Mundi 11/7/05. Sydney (10.

00am) ↑N → Beuladelah (red ppr ovr x 2 shot mug latté) → (Black-neck-

ed stork (lso korld Jabiru (Ephippiorhynchus asiaticus))) → Kempsey (‘city of cedars’; bort petrl; H
sor a wite hors. Noel (her dad)(c ‘7/2/02 – 22/2/02’ p14,15)) reknd if u c 1 in a padk it bringz luk if u
spit on yor fingr & make th sine of th † on yor shoo - so w dun it.) → Urunga (sleepn n our sual ● x th
rvr nxt 2 th golf kors : hav ritn this ntri in th pub (‘Ocean View’) on th 4shor; pot of beer; 6.05pm).
Chu-ezdi 12/7/05. Urunga (9.00am) ←W → Bellingen (Flamenco dans fstvl n th 15th, 16th, 17th juli) →
(fox ran † th rode) → Dorrigo → Ebor (Robe (c ‘2/4/05 - 8/4/05’ p13,14) spelt ←wordz; @ th tern off
→ G-uyra w wer n a rode w hadnt bn on 4 th 1st time on th trip) → Guyra (lamb & potatoe fstvl 18-27
jnuari; red ppr, bort n lowzi mug of x 2 shot kofi 4 $4.20 & a good hmbrgr (n nuthr shop) wth baikn,
unyn, eg etc 4 $5.00 (29/10. n good hmbrgr @ Burger (11/11. but wie noe fride unyn?) Republic n
Errol st Nth Melb (30/10. n ♀ @ lithoe haus (12/11. ths rvo met th nue PIRMININKAS (KA&LrAeDwĖ)
f th ♣ KMT-EE & 1 f mie reedrz (SrTiRmUaNsGA), lsoe n th ♣ kmtee, n th pub (Town Hall) † th rode)
† th rode hoo nue mie farthr n Šiauliai O 1935 told mi 2day ♂ woz soe h&sm n hiz ueni4m ♂ woz
nknaemd Gu-staf Frölich ftr n faemus moovi aktr) Nth Melb kosts $8.50)) → Inverell ((safire siti) shopt
up, stubi) → Warialda (“place of wild honey”) ↑N → North Star (stubi) → Goondiwindi (†d NSW/QLD
bordr @ th Macintyre rvr.) ←W → Toobeah (parkt 4 th nite a kupl of kz out @ a ‘camp & watering
reserve’ 4 stok; m drinkn Carbine Stout whch must b th worst n all of oz but woz th nli 1 in th botl
shop; 6.35pm). 4g-ot 2 mnshn rlier th@ I sor a Red Winged Parrot (Aprosmictus erythropterus).
Wnzdi 13/7/05. Too-beah (7.45) ←W → (sor nuthr Aprosmictus erythropterus; droverz n horsbk,
dogz, katl †d th rode) → St George (“inland Queensland fishing capital”) ↑N (long Carnavon Hwy
whch iz bein prmoted az th GREAT INLAND WAY goin mor or les ↑N orl th wai ← Dubbo → Cairns &
Cooktown & iz th kwikst wai ← Melb → th far north tropk koast wth n side trip 2 Carnavon Gorge
throne in) → Roma (not th 1 w r → nxt yeer (c ‘Vilnius (no 2)’ p8); had th werst hmbrgr, shopt, red ppr
(Australian) wer th ditorial woz vtuper@v (but not 2 th x10t of Beazley (30/10. hoo ksplaend ystrdae
n n speech → Australian Christ-ian (1/11(Melbourne Cup). ““According to senior Palestinian
official Nabib Shaath, George W. Bush explained the US foreign policy in these terms
when meeting Shaath and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in 2003: “God would tell
me, ‘George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.’ And I (1/11. Phillip Adams reck-
ons that we generally lock up people who say that they did it because God told them to)
did. And then God would tell me, ‘George, go and end tyranny in Iraq! And I did. And
now, again, I feel God’s words coming to me: ‘Go get the Palestinians their state and get
the Israelis their security and get peace in the Middle East.’ And by God (2/11. Prof. Harper
(“I don’t meet many low-paid people in my line of work.”) th hed f th prpoezd nue Fair Pay
Commission lsoe haz n drkt lien judjn x hiz: “My God is a God of love. My God is a God of
fairness and justice and honesty.” – The Age (30/10. p1,4)) I’m gonna do it.” ”” – The Big
Issue. (No 240. p7)) Lobby how “faith guided his life” – The Age (p1, 4) hoo (1s rfrd 2 our sljrz
az “b♥d mmbrz of our dfns 4sz”) korld th terrrsts “subhuman filth” (2/11. but thei (6/11. HOMO
SAPIENS (1st uezd x LcIaNrNoAlEuUsS n hiz ‘Systema naturae’). Kkordn 2 AgGiAoMrBgEiNo: ““ In
a letter to a critic, Johann Georg Gmelin, who objected that in the Systema man seemed
to have been created in the image of the ape, Linnaeus responds by offering the sense of
his maxim : “And nevertheless man recognizes himself. Perhaps I should remove those
words. Yet I ask you and the entire world to show me a generic difference between ape
and man which is co-nsistent with the principles of natural history. I most certainly do not
know of any.” The notes for a reply to anoth-er critic, Theodor Klein, show how far
Linnaeus was willing to push the irony implicit in the formula Homo sapiens. Those who,
like Klein, do not recognize themselves in the position that the Systema has assigned to
man should app-ly the nosce te ipsum to themselves; in not knowing how to recognize
themselves as man, they have placed themselves among the apes. ¶ Homo sapiens,
then, is neither a clearly defined species nor a substance; it is, rather, a machine for
producing the recognition of the human. …. It is an optical machine constructed of a
series of mirrors in which ma-n, looking at himself, sees his own image already deformed
1
in the features of an ape. Homo is a constitutively “anth-ropomorphous” animal (that is,
“resembling man”, according to the term that Linnaeus constantly uses until the tenth
edition of the Systema), who must recognize himself in a non-man in order to be human.
¶ …. This is why at the end of the introduction to the Systema, Linnaeus, who defined
Homo as the animal that is only if it recognizes that it is not, must put up with apes
disguised as critics climbing on his shoulders to mock him: ideoque ringentium
Satyrorum cachinnos, meisque humeris insilientium cercopithecorum exsultationes
sustinui {that is why I endured the derisive laughter of snarling satyrs and the exultation
of monkeys leaping onto my shoulders}.””) wer not prtraed like soe n ‘Parad-ise Now’ (8/11. n
wch th moest powrfl werdz wer put →2 th mowth f th 1 hoo choez 2 b n SUISIED BOMBR (…8/11.
loekl lejd wood beez rrstd 2dae (10/11. trnspairnt leegl proessz r th nli wae f +rsn fe-erz n th muzlm
kmnti f b-in ‫ٱ‬d. Mntiem th HOTLINE z shorli runn HOT – w need huemn skrfshl vktmz 2 feed
PARANOIA))) wch I sor @ the NOVA ths rvo. C it wiel u kan az n th neer fuechr such filmz wil b b&
(3/11. Robert Burns was threatened with a charge of sedition in 1794. He is rumoured to have
“tempered his writing”, and written under assumed names as a result of the threat. William Blake wa-
s charged with sedition in 1803 for exclaiming “damn the King and damn his soldiers” in a heated mo-
ment (7/11. n th Tablelands Advertiser. (17/5/05) ndr n mug shot f mi n p5 ie sed: “…. I am
against all soldi-ers. I don’t think people should kill under any circumstances because war does not
solve problems.” (8/11. but ie woz kort off gard (drinkn n kerbsied latté wth H) x th rportr z iem gaenst
kiln evn f wor did solv prolbmz (…8/11. tz n startn ● (fowndaeshnl). c ‘30/11/04 – 9/12/04’ p1))).
Daniel Defoe (Robins-on Crusoe) was imprisoned for his satire of church and state, The Shortest
Way with Dissenters (170-2). Ben Jonson was imprisoned in 1597 for sedition for writing The Isle of
Dogs. In th 1660s, Molier-e’s satirical play Tartuffe was banned for sedition by Louis XIV, although
the ban was later lifted. Ho-nore Daumier’s Gargantua, a lithograph depicting the French King as a
corpulent giant feeding upon the riches of his people, landed him in jail for six months in 1831.
Robert Goldstein, the maker of Th-e Spirit of ’76, which depicted British atrocities in the American
Revolution, was charged under the US Sedition Act 1917 during World War I. The judge was
concerned that the film might cause Americans “to question the good faith of our ally, Great Britain.”
The filmmaker served three years in jail. (Sour-ce: Chris Connolly, law faculty, University of NSW
(5/11. + Mahatma Gandhi hoo spent yeerz n jael 4 sdshn; Joe McCarthy ternd sdshn lorz gaenst th
mrikn left; it woz 1 f th chrjz gaenst Nelson Mand-ela; Peter Lalor & hiz folowrz wer charjd wth sdshn
& ditr f th Ballarat Times woz fownd gilti f it 4 praezn th rvolt & spent 3 munths n przn; sdshn charjz
wer laed gaenst anti-Vietnam War dmonstraetrz n th 1960s n QLD; jeezs f Nzarth woz †d n n charj of
klaemn ♂ woz ‘King of th Juez’.))(4/11. ‘Are we start-ing to censor ourselves?’ Freedom
of speech is a fundamental right which we tend not to notice until we’ve lost it. A healthy
democracy needs people who feel free to investigate, critique, satirize and mock our
politicians and their policies. A healthy democracy needs alternative opinions and films,
plays, novels and artworks that take risks and challenge the status quo. ¶ Censorship
takes many forms and self-censorship (11/11. merikn muzikian, EsAtRe-LvEe, rknz: “They
don’t have to censor artists nowadays, …. Artists censor themselves because they’re
scared.” F mor knsrn 4 mi z wn th lngwj f rdnri ppl n vrdae dskors → mor & mor → PL@ITUDES,
BANALIT-IES, INANITIES, & SIMPLFK8SHNZ ntrsprst wth th kkazional SLOGAN. (14/11 & howz ths
4 kleerli put x mienr oz ktor jeSrIeMmSy (← The Age (13/11. Sunday Life p19): “My professional
career has taught me that everyone has the potential to be bad, cruel and selfish.
Society is the restraining paradigm. Without a good mo-ral framework to hold us
together, mankind is a bad animal. Similarly, our capacity for good is always present.
That struggle, between angels and demons, is quite real. It is not some abstract
metaphor.”) is perhaps the most pernici-ous. Over the past few years both the media and
funding bodies have become more cautious; stories abound of pre-ssure put on artform
boards and production houses not to bite the hand that feeds them, and on individuals in
the media to tone down comment or reject certain cartoons. ¶ The new measures in the
2
anti-terrorism laws relating to sedition as they now stand will curb artists, writers,
filmmakers, producers, publishers and journalists. Without fair comment provisions as
safeguards (7/11. 4 ‘arts’ grueps 2 arsk 4 prvljd prvzionz wch uthrz r ksluedd from z n btrael f th riet
2 ‘free speech’ az w hav stablsht t n westrn dmokrsi (ie rkmnd Foucaultz ssae ‘What is an Author?’ 4
n dskushn f th traed-offs nvolvd). Not th@ rtsts dserv 2 b r r taekn sriusli eni mor (c ‘13/8/01 - 25/8/01’
p14, & ‘27/11/00 - 7/12/00’ Tuesday 28/11/00). Kkseptans f r kmpliens wth “fair comment
provisions as safeguards” wood maek rtsts kmplsit wth fshstk lorz. What kan b sed nli with
th permshn f th st8 z not werth saein. & ie gree wth Islamic kmnti spoeksmn Keyser Trad (The
Age (6/11. p2)) th@ famli mmbrz (& frndz etc)(8/11. & newzpprz) f eni1 ‘disappeared’ (8/11.
Habib?) ndr th nue nti-terrzm lorz hav n jewti (8/11. rflktn n th werd ie rialiez t kareez mor bagj
than iem pr-paird 2 ksept & t rkwierz kwalfkaeshn eg. hoo m ie (9/11. c-in z ie doent tork 2 god & m
not n hed f st-8) 2 pontfk8 n jewti!) 2 shout loud n long 2 eni1 & vri1 n eni & vri street kornr O wot
haz taekn plaes 4 th saek of thr ♥d 1z & 4 th saek f OZ ssieti & dmokrsi. Freedmz r eezli lost
but rtaind nli wth kurj (8/11. wch ie doent klaem 2 hav (10/11. larst niet ie dremt thr woz n nok n th
dor & wn ie oe-pntt ie woz rrstd x n kop n ueni4m wth n drorn pistl)).), sedition can be made to
mean whatever the governm-ent wants it to mean. ¶ The Prime Minister declares that he
doesn’t wish to silence legitimate criticism or catch writ-ers and artists in the net. He
asks us to trust him. We need rather more than that. – Hilary McPhee, Fitzroy n The
Age (3/11. p14)))); Roma iz korld “capital of the Western Downs”; stubi 4 th rode) → Injune (topt ↑
wth ptrl ; stubi; H took foto of pub) → Here (x th side of th rode mung s&stone skarpmnts stil O 70kz
short of th gorj; 5.45). W r bein reel 2rsts ie. travln huje dstnsz 2 a set dstn8shn →2 whch w had 2
book ah-ed (← Roma) bkoz thr iz nli th kmrshl kampn ‫ ٱ‬az th Parks hav shut theirz bkoz ppl wer
bringn in do-gz & leevn litr etc. – kost iz $20/nite. H just red out th@ th fsh u k@ch @ St George r
Murray Cod (M-accullachella peelii) & Yellowbelly (2/11. c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p10) (aka Golden
perch (Macqu-aria ambigua)). 4got 2 mnshn w kame † our 1st botl treez (boababz?) south of Roma
whr tiz th prdm-nt street tree. Thurzdi 14/7/05. Larst nite I lisnd 2 th TRUCKS (ZOOMn x n few 00
yardz wai) & gain long b4 dorn ths mornn & I reelized th@ th knomi here knot srvive wthout OIL. Ovr
th larst 3 daiz w hav cn mainli HIGHWAY & th subtxt haz bn ROAD KILL. Our bigst xpndchr haz bn
PETROL. Our ds-tn8shn iz a 2rst ICON. But dorn woz greetd x KOOKABURRAZ (Dacelo
novaeguineae) & az th sun woz rizin x Australian RAVEN (Corvus coronoides) & th veri pkuliar frog
like korlz, so krktrstk of th nl&, of th Little CROW (Corvus bennetti). & w r TOGETHER. Az w lai
ntrtwined I kood heer n Pied BUTCHERBIRD (Cracticus nigrogularis) (I kan heer a Crested
BELLBIRD (Oreoica gutturalis) no-w). Our klosenss iz wot w vlue most & w r old nuf 2 hav no need
4 tork. W like 2 tuch h&s like CHILD-REN (or TAMILS). 8.35am …. 5.35. w r cheek x jowl wth naiborz.
Th famli on 1 side (4 kidz, 2 bikes, 4x4, larj 10t prtrudin a metr → our ‫ )ٱ‬hav gon 2 th kamp fire 2 lisn
2 th rainjrz lkchr. Wv kum bak from our 1st nspkshn of th gorj. ICONS (8/11. ← ‘GULF TRIP’. Letr →
Melbourne ritn x mi 4/9/97: “FOR S-ALE ¶ In the middle ages devout pilgrims used to go on a tour of
the holy shrines and the churches where famous relics were housed. They would come back with
tales of blessings by various popes and the dangers on the road which abounded with brigands who
robbed both rich and poor. Grandch-ildren would be bored into submission by these stories. The
famous complaint: “we woz robbed” orig-inated in this way. Over the centuries an industry developed
to cater to the needs of the devout. Many churches to this day house the shrunken dried scrotums of
jesus christ. Enough pieces of the holy cr-oss have been sold to build a bridge. As of tomorrow when I
get to Daintree town and start heading south I feel that I too am embarking on a pilgrimage of the holy
shrines, the ikons of the tourist indust-ry – Cape Tribulation, Whitsundays, Mission Beach, Barrier
Reef (etc) and various other places that I already know from watching telly. I feel that I was
appropriately introduced to this new phase of my journey when I was robbed this morning of $100 for
not wearing a seatbelt. I intend to suspend my opinion and enter fully into devotional mode though I
must admit my interest in the pilgrims is greater than in the ikons. ¶ Everyone in these parts is
wracking their brains how to separate the traveller from his every last cent. Even at Korumba Point
where all the locals live by hiring out cabins there were ‘no camping’ signs everywhere. Here in the
3
Atherton Tablelands (very beautiful scenery, beautiful tropical aromas, a great botanical walk you
would have loved) there are even more of those signs and plenty of rangers to patrol them so I had to
come into this spot after 5pm when they have knocked off. It is out of Mareeba and called : Emerald
Falls. An artist who runs a coffee shop in Atherton recommend-ed it. If its as good as he says it is I
may not get to Daintree tomorrow. At least there are no crocs here so I can have a wash in the stream
as I refuse to go to camp site shower blocks. The bird calls here are great and all new to me. ¶
Avanti!”) r larjr n th mjn8shn than th rlteez thei rprznt. No1 in komi rusha wood hav bleevd th@
STALIN woz no torlr than Derryn Hinch (10/11. n ♥ gaen) wthout hiz pl-@4m shuze. I had 4md my
mentl pkchr from such gorjz as Edeowie n th Flindrz & veri narow spktklr 1z n th Gammon rainjz. So
far wv nli bn out 4½ owrz & nstpktd a singl side gorj (Wards, whr King Fer-n gro @ thr most suthrli ●)
& Il giv my 2rst rport n a few daiz. My bigst thril kame from th veri nknsrnd Kori (Australian) Bustards
(Araeotis kori), 8 of thm, & th 2 Brolgas (Grus rubicundus) x th side of th rode O 20kz out on th wai
→2 th park. In th gorj tslf thr r floks of Pale-headed Rosellas (Platycerus adscitus) n berd Im not
uzed 2 seein. Our prolbm iz goin 2 b our 6-life az th van woblz & jiglz a treet & itz a ded givwai. Maib
wil hav 2 dvert th@ nrji 4 works. The famli r bak. Thei hav a laptop set up in thr nx. W havnt bn so
klose 2 naibrz sins w stopt goin 2 th Port Fairy Folk Festival & thr I uzed 2 get bak 2 th van drunk ftr
mdnite so it ddnt m@r. I just mite hav a nip of th ČEPKELIU TRAUKTINE (c ‘ŠI-AULIAI’ p1) th@ Egle
brort bak 4 mi ← lithol& (26/10. & c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p15 (27/10. I hav lr-edi drunk orl 3)).(any
excuse!!) N th uthr side w hav n ldli kupl n a hewj kravan hoo hav thr radio on. Friday 15/7/05. The
camp was as quiet as the grave fairly soon after we ret-ired to our swags. The place is
called TAKARAKKA & everyone (mostly pension-ers it seems) is very civilized. The
Sydneysider with the enormous trailer home next to us last night (they left this morning
heading for Darwin & back by Sep-tember 1) raved about the camp kitchen & the
ablutions block, so it must be a cut above the usual, but its not as good as being alone in
the bush & we would-n’t do it except that there is no other option. Today we did a few
minor walks (the Balloon Cave, a walk to a rock pool & a creek walk called a Nature Trail)
& a walk into two gorges, one of which required going barefoot through water & got
progressively narrow as it rose up through the escarpment (off Mickey Cr-eek gorge). But
the central activity was the climb to Boolimba Bluff, the last 300 metre section of which
was described as “steep and rugged” and “suitable only for the physically fit”. I qualified
(just) by actually getting to the top, but a woman we met ½ way up the stretch was
feeling stressed, and we exchanged a few optimistic words like “take it easy”. On our
way back down we met a cou-ple who said she had had a heart attack! We caught up
with her at the Ran-ger’s office where an ambulance, two ambulance personnel and a
Parks emer-gency service officer were in attendance. She was OK, but was being taken to
hospital for overnight observation to be on the safe side. The ambulance had to come
from Injune, 155ks away. Funny thing was, she had said to John that though she had a
slight heart problem, she was quite physically fit! Hows that for a case of denial? Back at
the camp at dinner we saw a couple of kookabur-ras having a fight, and the Apostle Birds
bickering as they honed in on any scraps falling near us. They are quite unafraid of
people & will take food from your hand. The Currawongs would have liked to get in on
the act, but were timid and outnumbered by the smaller, constantly chattering Apostles.
The go-rge has been interesting but rather too planned – there doesn’t seem to be the
unlimited unstructured walks that you can have in the Flinders. The main pest problem is
feral pigs (havent seen any yet) which they are trying to wipe out with 1080 poison baits.
Here’s the description of the place from the internet site
(http:www.epa.qld.gov.au/projects/park/index.cgi?parkid=49) “Carnavon Gorge is an oasis in
the semi-arid heart of Queensland. Here, in the Carnavon Gorge section of Carnavon National
Park, towering white sandstone cliffs form a spectacular steep-sided gorge, with narr-ow,
vibrantly coloured and lush side gorges. Boulder-strewn Carnavon Creek winds through the gorge
4
… cabbage tree palms, ancient cycads (Zamias (Macrozamia moorei)), ferns, flower-ing shrubs
and gum trees line the meandering main gorge …” H ddnt mnshn th@ ths mornn on both sidez of us
our naiborz woke 2 larm kloks : the kupl in th huge kravn 2 a radio1 & th kupl wth th 4 veri wel bhaved
kidz 2 a beepr. Insdntli th kravn had 2 frijz & n xtra b@ri so it woznt rliant on powrd sites. It lso had its
own showr. I nevr ●d th ♀ outside. Oh yes, ystrdi evnn th kidz on th uthr side wotchd DV-Ds on th
laptop. 2 get O th prolbm of them goin 2 bed l8 w r @ th kamp ktchn whr ths ntri haz bn ritn. I m reedn
‘Selected Stories’ x Robert Walser (“Robert Walser was born in Biel, cental Switzerland, in
1878. He left school when he was fourteen. From 1895 until 1929 he moved incessantly,
living mainly in Zurich, Berlin, and Biel, had fifteen books publish-ed, and worked as a
bank clerk, an employee in a government unemployment office, a butler, a secretary in
an art gallery, a worker in a rubber factory, and in a brewery. These and dozens of other
jobs often lasted only long enough to finance his long walks about Swit-zerland and
Germany; his writing earned him little. ¶ Walser’s first poems and prose pieces appeared
in 1898 and 1899. In all, Walser wrote eight novels (four of which were either destroyed
or lost, one by a publisher), many poems, and over a thousand short prose pieces. In
1929, after a period of intense isolation and poverty during which he sufferend from
hallucinations and nightmares, and made several suicide attempts, he voluntarily
committed himself to Waldau Sanitorium outside Berne. The diagnosis was schizophren-
ia. In 1933 he was transferred, against his wishes, to a mental hospital in Herisau,
eastern Switzerland – after which he never wrote again. On Christmas day, 1956, four
months before his seventy-ninth birthday, Walser went on his usual solitary walk across
the hills near the sanitorium. He was found that afternoon by some children and their
dog, lying on his back, hand on heart, on a snow-cover-ed field of the Rosenberg.”) whch
woz h&d 2 mi x LfOrVaEnCkE (24/10. 2dae ♂ lent mi n faevrt book f hiz (29/10. ie red it wth plzuer &
H sed it woz “vri poetk” (8/11. ystrdi DRUaMlMeOcND (15/11 bumpt →2 him gain ths mornn owtsied
th liebri z ie woz wotchn owt 4 H mung th marchrz (O 200,000) proetstn th pndn IR ljslaeshn. Told him
how wen ie woz n kid n 4th r 5th 4m @ St Pats (1 f th 2 jzuit skoolz n M-elb then) ie had ritn n letr wch
woz publsht n The Sun (now th Herald Sun) proetstn th@ 2 kidz n mie 4m wer b-in hrast x b-in
maed 2 wair thr kaps jewrn klars koz thei had kruekuts. Th good farthrz wood do betr knsntr8n n
teechn kidz nsted f huemli8n thm ie roet. Ie had told Alec ie woznt punsht 4 mie proet-st but ftr teln
him ie reeliezd th@t must hv bn 1 f th reeznz thei had shaftd mi n yeer r 2 l8r 4 n teechr trainn
skolrshp (wn ie r-pplied @ Melb Uni Teachers College n mie 1st yeer @ uni ie woz aebl 2 reed thr
rport n mi n mie rjnl pplkaeshn wn th kolj prinspl woz owt f th room 4 n wiel z hi had leftt n hiz des-k.
Thei had markt mi ↓ n n 5 ● skael 2 vrj r les n vrithn nkluedn kdmk bliti – sneeki huh?!) ie had ppli-ed
4 n mie larst yeer f skool. Iev maed th knkshn 4 th 1st tiem 2dae & wn ie ●d th banr f th ‘JESUIT S-
OCIAL SERVICES’ (“Standing in solidarity with those in need / Expressing a faith that
promotes justice”) held ↑ x 2 ♀z ie toldm th stori lsoe.) sed ♂ redt 2)): ‘Shallow – Water
DICTIONARY’ (“A Grounding in Estu-ary English”) x John R. Stilgoe (26/10. it z posbl (29/10. now
heer z n werd much ♥d x Heidegger & s-oe wthowt eni dsrspkt → LfOrVaEnCkE (c ‘Port Germein’
p10,11 (31/10. but n fairns → Frank I dsku-vrd @ lunch wth him 2dae (2/11. ftrwordz mi & H → 2 c
‘The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill’ @ th NO-VA & ie rkmndt (14/11. 2 dae w sor HwEeRrTnZeOrGZ
‘Grizzly Man’ O n kstreem persn)) th@ ♂ haz red ‘Finnegan’s Wake’ x 2!!)) & OSOfW&SlKI (hoo tel mi
thei r tranzl8n sum Heidegger →2 frnch ← j-rmn n n limtd dshn n kopi f wch ie hoep thei giv → mi
(2/11. ie karnt reed n eethr lngwj)) ie giv u n se-rv ← th ♂ hmslf z kwoetd x AgGiAoMrBgEiNo n ‘THE
OPEN Man and Animal’ (Stanford Uni Press 2-004): “Dasein as such – i.e., whatever belongs to
its potentiality for being as such, whatever concerns the possibility of Dasein as such – is
at issue in beings that refuse themselves in their totality. What concerns a possibility as
such, however, is whatever makes it possible, that which lends it possibility as this very
thing which is possible. Whatever is utmost and primary in making possible all
possibilities of Dasein as possibilities, whatever it is that bears Dasein’s potentiality for

5
being, its possibilities, is at issue in beings that refuse themselves in their totality. This
means, howe-ver, that those beings refusing themselves in their totality do not make an
announcement concerning arbitrary possi-bilities of myself, they do not report on them,
rather insofar as this announcement in refusal is a calling [Anrufen], it is that which
makes authentically possible the Dasein in me. This calling of possibilities as such, which
goes together with the refusal, is not some indeterminate pointing to [Hinweisen]
arbitrary, changing possibilities of Dasein, but an utterly unequivocal pointing to
whatever it is that make possible, bears and guides all essential possibilities of Dasein,
for which we apparently have no content, so that we cannot say what it is in the same
way that we point out things present at hand and determine them as this or that …. This
announcing pointing toward that which makes Dasein authentically possible in its
possibilities is a necessary compulsion [Hinzwingen] toward the singular extremity of
this originary making possible …. To this coming to be left in the lurch by beings which
refuse themselves in their totality there sim-ultaneously belongs our being-compelled
toward this utmost extremity of the possibilitization proper to Dasein as such.” (29/10.
He could get a job in the mental health system! (18/11. & u kan tel RUd-MoSnFaElLdD woz n
stuednt)) Mie oen @tued → Heideggerz lngwj (12/11. ie knot rzist +n mie oen kmnt ftrorl – eni sjschn
th@ kontrtd & knvluetd lngwj z n prrkwzt 4 nlietnmnt z prpostrus (16/11 but he-er z n poem ie roet bak
n th daez ie uezt 2 spel god wth n kaptl: in the beginning was the Word, / and the Word was with
God, and / the Word was God // I imagine heaven to be the music / of a multitude of words and
languages / combining all bodies and souls // also I imagine the music of / a sphere of infinite
weight / spinning silently through space // the multitude of words / and the sphere / combine
to form the music of / the Word // we shall all be part of that Word / spin-ning like Music in
Space (18/11. ie seem 2 rmmbr ie dremt ths poem))) z wel ksprst x Wittgenstein: “The results of
philosophy are the uncovering of one or another piece of plain nonsense and of bumps
that the un-derstanding has got by running its head up against the limits of language.
These bumps make us see the value of the discovery.” (PI ¶ 119) & “Where does our
investigation get its importance from, since it seems only to destroy ev-erything
interesting, that is, all that is great and important? (As it were all the buildings, leaving
behind only bits of stone and rubble.) What we are destroying is nothing but houses of
cards and we are clearing up the ground of lang-uage on which they stand.” (PI ¶ 118)
(7/11. but c ‘30/11/04 – 9/12/04’ p14/15)) ♂ & th ssae r noen 2 Dr SA&NrIeGwA (Co-ordinator ¶
Graduate Programs – Landscape Architecture ¶ Faculty of Architecture Bui-lding and
Planning ¶ University of Melbourne ¶ Victoria 3010 Australia), hoo l8li ha-z kwierd n moebiel
& taekn 2 h&n out n kard & wth hoom I m havn lunch nxt wnzdae (2/11. Poestpoe-nd x 1 week (9/11.
haz 1 th ‘ELLIS STONE AWARD 4 Rsrch & L&skaep Arktkchr’, th 1st priez ♂ haz evr 1. Tz wrth $2000
& ♂ gtst & n kopr plark ← ♀ elMiUzRaDbOeCtKh nxt week)), az “John R. Stilgoe is the Robert
and Lois Orchard Professor in the History of Landscape at Harvard University, and the
author of Co-mmon Landscape of America, 1580-1845; Metropolitan Corridor: Railroads
and the American Scene; and Border-land: Origins of the American Suburb, 1820-1939.”)
© 1990 Exact Change. Cambridge (2/11. Dr SA&NrIeGwAZ oen book n th histri f l&skaep dsien n OZ
z pl& 2 b publsht x Cambridge Uni Press n 2007). ISBN 1-878972-02-2) in a brown ppr bag (8/11. c
‘‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p3) just b4 w left 4 mi 2 hav sumthn 2 reed on th trip. Th ntro iz x
SsOuNsTaAnG (c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p3). Walser klaimz th@ “ the sketches I prod-uce now
and then are shortish or longish chapters of a novel. The novel I am constantly writing is
always the same one, and it might be described as a variously sliced-up or torn-apart
book of myself.” I m drinkn ČEPKELIU tra-uktine (24/10. c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p15). S@rdi
16/7/05. WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY AND TH-EY IS US. Yes, w c rflxshnz of ourselvz xpt most r
drivin 4x4s oftn puln kravanz. W r wel manrd & qui-et & I kan tel @ 1st glants th@ most of us r lor
bidin, evn outst&n, sitznz. Meni of us think 0 of workn 20-30kz/dai. Kuplz 10 yeerz oldr than us wer
sprintn parst & w →d O 24kz. Nuf komnt O our felo 2rsts (8/11. but heerz n old 1 ← ‘GULF TRIP’
6
(17/9/97): “The tourist is living his fantasy (I met many Croco-dile Dundees from Melb. when I was in
the gulf country). The tourism operator is providing the props to help the tourist believe that this
fantasy life is real. The whole tourism industry is geared for the job of make believe + is helped by the
media + film industry. After awhile they believe their own invention-s. The tourism operators lie
throught their TEETH. The tourists pay through the NOSE.”) : BETTER TO CLOSE YOUR MOUTH
AND BE THOUGHT A FOOL THAN TO OPEN IT AND REMOVE ALL D-OUBT. 4 th bneft of a kupl of
birdoze hoo reed (2/11. or prtnd 2) my stuff I must rport th@ w sor 2 pair of King Parrots (Alisterus
scapularis) in th gorj tho its a long wai outside thr ranj. Th gorj iz a mikro-klim8. Ths mrnn a flok of O
15 Glossy Black Cockatoos (Calyptorhynchus lathami) flew ovr th kam-psite. On th wai ← gorj I sor
a few Blue-faced Honeyeaters (Entomyzon cyanotis). I leev th rest of 2daiz rport 2 H : We did the
full gorge-length walk today and also took in the Moss Garden, so I have been well and
truly baptised. The cycads here (Zamias) only grow about 30cm /100 years, so the tall
ones we are seeing are about 1000 yea-rs old! The aborigines who left their handprints
and stencils on the walls of Ca-thedral Cave have a history of occupation of 3560 years,
so this place is geared to the old!. Boowinda Gorge, near Cathedral Cave, is very
interesting because of its tunnel-like shape. Hellhole Gorge near the Moss Garden looks
good, so we are going to stay another day and do some “off track” exploring. My arthritis
in left hip and knee is kept under control by large amounts of Naprosyn, but the
inflammation in my little toe and its neighbour on the right foot flares up late in the day,
so the last few ks are always a reminder of lost youth. John’s left big toe, previously
damaged on a trip to the Western District (24/10. c ‘21/9/02 – 3/-10/02’ p7, 8)several years
ago, also plays up, so he shares my Naprosyn. We are a sharing sort of couple. Sunday
17/7/05. We explored Hellhole Gorge and revisit-ed the Moss Garden by 1pm, so
decided to walk a further 2ks to the Art Gallery, which we had bypassed yesterday in
deference to my hip/knee/toes. It was impr-essive as the stencils and engravings covered
some 6 metres of chalk wall. John suggested we walk off-track further along the gorge
the Art Gallery begins and we found a great series of gorges (3 in all) one of which we
walked along till about 3pm when it was time to turn campwards. We’ve decided to stay
another day so we can explore all 3 tomorrow. The scenery was spectacular, and the ab-
sence of footprints in the sand and mud along the way suggests that no-one has been
there recently. There were great pools and tall tree-ferns , epiphytes and orchids (no
flowers visible). There were some native violets sprinkling the floor and plenty of smaller
ferns. We rock-hopped along the creek (I managed to get a foot soaked) and I could see
John’s adrenalin rising. It hasn’t been very high so far because the set walks are hardly a
stroll for him, and we have-nt done any off track explorations until yesterday. Tomorrow
will no doubt whet his appetite for more, but we are running out of food, so will have to
leave after that. Last night was very cold, and tonight promises the same. A few ssortd
notes : th famli wth th 4 kidz left ths mornn. ♂ iz n mnstr of rljn & ♀ a liberian ← Casino (pop 12000)
in NSW. A few daiz go thei did a → of 23 kz whch thr 5 yeer old dortr had no trubl kmpltn. It iz stonsh-
n th@ no1 goze → 2 th gorj w found (26/10. kwoetn ← ‘Shallow-Water DICTIONARY’ p33 : In 1750,
five years before he published his Dictionary of the English Language, Samuel Johnson
asserted that “it ought to be the endeavour of every man to derive his reflections from
the objects about him; for it is to no purpose that he alters his position, if his attention
continues fixed to the same point.” In 1862 …. Thoreau argued, in an essay entitled
“Walking”, that he had met almost no one “who understood the art of Walking, that is, of
taking walks, - who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering: which word is beautifully
derived ‘from idle people who roved the country, in the Middle Ages, and asked charity,
under pretence of going à la Sainte Terre,’ to the Holy Land [Thoreau quotes Worce-ster
here, although without acknowledging his source – and Worcester took his derivation
from Johnson’s Diction-ary]. Johnson and Thoreau suggested that most people essentially
ignore their surroundings, and walk, if they walk at all, oblivious to nearly everything.
7
Their thinking has been restated, frequently. “To a person uninstructed in natural history,
a country or seaside stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art,
nine-tenths of whi-ch have their faces turned to the wall,” asserted Thomas Henry
Huxley.) az 1) a hewj numbr of ppl vizt th park & 2) it iz such n bvius thng 2 chek out. But ppl prfr th
much trodn parth. Sor figbirdz (Sphecotheres viridis) in th main gorj & n Azure Kingfisher (Alcedo
azurea) in Hellhole gorj. 4got 2 mnshn a few da-iz bak th@ WrAoLbSeErRt woz red x rMoUbSeIrLt &
woz n nfluens on KfArFaKnAz (18/11. larst tuez-dae @ th MAKE IT ↑ ♣ GjRoAhNnT sed hi woz goen
2 c METAMORFOSZ). The butter yellow fl-owers with a scarlet throat which are beginning
to appear in the park are call-ed Yellow Hibiscus or Native Rosella. There are pink and
white varieties too, but not in flower at the moment. Monday 18/7/05. Did gorge-ous
walks today alo-ng the courses of 2 creeks where the scenery was spectacular. The
Kangaboola creek runs in a gorge about the width of a train tunnel, but with high sides,
so that the floor is rarely sunlit. The Kamaloo creek has a wider floor to run over, and
many ferns growing on rock ledges, as well as cabbage palms, gums and a wide variety
of ground covers, one of which exudes a wonderful aroma when trodden on. Tree ferns
are common too, as well as birds nest ferns and maid-enhair growing on the walls where
seepage occurs. The sandstone cliffs tower above, and you can see the scrubby gums
growing on their tops. Judging by the log jams we scrambled over, both creeks can carry
flood water in quantity. To-morrow we head for Emerald to stock up on food, so John is
up at the shower bl-ock as we don’t know when the next one will be. At tea-time a
currawong swoo-ped away with a slice of bread John was going to have as part of a
sandwich. They are a large bird with beady eyes ringed in bright yellow and have obvio-
usly learnt that food is available where people congregate, and if they ganged up could
be quite intimidating (big, horny beaks!). I saw one cleaning up the BBQ plate in the
kitchen area this morning. Their cheek is forgiven because their call is beautifully
melodious. Pied Currawong (Strepera graculina). Larst nite woz listnn 2 th hootn of a Barking Owl
(Ninox connivens). Th praktsz of 2rsts uzin th park r just az ntrstn 2 mi. Thei kook meelz in th kitchn
‫ٱ‬s (3 of m) whch r hewj (snagz, risolez, staiks) & mor labor8 than mi & H kook @ home (suali w eet
out but). Thr seemz 2 b a smbiotk rl8shnshp btween 4x4s & wine drinkn – on our 1st nite heer I
kowntd th@ mor than ½ th ppl in th kitchn ‫ٱ‬s wer bibn wine wth thr dinr. Most notisbl of orl iz th@ wth
hardli n xspshn thei r kwpmnt junkeez. Th famli whch rplaist th Casino minstr hav brort vrythn whch
foldz & nfoldz (eg 10t foldz out of trailr; foldn chairz wth rm rsts & padd baks; foldn bedz (2/11. Joe &
Rasa (c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p16) wood hav ♥dt)) + a ktchn sink (wth a hoze → bukt 4 waist
H2O). Tz sad th@ th same mpulsz (eg 2 bleev wot thei r told x dvrtizerz, teli, travl magz (3/11. &
poltshnz)) whch leed thm 2 kwire orl th junk (whch thei r lwaiz bangn & r@ln) lso prvnt thm from doin
th kind of → w dun 2dai. Insdntli u got 2 get prmshn from th rainjrz → OFF TRACK whch w nvr dun az
thei mite hav sed NO sins w wernt proprli EQUIPT & 1s thei giv permshn thei kcept a ‘duti of kair’. Yet
th gr8 → w did kood hav bn dun x eni jri@rk or chile. Ystrdi I sor a ♀ wth her →n boot (of th kind whch
“giv nkl suprt” & lais up mpteen timez ovr hooks) off koz ♀ had a blistr. Theez bootz r hevi & vrheet th
feet bkoz thei r dzined in europ & th US 4 snow yet ths ♀ woz wairn thm on th ded fl@ parth 2 th nd
of th main gorj. U woodnt hav dun th → w did 2dai in thm koz thei taik 2 much f4t 2 take on & off & 2
kari wen u hav 2 waid in H2O. I giv theez xmplz not from a wish 2 rdk-ule 2rsts but 2 prvide a meta4
whch iz pplkbl 4 knsidrn wot kindz of bagj u must leev bhind wen u mbark on jerneez in
SPEKUL@V THORT. Chuzedai 19/7/05. Takarakka Campn gO in Carnavon Nshnl Park (Larst S@di
HrUeNxT (6/11. got mugd n Byron Bay n fue daiz goe – had n lot 2 sae) sed DlAeVoInS iz az blak az
a dog & b4 w got up ths mornn H sed I woz like a dog. Wen I nkwired ♀ sed I woz like a † btween n
St Bernard & n Rotwiler. ♀ reknz ♀ iz goin 2 hav 2 keep a rold up newzppr h&i. I dont no O th@ but I
do dmit 2 bein a PERVERT (26/10. Pe rvert , v. late ME. [ad. F. pervertir, ad. L perverte-re, f. PER-' 2, 3+ vertere to
turn.] †1. To turn upside down; to upset; to subvert – 1656. 2. To turn aside from its right course, aim, meaning, etc. late
ME. †b. To divert SHAKS. 3. trans. To turn (a person, the mind, etc.) away from right opinion or act-ion; to lead astray; to
corrupt. late ME. b. spec. To turn (any one) aside from a right religious belief or system. late ME. c. in-tr. To become a
8
pervert. late ME. ¶ 2. They perverted the course of justice 1868. 3. How He [Satan] in the Serpent had per-verted Eve, Her
Husband shee MILT. Hence †Pervert a.perverted. Pervert sb one who has been perverted or corrupted; an apostate.
Perverter, one who perverts (a person or thing). Pervertible a. capable of being perverted.). Piks in glossi ma-gz,
porno mooveez, TV romps, Kileez bum, Delta Goodrem getn n ORGASM (26/10. Or gasm . 1684. [a-
d.mod.L. orgasmus, a. Gr. * δργάσμός, f. δργάξζν to swell as with moisture, to be excited.] 1. Violent excitement of feeling;
rage, fury; a paroxysm of excitement or rage 1763. 2. Physiol. Excitement in an organ or part, accompanied with turgescen-
ce; spec. the height of venereal excitement in coition 1684. Hence Or gastic a.) plain th piano whch r such tern onz
4 th nrml helthi ozzi ♂ (& wer 4 mi wen I woz a teen) leev mi kold. My LIBIDO (26/10. †Lib idinist . rare.
1628. [f. L. libidin-, libidio lust + -IST.] A lecher – 1634. ¶ Libidi nous , a. 1447. [ad. L. libidinosus, f, as prec.; see –ous. Cf.
F. libidineux.] 1. Given to, full of, or characterized by lust; lustful, lecherous, lewd. †2. Provocative of lust, HOLLAND.
Hence †Libidi nosity , lustfulness. Lib idino usly adv., -ness .) rspondz 2 buteful streemz in gorjz & th kkazionl
sightn of th nxpktd vvd berd. (Gee, thanks. Next trip you can take one of those blow up
plastic dolls and I’ll stay home.) Th faisz (& faneez) of magzeen & flm starlts look plastk & their
lmpd, soelfl (xpktnt?) ize look vakuous. Yes! I m veri nromantk & so it seemz iz H.) → E (43kz) →
main rode ↑N (61kz) →Rolleston → NW (70kz) → Springsure (whr I stopt @ a grarj koz I koodnt find
whr 2 fil ↑ wth windskreen wiper H2O) ↑N (66kz) → Emerald (Tidy Town 1st prize 93); shopt up @ th
SUPERM-ARKT; red ppr & drank bad kofi & I 8 n hmbrgr; H rang Michael & heez OK (29/10. But
when we got back, he had been given bad news. The following letter, sent to his Contin-
uing Care Team explains the situation : Manager, ¶ Murnong and Chandler Continuing Care Team, ¶ Dear
Mr Foster, ¶ My son ‫ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ‬has recently informed me that he is required to pay $25 per month for medi-cation to
control his chronic schizophrenia. ‫שּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ‬-‫ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺ‬
‫ ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ‬His government pension of $580 per fortnight, including rent assistance, was covering his rent. However,
the rent has recently risen to $610 per fortnight. I am currently paying the difference until the possibility of more rent
assistance (11/11. but thr znt eni mor) can be arranged. Michael has no money to pay $25 a month for medication
‫ﻉﺰﺗכּﭺשּׁשּפֿמּטּﺊﺫﺱ‬.The only way Michael can have money in his pocket to pay for medication is if he goes to much cheaper
accomodation. There is not enough appropriate accomodation available, as Michael has already experien-ced. As you
probably are aware, many operators of supported accomodation are primarily concerned with the business not the
service. It is my belief, encouraged by the government through various advertising campaigns, public statements by the
Minister etc., that mentally ill people are entitled to live as safely and with as much dignity as any other citizen and this
implies appropriate and supportive accomodation. ¶ Michael was informed of this potentially deadly change to his cir-
cumstances by his case worker, and had it confirmed by the pharmacy which supplies his medication. This seems to be
an extremely irregular, undocumented and possibly illegal way of informing clients of new circumstances which may have
far-reaching repercussions on their mental and physical health. He did not receive any official, written notification explain-
ing this new policy signed by you as the manager of the continuing care team. I am requesting on his behalf that such a
letter be forwarded to him immediately, with an explanation of why this change has occurred, and that a copy be forward-
ed to me at the address provided on this letter. If I am to be made responsible for the supply of Michael’s medication I will
need full documentation for taxation and any other legal purposes. ¶ May I pose this hypothetical question? Suppose that
Michael had not been able to tell me of this occurrence due to my absence from Melbourne, or death, or hospitalization
from a stroke with subsequent inability to respond (I am 63 and these things do happen) Michael would not have had acc-
ess to his medication because he would have had no money. Who is responsible for ensuring that he would have receiv-
ed his medication under those circumstances? Who should have known that he was unable to afford the medication? Wh-
at is the duty of care of your service to provide medication for those people you case-manage who have no money to pay
because they are on a fixed pension which may not even cover their rent, leave alone normal living expenses such as cl-
othing, toiletries and necessary travel to medical appointments, pharmacies etc.? (7/11. n orl H spndz O $8000/y-
eer soe Michael kan liv wth n mnmum f dgnti (13/11. much mor ths yeer koz n mowthfl f teeth needd
fixn wch f heed gon n th waetn list wood hav 4ln out b4 hiz tern kaem n 2½ yeerz tiem)) ¶ I understand
that you may have reasons for the new regimen. You will understand that as Michael’s mother I am the person who expe-
riences the full impact of Michael’s decline from stability if it happens, and as a result I have a keen on-going interest in his
physical, mental and financial circumstances. I wonder what may happen to all those mentally ill patients who have no-
one to monitor their welfare (7/11. Big Dave (th merkn hooz dad haz werkt wth th dsdvntjd orl hiz lief) woz
bak n Miller st 2 pae n vzit larst week. ♂ sez n th mieti US of A th vraj lief kspktnsi f n hoemls man 1s
♂ z n th streetz z 3 yeerz (O th saem z 4 n polsh dportee → SIBERIA x STALIN). Bob & Bev (Joez
K8eez gr&prnts) sor meni hoemls men n thr 1st vzit → New York but 0 n th 2nd. Thei maed nkwiereez
but noe1 kood tel thm (r seem 2 kair) whr thei had gon. (12/11. n Melb thei r goen 2 poot em → bordn
hausz 4 th juraeshn f th kmnwlth gaemz.)) when they cannot afford their medication. Perhaps the government can
build more bridges for them to sleep under or employ more policemen to control them (3/11. x shootn sum of em
9
ded) when they become a social nuisance. ¶ I have asked my solicitor to sign this letter as witness that it has been writt-
en. I would appreciate your keeping it on file in case of future correspondence. ¶ Yours sincerely…. The letter was
only sent because of the run-around I got from Chandler House where numero-us phone
calls trying to speak to someone who could explain the situation and clarify Michael’s
worries ended in failure. Here is a record, written at the time, of the rigmarole : Thursday,
22/9/05. Following is the account of my communication with Chandler and Murno-ng concerning Michael’s ability to pay
$25 per month for his anti-psychotic medication. I learnt of the issue from Michael when I saw him on Sunday 18/9/05
after 2 ½ months absence from Melbourne on long service leave. ¶Tuesday, 20/9/05 : rang Chandler House to speak to
Michael’s case-worker, Glennis, about the issue. Explained my concern to the receptio-nist. Told by receptionist that
Glennis was sick, but would be back tomorrow (Wednesday). Left my mobile number and receptionist said that Glennis
would call me on Wednesday. ¶ Wednesday, 21/9/05 : There was no message on my mob-ile so rang Chandler House
again. I know that case-workers are very busy and may have unexpected emergencies to deal with which could delay a
call back. Asked to speak to Glennis and was told by the receptionist that she was on Long Service Leave and would
not be back until November. Asked to be put through to someone who would be dealing with Michael. Was told that
Glennis’ cases had not yet been allocated but was put through to a male who gave me his na-me, which I failed to
write down and cannot remember because by this stage I was becoming distressed and angry at what seemed to me to
be “buck passing”. The man I told of my concerns was sympathetic but said that it was out of his hands because his level
of decision making was not the level on which these decisions are made. I asked him who I nee-ded to talk to. He told me
that Gavin Foster was the director of services and gave me a phone number (9871 3988) where he believed Mr Foster
was working that day. When I rang (Murnong centre) and asked to speak with him, identifying my-self as Michael Smith’s
mother, the receptionist put me on hold for a while and then told me that Mr Foster was on a two day in-service, but would
be back at Chandler House on Thursday, his in-service having been on Tuesday and Wednes-day. ¶ Thursday, 22/9/05 :
Rang Chandler House and asked to speak to Mr Foster. Was told he was unavailable, but if I left my number he would
ring me back. As I was in a public phone booth I declined the offer and said that I would send him a letter about the issue
instead. I then asked for his official title as I needed to address the letter correctly so that if would definitely find him. The
receptionist said that she didn’t know his official title and that she would put me through to someone who did. I was
connected to the message bank of someone who asked me to leave a message. Since I didn’t know who the person was
or if and when she would be of any assistance, I hung up and redialled Chandler House, infor-ming the receptionist that
the person she put me through to was unavailable. She then gave me Mr Foster’s official title : Manager, Murnong and
Chandler Continuing Care Team, Chandler House, 16-18 Albert St., Upper Ferntree Gully. ¶ I still don’t know if this
title is correct, given the confusion my simple requests ( to speak to someone who knew the facts ; to know to whom to
direct correspondence) seemed to have caused. I have written my letter explaining my concerns, and will have it
witnessed by my solicitor next Tuesday 27/9/05. I will then send it by registered mail. I know that it will find the location but
I wonder whether it will find the person. If the title is wrong it may sit in an in-tray somewhere until it is cov-ered in dust.
Perhaps I will never get an answer. However I am a determined person and will keep knocking until some-one opens up. ¶
Tuesday 27/9/05. Had letter read by solicitor who was happy to sign it and suggested sending copies to as many
organizations as I could think of, including Tony Abbott and Bronwyn Pike, and to one of his good friends who is local
member for Doncaster. Also rang Mental Illness Fellowship where I was asked to send a copy, and it was suggested I also
send a copy to SANE Australia. ¶ So far I have sent letters to : Gavan Foster of Murnong and Chandler Continuing Care
Team; Kevin Andrews, MP for Doncaster; Bronwyn Pike, State Health Minister and member for Melbourne ;Mental Illness
Fellowship; SANE Australia. ¶ Monday 3/10/05. Rang Dennis (Michael’s landlord) about Michael’s $30 per fortni-ght rent
supplement and mentioned my concerns about the $25 medication fee. He says it has been put in place by Mar-oondah
Hospital!! ¶ About 5pm Barbara Hocking from SANE Australia rang me – she has heard that another hospital is doing the
same. She was most helpful and gave me more names for my letter list : Christopher Pyne, Parliamentary Und-
ersecretary for Health, Parliament House, Canberra, ACT who is Tony Abbott’s offsider; Dr. Ruth Vine, Director of Mental
Health, Department of Human Services, 555 Collins St. She also suggested copies for both the Federal and State memb-
ers for the electorate covering Bayswater, since they are Michael’s electoral representatives. Have to get on the Internet
tomorrow and find out who they are. She says the federal member is Peter Costello’s parliamentary undersecretary. She
has a meeting with the Democrats on Sunday and promises to bring it to the attention of Lyn Allison who is on a senate
committee inquiring into mental health at the moment. After a few days, I decided to ring the pha-rmacy
where Michael gets his medication and find out if they knew what was going on. The
person who answered the phone said that it was the hospital that informed them of the
change through a flyer which she faxed to me at my req-uest. It had no organizational
name, phone number or signature of an auth-orizing person on it, just the news that
each script would now cost $4 (Michael gets a month’s supply at a time - wonder where
the $25 fits in.) Her comment was that the whole situation with medication was “a dog’s
breakfast”. She then looked up some paperwork the pharmacy had and informed me that
Michael was on the exempt list! I was pleased to hear that, but also really angry that the

10
case-worker had given Michael incorrect information which had caused him stress. I also
felt foolish as the letters I had sent were factually incorrect and therefore less likely to be
acknowledged or answered. So far I have had one response – from Kevin Andrews who
has passed on the information to Tony Abbott (30/10. n The Age 2day (p16) he sed “I have
perhaps an overdeveloped sense of duty and service, thanks to the Jesuits and my dad.”)
and who promises to inform me of his reply if it happ-ens. I have still (16/11/05) heard
nothing from Chandler House (16/11 but today I received a letter from Bronwyn Pike,
Minister for Health : “The Chief Psychiatrist has responsibility under the Mental Health Act for persons receiving
treatment and care for a mental illness and his office can be contacted by telephone on 9616 7571 if you wish to discuss
the matter further. I am advised that the Chief Psychiatrist is following up on your concerns with Eastern Health and will be
responding directly to you.”),not even a court-esy phone call. It speaks volumes about the
shambolic state of mental health services in Victoria (3/11. but th prpraeshn 4 th kmnwlth
gaemz r n shduel & soez th ljslaeshn th@ wil llow ppl 2 b ‫ٱ‬d & dsntn pnion 2 b sprst & mor il ppl 2 b
put → streets z thei r n th US of A).) & sh had a txt msj ← K8 teln mi 2 reed mi msj bank but I dont no
how 2) ↑N & a litl bit ←W (190kz) → Here (w r on th wai 2 Charters Towers & hav kampt in skrub a
few kz off th hiway nxt 2 a staishn rode. 0 karz hav gon x & 0 wil durin th nite. Th erth & skrub r tpkli
arid but th air streem (← pacifk) iz humid & warm & it iz drizln. On th wai w drove past a pair of
bustardz on th rode verj. It iz a rleef 2 b way from th kamprz & thr kidz & thr geer.) 4got 2 mnshn th@
H iz limpn 2dai wth th smorlst toze on her rite foot plain ↑ & it looks like ♀ mite luze th nail on her rite
big toe 2 bruzin. Wnzdi 20/7/05. Mi ju-jmnt woz mpaird x mi 3rd (I kan heer a pokie klikn ovr bhind mi
– wr@ th Forrest Beach (8/11 ie think-twoz sumwhr O heer n 97 ie met mie x2. ← ‘GULF TRIP’:
“Andrew, ¶ I’ll probably beat this letter back to Melbourne but I still cant bury the
encounter with my doppelganger. I am still trying to understand why its had such an
effect on me. ¶ The romantics were infatuated with the idea and Schubert has a song in
his last and most famous lieder cycle which he wrote when he knew he was dying (at the
age of 31) in which he encounters his doppelganger who do-esn’t answer him but
presses on ahead of him into the distance. The song is very dark, the id-ea being that
you meet your ‘double’ (that’s what the word translates into) when you are in the grey,
indefinable area that separates the world of the living from the world on the ‘other side’.
Pity the idea lost popularity before the sci-fi writers came on the scene as it would have
made a lot of sense in a world of parallel universes. Every now and again due to some
warp in the fabric of time (or an excess of alcohol) the universes might get less parallel
and meet for a bit and that’s when the sci-fi hero would meet his double. ¶ What gets me
about Frank Roberts is not so much the similarity of his ideas to mine but his way of
expressing them. His g-estures, his emphatic way of speaking, his tendency to search for
the poetic phrase, his rea-diness to acknowledge that many layers of understanding
could co-exist at the same time were uncannily familiar. There was a knowingness in the
way we sized each other up that remains unnerving. I suppose it means that by pure
chance our brains have been similarly wi-red because our experiences of life are not
similar. He seems to feel he has been unlucky in love, while the women in my life,
particularly the women who know me well, eg. wife, moth-er, daughter, have treated and
continue to treat me better than I feel I deserve. ¶ It’s a hu-mbling experience because it
suggests that we get to where we are not by exertion but by the play of chance. I’ve
suggested anyway that most of what we perceive as struggles with-in ourselves about
making decisions and choices about life styles don’t really affect the out-comes (which
are determined, perhaps, by far more obscure sources too deep within oursel-ves to ever
be grasped) but are only about the rationalizations we intend to use to justify wh-at we
will do anyway. (Sorry for that long sentence). And I’m old enough to have no claims to
originality in anything, either trivial or basic, having met plenty of people who’ve taken
ev-erything further than I ever would. To meet somebody whose gestures and style
mirror your-self is something again; but you tell me that you’ve had comparable
11
experiences when you visited the village your father came from in Slovakia. When alls
said and done the above co-nsiderations still don’t provide a satisfactory explanation for
the eerie feeling I’m left with. Per-haps I’ve been affected by Schubert’s song and a
gothic imagination. But I’m not normally subject to preternatural intuitions! I’m not
looking forward to the next meeting with my dou-ble because we wouldn’t have much to
tell each other. ¶ See Ya! ¶ a … z ”) Hotel 17kz out of Ingham whch I woz tort az a kid @ St Patz
(24/10. c ‘22/11/00 – 7/12/00’) iz th wetst town (12/11. ma-eb twoz Innisfail) in oz but th titl iz dsputed
x Tully & Babinda a bit ↑ N) stubi whch I had bort @ Cler-mont & ftr w setld ↓ larst nite wen it bgan 2
rain liteli on kkazshnz I startd woriin O th rodeside kulvrt (dich) I had †d → our ● off th rode. I woz on
th nside of a slite kerv & I reelizd th@ if it raind & th dpr-shn fild up propr w kood b stuk 4 weeks. Wen
I told H & got out of bed & th van 2 nspkt th lie of th l& ♀ sed not 2 worri & sumwot techli “do u wont
mi 2 get out of bed?” (its pisn ↓ outside az it haz bn th ntire time sins w left Charters Towers). Wen I
fnali fel sleep I woz dreemn O orl kindz of snarioze of ngosi8n wth varius ppl in varius setnz wethr I
kood b towd out & H woz veri much in theez evnts & orl our pathlojeez wer bein plaid out in gzadjr8d
4m ptkoriali (I wont giv n kkount) til fnali (nsidntli I herd a sharp hevi showr erlier in th nite & it trgrd
ORGASMk spazmz in mi (in mi dreem?)) I showtd out in ngr in a xmpl of sum rdkulus moshnl poschr I
m kapbl of doptn & I woke mislf up 2 th sownd of rain 4ln stedli on th roof. Th@ & th dreem knvinsd
mi wi had 2 → out of thr b4 it woz 2 l8. H woz in greem-nt so @ 5.15 w ↑N (300kz) → Charters
Towers (where I rang Kate (no connection), Joe (fired from his phone job with the National
Bank (last on, first off) but OK with it and spending his time reading Freud and Jung (9/11.
& medt8n 45 mns/dae)), th-en Dan (who Joe said was back from his modelling expedition to
Milan (24/10. c ‘10/2/05 – 18/2/05’ p4; dae b4 ystrdi got ← NZ)) who sounded chirpy and had a
good time though it was 35º every day with a couple over 40 º - he sweated profusely but
got a tan. He’d seen Kate on the weekend and she’d sold one of her pieces to someone
in the LaTrobe Valley for $100 and is on antibiotics for a further mo-nth as a result of her
whooping cough/pneumonia bout. He’d also seen Ben who is OK, and a strict teacher in
the driving lesson he gave Joe (3/11. ystrdae faeld th tst @ hiz 1st @mt). Since I had rung
Michael from Emerald yesterday, that meant contact with all 5 kids has been made and
there are no dramas (cross eyes, fingers, toes while clutching wood). Charters Towers
has some fine, grand old buildings, including an impressive clock tower and a stock-
exchange buil-ding (now an arcade with tea-room and National Trust shop). Unfortunately
it has awful coffee, ersatz hamburgers and lousy bread, despite charging top dollar. As
we left it started really pissing down, which forced us in the Towns-ville direction as the
longer journey we intended through Greenvale, The Lynd junction , Mount Garnet to
Atherton & the Tablelands was on a road with a flood warning, parts of which are single-
lane, to be shared with on-coming road trains which have right of way. That means
pulling off the road to let th-em pass and the rain makes that manouvre dubious, and a
camping spot for the night off the road almost certainly impossible. It pissed down all the
way to here (Forrest Beach) with occasional flashes of lightning and even heavier fal-ls.
“Sunny Queensland – beautiful one day, perfect the next”. The lady in the pub made me
a free hot coffee cos she was cold and needed one to get warm. Everyone here is talking
about the rain – its sugar cane harvesting time and it is not appreciated. Everyone we’ve
met so far (rangers, information centre staff, people on the street and in shops we’ve
asked for directions/info) have been very friendly and obliging. A young man in the pub
here has bought John a 1&1/2 nip of rum, which the coffee lady said was “to warm your
TOSSLE” (3/11. toss n. 1 an act of masturbation.-phr. 2. argue the toss , to go on arguing after a dispute has been
settled. 3. to not give a toss, to be unconcerned; not care. 4. toss of f, a (of a male) to ejaculate sperm; have an orgasm.
b. (of a male) to masturbate. c. to pr-oduce casually: to toss off a poem (5/11. H just tost 1 off: Crafty little
Johnny and spineless big Kim /Tweedledee and Tweedledim /Conspired to mug
democracy and push her off the hill /So if IR laws don’t get you ASIO surely
will.//Tweedledee and Twee-dledim /Dangerous little Johnny and ineffectual big Kim /Have
12
worked hard together to make us understand/That fear, lies and evasions can ruin the
wide brown land. (7/11. 2 mor poemz tost off n 2daez The Age p12 : “Ole man Howard, / Dat ole
man Howard, / He must know something, / He don’t say nothing, / But ole man Howard, / He just
keeps rolling along …” - Ivar Dorum, Hawthorn. & howz ths 4 n bueti : “Jabberwocky ¶ ‘Twas
chillig, / And the slimey coves conspired and swindled o’er our wage, / All mimsy were the Beazley
boys, / While Andrews-spin soiled page by page. // Beware the Jabber-John my son! / With jaws that
lie and laws that lash. / Beware the gargoyle Ruddock-hawk, / His sedition claws your tongue will
slash.”- Peter McCarthy, Mentone.)). 5. toss up , to weigh up in order to make a decision. ¶ tosser n. a stupid
or annoying person; a jerk; a wanker. ¶ tossle n. the penis. Also, tossil. [variant of tassel]). As if it needs any
more war-ming!) I told her I had betr waiz of getn it wormd. I hav 2 kmmnt on th hmbrgrz I had in
ROMA (c ‘Vilnius (no 2)’ p8) & in Charters Towers az theez townz r in prize beef kuntri (31/10. From
‘GULF TR-IP’ : “25.08.97 Jundah QLD. ¶ Andrew, ¶ don’t consider the lilies of the field and the
birds of the air, instead consider the bullocks of the scrub. That’s what I was doing last
night camped a kilometer or two off the single strip of bitumen that connects Quilpie to
Windorah. The ‘three-trailer’ road trains roar east, one after the other, late into the night.
They are chock a block full of bullocks heading for the abattoirs on the coast in Ingham,
Rockhampton (etc) …. They will take a couple of days to get there. There is no other
traffic on the road as there is too much danger of hitting animals at night, especially
kangaroos, emus, pigs and free running cattle which constitute a significant portion of
the road kill here. ¶ The road journey is the mi-ddle part of the most intense period in the
bullocks lives. It starts when they are in the prime of condition and only several years old
when they are mustered in the scrub by men on trail bikes and helicopters. Then the
TERROR really begins when they are coralled in tightly pack-ed herds with the help of
vicious cattle dogs bred for the task prior to being loaded for their first and final journey
starting on the properties scattered along the Coopers Creek north and south of
Windorah. ¶ From the first days of muster to the final bullet or electric shock in the
slaughter house takes only a few weeks yet the bullocks live more intensely in this short
time than in the entire years of their previous existence in the scrub plains. Their lives
are so full of what is new, tumultuous, and incomprehensible that they have forgotten,
by the time they are packed tight in the trailers, that they ever had a previous life. If
some faint, dreamlike memory of the scrub surfaces at all they must believe, or we
would in similar circumstances, that these images have no connection with their lives but
are an intuition (vision?) of the pa-radise that awaits them. If they could communicate
with each other they would tell each other that it will be alright finally and those of them
who have a clearer vision cheer the oth-ers with descriptions of those halcyon plains.
They are wrong of course for the picture they draw is not of the future but of the past
which is their own, and irretrievable. They will not know the moment of their death as
when bullocks are slaughtered it is essential that they have no inkling of what is about to
happen as otherwise they tense their muscles and the resulting beef becomes tough
permanently. ¶ The road trains cannot stop quickly even in an emergency because
sudden braking makes the trailers jack-knife, hence the road kill. If the bullocks on the
train are capable of being aware of the occasional thud or of the others of their own
species lying twisted by the roadside then they must know, or at any rate we wou-ld,
that they are in the grip of an inexorable process. ¶ a …z”). In ROMA th ‘beef’ rsole had NO
MEAT IN IT!! – it woz a bubl-n-skweek p@i of th kind u x in pakts @ SUPERMARKTS. In Chartrz To-
wrz it kost $7.50 kkordn 2 th bord but thei took $8.70 off mi & then I notist in smorl ritin on th bord th@
BACON woz $1.20 xtra. Wel th@s 2rst l& 4 u but 2 top it off th so korld ‘beef’ rsole woz – maid from
th veri fineli gO mins th@ iz mor like paist, iz pale pink in kulr & probli knsists mostli of bred & taists
lowzi. Top prices 4 krap kwalti iz th norm here – xept in pubz (ovr th larst weeks I hav kwired a permnt
DISPEPTK NOZE (3/11. ftr chekn n ‘The Shorter Oxford Dictionary’ tz kleer 2 mi ie nvntd th fraez zt
maeks noe sens. Ie ment n prmnt redns n & O th noez – ie ‘strorbri noez’ (12/11. H sjstd th term but ie
13
think ‘strorbri’ znt rfrn 2 th kulr but 2 th pitd txchr like her dad had – but ie havnt gott yet.))). Speak-
ing of rip-offs, there is a National Park here called “Undara Volcanic National Park,
Savannah Way, via Mt Surprise, Queensland 4871” where entrance to the park is “by
guided tour only. Booking essential.” The prices are as follows for a single adult : 2 hour
lava tube tour : $37; ½ day tour : $65; full day tour : $97; wildlife sunset tour: $39;
helicopter scenic flight : $99. Accomodation (called “The Undara Experience”) ranges
from restored railway carriages : $75 per ni-ght; tent village : $18 (linen $7extra);
Wilderness Lodge : $25 (firewood $7/bu-ndle); caravan park and camp ground :
$7(firewood $7/bundle); Safari Shelt-er : $9 (firewood $7/bundle). The place has been
“leased” to the Col

14
lins family : “Our f am i l y were the f i r s t wh i te se t t l e r s i n th i s p lace , back i n the 1
S ince then , s i x Co l l i n s genera t i ons have exp lo red these s t range f o rmat - i ons bene
l and , now acc la imed as one o f the l onges t l ava tube sys t - ems i n How’s the worthat
ld . ”
for a rip off/sell out combined. Imagine Tower Hill or the Grampians or any other National
Park being “privatized” like that. We pay taxes to have National Parks in the first place
and then we have to pay exorbitant prices to use them – it’s the first such instance I’m
aware of and it made me froth at the mouth! The old lady in the info centre (name badge
“Gl-adys”) reckons its to prevent vandalism! Wel here w r n tropkl ↑N QLD, & it haznt stopt porn
sins w startd drivin @ 5.15am. W karnt eevn eet from th bak of th van az w r lredi a bit soggi so w r O
2 → th shop 4 FISH & CHIPS & then kum bak here → pub 2 get a site 4 th van az thei own th ttacht
kravn park. (wile H woz ritin I red WrAoLbSeErRtZ ‘The Little Berliner’; th newz itm n shCaOpR-
eBlYle on th big TV skreen kort th @10shn of th bar paitrnz; H iz reedn ‘Angels and Demons’ x BdR-
aOnWN.) In a wai th rain mai b a blessn az H kan nli hobl az ♀ kant put w8 on th 2 litl toze of her rite
foot. On th wai ← Ingham → here w parst th bigst shoogr mil in th S hemiO. In QLD thei r →2 ‘th big-
st’ & ‘th longst’ & ‘th moestst’. (1/11. soe ie + n letr ie roet ← QLD stil n mie arte-postale daez az its O
– ‘th moest mportnt’. Ie kwoett n full zt ppeerd n ‘GULF TRIP’ (c’13/9/05’ p1) : “24.09.97. Lil Chile ¶
What I am doing, Chile, is racking my brains and observations to work out filosofik questions of what
are THE IMPORTANT THINGS. Then I am goin all about the country comparin the importint things in
each class to themselves to find the very best. There arnt many important things in life and if I tell you
the best ones you wont need to travel as far as I have had to find quality. Of course your dad could
get them from a book or find even better ones in New York. However here are the tentative results of
my invesigashins. ¶ PUBS. Yes, little fella, the Toompine Hotel with its contradictory juxtapsishin of
small intimate bar and wide open country outside is hard to beat. But then all the 3 Normanton ones
have fabbo lounge/beer garden areas. And then I was in a beauty at Mossman and how can you co-
mpare anifink to the one at Croydon QLD or that absolute pearler at Babinda. These are the jewels in
the crown that I is giving you. By comparison the one at Cardwell is a bit ordinary but instead of payin
$3 for a stubby of VB (Yes, chile, it far outranks 4X in QLD) to drink at the bar you win two ways by
payin $2 to take away and drinkin it on the public jetty. And that brings me to the other of the IMPOR-
TINT FINGS in life what I am investigatin by trapesin all over the country : ¶ JETTIES. The one at Ca-
rdwell is good and the company at the end of it is always stimulatin late into the night. It is a sensitive
crowd there. In the windows of shops, like the one from which I got this paper I am writin on there are
signs, and in the front yards of houses too, chile, which all say : ‘PORT HINCHINBROOK YES YES
YES’. They mean the resort they is building down the road. But the sensitive types on the jetty have a
consensus of ‘NO NO NO’. They is so sensitive to the true values of the heart in this crowd that no
one catches any fish because they don’t want to be cutting em up and, even worse, eating them
dead. The germin kid who comes here every nite from 7 to 10.30 has been fishing even in Morocco
and New Zealand and India and the world over and he never catches anyfink coz he doesn’t want to
hurt them . At 10.30 he picks up his rods and nets and leaves with his bucket empty as usual. He is
very talkative and like all of us probably comes here for the company but he only gets going if you
start him off. If you want to drink your stubby by yourself in a dreamy mood he wont bother you. Ah,
the lights reflektin off the water, the lovely sound of waves lappin against the pylons, the bump of
boats against each other …. And all this in a tropic nite that gits warmer as it gets later; for, yes chile,
here in Cardwell, just after sunset a little cool breeze springs up and you is thinkin of putting on a shirt
when it drops away again as it gets darker and by the time you is back from the pub with your stubby
it is warmin up again. There are jetties and jetties. How about the one at Peach Tree in Victoria, or the
little ones at Corringle, peaceful hey! Or what about the old wharf at Normanton where the croc
cruises by, or the beaut one at Port Fairy or Port Albert! Your dad will probably burble on about the
one at Palanga or the Kursiu Mares in Lifuania but who gives a shit about that. There are hundreds
and hundreds all over down here. What about the one at Port Germein SA. Last night at about 10 at
night only the germin and me was left on the pier and we woz not talking cause he could tell I wanted
to be wid my thoughts and I was eating a hamburger which is very juicy here so that the juice was
15
runnin down my wrist to my elbow and from my elbow onto my knee coz you must understand, chile, I
wasn’t exercizin very good control of it coz I was holdin a stubby in my other hand and I was thinkin, I
was thinkin : ‘the world can be so beautiful sometimes that it is too beautiful for our minds to appreh-
end. Too, too beautiful.’ You see I had survived my encounter with the DECIBEL BOYS from the other
night. But to tell the truth the hamburgers at Cardwell are by no means perfect. ¶ HAMBURG-ERS.
And I don’t mean the good folk deutche of HAMBURG in uber alles. I travel the length and brea-dth of
the land seeking the perfect one. The ones at Cardwell are higher than they are in diameter. They
think they impress you with that but from me they get demerits. The perfect hamburger must have a
SUBSTANTIALLY greater diameter, lil Rudi, than it is high. Otherwise you practically dislokate your
jaw as you try to get a bite on it and the filling squeezes out of the sides unevenly and dribbles down
your wrist to your elbow and then your knee and people look at you strangely when they see you
lickin your knee. I know, chile. The perfect hamburger is made from buns that have a bit of text-ure,
not the soft, sugary, cakey type of thing you get in McDonalds or in packets of 6 in supermarkets sold
as ‘hamburger buns’. They must be toasted on the insides. Some places these days are cheetin to
save time by just warmin them in a microwave. And chile, never never put cheese or beetroot (3/-
11/05. or pienapl) in one but put a lot of fried onion; and the salad of course. Ya don’t want heaps of
juice that runs onto the plate like soup and you hav ta drink it up. But you do want enough juice to
make your fingers greezy – the good kind of juice what comes off the fried onion and slightly crisped
bacon. And I mean bacon, not that crappy manufactured stuff that is often substituted and they is
lieingly callin ‘ham’. If the diameter is very wide all the better, the one at Babinda was as wide as a
plate but still not too high to wrap your jaws over it. It cost $3.70 and was bigger than two ordinary
ones in Melbourne which sets a benchmark for price, a critical factor. No perfikt hamburger should
cost more; the one at Quilpie was $3.50. I know that your dad will say that he can get one at the Clide
or the Prince of Wales or whatever that pub is called, for 1½ c with a pot of beer thrown in and save
enough money, if he eats enough of em, to buy more real estate, but that’s crap. He has soled his
sole to the devil. The cheap jobs are wafer thin and they have nothin inside except insipid shit, and
they have no texture neither and above all they is eatin in the wrong spirit. For to have a really great
one it is not just the thing itself but the subtil newancy things around it that make the difference betw-
een perfikt and also ran. … Chile, I can imagine us one day eatin a perfikt hamburger (maybe at Qui-
lpie) after a few stubbies that we drank all arvo at the perfikt pub (maybe at Toompine) sittin on the
perfikt pier (probably at Port Germein) and we is havin an conversation (maybe about THE IMPORT-
ANT FINGS): ¶ “You forgot to mention the meat but I already know you will be sayin it must be good
quality juicy real beef mince not them round disks from packets”. “Pass me another stubby and screw
the lid off, them stars look great when youse is lying flat on your back like this. Like they is dancing to
the musik of the water lappin against the boats and they is shimmerin and wiggling and then all you
see is sort of blurry becoz the musik is all over”. “That’s because your eyes are shut”. “ Oh, yair, bet-
ter pour it in to me mouth as I’m talkin, otherwise its hard to handle in this posishin”. “So you reckon
it’s the newancy things around the edges.” “Yair, like the way at Quilpie the woman smiles at you wh-
en she gives ya the burger. Just because she can see that you is not like her hubby and you wouldn’t
break her jaw again becoz she was feelin too tired to screw on cue”. “That’s almost like sayin it’s the
journey and not the destination.” “Be careful when you pour, I don’t want ya to get me in the eye ag-
ain like ya did the last time.” “That wasn’t me, that was Danny, and he didn’t get ya in the eye, ya got
it in the nostrils.” “Ah yair I remember now. He’s always doin things like that he’s so agitatid.” “Or its
like sayin its not the peak of the mountain that counts but gittin there.” “Or not gettin there, but how
you don’t. When I shut it at the end of the word stop pourin will ya, your gettin it all over me face.” “N-
ot the four points, not the getting into the grand final, but the way ya bomb out. Talk slower and open
your mouth more.” “It’s the style that counts. Bow out with style. Ya reckon Pete polishes it or it shi-
nes like that naturally?” “It’s the operashin, hes been like that ever since. Having to keep it secret fro-
m the parints is what broke his spirit.” “They know he’s bald, mate.” “No, no, I mean Danny. His pari-
nts wouldn’t be able to handle it. They is littleaneans. “ “And they go on visits to Lifuania”. “Tough do-
uble.” “Or do ya reckon Vamzdys shines it up for him when they go surfin. With that stuff they youse
16
on the boards. Missed again.” “Dubbin.” “In the end its not what but how.” “Yair, but what if ya bomb
out without style. Disgracefully?” “That’s a tough one.” “Fits most of us, but what if ya bomb out, with-
out style, and ya got no money?” “We talkin about the same person?” “Maybe it gets shiny from rub-
bin against the wall or the top of his bed when hes asleep. Vamzdys and him aint talkin ya know.” “D-
on’t have to just to give his nut the occasional buff and polish." “Hardly anyone in the littleanian kom-
munity talks to each other.” “Theyre not missin nuffin.” “Faustas talks in littleanean”. “Same thing.” “H-
e frew away his mind in lifuania.” “Sounds like the title of a song, what is it, yair : Don’t cry for me Arg-
entina.” “Frew it a long way. Coz theres no evidence of it left.” “Listen Prof. Im gunna solve your prob-
lem. Don’t pour on the konsonints, just on the vowels, you got me in the ear that time.” “Do ya reckon
Ruke would sign a cheque for us not to catch fish on jetties? He’s the treasurer.” “And he’s kind, he
wouldn’t hurt a fish.” “Ive seen him eatin them, with us in Tassie.” “He doesn’t have to while he’s sign-
in the cheque though. Then we could go all over the country testin out jetties to see which is the most
perfikt for not catchin fish.” “Or maybe its vitamins that get him that way.” “Not enough of em.” “What
do ya mean?” “Make him so agitatid. Cause he was like that already before the op.” “I mean vitamins
that make Pete’s head so shiny.” “Or not enough of them that makes you know who so dum.” “Probly
the combination.” “They never made you a prof for nuffink.” “You earn all ya get, mate, fillin out forms,
applikashins.” “Suppose ya even worked out how to make this a tax deduktion.” “They don’t pay me
fer nuffin.” “Why ya stopt pourin?” “Ya finished yours.” “Give me one of yours. Pay ya back tomorrow.”
“Which pier?” “Cardwell.” “Im out anyway.” “That finishes the lesson then.” “What was the topik?” “H-
OW NOT TO POUR BEER.” “No, no, no, no it wasn’t I remember it was all bout : DA IMPORTINT FI-
N(G)S IN LIFE.” “Same fin(g).” ¶ a…z”)

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