All things small and wonderful

I hope everyone had a fun and happy Christmas. The food at ours was top notch. I ate to the point just before explosion. And then I ate some more. The days that followed also included much eating, the highlights of which were some wonderful barbecues. I particularly enjoyed eating pavlova. The mozzies particularly enjoyed eating me and my cat Morris particularly enjoyed eating bits of sausages and rissoles and cream (not altogether, though I'm sure he would eat that combo altogether if he could). My cousin's dog Koko did not eat the cats, which was good. Morris also ate roasted sweet potato, which adds further evidence to the theory that he is part dog.

Last night, by accident, I watched the film 'Human Nature' on the telly. By accident, because I meant instead to go to bed and read more Kurt Vonnegut which I got for Christmas. Instead Patricia Arquette’s incisors pulled me in - they do it for me every time. I can't resist. It was not a bad film - a bit patchy, but quite funny in places. Not as good as writer Charlie Kauffman's other efforts ('Being John Malkovich', 'Adaptation', 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'). Miranda Otto putting on a French accent was quite amusing. But of course, she's no Patricia Arquette. But the best thing, for me, was the appearance of Peter Dinklage.

Peter Dinklage is the hottest dwarf in filmmaking today, rivalled only by David Lynch's favourite creepy little man Michael J. Anderson, who was also in the spectacular TV series 'Carnivàle'. Yes, this is a claim I have just made up on the spot, but anyone who has seen 'The Station Agent' will no doubt agree with me and those of you who haven't should do so immediately. But life must be hard being a dwarf actor. It's not like you can audition for fun roles like Spiderman or Voldemort. This is probably one thing that drove Peter Dinklage to appear in 'Elf' with Will Ferrell. But apparently he stole the show from Ferrell - not that I'll go particularly out of my way to see it and verify.

So anyway, there I am, writing an email and pondering the great Patricia Arquette-Peter Dinklage combo in 'Human Nature' and, by the by, I wonder if perhaps are they in another film together and hey, wouldn't that be great?! So I turn to my trusty purveyor of all film knowledge, the Internet Movie Database, and do a search that combines these two favourite actors of mine, both so weird and wonderful I can't help loving them. And what comes up, but a 2003 film called 'Tiptoes' - which, lo and behold, includes not just the afore mentioned incisor queen and dwarf extraordinaire but also another of my all-time favourite actors, Gary Oldman! Next yet, I'll discover it includes David Bowie as well and Jude Law playing someone deliciously bratty who later on cries uncontrollably and also Ralph Fiennes eating plums, and thus will have everyone I could ever want altogether in the one film! It will be the filmic equivalent of Morris's ultimate sausage-and-rissole-and-sweet-potato-and-cream combo!

The imbd has this to say about 'Tiptoes':

"Gary Oldman plays as a dwarf brother to a normal-sized Matthew McConaughey. When McConaughey's girlfriend (played by Kate Beckinsale) becomes pregnant, the pair are fearful that the baby will inherit the Oldman gene. Matters are complicated still further when Beckinsale finds herself falling in love with Oldman's character."

Ok, so it doesn't sound great. How the last-time-I-checked full-sized Gary Oldman plays a dwarf, I do not know. But the "Oldman gene" - that sounds interesting! Peter Dinklage plays Gary's bad influence best friend, a drug addict Frenchman who rides a motorbike. And Michael J. Anderson is in it too! So I know what I'll be looking for when next I visit the video store. Harrah for dwarves! I can't get enough!

If only all blood-suckers were sexy like Spike...

I know last entry I said we should wage war against flies, but I change my mind. Flies AND mosquitoes - and if I have to pick just one, then it's the mosquitoes: they should all go and DIE. I was just hanging out my washing - which will probably dry in about 5 mins it's so hot here - and I got bitten 4 times. Those bastards! Now I want to rip my legs off with my nails. I killed two of them but two is not enough - they have armies. I blame the neighbours. As well as neglecting their two whippets, Valley and Ziggy, they neglect their so-called fish pond, which is really just a green-water filled bath and mosquito breeding ground. Hence all the mozzies in our back garden. So I think my washing is staying there - I'm not going back into that war zone until I'm armed with something - insect spray, machete, bazooka, anything! Meanwhile, my cat is lounging out there in the sun, looking oh-so-smug. It's not fair, just because my blood is nice and tasty ...

Meanwhile, to quote Chairman Kaga from Iron Chef, "If my memory serves me correctly, Christmas is just around the corner." But of course, pretty much everyone on this planet knows that and my guess is those lucky ones who do not know it are getting smaller and smaller in number every day. One of the highlights of my week so far has been reading Kurt Vonnegut's 'Slapstick or Lonesome No More!' at something close to the speed of light. And from that I would like to take today's reading:


Perhaps some people are born unhappy. I surely hope not.

Speaking for my sister and myself: We were born with the capacity and the determination to be utterly happy all the time.

Perhaps even in this we were freaks.

Hi ho.


(1991, p. 35) (Harvard system dies hard!)

... Come on everyone, be a freak and have a happy Christmas!

Home again, home again, jiggity jig

Hello all,

I am writing this, not from the freezing heart of wintery Europe, but from the warm recesses of north-east Victoria. It is windy. The parrots and wattle birds are making their parroty and wattle birdy noises respectively. The Cure is playing on my laptop. All is well with the world!

I am now in a little town called Mount Beauty, which is where my mum grew up and my grandma lives. The town is located in the Kiewa Valley at the foot of Mt Bogong, the highest mountain in Victoria (1986m, as Mr Google informs me). The aboriginals who used to live in the area called the mountain "Bogong", meaning "big fella," and it's nice to see the big old fella again.

I went for a walk around the lake yesterday - sorry, not lake, regulating pondage - and saw: 2 lots of 4 baby ducks and their mothers (wow, this is sounding like a primary school maths lesson! Now, how many baby ducks, or ducklings, in total, children?), 2 rabbits who ran off as fast as they could when they saw me (I'm pretty scary I know, what with my pistol and t-shirt that reads "I go where myxomatosis doesn't" - but who knew rabbits could FLY across the ground?!), a small tribe of magpies which luckily didn't try to stick their pointy beaks into my head, plus about half a million flies. Fuck, they're annoying! Enough with this war-on-terror shit, our government should be putting all its money and resources into the war on flies. I'm sure it would make many an Aussie feel happier and, more importantly, safer at all those BBQs this summer if there weren't all those frikkin' flies buzzing around and threatening the security of our sausages, rissoles and potato salads. Who's with me in starting a letter writing campaign?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I've opened all the windows to let the wind in. The current temperature is a sublime 21.8ºC, according to the informative website: www.visitmtbeauty.com.au - check it out if you want a visual as to where I am. Though now that I'm back in Oz, I may just get around to working out how to create some sort of photo album on this here blog, so yous'all can see some pictures from my trip (especially ye not-in-Melbourne ones). But no promises, because, you know, technology has this habit of getting the better of me. I'll try and whip it into submission though.

Ooh, better go. There's a wasabi-pea-on-the-floor emergency going on.