Express Yourself!

It’s funny to think that the endless stream of emotions that we feel everyday are often boiled down to one dimensional terms like happy, sad, frustrated or mad. That despite the millions of minute intricacies that occur within every smile or frown we still reduce that felling to either happy or sad. Your favorite television show gets cancelled, “well, I feel sad” you say; or perhaps the family dog passes on and you use the same adjective to describe your disposition, it’s all every odd and all very funny when you think about how we pair some of the emotions together.

The only reason I bring all this up is because I was watching Six Feet Under this morning.

There I am watching Six Feet Under and part way through the exhausting rollercoaster of emotion that is the show, I suddenly reflect on how involved I have become with this rear-projected reality, I was just as involved with Nate’s plight as I have ever been about anything in my own life, which is a completely ridiculous concept, but nevertheless true (at least on a very instinctive level).

This sudden awareness of what I was going through instantly brought a smile to my face, and at once gave me an idea for project of Claire Fisher proportions. During the remainder of the episode if I suddenly became conscience of my involvement in the show, I would try to maintain my expression and take a photograph to document my attachment to the show. The results are pretty hilarious, especially in light of my introduction here and I admit some of the photos are rather indulgent, but it is a saturday morning after all and Roadrunner isn't on anymore...

(AFTERWORD: Despite my hypothesis that we reduce all emotions into singular adjectives I'm now aware, after looking through 25 years worth of photographs, that these are the only four expressions my misshaped head in capable of making).

Hello Lovely...

I'm thinking of placing an add in the newpapers personals. May read something like this:

"Level 12 Elf with specialties in both marksmanship and magic, seeks early 20s female Necromancer to discuss the black arts and enjoy raising the dead with. Must love dogs."

Not sure about the font yet, but tired of waiting for the one special Dark Elf to knock at my door.

I See Dead People

Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.

Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.

Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.
Three series of six feet under in three days makes Mark a little crazy.

Friendly faces everywhere. Humble folk without temptation.

For nearly a week now my days have been spent staring aimlessly at my inbox and reading onion articles until I eventually fall asleep browsing some inane post on IMDB (read "the answer to what was in the briefcase" thread - truly the work of super nerds and Taratino Fanboys who take his oft retarded word as lore). I’ve been bored to say the least, and I fear the Internet is sucking my will to live. The constant flashing of the Word typing cursor seems to bellow at me “useless” as my word count rests without direction at 0.0.

To be fair though, while the Internet does do more harm than good these days, everyone once in a while I do find something online that helps wane away those daylight hours without reducing me to tears at the reality of how uneventful my days are.

Now call me crazy, but I’ve always wondered what my friends would look if illustrated in the South Park style, well, now I know…I found this program on the glorious www and after tinkering with it for about hour I couldn’t help myself from smiling ear to ear at the realism of each of the following characters.

While I think we all look great, David’s Butters-esque smile absolutely kills me. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you The Super Friends of South Park.:

This surefire cure for the blues can be found here.

If there is one thing I think about more than anything, it’s the prospect that one day the world will become overrun with zombies…

Call me crazy, but I’m sure one day it’s going to happen. There you are eating your breakfast of coffee and oats or perhaps you’re the sort of cat that likes tea and crumpets in the morning, I know I do; whatever the scenario, the day will come when you lean over the kitchen table to kiss your loved one goodbye before heading out to a hard day of work at the office and BAM! She/he tries to eat your face off. Are you prepared for that? What would you do? After all, they were, up until a few moments ago anyway, the love of your life. Just because they’ve suddenly become a member of the living dead doesn’t necessarily mean you have to stop loving them, does it?

Then again, the sacred vows of marriage do proclaim until death do us part, so technically, if you’ve ever had a gripe with your loved one: maybe they spilt red wine on your favorite shirt, maybe they ran over your cat, or maybe they just bug you with their always happy upbeat spirit, well now you have the catholic church’s blessing to lob their head off with the nearest kitchen knife. According to the Pope and his rules and regulations of marriage, God wants you to kill zombies. Once they’re dead, they’re fair game. How can you argue with that? But what happens and bear with me now, if they are really attractive? Could you still axe them? “But, Mark, they're a zombie, for goodness sake,” I hear you say, well, that is true enough, they are the undead, but when I say attractive I mean really, really attractive like Natalie Portman in Closer, or if you are a lass, Tim Curry in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, were talking super fit, here people. I don’t know about you, but I’d find it pretty difficult to put fair Natalie out of her eternal misery of damnation, especially if she had that pink wig of hers on. Sure, she’d constantly be trying to eat my brains, but I’d be a fool if I said that wasn’t kind of a turn on.

Super hot deadites aside, I’ve always wondered how I would cope – scratch that, how I will cope – when the zombies do finally take over. If it happens suddenly like in the remake of Dawn of the Dead where I wake up one morning to find one of those tricky zombies running around my lounge room, then I imagine my chances of survival would be pretty slim, but if I received word ahead of time about the rising of my great grandparents, well I think it would be safe to say I’d be in pretty good shape to get past day one, as training to kill zombies is something I’ve spent my life preparing for – believe me, when I first heard of the Bird Flu I was so excited that the dead would walk I went out and bought a new chainsaw and lawnmower.

Now, I’m fairly confident in my abilities to take out zombies, but you can never be too sure, you know, so I decided to put myself to the ultimate test developed by American scientists who have devoted their whole lives to zombie research. Based on my given answers, a super secret, super computer located somewhere in a super secret, super government lab seems to think I’m the Rupert Everett of zombie killers.

Sure, I like to fall in love with the undead, but with the fall of the government and the police department, I figure there's no laws against it and besides, you can never choose who you fall in love with, right? Anyway, take the test yourself here and post your results in the comments section of this post; and don’t worry, if you find the prospect of living dead terrifying, I’ll make an effort to help you out with some pointers.

Talking Grand Final Blues...

What loser forgets to take Grand Final day off work? Unfortunately, I know only one fool lame enough to let that most hallowed day in September slip through their fingers; I refer of course, to the loser typing this post.

Yes, after taking Saturday night off for the past few weeks, the probability of securing a day in the sun with the time honoured Aussie tradition of snags n’ beers in between kicks of the pig’s skin were sorrowfully slim to none. Now, I don’t even like the Aussie Rules, but given a few drinks and let’s say three sausages, I’m yelling for holding the ball and dropping the C-Bomb at the pixilated umpire like any other hot-blooded, testosterone-filled male.

Serving maybe six people at best, during the sunshine hours of work, I quickly slipped into a mass depression as every customer came to see The Devil Wears Prada – mostly mothers with their daughters or gay couples; I guess most of the “blokes” planned ahead a saw the movie before the big game – while I sat forlornly staring out of the window at the merriment of the people playing and having an all-round goodtime (we don’t have any windows at work, so I spent most of the day starring at the ventilation ducts planning my escape). The only reprieve from the dreary white walls of work came on the cover of the Age’s Weekender.

Reaching a point where any distraction was welcomed, an animated Tim Robbins made his way around the facilities in a modest attempt to cheer me up.

A cheeky Daisy gets some time alone with an Academy Award winner.

Hannah giggles at Tim's persistent advances.


A surprised Tim nervously eyes Bonnie as the lioness prepares to pounce.

A wandering Tim finds a surprised Rita (note the expression of Renae who can't believe her luck at meeting her favourite actor)

Tim did bring a little sunshine into an otherwise grey day, but I think next year I'll just take the day off in advance.