I bring dire news. The Waiters Restaurant seems to be sliding downhill. This has been a regular haunt of mine for over a decade now, and what it lost in cramped surroundings it made up for in atmosphere and the food. Ooh, the food. But last Thursday night a bunch of us trooped along for ... [More]
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Memo to self
INTERNAL MEMORANDUM DATE: 18/10/2003 FROM: Daniel Bowen TO: Daniel Bowen SUBJECT: Door to door When allowing house to bask in warm weather on a gloriously sunny Saturday morning, keep security door locked as defence against door to door sellers. Note poor visibility through security door for those looking in, reasonable visibility when looking out. Use ... [More]
The sun setting behind Melbourne Central last night. Click for the full size image. (Yes, that is the reflection of my hand you can see).
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Horn habits
Yesterday I used my car horn in anger. I was merrily driving down the road. The sun was shining, the road was almost clear of traffic; it could have been a car commercial, apart from the fact that my car is 10 years old and has started making that noise again – insert rant about ... [More]
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Melbourne Central wants your money
Now I wouldn’t normally mix business with pleasure like this, but I can imagine a lot of Melbourne people will be affected by this. Melbourne Central, in their wisdom, have decided that people getting off trains and going about their business do so far too easily, and they’d like to send them on a merry ... [More]
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Zzzzzzzzzzzzz
I promise, I tried to get to bed early last night. It had been a long day. I tried. Didn’t quite make it, but I’ve had later bedtimes on work nights, so there you go. Anyway I was happily snoozing, until I suddenly woke. Outside it was light. I lay there for a minute or ... [More]
Sweating today at work. Damn the air-conditioning for breaking down on a warm day. But it was a good excuse to go out for a walk in the glorious sunshine and get some fresh (well apart from the traffic fumes and the occasional passing smoker, cough, cough) air. If it’s like this tomorrow maybe I’ll ... [More]
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Booting the car
So I was going to run some errands in the car, and I thought hey: it’s about time I checked the oil. After all, it’s been a while, and I’m in no hurry for more credit card crippling repairs like last year, caused in part by leaking oil. So I reach under the seat to ... [More]
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Three-quarters of a diary entry
Had to laugh when looking through the paper today I found an advert for K-Mart. "Men’s 3/4 length pants" it said: "25% off!" Yup. Makes sense. My tea mug at work is rather less than spotless. It seems to have various ingrained stains around the inside. Evidently no amount of scrubbing with a soapy brush ... [More]
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Media circus
Public Transport Users Ass? Daniel, dammit, my name is DANIEL. I know I said I’d stop talking about this, but it’s too freaky not to mention. 1:15, I said I’d meet them. A couple of friendly journalists,going to a ministerial press conference, wanted to talk to me afterwards. As I walked the two blocks to ... [More]
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Hot chocolate for comments
Decorative, and safe as well: Condom flowers As the lines between new media (and I’m specifically talking about the web here) and old media start to blur, one might expect to see some of the attributes of the old starting to sneak through into the new. Like product endorsement, for example. Could this happen? Quite ... [More]
Tony Abbott has beenappointed the new head-kicking Minister for Health, and is getting a baptism of fire with the current debate over hospital funding and medical indemnity. So with that in mind, here is a short rant about health insurance from Daniel Bowen, private citizen. I have private health insurance. Government policy practically makes it ... [More]
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Patron of the arts
It’s about a year since, after being refused a Foxtel connection, I decided to patronisePBS-FM for a year by subscribing. Now it’s up for renewal, and I’m considering how I want to spend my minority arts budget this year. A lot has changed in the past year, and these days I find that at home ... [More]
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Mind-numbingly dull
Thank goodness The Batchelor 3 has finished. Now that was a show that I found seriously boring. I had to sit through it waiting for the Sopranos or Six Feet Under to start. And I don’t actually watch those shows when they’re on – no, I tape them and watch them later in the week. ... [More]
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On the road to Domesti City
Yesterday another step on the long road to domesticity. Brace yourself for a shock. My friends will think it’s trick photography: me mowing the grass. Are you sufficiently braced? Okay. I did gardening. After a few subtle hints of the "Hey Daniel, did you mow the lawn yet?" type recently from various people, I finally ... [More]
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Carn the Lions (just this once)
The big men fly in the Grand Final. (Pic: ABC News online/Getty Images) I thought a lot about which team to support in theGrand Final. Eventually I concluded I must by default go for the Brisbane Lions, because I could not support Collingwood for the following reasons: firstly and foremost, they are Collingwood. You either ... [More]