Signs unseen

Can't remember where I saw or heard this but it speaks for itself, even if it only ever existed in the mind of someone who'd exceeded his or her tot quota for the day:

UNATTENDED CHILDREN WILL BE GIVEN AN ESPRESSO AND A FREE KITTEN!

Swings and roundabouts

One minute I'm singing the praises of the solitary life, and the next minute my friend D's kid writes this in his Facebook status update --

[Anonymous Son-of-D] is installing software to replicate a COM port via USB to trick a DOS program into working in Vista

-- and I am re-plunged in gloom.

I mean, if I'd ever got round to having one, chances are s/he too would have been able to say that kind of thing, and all that that implies for personalised helpdesk service finely tuned by filial obligation.

And if, like D, I'd had four ...

Oh well.

Halloween

Here on the Eve of All Hallows I am reminded by the Weatherpixie's pumpkin, which I probably wouldn't have noticed (being too focused on the lovely lovely rain) if Elsewhere hadn't mentioned that her own Weatherpixie is also accompanied by a big orange veg of the gourd persuasion, that I am likely to be constantly interrupted watching House and Criminal Minds tonight by local children and, alas, mid-teenagers (if the last few years are anything to go by) out bashing on the neighbourhood doors demanding chocolate with menaces.

I'm a bit torn about this. I have gone so far as to buy a couple of supermarket bags of so-called 'fun size' Mars Bars and things to distribute to such small ghosts and witches and skeletons as may happen by at dusk, but anyone who knocks on my door after 8.15 pm will be told that if they're old enough to be out cruising the streets after dark then they're too old to be bludging chocolate from strangers. I might even seriously torture them by giving them a lecture on the evils of cultural imperialism and the details of the original Samhain.

Lose on the roundabouts, lose on the swings

In the immediate wake of Steve Bracks's shock resignation as Premier of Victoria, a decision in which the very public problems of his children played a major part, and after eight years as Premier that began when the oldest child was still only twelve, Bracks's replacement John Brumby has shown his Heffernan-hued true colours and demonstrated that he has learned less than nothing from his predecessor's life experience.

From today's Age:

'New Premier John Brumby has suggested one of the reasons he overlooked Tim Holding for the Treasury portfolio is that the young Finance Minister is unmarried and has no children.

Asked on ABC TV why he had chosen former education minister John Lenders over Mr Holding for the key job, Mr Brumby replied: "He's a bit older and has had a few more of life's experiences. He's a parent, father, husband. All of those things."'

Got political ambitions? You'd better get breeding, then, if you haven't already. And while you're at it, setting up a trust fund for the sprogs' counselling and rehab in fifteen or twenty years might be a prudent move as well.

Can't help wondering whether millions of people all reading the same book at the same time might exert some kind of gravitational pull

Not even the punters who had thoughtfully pre-ordered their copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows from Borders could escape the Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Test of standing in a long queue on a cold morning,


except by saving their $29.95 receipts for later (anyone who paid $50 was seriously ripped off) and rocking on further down the mall to the shop known in some literary circles as Anguish & Robbery: hundreds of copies, no waiting, and witches giving away pumpkin juice and Butterbeer at the door.


Some, having attained their prize, walked only as far as the nearest bench before giving way to the desire to start reading immediately,


and others didn't even get as far as that.


By the time I arrived at one of our regular Saturday morning cafes at 9.30 am, the Aerospace Engineering student and her mother the lawyer had picked up their copies, settled down in a sunny corner with their lattes, and were already up to page 60. They didn't see me come in.

Potterblogging

And as we count down to only one more sleep, today's issue of crikey.com.au offers an assortment of hypotheses on how the Harry Potter series might wind up. Here is my favourite:

Neville Longbottom manages to convince Voldemort and Harry that they should detain Parvati Patil without charge. This has unforeseen consequences.

In a not unrelated conversation, I was telling My Friend the Lawyer a week or two ago all about my plans for a photo-essay en blog recording the scenes tomorrow morning in Border's when I will be jostling with a lot of ferocious nine-year-olds (plus Ampersand Duck's BB, in spirit if not in fact) to pick up my copy of the final volume.

I had planned to amuse myself by taking pix of the hundreds of junior Snapes, Hagrids, Hermiones and other assorted Hogwarts alumni who abound in the early-morning streets of Adders (and every other city in the Anglophone world, I'm sure) every time a new Potter comes out.

My Friend the Lawyer, scornful still of blogs, looked at me sternly for a moment. 'Uh huh,' she said. 'Do give me a call from the station after the nice policeman has grabbed you by the elbow and said "Excuse me, Madam, what are you planning to do with those photographs of strange children that you're taking in a public place?" and you've answered "Well, Officer, I'm going to put them on the Internet."'

Tinker, tailor ...

Over at crikey.com.au today, regular contributor Christian Kerr observes Treasurer Peter Costello's childhood dream of being an astronaut and invites readerly speculation on what occupations other senior political figures might have dreamed of, tucked up at night in their stripy jarmies when not a creature was stirring.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a vet. Then, being a bit apprehensive about large, non-cute animals, I eventually narrowed it down to the more focused field of marine biology, but that too had its down side; my healthy fear of stingrays, which abounded in the waters where I learned to swim, proved last year to be well-founded.

What did you want to be when you were a kid? Are you being it?