Most memorable moustache in a motion picture or television series

...and the nominees are:

Tom Selleck for his outstanding work in Magnum P.I.

The man with the bulletproof stache, Charlie Bronson

Acting without ever seeing his lips move, Elliot Gould in M*A*S*H

Now I realise I'm missing out on one very significant figure here, however I think we need to rule out the obvious because of his unfair advantage in being the first man on the planet to ever grow a mo. Therefore, awarded the lifetime achievement award is none other than Mr. Burt Renyolds, without whom Jason Lee and state troopers of the world would have no one to look up to.

............................................................

I challenge anyone out there, can you think of a moustache in history before Burt?

...I didn't think so.

Talking Weird Science Blues...

"Look what you can make with a little imagination, Son:

...a little imagination, an Amstrad PC, a bolt of lightning and a bra on your head!"

Don't listen to this movie, it sits on a throne of fucking lies and will only get you yelled at by your sister for ruining her "date night" underwear.

I think I love you, Barbara.

Just finished watching Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc?

...and now I have uncontrolable crush on Barbara Streisand.

This can mean only one of two things:

1) I'm now gay - and like Kevin Kline in In and Out I'm going to stand up my viking princess on our wedding day.

Of course, the only thing against this concept is my terrible sense of style and grooming and oh yeah, my preference for transexuals over gay men, but that's not queer, right? They still count as girls, don't they? After all I am British, which Ben tells me is a common hangup we all share what with being seperated from the rest of Europe and all.

2) I'm now a middle aged Jewish woman. I share almost nothing in common here, but oye vay I do love Babs.

I wonder if Barbara would consider marrying a skinny white boy from Melbourne who can't get his drivers license until March and eats cereal three times a day. I can only hope...

(Note: I must remember to ask the doctor if these thoughts have anything to do with losing my appendix or perhaps my total under exposure to vitamin E recently. I have been in doors an awfully long time.)

Surefire cure for the blues...

Been feeling a little blue of late. Had camera problems, Viking Princess fantasies and I find myself saying "you don't know what it's like. You've still got an appendix?" It's funny how much you miss them until they're gone and how many bars require you to have them for entry...

...blah, blah, blah, essentially I've been crying, chain smoking and making papier-mâché hats with a support group for Matt Dillon lookalikes for about a week now, but this morning all of that changed. Why, you ask?

Well...

Because Jeff Daniels is now a myspace friend!

I feel happier just saying that out loud "because Jeff Daniels is now a myspace friend!" I might even make a little song:

Jeff
you are my friend,
Jeff,
we are good friends,

Jeff,
I worship SATAN,
I love ROBOTS,
ARGH...!

(I think that's more work than what goes into a my chemical romance song)

My dearest peeps, I need a little help…

During my time with the Austin's eighth floor posse: Adrian (Liver Transplant), George (Heart Attack) and Angel (Whinny old guy), we were all presided over by one Nordic princess, Ingrid. This 6’1” Viking beauty not only tended our wounds, but administered 100mg of love in the process to each and every one of us; and after three days of care we were all biding for her plastic-gloved affections. Indeed, this could purely be because she was the only resident capable of taking our ills away with those lovely, pearl-like white pills she would manage our way every four hours; or it could simply be a stereotypical case of Florence Nightingale syndrome, wherein the patient falls in love with his immediate career. Whatever the case, I’ve been out of the ward now for seven days and while I'm sit lamenting over the lovely princess, Adrian, George and Angel are still privy to her affections.

Something must be done.

Now, these five days haven’t been without purpose. Concurrent with the healing of my battered stomach, I’ve managed to watch every Richard Curtis movie made available, research in itself that should enable me to be the most romantic man in the world, no? So, I’m thinking, like Hugh Grant I should march down to the hospital, down to the white walls of “w” wing and woo the precious Viking queen like she’s never been wooed before.

I can do it, I know I can.

...However, the only draw back to this otherwise flawless plan, is that I’ve also spent the last week listening to Ronny James Dio records and for anyone who knows his work, knows that Dio is spent on tales of Dragons and the adventures of Knights. So, while my heart is savoring the dry witted romance of Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill, my mouth is sprouting the words Lord of the Rings and Excalibur; and as experience has taught me, this is not the strongest of suits. The way I see it I have three choices:

1) March down there, sounding like a dwarf lord and all, and let the chips fall where they may.

2) Grow back my appendix so that they can get inflamed again and get back on the ward to some more reconnaissance work.

3) Forget about my Viking Dream girl, make the final payment on my Russian bride and live happily ever after.

The clock's ticking and I'm without a clue...

Yo, Snoop. You gotta try this shit right here, man.

Because of the operation my movements are pretty much limited to the span that my wee Hobbit-like arms will allow, but the always active biographer in me makes damn sure that the camera is always within that reach.

Case in point, while dosed to the eyeballs last night, I woke prematurely from my hydrochloride induced date with the Olson Twins ( I hadn't even removed my socks yet) to find myself unable to sleep and high beyond all belief - I mean high, like, really high, as in Robert Downey Jr high.

I remained awake for over three hours until sleep eventually provided refuge for me. I remember the sensation of having my faced licked by a Labrador, but Lord only knows what’s going on behind these dilated pupils.

The result of a Tramadol drip/100 mg capsule cocktail.

Kids, say no to drugs.

Hands up everyone that has had an Appendectomy

Funny how you can go from a glass of milk at 9.30, roll on the floor for two hours, roll on a gurney in the ER for nine hours and still remember to take some ridiculous pictures for your blog when you finally get hooked up to The Machine.

Morphine says "make it so!"

Here's a poem I composed to shorten the experience but to sustain the order of facts into nine lines:

Pain
Oh, Pain
Emergency room
Pain
Searing horrible pain
Emergency room
...and then finally,
an attractive doctor felt me up!

Slam Dunk

From being admitted on Saturday night, I wouldn't see the sweet, sweet relief (however brief) of the surgeons knife until 4am Monday morning. Then, dosed up, I was back in the sactuary of my bed for 6pm that very night...

...only to be back in hospital eight hours later for another round with the white coats when things went belly up - I'm so glad Steve Bracks spends more money on sms voting for Australian Idol than Health Care.

People, if you don't vote your Idol won't win!

Oh, well, at least it gave me time to grow this poor man's imitation of a Nate Fisher beard:

Apologies to everyone who thought I was dead for not answering phones calls, MSN messages, smoke signals and the front door. I'm back home, still in the worst pain ever, but and high as a mofo.

P.S. Big ups to the nursing staff at the Austin. Each and everyone of you is as skilled and attractive as Brett's father's VHS tapes led us to believe.

...and I'm spent.

Well, that's all folks...

After what seemed like a month, editing has finally wrapped on the film. My eyes hurt. My brain hurts. I’m hungry and I think I’m getting the flu. Completely exhausted.

There’s me, and there’s this panda – we both need a long nap (and a new job).

...and maybe a little detective hat for the panda so he can solve crimes at the zoooooooooooooooooooooo...

*crashes into keyboard*

Kung Fu Crazy (re-post)

Despite a brief hiatus for sleep, in which I dreamt of robots trying to steal my brain, I've been editing this film for nearly 20 hours now. My eyes are sore, my mind is weak and I’m pretty sure I spilt cornflakes on myself a few hours ago, but can’t for the life of me quite remember it happening.

Cross Dissolve, Freeze Frame, Star Wipe….

Cross Dissolve, Freeze Frame, Star Wipe….

Cross Dissolve, Freeze Frame, Star Wipe….

And so it has gone since 10am yesterday morning…

Around 4.30 today, sometime between editing hundreds of Bruce Lee photos and Van Damme’s roundhouse kicks, I think I officially lost touch with reality. How does one know when they have lost touch with their surroundings? Can someone know when they lost touch with their surroundings? Well, the answers to these metaphysical questions are indeed debatable, but yet, I would endeavor to say that the point of no return happens sometime around the moment when you begin to seriously question (verbally, mind you) whether or not you would prefer to live in movie Hard to Kill or Hard Target. One, you are chased by Lance Henrikson and are forced to wear skin tight acid wash jeans and don a sleezy permed mullet, and the other, well, you get to be Segal: pony tail, kinda pudgy and just plain mean….

Bring on the mullet acid wash.

*passes out mid Star Wipe...*

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.