King Kong 2

Further to my previous rant about the "new" King Kong...

Many people who make porn insist on putting in Plot. This is a waste of everyone's time, since the viewers will all be fast-forwarding to the Sex.

Lots of the big budget special effects movies - King Kong being one - also fart about with plot etc., when everyone is really there just to see the explosions, fights, things getting fucked up, gorilla's climbing buildings. King Kong is a bit over three hours long, and the Monkey doesn't even appear for the first hour! I sat there with evildoom_bunny going "Get to the monkey already!"

Mind you, the original film did consist of a plasticine Ape and Fay Wray screaming for two hours straight. At least this version kept a whole bunch of Aussies and Kiwi's in work...

The Otter's Sunglasses

I dragged myself and evildoom_bunny around the Melbourne Zoo today. Took us about three hours, although we were too late to see the frogs...

And... I don't know... It's interesting to see all these wild animals, at one level, but at the same time, it's really depressing seeing them pressed into little cages. Even the elephant enclosure, which must take up fully 30% of the zoo, didn't stop the elephants standing around and swaying back and forth. A sure sign of a bored despondent animal.

Indeed, almost all the animals seemed to be more or less miserable, except the busy small mammals, the seals and the penguins. The seals swum back and forth with a look of utter contentment, the penguins were standing in ranks like a church full of nuns. But the tigers and other cats paced round and around, the gibbons sat on their little shelf, the giant tortoises slept. Which is typical of reptiles, I confess.

I understand that many of these animals are not going to survive in the wild (there's a whole other topic) and that the zoos play a vital roll in preserving the genetic diversity of the planet. But...

And I understand that millions of kids - we were almost the only people there without a child in tow - get a buzz from seeing these animals. But...

I felt really intensely sorry for all the creatures there, demonstrating for all the world that nature is so under our thumb. I also felt an intense pang of the Travel Bug, to go see the Capybara in it's native landscape.

The Zoo also seems to be a magnet for Parents. The whole place was infested with a large number of Humans, and most of them were pushing those humongous three-wheeled vehicles which pass for prams these days. So many kids!

I think I'll not be back there again, although from memory the Werribee Plans Zoo is far superior, the animals lope about in groups that are unlikely to eat each other, in huge fields.

Possibly the happiest animal there was a little otter who'd found a pair of cheap sunglasses dropped by a visitor, and was busily trying to eat them.

Run Paul Run!

I did a silly thing on the weekend.

I bleached and peroxided my hair to a light blonde, then applied a bright red color to it. It has gone an intense shade of orange! I look like Lola from Run Lola Run. Which was actually the effect I was after.

Ok, so, I have far less hair than Lola, but hey... :-)

Picture to follow.

The Word of Bob

Have you hear the word of Bob?

I doubt it, since evildoom_bunny and I only invented it on Friday.

We were on the doorstep of evil doom's house, and we had to ring the bell 'cause her keys were back in Northcote. So we asked "Have you heard the word of Bob?"

(I actually think I probably had Bob Dobbs from the Church of the Subgenius in mind, but hey, if you're going to invent a religion...)

Anyway, we decided that the four day holiday we've just endured was a celebration of Bob's withdrawal into the "Schrödinger Booth" on the Friday, and his (possible) emergence on the Monday, an event called "Collapsing the Waveform". In the intervening period, Bob is in an indeterminate state between alive and dead. And on the Monday we discover if the radioactive source has emitted a particle and killed Bob.

Ok, so, it need some work, but hey :-)