The Blather

 A quick session playing my Dan moi. Three minutes of various sounds to the one beat.Behind the lips I'm hollow.   Audio file.

The beach calls me to tramp. Audio file.  

Trying again with a different rig and setup. I'm using ANCHOR -- a creature out of the Spotify stable. Audio file.

 Didyahavagoodone?   We sure did — me, the partner and sprogs. Made all the right moves and spent the preceding period stretched out like a lizard drinking. On a beach no less. Happy little vegemites doing our all to catch the rays of the sun through our 15+ slop and all the slip and slap we could muster. The world could have gone to the dogs as far as we were concerned. 03:17 mp3

Pray cast your eye across the street. Our mutual friend with the cap. Going down to lay a little something on the TAB unless I'm very much mistaken. I have often seen you chatting with him. And I'll bet you a dollar he talks about the government because there's nothing else he can talk about. Is he a personal friend? No. I would call him an acquaintance. Well, I am real glad to hear that, because I'd advise you to make it your business to be on the other side of the street whenever you see him approaching.  Is that so?  Why, yes. He's not the simple man he makes himself out to be. Not on your nelly, mate. That acquaintance of yours is a One Nation supporter! He's not, is he? 02:35  Mp3

Not the one now, but the one before. Before Trump...in Brisbane Australia. 08:18  mp3  

There is a funny idea abroad (by which I mean, of course, in this dry brown land in which we all do dwell) that there exists a minor figure of such truthful grit that every attribute of ordinariness is congealed within their being. This entity, I am led to believe, is now thought to be putting aside a characteristic reticence and a mug of tea, throwing the Akubra into the ring and stepping flat-footed into the political arena. Their mission? To wake up Australia. As soon as I heard that such a quintessential creature was out and  about, I went to great pains to locate it. Duration: 03:55   mp3  

Alan Broughton is a biological agriculture researcher and organic farming teacher based in Eastern Victoria. He has had extensive experience in farm management and setup both here in Australia and overseas. I had a chance to discuss with him some of the assumptions being made about livestock as climate change drivers and how a new approach to grazing animals can impact on the sustainable ecology of agriculture. [This interview was recorded in March, 2016] (Duration:29.01 — 31.1MB)  mp3. For more information visit The Soil Alliance Further Reading Ruminants and methane: Not the fault of the animals by Alan BroughtonVeggie is the most low-carbon diet, right? Well, it depends where y...

How can I put this without giving offence? There are some in our society who live off the labour of others. Don't get me wrong. Most of us get along without recourse to such means, but there are an anonymous few who exploit their fellow human beings without compunction — and, what's more, they have been doing it unchallenged for years. Does that seem so fantastic? Here is a conspiracy going on under our very noses, and no-one owns up to it. You won't read about it on the front page of the local daily, nor has Sixty Minutes covered the story. But these types do exist. They're among us now. (Duration: 2:46 — 2.7MB)  mp3

I wonder if I could have a few moments of your time? I feel that it is my responsibility sometimes to remind the reading public that a society such as ours goes about its everyday business often with strict regard to certain well-established norms of behaviour. In this regard, I wonder if I could prevail upon you — it will only take a moment — to reach down between your legs and see if you can locate something to grab onto. You don't need to go far — just keep searching at arms length in a region often referred to as the crotch. More than likely you'll know what I'm talking about as many of you no doubt find an excuse to visit this locale several times a day. In your hand is a tackle box. If you don't possess this item of anatomy, I need trouble you no longer. You can go back to the crossword. The rest of you should not take this opportunity to spend an undue amount of time down there exploring a structural component which you are perhaps already quite familiar with. You can adjust it. Hitch it up. That will do. All I'm interested in is reminding you that it's there.... (Duration: 3:13 — 3.1MB) mp3

Here we are, somewhere in the South Pacific. That's the big picture: a big brown stain in a puddle. Those in the know didn't know about this spot for some time. It was terra incognito — the secret country. The first civilised person (by that I mean someone who wore underpants) to visit these shores was Lemuel Gulliver.  I’m sure you have read of his adventures. His visit down-under was to the outback settlement of Lilliput, which was located in the inland region of what is now known as Western Australia. See if I'm right. Gulliver's first journey ignored the big dry bit in order to have himself pegged out on a beach at some distance from the briny and within cooee of Uluru.  This spot is not now listed on any Admiralty chart, but back then it must have been.  Kathump! Gulliver lands in WA and the cute little Lilliputians take him to their hearts. They feed him and clothe him, and besides the bits that get edited out for the sake of the kiddies, a good time is had by big and small. What if Gulliver were washed up today? (Duration: 3:08 — 3.0MB) mp3

I admit to it. It was some time ago when I first realised that despite the pressure of my friends and family it was time for me to come to some resolution, if only at first for my own peace of mind. Once I had got that right in my head, all the rest seemed to follow. I knew straightaway what I wanted to be by recognising what I had become -- perhaps slowly at first and then with greater clarity.But that was the easy part because you can never be one just by yourself. Saying you are in itself won't change things at all. You have to do it. You have to act it out publicly; otherwise you let yourself down and the expectations you have of yourself. Simply changing your label isn't enough.(Duration: 4:04 — 2.9MB) mp3  

Pick a day — any day — and there is sure to be a lot of human semen entering the world from private parts unknown. What it gets up to — when it gets out there — is anyone's guess. Each day there's buckets of the stuff discharging forth half a teaspoon at a time. If we were to check the manifest, despite the current trend for low numbers, 200-300 million spermatozoa are on board bravely going where no wriggly thing has gone before. Just imagine how many sperm are sent on a mission each Saturday night! What with one thing and another, most of them are going to be dead by breakfast.  Such is life ... for sperm.  Lest we forget them. If it wasn't for those few who make it, where would the patriarchy be today. For millennia we just thought milking males for semen was a fun thing to do. We didn't know it could help make babies. And now that we do, every sperm is suddenly so very sacred — so sacred that we are encouraged not to spill a single drop. (Duration: 2:32 — 1.8MB) mp3

The Reserve Bank in conjunction with the federal Treasury is making arrangements for turning the whole country into a limited liability company.  And lucky you:every Australian citizen will be offered shares in the float. The new enterprise will take over the country as a going concern, together with all available assets, pre-existing good will, gold reserves and debenture stocks. This novel initiative is a logical consequence of the currently very popular trend towards privatisation.  We're fast-tracking it, that's all.  The formation of Terra Australis Proprietary Limited and its listing on the nation's stock exchanges is intended to shore up the local share market at a time when investors could do with an injection of confidence. The present zigging and zagging of the All Ordinaries does no-one any good. Your everyday, run-of-the-mill Aussie battler-type person could do without such uncertainty. Furthermore, the overbearing pressure of state debt will be a thing of the past. This way we settle up and wipe the slate clean in one swoop without having  to  put up with all this relentless  year in year out budget rigmarole. Every year the same ole same ole… mp3

I am not usually one for public confessions, but I feel that something must be said. You can imagine how difficult this is for me to admit to. I am just an ordinary Joe Blow trying to make their own way in the world. There's nothing special about me. And since there's not, maybe what I have to say many of you can relate to. I'm different, perhaps, because in this matter I'm more in touch with my feelings than you are (or maybe it's just the way I was bought up). When the consequences of my actions dawned on me I, personally, found the guilt overwhelming. In order to seek some relief, at least allow me to confess what I have done. You know that huge budgetary shortfall the new federal government is talking so much about? The one that seems so hard to addres without financial pain and suffering...  I caused that. Little ol' me — through my own carelessness and selfishness — drove this country so deeply into debt. But how can one person, you ask, be responsible for debts of such a grand scale? I, on my lonesome, of course, wasn't that wasteful. But me and a few million others like me can do a whole lot of damage when we throw caution to the wind.(Duration: 04:03 — 1.9MB) mp3