Got Milk?

I do. A lot of it…
But not in a weird way…
But I do always have a bit of milk in me…
Damn it, what I’m trying to say is that I drink a lot of milk. Like in summer sometimes I can go through a 3L in a day or less.

So I had this random idea of tallying all the milk that I drink for an entire year and count it up at the end. So, starting tomorrow I’ll be keeping all my receipts and noting exactly how much milk I drink for an entire year. (You can tell I have a lot of time on my hands.) Now this is where you all come in, I want everyone (yes all three of you) to place bets on how much I can drink in 2010; the most common suggestion (or the average) will be the target.
I may also collect all the bottles (and keep them in the garage) for an elaborate video at the end of the year involving the words “Milk was a bad choice.”
We (I) need your help. Contribute to the Milk Allowance now.

Other things I plan to do with milk over the summer:

1. Put a petition to Centrelink about creating a Milk Allowance. For the lactose impaired.

2 I’ve had this idea for a TV show for a while now (and if I haven’t already explained it to you in great detail, then I probably don’t like you very much), the premise is this: it’s a milkshake review show where we travel around the country (eventually the world) and review milkshakes. Initially it would be just me and Jodie, but eventually I’d like to get about four reviewers for all the different flavours. We’d give scores out of 40 (ten each for flavour, size, price, and accessibility) and make a list of where the best milkshakes are to be found. I’m still torn about the intro sequence; initially I wanted an upbeat intro set to ‘Shake It’ by Metro Station (because it’s a hilarious pun, and a cool song (until you watch the poncy video clip)), but now I’m thinking more of a ‘Reservoir Dogs’ intro where all my reviewers are in suits walking in slow motion towards the camera to an old 70s song. And text would come up introducing everyone – Ben: Strawberry Specialist, Jodie: Chocolate Specialist etc.

3. Write a spin-off of The Milkshake Review Show, and seeing as vampires seem to be big right now, I’ll capatalise on that and write a screenplay where the world is riddled with vampires, except the catch is that everyone’s blood is actually milk. So instead of blood-sucking vampires they would be milk-sucking vampires. And instead of different blood-types people have different flavoured milk. And it would be filled with bad one-liners, like when the American military come to take out the vampires they say “got milk?” and then riddle them with bullets. And the best thing about it all would be bamboozling the MPAA (the dudes that classify movies), because there’s no blood! Only milk =]
And I’d call it…wait for it…'Milk’…
What? There’s already a movie by that name? Shit! Well then "I’d call it ‘What’s Your Flavour?’ and the theme song would be ‘What’s Your Flava?’ by Craig David. (Can you tell I just made all of that up now?)

By The Numbers

Fuck me, what a day!

Yesterday, there was an epic all-day concert at the Kelvin Grove amphitheatre, and I volunteered as a photographer. Little did I know just how epic it would truly be. Let’s just say, my ass is bruised, my feet are bruised, by ears are impaired, and my eyes hurt from lack of sleep. But aside from the sensory deprivation and bruises left right and centre, it was an outstanding day. Although next time i’ll bring a water bottle, lunch, and remember to slip, slop, and slap.

If you know me, you’ll know I love numbers and statistics, so here’s the day by the numbers.

1 – Day

2 - Blocks of delicious Lindt chocolate (god bless you Woolworths…I hope no-one from Maleny heard that…)

3 - Toilet breaks (the last of which was in the complete dark, but luckily I had already been there twice and knew my way around)

4 - Sound Technicians

5 - Film & Photographic crew (none of whom as omnipresent as I)

6 - The amount of times Rob hijacked the keyboard

7 - Hours without food (thanks Jodi =])

8 – Pm. Marked 12 hours since my arrival (coincidentally, the same number of times I wished I could leave and go to sleep)

9 - Different styles of music

10 - Rows of the amphitheatre

13 - Cups of water (see #3)

14 – HOURS! (58% of an entire day)

16 - Members of Noosphere

21 – Acts (were planned; 19 actually went on)

45 - Minutes break (5.25 – 6.10)

123 – Songs*

827 - Photographs taken (of which, 10 are probably good =P)

* This is purely guesswork. But I know it was a lot, and I know it was over 100.

Break It Down Now

Ben’s Day, featuring: a 12 pack of toilet paper for $2.99; a Clint Eastwood movie; a train; a $5 shake; a $9 salad; a sexy bitch; and a pantomime.

So I started the day just like any other; woke up set on doing uni work and then found a whole bunch of new and ingenious ways of wasting time and procrastinating.

At some point in the afternoon I thought it would be a good idea to do a shop, on account of there being no toilet paper, and no god damn food. I went up to Lutwyche, and popped into the op-shop briefly, thinking they might have something I could use for my Halloween costume.They didn’t, but before I left I saw a 12 pack of toilet paper for $2.99. A mighty good deal.
I did the shopping at Coles, and you know how it is; you go in there needing toilet paper, a loaf of bread, and a can opener and you come out with bloody cordial, biscuits, cheese, mayonnaise, and half the bloody time you forget the things you went in for!
So instead of the small $20 shop I had planned, I came out with five bags (plastic bags, yes I felt terrible for the fuckin’ environment, but you know what, I also felt terrible for my fuckin’ hands; plastic bags are bitches to carry) and it cost me $67. So here I am, making my way to the bus stop, trying to carry these five heavy, awkward bags and realising I still need the damn toilet paper. So I hobble across the road, buy it (of course they don’t have bags) and try and fit it in my already over-crowded bags. Anyway, the moral of the story is: CARRY MY FUCKING SHOPPING WENCH!

I got home, watched Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood) and had some delightful and hard earned snacks, including chocolate, chocolate, and more chocolate.

I caught the 7.19 train into the city and made my way to JoJo’s in the Queen Street Mall (it was a friend’s birthday dinner).
Turns out I’m there before the actually birthday crew (lame, or totally awesome?), so I grab a seat and whip out the book i’m reading, Tarantino and Philosophy: How to philosophize with a pair of pliers and a blowtorch. Fucking good read, I recommend it.

The peeps rock up, we get our table, and we gets to perusing the over-priced menus. The meal that caught my eye was the Sirloin steak, with chips - $18, which isn’t too bad considering, but I looked one row down to find Sirloin steak, with chips and a salad - $27. That’s a fuckin’ $9 salad. Outrageous!
After I got over that I also found a $15 sandwich, but hey it’s gourmet right? And $20 Tortellini! You can buy that shit (i’d like to say it’s not actually shit, it’s my favourite meal) for $6 at the supermarket, add $4 for sauce, and that would feed 4. God damn.

The highlight of the evening, however, came when I started getting thirsty. I felt like a milkshake, so I went to the bar and saw the milkshake flavours, so I thought cool, no dramas. But what actually unfolded was a strange re-enactment of the milkshake scene in Pulp Fiction (which coincidently i’ve been reading a lot about).
I ask the guy, “Hey, do you guys do milkshakes?”
To which he replies, in a very whingey, non professional tone, “Ahhhh nnnnn, yeah we do. I just don’t like making them.”
Astounded I said, “Well how much would it be?”
He ummed and ahhed for a moment and then said, “Well…$5.”
To which I replied, “$5 shake? That’s milk and ice cream?”
”Yeah.”
So he trudged off and started making it (Mark said he saw him pretending to spit in it), during which he asked, “you don’t want bourbon in it or nothin’?” (Those weren’t his exact words, but I can’t remember which alcohol he was referring to; regardless, the point remains the same.) I said no, to which he replied, “Weak.”
To which I said, “my [fucking] choice [you fucking douche bag].
He came back a couple of minutes later with the big metal mixing cup. I thought, sweet as, this guy has been a douche, but I paid $5 and I’m getting what I paid for.
However what actually happened was he got out two glasses, a big milkshake glass and a girly wine glass, he pours it into the wine glass and says, “one for you,” then pours the rest into the milkshake glass, “one for me.”
The audacity!

All said and done though, it was a good meal, and the shake was alright too. Certainly no top 10 material; certainly not going to make my milkshake review show. Despite everything I thought the restaurant was quite cool, but if I go there again and that guy acts up again I’m gettin’ his ass fired [out of a cannon, into the sun].

Next we hit the valley. Now it was never my intention to go out that night, especially because I was wearing a jumper and carrying a bag and my head was messed up. But I got into The Beat so we went and danced for a bit. Mark had assigned me a mission and claimed that if I did it, I would be “a legend”. My mission, if I chose to accept it (which I did), was to go to the valley, wait for our friend Steve to arrive, call him a pussy, and then leave. I did all of those things, except instead of really leaving, I just pretended to leave. But it was still funny as hell (had to be there).
I hadn’t danced yet, but when my song came on (Sexy Bitch) I got up on that dance floor with Mark, and we ripped that mofo right up. Good fun. What a great song to dance to.
About 15 minutes later I was sitting down at the table and this guy came up and eyed me, then proceeded to grab at the air in time to the music, after each time he shook his head, and sometimes he would flip the sunglasses over his eyes and start again. Steve came to sit down and was like, WTF, and I was like ZOMFGROFLMAO.

And that’s my story. Now, back to uni work =]

It.Was.You

I’ve been struggling with things to write about for weeks, but this morning the floodgates opened.

So this morning I came in and sat down in my Corporate Writing and Editing lecture. About 5 minutes afterwards this girl comes in and sits down a row in front of me. A couple of minutes after that she gets up and turns around.

“It was you.”

“Huh?” I said.

“It was you last week that was coughing all lecture.”

“Um, sorry about that…I was sick.” A hint of sarcasm.

She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a packet of butter menthols and passes them to me.

Perplexed, I laughed and said, “No i’m okay now thanks.”

Rather abrasively she says, “No, i bought these especially for you.”

I take them from her, awkwardly. Then she proceeds to pull out a packet of tissues. And a bottle of water.
She leaves them on my table and goes to sit back down.

“I’m sorry for my random act of, getting sick.” Medium sarcasm.

“Well, i just did it so that we could all have a pleasant lecture.”

“Well, i’m sorry if i offended you. You know it was actually intentional. I went to the Ekka and made out with a lot of sick people. But i didn’t expect to get sick.” Sarcasm in overdrive.

Even our lecturer, Glen Thomas, entered the conversation.“You didn’t make out with any sick pigs did you?”

Beside me, Ethan was beside himself. lol, epic win.

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

Obviously i told everyone I knew about this bizarre occurrence. Man we had a field day; laughed till the cows came home. And then some.

A few questions, however, still plague me;

1. Did she rehearse what she was going to say?

The general consensus amongst my friends was yes. And i have to agree; one does not rationally spend five dollars on a stranger and then not plan what they are going to say. But then again, one does not rationally confront someone about the involuntary act of coughing whilst sick. Which leads me to the next question.

2. Is it the same as walking up to an Asian person and saying, how dare you be Asian?

My friends insist that i shouldn’t compare being sick to being Asian -and they make a good point – however, my intentions are good. It’s the same principle; being berated for something which you have no control over. Some would argue that i could control whether I went to the lecture or not, but I would call them useless fuckwits, and then proceed to berate them about being so stupid.

3. How much does she fucking love Corporate Writing and Editing?

Okay so let me just say that this 2 hour lecture entails Grammar, Punctuation, How to write reports and so on. I would perhaps understand if it was a god damn film subject and Quentin Tarantino was giving a guest lecture, but it’s fucking Corporate Writing motherfucker, get the fuck over it!

4. Does she now feel like the biggest douche ever/is she mentally retarded?

Now i’m well aware that sometimes confrontation needs to occur, and when I am the instigator I often feel guilty, whether I believe what i’ve said is true or not. But in this case, I really do wonder how you could not feel like the biggest douche bag ever, unless you were actually retarded in some way.

Jackie Fail

Jackie Fail: A slang term for when Jackie McKimmie does or says something stupid.

Okay, so news flash for those of you who are thinking; who the fuck is Jackie McKimmie? Well she’s no-one really, just one of my lecturers. For film and tv scriptwriting.
Now i’ve had something against her ever since the first lecture, which was comprised entirely of her telling us how amazing and brilliant she is; how many films she’s worked on, and showing us clips of films she was apart of.
So she’s a pretentious wench? Deal with it Ben. Aha! That’s where you’re wrong, she’s so much more than just a pretentious wench. She’s also stupid and annoying. A stupid annoying pretentious wench she be.

I got my marks back from our first assignment the other day.
Now let me first say that I explained to her that i am doing a non-linear, hard to explain story, and told her that my synopsis may not be as clear cut as ‘This is a story about [protagonist] who runs into [conflict] which is caused by [antagonist] which is resolved by…’
She’s extremely by the book in that way. Well, in every way i can think of. She’ll be like, ‘okay, so does anyone have an opinion on this?’ and I’ll put my hand up and give my honest opinion, and in no uncertain terms she will say, ‘No, you’re wrong.’ Then she will spend the next 3-5 minutes denouncing what i’ve said. Not blatantly. Usually pretty subtly, i’ll give her that.
Okay, now that i have explained that, i’ll tell you about the assignment. She gave me a 4 because ‘the synopsis was unclear’. In other words, she was unable to comprehend it, or she disagreed with it in someway, therefore a 4. But here’s the kicker; for someone claiming that something is unclear and vague she doesn’t do a very good job giving feedback.

Okay, so for those of you who have no idea what the fuck that says, here’s a translation, provided by Google’s foreign language translator.

“And?

Not oure what you wont ill audience [infinity symbol] thik/feel – why Bette a [indecipherable] he way ole olds.”

Seriously. I’ve heard Chewbacca speak better English. Thanks anyway Google, you tried your best.
But that’s just one of the many Jackie Fails. So it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you the list of top 10 Jackie Fails.

#10: On a lecture slide was a url which was supposed to link to a screen website: Screenbub. Which she later changed to Screenhub when students couldn’t access it.

#9: Every time she has a worksheet out the front and a student walks by she will say (quite aggressively), "’Hey, grab that!’
Try it, just to get the inevitable response, it’s hilarious!

#8: On a lecture slide there were two references to Melbourne. The first was spelt correctly, the second however was spelt Melboorne. Fair enough though, she did write it in pen; no spell checker.

#7: About the second or third lecture Jackie was telling us how much she loves Seinfeld, The Sopranos, Deadwood, and Analyse This (they are actually the only things she ever talks about). Anyway, she then proceeded to act out an entire scene from Analyse this and part of one from Seinfeld. Taking up a good 20 minutes of class time.

#6: When teaching us how to refer to unspecified people (like Girl 1, Boy 2 etc) she got the asterisks horribly confused with the hash.The result being, ‘you should always write Cop*1 or Girl*2.’

#5: In one lecture she tried to use the word evoke, but failed hard and said emoke instead. Which consequently failed to emoke any feeling that i might have in regards to her being semi literate.

#4: In one particular lecture she was talking to us about making sure audiences don’t loose interest. Ironically, as she was saying this, a bunch of people left the room.

#3: Jackie on Characters and motivations, "And then they get something, which is either nothing or something."

#2: A direct quote from Jackie, "The main character is the one who features mainly in the plot." 

#1: In our second or third lecture there came a point for her to use the word poignant. Now most people know that it’s a silent G right? She didn’t. A rather foolish mistake for a teacher who was just claiming that spelling errors and the like will not be tolerated.

[Thanks to Gavin for some quotations]

Finally, just to demonstrate how right i am; here is a selection of inspired haiku’s by my classmates and myself.

Ten in the morning,
McKimmie, McKimmie why
you torture us so?

Jackie, I loathe thee,
Jackie, your voice is so shrill,
Poin-yant, not poig-nant.

Your glasses are red,
You have a stupid fat head,
Now analyse that.

This lecture so dull,
Get the fuck off your high horse,
Insalubrious.

As of now they’re just mine. But hopefully I’ll be able to persuade some of my brethren to put some of theirs up. And yes, they are terrible, but i think that it reflects the truly terrible, horrific conditions under which they were written.

Songs You Love To Hate (Or Hate To Love)

Has anyone else noticed how pretty much every song in the top 10 is totally shit, but has a catchy beat?
Songs that are shallow or have no substance whatsoever, that promote douche bag things like alcoholism, promiscuity, sexism, and being blasé about ridiculous amounts of money. Case in point;

- Sexy Bitch; or anything else by Akon for that matter. Aren’t Sexy Bitch, Smack That and Shake That essentially the same fucking song? Akon’s songs, like most rappers are always about the same shit; money, hoes, and often excessive amounts of alcohol. Way to set a good example for the kids Douche Bag!

- Good Girls Go Bad. No not even Leighton Meester could save this one. And what’s with the setting. ‘Yeah, we’re a bunch of teenage sluts who just want to go out and get drunk and make out with random guys, where’s the best place to do that?’
… An Abattoir?! Sorry, sorry; a nightclub beneath an abattoir. Because that make so much more sense.

- Poker Face; or anything else by Lady Gaga. P-p-p-poker face, f-f-f-fuck her face. None of her songs have any substance, they’re all about the same things; getting drunk and being promiscuous. Oh and wearing ridiculous and outlandish outfits.
And we all know that Lady Gaga is actually a man, i think she would have a lot more respect, if she just came out with it. A transvestite pop star. Then she’d actually be doing something different, rather than senselessly slutty herself around like so many before her.

- Right Round; I actually do love this song, but seriously Flo Rida? Here’s how a pitch would have gone;

Flo Rida: Yo Homie, i’m thinkin ‘bout doin’ a song about getting head. Cuz that’s all me does 24/7, gang-STAH!

Agent: Um. Well you did have a big hit with the rob a bank song. Tell me more.
Flo Rida: Well, the beat will be a cheap rip off of some popular 80’s song; i’m thinkin’ Sweet dreams or You spin me right round
Agent: Sold!

- I Kissed A Girl; shamelessly using the “lesbian” image to sell  songs. That’s low. At least Tatu looked like lesbians.
That’s just to list a few. Also, who else is sick of hearing Tainted Love being recycled over and over again!? I mean it’s a good song but seriously. There’s been stacks of covers, but recently, Rihanna sampled it on S.O.S (which i thought was used effectively), but then there were a swath of other songs which didn’t use it so well. The latest is Sexy Bitch.

Most of these songs are just shameless rip-offs of Tainted Love with different lyrics, they would claim otherwise of course, but we all know they’re full of shit. It’s kind of like how Vanilla Ice said that he didn’t rip off Under Pressure when he totally fucking did. And how Destiny’s Child recycled the opening riff from Stevie Nick’s Edge of Seventeen and said, ‘Ohhhh look at us, we’re Bootylicious.’
Anyway. That’s just hip hop and pop music for you. It’s been happening for a long time, and it’s never going to stop; it’s just like fashion, we are doomed to keep repeating the same fashion trends over and over again, until someone finally has the guts to go against what will assure them a house in the Hamptons and say, ‘Let’s do something new.’
But then again, people are scared of what’s new; they just want to see, hear, and wear the same thing they have done a thousand times before. But a tiny little bit different.

No, You’re A Twat!

I wish people would stop following my god damn twitter page instead of my blog. The only update i’ve put up there in the past 5 months is: Ben Carey – Is scratching his arse. If you’re reading this and thinking, ‘well why don’t you just delete it?’ Good fucking idea, i think i’ll do it now… Or, I could just constantly post links to my blog. Shameless.

Seriously though what’s so great about twitter? The only reason I use facebook is because it’s a convenient way to keep in contact with people these days… And yes,  i am implying that people are too fucking lazy these days to pick up a god damn phone or to reply to a freaking email, who ever thought email of all things would become one of those tedious forms of communication such as snail mail and telegrams.
Everyone’s into it aren’t they? All the celebrities and that. All it is, is a glorified myspace/facebook status update box. WHY DOES IT HAVE 100 BILLION TRILLION USERS???
And then there’s all the stupid lingo that goes with it: ‘What are you doing Johnny?’ ‘Oh I’m just tweeting’, no Johnny, you’re a fucking Twat is what you are! It should definitely be renamed twatter. I wonder if anyone would do anything if I just constantly posted messages saying: ‘Twitter is gay’, ‘twitter is stupider than Sarah Palin’, ‘twitter sucks monkey balls’.

Another thing that worries me is how desperate the movie industry is at the moment, what with the whole 3 good movies being released in the past decade thing (slight exaggeration, there have been a lot of good movies lately, but they are still desperate! Case in point – the 100 trillion comic book adaptations being made). Next thing you know you’ll be watching ‘Twitter: The Movie’ and wondering why you just spent $10 to watch some accountant guy, hopeless at talking to the opposite sex, find the love of his life through the ‘magic’ of twitter. Here is the sample trailer:

Twat #1

6.37 - I Just got home from work
6.38 – I had such a bad day
6.40 – Everyone yelled at me for no good reason
6.42 – I Think I fail at life
6.43 – Do I?

Stupid Movie Guy Voice: He was down on love, he hated his job, he failed at life. Just when he had given up all hope, he found twitter.

Twat #2

7.01 – Ohh I hate my life
7.02 – I just broke a nail for your information
7.04 – Screw you, cruel world, nobody understands me!!!!

She was a pretentious wench, who lost her job, she hit rock bottom and twitter was there for her. She was hopeless at love; she had been with all the wrong guys, until now.

[Climax of the movie]

Twat #2

1.02 – What are you saying?

Twat #1

1.04 – I’m saying… I think I luv u

Twat #2

1.06 – Oh my gawdddd! I luv u 2!!!!

Twat #1&2

1.07 – Thank god for TWITTER.

[Fade to black]

Think it will be a hit? Probably not, but if you think i’m just being stupid, well… I am, but there is some sort of truth to it, albeit, the alleged facebook movie. Ohhhh dear. I wish there were more Tarantino’s in the world.