Let my children never know a father that doesn't give in completely and utterly to pleasures that others  have labelled "childish" and "immature" for the majority of his life.

Let my children never know parents that never find the time to let go, wholly and completely, to the passion and emotion that envelops one's soul.

I took a train to the city today to meet a stranger from the internet.  I've done it a few times, most notably once 7 years ago (almost to the day) when I met my once and future wife, but I was still a bit nervous.  He was cool, I dorked out a bit, and we shared a couple of pints while talking about things that I don't reckon we get to talk about a whole lot in our lives.

I met this guy on a forum for grown-ups who collect G.I. Joes.  We both collect(ed) comics and think playing with swords in Viking helmets is cool.  He brought me several quite-hard-to-find G.I. Joes that made me squeal with delight (inside) and stammer a bit about how to say thanks.

Even aside from the gifts, he seems like a pretty excellent guy.  And I met him because I am a G.I. Dork on a forum.

Tonight, while feeding the little ones dinner (older two are at The Others this weekend), Wifeage and I eschewed the standard distraction of the Idiot Box and put on music.  The toddler enjoys certain CDs more than anything, and we all enjoyed it in turn, but then wife got an idea and put on The Phantom of the Opera.

Her birthday surprise of years ago revisited... never fails to give me chills and instantly suck me in through a space/time vortex back to that pivotal, intensely impactful, moment when I first felt the music of that incredible show.

We cranked it up, I made Quick Spaghetti, and we sang and danced and danced and sang and the baby grinned and yelled (as babies do when they think they're singing) and Jadeybug sang and danced and even wept when The Phantom did.  Amazing and magical and about as dorktastic as you can get.

I simply cannot imagine being any other way.  And goddamn... I wouldn't want to.

Thank you Banjo, for a great day.  Thank you Wifeage, for a great night.

Thank you Universe, for putting these people in this life with me where I could find them.

Indigenous people, some of them in that article not even seeing white people until the 80's (1980's, put some perspective on that), are being given money from the government for doing what they naturally do... only if it's a benefit to the community.

This CDEP (Community Development Employment Project ) says that if you're doing something that's valuable to the community (determined by the regional bloke in charge... indigenous, an elder, very important, etc) then you get paid.  Which means that most of the White Man's Conventions leave you alone.  Things like rent and vehicle registrations are not to be bothered with, because you taught 7 youngsters how to properly hunt kangaroo with a boomerang.

Say that last sentence again.  Sound funny?  Like you're busting out some Aussie cliches as casual as you please?>

Well think about it again.  Indigenous people that haven't Ever Really Known the White Man's Way.

Why... why in the Blue Fuck would you seek to introduce the White Man's Way to these people, when history has proven, PROVEN OVER AND OVER AGAIN, that doing this to indigenous cultures does nothing but leave them irretrievably fucked, at best.  And at worst?  Forgotten FOREVER.

This project is set to end in 2013, where the White Man will implement another solution that will eventually amount to what they do now to the inner-city Noongars.  Put them on the dole.  Simply give them government money every fortnight because we feel bad about stealing their land and stealing their children.

I can't help but think to myself, which on my blog amounts to thinking out loud, about why we haven't learned that the White Man's Way is complete and utter bullshit?  It's bullshit.  The original European settlers of this land did almost the same thing that the same European-in-origin settlers did in America (and some in South America and Africa...).

They came in, took what they wanted, and either killed or drove away any indigenous person that confronted them on it.

-------------------

So here's this culture.  This block of Australia full of people that have never been fully subjected to this bullshit.  These people that only know that the bullshit the White Man has forced on them (like rent, groceries and insurance) has been ignorable if they just make sure that they're accounting for the shit they're already doing for their community, and it's ending.

The White Man is forcing it to stop so that they can enforce values like: "proper wages and conditions, including superannuation and leave entitlements"... from Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin.

Holy Fucking Shit.  This is Two Thousand and Twelve.  No Fucking Shit.  And somehow, someway, somebody seems to still think that it makes more sense to make the Indigenous people of these lands conform to the White Man's way of thinking instead of just leaving them the fuck alone.

Which really, is all they've ever wanted.

-------------------

Mr Joopahroola of the Kiwirrkurra community, which is located in Western Australian's Gibson Desert, says "Centrelink will make people lazy and bit by bit they will start to leave."

He's absolutely right.

Because there's something that the Western/White Culture forgets about the Indigenous People of Australia.  There's an old axiom that I've heard from one of the elders here: Give a man something for nothing, and that's exactly the value he'll place on it.

There's a lot in that.  A lot we, the White People here, can learn from that.

If only we'd fucking listen.

They, the Indigenous People of Australia, don't want money for nothing.  They don't want money from you to say sorry for The Stolen Generation, or to say Sorry For Stealing Your Lands.

They want what they've always wanted.  The freedom to roam the land.  To hunt.  To fish. To go walkabout.  To explore.  To feel like there's nowhere that they're NOT allowed to go, and to feel like they can do what they like, because THEY know that doing what they like isn't going to cause millions of tons of pollution, nor is it going to choke a city's water supply off, nor is it going to impact anybody really, in any fucking tiny way.

That's how they lived, and that's how they want to live.  And we're too fucking stupid to let them.

It was August 2005 when I first laid claim to being an official Australian. I'd languished in an alcoholic depression for most of the summer in Colorado, desperately missing my newly-discovered Other Half. Looking back, I'm amazed that my friend/roommate put up with me, my company didn't fire me, and my co-workers didn't barf openly in my presence from either the smell of my lack of hygiene (or said alcoholism) or the sadsack lovesick waif that I sometimes was. None of that time was fun, but I'm incredibly thankful for the people that put up with me through it.

Then, not only was I not fired, but they gave me my stock options early, enabling me to save up to bring the wife back at Xmas. And to top it all off, the lovely co-workers passed the hat and gave me pre-charged debit cards. No fussing with exchange rates or ridiculous amounts of cash. They knew exactly what to give me to send me on my way.

I don't know if I ever told you folks, but those cards paid rent and bought groceries for the first few months of my being here. This not only helped heaps in financial terms (since I was technically a tourist and couldn't work for a bit) but it gave my wallet and my mind time to not only adjust to my new life, but to honeymoon with my new love (AND learn to be Dad to my kids, who both now can't even really remember a time when I wasn't Dad...).

It's coming up on 7 years and I've never been happier with my decision and I am so incredibly thankful that I had such support from some of you wonderfully awesome folks.

Just a note to say thanks.  Thank you to the HealthGrade peeps.  Thanks to the fellow hockey players.  Thanks Mom.  Thanks everybody that helped me get to where I needed to be.

Thank you for getting me home.

And to everybody else that told me I was crazy or cursed me for abandoning my family and/or being generally unsupportive: *raises middle finger*

Sometimes, like today, it’s just gorgeous, and I breathe deep and am thankful for every little thing that I have in this world.  I took the baby and we all went to Breakfast Club, where the Dept of Po’Folks Food sponsors a bunch of bread-oriented things to be cooked up by volunteers and all the little refugees and indigenous kids with crappy homelives can get a decent meal and a cup of milk.

Of course, we don’t quite fit the criteria, but screw it.  We definitely AIN’T rich and my kids suck at eating breakfast, so any way to get them to put a few mouthfuls together is worth it.  Plus, Baby Boo loves seeing all the kids around and stuffing his little face with buttered bread.

There was an assembly afterward, so no reading to Bug this morning.  We were a bit late, as always, and I got to hang with an indigenous fella whose oldest boy is in Bug’s class.  He was pushing the pram for his middle child, an absolute stunningly gorgeous child that I remember crawling around in nappies a year ago, and he was having a good day I think.  We chatted, as really casual acquaintances do, and I was reminded that a very strong facet of their culture is not liking somebody like me straightaway.

I’ve probably chatted with him a half-dozen times, but it was only when some of his slightly drunk and rowdy mates were passing by me at the newsagent that he strolled up and told them off, grinning at me with a  cricket bat over his shoulder, telling me that I should join them sometime.  Since then, he’s friendly and brings up conversation on his own without my obnoxious prompting or any awkward silences.  Today he puffed up a bit when I told him that I remembered a little girl from years ago when I was helping with the Year 3 Maths class who was a little turd and is now a pretty damn good kid.  His niece is clearly an apple in his eye.

He confided in me, with no small note of pride as well, that he was sending a resume to the mines in the hopes of a good job.  “4 on 1 off,” he told me with a frown, “but it’s real good money.”  I offered to help with a resume in a way that simply suggested that I’d done lots of ‘em, and he nodded that he would probably appreciate some help.  I told him it’s not necessarily because I’m so well-educated or anything like that, but because of my gift for bullshit.  That brought a very big smile and a quiet thanks.

She asked a very simple and sweet question about what it's like to live in Australia, and I answered back in my usual fashion of writing a novel where a novel wasn't requested.  It's moments like this that always remind me that I don't write enough.

So here you go:

I can really only speak about Perth, so I'll explain a bit about that first.  Given that the continental US is about the same size as Oz, Perth would be LA, Brisbane = DC, Sydney = Tallahassee, Melbourne = New Orleans and Adelaide would be roughly Texarkana.  Since these are the most likely cities in Oz that you'd make it to, I find it best to equate them with American cities.

Oh, and in-between Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane there are rural towns, smaller cities and geographical terrain and climate very much like the entire state of California.  Beaches, deserts, heat, cold, snow, trees, mountains, hills and rivers.  But all these cities are on the coast (virtually).

Then, there's Perth.  On the assend of a continent that's on the assend of the world.  Know how I laid out the cities and their US counterparts?  Yeah, make everything from the Nawlins to Vegas a freakin' DESERT with nobody in it.  That would make LA feel pretty lonesome you can imagine.

So here we are, in the World's Most Remote Capital City.  Western Australia is shortened to "WA" which is then renicknamed "Wait Awhile".  We bitch about that constantly, but secretly like it that way.

• Brisbane is the surfer's paradise and is probably more like Venice Beach than Venice Beach is except with fewer freaks.
• Sydney is big and bustling and they love rugby.
• Melbourne is hipster and San Francisco-ish and it rains alot and even if they ride fixies they have footy which is Australian Rules Football and not rugby (which is also called "footy") and not soccer (which is also called "football" sometimes).
• Canberra has politicians and I don't think anyone there drinks or smokes or has sex.
• Adelaide has a lot of churches and one rock metal chick who's a friend of mine.
• Perth is nicknamed "Dullsville" (I shit you not) but we like that and if we don't we move to Melbourne and bitch about the rain.

As you can see, I don't know much about the other cities (not having lived in them) but I know a bit.

The people, the life though, are all so wonderfully excellent that I truly believe that I've landed in the greatest place on earth.  Aside from the healthcare, which is all top-quality and FREE, the streets are clean and the housing is big if not terribly affordable.  The attitude just about EVERYWHERE is "no worries mate" and the people here live like they're really not in that much of a hurry or a worry.  It's awesome.

That said, the healthcare and anytyhing publically run is so great because our taxes are insanely high.  There's an 11% Goods and Services Tax (GST) on everything and anything "vice" is stupid expensive.  A pack of Marlboro's and a 6-pack of cheap beer will run you $13 each.

A pair of jeans is $30-$50, a pair of shoes is around $25-$50 (unless they're Chuck Taylor's, which are around $100 a pair).  Big W (Walmart), Target (same) and Kmart (well, you know) are the places to get shirts and undies for under $20 but everywhere else will double that.

A loaf of decent bread is $3.50, milk is $3-$5 for 3-litres ($4/gal), cheese is $10/kg ($6/lb), ground beef (mince) is $6-8$/kg (or $4.50/lb) and gas (petrol) is $1.55/litre ($5.50/gal).  A beer at the bar is $7.50-$9 and ordering a Dominos pizza delivered will run about $30 for the "family" size.  McDonald's (Macca's) Big Mac meal is $8 and Hungry Jack's (same as Burger King) is about the same, so feeding a family of 2 adults and 2 kids will be around $25-$40.

A midsize home in the burbs will run you $400,000-$600,000 and a decent zip-around co-ed car is $15,000-$35,000 new.  It'll cost you about $600-$800 a year in registration and fees for your vehicle (though that includes 1st level insurance, the only one that's mandatory) and a bus or train on our clean and reasonably polite public transport into the city from the burbs is $3.80 one way.  Flying to any of the cities over east is $300 one way on Deal Day, and about $500-$800 any other time.  Flying to the US with careful planning is about $2000-$2500 per person and in an emergency (like a funeral) it's about $4000-$5000 per person.

If you're a struggling small business guy like me, you'll stand to live on (and be poor on) about $35-$50K a year.  If you work for a company in the city and are reasonably good, you'll pull down $80K, and if you work anywhere in the Mining Industry, you may actually shit money.

That's all I can think of for now, but I reckon I've more than used up my allotted time for your question.  Heh.  I'm just going to post this on my blog and see how many Aussies (pronounced Ozzies, not AwSSees) want to correct me.

Oh, and for the most comprehensive, I'm New Here book on all this, read Bill Bryson's "In a Sunburnt Country".  It'll tell you all about Shit That Tries To Kill You, which I've conveniently left out.  Oh, and he writes NOTHING about Perth which again, is probably how we like it.

I am really, really sorry, but they're nasty bastards, these hackers, and I'm doing all I can to rid myself of them forever (without nuking my entire site, of course).

I've created this page just to say sorry and to keep you from getting sucked into their crap.

Feel free to copy all the relevant information from the email you were sent (NOT from me, either) and report them to SpamCop, Spam Assassin and anything else you can Google.

Cheers.

I keeds wichoo.  But still.  I'm aware of my problems updating and in true 12 step fashion, I'm going to dig deep into denial and ignore them!

But, by doing that, I'm also putting lots more pictures up for you to enjoy, so yay, double yay and triple yay.

First, some from a random trip to the Duck Pond Park near our house.

The boy is a bit of a character.  I have NO idea where he gets that thing where he can't have a serious face when the camera is pointed at him.  Hmmm...

I blame his mother.

While we're blaming their mother for things, check out this ethereal beauty.

I won't mention that she was told to only dip her feet and not scootch all the way to standing in the water (broken glass... we ARE still in the city after all).

Sometimes, I am reminded that this is the life I wanted back when I wasn't living this life.

My little munchkin Boo.  This was just before Christmas, barely 2 months or so ago, and already he looks different from this shot.

My girls making Xmas cards for every single human they could think of.  My apologies if you didn't get yours, it may or may not be because I had a hard time figuring out who "Ukweeku" was.

They were so excited by the idea that I emptied out an entire box of crap onto the table to find those hats.

Big Sister showing Little Brother how to play the letter game.

BUSTED.

Trust me, I was as surprised as he was that it was time to "Drewproof" the house.

A "Drum Session" at the local library.  The guy passed out drums, then asked if somebody would like to take the African spear and shield and lead everyone in a dance.

*CRICKETS*

He asked again.  I looked at Jade enquiringly and realised that she was playing with the fruit-shaped maraccas.  When I told her he was asking for a volunteer to lead the dancing, she left a little Jade-shaped vapour cloud where she was sitting, grabbed the goods, and started stomping with the beat.  Of course, he didn't explain that singing wouldn't be heard over the drums, and she didn't explain that she didn't care if we heard her song or not.

Blurry, yes.  But so damn cute that it couldn't be skipped.  Happy little boy.

Birthday time, and she got the magic fairy wand with the magic fairy horse and some other magic fairy thing that surely brought so much magic fairy magic into our house that I forgot to be angry when I stepped on the spikey, designed-to-kill-dad's-feet magic fairy shoes in the middle of the night.

Happy Birthday my little Jadeybug.

This is the look you get when you say, "Mum says take a picture of you while we're fishing so she has proof that we're not out at a bar!"

He smiled later and was a goofy goofball with his mates but I don't want to break some sort of internet laws and post pics without permission.  Suffice to say, 3 young boys fishing and jumping off the jetty was a roundly soundly good time had by all.

The little turtle pool getting some good summer use.  Jade in her default state with her mouth open.  Boo in his default state, chewing on something that he probably isn't supposed to have.

Smiling big from the excitement of Granbo's gift.  What better way to celebrate an 11-yo sciencey, buildy, inventy kid than to give him something sciency and buildy and inventy?  Long as he doesn't blow anything up.

And if he does, it better be coooooool.

He'd asked a bit ago and we weren't sure if he meant it.  Then Jade got her ears pierced for her birthday (Jan 24th, 5 days before his) and he waited almost a whole day later to quietly insist, "Um, mum and dad? I really would like my ear pierced..."

It was actually fun, I must say, to do that with him (Wifeage was home with a sleeping Boo) and now I'm wearing the mate (had to buy a pair) in my ear too.

Just a random shot while I was leaving the school after dropping Jade.  The sky was alive that morning and there was a huge flock of those big white cockatoos (something-crested somethings) in that field there on the burn mark.

I know the barbed wire and chainlink fence kind of throw you off, but the clouds and that huge flock of screeching birds (wingspan of about 4 ft) really show the energy of that moment.

************

Now, I am pleased to present to you some once-in-a-lifetime Pro Shots of my gorgeous kids.  We purchased a voucher AGES ago, and the bugger was about to expire.  It was for up to 5 people, so we weren't sure if that meant they'd have all of us.  Plus, I'd just sort of spaced the appointment at 2:30 until about 1-ish on a very, very busy Monday.  I gave wife that look that says, "There's a slim chance that you and I can get 4 kids ready in the next hour, but there's almost NO chance that we can do that and be ready ourselves."

And by "ourselves" I meant "her" because I shower, shave and dress in the time it takes to boil a kettle.  Part of the fun of being male.  But poor Wifeage actually cares about A) how she looks and 2) how the kids look, so she's kind of behind the 8-ball on that one.

So yeah, that's why there's no Wifeage in any of these shots, but there ARE 4 absolutely gorgeous (and gorgeously dressed, thank you so much honey) children and one mildly not-hideous grinning idiot dad.

The following are all courtesy of Ze Photography.

My oldest boy.  Damn fine looking gent if I do say so myself.

My oldest girlchild, who will likely take a stab at modelling before it's all said and done.

Aaaaaaaaand My Little Showpony.  Unprompted, unsolicited, pure Posing Jade.

My beautiful Boo.  He was a bit grumbly from missing a nap at the time, but he still managed to only look slightly bemused instead of grumbly, so that's a win.

A lucky, lucky man.

FUN!

No really, it really was fun.  Folks have commented that they would've gone slightly mad trying to corral 3 kids (one very un-corralable) and a baby, but it was actually a really good day.

Monkeys...

My beauties.

My boys.

************

And that's all folks.  Hope you enjoyed as much as I did.

Mad Loves and Smooches and Hugs.

I'll bold the ones that I've got.

Also, check out the Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow individual pages where I've got all their weapons and such all listed out.

Year	Snake-Eyes Version	Year	Storm Shadow Version
1982	v1
1983	v1.5 (kung-fu grip)	1984	v1
1985	v2	1988	v2
1989	v3
1991	v4	1992	v3
1993	v5
1994	v6	1994	v4
1997	v7	1997	v5
1997	v8
2000	v9	2000	v6
2002	v10	2002	v7
2002	v11	2002	v8
2002	v12	2002	v9
2002	v13
2002	v14	2002	v10
2003	v15
2003	v16
2004	v17	2004	v11
2004	v18	2004	v12
2004	v19	2004	v15
2004	v20	2004	v14
2004	v21	2004	v16
2005	v22	2004	v13
2005	v23	2005	v17
2005	v24	2005	v18
2005	v25	2005	v19
2005	v26	2005	v20
2005	v27
2006	CLASSIFIED	2006	Tommy Arashikage
2007	v28	2007	v21
2007	v29	2007	v22
2008	v30	2007	v23
2008	v31	2008	v24
2008	v32	2008	v25
2008	v33	2008	Red Ninja Leader
2008	v34	2008	v26
2008	v35
2008	v36
2008	v37
2008	v38	2008	v27
2009	v39	2009	v29
2009	v40
2009	v41	2009	v30
2009	v42	2009	v31
2009	v43	2009	v32
2009	v44	2009	v33
2009	v45	2009	v34b
2009	v46	2009	v34a
2009	v47	2009	v35
2009	v48	2009	v36
2009	v49	2009	v37
2010	v50
2010	v51	2010	v38
2010	v52	2010	v39
2010	v53	2010	v40
2011	v54
2011	v55	2009	v28
2011	v56

For the horrifically uncool, "tabs" are "tabulature" which is musospeak for "numbers where your fat fingers should go on the strings and frets.

It's basically how I learned to play guitar.

So, frequently I hear something and want to learn to play it.  This is a beautiful way to learn how to play, I've learned, because just like piano lessons from Mrs. Chubbycheeks when I was 8, if the song sucks there's no inspiration to learn it.

Who wants to play shitty music?

Last song that really stuck in my head long enough for me to climb out of the car, go inside, and still somehow magically remember to look it up on Ultimate Guitar (the greatest guitaring website in the entire known Universe, including Uranus) was by Led Zeppelin.

Now, I only knew the opening guitar riff and a bit of the words, so Google had to help, but I found out it's not "Hey Lady" which is something that rude Mexicans yell at you to try and get your girlfriend to buy an overpriced bead necklace or hoodie made from donkey dung.

Nup, it's called "Over the Hills and Far Away" and I happily plugged that into Ultimate Guitar.

I found some tabs I liked (the ones with 3 or more stars on their rating) and clicked the link, breathless with the anticipation that can only come from being the next Robert Plant.

I got this:

This tablature has been made unavailable in your country at the request of the rights owner.

Excuse me?

Unavailable?

IN MY COUNTRY?

They may as well have said, "We're American Assholes so Fuck Everybody." because really, that's what it translates as, and I didn't even use Babelfish.

They also forgot that I am a Google Ninjatastic Pimpdaddy 5th Level of the Octagon, which means I had the "cached" version loaded up and the original content displaying on my browser RIGHT HERE IN MY FUCKING COUNTRY just fine, thank you very much Mr Asshole Rights Owner.

It copied, it printed, it looks just like all the other music in my "Geetar Moozak" folder here, surprisingly enough, and I sound just like Paige and Plant and all the rest of the musical wonderment that may fall out of your radio occasionally.

Go figure.

K, I totally lied, I sound nothing like Robert Plant, but that's because I have decent hair on my head and testicles.

ROCK.

This tablature has been made unavailable in your country at the request
of the rights owner.