News Bulletin Number #5
Hello! Konnichiwa! Bonjour!
(Sorry, I’ve been greeting everyone in the way they do Olympic announcements)
Welcome back to what will no doubt be another enthralling edition of the newsletter!
Wow. What a week. I’m drained. Obviously it’s all party time after another gruelling fortnight in this NSW lockdown.
The problem with being a stand up comedian (after the obvious deep-seated childhood trauma and lack of social status) is that you can’t do it without an audience.I literally have nothing to do. No matter how hard you try in the stand up game, it’s simply not the same without people there to watch – and I’ve tried!
Once I did a gig to zero people. Like no audience turned up and the guy running it said to me “just get up there and start mate – see what happens!”
See what happens? There was no one else there! I was just a man in a room talking to myself. I spoke to no one for 10 minutes, left, and drove home wondering what happened.
Anyway, the big news is the virus! I’ve been enjoying the media around COVID at the moment. Not the virus or the lockdown obviously, but definitely everyone’s reaction to it. I love the way everyone in Sydney is handling it. When Melbourne was doing an extended lockdown everyone was like “you got this Melbourne!” and “In it together babes, let’s do this for the country!!Sydney is like, “WE WILL RIOT ON THE STREETS”So funny. Melbourne created an instagram sticker during lockdown. Sydney punched a horse and sent in the fire twirlers.
SCOTT
Everyone hates Scott Morrison at the moment.
I mean, I never liked him and I’m sure there was never a huge amount of love for him, but my lord there is some serious hate on my social media directed towards that guy.
I miss bushfire Scott Morrison! That guy had swag.
He’d turn up to the press conferences in his Hurley flex-fit cap, always so out of his depth and throw the state premiers under the bus. Now he turns up to the press conferences (and still throws the state premiers under the bus), but the lack of headwear suggests a contempt for the Australian people. Maybe he doesn’t care anymore? Maybe he’s lost the spark needed to lead a country?
Bring back the hat Scott!
Anyway, enough about that dork. To the headlines!
LEADERS AT SCHOOL
Speaking of leaders, I was Zooming with my buddy the other day and we were talking about weird people that would come and speak at our primary schools.Normally it would be someone inspirational who had overcome adversity or at least someone that would deliver an inspirational message to the kids.
I was telling him that when I was at primary school, a man came to speak to us that had gone to prison because he’d stood on top of a freeway overpass, thrown a large rock at a car, it had gone thru the windscreen and killed the lady driving.One of the most horrible things of all time.
He spoke for so long about it. Why he did it, how he regrets it, where he grew up, and how his parents are super disappointed in him. When he finally got to the end, he paused and said so seriously, “so in conclusion kids, don’t throw big rocks at cars…”
Everyone at school was just like, “umm what? We weren’t gonna do that anyway??”And that was the end of his presentation!
We were all confused! Did we actually need to be told that? I know we were 12 years-old but I reckon we all had the ‘don’t-throw-rocks-at-cars’ thing pretty sorted.
Our teachers must have had so little faith in us. Just them in a planning meeting being like “well I saw Jeremy throw a rock in a pond last week…we better get the guy that threw a rock at a car in to talk to these animals!!”
Anyway, I was telling my friend that story and he goes
“oh, that reminds me of the time in primary school, when president BILL CLINTON came and spoke at my school…”
Like lol what?! Those are not the same thing?
He went to a very fancy Jewish private school, and I went to a south-coast NSW public school, but surely the gap isn’t that big? It shouldn’t be, right?
People love to talk about the elitism in these private boys schools, but maybe we should talk about the discrepancies in budgets for public speakers?
The gap can’t get bigger than ‘car-throwing-rock murderer’ at one school, then the other school gets the ‘number one international pants-man and president of the United States!’
Also this was like mid-2000s. So Clinton was in his prime. He’d just come out of the Presidency, his marriage was back on track, he’d probably flown to Australia straight from Epstein’s island.
THE WINNER IS…SYDNEY
Brisbane won the bid to host the Olympics! I remember when Sydney hosted the Olympics in 2000! It felt like a moment in time.
I was a small child so it’s all blurry, but my school teachers kept telling us it was the greatest day of our lives which now I realise (as I look at my daily schedule which consists of me checking the 9GO website to see if another episode of LOVE ISLAND has been uploaded), they weren’t far off.
I don’t really remember much of the day except I ate an overpriced ice-cream and watched the European Handball.
Yeah, the European Handball!
That’s the only sport we had tickets to watch. Still to this day I’ve never seen it outside of the Olympics.
No 100m sprint for me! The Basketball Final? Who cares! What about a ticket to the opening ceremony?! Nah forget it! The ticket EVERYONE wants to get their hands on is for the European Handball.
I remember going back to the school the next day and trying to brag to the other kids that I saw the European Handball. They couldn’t have cared less. I even tried to get the game going at lunchtime but no one wanted to join in. They made fun of me! We already had our own (and admittedly better) type of handball.
THE REAL OLYMPIC GAMES
I find it funny that Brisbane got the games. They’ll go on about this for years. They still go on about the 1988 World Expo.
Seriously, Brisbane still has a plaque and a boardwalk down by the river commemorating it. If that was in Sydney or Melbourne it would have been bulldozed 6 months after to make way for apartments that 80% of the population couldn’t afford.
Also I don’t think Brisbane people will even like the Olympics? I imagine every Queenslander is like “Olympics?! Pffttt doesn’t have anything on an Origin at Suncorp! That’s greatest sporting event on earth!”These are my top 5 favourite things to happen in Brisbane:
ALFIE LANGER RETIRING
This is awesome. The great man Alfie retires citing ‘running out of mental puff’ as the reason he had to hang up the boots. Incredible. I’ve never heard depression described in football language. This was before sports stars were allowed to pull out of events the morning of due to ‘mental health reasons’ then go on a six-week coke binge to get them back to a place where they can compete at the highest level. Alfie probably didn’t even know what depression was! He just knew he was deep in the 2nd half of a football career and too far behind on the scoreboard.
STEFAN THE HAIRDRESSER EXISTING
The most popular man in Brisbane. A crazy hairdresser who had a pink speedboat. Peak Brisbane stuff. If he doesn’t light the flame at The Opening Ceremony that whole state has lost its way.
KEVIN RUDD WALKING THRU FLOOD WATERS HOLDING A SUITCASE
For some reason this makes me laugh so much. Just Kevin carrying someone’s suitcase thru the flooded streets of Brisbane in possibly the worst flood-attire I’ve ever seen. Apparently he did this the whole time. Lucky the cameras were on! Go Kev!
THAT FUCKED FAKE SWIMMING POOL IN SOUTHBANK
Man, this pool is so gross. I went swimming in it once and immediately looked around and realised I was covered in children’s urine. Do not recommend! Unless you wanna have a little sun-bake looking out over the beautiful Brown Snake, there’s nothing there for you. Hopefully they use it for the swimming in 2032.
THE CBD IS A GHOST TOWN AFTER 7:30PM
This is crazy. I never believed it but there’s literally no one around after 7:30/8pm during the week. I think it’s because they don’t have daylight savings so the sun comes up at like 4am. Everyone has to be up at 5am so they’re in bed by 6:30pm. What a lifestyle!
HUMILIATION
There’s not much else to report except three days ago my girlfriend caught me in the bathroom, naked from the waist down, wearing a hoodie and shadow boxing in front of a mirror.
It’s hard to come back from that.To say we’re on the rocks is an understatement.
It’s a bold look – a man walking around with a top on and his dick just hanging out the bottom. That in itself is a humiliating moment. When you add in the shadow boxing in the mirror, it’s hard to see a way back from here.She is being very polite and dignified about the whole thing but if we weren’t in lockdown I guarantee we’d be in couples counselling.Okay moving on.
POP CULTURE
THE GOOD STUFF – Tom Cashman and Sam Taunton
Normally I mention something I’ve been watching or listening to but all of I’ve been watching is the boring Olympics so I’ve decided to mention the podcast I do with Tik Tok star Tom Cashman. We used to have guests but we’ve recently got rid of them and now it’s just us two which is surprisingly waaaaay better! (Apologies if you’ve been a guest before). Tom has recently become a Tik Tok superstar so we’re rebranding to try and use some of his new found fame with 14 year olds! Please listen and subscribe.
THANK YOU AND GOODBYE
Well that’s it. Thank you for reading. I hope all is well in your world and you’re not dying of boredom like the rest of us.
Goodbye! Sayōnara! Au revoir!