Irreverent rants, hungover musings, too much salt...

Friday, April 20, 2007

Cameras and swearing

I finally got a replacement battery for the old Canon G2, and am once again armed with a working camera. I keep putting off on going on a photo-taking mission, as part of me (my brain) feels foolish taking photos where other people can see me. I also have a tendency to burst into involuntary fits of swearing at inappropriate times.

The other evening I thought I’d try a few low-light shots outside, and so, balancing against a handy power pole, I waited until a car was driving through frame, then squeezed the trigger. The flash went off, the driver of the car, blinded, drove off the road and into a tree*, and I said some very hurtful things in a loud voice to the camera.

I realised I’d just said some pretty obscene things at high volume out in a public place, so I looked around to make sure no one had heard me. An elderly power-walking couple were crossing the road to avoid me, looking at me like I was a terrorist, as they skirted around the gently smouldering remains of the crashed car.

‘Sorry, guys!’ I called out to them, ‘it’s just that this camera… she’s fucked,’ I said.
‘Help… me…’ moaned the man trapped in the crashed car.
‘We never should have left the gaming lounge!’ said the wife. ‘This world is full of violence!’
‘The government should enact some retrospective legislation to stop people doing all the things we don’t like!’ muttered the man.

I braced myself against the pole, switched the flash off, and waited for another car. The trapped driver managed to kick out his windscreen and climb out of the smoking wreck.
‘I never should have bought a fucking Camry,’ he said.
‘Too, true,’ I said. ‘Camrys are the leading source of road rage in Australia,’ I went on, but then another car drove by and I depressed the shutter. The result looked something like this:

small road outside

And here is another entirely unrelated photo.

wall bw

*Certain elements of this story may not have actually happened.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Busted!

Let this be a lesson to all you goat rooters out there!

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

What day is it, ey?

The weather has clicked its heels and become a little brisk in the mornings. By ‘a little brisk’, I mean by Australian standards. I’m sure if you’re from Canada you’d be walking around naked exclaiming, ‘how aboot this heat, ey?’. Funnily enough I’ve never heard a real Canadian say ‘aboot’, but they do sure say ‘ey’ a lot.

I heard a group of Canadian girls holidaying at Airlie Beach in a supermarket talking…

‘Let’s try these, ey?’
‘Look! We told you not to say that anymore, everyone laughs at us!
‘Oh, fuck off, ey?’
‘No, seriously. Cut it out!’

And you could sense there were some repressed ‘eys’ meaning to get out.
Tim couldn’t help himself, ‘you guys are from Canada, ey?’
‘Yeah,’ they said, ‘how did you know?’
‘If you guys are from Canada, you should be great at spelling it, ey?’
‘What?’ They said, blinking in the sunshine that was streaming through the glass doors.
‘You know: Cee, ey. En, ey. Dee, ey…’

They looked at him like he was a fool and walked off.

‘Was that guy retarded? He can spell Canada… big deal, ey?’