Butch aka Travis

“An electrician is either good or he is dead”
T.E. Sutherland

In the spirit of quotes which I have started blogs with lately I chose to include one from my old man. I thought it witty and very incisive. But more on that later

As I sit here with a glass semi full of a fine bottle of semi single mated fine Balanteyns whiskey, exceedingly drunk and struggling to see the keys in the dark on my Ma’s laptop I wish to admit that I really miss ole Melbourne town. Sure I miss my P & M when I am in Melbourne, but aside from that, Brisbane (which is the town where I grew up from the age of 3 until 21) seems to be becoming more and more of a living joke. Sure it is expanding at a rapid rate, but you know, it’s still the dry hot hell hole it has always been.

I have actually experienced a withdrawal from good movies and writing. I watch a fair amount of movies a week, except since Sunday I have been locked in ole Brisbane where I don’t have a Video Ezy membership and Blockbuster Video seems to remember a debt I racked up almost three years ago, which thwarted my attempts to show my parents the last Coen Bros film I wish them to see ‘O Brother Where Art Thou‘.

Instead last few days have been spent watching Simpson’s reruns and Married with Children, with the occasional English Premier League Football match thrown in for good measure.

Last night, in my haste I grabbed the nearest DVD available (which happened to be my sisters copy of) ‘The Last Samurai’ starring one Tom Cruise., an actor I am not all that familiar with. It wasn’t horrible…….. No I lie it was. What is it with Hollywood movies and these ridiculous transition scenes where a character who was once a drunken fool, spends a few days alone after a minor injury in a dream sequence where he rolls around in pain clutching his stomach yelling out the occasional expletive, only to reborn again and be forever changed? Honor and love are predictably involved as usual.

I have just finished writing a feature which touches lightly on ‘honor’ and more on the side of the dark side of human nature. No I don’t mean Darth Vader saving his son before murdering the vicious and manipulative guy whose name I forget in my drunken state. I mean the possibility of a person becoming completely detached from his human form

Anyways I digress, the moral of the story is, stay away from Tom Cruise because despite his acting appearances he is a sober Nazi, and just think about this. He made, his wife give birth without making a sound.

My P & M are such lovely people and after many a drunken conversation (including many references to and about the beloved South Africa from whence we all hailed from originally N’kosi Sikelele!!) they have both told me to go for my dreams. To write and to create, to not be, but to hold and lastly to not be a money spinner, but to embrace the form and to be an artist.

That is my dream, to be the next Polanski and the first Sutherland

Tomorrow I have a funeral. It is a tradition of mine to get insanely drunk the night before a funeral and to show up incredibly hung over. I have almost achieved my goal,

I have only ever been hungover at funerals, I don’t know why, maybe it is because it makes me more emotional and that I might actually feel bad for some one else for a change

And funnily enough i really miss my Girlfriend Jennie, and to a lesser extent i also miss my old pal Rupert. What is it with that guy?

And with that I bid thee Farwell, or as we QLD’ers say “Slater yaw firkin little bastard”

Sincerely

T