt take any moneys with her to officeworks, and dad refused to fork out the $12, ignoring her promises that she would 'pay him back'. what was the dvd doing in officeworks? i dont know. believe me, no one was happier when her tape began to die, but now i think she has her itty bitty heart set on the darn-ed thing.

right. off to organise this press gang bonanza ive been conned into hosting in 2 weeks...

mels

we WISH you ...

whoops. just realised that if i have a post partly completed and saved as a draft, when i do complete and finish it, it will show up in the spot it would have if id finished it in the first place. ergo, the self-reminding wishlist i created for my own remembrall use has appeared in the 'october' posts. so anyways.
aha-ha.
to the updated 'mels wish list':

a miyazaki dvd or two (im missing laputa - bloody psycho vcr, and my porco rosso tape is a bit dodgy)
the piano music to anything from bugsy malone - i can't find it free on the net
amelie dvd (my tapes almost gone)
PeaceKeeper Wars DVD (to round off my collection)
The Princess Bride DVD
'Unfinished Tales' by Tolkein (its the only one im missing - the one with the black cover and pretty stained-glass looking circle on the front)
Some piano sheet music (something familiar, not too easy)
Futurama dvds, mmm.
system of a down cds. i think there were 2 this year alone. 'hypnotise' or 'mesmerise' or something like that.

whatever i cant con out of someone, im gonna hafta find and buy myself so this is partly a self-reminder as well as everything.

and tripod did a really cool song the other day on that 'world comedy unplugged' thing. lyrics coming soon (read: whenever i can get ppl out of the house so i can listen to my tape at my leisure). dya reckon i should keep it for mary? cos it was much funnier than that other one that nat taped... maybe i will.

mels

I. D. (Idiot Dubya)

heh. apparently our fearless president (dont deny it, he is ours as well), is thinking about bombing the HQ of al-jazeerah's TV station. teehee. something about that is bloody amusing. the guy is meant to be the bringer of freedom and democracy, but he thinks the way to achieve his god-given mission to liberate the great unwashed masses is to destroy their broadcaster. yes. freedom in a democracy does not equal freedom of speech. obviously.

one of the reasons i cant take intelligent design seriously is becasue of the people putting the thought forward. these are the people spending millions on setting up 'museums' with life sized displays of humans and t-rexs living in harmony, telling scientists that satan put million-years old bones (as proved by C-dating) in the ground to 'mess with our heads', and using their pull on the most ineffectual leader i think the US has ever managed to elect to rearrange the syllabus of the next generation in the way they see fit.

http://www.hereticalideas.com/ has this as the quote of the moment:

" “I hope one day I can clone another Dick Cheney. Then I won’t have to do anything.”– George W. Bush "

i rest my case.

mels

save some for later, augustus

hey all.

so time for a tv update. luckily, ratings season is over, and we finally get to see some of the gems the networks have had buried in their vaults for the last few years. i hate how the commercial networks have gotten into the mindset of: 'if the americans didnt liek it, the australian viewers wont either'. what i hate more is that theyre usually right.

so ive been trying out some of the new stuff. heres the prelim verdicts:
ghost whisperer - woulda been cool if they had thought of it before 'medium'. i never watched medium, so i think that explains why i wasnt so offended by the plagiarised nature of the show. and its on of those 'star' shows. you know, the ones totally based on the pulling power of a single actor. in this case ms. jen love hewitt.

5ive days to midnight: i still havent got this show/film (?) pegged down yet, but its pretty interesting so far. think '7 days' meets 'dead zone' with the cool floating superimposed numbers and equations a la 'numb3rs'. so this guy gets this funky suitcase with all the evidence of his murder, which is to happen in 5 days time, and hes meant to find out who will kill him. the characters are pretty realistic, and the idea was although not original, a pretty cool take on the whole thing. its moving a bit slowly at the moment, but im sticking with it till nic deboer shows up (from dead zone). i dont know if its a series/miniseries, some ppl on the net are calling it a film? anways. and i think it was filmed in vancouver (like all sciffy is at the moment).

veronica mars: okay, i only caught the last 5 minutes of the premiere, but i gotta say, it doesnt look anything like the OC. at all. dammit channel 10.

futurama: ten are playing the whole lot (from ep 1) it appears. i love that show. and how much do fry and leela remind you of crichton and aeryn? freaky. which makes bender=d'argo, amy (apparently her last name is 'wong'. haha)=chiana, hermes=rygel, prof=...zhaan i guess, which leaves zoidberg as stark maybe? anyways. it ru-les.

empire: fluff. stoopid, stoopid, unnecessary fluff.

boston legal: i know a lot of people cant stand it, but it is hilarious. james spader and william shatner? classic. and candice bergen is so cool. i guess i never really watched the practice or ally mcbeal, and thats why it doesnt seem to annoy me like it does other people, but really its good.

SLOU: one of the still respectable aussie dramas on at the moment. that and always greener. tina said jeffrey walker (ocean girl, waynes manifesto, thunderstone, round the twist) and brooke harman are engaged in real life. freaky. i love stu and whatever aaron pederson's character is called. the stories are getting lamer and lamer, but the characters are still really interesting. unlike a lot of top rating shows i could mention.

other stuff on: always greener (the whole marissa/tom thing is just starting. yay!), and queer as folk. i had to shut my ears when caz said she already read up the next ep. sheesh. the last ep was sooooo good. the explosion was totally like wtf? i know i sound like an idiot, but it really was that good. i cant believe i only started getting hooked in the last season. godnabbit.

mels