I realised last night that I hadn't started this column with the GIF for quite a while.


I find the fact that someone made a GIF for me flattering in the same way that I imagine your average 14 year old girl would find having someone write poetry about them flattering. Which is to say: I'm yours Toblerone.

News

OK. Peter Slipper is the Deputy Speaker. It's done. It's over. Can we now please all just shut up and get back to running the country? Yes? Yes. 

Although there was a bit more fuss and palaver yesterday after Simon Crean cancelled a speech at the Press Club because the Opposition refused to take one of their own out of the chamber to pair with him. However, they later recanted and now Simon Crean can deliver his speech at the Press Club. So, am I the only one really beginning to struggle to give a shit here, or what?

The Australian dollar just hit 96.85 US cents. In other news, WHAT ARE YOU STILL DOING HERE?! GO START BUYING SHIT FROM URBAN OUTFITTERS! GO!

Four days until the beginning of the Commonwealth Games and the beleaguered (what a great word) organisers may well be cresting the corner of catastrophe and rolling into the sweet, calm waters of procedural inevitability. Athletes have already started arriving: they pretty much have to host the Games now. Even if it does end up being a twelve person meet where the shot-putters have to compete against the 3000 metre runners. Although the organisers did find time to have a go at the entirety of the Western world yesterday, but, seriously, when your facilities are being criticised by flood-torn, poverty-stricken Pakistan, one really has to start asking some deep, probing questions.

In further tribute to the leaps and bounds Afghanistan is taking on its way to peace and prosperity, President Hamid Karzai last night wept on national TV after the Taliban killed a provincial governor and his son. Meanwhile, the Afghan Government is in the process of setting up a 68-person peace council to try and negotiate a ceasefire/power-sharing arrangement with the Taliban. Yes, that Taliban. Is this what victory tastes like? Because it tastes an awful lot like mouldy balls.

Venezuela has gone to the polls and socialist/borderline dictator/raving loony Hugo Chavez has lost the two-thirds parliamentary super-majority required to simply rule by decree. Or, as Chavez prefers, rule by six hour televised pronouncement.


And in news that has surprised no-one anywhere, Kim Jong-il's son, Kim Jong-un, has been elevated to the rank of general in what is generally seen to be North Korea's first step toward dynastic succession. One only hopes he is as ripe for parody as his father... Actually one probably also hopes for the wholesale collapse of that brutal, torturous, vile regime, but you have to admit 'I'm So Ronery' was pretty funny.

Features

This open letter from Twitter user @karalee_ to her suicidal brother is simple, honest and deeply affecting. Worth your time.

An impassioned and vitriolic broadside on the cruelties and absurdities of Australia's immigration policy by angry man extraordinaire, Bob Ellis. The man must spend a lot of his life vibrating at a very high frequency. Could only possibly be exhausting.

Oddities/Curiosities

Who doesn't enjoy a good Wikipedia list? Nazis, that's who. Are you a Nazi? No? Good. Then you'll enjoy this Wikipedia list of common misconceptions. Apparently Vikings didn't have horns on their helmets. Who knew? This list could probably also be re-titled "Destroying Your Childhood One Sentence at a Time".

In the style of Charlie Brooker's superb How To Report the News sketch, comes this piece on how to report a science story in a major newspaper. Having just finished reading Ben Goldacre's exceptional Bad Science, a lot of this strikes very close to home.

Video

At the risk of blindly doubling up content from other esteemed corners of this website, here's Jason Schwartzman spruiking the iPad iteration of the New Yorker, a magazine I love with an intensity approximating my love for oxygen, water and lamingtons. Also, it was directed by Roman Coppola, AKA the other, other Coppola.