I have sort of a love/hate relationship with Christmas. Well, that’s not entirely true, it’s more just the latter. In recent years, I’ve learned to tolerate the holiday and with the arrival of Boy Z last year almost relished the season. But not this year. This year, I’m going Grinch.

It’s largely because of the seasonal reversal here in the Southern Hemisphere. Christmas Down Under is in midsummer, but the Australians have maintained most of the traditions of their felonious progenitors (turkey, stuffing and sedition). I just can not get my head around eating a full Christmas dinner when it’s 40C (104F) outside. The Christmas trappings here are the same as they are in cooler climes: Fur draped Santas who must bog down the local ERs with heat stroke complaints during the holidays, spheroid snowmen in a part of the world that hasn’t seen snow since the Mesozoic. Come on Aussies, after 220 years of baking Christmases, couldn’t you have come up with some climate appropriate Christmas icons? A Santa in board shorts driving a surfboard pulled by a team of kangaroos? Eucalyptus trees trimmed with jingle-bell adorned koalas? Willy the White-nosed Wombat? Something?

I think I may have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. But I fear that this is going to be a Joni Mitchell kind of Christmas.

It’s coming on Christmas
They’re cutting down trees
They’re putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
But it don’t snow here
It stays pretty green

—————–

Nothing better to cheer one up, though, than a nice word or two about one’s self. The Noble Savage, a fellow expat blogger, gave me the much coveted I Heart Your Blog award. I blush.

The best thing about the award, well beyond the stroke to my ego, is I get to pass it on to seven writers worthier than myself. I’m always up for working on my blogging karma. I’ve discovered a few new blogs (and have been relishing some old ones) in the past few weeks that I would strongly recommend. I would go so far as to say I heart them:

1. My first two awardees are a couple of ladies with whom I have a lot more in common than just the blogging. Mongolian Girl is a Misery based commie who brags about disrobing in front of presidential candidates among other things. I would describe her site, The Cusp, as gonzo blogging. A must.
2. I found the Indisputable Topcat whilst searching for bloggers to hold down the Auburn end of next week’s Smack Talk. I still don’t know how she came up in a search for “Auburn Tigers” but I’m glad she did. Australian, husky owner and a smashing writer.
3. One of my oldest blogging buddies has said she’s quitting the blogosphere. I hope she changes her mind, but if not, I’d like to give Just Jessie this award posthumously. Maybe if we all go over and beg her to stay she’ll reconsider.
4. Everyone and their Great-Aunt Siobhan blogged about the election, self included. But Matt and April really nailed it with their post-election posts. Fantastic, well thought-out politics at The Bauer Confidential.
5. As we’re into another weekend of college football, I’ve got to direct some hearts in the direction of A Bulldog in Exile. The Dean is a Georgia Bulldog in King Corn’s Court and is doing some fantastic ‘Dawg blogging up among the unwashed Midwesterners.
6. I find it difficult to explain why I like Carrie’s blog Reconstructing Fossils, but I’m well hooked. I think it’s the kind of “Truman Show” quality of it, she doesn’t use a lot of words but I warn you there’s something addictive about her photographic diary.
7. One of my consistently favorite reads is Malfeasance. But Courtney lives up to her blogging pseudonym: she is evil incarnate and, I believe, single handedly caused my beloved alma mater’s humiliation in Jacksonville last weekend. So, rather than rewarding evil doers, I will offer this award to her better half who blogs at The Prettiest Denny’s Waitress. All the writing chops of Malfeasance with 50% less evil.

Have a Christmas free weekend, gentle readers.
——————–

I was too depressed to take my own photo, so had to nick this photo of the Rundle Mall Xmas decorations from here.

If you don’t own Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” then you really should. It is available from and Amazon or your local independent record store.

A lot of you, my readers, are clever people. If you were given a chance to retool your career, what would you focus on? What careers are  going to be in demand in the next decade or so? Any economic Nostradami out there? Australian opinions are particularly welcome.

———————-

Speaking of paying the bills, you may have noticed some changes up at the top of my sidebar. Now, I’ve never been a big fan of advertising or sponsored posting or any of the money making ploys that some folks employ. But a self-hosted site isn’t free and while I’m not blogging to be a millionaire, I’d like to at least not lose money in this gig. So, I’m grateful to BlogHer (and Nichole for pointing me there), the community for women who blog, for taking me on despite being demonstrably not a woman. Says so on the box, in fact. Once we get the code sorted out, there will be a likely pretty garish ad dominating the top of my side bar. Beyond having to scroll a bit further down the page to get to recent comments (which Dr. O’C has already given me an earful about) nothing else will change here at A Free Man.  So don’t call me an ad whore or I’ll put my dog on you.

———————-

Now, I typically don’t get into the whole blog award game, but having just gotten a golden egg laid on my lap I figure it’s time to start paying back some of that karmic debt. I found this present from Bluestreak this morning on her site. I don’t speak Spanish, but I’m pretty sure that this means I am now queen of butterflies that land on toilet paper rolls. My first order of business as Lepidoptera Queen is to secure some knights of the loo roll realm. So, here are eight bloggers who have written posts recently that earned them a tap with our royal scepter:

1. Bobbie at The Right Blue for her post on photosynthetic nudibranches.
2. Maggie at Okay, Fine, Dammit on her encounter with a 10 year old me.
3. Boyhowdy at Cover Lay Down for his most recent edition of kidfolk. If you’ve got kids and like music, this is for you.
4. Doug at Hey Jenny Slater for outstanding college football coverage.
5. Matthew at Pop Songs 07-08 who managed to score a series of guest posts by Michael Stipe.
6. Strange Scottish Girl at Wake Up It’s Tuesday has been on lately.
7. I’ve been stalking Breaking The Ice lately and it’s time to out myself.
8. Finally, appropriate to the karmic theme, fellow expat Ian from Letters Home posted a bit of Buddhism for bloggers.

———————–

The Beastie Boys’ “The Sounds of Science” is available from .

Image credits:

Up is down

The Whore of Babylon

Lot of controversy on A Free Man lately, so I’ve decided to ease into something we can all agree as the weekend nears – the supremacy of my almae matres’ football teams*. Both the Universities of Georgia and Missouri are in action again this weekend, so the Free household will spend an Australian Sunday morning hunched over the computer keeping up with what’s happening on the gridiron half a world away.

Missouri’s got another easy one this weekend, hosting MAC powerhouse Buffalo. The way that the Tigers’ offense is clicking right now, however, I’m pretty sure that they could beat the Buffalo Bills, nevermind the Bulls. I’m looking forward to seeing what Mizzou can do in a couple of weeks time when they go over to Lincoln for a big game with the Cornholers. This one will be a walk in the park: Missouri 66, Buffalo 13.

Now, Georgia. The Dawgs failed to whelm on Saturday against the Gamecocks of South Carolina. They ground out a win in Columbia but have to travel across the country this week for a rare appearance out west against the Arizona State Sun Devils. Arizona State looked a lot scarier last week before they completely laid an egg against a lesser opponent, but it’s still a dicey game for the Dawgs. Three keys for a Bulldog win in Tempe:

1.  The offensive line has got to figure it out. We have one of the best backfields in the country, but if they keep getting crushed because their line falls apart there’s not much they can do.
2. Special teams. If you regularly give the opposition the ball on the 40, they’re going to be able to score regardless of how good your D is.
3. D backs. Come on guys, S.C. got 271 yards in the air and they aren’t particularly good. ASU’s Rudy Carpenter is 5th in the country in passing. The secondary absolutely must get it together.

It’s a late kickoff on Saturday, which means that I get to sleep in on Sunday for a change. Internet radio only, kickoff at 9:30 a.m. Sunday Adelaide time. I think Arizona State will make this a game, but the Dawgs pull it out on the road: Georgia 24, Arizona State 17.

Finally, two of my least favorite teams are head to head this week as the Marsh Skinks creep out of Gainesville up into the Smokies to face the Hillbillies of Tennessee. If only it were possible for both of these teams to lose…

—————–

Speaking of karma, it’s about time for some more link love. Here are five bloggers who have been on their game lately:

1. One of my old timey blogging buddies, Not Afraid To Use It has taken things to a new level lately with a serial set of posts about  a cancer scare and the medical and personal repurcussions thereof. Her writing is just raw emotion. Fantastic. Start here and follow the story along.
2. Music blogging is a tough gig. I’m not the best at it, which is one of the reasons that you just see an occasional music post from me. It’s just not very rewarding as you don’t get a ton of comments. You’ve got to be something special to get your readers involved. Well, from the wilds of inner city Glasgow comes an amphibian to show us all the way . Toad of Song, by Toad is a master of getting feedback from a notoriously reticent audience. See this post about Neds and this one on Calexico as an example of Toad at his best.
3. Everyone and their bloggin’ grannies posted about 9/11 on 9/11 and fair enough, it’s a big day if your an American. I tend to be suspicious of this day, because I think that the Right has been using it for political gain since it happened. But three bloggers really got to me, got past the cynicism that’s built up in me about this day in the seven years since. You may not want to think about it again, but I’ve got to give People in the Sun, Nitro Vista and Formerly Fun kudos for very different, yet very powerful 9/11 posts that didn’t make me want to click away as soon as I saw that it was a 9/11 post.
4. New discovery of the week: a fellow Floridian, a fellow expat, a fellow dweller Down Under – check out Florida Girl in Sydney. I’m still going through her archives, but am enjoying what I’m reading.
5. I hesitate to point you here because I’m cringing in anticipation of what is no doubt going to be a hefty dose of public humiliation. Maggie, damn her, gave my name to Brian as a potentially willing victim for his Fug Mug Friday this week. For some reason, I agreed to participate and sent Brian two photos that really shouldn’t see the light of day. I’m not sure which he chose, so I’ll be as surprised as you. Check Brian’s site and see if you can figure out which Fugly is your underwhelming correspondent.

Have a great weekend!

Hurray, hurrah! Mizzou! Mizzou!

Go Dawgs ! Sic ‘em!

—————————-

Wilco’s Being There, perhaps their finest, is available from .

Gregor Mendel, the father of modern genetics, started to study the mechanisms of heredity after observing variations in flower color in his garden pea plants. He began to notice patterns from season to season and ultimately was able to predict the frequency of one flower color occuring in subsequent generations versus another. What started with attention to detail ended up as a set of natural laws that still stand unchanged 150 years later.

It’s serendipitous discoveries, like Mendel’s peas,  that have driven most of the great scientific discoveries over time. Something can start off as a curiosity and evolve into a groundbreaking revelation. So, one, especially if that one is a geneticist, can’t help but swell with a bit of pride when sent a photo like this. My young son is clearly demonstrating a scientific curiosity and spectacular powers of observation. Maybe he’ll get that Nobel prize that his Papa fell (well) short of…

….or maybe not.

—————-

Ego bubble unceremoniously popped, I thought I would turn my narcissism outward and point you all at the folks that are doing this blogging thing better than I. I was talking to a friend about my apparent good karma today (let’s talk about that later) and I figure I better spread it around a bit to keep it coming. Here are some of my recent favorites:

Politics: If you’re not supplementing your election coverage with the Wonkette, then you’re taking this whole 2008 election far too seriously. While I occassionally disagree with their politics, the Wonkette folks are treating the race with just the right amount of gravitas.

Science: I tend to recoil from “old media” blogs, but Nature’s online commentary is excellent. The Great Beyond covers ‘hot’ science with just enough sarcasm and humour to keep it accessible and interesting. Nice work from the scientific “Grey Lady”.

Music: One of my favorite music bloggers these days is a 24 year old primary school teacher from Down Under. It’s a great statement about the democratization of media and I guess I’m just surprised that a school teacher has her fingers so perfectly on the pulse of new music. Impeccable taste and a way with words – check out Agnes at It All Started With Carbon Monoxide.

Personal: One blog that I’ve recently stumbled upon is really tickling my fancy lately. Formerly Fun is authored by a Southern California bikini waxer. If that doesn’t encourage you to give her a click then your priorities are all sorts of misplaced. She’s dead funny, prolific and spends just the right amount of time talking about mons pubis (or is that mons pubii?).

Wild Card: Finally, Garfield Minus Garfield. Ryan pointed me in the direction of this site which, as you may have guessed, is based on the hackneyed cat comic strip. Turns out that if you remove the title character, you go from having a fairly unfunny comic strip to a horse of an entirely different color. Garfield Minus Garfield is a portrait of the inner workings of one lonely, slightly disturbed, feline-less man. Even if you don’t like Garfield, especially if you don’t like Garfield – this one’s for you.

Wishing you a great weekend from Happy Valley.

———————

Update

While I’m spreading the love, I just have to point you to this post from one of my long-time favorites. Schadenfreude.

———————

The Dandy Warhols’ “Welcome to the Monkey House” is available from .

-Over the Rhine – “The Poopsmith Song”

The strains of preparing for a trans-continental move must be getting to me because I’m finding the blogging juices have run bone dry again at this week’s end. Dehisced, I’m resorting to miscellaneous tidbits again

First, an update on my quest for decent kids music. Dr. O’C hooked me up with a compilation from Nettwerk Records called “For The Kids Three”. It features kid-friendly songs from different indie artists – the likes of Moby, The Barenaked Ladies, Of Montreal and many more. I’ve posted a couple of my favorites – Over the Rhine’s “The Poopsmith Song” and Great Lake Swimmers’ “See You On The Moon”. Before listening to these, I’ve got to tell you that “The Poopsmith Song” is deviously catchy. Even if you don’t have kids it is very possible that you will wander around for the rest of the day singing “poop in the potty, poop goes in the potty”. You’ve been warned. Great Lake Swimmers‘ “See You On The Moon” is really the better song. I liked it so much that I went in search of more music from these guys. Their “proper” music is this wonderful nature inspired indie-folk – all banjo and acoustic guitar and glockenspiel. I tracked down Tony Dekker, the heart and soul of Great Lake Swimmers, and got him to sit down with me on the virtual coach for an interview. It’s up today at A Free Man – check it out!

———-

Maybe I should start a new feature, call it Lazy Ass Friday, in which I seek to entertain my gentle readers by sending them somewhere else.

1. Judgmental cat is unpleased
2. Let’s get something straight
3. Chaos Theory: March 2008
4. The Sacajawea Theory, v 2.0
5. Vacation, All I Ever Wanted; Vacation, Had To Get Away

——–

Excellence? Wow, after I just shifted all of my writing responsibility for the day to other bloggers? Well, fellow expat blogger (and fan of alliteration) Kathy at What Do I Know gives me more credit than I give to myself. Thanks, thoroughly thrilled and titillated. I’m meant to pass it on and I think I’ll go out on a limb and offer this award to someone I don’t know so well. Ray at Nitro Vista got a well deserved, and much sought after, “I fucking love you” review from the hard to please folks of Ask And Ye Shall Receive. He’s a fellow “daddy blogger” up in the wilds of a Wisconsin college town. He’s apparently also a Wilco fan and as any Wilco fan should, has a witty, wry way with words. He deserves this award much more than your underwhelming narrator.

“For The Kids Three” is available from Amazon.

-John Denver – “Leavin’ On A Jet Plane”

Actually none of that is true, but we do have our tickets. And Z has his passports. That Australian one is yummy – tastes like emu.

I’ve really not got not much to sat today, beyond a cute photo, so here are some of my favorite posts of the week from around the interwebs:

• I don’t like cricket. Oh no. I love it.
• Fate loves to screw with me.
• More about cockroaches.
• Peace the Spork Out Dungeon Master: Gary Gygax: 1938-2008.
• NAFTA Talk Started With Hilary.

———————————

Aha, Alice saves the day by tagging me for a Best Of meme. Apparently it refers to the best of me. Thanks, Alice, that’s my favorite subject!

** Post about the meme and link back to the person who tagged you.
** Go back to your archives and link to your five favorite posts.
•Link One: must be about family
•Link Two: must be about friends
•Link Three: must be about yourself
•Link Four: must be about something you love
•Link Five: can be anything you choose

** Tag five other people (at least two must be new acquaintances so that you can get to know them better).

Here are my choices:

1. On family: The Alice’s Restaurant Anti-Masacreed Movement
2. On friends: Berries and the nomadic lifestyle
3. About me: How do you afford your rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle
4. About something I love: Good Morning Son, I Am A Bird
5. Wildcard: Hello, I’m Johnny Cash…

I don’t typically tag, because I’m a party pooper. But this is the second meme in a row that has been a godsend on days where the creative juices were running a bit dry. I won’t tag, but will tap gently on the shoulder The Vol Abroad, Okay, Fine, Dammit, Malfeasance, Jessie and The Busy Dad Blog.

——————–

I am featuring tracks by two new (to me) bands today. Larsen & Furious Jane came highly recommended by Steve Adams of The Broken Family Band. “Australia” is from their 2004 record “I’m Glad He’s Dead”. Me First and the Gimme Gimmes’ cover of “Leaving on a Jet Plane” is one of the best I’ve heard. Discovered them here.

——————–

Finally, here’s the convoluted route we’ll be taking to Oz next month…