Category Archives: opinion

Flamingo Files, Wednesay style

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I am wearing my knitted blue dress and I am so sexy, even if I say so myself (and I do!)

We have a bird problem outside the library; birds perch along the exterior window ledges and poop over the paving, especially in front of the doors. We notice that it is worse after the weekends when the birds can perch unmolested.  So, one of the building staff purchased a large plastic owl and had it installed on the corner of the building. The theory is that it will scare the birds away. I think it is more likely that the birds will fall about laughing! This morning a big black crow was making friends with it, and the crow only took flight when I walked towards the building (no, you don’t want to make comment as to the relationship between my appearance and the level of fright of the bird, well, not if you want to live). Pity the owl doesn’t have a voice and motion sensor. I would record the message “No food in front of the library! Put your bag on the bag racks! I am talking to you, kiddo!” Then it would really earn its place!

I increased my life insurance and income protection insurance this week, so if I mysteriously disappear in the near future, please feel free to point the finger at Mr FD. He has been following the Baden-Clay case closely, as indeed everyone has.  If he suggests I suddenly developed a passion for going for walks late at night, call him a liar. We all know that I do not exercise, indeed exercise for me is moving from one end of the couch to the other (Flamingo Dancers do not get sweaty, we merely become dewey).  I also do not swim in local water holes or creeks. I do not walk along the nearby river’s edge either. Even if he didn’t do it, he deserves to suffer in my absence. He should have taken better care of me!

merely dewey, not sweaty!

The quote on my desk calendar states, “The plainest sign of wisdom is a continual cheerfulness: her state is like that of things in the regions above the moon, always clear and serene” (Michel de Montaigne). Obviously I am never going to possess wisdom, for continual cheerfulness is beyond me. To be continually cheerful one must no doubt be continually nice, and we all know that I find being nice so damn exhausting. Last week I developed a severe migraine from an extended period of niceness, and required a day in my bed to recover my evilosity balance.

Over a week ago I bought some green grapes which I put into the vegetable keeper of the fridge and promptly forgot about. On Monday morning I remembered that they were there (okay, I didn’t remember, I found them when searching for a tomato that hadn’t gone mouldy) and decided to take them for my lunch. Problem was that after a week in the fridge the grapes were no longer as fresh as they had once been (who is?) so when it came to lunch I allowed myself to reject them in favour of some chocolates that were being passed around. Guilty as only a catholic girl can be, I vowed I would eat them the next day, so I kept them in my lunch bag (lunch bag, think of something Fred Flintstone would carry, except in insulated black nylon!) Next day rolled around; as did grape time and I now know those damn grapes have been in the bag, not even the fridge since yesterday. My mind imagines the brown patches as browner, brown patches. Now, we all know that I am never going to eat those damn grapes. I am going to keep playing this routine until the damn things fall out of my lunch bag, or the fuzzy mould takes hold. Then I will throw them out. So, why don’t I save myself all these feelings of guilt and just turf them into the compost bin now? They are going to a better place – earth to earth and all that. However, there are still starving people in the world and so I keep pretending to myself, which is even worse, as it is not as though my lack of grape appreciation is public knowledge (I am no longer on Facebook) so I need only hide my dirty secret from my own consciousness, but I can’t. I have a solution though – I shall give them to Mr FD when I go home. And that, Virginia, is what husbands are for…

Speaking of vaginas, Virginia, male student was waiting for male friend at the circulation desk and was reading through a homework quiz. One of the questions was “Do women have a cervix?” Neither of them knew, and I did not enlighten them. Some things a boy just has to work out for himself.

 

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Dick Cheney had a heart?

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Stunned at the news that Cheney has had a heart transplant, because I always assumed he was a heartless bastard. I wonder if they ascertained whether it was a democratic or republican donor?

If I offered to be a donor and then from the Great Beyond found out someone like that got my bits, I would demand their return!

One, one Flamingo File for 2012

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  • How to jettison friends and annoy the female population: tell them that, rather than putting on weight over Christmas, that you ate like a seasonal pig and still managed to shed half a kilo too

I can only suppose that it was the heavy scale gardening of the past few days that balanced the scales in my favour. Or someone moved the dial, but I am not checking!

  • How can a man, who squeals like a teenage girl at a Justin Beiber concert when he spies a spider, big or small, admonish his wife for refusing to enter the garden shed, with its possibilities of rats, snakes and mice, as well as filthy geckos and lizards? Surely, equality has allowed us equity of phobias?

I will smite any spider with foot, stick or book, but I will not battle with rodent or reptile, and if Mr FD keeps up his mocking he shall make it onto one of either of the lists, or both, and as an endangered species too!

  • I am yet to take down our Christmas tree. Why is it that everyone clamours to put the tree up and decorate it, but volunteers to take it down and store everything away are thing on the ground?

I could always leave it up until Mr and Mrs Boy return from Europe (they are currently in Paris, before travelling onto Spain) and make myself a heroine by claiming that I wanted to share another Christmas with them. Then when I have them all back in the same room, I could guilt them into doing the deconstruction work! Poor mother me, you spoiled my Christmas by having a marvellous European holiday, leaving me to feed your worms, the least you could do is pack away the Christmas decorations.

  • An ad on TV suggested I start the new year with a whole new body. I have searched the internet and not found anywhere where I can order a new body. Another example of false advertising
  • Why is it, that all the hints by organiser gurus online involve purchasing hundreds of small containers and baskets? Why can’t I just file things in a recycled computer paper box, two shoes boxes and an empty biscuit tin?

There is nothing wrong with making do and not having matching teal baskets, folders and buckets of varying sizes. I think the problem starts with we neglect to actually put things in the recycled computer box, or shut the lid on the biscuit tin, while piling things on top of every available space. I think we all start with best intentions, and things are great until the pressure mounts and the deadlines loom and that is when intentions get replaced by panic and expediency. Mess comes to visit, outstays its visa and moves right on in. It is not the pretty stuff that keeps us organised, it is our own effort and commitment.  Now where is that tin of short bread biscuits I received for Christmas?

  • First task checked off my 2012 list. I have organised my home office. I was ruthless, and it looks fantastic even if I say so myself, and I do. Such a feeling of lightness and relief.  I am just so perfect this week. Yeah me! And it didn’t even need flying pigs to achieve!

Merry Flamingo Files to you, if not me.

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What has been annoying The Flamingo Dancer this week:

Handshakes. What is it with handshakes? Why do we shake hands at all? We no longer carry swords and so there is no reason to disarm the sword hand, so what possible service does a handshake provide, other than to transmit germs?

Hugs. I hate hugging. All that, do we touch cheeks, or kiss checks? Yesterday I got hugged by a female friend outside the supermarket. I saw no reason to hug, I hadn’t won a prize, and I wasn’t crying. I didn’t need comfort. I was in fact about to buy Christmas?

Bing Crosby singing “White Christmas” over the supermarket speaker. It is Australia. You can dream all you want about a White Christmas, and the most that will happen is a hail storm, and no one wants one of those, especially on Christmas Day.  Wouldn’t it be better to play some relaxation music, so I don’t feel like taking my trolley and ramming it over the family of FIVE SCREAMING CHILDREN who keep crossing my path, even when I jump two aisles to escape them?

Wrapping paper so thin that it tears as I wrap my gifts. I know it is going into the recycling bin on Christmas morning, but I would at least like it to last long enough for me to wrap the present and place it under our tree.

The glorification of Christmas light shows throughout the neighbourhood. It always strikes me that it is probably the family that can least afford the extra power costs that indulge in this habit. Do they know, Virginia, that there is no Santa Clause  coming, and if he did he would be on the side of a Coke Cola delivery truck rather than in a sleigh?

Gift giving trees in shopping malls. You know, those trees that department stores set up in the anticipation that they will guilt us all into spending extra, in their department store of course, for people in need.  Now, don’t get me wrong, I think we should all support charity, and no better time than Christmas, but wouldn’t it be better to donate money to a real charity to use where it is really needed? Not making shareholders richer. (Here I do have to admit that on more than one occasion when our children were younger we did in fact buy for the gift tree, but have in more recent times seem the capitalist star on the tree and donated to charity instead).

People who have moved during the year, but neglect to write their address on the back of their Christmas card so that you can return a card to them. More than once I have had to play sleuth and search through whitepages.com.au for what I suspect might be their address on the few hints they gave in their card.

People who say they will only send a card if someone sends them a card first, and then complain on Christmas Day about how few people sent them cards. My mother has fallen into this trick for a number of years. Now the family insists that she sends cards first, and we take turns writing them for her, to the extent that she only has to sign them. Now she complains about the handwriting of the ageing card senders, who these days find it hard to breathe let alone write!

People who complain that they “just can’t get into the Christmas spirit this year”. Why do we even expect to? We spend weeks being told to hurry up and finish our shopping, which most people ignore, then we plan huge complicated meals we have neither the energy nor ability to cook, to serve to people that we are not altogether sure we want to spend an entire day with. Try it with 33C summer heat and no air conditioning. No wonder the murder rate goes up at Christmas! More than one Christmas I have looked at the carving knife with strong desire.

Silly ecards of cute puppies and kittens waiting for Santa and looking disappointed. Then Santa arrives, Surprise! I got one today that had the puppy eat all the cookies off the plate except for one, which Santa ate when he left a bone. If I had known Santa would settle for dog biscuits I would have changed my offerings years ago.

The dramatic grieving, chest beating and wailing that is taking place in North Korea. See, that is what happens when you worship your leader and not the God Capitalism. That is never going to happen in a western country where most of us would be happy to send our leaders to sea in a leaky boat in a bad storm. Watching grown men in military uniform blubbering is kind of fun I must admit, but the fact that these people have a finger on a nuclear bomb does causes one to pause in concern though. Let’s hope that someone gives them some happy juice and soon.

Why does it seem that so many British people appearing on television can’t pronounce their r. I have just been listening to a British presenter talk about Euwope. Euwope. He said it every second sentence. Euwope. Maybe we should send him to North Kowea to cheew up the cywing. The r affliction does seem to be endemic in the British. Is it because of inbreeding? (I am told that my parents were not related, but their grandparents may very well have been… it happens when you can only marry someone who lives within an afternoon’s horse ride!)

last one left, turn off the lights

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Today, I heard of two news items that have really disturbed me.

The first was about the introduction of Christmas gift registries, along the lines of a wedding, or baby shower registry. An online list where you can list all the things that you want other people t o buy for you at Christmas.

It took me a long time to adjust to a wedding registry, but I have come to understand that in these days of  couples living together before marriage, that a registry will at least mean that you aren’t going to end up with duplicates or triplicates,  or in the one colour that makes you homicidal.

However, I don’t think I will ever accept such a process for Christmas gift giving, as it seems to go against the whole concept of Christmas. It seems to me, that such a concept means that we have learnt nothing from the recent economic downturn and the greed that lead us into our own downfall; not to mention all the chatter about distressing, and decluttering our lives of things and debt.

The second area of concern was a small item on CNN this morning which was almost celebrating the fact that America has shelved the introduction of government regulations to introduce low energy light bulbs. I suspect it was lack of government funds to carry through the policy that was at the bottom of action, but there were also a number of people who were celebrating the triumph of their constitution and their God given right to burn whatever bulb they wish too. One senator proudly declared he had 200 light bulbs stock piled at home. A politician who really has his constituents at heart; obviously not.

Well, can I say, hey guys, you aren’t the only ones on this earth? I have a God given right to a healthy planet. There are more than you in this sandpit, kid.

I have been using low energy bulbs wherever and whenever I can, because I recognise that my actions not only have a local impact, but a global impact as well. Plus it lowers my power bill costs!  I don’t think my individual rights are superior to any other individual in this world, or any future individual, I believe in equity.

So, if I adopt a self-centered attitude, and they continue their selfish ways, what is going to happen to our planet?  Nothing nice, that is sure.

As I said, both these new items I found disturbing, for it  appears that despite all the media, the education and the personal experience of economic downturn and climate change, we really haven’t learnt a thing. A sobering thought to take into Christmas and the season of goodwill and peace on earth.

I am a Jones-er! Or is that a Wedger? Either way, I rule!

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Are you born between 1954 and 1963? Feel as though you don’t belong to the “Boomers” ? Well, you aren’t a Baby Boomer at all!

…Jonathan Pontell who first identified us in a distinct demographic wedge of our own.

“While the Boomers were out changing the world, Jones-ers were still school kids – wide-eyed, not tie-dyed. For Boomers, the legacy of the 1960s is ideology, but for Jones-ers it is idealism. They were forged in the fires of social upheaval while too young to play a part. It’s time for Jonesers to redress unkept boomer promises; to “finally scratch the itch”.

via   The Hoopla

Join the Joneser crowd: President Barack Obama,  French President Nicholas Sarkozy, Oprah Winfrey, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Tom Hanks, Jon Stewart, Nigella Lawson, JK Rowling, Madonna, Tom Cruise, French and Saunders, Stephen Fry. AND FLAMINGO DANCER!

Now I understand why the boomer tag just never felt comfortable. I am a little Wedger of a Joneser! I feel as though I have arrived home.

Does anyone pause for them?

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Western black rhino declared extinct

WILD black rhinos were declared extinct, according to the latest assessment by experts at a leading conservation group.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature said the western black rhino, native to West Africa, no longer exists and claimed that a quarter of all other mammal species are at risk of extinction.

This baby black rhinoceros, pictured with her mum, was born at the Western Plains Zoo in NSW in 2002. Experts say zoos are the only place we will see such animals from now on.

They took all the trees and put ‘em in a tree museum
And then they charged all the people twenty-five bucks just to see ‘em
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot

Joni Mitchell

Going up the staircase, one step at a time

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Australia is introducing a nation wide curriculum for our schools. A nation of only 23 million people it makes perfect sense that our children should all be learning the same subjects at the same stage. In our mobile society it means that students can move from state to state with more ease.

As a teacher I am encouraged to not educate with old models. I try to teach in a way that will reach students who have been born in the 21st century. They have never known a time without mobile phones, laptops, Xboxes and the internet. To use what is in serious danger of becoming a tired cliché, they are indeed digital natives. Their every day life is lived multitasking in a digital online environment. It is natural to them as breathing.

Why then are our politicians continually serving up to their constituents old model politics of conflict and hate? Why is our media so happy to work within this position?  I use the word our, because we have a role to play in this, and many of us are abdicating our role.

That role is to communicate to the institutions of our various societies, that we will no longer tolerate this abuse of the power we give them. I am of the opinion that the place to start is with the media. Media magnates the likes of the Murdoch Family (family taking on a new meaning since the accusation of “mafia boss” made against James Murdoch this week), are motivated by money and in particular profits. If we hit those profits, they will listen.

If we don’t buy or subscribe to their biased and conflict ridden media, for example in Australia the very biased Australian or Courier Mail newspapers, then they will soon listen. Falling profits and unhappy investors are what they listen too. I think far too many investors are morally bankrupt. The hysteria in the stock markets is proof that they too are concerned about profits, and easily spooked. It is up to the consumer to spook them.

Send them, the media and their investors, the message that we will no longer tolerate this abuse of our good will. When the media changes its tune, the political whores will follow. If politicians want our attention, and our vote, they will have to play to our rules, and that rule is no bullying, no conflicts. Communicate, negotiate and produce some positive results.

We can’t blame the politicians or the media, if we don’t tell them what we need and what we want. And we want it now, don’t we? It means that we are going to have to communicate, negotiate and produce some positive results too. We can lead by example, model the behaviour that we want, just as a committed teacher does; as an effective parent does.   Don’t subscribe to their behaviour, attitudes and values.

Think about, and try it; we might just like it!

Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase.

Martin Luther King Jr.