mislaid my phone

This has happened before, it's interesting isn't it? Particularly when you're not sure if you've outright lost it or you've just put it down somewhere. I am going to go to work shortly and see if I left it there when I was there this morning. It would be just my luck if I saw a grisly accident or John Pesutto (I know, I know, same thing) and wasn't able to photograph it. 

Here's something I saw this morning, an episode of Division 4 from 1969 where a couple in the dingiest home imaginable are about to be evicted. Of course the home is in a reclamation area. I was thinking perhaps Atherton Gardens though the more I look at that building in the background the more I think perhaps not. That's irritating as it being Atherton Gardens would really suit a lecture I'm giving next week but I suppose I'll find a way to make it apt. 

Update: you'll be relieved to hear it was in the car. 

Stay tuned for more exciting news tomorrow when something equally thrilling is bound to happen. 

happy sixtieth birthday brett climo

 

I vaguely recall meeting Brett Climo. I think it's possible that he was the guy who I interviewed at Bondi Beach, we did a photo session at Bondi, and some old women came up to him and said 'we love you! Who are you?'

Anyway, he played Michael Langley in A Country Practice from '87-89, I'm fairly sure that's why I did this. What it was for I'm not sure but what's anything for? 

the more i learn, the less i know

Just looking at whatever I can find about islands off the coast of the state of Victoria, I noticed a file regarding a query about sale of 'Brilla Island' in the PROV listings. I didn't know where on earth this Brilla Island was, but I figured this was the way to find out whatever there was to find out about it. I won't go into extensive detail about the people involved (although I did try to find the main correspondent in the newspapers in the 70s and 80s and got nowhere) but the point is a person, I assume a man, who lived in suburban Melbourne, let's say East Bentleigh, wrote asking to buy or lease Brilla Island from the Department of Crown Lands and Survey in late 1971.

They wrote, 'The reason for my interest in this small piece of land is that I have lived in the vicinity of Western Port Bay for the majority of my life. Also having owned land on French Island as well as my parents and brother.

'I am very interested in the conservation of Western Port Bay. We have a boat and do quite a lot of fishing and cruising in Western Port Bay.' 

Answer came back (January the following year, which was fine, because the original letter was in December), no we can't sell or lease this island to you. 

So where is Brilla Island? It's right there, the red bit, at the northern point (more or less) of French Island. 

 The weird bit is when you go looking for that on regular maps because there's only this:

And the weird thing about that is when you try searching for this name anywhere else. Because you won't get that. You'll get this:

To add to the weirdness of the whole, a search on all the newspapers in newspapers.com brings up precisely nothing about Brilla, Barralliar, or Barrallier islands except this snippet from the Sporting Globe in 1939:

And a search on the internet generally for 'Brilla Island' brings up this and this alone - from the Victorian Government Gazette for 25 September 1874, which incidentally is exactly 150 years and one day from the day I'm writing this:

So I guess it's, like, a super obscure island or something, and I guess they, well, they changed its name sometime between 1972 and now. 

I have to get on to Wikipedia and add the snippet about Brilla Island though actually before I do that I'd like to find out more about when and why it was changed. 

Then of course I'll see if I can buy it. 

it was certainly a day

So it has been a weird couple of weeks in the sense that firstly I stopped my long association with Duolingo, and that feels like a bit of a loss, and also the Little Dum Dum Club, which is a podcast I've been listening to for over a decade now, perhaps a slightly guilty pleasure and tbh also not always a pleasure, ended, suddenly and without warning (another tbh: I had been considering possibly it was time for me to stop listening, because I felt either it was losing its mojo or I was losing the mojo to listen to it). So... things which anchored me, are a little bit absent. 

Today I went to the SLV to look at some stuff I'd ordered. I am doing a conference paper about Island City, which was proposed to be built off the coast of South Melbourne for a brief period of time, then axed in an instant once the plans were released (February 1974). I was looking into some of the conservationist/activist groups around at that time and I checked this out. 

I do recall the controversy around the building of the Newport Power Station, which is of course a very real thing today and just sitting there on the banks of the Yarra not greatly upsetting anyone anymore. This publication, amongst other things, raises the case that I well remember for the 'heat bubble', the upshot of which seemed to me then and still seems this way now, to have been a warning to the comfortable and smug eastern suburbanites not to get too 'it's out of sight, should also be out of mind' about this structure because it was going to pollute the east. I don't really know if this happened. 

This: 

is a cool diagram someone spent a lot of time on in the mid-70s, and they published it in this newsletter:

I love the idea that there was a publication called Beach Use. The above is as glossy as it got (with the printed, um, letterhead? of the first page, and the rest I guess roneo'd or something. Anyway, pretty cool. 

Speaking of beach use, I saw a bit of Jacinta Allen promo today that talked about a young-ish man who was walking the length of all of Melbourne's 600km of railway to raise money for cancer research (I think), and it mentioned he walked to Stony Point from, I assume, central Melbourne and I thought well I wonder how long that would take. So I looked it up on mapsonmyphone and got this: 

Yes, according to mapsonmyphone the only way to walk to Stony Point from the CBD is via Phillip Island. Does that make sense to you? I wanted to set it to go via Hastings (for instance) but it wouldn't countenance that as a possibility. Anyway it's nonsense but there you go. 

Other things that happened today - I went shopping for my mother, who has covid (she feels fine). I had work meetings and listened to an interview with Sam Prekop, who I like, and also Marc Maron's interview with Elizabeth Olsen, which was a very enjoyable listen, actually. I also did admin and tied up some loose ends on a new book chapter that's coming out soon. 

So, it was certainly a day. 

 

bye duolingo

Weird goings on with Duolingo. I am sure I have mentioned that I was tired of using it, as it served me up the same stuff every day in a passive-aggressive way and clearly did not have any new vocab beyond what it took to jump through all the hoops. I decided to end my subscription. 

It kept me on, transferring me to the free version, then suddenly started giving me really difficult exercises, of either things I've forgotten because they were so long ago, or things I'd never actually seen before, can't remember obviously. I was then told I had run out of 'hearts' which might be a thing on the free version but was never a thing on the paid version. I wasn't going to pay, so I ended my streak. There you go!!!

Meanwhile, Drops, which you may recall was the app I chose instead of duolingo, is also putting me through my paces but I have paid a subscription to Drops for life, so as long as they don't suddenly put a ceiling on what they choose to present to me, I think I will continue to get a lot out of them. 

Of course, apps aren't the be all and end all. I am going to have to start being a bit more proactive about teaching myself Finnish if I'm going to be fluent by the time I'm 85. That doesn't leave much time. 

laura's launch

I am torn between a strong desire to commemorate Laura's extraordinary achievement as author and publisher of Making the Shrine which was launched during the week, and a strong reticence to look like I'm basking in someone else's glory. I don't bask! Let's just say that the book is being exceptionally well received (I won't say that was predictable; sometimes people just don't know what's good, much less good for them); it's a modern classic, I've heard, and well, I knew that. 

The launch itself went beautifully, and I think many attendees enjoyed the event possibly in a comparable fashion to which they will enjoy the book. Laura has been through the wringer but she would have deserved the success even if she hadn't been, because the book is incredible. I have probably already gone into boring detail about how it's wrong, wrong wrong to be proud of what someone else did, so let's just make the point that it's an amazing achievement and also that you can buy your own copy here and why on earth wouldn't you!? 

flagstaff hotel #2

Went past the former Flagstaff Hotel a couple of days ago and got a shot of what is probably the only remaining element of the deco detailing, I am referring to the bit between the 'window' below (with the gruesome artefacts) and the rollerdoor. I don't know what you call that but I assume it has no function, and it wasn't removed because why bother (and I suppose if you removed it you'd have to put something else there instead to stop the rain getting in). I could be wrong but looking at this picture now I think I can see some words above that window, perhaps the word 'Hotel'? Probably. 

So what's here is hideous but I had a little browse through the newspapers and it would seem that in the early 90s the block was slated to become a high-rise (ten storey?) apartment block, that didn't happen clearly, I am ambivalent about whether that would have been a better outcome than Witches in Britches, I mean this is an ugly building now, but its former incarnation wasn't that delightful (can't speak for what it looked like originally, it certainly has the dimensions of a 19th century hotel). 

the flagstaff hotel, who knew

...a lot of people probably but I didn't. I have started (gulp) watching Division 4. This is an establishing shot from the episode 'Night Out', first broadcast in (I think) April 1969. 

Witches in Britches hides in plain sight. It never occurred to me to wonder what the building was before it was whatever it is now, I guess if challenged I'd imagine it was some kind of warehouse, I don't know why. I've never been inside but I wonder if there's anything appealingly deco about the inside or whether the exterior, obviously now completely destroyed, was just a hack piece of modernisation. 

flook in the second half of september 1954

 

scrounge lizard

 

I wanted to tell you about this shop (which isn't a shop anymore) in Preston. The internet doesn't say much about it except that it was a recycled furniture store between 1994-2005. I was told, or perhaps I got confused or am misremembering, that the shop's logo is an early piece of Philip Brophy design from the 1970s. I will look into that further perhaps as I recall who told me and I can ask them again. Ok talk then. 

definitely not in the mood

Laura's book is now officially out, and she sold a bunch of them at a comics fair in South Melbourne today - very impressive. More about this anon. In the meantime I went to (amongst other errands and Perry walks) a record fair being held at Northcote Theatre. 

Firstly, it was basically a secret record fair. I don't know how I found about it (facebook advertising I think) but there was absolutely no signage in the street or even once inside the doors - I just followed the sound of people prognosticating about surface wear and making jokes about Michael Jackson. Once inside, I just didn't feel it, one bit. Everything was highly priced (of course in some instances this is essentially justified - I don't mean in terms of 'collectability' but just in terms of - good records should cost more) aside from the David Dundas album I bought which was a sensible $5 and in the scheme of things not a bad purchase though it is a bit scratchy, but I can't be angry about that. 

I guess ultimately I'm just pissed off that there is a collector world.

You know, about five years ago I sold off a large swathe of my record collection to make money to record a record with my friend Art Rush and to be clear I have precisely no regrets about that. I am so glad I did it, because Art is no longer with us (if you don't know the story, well, it's a long story, but he didn't die) and we captured his real genius right at the appropriate moment. The point is, making art/music is more important - to the degree that it's about a thousand times more important, even if it's bad art which this wasn't - than fucking collecting. I mean it's nice to curate, and it's nice to own books and records and even art and there's no shame in it, but collecting with a view to acquiring something monetarily valuable, should be a crime. Maybe I should simmer down a bit because there's obviously something I'm not remembering about the real world. 

PS I bought: David Dundas Jeans On; Slapp Happy and Henry Cow; ELP; The Ritz A Diamond as Big as the Ritz; a Bikini Kill album as I am reading Kathleen Hanna's book; a Bryan Ferry solo album I can't remember which one and I'm too lazy to get up and check, sorry, but who cares really? and a compilation of Mouse and the Traps.  I really wanted to find some Captain Beefheart albums or Supremes records but yeah nah. 

finland final thoughts (two weeks ago)

So I have been back from Finland for basically a day (more like 22 hours) now and have spent a Friday in a limbo state which films can sometimes represent so well, you know, delayed responses, standing outside myself, sitting there not saying or really doing or thinking anything for a long time. Jetlag is possibly worse than you think it is because you don't entirely realise what state you're in while you're in it. I note that two weeks ago I was enduring airport hell waiting for a flight and I said that was a first world problem and so is this so... fine. I am not even totally complaining. What's the point? It just is.

Perry is two years old today, and like me he's been awake since 2am and he is now acting like it's time to get into the day but the joke's on him because it's actually time to go back to bed for a few hours. We have been out for a walk and he's also had two weetbix, which is certainly a food I've never given him before but maybe they gave it to him at the Pet's Hotel? Or maybe at Doggy day care. They are good for dogs I gather. 

So I bored Laura, when I was actually able to talk, with my boring thoughts about various Finnish things, because of course it's not just the experience of being there, it's a culture and a language that fascinates me and the difficulties inherent in engaging with it also fascinates me. I have to say that there is something special about looking through Finnish records or books or even some other things that remind me of trying to come to grips with the world as a child or teenager. So much to remember and interpret. This is not special to Finnish things, it's just any culture where there's a huge amount of internal connections that don't necessary have a context ready to hand. 

OK I said 'final thoughts' above but I will probably have others, if I do I'll let you know. 

samuel hatty what a dick

You may recall in late 2021 I relayed the story of Samuel Hatty getting put in jail for a month for ripping up a flag. Well I don't know much about Samuel Hatty but I know he got in the news periodically and usually for doing worse things than that. In September 1924 Hatty was charged with robbing John Anderson, an elderly engineer from Yallourn, of £10 and having used 'personal violence'. Hatty was living in Roden st, West Melbourne at this time (Melbourne Herald 12 September 1924 p. 7) So apparently John Anderson turned up at the Waterside Hotel with a lot of money and shouted the bar twice but then refused to do so the third time. Hatty, who was otherwise just a drinker in the bar, struck Anderson on the side of the face and he fell to the floor. Hatty then put his hand in Anderson’s trouser pocket, then stood on his stomach. He stole two £5 notes. Barman Ivan Mitchell didn't tell the court that he saw Hatty steal the money but he did say that Anderson was half drunk and Hatty was very drunk. Hatty told the court (I guess this was his excuse - ?!) that he was a married man with two children* and he had spent most of his wages at the hotel that day. ‘The police gave Hatty a good character’. He was fined £5 and £1 costs.   

(‘Country visitor in town’ Melbourne Age 16 September 1924 p. 13)

*This was a mistake on the part of the reporter or Hatty was lying or something else because his (and his wife Honora's) grave at Fawkner cemetery only claims one child - a daughter, Dorothy. 

The picture above, by Graeme Butler, is of the Waterside Hotel (obvs) in 1985, from here

leaving finland (two weeks ago)

 

So the flight is due to leave in around fifty minutes. 

As mentioned, I was not dying to make this trip, and it came at an inconvenient time (long story short and very very third world problem - it was a work obligation). Of course, I love visiting Finland - I am going to say this has been something like my seventh, maybe even eighth trip? It never lets me down, and it always gives me more to think about. 

Before you think I'm obsessive, I just want to say I may be, in this case, but really I am not the obsessive type, at least, I'm pretty sure I'm not. It's definitely a society that's familiar in a lot of ways but just different enough to keep me on my toes, and it's very civilised and the climate absolutely agrees with me (even when it's warm, which it was these last two weeks). 

Oh we're boarding... ! 

tapiola uimahallia (two weeks ago)

I think I already mentioned the swimming pool and its current degraded situation. Not sure what that's about. Clearly in its heyday it was the pride and joy of the town.

What amazed me about it, is I thought it was an 80s building. Nope. 

tapiola (two weeks ago) cont again

People at the lake which the Tapiola Park hotel looks out over. 

Here are a few vintage pics of the lake from the Raportti book.