If I call myself a feminist, will I be paid for writing crap?

The Guardian has paid someone called Jessica Valenti to write an article about her upcoming wedding. What could possibly be so interesting about Jessica Valenti's wedding? Well, she's a feminist, apparently, and she started the blog feministing.com.

Why would a 'feminist wedding' be a particular novelty? Apart from the bit about getting slagged off by fellow feminists for marrying in the first place...

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1. A feminist talks with her partner about getting married, and they jointly arrive at a decision that being married is a good idea.

2. A feminist keeps her surname.

3. A feminist is not 'given away' by her father at her wedding.

4. A feminist does not wear a white dress.

5. A feminist does not promise in her vows to 'obey' her groom.

6. A feminist and her husband are jointly involved in the planning of the wedding.

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Ooh and to think I never considered myself a feminist! I fit all those criteria! Actually, wait, basically all this is saying is that having a wedding that fits your own preferences, that isn't exactly like everyone else's, that doesn't involve changing your name and abandons all of the most stupid conventions makes your wedding feminist.

1. Common sense. Although Gam still bemoans on daily basis the fact that he didn't 'give me the proposal I deserved' (i.e. the one he imagines everyone else has- some fairytale crap), anyone who waits for 'the proposal' to start discussing anything but the mechanics of the wedding itself must have rocks in their head.

2. Okay, I kept my surname because I'm too lazy to change it, not because I think the name-changing convention entails upholding a sexist institution. Frankly I'd be perfectly happy to change it. I honestly don't care what anyone else thinks on the matter, feminist or 'traditional', I like my current surname because it's easily identifiable- I like being easy to find on the electoral roll on polling day- but so is Gam's. And we still haven't decided what we're going to do when it comes to naming our kids. I suppose that conversation will depend on whether I'm too lazy to bother changing my name before we finally get around to having them.

3. Maybe this one does make me a feminist in the eyes of some people- I think the whole idea of a woman being 'given away' is gross and reeks of a not-too-distant past where women were effectively chattel. I just happen to believe that not looking fondly on a dehumanising tradition is, again, common sense (and shouldn't necessarily subscribe me to a whole host of beliefs and opinions that I want no part in).

4. The white dress thing? People think they're making A Statement by not wearing one? I didn't wear one because they are boring, not because they 'symbolise purity'. I mean, come on- I think my cousin Rach is the only person of my generation that I know personally who will be married without ever having had sex with the person she's getting married to (not something I would encourage anyone to do, but we'll see how it goes). She's abnormal in this day and age, but wearing a white dress certainly isn't.

5. Does anyone promise to 'obey' their groom these days? My grandma didn't, and she's no feminist (despite a few material characteristics that might make her attitude to life sound more feminist than it really is). My Mum didn't, and she's some kind of cross between a saint and a doormat. I didn't, but not because I thought I was giving some kind of 'fuck you' to 'teh patriarchy', but because it's common fucking sense. Oh and it would have been a lie anyway.

6. I have known people (all women, naturally) who had basically dreamed up their wedding to the finest detail before they'd even met their prey partner. I had thought these women were a minority. However, the wonderful world of Facebook has changed my mind about that. Just about every female I went to school with who happens to have been engaged during the time they have been my 'friend' on Facebook has had a very public wedding countdown ("Only 471 days to go!!!!") and a very conventional wedding. So maybe it is a minority of women who consider a wedding to be just as much about their partner as themselves and want equal input from their partner. However, I don't believe that not doing the whole Bridezilla thing makes a woman feminist.


Finally, I couldn't resist clicking over to the National Review to see what Kathryn Jean Lopez (deranged right-wing nutbag) wrote to mock "my attempts to subvert traditional wedding standards", as Valenti put it. As it turned out, Lopez didn't write much at all- just copied and pasted a whole heap of stuff from feministing.com. Maybe she felt she didn't need to do a whole lot of mocking.

Several of you also got into it about dresses - whether the traditional white dress actually did signify "purity," etc. I'm kind of ambivalent about it, but I ended up getting a not-quite white dress (don't want to give too much away in case the boy is reading!)

In case 'the boy' is reading, eh?

Subversion FAIL.

Every single other moronic bridezilla type does the whole 'it's bad luck/wrong/less romantic for the groom to see you in the wedding dress before the wedding' crap.

It's funny, Gam and I had to do an awful lot of arguing to have our wedding the way we wanted it (i.e. religion-free). That was about our beliefs, and about not bending them to anyone else's, I suppose. But everything else was just a matter of personal taste. There's no pressure to wear a white dress. There's no pressure to obey. There's no pressure to change your name. If there is, it's not because of 'teh patriarchy', it's because you're hanging around the wrong sort of people.

If only I'd believed myself a persecuted feminist for having a wedding somewhat like Jessica Valenti's, I might have made a buck out of flogging our story to the Guardian. Shame. I really ought to be more entrepreneurial.

Ipswich more progressive than Brisbane (!!!!)

I almost died of shock when I read this. While Campbell Newman is happy for pregnant women, babies, small children and the 80% of the public who don't smoke to suffer the ill-effects resulting from being forced to breathe other peoples' used carcinogens at bus stops, taxi ranks and in Queen Street Mall, Ipswich of all places has decided to enact a smoking ban in its central mall, as well as at bus stops and taxi ranks. Ipswich. Wow. Go Ipswich.

Ipswich aims to become Queensland's first city to ban smoking at taxi ranks and bus stops, as well as the city's central mall.

The decision by the southern Queensland regional city follows the introduction to state parliament last week of new legislation giving councils additional controls over public smoking.

Ipswich council's policy board spokesman Paul Tully said the move would be welcomed by most residents who were unhappy with smoking in busy public places.

Oh no it isn't

I posted this as a comment on Politically Homeless a rightie blog I read often. It's normally quite good, excellent even, but the author seems to have misread the bounce on this one. Leaving aside the hilarious inaccuracies and the fact that a journalist is trying to make an argument on media coverage without Lexis-Nexis, I don't agree with his reading of the style of the article which will be very familiar to those of you who've had any experience with the dimmer bulbs in the right-wing chandelier on the 'net.

The way to snark

This is the way to do political incorrectness, snark, kulturkrieg, counterintuitive journalism, out-of-the-box thinking, wading against the lefty tide - call it what you will. It’s well-researched and well-written, and specific in its targets. Greg Sheridan could never write an article like this if his life depended on it (nor could John Pilger). The link to al-Qaeda is measured and defined. The laziness of those who go after Israel is made clear, without the ideological blunderbuss hitting fair and foul alike (the very sort of intellectual imprecision that the targets of The Australian are often accused, but which its writers practice so often its credibility is almost exhausted). Well done on rescuing Anna Politkovskaya from a schlocky Diana-style martyrdom and putting her death in a squarely political and journalistic context.

Chechnya also shows the wisdom of what Americans call “the surge”, or (before he fell out of favour) “the Powell Doctrine”. I’d be fascinated to know if Australia has accepted any Chechnyan refugees. This does not make me any sort of expert on Chechnya but I am better informed that I was and challenged to consider issues I hadn’t considered much. I wish this article would be recognised by the various journalistic prizes at year’s end, but it probably won’t. This article is a real find in the lame junk shop of Australian media, and I was glad to have found it.

Pity the comments aren’t of similar quality (Moderates don’t take to the streets by definition, DH, they have work to do – and shame on you for not noticing people until they take to the streets and cause atrocities).

This doesn't take four months of undercover work to do - it's bloody marvellous and there should be more of it.

That article, from its initial argumentum ad google, debating society outrage quotient and teh left hates Jews ending, is another example of how right wing snark is only ever unintentionally funny.

The 'article': x opposes y but x has not opposed a,b...g therefore x is clearly motivated by evil motive z' is standard fare on right-wing blogs. The fact that such a lazy, imbecilic argument can be published on the Australian website as a meritorious argument from a right-wing point of view is another sign of how empty the right-wing cause has become of late. I'm amazed that Andrew seems taken in by this. Or is he engaging in subtle sarcasm and am I the one taken in?

Alternatively this could just be a shitty article by a shitty writer. why not make an argument about the left being happy to invade and bomb eastern European statelets and iraq on spurious reasons only when a centre-right us president thinks it's a good idea? oh, because John Pilger already did that, in fact Brendan O'neill of sp!ked has pretty much made a career out of this massive blindspot some left-wingers have.

If this is it, it's going to be a long time in the wilderness waiting for Rudd to slip on a banana skin, or for the American right to fix their fax machine.

Sexualising kids: What dirty-minded parents don't realise about their 13-year-old

Heidi Davoren: apparently the only qualification you need to dish out sex advice to teenagers is a complete lack of empathy and common sense.

SMH blogger Heidi Davoren throws a hissy fit in her latest post over the 'sexapedia' in the most recent issue of Girlfriend magazine. Unbelieveably, she also takes issue with the magazine providing "advice on sex at the tender age of 12".

Davoren makes her response in defiance of common sense, which would dictate that if a 12-year-old girl becomes sexually active any reasonable thinking person would want that child to be exploring her sexuality in the safest manner possible. That can only happen if the child has the necessary information to make that happen. What's the alternative? Chaining 12-year-olds by their ankles in a cell until they solemnly promise to wait until Heidi Davoren thinks they're mature enough?

Let's not beat about the bush: 12 year old girls are, by and large, approaching sexual maturity. They're full of powerful hormones that give them certain sexual instincts and a very small minority, given the opportunity, are going to act on those instincts. Whether they do so has absolutely nothing to do with whether they have sensible, factual information pertaining to sex. Otherwise incidence of teen pregnancy would be somewhere around zero and result solely from condom failure.

Girlfriend magazine provides an avenue for sexually active teenagers to receive sensible, non-judgemental advice on something that they are already doing. By extension, it also provides an avenue for non-sexually active teenagers to learn about staying safe in the spectrum of sexual activity without having to find out the hard way. If they wanted a judgemental tirade they could simply ask their parents, or Heidi Davoren, for advice. Teenagers are no different from anyone else in the respect that they wish to avoid being subjected to judgmental tirades. Sure, I think 12 years old is too young for a kid to be exploring their sexuality with anyone other than themselves, but it happens. Incidentally I didn't necessarily think so at 12 years of age (because at every age during my teenage years I felt adult enough to make my own decisions on such things). And the fact is that I knew, and 99.9% of 12-year-olds know, that the first thing that will happen to a teenager if they ask their parents for advice on anything of the sort is that they will receive a horrified "You're far too young!" in reply. I suppose it's hard to imagine a sensible parent saying anything otherwise to a 12-year-old - Heidi Davoren obviously can't conceive of such a thing. Your average 12-year-old, sexually active or not, also has a certain amount of common sense, and so when they want a no-nonsense, straightforward answer to a question on matters sexual they will go someplace like Girlfriend magazine or (probably more commonly these days) the internet.

I'll be quite honest: I started reading Girlfriend when I was 12 years old. It was the done thing. And let me tell you, with the internet back then not being what it is today, everyone in my peer group wanted to read the sex questions. My Dad hated the fact that I read the magazine- I've no doubt the phrase "stands for everything I despise" was likely bandied about at some point- but my parents bought me a subscription when I was 14. They didn't doubt my capacity to eventually come to my own judgement on the material I was reading. Which I did. As it happens I think I was far more damaged by the insecurities that were aroused about my physical appearance and the fact that I didn't have all the latest, most fashionable clothes; I was grateful, then and now, to Girlfriend magazine for relieving me of any necessity to ask my parents questions that would have been very awkward and unpleasant for myself and for them.

Now, despite my filthy mind and voracious appetite for any material of a sexual nature that I could consume without being caught, I didn't kiss a boy until I was 15 and I didn't lose my virginity until I was 18 years old. Both, to my chagrin, rather late in comparison to my peers. And both in circumstances that would have horrified many parents- my first kiss with a nice enough boy who I didn't find particularly attractive and whom I was too cowardly and immature to break up with myself a couple of weeks later, just so I could tick it off my 'to do' list for growing up (and confirm to myself that I wasn't completely hideous because no-one had tried it on me before that point), and my 'first time' a drunken one-night stand with a guy whose surname I never knew and whose face I probably wouldn't recognise if I saw him today (though at least I can confirm I found him attractive). People like Heidi Davoren don't take issue with 18-year-olds engaging in sexual behaviour because they are supposedly mature enough to do so. Well, there's all sorts of things I've learned about sex since I was 18 that I'm quite sure would have been just great to know earlier in life- hindsight is a wonderful thing, after all- but the fact is that none of my experiences have left me with any real sense of regret (at worst perhaps some lingering embarassment at how I behaved when blind drunk) because I was well-informed enough to keep myself safe.

Girlfriend be damned- teenage sex depends not just on motivation (of which I had plenty) but opportunity. Aside from the 'penis enters vagina' basics (which every child learns thrice over during sex ed classes thanks to multiple screenings of the hideous 'Where did I come from?'), teenagers don't need any information on how to engage in sex. The type of sex information magazines like Girlfriend provide is for those who are already taking part in, or are set to take part in, sexual activity of some description. If Girlfriend simply joined the "Don't do it!" chorus, as Heidi Davoren desires, teenagers would inevitably look elsewhere. Of course, if that were to happen, the quality of the advice they received may vary.

What Heidi Davoren doesn't seem to realise is that as much as parents, governments and religious quacks would like to, you can't legislate sexual desire. Sexual urges don't suddenly and conveniently manifest themselves after the age of 16, when it becomes legal to engage in sexual activity with another individual. The most responsible thing we can do for the small proportion of very young teenagers is not simply tell them we think they shouldn't be doing it, as if they don't know what we think, it's to give them sufficient advice on how to keep themselves safe both physically and emotionally.

Mortgage Madness

Sarah and I were watching some show on channel 9. It was about some people who were experiencing mortgage stress and the show was basically going to get them out of debt by tarting up and selling their house. Apparently they had a mortgage on their home, inherited some money and then used it to get a second mortgage for another house in an attempt to become a today tonight 'property tycoon'. Obviously this hadn't worked out so well for them and they promptly went deeper and deeper into debt. They then went into their super for more money which of course didn't help. So pretty much out of misguided avarice the decision makers in the family had flown their financial future into the side of a mountain, when they had an opportunity most people can only dream about to secure their own home.

We couldn't help wondering as we watched the show, why couldn't channel 9 have picked a family who were in financial trouble as a result of a lost income or something else, instead of some people who were trying to get rich via property speculation. As someone who doesn't have a house and views actually buying one as a goal so unachievable it's practically pointless planning for it, I guess I don't have much sympathy for people who own one house and, instead of paying off the house, buy another one to try and turn into millions of dollars like they see on TV, making it that much more difficult for people who have no house to get one. I feel that there are far more people who could use that help.

Disclosure: Sarah and I have received neither of the govt's two stimulus packages. We haven't got kids, Sarah is a student but hasn't been on Centrelink for 3 years or so and I started my job last April and so haven't earned enough to qualify for the tax hand out. However it's not like we're starving or anything. We've been lucky enough to have parents able to support us in really vital ways, like providing us with a place to live. I just don't understand why help from the government seems to be based on maintining people's lifestyles regardless of circumstances.

The govt. recently increased the level of support for homeowners who lose their jobs by increasing consumer credit hardship restrictions from $300,000 to $500,000 contract value. I guess you could make the argument that that reflects the increased cost of housing these days but given $300,000 is around the average house price in Australia I'd make the counter argument that if you're unfortunate enough to have lost your job and your mortgage is worth $500,000, you should sell your house and adjust to your new situation. When we went down to living off one youth allowance income, we made adjustments, cut out just about everything that wasn't essential, sold stuff we didn't need and got through it. Perhaps the most galling thing about keeping people in half-million dollar homes is that a lot of people bought the houses they own during the last economic downturn, so that means now, even when there is a downturn houses are still priced out of reach of people like us.

Maleny Trip, April 2009

Here are a bunch of pictures from our trip to Maleny. Gam took a couple of weeks off and we went up on Easter Monday, staying Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights at a B&B in Witta. I tried to post these the other day but our internet connection has been horrendous, thanks to iinet still not having got our new modem to us (we still love them, they're not Telstra!), and I was unable to upload. Thankfully the tech-savvy Gam has provided a fix until iinet- or at least their chosen courier- get their act together :)

It wasn't this depressing all the time, thankfully!

Monday:

It was pouring rain on Sunday night and it continued to pour on Monday. It bucketed down. Gam was convinced it was all part of a curse from the gods that ensured every time he took time off work it would rain incessantly. It didn't seem entirely crazy, since I can't remember the last time we had such heavy rain- and for so long! Needless to say it was a fairly awful trip up, but we later saw on the news that the poor bastards coming down the other side of the Bruce Highway took 4 hours to get from the Sunshine Coast to Brisbane! We had intended to walk some of the tracks in the Glasshouse Mountains, but of course that was all off thanks to the weather.

From the website (Obviously! "This is a bed and breakfast for ants! It needs to be at least... twice as big!")

The first thing we did after we got to Maleny was find the place we were staying- Middleton Manor. It was in Witta, rather than Maleny, but only a 10 minute drive. Very pretty indeed, despite the rain. We then drove to Maleny to try and fill in the 2 hours until we could check in and hide under the doona until the rain went away.



We first went to PS Books- Gam picked up an enormous tome containing the Bourne Trilogy that must've weighed a tonne, and I picked out 3 books that I've wanted to read for ages but never got around to, namely Margaret Attwood's The Handmaid's Tale and The Blind Assassin, and Nineteen Eighty-Four (Orwell, just in case someone's reading this a hundred years from now and wonders what I'm talking about). We didn't photograph our purchases but Gam snapped their L.Ron Hubbard collection on his new Blackberry! Subsequently we took ourselves to the IGA (which has better opening hours than supermarkets in Brisbane!) to buy some toothbrushes and then the Swiss Woodfire Bakery (or whatever it's called) to pick up a selection of what we hoped would be tasty baked goods...

The bathroom... ohhhhh the bathroom!


I do love a good bathroom, and this was the prettiest, cutest and best-heated bathroom ever!



Okay it looked nicer before we plonked our toothbrushes down, but you get the picture.

After driving back to Middleton Manor and being shown to our room (the 'Burgundy Room') by Viki, the proprietor, and admiring the view (despite Gam's cries of "It'll be raining the entire time we're here, you just watch!") I settled down to the business of turning on all the heaters (reverse cycle air-conditioning plus hotlights AND a wall-mounted fan heater thingy in the bathroom- win!!!) and running myself a hot bath. Ahhhhhh.

May I just say- two towels each, plus two bath mats and two hand towels... I was most impressed. There's nothing worse than having to re-use a soggy bathmat or a wet towel (well, yes there is, but let's not be pedantic), so I really appreciated that little touch, even though we only used one bathmat. In addition, it turned out that it wouldn't have mattered that we forgot to bring our toothbrushes- there were dinky little boxed toothbrush-and-toothpaste sets in the drawers! *Ahem* I took those little toothbrush sets home when we left because I thought they were not only cute but useful for us when we have guests who forget their toothbrushes.

By the time I'd finished my bath it was warm enough for me to laze around naked (it's hard to feel like you're on holiday unless you can wear nothing if you feel like it, I reckon) while Gam went and had a bath. I started on The Blind Assassin and had an experimental bite of the Linzer tart and the vanilla slice we purchased from the bakery. The Linzer tart (not torte- more a tart inspired by the Linzer torte, I guess) was ok, nothing to write home about. The vanilla slice was a dead loss. Horrid, sweetened fake cream took the place of the nice, sticky cornflour-thickened custard that makes the vanilla slice so great. Yuck yuck yuck. The pastry was ultra-crispy too. After one bite it went in the bin. Luckily Viki had left some crackers on the side table and a cheese platter with some grapes in the fridge for us, and since Gam doesn't really eat cheese (perhaps the occasional nibble of something safe like an aged cheddar or some jarlsberg), I got stuck into those. There was a fairly bland, cheddar-y cheese and a nice creamy, aged soft blue cheese. Not particularly stinky, but very tasty. The grapes were good too.

I suppose the rest of the room is important too...

One thing I should note is that Middleton Manor does have a bookcase full of books downstairs as well as a large-ish list of DVDs to cater for guests during such weather as we experienced on Monday. We didn't check out the 'library' because we had already bought a bunch of second-hand books, but the DVD selection consisted entirely of chick-flicks... I'm sure that's entirely appropriate for the romantic atmosphere that most B&Bs try and cultivate, but... surely a couple of classic action films or comedies wouldn't go astray?

... Especially the bed... For sleeping, I mean. You don't want to think about the other things people might have been doing in it before you got there, even if the sheets have been freshly laundered!


'Veronica' parked out the front in the rain.


The view from our balcony in the rain... still so pretty.

One more thing I noticed- and loved- immediately was that the air up there is so goddamn clean. Brisbane isn't a very big city, nor a very dirty one, but there is a very noticeable difference in air quality in the area. I may have raved about this before in a post on one of our previous trips to the area. Since getting back to Brisbane it's actually been rather depressing how bad the air is here... Clean air makes such a difference to your quality of life, not to mention your health.

We had a great sleep in the comfortable bed, although Gam was too hot because I'd had the heater on for so long prior to going to bed... oops!

It poured and poured and poured overnight, some of the heaviest and most sustained falls we've ever heard. It turned out that about 20cm of rain fell overnight, which was quite something.


Tuesday:

In the morning we had breakfast on the balcony, cooked for us by Viki. There was a 'menu' with basic but fairly classic breakfast choices. There were two courses, the first suited me (I had fresh fruit and yoghurt, while Gam had muesli) and the second suited Gam (bacon, eggs, tomato and toast). There was also the option of an omlette and maybe one or two other things (e.g. scrambled eggs or whatever). It didn't say whether the eggs were free range, so I couldn't bring myself to eat them... I did eat the bacon, even though I'm sure that wasn't free range... As far as hot breakfasts go it was ok but nothing special. Full marks for the glass of freshly squeezed orange juice- although Gam didn't like it ("too much pulp!") and wouldn't drink it despite my exhortations... so I enjoyed two glasses!


After breakfast we walked out onto the little paved courtyard area below the balcony and admired the yard with its nice big lawn. I said to Gam that the only thing missing from Middleton Manor was a resident animal- maybe a dog- to enjoy that nice lawn... as it turned out, Viki did have a dog- a very friendly dalmation named DJ- who we got to meet that afternoon!




We decided to go for a drive, without really having decided what do, and almost immediately happened upon a sign advertising tours at Maleny Dairy at 10:30am. It was 10:20am, perfect timing, so we followed the signs to the dairy... unfortunately, thanks to the spontaneity of it all, I'd left my gumboots at the B&B, but decided to hoof it through the mud anyway. And there was a lot of mud...

First up I got to meet 'Tex', a grizzled-looking 14-year-old fox terrier who obviously thought he owned the place. Tex made it his business to meet and greet Gam and I, as well as the four small children who showed up for the tour (along with two mothers), and proceeded to 'lead' the tour around as well as wee on a lot of things in a most officious manner. Apparently I bonded with the kids over Tex as well, as they proceeded to tell me all about their own pets and then later ask me questions that should have been directed to the tour guide... usually it's Gam who's a total kid-magnet, so that was a bit of a surprise... I had no idea what to do with them!

The tour guide seemed lovely too. She first of all took us to visit 'Lucy', a 4-week-old calf. Lucy showed no interest in anything but her meal, while the tour guide told us all about the process of getting the cows pregnant, separating them from their calves (thankfully it doesn't have to be done every year, just the once, she said) and then raising the female calves until they are old enough to be bred and produce milk... the issue of what happens to the male calves was kind of skirted ("they go to the market", she said, and left it at that), but I suppose that's fair given that they have nothing more to do with milk production than that.


Following our introduction to Lucy we all traipsed off to see where the cows and goats were milked and hear an explanation of the process and get to stick our fingers in one of the goat auto-milking thingummies (obviously it would have been cleaned afterwards) to see what it felt like. It was interesting but I suppose not interesting enough to take any photos, because neither Gam or I took any... personally I was looking forward to the goats! I love goats... it was a shame that we were there mere weeks prior to the goats giving birth- not only did I miss seeing all the cute little baby goats but I couldn't buy any of Maleny Dairy's delicious goat's milk yoghurt. Standing in for the baby goats was 5-month-old 'Annie'. Annie came when she was called by name... awww... just adding to my dream of having a pet goat one day... and was happy to oblige us all by drinking a large bottle of milk while we all took turns posing for photos with her.


Finally we were taken to 'the moovies'- a little tin shed containing a bunch of old dairy memorabilia from the farm- where we watched a nice little film of the farm's history. Then we all sat outside at the benches and were given a bottle of frankly pretty awful flavoured milk and a taste-test of some really yummy yoghurt. I got two tasters because Gam doesn't like yoghurt. I had apricot, which was very yummy but fairly generic, and goat's milk yoghurt, which I'd never tried before. It tastes just like the soft white chevre you can buy in roll-shaped packets, but has the texture of yoghurt. I think it would be great in dips and I'm really keen to get my hands on some. The flavoured milk had recently been reformulated so it was low fat in order to be able to be sold through school canteens in Queensland. Not only did it have the thin texture of low-fat milk (a lot of low fat flavoured milks have gum thickeners added for this reason), but it was ridiculously sweet thanks to the fact it contained invert syrup rather than sugar. I felt really bad about throwing it out, but neither Gam or I liked it- he tried the chocolate, while I had coffee-flavoured.

After visiting Maleny Dairy we first went for a drive to Mapleton and stopped at a tiny shop that advertised itself as a 'chocolatier'. They really didn't have much in the way of chocolate-y things, but we bought a couple of marzipan chocolates from their small selection and they were okay... We sat on a set of stairs somewhere and ate the chocolates while we admired the view... you're never short of a beautiful view when you're in the Blackall Ranges area.



We then drove back to Maleny and went to one of the three bookstores on Maple St (I think- the main street, anyway). I can't remember what it was called, but it was definitely the coolest. It was run by a really nice old guy and had some really great, out-of-the-0rdinary stuff (including some genuine collectables that we probably couldn't afford), but best of all he had a beautiful little poodle named Milly who kept him company at the store. She didn't have one of those silly haircuts that some people give their poodles, and she was sooo cute! I could have spent all day in there. Gam bought a book on submarines and I bought a 1960 copy of The Australian Woman's Mirror and a bunch of vintage knitting patterns... not that I'm capable of knitting anything more than a scarf, but I would like to get better at it and figure there's no harm in collecting classic patterns just in case I ever get good enough to make them. The Women's Mirror, as might be expected, is a total hoot and will get a whole post of its own.

When it was time for lunch we went to Colin James Fine Foods on Maple St. First we ducked into their little 'cheesearium' (for the life of me, ever since Gam used that word I can't remember the proper name for it, but I like 'cheesearium'!) and bought some kind of stinky French washed-rind cheese, some Port Salut and a hunk of calabrese salami. We were also after some of their gelati but I was so cold after buying the cheese that we had to go for a walk outside. We bought a couple of bread rolls at the Swiss bakery plus some Finn Crisp (rye crackers) at the IGA for later. Finally we got our gelato. I forget what Gam had, but it wasn't cookies and cream (his usual- it wasn't available), but I had cherry and cherry ripe. The cherry flavour was so similar to Shlix that I'd put money on them using the same mix (or whatever they use to make up gelato). I wasn't complaining- I love Shlix, and not only was the Colin James gelato delicious but my $4.50 for two scoops was at least equivalent to 3 scoops at Shlix. We ate in a park across the road.




Wanting to make the most of the weather in case it started raining again, we went for a drive to check out Lake Baroon. It looks like a great place to take a kayak out for a paddle, but the sign stated that if any part of the sign was underwater then doing so was prohibited. It was obvious that the rain had filled up the dam significantly overnight- the grassy embankment leading down to the water had obviously been freshly covered by the rising water.






Afterwards we went home and ate cheese (well, I ate cheese) and salami on our nice little balcony with a bottle of organic, preservative-free vegan (i.e. no fish bile, no casein, no egg white products) white wine... I know that makes us sound like total hippies, but the additives make a big difference to the taste and the preservatives (usually sulphur) often set off my hayfever... not to mention a lot of wines make me feel seedy even before I start to feel the effects of the alcohol (needless to say we don't drink a lot of wine as a result). Since trying the selection of organic/vegan/preservative-free wines we brought recently I'm a bit evangelical... they're inexpensive and worth seeking out!

I even convinced Gam to (grudgingly) pose for a photo for me!

I finished off The Blind Assassin (highly recommended- great story, impressive piece of writing) and started on The Handmaid's Tale, while Gam ambled his way through the enormous Bourne trilogy.

That night we had planned on checking out Finbar's Irish Pub in Maleny where, according to the tourist rag left in our room, we could get some tasty wood-fired pizza.

There were frogs everywhere that evening- I even saw a black one!

On our way there we hit a massive pothole. At first we thought a tire must have burst, then there was an extremely loud, metallic scraping sound coming from the left-hand side of the car. Despite me wishing and hoping very hard it didn't stop, and Gam pulled up around the first corner we came to. Given that it's a rural area and there were no streetlights and we'd left our torch at the B&B, we had no way of determining what, if anything was wrong, other than that we didn't have a flat tire. The noise was so bad I was worried that we'd somehow ripped something away from the undercarriage of the car- and it continued to make the noise whenever Gam moved it. There were dogs barking loudly from the yard of the house we'd pulled up outside, and a voice called out for them to quieten down, but when Gam called out 'Hello? Hello' the voice suddenly hushed. We had no choice but to go and knock on the door of the other house across the road and ask them for a torch. They obviously hadn't been expecting visitors- the gentleman who answered the door (and he was a gentleman!) had on a dressing gown over his pyjamas. He fetched us a torch and asked whether we'd like him to call RACQ. We said we'd call them ourselves. Gam tried calling RACQ and got stuck talking to a machine so he tried Volkswagen's Roadside Assist. They weren't particularly helpful either- they wanted to have the car towed (leaving us in a place with no taxis!). Thankfully by this time we had determined that the problem, whatever it was, lay in or behind the left rear wheel, and Gam tried moving the car one more time - there was a clunk and the noise was gone! After we had returned the torch and were on our way there was a noise in the wheel like there was a rock rattling around in there, so our best guess is that the rock must have got jammed somewhere where it could cause a horrid metallic scraping noise for a while before becoming dislodged. We were very relieved.

Finbar's was closed, despite their opening hours stating that they should be open at the time we showed up (after 7pm) and it looked like just about everywhere else was too. I'd spotted an Indian restaurant that was open- Punjabi Palace, I think it was called-so we went there and ordered a bunch of food. While we were waiting for the order we walked to the IGA and bought a box of chocolates to give to the old gentleman who'd helped us out by lending us a torch, figuring we'd drop by the next evening at a more decent hour.

While we were waiting for our order at the Punjabi Palace, being cooked by the good-looking Indian guy who I assume was the proprietor, the older (Aussie?) guy in what looked like traditional dress who was waiting tables and manning the counter brought us some freshly-cooked pappadums to snack on. Ten out of ten for service! I love pappadums. I also approved of the samosas, which were perfectly cooked, though still not nearly spicy enough. The proprietor recommended we buy some of his chilli pickle to add to our curries in case we wanted them hotter, and I dipped the samosas in that- it was pretty hot and very good. Since we got home I've been adding it to baked sweet potato and brown rice for a healthy, tasty lunch.


Wednesday:



On Wednesday we skipped breakfast and went to the Eumundi Markets via the back-route suggested to us by the old guy at the bookshop. As soon as the road turned to dirt Gam got a bit precious about what it might do to his baby (the car), but it was a good quality road even in spite of all the rain. Much more scenic than the highway, too.




We went to Eumundi Markets last August with Rachelle and her now-fiancé Chris and had a nice time, but this time it was frankly pretty awful thanks to the fact it was school holidays. The place was crawling with people, most of whom seemed to be smokers. We stopped at Lief Chocolates, after having thoroughly enjoyed their wares last time around, and weren't disappointed. Those guys do good chocolate. We also went to the Japanese food stall (the name of which escapes me) and bought gyoza, because we'd enjoyed some of those on our last visit too. Once again, the gyoza were delicious- I only wish we didn't have to visit the markets to eat them!

After leaving Eumundi Markets we drove to Montville and had poffertjes with jam and cream and an iced coffee for lunch at the Montville Coffee Pot. Despite being rather enamoured of these poffertjes the first time we had them, Gam has since taken to making them at home, which rather puts the Montville Coffee Pot's efforts in the shade. Nevertheless, they were tasty and were polished off in no time flat. I was well overdue for a coffee, too, and the Coffee Pot's iced coffee contained a much-needed shot of espresso along with its mountains of tasty whipped cream- the iced coffee wasn't too sweet, either, which I liked.

For dinner on our last night we had planned to go to the magnificently-named King Ludwig's German Restaurant, but it turned out 'King Ludwig' (actually, his name wasn't Ludwig) and his wife had gone on long service leave and closed up the restaurant until March 2010 to travel around Europe! That made it even more of a blow- it must be a good restaurant if he was doing well enough to be able to take a year's holiday. Plus I had worked myself up for some tasty German food...




In the end it was a matter of seeing what was open on the Wednesday night and just rolling the dice. We narrowed it down to two restaurants on the same road- it just so happened that the road was so dark we drove past the first one, and immediately the second one appeared on our left, so we turned in, parked and went and had dinner at Reserve Restaurant Cellar.



Reserve seemed posh enough to be filled with snooty waiters and rich people, but thankfully it wasn't. Instead we were served by a charming young French woman in a fitted shirt and baggy pants. She obviously knew her stuff when it came to the food, and while her service was perfectly attentive it was never intrusive. Spot on. Reserve was clearly no place for the vegetarian, so I ordered the eye fillet with parsnip purée, spinach and caramelised onions. Gam had the slow-cooked lamb shoulder and we shared a plate of deep-fried potato wedges with celery salt and a pot of lime/sour cream something-or-other to dip them in. Boy were those tasty- as were both our meals. I made a fairly gallant effort, I thought, to finish the entire eye fillet. Neither of us had any wine, nor any of the cocktails, as Gam was driving and I didn't feel like anything more than a soft drink. Mimie, our waiter, informed us that Reserve offers a pick-up and drop-off service to B&B guests so they can partake of the wines and cocktails on offer without having to worry about driving (taxis are scarce in the area). If there's a 'next time', perhaps we'll take advantage.







The passionfruit tart and honeycomb mascarpone I had for dessert was perfect but for two things- first, the tart was warmed, and I prefer that type of tart cold. Second, the pastry seemed not to have been blind-baked. I have no doubt that not blind-baking it might have been the proper thing to do, but I find pastry fairly inedible if it's not blind-baked. Given that I tend to view pastry as a vehicle for transporting the tasty filling of the tart from the oven/fridge to my plate I am always happy to discard it anyway, therefore it was of no consequence to my enjoyment of the meal. Mind you, after the eye fillet I had trouble getting dessert down. I think next time I'll have an entree and dessert rather than a main and dessert.

Gam thoroughly enjoyed his mocha fondant pudding- it should be noted that the camera on his Blackberry does neither dessert justice. For one thing, my mascarpone wasn't a sickly shade of green...

Our meal at Reserve was a lovely way to end our short stay. It's nice being able to go somewhere as beautiful and different from Brisbane as Maleny and still feel like you're still in civilisation.

"Africa" Has Elections

South Africa, arguably the most powerful democracy on the African continent is having a general election. You won't hear about it on the news in any great depth, unless there's some violence, which is unlikely. Similarly you probably didn't hear that Ghana, a small west African nation of 20 million or so had a general election recently where power changed hands for the third time in four elections. Incidentally there was also no violence involved. There were a couple of reports in the media when it looked like there would be violence.

Don't expect to see much coverage of South Africa based on anything that doesn't involve violence of some kind. There will be little coverage of South Africa's political system that can justifiably claim to be probably the most representative democracy on earth. You probably won't find out from the media that South Africa's human rights achievement include comprehensive rights for LGBT people, including same sex marriage, adoption, serving openly in the military and a complete ban on discrimination. This is in a country that is strongly socially conservative and religious. 26 parties are on the national ballot, with more making regional ballots, from muslim and christian parties to anti-poverty and anti-privatisation parties. That South Africa has gone from decades of racism and disenfranchisement to one of the most vibrant and representative democracies in the world is something you will be very unlikely to hear about in the media. Likewise you won't hear much about the origins of South Africa's representative system, why the ANC and Nelson Mandela in particular rejected the winner takes all system and the Westminster parliament style, opting for a hybrid that would offer maximal representation, despite the nation's ethinc make up. Nelson Mandela's writings on democracy and representation make for interesting reading. Also South Africa is not a young democracy. It is a young fully representative democracy but as a union has been having elections since 1910.


South African General Election 2009

South African Elections Show the Way Toward Racial Fairness

Election News

7:30 Report Rant

Tonight on the 7:30 report they had a story in which the small business association said that the consolidation of the big 3 banks has made it harder for small businesses to get loans because the big 3 banks have bought up all the competition. They also alleged that the govt. loan guarantees had now made it even harder for small businesses to obtain loans.

All the big bank consolidation has pretty much occurred in the last decade. The small business association didn't utter a squawk of protest when big banks were buying up every regional bank, credit union and non bank lender they could get their hands on and the former govt. sat and watched. Those pricks praised Howard to the skies even as he created the conditions they deplore today.

I'm not sure how the current government's loan guarantees are making it harder for small businesses to get loans. Perhaps if they didn't guarantee loans and then everyone went into a panic and started calling in their loans it would have made things better, oh, that's right, it fucking well wouldn't have you tools. Apparently businesses that aren't risky in a global economic cluster fuck are still getting credit. It shocks me that banks will only lend money when they are reasonably sure they'll get it back. All this time I'd thought they were big cuddly charities that lent money to people out of the goodness of their hearts. Big banks have tightened up their lending because they think a lot of small businesses will go under. That's because most small businesses depend on discretionary spending. There isn't going to be a big market for pool cleaning and restaurant meals if people are going to be relying on their pools for fresh water (sucks to be you if you went salt water) and eating their pets. In fact there would have been an even smaller market if we'd gotten workchoices which the small business sector broadly supported.

The global credit crunch is the fault of your man's best buddy G W Bush. And so is what should be called the second Bush recession. Indirectly these things are the fault of pin headed ideologues like the small business association. To make things worse the small business association went for workchoices like a crack addict to er, well, crack. Most small businesses depend heavily on discretionary spending and yet the small brain business association championed policies that would have HURT small business by increasing compliance costs, reducing discretionary spending and driving consumers into the arms of big businesses who could maximally exploit the legislation.

It's incredible to me that these people are even allowed to use sharp cutlery, let alone operate businesses. If they can't see their way to protecting their own interests, it's going to be a bumpy recession for them. Take a look at the last stimulus package. You'd think that $1000 burning a hole in the back pocket of every Australian would be something they'd be screaming for and that Turnbull and the deadbeat senate independents would have come under pressure for stonewalling and paring the package back to score political points. Not a chance. Ideology trumps staying in business for some people.