Dental As Anything

I’m at Gate 7 at Melbourne International Airport waiting to catch a plane to New Zealand to entertain 40 ancient dentists. Their faculties may be failing but at least they’ll all have a fine set of knashers to clack together if they’re too tired to clap. Dentists have one of the highest rates of suicide in the world so ancient dentists will be very depressed and praying for a death they no longer have the energy to actively instigate. Hopefully our 40 minutes of comedy and my comedy legs will give them a small spark of pleasure as they shuffle towards the pearly white light.

It could be a tough gig. It could be like pulling teeth. Did you laugh at the gag? I bet the old dentists won’t. They probably won’t hear the gag if I scream it into their waxy tunnels  as they clack morse code at each other. I remember doing a gig once for a bunch of old farmers and afterwards while crying in a cubicle I overheard this assessment of our performance.

‘Hey Len, what did you think of the entertainment?’
‘I dunno, couldn’t hear a fuckin’ word they said.’

From memory we were pretty shit so Len got lucky. On the topic of shit gigs another one that sits deep in the cerebral cortex like a confidence sapping cancer was a wee gem for 200 builders and architects in that mock Tudor Christchurch marvel The Chateau on The Park. We dressed up as builders and thought it would be a great idea to build the stage as the night went on.  I wore short short denim shorts, a white string singlet and a mullet wig. To this day I don’t know why I did this. I’m sure all the builders took one look at me pretending to be one of them and wanted to stick a splintery bit of four by two up my two by four. (I have no idea what this means, I just like the way it sounds.) Things went from bad to worse when we realised we had forgotten about steps and dropped one poor lady as we tried to lift her onto the stage to accept an award.  You could actually hear the hatred in the room. You could feel the waves of anger crashing onto our stage with no steps and not even my comedy legs could save us. Even worse it was being beamed live to all of Christchurch via CTV’s one camera set up at the back of the room. We ran from the scene of the crime and upon arriving home I discovered my father had been watching the horror unfold as we unfolded it. We sat in mutual silence and I prayed this was a sign neither of us would ever speak of the abomination again. SuddenIy he spoke.

‘I was just watching some builders awards and Potpinto and Dori were doing the entertainment with some really ugly girl. Who’s she?’
‘I don’t know…she’s new…I’ve never worked with her before.’
‘She’s a bloody strange looking thing.’

To this day I’m not sure if dad was telling the truth. They say when people witness traumatic events like car crashes and Feelers concerts everyone describes what they’ve seen differently, so maybe in a fit of self preservation he substituted me with a skanky two-bit crack whore. It wouldn’t have been hard. There are some things a father should never witness his son doing and that gig was one of them so I am forever indebted to the mullet, CTV’s lack of budget and my milky feminine legs.

Oh pooh. They’ve just announced my flight has been delayed until 7.15pm because of a Chile explosion so I shall keep rambling. God….I WISH I was in the Koru lounge right now. It’s so close. I can almost smell it and it smells better than KFC dipped in beer and sunshine. I can almost smell the free pastries with their viscous apricot and raspberry centres. I can almost hear the clacking and cackles of the ancient dentists as they spray free bottles of Lindauer Special Reserve and Steiny Pure over body painted Air New Zealand nymphs in kiwifruit bras and sheepskin thongs. The finest New Zealand lambs will be turned by bronzed trolly dolly eunuchs on spits of gold before being torn apart by the presidential dentists in an ecstatic hedonistic gorging orgy. There will be a food fight and then as the 42 bottles of pinot mix with the 42 Below,  inhibitions will evaporate and everyone will start lap dancing on laptops all connected wirelessly for free.  Hayley Westenra will serenade you and whisper in your ear that she wants you to be her first. Dave Dobbyn will serenade you and whisper in your ear that even though he’s a born again Christian and off the bottle he’d still be happy to let you finger his slice of heaven in the posh bogs. The Feelers will serenade you and explode.

Oooh, we’re boarding, I’ll stop here. Let’s hope Air NZ knows something Qantas and Jetstar don’t because I’ve splashed out on ‘The Works’ and have to drink a whole lot of red wine and watch two movies to get my $30 worth of upgrade.

Dennis Hopper On Top

I walked down Spencer Street with a heavy heart and a light head for it was washing day and I had nothing to blog about. As I weaved my way among red and black ensconced Essendon supporters I was approached by a man who looked uncannily like a half-cut homeless version of Dennis Hopper and considering Dennis Hopper often looked half-cut and homeless  he looked uncannily like Dennis Hopper.

I’m usually pretty good at avoiding unwanted street intercourse with junkies, zealots and backpackers bearing clipboards but my brief befuddlement at looking at Dennis Hopper looking at me looking at him gave me no time to pretend to be very interested in something on the other side of the street.

“Hey mate, you don’t know where the Toff of The Town is do ya mate?”

My pulse raced and I almost bounced with joy. Yes! Yes, I did know where the Toff of the Town* was. I’d been there a couple of times for drinks and now I was in a position to tell a real fair dinkum Aussie who looked remarkably like the star of Easy Rider where to go for the very first time.

“The Toff of the Town is on Swanston Street, just above a Thai restaurant called Cookie. Head down Collins and when you get to…”
“Nah, nah mate, it’s a brothel.”

This threw me for a second but I was sure of my facts and hammered my point home.

The Three Golliwogs by Glud Button

“No, Cookie's a Thai restaurant, I’ve been there before.”
“Nah mate, it’s a brothel. Top Of The Town. I’m meeting an old friend there.”

I took a cautious step back and considered my options cautiously. My dream of guiding a local had been shattered and was in danger of turning into an episode of Seinfeld. He’d never said Toff, my foolish over eager ears in their eagerness to assist had simply heard the word they wanted, just the way I’d always misheard the opening lines to Blue Monday as, ‘I see a ship in the harbor, hiking in a shallow bay’** and the way my eyes had until their early teens thought the author of The Famous Five books was Glud Button.

Dennis Hopper continued.

“I haven’t seen him 15 years. Can’t wait to catch up with him.”
“Sorry, I thought you were talking about a bar…I don’t know where a brothel is…good luck though… sorry I can’t be more help.”
“No worries mate, I’ll find it, can’t be far away.”

And it wasn’t.  At The Top of the Town brothel is located at 516-518 Flinders Street and features a ‘discrete rear entrance for your peace of mind.’ Their website is rather flash. You can enter a fortnightly competition to win a free stay with the lady of your choice and if you say the codeword ‘Year of The Golden Shower Rabbit’ at reception you receive a $30 discount on Friday and Saturday night. They have a blog as well to convey their outrage at cruelty to bears in Pakistan, India and China, although they seem particularly incensed with the Chinese because, ‘It is disgusting that bears are treated in this manner especially when the Chinese love Panda Bears.’

Who the hell catches up with a long lost friend at a brothel? Perhaps one of them liked BBQ and the other suggested a spit-roast and then it all got out of hand. And why did he ask me where the brothel was? Why didn't he ask the Essendon supporters? Do I look like a man who would know where a brothel was or was he just hoping he’d get lucky? What do men who frequent brothels look like? Like bloody me according to Dennis Hopper. Dennis Hopper took one look at me and assumed I was a brothel creeping brothelite.

I admit I did used to own a pair of brothel creepers but I only wore them in character with a door knob round my neck while doing soul destroying murder mysteries. In fact performing at murder mystery dinner theatre was not dissimilar to working at a brothel, staggering home with my arse rendered red and raw by the pinches of countless drunken 50 year old women and the occasional homophobic man when I was dressed as a woman. The hourly ‘ladies fee’ at The Top of The Town is $120 and for three hours of murder mystery dinner theatre I would get around $350 and some leftover meat and two veg if I was lucky… so I suppose I came out on top and shouldn’t complain.
*Yes, it's not even called the Toff Of The Town, it's actually The Toff in Town...but it's definitely not a brothel.
** The real words are 'I see a ship in the harbour, I can and shall obey.'

Puppies Puppies Dr. Who

This post will be all about Dr.Who’s puppies. Here is a photo of Dr.Who and a puppy.

Now that I’ve hopefully fooled Google I can move on to what this post is really about. I do like puppies and Dr. Who but I’m not going to blog about them because every man and his puppy blogs about puppies and people who blog about Dr. Who should get themselves a puppy and blog about that because they are sad and lonely.

Some of you may have noticed advertisements began appearing on my blog a few months ago and you’ll be pleased to learn I’ve milked almost enough from them to buy a Soy Flat White. I didn’t sell out and do this for the money; I just did it to provide you with exciting opportunities to obtain information about products and services relevant to your demographic, location and sexual persuasion. Up until my post about a device that puts marks on paper similar to the marks on your screen and the substance needed to make the marks, I’d been providing my Melbourne audience with fantastic opportunities to get 70% off Sushi somewhere. This is a good thing. Sushi is yummy and good and is good for you and gluten free as long as you don’t have soy sauce. Unlike New Zealand where the sushi is thin, Australian sushi is long, maybe as long as 10 cm or nearly 4 inches for my U.S readers. I usually splash out and get two rolls and believe me, after swallowing 8 inches I’m full as a bull yet only $5 lighter. 70% of $5 is $3.50, almost enough for a Soy Flat White.

I don’t know what ads you’ve been seeing where you are, but every time I look at my blog to make sure it hasn’t been hacked by the Chinese Government I’m bombarded by ads for cheap apparatus to put in your magic paper machine made by the very company I spent a good few hours ranting about. I’m too scared to type the name of the brand or device in case one of Google’s robots spots it and throws up even more advertisements for something I despise….not that they could fit any more ads for the stuff in.

This looks more like a sad spider but you get the point.

Yes, I can hear you screaming at your desktop monitor, laptop, netbook or hand held device that I should just not have ads on my blog but then I would never get my cheque for $100 from Google. Yes, that’s right, you have to earn $100 before Sergey and Larry will open the Google cheque book and hand over the money it will take me approximately 5.5 years ($1.50/month = $18/year : $100 = $18 x 5.5555 years recurring) to earn and them 5.5 picoseconds. By the time I get my $100 it won’t be enough to buy a Soy Flat White anyway. I’ll have to wait another half decade for another $100 when $200 won’t be enough for a Soy Flat White so the whole thing is a complete waste of time unless I cut my losses and order a Short Black or a Fluffy.

Which is a good name for a puppy. Fluffy that is, not Short Black, unless your dog is short and black and you're not a heightist racist.

Puppy puppy puppy. Dr. Who. Dr. Who. Dr. Who. I’m pretty sure the robots stop looking after the title and first line but better safe than sorry. Puppy.

Temporary Insanity

Like at least two before it this post comes to you direct from Melbourne City Dry Cleaners and Laundromat. If there is one benefit from the washing machine smoking itself it’s that I now have an occasional 27 minutes of normal warm washing time to type uninterrupted and free from guilt and wireless internet.

My desire to sit in front of a screen and write to you at night has diminished due to days sitting in front of a screen sending sports bras, boots and balls to a large chain of sports stores in New Zealand. I had been led to believe my sportswear temp job would finish after I saved the New Zealand economy but when I asked last Friday if they wanted me back on Monday my boss smiled, quite possibly malevolently and said, ‘Oh yes Greg, we have big plans for you.’

Her image wavered and for a second I swore I saw the Grand Beaver before she continued, ‘I think we’ll get you keying some orders and then train you up on the in house system that even has pretty pictures…how do you feel about that?’

I croaked something to the affirmative and she continued.

‘I think we’ll need you for another two weeks at least. Mark’s been here over a year now as a temp so who knows what could happen.’

Temping for a year! I didn’t know that was possible. I’d thought Mark was a full time sportswear careerist and had been all G.I G.I, likey likey, love you long time and now I find out he is just like me. What a little shit. There’s nothing worse than a temp who sells out, gets all permanent and chummy with the salaryites and still calls themselves a temp…which he didn’t to me. Oh no, he kept his temperance well hidden and pretended to be my benevolent supervisor, giving me patient and helpful answers to my stupid SAP questions. He even chatted nicely to me on the train back into the city. I showed him photos of my cat for God’s sake!

I backed out of the office and went and made a cup of Merrill Fernando’s finest with two bags to calm down. Nothing terrifies a temp more than the threat of permanency. The reason temps temp is because they fear commitment and prefer to whore themselves out on one week stands for rates of pay those permanent schmucks can only dream about…I think. We are jobbing journeymen, littlest hobos, wherever we lay our SAP, that’s our home. We sit at an empty desk to do work nobody else can be arsed doing and just when you finally remember our name you turn around and we’re gone again. Maybe tomorrow I’ll want to settle down, but until tomorrow I’ll just keep moving on and you’ll wonder who I was and how 340 sports bras ended up at Rebel Sport in Albany.

My washing has finished washing and so has this post. I refuse to pay $6 to use the drier so I will finish here and carry my moist undies through the streets of Melbourne.