With only four and a half hours sleep (thank you world cup) I dragged myself out of bed this morning to the news of a potential leadership coup within the Federal Labor Party.

Confirmed a few hours later, Julia Gillard is the new leader of the Labor party and will be the first female prime minister of Australia.

I admit to not knowing much about Gillards personal politics (although in the position of deputy pm she has certainly proved herself), but it has been increasingly clear over the last weeks that Kevin Rudd was not going to be able to win the election for Labor. While I personally would prefer Rudd as pm, as what I know of Gillard suggests she leans too right for my likings, I would take any leader of the Labor party over any leader of the Liberal party. I think the right decision has been made in appointing Julia Gillard.

So I say farewell Rudd, I think you did your job well and you led your country to a better place than it has been in for the last 12 years, and I welcome Gillard. Interesting times ahead.

My sister-in-law sent me a message this morning saying: ‘I predict a blog about Fred Nile coming on…’

I don’t actually have much to say about his policies, sure he spreads ignorance, racism and hatred wherever he goes (allegedly), but that seems pretty universally acknowedged, so he doesn’t really carry that much weight. Yes he tried to introduce a bill banning burka’s, a concept that makes my blood boil, but really anything he introduces is voted down immediately.

My big problem with Fred Nile is that he is seen as ‘the Christian’ parliamentarian. This is the man that the general public see as representing the viewpoint of Christians.  

It is no wonder that the world has no idea about why we follow Christ and what that means, when so many right-wing, fundamentalist, religious idiots are jumping up and down claiming they represent the beliefs of all Christians.

I believe in God. I believe that Christ died as the ultimate payment for sin, and because he rose again I can be right with God. I believe that these things call for a response from me and that I must live as much like Christ as my sinful self is able. I also believe that Christ dined with prostitutes and tax-collectors, he treated women as sisters, healed the sick and cared for the poor. Yes he condemned many people, but they were the self-righteous, the oppressors, the religious shells.

Something is going very wrong when the world looks as those who say they represent us and see the very people that Christ condemned.

Incredibly bad advertising.

Have any of you seen the new ad from Tourism Australia?

If you haven’t, you can check it out here.

And they really think this is an improvement on “where the bloody hell are you?”

If I was living overseas and this ad came on television I would probably leap from the couch like a husband caught in a compromising position screaming, “It’s not what you think it is, honest!!!!!”

I can see the ad execs sitting around the table at Tourism Australia headquarters, one of them leaps up “I’ve got it! Why don’t we do an ad with a bunch of people singing off-key about Australian stereotypes!?!?!”

Brilliant. Sheer Brilliance.

If Abbott gets elected, I’m moving to another country.

He is a racist, misogynistic, fear mongering piece of poo who will turn this country back into a demagoguery.

I’m so disgusted with this country, they may as well just bring back the white australia policy.

What the hell happened to compassion???

Stop the press!! I didn’t even think it was possible, but I just read an article written by Pru Goward, shadow minister for women, and I agreed with it! And she counts herself as a close personal friend of John Howard!

Who knew that there were conservative politicians out there who are concerned about human rights?

Anyway, have a squiz at this and let me know what you think, she basically sums up my position on the issue.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2901153.htm

p.s. I know I havn’t been blogging much lately, sorry about that!

Thats right, the man I love to hate, Mister (and I use that term loosely) Tony Abbott, has announced today (as reported in the ABC news) that the coalition is considering a scheme which could deny the dole to under 30’s.

That’s right, it seems that the Abbott thinks that if you’re under 30 and don’t have a job you should move to Western Australia, because they have a labour shortage there (they also have a labor shortage there, but that’s another story).

Brilliant huh? I can see it now: “I’m sorry that you had to leave your job because you were being sexually harassed. No sorry, we can’t offer you any short term relief until you get back on your feet, you’re 25 years old and that means you can’t qualify for the dole. What should you do? Get a job, of course. If you can’t find one here, you will need to move to where you can get one. Well I’m sorry that would mean leaving your family and all your support systems, but you should have thought about that before you quit your job.”

Or what about: “It says here that you are 17 years old. Why aren’t you in school? Oh you were being abused at home and fell behind so you left. Well that’s a bit of a defeatist attitude isn’t it. You’ve left home too now? So why don’t you have a job? You don’t have any skills? Well we can offer you some training programs that will get you back on your feet. The next one starts in one month, but you will have to find a way to support yourself while you complete them. How will you do that? Well maybe you should think about moving back home. You are only 17 after all.”

I had a conversation with a gentleman the other day where I was ordering goods worth a little over $7000. During said conversation I used many different words, with a wide range and number of syllables, combined them into these convenient sets known as sentences and was thus able to get across my desire to purchase said goods.

The gentleman with whom I was conversing decided to use a different method of communication. Known to mothers and sisters worldwide as the gruntversation, this is a method usually confined to boys between the ages of 12 and 20, but apparently can continue through to men in their 40’s who run their own business.

The entire conversation from his side consisted on monosyllabic words. In fact, with the exception of one sentence (‘yeah, bout that’), the entire conversation consisted of monosyllabic sentences.

Teenage boys around the world should take heart for, despite their mothers warnings, it seems to can make it in this world without ever having to attempt any advanced sort of communication.

It might impede your chance of getting a girlfriend though…

Cinnamon has recently become a bit of an enigma.

You see generally if I go from not liking a food to liking a food it is a slow process, gradually building up tolerance until that tolerance turns to liking.

Examples of this would be feta cheese, wine, brown rice etc.

Not so with cinnamon.

Up until two weeks ago I did not like cinnamon. And I would say I would have eaten it at least once or twice in the past year and not liked it.

Two weeks ago I ate an apple and cinnamon muffin.

Yum.

Now suddenly I’m liking the cinnamon.

And that’s my super cool and amazingly interesting story for the day.

And those locusts have made it into town.

I was riding to work this morning and I had to make sure I breathed through my nose, otherwise I might have had something unexpected for breakfast.

Yum.

In other matters I am pleased to announce that I now have a ‘loner’ car for the next little while and although many people have commented on how well it ‘suits’ me (I don’t know why people would think a little bubble car with a Jesus fish on the back isn’t me…) I am extremely grateful, for it is making my life a whole world easier. Never fear though, the riding and walking to work is continuing and I have added a bit of swimming in there as well (not to work, we haven’t had quite that much rain).

Anyway, before I go, let me leave you with this quote:

”It’s very hard to beat a first-term government.” Tony Abbott

With the opposition leader holding that kind of attitude my outlook on life is definitely starting to look up.

This weekend just gone is generally considered to be the biggest weekend in the social calendar of our town.

This year, as part of the festivities, I set out to break my own personal record of how many times I could get breathtested in one weekend.

Last year on the same weekend it was three times. This year I was going for four. At least.

Initially I was hampered by the whole not having a car factor but I overcame that with the aid of a friend who was heading out of town.

Now the rules are that you must be going about your normal day to day activities, you can’t drive around looking for rbt stations. For example on Saturday I drove to the swimming pool, and home, then out to buy a vacuum cleaner, a quick stop at the video store, out to the west to buy some bath towels and restock on water supplies. In the evening I went out to the noodle place for some yummy fried rice. Sunday was church, home, church meeting, home, bible study, home (I know, I’m a nerdy, nerdy Christian)

Grand total number of times I was breathtested??

Zero.