Author: Me

Considering the day this is more a Public Service Announcement as much as one of the lessons I’ve learned in my life.

I’ve never been a big drinker so when at parties with people all around slowly (and sometimes very quickly) losing their sense of right and wrong, up and down, hot v not, I had the opportunity to listen to some very smart people saying some very, very dumb things before they’d pass out.

Upon arriving at one party hosted by a girl from school a group of blokes from another school who had started drinking much earlier, started asking me en mass if my name was ‘Norm’? This is the ’80’s. There was a health campaign called ‘Life, Be In It’ promoting exercise and delivered by a fat cartoon character called ‘Norm’. In these kids’ bleary-eyed world, as I was fat, I must be Norm. When I tried to rationally explain that I was not, in fact, a fat cartoon character from TV but a real-life human from another school christened Craig, they seemed to be very disappointed. So disappointed that they felt it necessary to surround me and began the man-dance. Hitting drunks for being drunk is not a sport in which I choose to participate so I patiently stood there trying to convince them I was not Norm. I think it would have been easier to convince them I wasn’t Mickey Mouse. A not-as-drunk friend suggested that the mob would be appeased if I did admit to being Norm for the night. I agreed and thus became Norm for that moment to great cheers from this bunch of fucking imbeciles. I did take some revenge two weeks later when our schools met on the rugby field. None of them walked off.

Fools are more of a challenge. Mostly because there are so many more of them. Lots of agreeing and ‘oh, is that the time? I really must get home to feed the cat’. I have no cat but fools seem to be understanding that for some reasons cats can’t live unless fed at the same time every day.

Anyways, the cat is calling. Happy New Year.

My mum used to say, “there are plenty of tombstones in the cemetery for people who died defending their rights.” Typically she was referring to other road users who, while defending their right-of-way would do something stupid.

If you drive you know this situation. And it isn’t getting better out there. How many times have you experienced someone roar past you only to be at the same set of traffic lights moments later.

When I was learning to ride the instructor cautioned us to ‘ride to your limits – by the time you catch up to your mates they’ll only just be taking their helmets off’. It is so true. The first couple of long day rides I went on with more seasoned riders I was always at the tai; where I liked it. And always when I caught them up my coffee was still hot.

But this saying extends way beyond driving and riding. I’ve deployed this maxim with customers, clients, staff, suppliers, managers, friends, family, strangers and wives. And almost daily on Twitter.

Who has time to argue about shitty, insignificant rubbish when there is so much to do. You want to tell me black is white? Fine, I’m colour blind so go your hardest. Feel in the mood to tell me my language is too coarse? Ok, but fuck off anyways. If you want to argue shit then you need to look at your life and expand your horizons. Look up from the dirt and start seeing the clouds.

And I know this to be true because I used to do it every-fucking-day in some lame ass attempt to prove false superiority.

Buckle up kiddies; only 12 sleeps to go and this shit is getting real, bitches.

Many years ago my sister was at a school careers night. She was in 4th form (as it was then called) and the school had invited a range of local business owners and other professionals for the kids to talk to about life after school, ie, work.

One of the invited was a B-grade Australian TV celeb. And B-grade is rating him really rather high. He was then a weatherman for the ABC. In fairness, this carried a little more kudos in our family as dad worked for the ABC too, behind the scenes. Although, for many years I did think my father was the ABC 7:00 PM news reader. Follow my 5-year-old logic here. 1) Dad was never home at 7:00 PM. 2) Dad looked a lot like James Dibble who really was the ABC 7:00 PM news reader. Ipso facto, my dad was James Dibble. Not so much it was pointed out to me. Dad was actually moonlighting in a second job as a projectionist around Sydney’s drive-in theatres.

Anyways, my 14 year old sister strikes up a conversation with this wannabe meteorologist. He asks, “So little girl, what do you want to be when you grow up?” My extremely creative sister responds, “I want to be a graphic designer.” “Really?” says the dude who now has to work for a commercial network and hasn’t got a creative bone in his body, “that’s hard to get into. Maybe you should try something else.” Can you hear the dreams of a little girl’s balloon popping? It was 1980 and if I had a time machine i’d go back to that moment and punch him in his nose so hard it would go back into his brain.

This is not to say my sister’s life and career haven’t been fantastic and she enjoys her role as the registrar of a private girl’s school very much. But still, that bloke’s a cunt.

Fast forward a couple of years and I had a similar experience. Dad had taken me to Film Australia’s Lindfield HQ where he was catching up with some of his old mates. I was there because it was school holidays and couldn’t be trusted alone at home. Like history repeating itself one of dad’s mates (whose only experience in film production is showing the finished product on a big white sheet) asks me, “So little boy, what do you want to be when you grow up?” Firstly, I have never been a ‘little’ boy. I answered, “I want to be a cinematographer”. Like a ninja decapitating an enemy’s head he quipped, “So, you want to be unemployed.” My dreams were dashed at the same rate that laughter filled the air. Their rationale was Australian cinematographers rarely worked professionally.

Six months later Dean Semler wins Oscar for ‘Dances with Wolves‘.

Fuck those fucking fuckers. Now in those days I didn’t know an aspect ratio from an ISO so I’m not suggesting Kev Costner should have called me to shoot Dances for him. But in that short time, my course was readjusted down a very different path. Which has still been amazing and I wouldn’t swap for anything… except maybe an Oscar.