Gone...

You might remember I was having virus-generated PC problems at home. And that I was trying to get a solution via the http://www.techguy.org/ forums. This is a great way to solve problems and I highly recommend the website.

Alas, I had to have a problem that resisted even the good folk who trawl those forums dispensing sound advice. Okay, fora for those of you who insist on correct Latin plurals.

For some reason, the WinXP disk's recovery mode just wouldn't fix things so after a couple of luckless weeks, I rashly went for the reinstall option. After all, it only warned that I MIGHT lose the contents of the My Documents folder. Any chance is better than no chance at all. So I did it.

And lost everything. Family photos and video, family history research, personal stuff, everything. And 28 nearly-completed posts for this pathetic blog. When I say that they were all brilliant, witty, cutting-edge pieces of fine writing that could change your whole outlook on life, please take my word for it.

It's my own stupid fault. Mea culpa. Again with the Latin. I should have had virus protection in the first place. And even failing that, I should have waited until I came across someone who could help me recover Win XP without causing loss of data.

And then last week, TLOML's laptop surrendered its internet capability. And I got knocked back for one of those Virtual Community personal PC loans. Something about me only being in the new job for less than six months. So we're technologically-challenged at home.

Luckily, I'm now semi-comfortable at the new workplace and have girded my loins and posted this from work.

I'm not back in town as such, but I'm entering Kalkallo.

Kalkallo - small town on the northern outskirts of Melbourne

At A Standstill...

There are 27 files in the PendingPosts folder on the hard drive of my PC. There are 28 viruses, trojans and spyware gremlins infecting that PC. Just as soon as the new ADSL was connected, they flooded up the cable like sperm swimming towards an egg. But unlike fertilization, they all got through.

Now I'm waiting for our good friends at MicroSoft to deliver the Win XP disk I need to fix the damned registry problem the spyware has caused. And then I'll need to get some anti-virus software on. Last fucking time I ride bareback.

The battery on this laptop is getting low and TLOML has left the power cable at school, the darling. My blog and web access might be in tatters at the moment but life is not. I'm enjoying the change provided by my new job and funnily enough, I think I'm a bit more pleasant to be around for my loved ones. The Bombers playing great footy also helps.

I've been neglecting all of your blogs too as I'm not quite bold enough to run through them at work. Being new and all.

But guess what? One of my new colleagues is the partner of a blogger who I've been reading and commenting on for the past two years. Small world. Delightfully so, sometimes.

It's Up To You, New York, New-ew Yooorrrrk!

You’ve probably seen the footage on the news. The CCTV from the Kings County Hospital in Flatbush, Brooklyn, New York City, which shows a 49-year old black American woman dying on the floor of the waiting room. It’s here. The TV News in Australia described her as a psychiatric patient who had already waited 24 hours for unspecified treatment and that the other patients in the waiting room, who ignored her for the whole hour she was dying unattended, were also psychiatric patents.

You would also have seen how she was observed and successively ignored by: a security guard; a doctor; another security guard – that’s right, the one who rolled his chair back to have a look and then rolled it back out of frame. And of the nurses who finally did come to her aid, one gave her a bit of a kick before bending to check on her.

The news you saw probably also had a New York public official saying something like:

“You might expect something like this to happen in a Third World country. You do not expect this sort of thing to happen in New York City.”

I disagreed with her. I’m not totally surprised that something like that happened. And I’m also not surprised that it happened in New York. I thought that the American cities I visited in the mid-80s all looked a lot more like Third World countries than I was comfortable with, including New York. I think there might also be quite a few Americans who are similarly unsettled by the nature of American cities.

And if there are any of you out there who’ve also been to New York City, you might just have picked up the same vibe from many of its inhabitants that I did.

That people seemed to be predisposed towards being deliberately unhelpful. And further, would even appear to take some deadpan pleasure in you being disadvantaged by this unhelpfulness. Always politely, of course.

Some of it was epitomized in the TV show Seinfeld: In scenes where the main or other characters would delight in or be dismissively uninterested in someone else’s misfortune. And then when the plot resolved and some disaster had overtaken the indifferent, their despair and pathetic pleading for assistance. I picked that recurring motif as very much a New York thing. In Australia, it appeared to be perceived as a combination yuppie Gen-X thing. The final two-hour episode was probably the quintessential example of what I’m talking about here.

Now, I’m happy to cop a roasting on this, particularly from any Americans who don’t see it as an indictment on New York or America anymore than backpacker murderer Ivan Milat reflects Australia. But that’s just it. He does reflect Australia. If you’re able to, check out some of the statements attributed to him by people who encountered him and tell me they’re not (admittedly) extreme examples of attitudes to women and crime that are not entirely rare in Australian males.

The indifference and deliberate inaction of those officials in the CCTV footage towards the dying woman is an (again admittedly) extreme example of attitudes you would not find altogether uncommon among New Yorkers.

We should be shocked, but not surprised.

New Job

My Long Service Leave ended just last Thursday. Counting the Christmas school holidays, I haven’t worked since December last year. On Friday, I commenced Leave Without Pay. And as this juncture approached, I didn’t really know what I was going to do. Job-wise I mean.

This is not a wolf-at-the-door situation. I can do Casual Replacement Teaching if nothing falls into my lap. And if that’s unbearable, I can always go crawling back to my teaching job. So I’m not in the same situation as some poor bastard who’s been retrenched. I’ve jumped, but with a parachute securely strapped on.

I’ve been half-heartedly checking employment opportunities since about April. Something in training, perhaps. I have a B Ed and a Post Grad Diploma in Educational Computing. Neither of which makes me an appealing prospect for training firms. Certificate 4 is the preferred qualification there.

But just last Friday afternoon, I found out I have a new job, starting on 14th July. I’m pretty relieved, as you can imagine. I’d been feeling a bit guilty about making my family hostages to fortune.

The interview was on Friday morning in the city. With a State govt statutory authority. Being a qualified teacher was one of the selection criteria for the job. So I wouldn’t have to bluff my way through, too-hopefully claiming that skills I’d picked up during 25 years as a primary school teacher were transferable to whatever job I was going for. This was a job for a teacher that fulfilled all my requirements: it didn’t involve actual teaching!

There’s a bit of a pay cut involved. Leaving the profession right after a salary increase to take up a lower-paid job might not appear the smartest move and has generated quite a few interestingly arranged wtf facial expressions. Including from my new boss.

I’ll be working in the city. First time since 1978. Catching public transport. The kitting up will be expensive. For a teacher, the general rule of thumb in the absence of a dress-code is sort of just below smart casual. Or in my case, very casual and not always smart. From now on, I’ll be in shirt and tie territory.

And loving it.

Something Happened To Me Yesterday

Actually, it wasn’t yesterday but I’ve been dying to use that song title from the Rolling Stones 1967 album Between The Buttons to head up a post. This is about interesting experiences on a few occasions where I’ve been out recently. At night. And why I always feel I’m at the mercy of the naked city whenever I do.

Episode One:
I’ve arranged to go out for a drink on a Friday night with a former colleague, Paul. We both need a night out. At Newmarket’s The Quiet Man. It’s one of those fake Irish pubs, with a warm, friendly atmosphere, and named after a sentimental John Ford film set in a Hollywood faux-Ireland, so there’s a layer or two of irony attached to it.

Populated without being crowded, an acoustic duo plays unobtrusively in the corner. We have a look and a listen and I go to the bar. On the way back, I see this big beefy bloke, maybe early to mid-20s, and with facial features as if designed by the NRL Footy Show, sitting in a booth with a couple of friends and they’re trying to get him to stop punching the wall. Or at least stop punching it so hard.

Clearly someone to give a wide berth to. I tell Paul to keep his eyes peeled for the plaster pugilist. A couple more rounds and I’m waiting at the bar again when someone comes up beside me. It’s the big beefy bloke, still looking a little affected by his earlier anger-management issues. Fuck. I can be a bit of a magnet for these types.

“G’day mate I’m Steve how’s it goin’?”
“Hi Steve. Pleased to meet you, I’m Lad.” Wary without trying to appear wary.
“Geez I fuckin’ love this pub y’know. Good to get out on a Friday night and get pissed in.”
“Yeah, it’s alright isn’t it? Couple of drinks, bit of music, a few people.”
“Few wankers though. I kicked the shit out of a fuckin’ homeless cunt just down from here last week. Reckoned the two buck coin I chucked at him was a bit stingy. Fuckin’ ungrateful cunt. He fuckin’ deserved it.”

Often with these sorts of pricks there’s an inherent challenge to disagree with their scumbag attitudes. You find yourself with a tenuous grip on the tiger’s tail. But he seems to accept my non-committal single-nod Mmm as some kind of endorsement and I let him. Then he insists on buying me a drink, because he reckons I look a bit like a sometime in the future fucking homeless cunt myself. I know this is a fishing expedition, but I take it as a half-matey you-old-bastard-type insult and manage to grin and disentangle myself from him and return to where Paul and I are sitting.

“You looked to have handled that pretty well,” Paul says.
“Yeah. Managed to avoid putting him on an action footing, but he wasn’t pushing hard.”
“What would you have done if he was?”
“Well, and this is only a theory mind you, but with fucking arseholes like him, and there’re plenty around worse than him too, there’s a point where you realize they just want to hit you, and there’s no way to placate them. Anything you say they use to wind themselves up further. So when you feel you’re almost at the point of no return, get in first, I reckon. Start with a quick uppercut into the very soft bit just under the sternum. They’ll be winded by that and it might be all you need to do, but if you’re not confident about hitting the right spot, a couple of straight jabs right into their Adam’s apple should make them lose interest.”
“Shit, have a listen to Mr Fucking Natural-Born Killer here. Hahaha! Can’t understand why you’re not in Special Forces.”
“Now, you know perfectly well that we covert op types can neither confirm nor deny.”

Thankfully, Steve found other people at the pub to earbash (I hope that’s all he ended up doing) and we were left to chat and drink too-many Black Russians unmolested.


Episode Two:
This time it was a regular monthly get-together of old schoolmates. Usually referred to as “the boyos”, for no good reason other than it gives us a chance to put on a piss-weak Welsh accent. I don’t get to go along all that often anymore, but this time I’m keen as mustard to make an effort. It’s in Preston, in a Chinese restaurant near the market.

After picking up a nearby mate, I’m waiting to turn right into Cramer St from Gilbert Rd. The lights change to green but I’m not in a hurry, so there’s a beat before I ease my foot off the brake. And just as well. Because as I do that, some kind of hoon-mobile comes streaking through the intersection to my right, doing what my companion and I estimate to be between 80-100kmph. We also estimate that if I’d taken off a little more quickly we might just have made the 7:30 news update as a diverting tsk-tsk item about two middle-aged blokes being killed in a horror smash. So far so good.

At the restaurant, one of the boyos is a regular and keen to order on our behalf so we let him concoct a set menu that is pretty good. Some of the guys are a bit dubious but I trust his judgment and we are vindicated. The meal is excellent if a little pricey, and we have a fun night catching up with good friends.

We get out of the restaurant at about 11:30 and walk over to where I’m parked in the market. We get in. Over to my right, a police car cruises up to a nightclub entrance about 50m away when I see a car being driven at speed from in front and to the left heading straight for us. This bloke is howling across the car park, swerving between cars parked in marked bays. Just as I start bracing myself for a significant impact he manages to yank the wheel over and flies past us leaving just a few inches to spare. We both say “Let’s get the fuck out of here” together.

Of course, we remember to link our little fingers for luck. We figure we’re going to need it if we’re to have an incident-free trip home.

Episode Three:
Collingwood have easily beaten Essendon in the annual ANZAC Day match at the MCG, but back at a mate’s cozy place in Richmond afterwards, a few drinks and a few more joints take the edge off a terrible result for the Bombers.

I start heading home around midnight. Richmond West station is down the end of the street and I just need to hop on a train to Flinders St Station and then change there for another that will take me home to Flemington. But I’m disoriented, and catch an outbound train by mistake. I realize this when the next station is Collingwood.

No worries, I’ll get out at the next station, walk around to the city-bound platform and everything will be just tickety-boo. At Victoria Park, there are teenage kids saying goodbye to some mates and they’re good-naturedly rubbishing each other across the platforms.

A couple enters the platform opposite me. She’s tall and thin with long lank hair and he’s short and agitated, wearing a tracksuit and baseball cap. He walks quickly up and down the platform tapping on the walls, seats and signs with something and then jumps down on the tracks opposite the kids. They go quiet.

“Give me a fuckin’ cigarette. No, two,” he tells them. He’s wound up. The kids hand over the cigarettes. Hmmm, I think. A nasty piece of work. He turns to go back over to the platform opposite but then stops and looks directly at me, where I’m leaning against the station wall. It’s about this time I notice that he’s carrying a knife.

Fuck. I push off from the wall and walk out to the edge of the platform, so I can have a go at kicking his head off if he tries to climb up. He’s still looking at me, but it’s just a pause and he returns to the other side and he and his girlfriend leave the station. I go back to the wall, and turn so I can see anyone coming up the entrance ramp, just in case he’s decided to pay me a follow-up visit, but my train arrives and I’m on it and away.

Every night, there are four million stories in the naked city. I'm just paranoid enough to see it that way too.