The budgie equivalent of Hamlet

I love budgies. They are fantastic pets and have huge personalities. As a child, I always had a pet budgie that was hand tamed. I used to have one that helped me with my homework and would put little puncture marks around the edges of my assignments because he would sit on the desk with me as I worked. Another one used to let himself out of the cage and taunt the cat from the curtain rail. Anyway, I just adore them and deeply regret not having spent enough time with my current budgies to have them tame (with three cats and two dogs, I really don't want the budgies to meet a sticky end).

Anyway, the whole point of this is that on Saturday we went to the Mt Gravatt Show which is like a small version of the Ekka (which is like a State Fair or Easter Show for you out of towners). They have the usual type of competitions that people can enter (vegetable growing, flower arranging, cake decorating etc) as well as a budgie competition. I don't know the ins and outs of budgie showing (ie. good markings etc) so I won't even try to explain how it works. I wandered into the pavilion (which was actually a medium sized garden shed) and was looking in the cages at all the budgies lined up in their small cages.

While I was talking to them (well, you have to - they love being talked to), a lady came over and interupted the guy who was answering questions. "Excuse me, I think that one the birds isn't well". I looked over about three cages, and sure enough there was a big, yellow bird lying on the floor of the cage with it's little legs up in the air. The guy looked up, swore under his breath and walked past me to the cage containing the bird in question. "Bloody bird", he said. "Oh God", I thought, "that's a bit harsh". And then he banged on the cage with his fist. The bird immediately jumps up and hops on it's perch looking around to see what's happening.

Apparently this particular bird does it for attention. It pretends to be dead because then everyone clusters around the cage looking at it. It waits until it thinks that no one is looking then it jumps down into the corner of the cage and lies down for about a minute. Then it does a neat little roll so that it's legs are up in the air. If no one notices, it then starts twitching like it is having a seizure.

The bird in the next cage, a lovely white one, has a similar act. It holds onto the bars with one foot and then twists its body upside down so that it looks stuck. Everyone stops to look and then they call the man to say that this poor, wee bird has its leg caught.

I stood there for another ten minutes and both birds tried their acts on twice more. No wonder the man just banged the cage and swore. These birds deserved an Oscar.

Uni starts back - Graduation draws nearer

Uni started again last week. This semester I'm doing Hinduism and a religion subject called "Health and Healing" which sounds interesting but has the potentional to not actually be interesting at all. In fact it could be rather dull. Already I've started bitching about the assessment.

Pictorial war wounds of that damn cat

In this one you can see how much fur had to be shaved off to get to the abcess. I told you it was gross didn't I. 

"post pictures, Laziest", they said, "post pictures"

Ok - so this is Hazel from the side. You can see the drains pretty clearly. You can also see the yicky bit at the corner of his eye. 

Hazel aka "That damn cat"

I've had to take that damn cat to the vet again. He's been brawling with the neighbourhood cats again and had a weepy eye and the right hand side of his face and neck was all puffy. So I dropped him off at the vet yesterday morning and Handsomest picked him up in the afternoon.

The vet found the bite mark on the back of his head and tunnelled through the side of his head (under the skin) to clean out the wound which was festering on the side of his neck. He currently has two drains in his head and his head is shaved to the collar - he looks like a freak of nature. And for only AU$189.00, you too can have a cat that looks like he has crossed over to the dark side. Now I know why Darth Vader wears the bucket.

But don't feel sorry for him, he's brought it upon himself.

Proof that my brain is a technological wasteland

On 7/20/05, Laziest Girl < laziestofgirls@yahoo.com.au > wrote:
anyway, do you know what happened to the comments on the book group page - I can't see them anymore.

On 7/20/05, Fount of Useless Information < fountofuselessinformation@gmail.com> wrote:
I think MC Etcher deleted one of his comments. That screwed me up before. Try to clear the cache of your browser and then reloading the page.

Let me know if that works.

Fount of Useless Information < fountofuselessinformation@gmail.com> wrote:
Did this work? Were you able to see the comments

On 7/24/05, Laziest Girl wrote:
as I have no idea how to clear my cache (is this a euphemism?) I didn't do anything - but the problem seems to have fixed itself now.

Fount of Useless Information wrote:
What browser are you using? Internet Explorer? Knowing this will help, and I can tell you how to clear it if it happens again (assuming you care).

It's not a euphemism. The cache is the temporary files from the internet that your browser is storing so that it can load pages faster if you have visited it before. In this case, the comments section had changed and it tried to use the old one, but part of it was missing (the deleted comment) so it didn't work properly. This has to do with the script I half-wrote/half-copied for the comments.

Wait, this is one of those conversations you described a while back where you just drift of after about a sentence isn't it?

On 7/24/05, Laziest Girl wrote:
yep. I got half way through the second paragraph. curse you.


And if you ask CK about the Gmail conversation we had - I think he will actually cry.

How quietly can you spell it?

You'll all remember that a little while ago, I went to the book launch of "Sodomy: The History of a Christian Biblical Myth" which was written by my old tutor, Dr Michael Carden.

Well, today I was given a $50 book voucher for Angus & Robertson as a prize for something pointless at the day job. Without trying to diss Angus & Robertson, they do tend to carry a little more Stephen King, Dan Brown and Bryce Courtney than could actually be considered healthy. Now fifty bucks is fifty bucks, and I thought that if I rang them up, they could order me in a copy of Michael's book so I could use my book voucher to good effect.

So I give them a call.

"Good morning, Angus & Robertson Bookworld, this is Mandy"

"Hi Mandy, I was wondering if you are able to order a book in for me?"

"Of course", says Mandy, "we would love to - who is the author?"

"Dr Michael Carden", I say. But they can't find any listing for a book by Michael Carden.

"Ok, that's not coming up - what is the title of the book"

"Sodomy: The History of a Christian Biblical Myth"

"Sorry, what was that?"

"Sodomy: The History of a Christian Biblical Myth"

"Uhhh, can you spell that?"

"s-o-d-o-m-y"

"Sorry?"

"S-O-D-O-M-Y", right at that very moment, my bosses interstate visitors arrive and are standing right by my desk with very curious looks on their faces. Just how quietly can you spell sodomy on the phone?

Anyway, she finally found it and has put it on order for me. I think I freaked her out though - and not because I wanted a book called Sodomy. I think I freaked her out because I wanted a non-fiction book that wasn't about WWII or a how-to-guide about becoming a white witch. Well, that'll teach me not to make personal phone calls while at work.

I have a black belt in bar stools

Believe it or not, this is a real movie quote.

It is best spoken in response to the following phrase - "Listen skinny, before you start talking tough, I'd better warn you I've got a black belt in karate. So why don't you get out of here quietly, while you still got some teeth left in that ugly face?"

For full effect ensure that you are a six foot black woman with an outstanding 'fro and are currently standing in a gay bar surrounded by lesbians dressed in wide-legged denim overalls.

If you have any doubts about the effectivness of this procedure - watch the 1974 version of Foxy Brown.

We went and saw this last night (the double feature at the Globe) and it was wonderful. The other feature was "The Monkey Hustle". I have never seen that much booty in one place. There was tight denim, wide flares, midrift shirts, tight denim, a complete lack of sensible underwear, knee-high socks, tight denim, silly floppy hats, big hair, gold lame as day wear for men and did I mention the tight denim?

Now all I need is to gain about 10 kilos, wear denim patchwork hot pants with knee high socks and roller skates. I will be sooooo hip. For 1974.

Sin City

Last night we went and saw Sin City. And it was good. In fact it was so good that I had nightmares all night and woke up exhausted. But I'm glad I saw it.

If you haven't seen it - well catch up people - I'm not going to go through any explanations about it or explain who Frank Miller is yada yada yada. I'm not even going to bother with a proper review because, as you know, I don't really do that. I haven't read the graphic novels (don't say comic books or they'll kneecap you) so I can't even tell you if the film stayed true to his vision, but Handsomest (aka Geek Comic Book Guy) said that the film was very much like the graphic novels. And it was pretty unlike any movie I've seen.

It was black and white (as the girl at the ticket box felt compelled to tell us) and they used some colour for certain things they wanted you to notice. Which was effective because there was a lot of blood and a lot of gore but for the most part, it was a glowing, oozing white. Strangely enough, this made you feel different about all the gross stuff. I haven't quite figured out how different, but I'm getting there. It was horrific in content. I really can't say this enough. Some bits were totally ewwwwww and yick, but it didn't put me off.

Anyway, Mickey Rourke was fantastic as Marv - it was perfect casting. He was my favourite and I felt so bad for him by the end. If you haven't seen it, I think you should. Which I guess counts for as close to a ringing endorsement as you are likely to get here.

Coming out of the closet (well, not that way)

I have raved (and possibly even ranted) numerous times about the user profiles in which we (the blogger) tell you (the sad and demented audience*) what our favourite books, films and music are. I'm not going to drag up the fact that just because we both watched Lord of the Rings (the extended version, not the cinema release version) and loved it then it doesn't mean that we are soul mates. I'm not even going to carry on (again) about the fact that liking stuff doesn't give you a true identity - all it gives you is a group to sit with at the pub.

And that's not always a bad thing. The problem is that we are always going to list books, films and music that gives us cache. Cache with who isn't always certain, but it's all about trying to make a connection with someone. So even if I loved Sleepless in Seattle (not that I do) and it was my favourite movie of all time (not that it is), I'm not going to tell you because it makes you think that I am a certain type of person. Actually, this is turning into a circular argument because if I did really love Sleepless in Seattle (not that there's anything wrong with that) then surely that makes me that kind of person?

Anyway, if you can't follow this kind of logical reasoning - then I ain't helping you out any further.

The whole of point of this is that I think it's time I came clean with you all. I own a number of DVDs. An obscene number of DVDs come to that. And each and every one of these DVDs were carefully chosen by me and I like them. But the very existence of some of these DVDs is somewhat embarrassing. So I've decided to stage an intervention in order to overcome my shame at loving dorky, smaltzy, childish and generally appalling movies. So what are these film which haunt me?

Top Three appallingly bad films that I love:

Sliding Doors with Gywennie Paltrow.
Why? I can't stand her normally (and I wish she would eat something, anything) and this is a truly appalling chick-flick but I must have watched this film about 50 times.

Serendipity is another film on high rotation.
"Come on LG, honestly this is a terrible film", I hear you all moan. I know it is - they have the worst on screen chemistry that I have EVER seen. They make a better couple when they are apart then they do when they are together. I just can't help it (although the whole John Cusack obsession may be blamable for this one).

Tomb Raider (I know, the mind boggles)
I've watched this film ad nauseam. Her outfits are comical, her characterisation is worse, the situations go beyond unbelievable and the dialogue is ridiculous. I can't even begin to discuss the plot.

An Honourable Mention goes to Muppets from Space (although I do own nearly all of the Muppet films, this one is my favourite - closely followed by A Christmas Carol).

Ok, so the truth is out. And, if you don't mind, I need some time on my own now.

* I mean this in a nice way. Afterall, every blogger is also part of the audience and I know only too well how sad and demented I can be.

Bronski and Bernstein - episode whatever it was

I watched Bronski and Bernstein through a pharmaceutical haze last week, and I have to say, I was ready to slap the pair of them. The Forensic Pathologist (the one who is kind-of going out with the boss, Micklitz) has a corpse stolen from her morgue so she ropes in Bronski and Bernstein to help her find it because Micklitz is on holiday and she doesn't want to disturb him.

I got a bit confused about the oysters that Bernstein put in the morgue fridge because his mum was hosting a dinner party and he needed to keep them cold (apparently this was the source of much ongoing mirth in the writers room but the joke failed to enthrall this viewer). Bronski's mum, sister and his girlfriend (Bronski is getting more serious with the lovely Lene and even pashed her in the stairwell to prove it) were invited to the dinner party with Bernsteins parents and the boys didn't end getting to the dinner because they were staking out another cop whose son they suspected of having stolen the corpse due to a complex series of clues that confused me.

But don't think I'm losing interest in our boys - it's just the lack of partial nudity in the PG timeslot that's killing it for me. And my cup of tea was really nice.

So I didn't actually die, I just felt like I was going to.

So I'm feeling a lot better now. Thanks for the emails, the flowers, the telegrams and the stripper, although the sympathy cards to Handsomest were a bit much. I'm back a work now, a little woozy, but that could be the gin we had at morning tea time.

The sinuses have drained, the pajamas are no longer de rigeur day wear, the doona is back on the spare bed, the eyes are now devoid of sunglasses when indoors, the comics books are back in their box, the Indiana Jones films have been returned to the video shop (well, actually, not quite yet, I've still got to watch the extras - but they are so nearly returned), the hair has been remodelled by the hairdresser and all is well at Casa LG.

Even better, results were released for Uni this semester and I got a 5 for Buddhism and a 7 for Meditation. Celebrations would have gone into the night had I not needed a couple of panadeine and lie down.

By Sunday, I even felt well enough to go out to breakfast and then on to the Valley Fiesta. We met up with Jay, Becc-with-two-c's and the Percussion-king and caught local Brisbane bands Gentle Ben and his Sensitive Side, the Vegas Kings and the Gin Club before repairing to the pub for a few restorative ales.

And then, because I'm so damn hip and cool and happening, I watched this really interesting documentary about this black stone tablet that was discovered in Israel and purported to evidence the existence of the Temple of Solomon (remember, that's where the Israelites stashed the Ark of the Covenant (see Indiana Jones "Raiders of the Lost Ark" for further historical details)). Apparently the guy who owned it also discovered the ossuary that was initially believed to have held the bones of James, brother of Jesus. Anyway it all turned out to be fake and the guy was actually manufacturing fake seals etc that he was selling off to museums around the world. It was really interesting - even the boring bits where they talked to scientists and examined stuff through the microscope.

Where's the sympathy?

Hello, it's me. I'm sick. That's right. My sinuses hurt, my nose is blocked and I am cross. Where's the sympathy? No, don't look at me. I haven't brushed my hair since yesterday. And that's the doona off the spare bed over there on the couch. And I'm wearing sunglasses to watch the tv because my eyes hurt. And all I've eaten for the last two days is hot chocolate and ginger nut biscuits. And all I'm capable of reading is old Footrot Flats comic books. And, worst of all, I am breathing through my mouth.

Maybe I should go to the doctor.

What did your father teach you?

Last night we went and saw a double feature at the newly re-opened Globe in the Valley and it was such fun that I know we'll be going again. It cost us $10 bucks each (normally $15 but if you have a group of four it's $40), the popcorn was free and we were able to take our beers into the film - life doesn't get much better than this.

At the Globe, they have this theory that not all movies demand reverence - some just beg to be shouted at, mocked or jeered. So, with our drinks in one hand and our laughter in the other, we watched "The American Astronaut" and "Arizona Dream".

The American Astronaut totally blew us away. I seriously thought I was going to die from laughing. I can't even begin to describe this film without sounding like a pretentious git, so if you're interested, have a look at imdb. And the soundtrack was fecking awesome.

Next week is The Deadly Spawn and The Lair of the White Wyrm. If you live in BrisVegas - get yourself along to the Globe.

And in case you were wondering - my father taught me to kill the sunflower.

Stop me if you think that you've heard this one before.

You know, people here are arguing that, because Queensland schools don't teach by rote in schools anymore, poetry and the like is on the decline. That's not true. I think we just need to re-define what counts as poetry.

All those Smiths lyrics I absorbed as a youth, are still in my brain - ready for total recall at any point. The Pixies too, and the Cure. I think I know nearly all the dialogue from Blackadder and it's lodged right next to the dialogue from the The Young Ones. And films - I can repeat the words almost verbatim for so many films that it is both scary and pathetic.

Clearly I learn by listening but why is is that the brain fills up with this stuff? Really, it's no wonder I can't remember anything useful. Like how to use apostrophe correctly.

The 3's Meme

That dreadful CK thought that he had to get even with me for dobbing him in for my last Meme so he's passed one back to me. So here is the 3's Meme.

Three Nicknames
- Laziest Girl, obviously
- at Primary School I was known as Suki
- more recently, Wong

Three Things I Like About Myself
- my green eyes
- my indolence
- that I don't have an off button

Three Things That Scare Me
- Canoes or small boats (I get vertigo when on the water)
- Cockroaches (because they scuttle)
- Spending the night in hospital (I don't know why)

Three Everyday Essentials
- books
- tea
- a Springer Spaniel (or other miscellaneous furry creature)

Three Things I'm Wearing Right Now (what is it with this question - do they think I do phone sex for living??)
- jeans
- a gold bangle my parents gave me for my 21st birthday
- a pair of red Chuck Taylors ('cause they are red)

Three Fave Bands Growing Up
- The Smiths
- The Cure
- The Jesus and Mary Chain
(yes, I was a goth but not a terribly successful one - I always chatted too much)

2 Truths and a Lie
- I have double jointed hips and thumbs
- I hate trashy mystery novels
- I am ambidextrous with a knife and fork

Three Things I Can't Do Without
- glasses (because I can't see a thing without them)
- straigtening irons for my hair
- creme brulee

Three Things I Can Certainly Live Without
- my pathological shunning of anything to do with details
- mango pieces hidden in fruit salad
- Bryce Courtney

Three Places I Want to Go On Vacation
- Tibet
- Istanbul
- Easter Island

Three Things I Want to Do Before I Die
- learn an ancient language
- master the apostrophe
- bake a pineapple upside down cake

And who shall I pass it on to? Well, Granola Girl because she is too nice to say no and Blandy (even though he'll do it in my comments).

That ringing in my ears has finally subsided

On Saturday night we went and saw a couple of bands at the Zoo. The French Horns were playing, followed by Whirlwind Heat (from Grand Rapids, Michigan) and the night closed with a most excellent Sydney band call The Mess Hall.

The Mess Hall were fantastic although I couldn't give you a song by song review as Becc-with-two-c's and I had had a few wee glasses of lemonade (only to ensure we were well hydrated). There was much dancing and a vast array of nonsense which culminated with a strange guy in a suit jacket (dressed more like Don Johson than that guy from the Strokes) tried to chat up Becc-with-two-c's. We were very mean and kept playing paper, rock, scissors to see who had to dance nearest to him. On the way home, I also learnt a very fascinating thing about myself. When I've had a few lemonades, every song that plays on the radio sounds like Franz Ferdinand.

Shameless book plug

I'm sorry to disappoint you all today but I don't have a Bronski and Bernstein episode update. How could I be so thoughtless as to miss Bronski and Bernstein and thus deprive you of your weekly fix? Well, I went to a book launch.

And it was a serious book - "Sodomy: The History of a Christian Biblical Myth" by Dr Michael Carden. Michael was my lecturer at Uni for a couple of subjects ("Gods and Goddesses" and "Religion and Sexuality") when he was still doing his PhD. Finally, PhD completed, Doctorate awarded and now he's published a book based on said PhD.

Unfortunately, I haven't read it yet. The books hadn't arrived at the bookshop (publishers, who'd have 'em?) in time for the book launch but I've been reliably informed that they are available from today.

Essentially the book examines the stories of Genesis 19 (Sodom and Gomorrah) and Judges 19-21 (the one about the outrage at Gibeah) in the Christian and Jewish traditions and, in particular, examines the traditional homophobic interpretation of Sodom and Gomorrah. He presents an alternative perspective on the story in which the events at Sodom and Gomorrah are associated with xenophobia, inhospitality and the selfishness of the wealthy and are not seen as some sort of gay mardi gras of excess.

I, for one, am looking forward to reading it.