I'm going on a writing holiday. Back Friday. If I don't do any writing on my writing holiday, you may not hear from me until March.

Just by way of warning.

Otherwise, see you Friday!

L

Apparently, humans are social animals. Without social interaction, we become dysfunctional and can't survive. We go loopy and do crazy things like thinking we’re from planet Zorb and worshipping the god of an inanimate object such as a pedal bin, piece of rope, can opener or smiliar. Apparently this is true, which I know because I saw it in a documentary.

I also know it is true because lately I have been working weekends.

On Sunday, I made myself take an hour off to go and meet my friends who were at a BBQ for my mate Lawrence who is going to live in Sydney.

I went to the party and I couldn't do it right. I couldn't do small talk, I couldn't do large talk, I couldn't even do medium-sized talk (normally my specialty). I couldn't TALK without getting confused and realising I wasn't saying what I set out to say. I do believe at one stage I was speaking in tongues.

No wonder those people in the library are so insane.

Argem de minno frizzle mop. Don't you think?

Thank you to the very astute and highly amused Big Oceans for pointing out the new heights to which Melbourne pretendy newspaper The Age rose majestically yesterday.

As you know, I am not very good at photoshop so I did not make this up. I couldn’t make this up. I would think this was a very laborious way of making the point that The Age is crappy, if it were not for the fact that The Age really is this crappy.

Britney Gets Flat Tyre

You heard it here first.

My favourite bit is how they try to make it news by mentioning other incidents involving Britney that have been in the news “She won’t be running over anyone’s foot in her car BECAUSE SHE HAS A FLAT TYRE!” and “her kids are gone so she’s feeling even worse now that she’s GOT A FLAT TYRE!”

I’m surprised they aren’t trying harder to make it newsworthy actually. “Third world debt is ballooning out of control, which Britney must have been contemplating WHEN SHE GOT A FLAT TYRE!”

“Hillary Clinton won the New Hampshire primary with no help from Britney who HAD A FLAT TYRE!”

In other news, it’s very hot today. It’s going to be 42 degrees in Mildura. Some people think this is because of global warming. Obviously they are failing to account for BRITNEY’S FLAT TYRE.

Did you know there are writers in Melbourne without work? Quelle hilair!

So, as George Bush convinces his coalition of the willing to gear up against Iran, the globe heats up, Kenya descends from democracy into chaos, the most powerful nation in the world launches a political campaign that could effect us all, spare a thought for the real news items that some fearless journalist somewhere is covering without concern for his or her own safety. Maybe Paris is getting out of a car. Maybe Enrique is scratching his botty. These journalists are the reason we fight for our freedom. Spare a thought for them.

When you picture someone writing, what do you picture?

A piece of paper and a pen, or a computer?

I used to picture the pen. I used to write with the pen. I used to write first, type later. Couldn’t do it any other way. These days, though, it’s straight into a blank word document, or I lose concentration and look out the window at the car being towed away opposite the cafe I go to. (At exactly 4pm every weekday, two parking ticket inspectors and a tow truck arrive at what was - at 3:59 - a car park but is now a clearway zone opposite the cafe. Parking ticket first; tow truck second; confused, disbelieving, furious motorist third. It’s a depressing regularity and the kind of thing one is likely to get an arts grant for filming in fast forward through a grainy camera with no sound and subtitles).

Sadly, my vision of a writer has clouded somewhat since I’ve attempted to be one. I don’t write things down, I don’t use a typewriter. I use a laptop, but not in the way I’d like to. I’m not like the writers in those pictures in American magazines that advertise the latest laptop: thoughtful, faintly amused writers in spectacles who wear white socks, resting on the laps of their clearly wealthy but inspiringly mixed-race families, while the fire burns away in the corner and the laptop is synched to the Blackberry which is synched to the office, where they have a job that requires them to write from home wearing white socks but also apparently keeps them in the life to which (just look at their kids) they have clearly become accustomed.

I never quite live up to the best parts of the corny picture people have of things. I live up to the worst: procrastinating on the internet, being antisocial, not having enough money to give anything the attention it deserves, and, you know, never going outside.

One day though, gadget. One day.

Well, at least the socks.

Yesterday, I wrote out the Standing There Productions timeline for 2008.

It took me two hours.

I’m going to go and do some work now. I may be some time.

Please collect the mail and help yourself to what’s in the fridge…

L.

Hello everybody and welcome to the most fun month of the year. January in Melbourne is extra grouse because of the following mathematical equations:

1. Weather + park = frisbee
2. Daylight savings + best friends in world coming home for Christmas = more daylight hours for hilarity
3. New year + weather = fitness regime
4. Feeling of pride at fitness regime + weather = justification of consumption of icecream or (”it’s good for you”) gelati
5. Complete lack of desire to go inside and do work + all the above + new movie releases = fun times

Using the above equations, please provide a clear solution to the following problems:

1. Deadlines (x 3)
________________
Best month of year - hours spent wishing the state library was a surf beach = ?

2. Deadlines + The Guilt + The Fear (to the power of twelve) minus Being A Bad Friend = ?

3. Missing out on seeing best friends in world who are only in Melbourne for three weeks (x 3) - amount work done = ?

4. Amount of time spent on fitness regime - amount of work not done in those hours = justification of lack of fitness. True/False.

5. Occasional reward of new release movie + (”it’s healthy”) gelati - fitness regime = white, stressed, fatty + The Guilt. True/False.

You do the maths.

Hi everyone,

This is my last post for the year. Standing There Productions has had a fantastic 2007 - and 2008 is looking to be even more action-packed. The kids' TV show development, our comedy festival show, Greatness Thrust Upon Them, and our artists' residency in August at Bundanon... not to mention the things we haven't come across yet, the coffees we haven't drunk, and the people I haven't told off yet in the State Library.

Since we won't be back until January, here's something to be going on with. It's a rare treat - a bit of a role change - it's video we shot earlier in the year that's written and performed by Rita Walsh. Shot by Stewart Thorn and directed by me (pick who got the easy job) it's based on the early careers of Rita and myself. It's called The Receptionist.

Enjoy. Have a great break and see you in the new year. Thanks for playing!