In which the pond provides an epic serve of reptile stew for a meditative Sunday, and all by way of bicycle ...

 

 

 

 

 

The pond has always suggested that the venerable Meade is essential reading for herpetologists, especially when looking out for news from the likes of the Bolter ... a man whom the pond lost interest in long ago, a Mornington peninsula man pretending to be a populist, and one of the masses ... and what a fine effort that one was ...

 

The pond also recommends Marina Hyde for a jolly read, as with this fishy outing on Friday. But it's the venerable Meade who comes up with the local doozies, and what fun it was to read this, with more goodies here ...

 

 

Only the venerable Meade could juxtapose that Bolter headline with Miller's profound silliness ...

But now it's back to the salt mine of reptile opinion in the lizard Oz, and this Sunday, the pond decided it would start with Dame Slap ...

Dame Slap has gone very quiet for yonks about her love of the Donald, and her donning of the MAGA cap, and these days she spends her time being an IPA lickspittle fellow traveller and blatherer about freedom of speech ...

 

 

 

 

Now don't get the pond wrong. It's all in favour of free speech ...

 

 

 

 

The trouble comes when Dame Slap gets wound up, and launches into a never-ending tirade of nonsense, and the pond has to go along with it, because that's what you must do with reptiles, indulge them in their foot-stamping and their petulant anger ... and occasionally wonder in a Miller lite way if that's why the Murdochians are held in such contempt ...

 

 

Of course in the world of the IPA, the reptile talk of free speech is just code for the ability to do bad science in the Riddster style, and blather away without consequence.

Or perhaps turn universities into IPA propaganda machines, wherein reptiles might frolic and gambol, and a degree might come to resemble a Dame Slap school certificate earned above the faraway tree in Planet Janet land ... (right class, everyone first don the MAGA cap so we might begin our lessons) ...

 

 

It will be noted here that Dame Slap is proposing a model beloved of authoritarian leaders. Everybody must run a nebulous concept of "freedom of speech" up the flag pole each year, or else, there will be consequences ... and being Dame Slap, she keeps banging on endlessly about the need to conform. What a pity the reptiles ruined the use of Orwellian ...

Now how soon before the Riddster slithers from Dame Slap's cupboard?

 

Must it always be this way? Is the only example Dame Slap can return to over and over, like a dog to its vomit, the matter of the Riddster? What do the 'leets say, because when it comes to the crunch, Dame Slap loves to quote 'leets ...

 

Yes, free speech means conforming to the dictates of the coalition government, the IPA and Dame Slap, or there'll be no butter on your bread, you naughty wretches ...

 

Yes, legislate, that's what they'd do in an authoritarian country. You will be free to speak, or dammit, there will be consequences ... if you don't do your free speaking, perhaps a hefty fine or some time in jail will loosen your tongue, dammit, and you can learn to chant 'IPA good' in the Dame Slap way ...

At this point, the pond began to wonder if Miller lite actually ever read the lizard Oz. 

 If so, he would have noticed the monotonous tedium and sense of ennui that comes from routinely reading Killer Creighton and the dog botherer, now regularly carrying on duties as a Killer substitute ...

 

The pond has no real interest in what the dog botherer has to say, because the pond has read it all before, but it does give the pond the chance to slip in an infallible Pope ... showing a real tennis court in action ...

 

 

 

The pond has already noted the way that some right wing governments, such as Israel, took the matter of vaccination seriously, and had already given some 55% of the population at least a first shot (ABC here).

 

But what do Miller lite's Killer team keep doing? Kick the state governments for daring to take precautions, while the federal government dithers and uses the virus as a convenient excuse and distraction ...

 

Indeed, indeed, it's the right of ancient diggers to attend a potentially lethal super spreader event and then totter off to die, because that's the digger spirit and the digger tradition ...

But the pond has heard all this before, and feels like drawing itself up and saying to the dog botherer, "you sir, are no Killer Creighton." And now on with the usual Gladys worship ...

 

You know, if Miller lite paid the slightest attention, he might wonder why anybody would pay to read this repetitious, tedious guff ... now can a mention of the Nanny State be far away?

 

 

Ah, how the reptiles hate Swan, and even worse, he has an actual degree. The dog botherer, of course, doesn't need to pay attention, he's an expert in everything, from epidemiology to climate science ... but will he ever shut up, or will he produce another catch phrase?

 

Of course Comrade Dan actually saves Gladys from looking impure in reptile minds. Dan and other states do lockdowns, and Gladys can look dewy-eyed and innocent ... but that's the luck of the draw when it comes to Killer reptiles ... and yes, there you go, in that last par, a rant about welfare, when Miller lite would surely know that the lizard Oz is a retirement home for superannuated ranters ...

 

Oh just fuck off, and with a bit of luck, get a dose of it, and then see how you feel like strutting - what's that, the state premiers are doing their best to control it, so he might miss out on a dose? - and meanwhile the pond will get a whiff of Rowe, with more Rowe to be sniffed here ...

 

And so to a bonus Sunday item. The pond at first thought of doing the bromancer ...

 

But even though the reptile war on China is going badly, the pond is in no mood to pretend that it's interested in defending a reprehensible dictator of the Xi kind, even if the bromancer offers up a typical case of bromancer hysteria.

It was enough to note the presence of the cult master, what a meisterwerk, and then move on to the challenge of tackling Mount "Ned" Everest yet again.

Yes, yesterday the pond fudged the challenge and settled for prattling Polonius and a dose of feminism Gemma style, but this is Sunday and there is no excuse ... drum roll please ...

 

 

 

All the pond can offer is a lengthy bout of existential ennui, but it might pause every so often for a cartoon ... no matter that the cartoon has nothing to do with the nattering "Ned" at hand, because we all need a suck on the sauce bottle to make it to the top ...

 

 

 

 

Of course we all know the reptiles love job insecurity. Poor Lou Dobbs, whatever did he do to deserve such callous treatment ... here, have an irrelevant cartoon ...

Of course nattering "Ned" is just doing what must be done in preparation for the next election ... and sure enough, at the very end of the next gobbet, we will be invited to just look at that innocent face ...

What an innocent face, and not a hint of a lump of coal in the paw!

Incidentally, the pond stumbled across a piece by Josephine Toovey the other day in the Graudian - I quit food delivery apps - the absurd convenience was not worth the cost ...

The one time the pond's son insisted on using an app, the food arrived stone cold, and the deliverer a lost waif, also stone cold, and that was the first and last time the pond wasted money on an app which sees casual workers treated as slaves to the system ... 

But at the same time, the pond doesn't want to promote the reptiles, or encourage people to read them, as if what they had to say was in any way useful or meaningful, and yet here we are, enduring an endless slog with a man so up himself, so complacent, so full of humbug, he wouldn't pause for a moment to think what it's like to get less than the minimum wage to ride around Sydney and offer yourself as a target for road raged Sydney motorists ... here, have another irrelevant cartoon ...

And now back to "Ned" ...

 

In short, it is all reptile screw, and that's a bloody good policy, because when has the desire to screw workers ever gone out of fashion in Murdoch land (or Dame Slap's IPA faraway land for that matter)?

Sorry, the pond is running short on cartoons to hand, and so must press on with "Ned" explaining how in the tech age, everyone must head to an Amazon warehouse and pee out of hours, and if you can't hold on, just piss in your pants, or perhaps piss in chairman Rupert's pocket, in the approved "Ned" style ...

 

 

 

Yes, the sooner we get to a condition where every worker is a nomad living in a car, how much better the movies will be when looking for a story angle ... 

As for the FDWs, there's surely a neo-realist show to be made exploring their fate, as the digital economy makes a few filthy rich, and the rest peons ... here, have an irrelevant cartoon ...

 

 

 

Yes, yes, that would have been better deployed in the dog botherer piece, but the pond is anxious now to get to the end, but feels like thus far it's only made it to "Ned's" base camp ...

 

Indeed, indeed, and the pond is simply dreaming when it sees endless herds of bicycles roaming Newtown, delivering food to lazy hipsters, too stupid to see the pile-up that will come at the end of the road, when private companies have managed to socialise all the expensive trivia of employment, and left everyone the chance to exist on a mealy-mouthed government pension with no extras ..

Better start saving for that caravan today, sure beats living in a car, and meanwhile, have another irrelevant cartoon ...

 

And so the pond can happily report that we have reached the end of "Ned", and with only one movie to reference ... but what a nice caravan. Ask "Ned" for help, fat chance, as you start saving today ...

 

But there will be more to come as the naked unfairness of it all seeps into Australia, and people turn to populist saviours, not remembering what happened after the Weimar republic ... but never mind, the pond has reached the peak of Zen nothingness, and it's on with the final "Ned" gobbet ...

The coalition government cares about higher wages? Well if you're in management, banks, finance, or such like, it's vital you get paid what's due to you ...

As for the rest, remember to save for your caravan, so much more comfy than a car, and have another irrelevant cartoon as a closer ... though if you find yourself working for Amazon, you might be tempted to lift that flag too, not that rioting will do you any good ...