Hello, my name is Adrian and I’m a friend of Colin’s. I’m too lazy to write my own blog, so Colin has graciously allowed me to start writing in his in the hopes that between us we can write something here almost yearly. Today is a particularly auspicious day for me, as an Austraylian, to begin writing, for no doubt you are all aware, it’s Australia day! Australia Day for Australians is usually the day we salute the flag, shoot and eat the animal on our coat of arms, chuck beer on ice, prawns on the BBQ, and infants in the croc pool.

We Australians are a free nation of blokes, sheilas and the occasional wanker. We come from many lands (although a few too many of us come from Neu Zulland), and although we live in the best country in the world, we reserve the right to bitch and moan about it whenever we bloody well like. So let me tell you about this big brown land and educate your foreigners.

We want to make “no worries mate” our national phrase, “she’ll be right mate” our national attitude and “Waltzing Matilda” our national anthem (so what if it’s about a sheep-stealing crim who commits suicide, he was obviously going to VOTE LAMB). We’re the best in the world at all the sports that count, like cricket, netball, rugby league and union, AFL, roo shooting, two up and horse racing. We also have the biggest rock, the tastiest pies, and the worst dressed Olympians in the known universe. Only in Australia can a pizza delivery get to your house faster than an ambulance. Only in Australia do we have bank doors wide open, no security guards, or cameras but chain the pens to the desk. Stand proud Aussies - we shoot, we root, we vote. We are girt by sea and pissed by lunchtime.

First, there is Victoria, a state named after a queen who didn’t believe in lesbians. Victoria is the realm of Armani turtlenecks, Melbourne Macchiatto, AFL grand final day, and big horse races. Its capital is Melbourne , whose chief marketing pitch is that “it’s liveable”. At least that’s what they think. The rest of us think it is too bloody cold and wet.

Above Victoria is New South Queensland, home of the Telstra Dome, an Olympic stadium built by the government, the same government that charged its self billions of dollars to rename the stadium, after another part of the government. Its mascots are Bondi lifesavers that pull their Speedos so far up their cracks to keep the left and right sides of their brains separate.

Down south we have Tasmania, maps of the little state bring smiles to the sternest faces because it looks like a set of well trimmed genitals. It holds the world record for a single mass shooting, which the Yanks can’t seem to beat no matter how often they try.

South Australia is the province of red wine, a festival of foreigners and bizarre axe murders. SA is the state of innovation. Where else can you so effectively reuse country bank vaults and barrels as in Snowtown, just out of Adelaide (also named after a queen) as a mortuary to host the bodies of those your axe has cleeved in vats of acid?

Western Australia is too far from anywhere to be relevant. WA was the last state to stop importing convicts and many of them still work there in the government.

The Northern Territory is the red heart of our land. Outback plains, sheep stations the size of Europeon nations , kangaroos, Jackaroos, emus, Uluru… Its creek beds have the highest aluminium content of anywhere too. Although the Territory is the centrepiece of our national culture, few of us live there and the rest prefer to fly over it on our way to Bali.

And there’s Queensland . While any mention of God seems silly in a document defining a nation of half arsed sceptics, it is worth noting that God probably made Queensland, as its beautiful one day and perfect the next. Why he filled it with drongos remains a mystery. Queensland is the only Australian state without daylight savings, making it one hour and twenty years behind the rest of the country.

Who could forget New Zealand? Where the men are men, the women are men and the sheep are very, very afraid. Sheep outnumber people in New Zealand, mostly because there are no people in New Zealand, just tourists and Kiwis.

Oh yes and there’s Canberra. The less said the better. Capital of the nation, home of pornography and illicid drugs. This bastion of our democracy, albeit a democracy so flawed that a redneck, gun toting political party can get a million votes and still not win one seat, is the home of more prostitutes than any other city in the nation.

So it is that I will leave you with not the Prime Miniture’s address to the nation, but an address from an Australia Day Party, where the beer flows freely, the BBQs are fired up, and Midnight Oil has political representation on a Federal level:

My fellow Australians, in this election year, we are faced with a stark choice: allow un-Australianism to flourish, or take a stand against it, before it becomes as prevalent as exposed genitals on a reality television show. I love Australia, her far horizons, her jewelled sea, the Aussie people and our Australian way of life. In the past year, I’ve travelled all over this wide, brown land. I’ve met a few people, both young and old, and listened to what they had to say. I’ve seen first-hand the devastation un-Australianism has caused. And frankly, I’ve had a gutful.

Don’t be unAustralian. Vote Lamb on Australia Day. You know it makes sense.

On a well removed note, Colin suggested that I list a daily fact about myself here so here we go: I once pissed on a cat.

Related posts:
first daily fact from Adrian
Ain’t nobody got any style no more
A list of Australianisms
Greek Fire
child abuse awareness post #8

Written by Adrian on 26.01.07 at 10:30 am.