KerrieJean.com

Talk about high pressure…..nervy, nervy, NERVY, fraught fraught, FRAUGHT…..just awful to watch……

Do you realise just how many 40 to 60 year old women throughout Australia are wilting under the pressure of the end of high school exams?

They can’t sleep, they’re in counselling, they’re forgetting to take their hormone replacement pills but – thankfully - they haven’t forgotton to already slate work days off for the Higher School Certificate….

They are driving me stark raving mad……..

*Mummy booked a seat but they wouldn’t let her in…… (cr jackhynes:flickr)

Today, a heartfelt appeal to mothers of HSC candidates…..Yes, it may hurt, Yes, you may deem me cold and bitchy - you may even claim that the unfecund KJ has NO right to weigh in BUT I’m gunna and my message is simple:

GET A GRIP, GROW UP…….

This is how my HSC Year panned out 35 years ago at the academic centre of excellence, Leeton High School. Yes, YES I know that no-one there had forked out $150,000 for a desk - and another $30,000 for ’extras’ like wiping bum classes and excursions to Salzburg.

But still, I was under NO illusions that the HSC was for sissies.

Take Miss Penny  – Subject:  English: Blonde, great legs, disporter of one of the best ensembles I have - to this very day - ever seen: Paisley baby doll top, matching mini-skirt with flounce.

KJ, There is NOTHING in the book suggesting that Mr Darcy was grappling with his sexuality……NOTHING!! This is the HSC, THE HSC……

…..Or Mr Schofield, ‘Scoffy’ – Subject: Economics: Passionate teacher, weight issues.

KJ, While I can’t see you ever ending up in The Treasury, this is the HSC, THE HSC……

With just one month to go before the HSC, a light went on in KJ’s head and she pulled it in…..

This is the HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC, THE HSC……

Overnight, with Gwennie’s support, our big lammie table was turned into KJ’s This Is The HSC Tri-Polar Campaign headquarters – open for business 24 hours. Gwennie immediately came up with her HSC Strategic Plan. We immediately conceded Level 3 Maths and Science but deemed that a full-on assault on The Humanities would disprove the vocational guidance officer, Mr Kusiak’s, hunch:

You’re a caring girl, I’m suggesting kennel maid .

What happened during the This Is The HSC, THE HSC Tri-Polar Campaign was simultaneously magnificent – and wretched.  Gwennie did all she can in the way of support facilities. I had an ‘in’ plastic washing basket for urgent topics under study – and an ‘out’ plastic washing basket to keep track of what I’d had a brief look at.

Meanwhile, Gwennie was making confident predictions based on her forensic study of the This is the HSC, THE HSC  papers of the last decade.

KJ, my latest stats show the American Civil War was big in 1966, ‘68, ‘70, ‘72……..IT’LL BE BIG AGAIN IN ‘74. GO FOR IT KJ, GO FOR IT!!!!

All day and night, Gwennie worked on her 1974 HCS Statistical Probably of Questions (SPQ) Strategy, stopping only to make the occasional egg flip*.

Karl Marx - Conspicuous Consumption and Super Normal Profits. Gee whizz KJ, already stinkin’ rich and they want more - 98.9% chance of question.

Monotremes – dead cert – 100%.

Masai tribesmen  - Gee KJ, didn’t know they drank blood milkshakes  – 95%.

Snowy Mountains Scheme - Beauty KJ, ya know all about that already – NO Snowy, NO irrigation, NO  Leeton, NO US! - 99%.

Gwennie’s HSC SPQ worked beautifully.  HSC Candidate KJ was ready to pounce on only 4.8% of the curriculum – but, by God, it was the right 4.8%.

Throughout the This is the HSC, THE HSC Tri-polar Campaign of ‘74, Gwennie remained approachable and loving.

She said that kennnel maids sometimes had to put dogs down: something that if I had to do, SHE’D find too distressing.

If things things don’t go well in the HSC, we’ll just set up our headquarters again next year, yes we will……..

*Quick, nutritous, good for ‘nervy’ tummies.

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Our trigger words - generated exclusively by The Macquarie: Australia’s National Dictionary. Pushy + obsessed + parents, excellence, exams, pressure, Tri-Polar, ambition, statistics, private + schools, living, loving, learning.

****THE KEV THE KANGA CHRONICLES: THE GINGER MAN*****

BOING, BOING, BOING……….

Adventure with The Ginger Man all this week (with specially selected soundtrack) as he and Kev The Kanga BOING through the National Capital.

Who will survive, who will be the NEXT victim of one of the features of our treasured Coat-Of-Arms?

Kev The Kanga will be BOING-ING thoughout the comments section all this week.

cr:thoughtcrime: flickr

******ALL commenters go for it!! Just click on the ‘comment’ thingo and follow the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the URL thingo – just ignore it.

While I have never got on well with bosses, I do pride myself on being a reasonably hard worker. I turn up, I smile and because it’s Radio National, I’ll even occasionally demonstrate unbounded enthusiasm by yelling across the office:

That’s a bloody good IDEA Sonia, a bloody good idea. Well done you Sonia, well done you!!!!

But, I have NOT always been SO engaged, SO productive…..

The reality is that once I had a job which I made a total hash of……

(cr: here’s kate: flickr)

I’ve already told you that my first attempt at tertiary education ended in disgrace after just three weeks.

In the emotional chaos that followed I, like Spider-Man, eventually had to land somewhere. KJ lobbed right onto the fringes of Sydney, right into the book stacks of The HG Daley Library in Campbelltown. The book lover had suddenly turned professional: Library Assistant Grade 19.

From day one, my new job was wrong, DEAD WRONG……. 

For starters, I thoroughly enjoy working with men, NEVER following the ‘no office romance’ rule (I ask you: where else is IT gonna come from?) 

At the library, fifteen women with absolutely NO control over their body temperatures: the fertile, the peri-menopausal, the peri-very menopausal, the paused-menopausal, the obviously-stark-raving mad-menopausal, the poste-haste-menopausal, the post-way-past-the-post-menopausal……..

Head Librarian, Mavis Shipton, was also dealing with personal climate change dramas but she determined  NOT to let biological determinism get in her way…..

Mrs Shipton quickly realised that her new Library Assistant Grade 19 – while having a stable body temperature - was worse than hopeless……

KJ, you MUST collect overdue fees, you must….

But Mrs Shipton, Hec always told me: ‘Never ask anyone for money.’ I CANNOT demand (even without menaces) 15 cents from pensioners….I just CANNOT.

KJ, I’ve also been told that NO matter how much you are shown, NO matter how hard you try, you are a book DESTROYER and we all know what history tells us about those…..

….You CANNOT cover a book, you have no control over the material loved and respected by all true librarians, ‘contact’. Bubble wrap, bubble wrap, BUBBLE WRAP - you are, by default, a book bubble wrapper, bubble wrapper, BUBBLE WRAPPER….!!

Because of my bright personality, Mrs Shipton decided the community would be best served if I was out of the library -  spreading the joys of the written word to the poor, the disenfranchised, the infirm. Only problem - a Bookmobile operator needed a driver’s licence.

Enter Leslie Lennox, the only man in Australia who used a Valiant Charger at his owner-operated precision Driving School……

The reason being KJ if you can park THIS, control THIS on the open road, you can drive anything……

Leslie found it hard to concentrate on the job at hand. He was all fired up. For these were turbulent times in Australian political history.

That Malcolm Fraser is a turd……that John Kerr is a turd……they’ re all turds KJ…..WATCH OUT!!! WATCH OUT KJ!!! Boy Oh Boy, that was close!!! In fact, I can’t think of bigger turds …..WATCH OUT, WATCH OUT!!!!!!

I NEVER took the wheel of the Campbelltown Community Bookmobile……

Meanwhile, the workplace pressures intensified…….. 

But there were some bright spots. I had a couple of innocent dates with a handsome, self-possessed fella who turned up at the library announcing: I am the Council’s first Community Social Planner.

The library ladies flushed and blushed on my behalf……..

They even arranged a special ‘welcome honey’ night out for THE Social Planner – drinks at a well-known bikie pub. In the car after, silence. Mr Social Planner – who was to go onto a stellar career as an ALP politician – knew that campaign posters of him sitting around a bikie pub with the library ladies wasn’t quite the thing. 

I called a halt to my library career before Mrs Shipton had the chance to. I’m a unionist but – in relation to me  - I really think she would have had a case.

All things considered, the library ladies were very kind, very understanding…

I was 18, Dewey Decimal STRICT ORDERING incapable, subsisting on Woolies ham steaks, pineapple and coleslaw in a downtown flatette and was on my fifth cycle of reading every Mills and Boons – Scoop me up, gently brush my bosom and take me away from all this Tristan – EVER published.

My farewell? A beautiful night out (hubbies included) crawling the strip joints of Kings Cross.  

The Campbelltown Library Ladies taught me one great lesson:

THINGS AIN’T ALWAYS WHAT THEY SEEM…….

* Trigger words: Libraries, wrong job, job anxiety, books, wonderful weirdos…….and speaking of them, please report in on anything happening (appalling or wondrous) on your patch.  Particularly interested in anyone who’s sighted Malcolm T of late – how’s he bearing up in the flesh?

(cr: capn mad matt: flickr)

* And congratulations to The Ginger Man. He ran himself ragged during Science Week for the groundbreaking ‘Klytorian Chronicles’ but he’s still up and at it – ON THE ROAD AGAIN! You’d be a fool unto yourself NOT to follow his adventures in the comments section.

Thank you Walter Burley Griffin, thank you……

Now, most folks know you as the genius who gave us The Rev Kev’s Kingdom but how many people know that Leeton also came tumbling off your drawing board when the Foundation Dreamers of the Murrumbigee Irrigation Area realised towns would be needed to service the salinity?

BUT even less people are aware of your greatest legacy:

Undisputedly, Australia’s BEST Lapping Circuit……

*Definition: Lapping, Lapping The Main: The long-practised ritual in Australian country towns where young people in motor vehicles spend up to 16 hours at a time driving up and down main streets. Viewed as ‘moronic’ by Non-Lappers and carbon emissions alarmists.

 (cr: ekpatterson:flickr)

I am a Lapper. Always have, aways will be. I KNOW what makes for great Lapping and so did you Mr WB Griffin.

Goddammit! I’m gonna make those Leeton kids Goddamm love me…..I’m gonna make their Goddamm main street, Pine Avenue, a duel carriageway. And Goddammit, I’m gonna plonk a big War Memorial at one end where Lappers can pay their respects AND then whizz up the other side of the street, execute a nifty turn at the other end…..and God bless ‘em – Goddammit! - they can do it all again and again and again……

BUT, with respect Mr WGB, it’s NOT that simple. Let’s go Lapping Pine Avenue on Saturday night and I’ll show you why………

First, meet Warren. He’s an apprentice fitter and turner at the Cannery. Handsome in a next-door-bar-one sort of way. Gwennie says Warren’s okay -  seems to have his head screwed on unlike those parents of his…….

Warren’s payin’ off a car: A basic bench-seated Holden Kingswood with superb engine and exhaust modifications all done for nought in the Cannery machine workshop. The Kingie is NO longer a serviceable family car: It is a loud, heaving, powerful, ozone layer destroying beast. 

It is the PERFECT Lapping Vehicle……….

Warren and me are goin’ good, real good. Warren has been looking for a girl not too up herself to enjoy Lapping. Ditto for a girl who doesn’t yap too much while Lapping is underway.

I understand. A man who’s Lapping has much on his mind. For starters, real Lappers drive with only one hand. The other elbow is nonchantly rested out the window. However, when there’s a tricky manoeuvre to be executed - perhaps an angry burnout after bowling over a pensioner at the pedestrian crossing or negotiating the ‘death’ swoop around the War Memorial - two hands come into play.

It is in the moment before that second elbow returns to its traditional Lapping configuration, that a quick feel up is most likely to happen.

And let it be said: NOTHING comes close to a mid-Lapping feel up… dangerous, urgent, a rare and exciting mix of the public and private spheres….

And a good Lapping sess is organic…..one lap quickly becomes fifty, fifty eighty, eighty 456, 456 -789……… 

Up Pine Avenue – Gee, it’s a bit rough outside the pub – Around the monument – Why is just about everyone up there called Harold? - (Engine Roar!) Down the other side of Pine Avenue -Take a look at that, what a tart!….. (Threatened Burnout!)  ’U-ey’ chucked - Gee, that was close Warren -  (Muffler – what muffler?!!) Up the OTHER side of Pine Avenue – Around the monument – Rest Easy Harolds – (Roar, roar, ROAR) - SUDDEN Halt. Classic ’standing’ start (ROAR, ROAR!) Dislocated neck….

You right babe?

Yes, thank you Warren, I’m good……….

And why wouldn’t I be?  Safe in The Kingie….with a boy with only one (intermittently) available hand, safe from the nuns and their poking and prodding and mascara-hating ways, safe from four sisters hellbent on telling everyone that I’ve moved into DD bras……

By the way, it is those same sisters who whenever we’re home……..always ask: Wanna do a Lap KJ, wanna do a Lap? 

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So..as always….do report in. Trigger words: Lapping, Kingswood, Safety, Tart, Double D, Single-Handed – and any others that get you going from our sponsor The Macquarie: Australia’s National Dictionary.

SCIENCE WEEK WITH THE GINGER MAN ON KERRIEJEAN.COM

Absolutely thrilled to report that the ABC has appointed the The Ginger Man as an official ambassador for Science Week.

All this week The Ginger Man will, though his KLYTORIAN CHRONICLES, will continue to push the parameters of what surely will become Australia’s hottest Scientific Debate.

Does Klytoria Exist?

Has Klytoria finally been located?

Should Klytorian doubters be heard?

*The Ginger Man’s Science Week Klytorian Special is accessible in the comments section

******ALL commenters go for it!! Just click on the ‘comment’ thingo and follow the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the URL thingo – just ignore it.

…..The existing sex education programme is farcical, biased and unreal….an atmosphere of fear and disgust is produced by emphasising venereal disease and society’s view of the unspeakable three-letter word……here women run the gauntlet of inhibition or guilt…….

(From Leeton High’s School’s student newspaper, INK, 1973)

Needless to tell you, an almighty stir erupted. For a young Revolutionary had arrived in our town, lobbing right into the halls of secondary learning. His writings were deemed nothing less than an explosive combo of pox and politics - and his name was Mr Graham Manners.

Cr: sponng:flickr

The son of the new Rural Bank manager, Mr Manners was of superb dimensions – gangly, long straight hair framing a pasty, delicate face…….

In February, it’s hot in Leeton – Hot, Hot, HOT…..

And so it was that during one stinking lunch break, Mr Manners – armed with a rolled up copy of Direct Action - approached me while I was feeding the carp in the shade of Leeton High’s ornamental pond.

As a representative of THE Patriachy, I could very well understand if your first inclination is to feed me to the carp……but I would very much like to get to know you…..UNDERSTAND your twin passions, caked on mascara AND the writings of Marvell……Had we but world enough and time, your coyness lady were no crime……

Oh Mr Manners…The grave’s a fine and private place…….But none, I think, do there embrace……

And so it was that two awkward Marvell afficionados came together…….

Mr Manners thrilled me with his new ways of thinking….and doing.

Only once, did I end up in his cell on top of the bank. While I sat nervily on the edge of his single bed – with its hammer and sickle spread - Mr Manners showed me his artworks.

Currently, I am working in MANURE……

Before me, four or five substantial canvasses with big plops of dried cow poo stuck on them.

Gee, I’ve never seen cow shit on the VERTICAL before….NEVER!!

Exactly my point KJ, EXACTLY my point…..!

Another time, Mr and Mrs Awkward – Leeton’s undisputed candidates for The Melonomas Most Likely  – decided on a rare excursion to the local pool.

You are my little WHITE soggy Post-Colonial bread roll KJ………AND I am your Post-Colonial soggy HOT DOG roll………..

Afterwards, lying on our towels under the palm trees, I said something silly, inappropriate: 

In line of what you wrote in INK, I won’t mind if you move a little closer, my soggy hot dog roll…..I won’t mind a bit….

Silence. Mr Manners blushed, quickly rolling onto his stomach. I continued to suck on my raspberry Scrummie.

I don’t think you could say that Mr and Mrs Awkward were exactly enjoying their time together.

Mr Marvell would have been disappointed……..

For to hold hands, let alone go the pash, was becoming increasingly impossible. WILD expectations could never be met….wild nerves, never curtailed. 

In their minds, the soggy bread rolls were certain that Godeldrie Weir’s floodgates would burst at the slightest touch. 

Reality screamed a different headline: Two Scungy Skinnybuns Too Nervy To Get Past First Base. 

So Godeldrie Weir, like me, remained intact.

Don’t know what your future brought, my Sweet Revolutionary.

In the spirit of Leeton High’s motto, Quinon Profict Deficit  (He Who Does Not Advance Goes Backwards), off you went to a bigger bedroom above a bigger bank well before the HSC.

Or, how about something simpler….?

Lovely, that’s what you were…..

 ****************************************************************************

Well, sentimental or what!? I’m feelin’ it…….I really am…..choked up…..I’ll let you on a secret…….when I’m feelin’ like this, I NEVER eat until at least midday – can’t face solids………

Anyway, enough of me, what about YOU? Thanks to everyone who lobs in – we ain’t in the mood for gettin’ closed down, nosiree!!!

New posters, most welcome. I’ll re-phrase that: TREASURED!!! Trigger words: revolutionary, awkward, love, opinion, Malcolm, different, school mottos…..and millions of others. *Remember the House Rule though: Trigger words have to be in The Macquarie: Australia’s NATIONAL Dictionary.

(cr: jumpinglab: flickr).

To say TGM NEVER stops would be a gross understatement.

While our very own ball of love, The Chief Monk of the Gundagai Whirling Dervish Monastery, waits for Lord Ginge to re-appear, TGM has created his own special brand of action down Leeton way.

The Ginger Man is whirling, whirling….The Five Super Puppies and Fingo likewise……..

But this time, has our Obsessive-Compulsive-Bi-Polar-Borderline adventurer gone TOO far?

 ….Follow The Ginger Man Chronicles in the comments section.

  ******ALL commenters go for it!! Just click on the ‘comment’ thingo and follow the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the URL thingo – just ignore it

Nervy, nervy, nervy……. that’s how I was when my first chief-of-staff, the late, great Peter Cullen bellowed across the newsroom:

KJ, you’ve got your first ball-tearing, BALL-TEARING yarn……

A couple of old kooks at Windang have rung in. They reckon they’ve just come real, REAL close to having their heads cut off by an identified fast-flying object.

AND bugger me KJ, BUGGER ME…..the kooks say the mystery missile is lodged fair and square in their fridge. Bugger me……BUGGER ME…….  

cr: naslrogues:flickr

And so it was that Pete sent me on my first outside assignment: meaning I was leaving the Illawarra Mercury suites with photographer.  

….One time Illawarra Escarpment Photographer-Of-The-Year, Greg, fanged The Mercury car, a converted highway patrol panel van, out to suburban Windang.

He was the only man I’d ever seen precision drive, read a UBD, talk back to base on the two-way – number six, race seven, Kembla Grange, got that? – smoke, hoe into a bacon and egg burger and push film into a camera similtaneously.

BUT this time, Greg had pushed his multi-skilling too far, too far…….

He’d failed to factor in  – Bugger me KJ, how did I know? – that the Windang kooks were fixing an urgent ’seppie’ tank problem. So, when Greg roared up their driveway…..Bang, Bang, BANG, Shiiit KJ, SHIIIIT, SHIIIIIIIIT!!!!!……our vessel of professional conveyance (with wheels smoking) ended up in a ditch.

With my first time outside job demeanour threatening to explode into a fully-blown nervy episode, Greg pulled me out the driver’s door: We’ll worry about THIS later – in the meantime, THERE’S WORK TO BE DONE!

Inside the modest cottage, the Windang kooks were bolt upright (and white-faced) around their lammie table. Behind them, THE fridge with what appeared to be a propeller off a regional haul Fokker Friendship lodged in it.

My notes from my first outside job said this:

Two nice people. Ces, retired steelworker. Joanie, homemaker. Enjoying a luncheon of cold cuts – salad loaf and corned beef - purchased from Franklins, Kanahooka. Terrible sound of kitchen window smashing. Metal missile with distinctive blades hurtling through. Ces ducks.  Joanie, ditto. Horrible sound of metal on metal as missile ploughs into Kelvinator (single door, nicely maintained….just like Gwennies). Ces and Joanie – no known enemies. Why do bad things happen to good people? Very big story…VERY BIG…..won’t be able to write anything……..I don’t have the words, I DON’T HAVE THE WORDS……. 

CES: (Still in shock)…..So, so……what has h’h'h’happened to me and Joanie?

ME: No idea Ces, but I promise you….I will NOT sleep, Pete Cullen will NOT sleep, Greg will NOT sleep until we can look you in the eye and tell you WHY a near-miss-double-decapitation destroyed your retirement dreams TODAY.

With that, Greg snapped 345 frames of a shocked Ces cradling a shocked Joanie near the jinxed Kelvinator.

Over the next two hours hours, I could do nothing but observe journalism practised at its highest levels.

Greg and me got a cab back to The Mercury suites. Re the van in the ’seppie’ ditch, Pete quickly called in a favour from a local tow truck operator. All fixed, ALL fixed……

Soon he was poring over the negatives of the killer Kelvinator. Bugger me, bugger me……..It’s a ball tearer, it’s a BALL-TEARER of a yarn KJ….BALL-TEARER……

After calling in a favour from a top steelworks engineer, a triumphant Peter was yelling down the newsroom……..

CASE SOLVED, CASE SOLVED. Stinkin’ hot day, stinkin’ hot day…..

Can ya believe it? 

IT’S a blade from a bloody big industrial air-conditioner……zeeee, zeeeee, zeeeee, zeeeee, zeee….IPPPPPPPPPPP, IPPPPPPPPPP………

SHE’S DISLODGED!!!!! 

Off she goes, OFF she goes……SHE’s a weapon…….SHE’S pickin’ UP speed…..over Port Kembla, over Cringila, WATCH OUT Dapto….

SHE’S losin’ height over WINDANG…….WATCH OUT Ces and Joanie……WATCH OUT, God Arrr-gie, GOD Arr-gie………

Pete banged out the story – in four minutes max.

‘Hard to find the words for what happened to a couple of gentle folk enjoying lunch in peaceful Windang, yesterday……..’

I’ll give ya the by-line KJ……I’ll give ya the by-line…….just get those nerves under control, and you’ll be okay, you’ll be okay…….swear to God ya will….

THE END

So, in line with our new modis operandi: NO questions……just a couple of trigger words – first day on the job, mystery, propeller, unexpected, near-miss, decapitation. Ignore at your pleasure – Your little life report backs are treasured. As I always say…….you gotta say something or THEY’LL close us down…….

THE GINGER MAN……

 (cr: Rubber Slippers in Italy: flickr)  

***** Meanwhile, our obsessive-compulsive adventurer, The Ginger Man, is on the case again with ’The Mount Yodel Chronicles’.  An explosive combination of folkloric art, mystery and contemporary hi-jinks. Follow the excitement in the comments section.

******ALL commenters go for it!! Just click on the ‘comment’ thingo and follow the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the URL thingo – just ignore it