The History of August

It's the end of August, which means SUMMER IS ON THE WAY! This is the best news I've ever heard today.  Best news in the history of ever. Do you know the history of August?  Do you? You should learn.  Let me teach you.  All of this is practically completely true.

It all started with Augustus, the first emperor of the Roman Empire.  It was a terrible moniker, but he didn't care because he was emperor, which enabled him to punish his parents severely for this aberration. 

It's hard to keep track of all the monikers of Augustus, because he changed his name more times than Facebook would ever have allowed.  But Augustus must have been his fave because the month of 'Sextilis' was renamed August in his honour in 8 BC, after he picked this particular month because it was the time of several of his great triumphs in his rise to power, including the conquest of Egypt and when he killed Lily and James Potter. 


Poor Augustus didn't get a salad
named after him. But he got the month 
of August, so he no complain.

Similar to the Obama Messiah and Lord Voldermort, Augustus held a collection of powers that were granted to him for life by the Senate, including those of tribune of the plebs and censor, and the intellectual property rights for use of the Killing Curse as a threat.

His magical powers stemmed from financial success, ability to apparate out of awkward press conferences, resources gained in conquest, the building of relationships with dodgy, decrepit nation states throughout the Empire, the loyalty of many military soldiers and veterans, and the respect of the muggles, believe it or not.



Although the most powerful individual in the Roman Empire, Augustus wished to embody the spirit of the average muggle's virtues and norms, so he tried to relate to them and pretended to connect with their pathetic little concerns.

He did this by throwing good money after bad, pretending to cut back on lavish excess and banning Twitter tweets that use the wrong version of there/their/they’re and you’re/your.  He didn't even have to pretend about the last thing - he hated it for real.    

In 28 BC, in an attempt to appear frugal and modest and ghetto, he generously decided to melt down 80 silver statues erected in his likeness that he had built because he was "born this way" and everyone needed to know it. And in 29 BC, Augustus paid 400 sesterces each to 250,000 citizens, turned bad romans into Horcruxes and raised the debt ceiling so he could keep buying spears and whores whilst looking like the savvy shopper.



The good news is that Augustus eventually died. The bad news is that his reign laid the foundations of a regime that lasted for nearly fifteen hundred years. And this is why they have three to four-year terms in democratic nations.

Liberté conditionnelle - fancy talk for parole

Liberté conditionnelle.  It's French for parole.  Everything in the world sounds more fancy when you speak it in French with a bad French accent.  Which is strange, because the French are muchos bastards in general.  I know; I've met at least 12 of them.

Speaking of parole - such a coinkydink - I’ve always thought an efficient way for the Government to generate some extra revenue for their kitty would be through the installation of grandstand seating at police stations and charge non-criminals for the privilege of watching life’s shitheads report for parole.  I’d watch the heck out of that.

And we could clap and woop woop as criminals are led down to the gallows or whatever in their chains and be forced to watch a live feed of Big Brother for three hours and eat a plate of peanut butter-encrusted brussell sprouts.  Gross.

As if that wasn’t enough excitement for you, then there’s the uniforms. Oh wait. I’m pretty sure no-one on the earth has ever shown any interest in men in police uniform, so that’s just not relevant.

In reality, no criminal activity of any sort will happen on the day you have your tickets and you will just have to watch police officers do boring paperwork and talk over-the-counter to little old ladies. Sort of like requesting to attend swimming in the Olympics lottery and getting tickets to the diving.

They could have icecream sellers and everything. But not the ones who block your view for ages during important bits just so some moron can change their mind 18 times about whether to purchase a cornetto or that other one that is exactly the same fucking thing as a cornetto but has a different name. And then we get marzipan to throw at the prisoners. Such fun.

So I’ve recently been walking home via my local police station. There is a good reason for this. I’m not actually on parole anymore, so that’s not the reason. I have recently moved to an apartment and the copshop is on my walking route. When I walk past in the afternoon there are always losers sitting waiting to sign in for parole. I know they are on parole because they have losers on parole written all over them.

My concern is that they will be so bored stiff waiting in the backlog of deadbeats that they will notice some blonde chick walking past and decide to follow her for some sinister purpose. I'm assuming none of them are murderers but you just never know; especially if you live in Victoria.

Footwear Interchanger

And today's post will be about shoes.  Ooh, should be exciting.  Brace yourself.

When one walks to work, as this one does, it requires the wearing of runners, sneakers, walking foot attire.  I also wear such footwear when I leave my building for lunch and such.  I don't understand why women wear heels when they go out onto the cobblestones in their lunchbreak.  They are either suicidal or moronic.  Little from column A... 

Cute. But probably not ideal for a rowing machine.


A very good reason to wear runners when leaving any building ever is that you are best placed to outrun a marauding lion if it escapes from the zoo, which is just up the road from my workplace.  Reliable and trustworthy statistics show that women in Africa who wear high heels do not escape from lions.

At my workplace, the women who choose to wear heels when walking around outside are ironically the ones who don't know how to walk in high heels and end up walking like the first man on the moon.  Practice makes perfect unless you're a moron in heels.

In more boring news, I like to wear heels or ballet flats during the day, the latter specifically if I feel like breaking into some spontaneous pointe work.  I have about ten pairs of shoes in a box under my desk at work.  There are good reasons for this.  This first reason is that I just like change.  Change is good.  Change is as good as a holiday to a really shitty holiday destination like Bali.  The only time change isn't good is when summer turns into that princess bitchface, winter.

Hopefully I'll find something more interesting to blog about forthwith.

The Bubble Addiction

Addictions.  No-one wants them and certainly no-one wants to admit to them - least of all on a social networking site. Well, I have an addiction.  So there.  It can easily take over my life, and I can't function adequately without playing it at least once a day.

When I start bingeing, it alters the chemical makeup in my brain, and I can't stop without some serious intervention, like starvation, dehydration or a desperate need to go to the loo.  My problem is not booze, cigarettes, pornog, drugs, Wills and Kate fanaticism, pokies, shopping or exercise.  It is a recurring compulsion to play the bubbles game. 

I don't want to encourage others into my web of shame and illicitness, but here is the link to this massive waste of time. It's a dark, murky world, where bright little round balls prey on the vulnerable.   A few things you needs to know before entering the land of bubbles.  Don't let them build up, because they just keep coming at you, like rioting Syrians.  And then they'll shoot you in the head.

I always try to pop the red ones first. I don’t have a justifiable reason for this; perhaps it is because I'm anti-communist and wish them to be eradicated from the planet.  And I always seem to let the baby blue ones slide, as if they were harmless little puffy clouds that wouldn’t dream of messing with my batting average.  The yellow ones are rather insignificant to me; much like Kim Kardashian is to the human race.

I always feel a tad guilty when I’m playing my bubbles, as if I am denying myself my true purpose in life; like plotting a new peace roadmap for the Middle East, or even more meaningful tasks, like eradicating that which is useless and pointless from my wardrobe.  I guess what is most troubling about my indulgent, depraved pastime is my belief that it's worthy of a blog post.