Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Grumpy's Grumblings

Here is a list of things that currently annoy the crap out of me which just goes to show that I really am a cantankerous, grumpy, bad tempered, intolerant, old man!




The Price of being Published.

Wow, ripper, I've got a contract, woopee, you beaut, I'm an Author, Oh glee, and I even got an advance. You mean they are REALLY gonna pay me for this??? Now hold on!  There's got to be a catch here somewhere. Marketing??? What's that? Oh! I have to do WHAT? !!!!

Media People.

I've spent 68 years on this earth and the only time I've ever been bothered by these people was when some bloody nong tried to stuff a microphone up my left  nostril, just after I'd returned from Vietnam. I sat him on his arse. Very satisfying. Since then media people have ignored me with a profound dedication.  Good.  

Now suddenly I'm to be a published Author and  someone from some damn  literary journal I've never heard of wants to know my opinion on  the third century  poetry of Lord Nerd of Mugwump.  HUH? Who? The look of  shock and horror that  I didn't have a clue  who the bloody hell they were  raving about branded me  unconditionally as a literary  whore. So I've prostituted the written word to the evil lust of commercialism?? I should  worry? I asked, as I counted off  the zeros on my advance on royalties cheque. So  I'm a literary  whore? Eat yer heart out!

Hangers On.

Now, for  me,  this is a  very new phenonema. Some bloody fool  (me)  innocently mentioned to another bloody  fool that I'd scored a book contract. The other bloody fool  mentioned this to  a third bloody fool  and  you  can  guess the rest.   I live in  a  suburb  where celebrity  means  you've won the  weekly  chook  raffle at the pub. So far  I've been  invited to  three speaking engagements, two school  lectures,   a  women's group meeting,  two service club dinners, one historical  society bash, one  football  club brawl  and the local boy scouts. The  local  boy scouts  being the only  ones  who've  offered  to pay for any  expenses. 

AND WHILE I'M ON MY SOAPBOX!

Research.

 Bloody research, blessed is research because there will come a day when everyone who writes must do research. It is the great leveler. Even those illustrious high fliers who have initials like SK and TC  have to do research. Just imagine kiddies, you creep furtively into the local library to research the sex life of the rare yumandubrah grey moth and there sitting quietly, with the very reference you want is ????  ??????. Fill in your own blanks - who ever you'd like to wake up in the morning and find you've become - or perhaps you'd just like his/her cheque book - no matter. Now of course it's highly likey that these grand pooh bahs of the literary word employ some poor slavering fan, at a pittance, to do the research for them, but, it still has to be done- Oh joy - they're human afterall - their words - complete with correct punctuation and spelling - don't come from some great voice in the sky. They too have to work at it! I am content.

Government Websites.

I am thoroughly convinced that government websites are the bureaucrat's (damn I have trouble spelling that word) latest torture to bring us poor voters and other ordinary folk down to our knees. So you want to try to find something on a government website - GOOD LUCK!! The index of all government sites is incomprehensible, a logical layout, if there is one, is not designed in a methodology we mere mortals can understand. Government websites are designed like Government offices. By the time you find what you want you're to damn exhausted to ask for it.

Search Engines.

Oogle and Numbat and Yea bloody Ha or what ever they call themselves. Have you ever tried to use them? You put in your search word, or words, something like - Senate Enquiries and Royal Commissions - and what you get back is a hundred bloody thousand hits - All references to Senate, Enquiries, Royal and bloody Commissions. It's quite easy to get over half a million hits. Hmmm you think. I need to narrow down my search, so you go to advanced search and it boggles your mind with all the options. So you got to HELP. Help? Help my arse. First you must have a degree in computer geek speek to use it and the one thing you are looking for will be conveniently buried under a ton of incomprehensible gibberish that you have no hope of deciphering. Haven't these people ever heard of plain bloody English?

Christmas.

It's that time of year again. People scramble to buy the right present, some times for children, some times for relatives they can't stand. In the process they manage to overspend, max out their credit cards and create a year long nightmare for themselves that sometimes ends up in heart break.

Weather.

Yep, weather, that stuff that can be wet, cold, hot, dry and all stages in between. Weather can be the blonde Barbie doll or the terribly ernest "mature" male on straight after the news at night. They quack on about fronts, and charts and systems and averages until you are so mesmerised by the bullshit that you don't remember what the hell they did say about tomorrow,  they probably had it wrong anyway. It annoys me because on the rare days I fight my way out of my garret, and wistfuly look for the sun, I invaribly get bloody rained on. Because blonde bloody Barbie or ernest bloody Ernest doesn't bloody know what they are talking about!!!

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