2 bigshot Americans in town

If you haven’t noticed, there are a couple of big American stars in Melbourne at the moment getting everyone excited.

Britney Spears is here doing her Circus tour. It’s mildly controversial, due to her obvious and apparently very poor miming of her “music”. Still, I’ve met many women (it is mostly women) who seem to be almost hyperventilating at the thought of the concert. I talked to a fully grown women on the train last night who was seriously talking about camping out the front of her hotel. I’m not sure what she hoped to see that hasn’t already been splashed over the front of a thousand trashy magazines. God knows, I’ve seen enough.

The second megastar is Tiger Woods, who we’ve paid 3 million bucks US to come here to play in a golf tournament. Thousands of apparently sane people turned up to watch him practice earlier in the week. I assume they’re mainly men. As I write this, theage.com.au has a live leaderboard. For golf! Golf, for christsakes!!

I’m a bit underwhelmed by all of this. I’m sure Tiger Woods is a decent guy, and he can certainly play golf. I’m not much of a fan of Britney’s work, but I do have some sympathy for her: she’s obviously had a difficult couple of years in her personal life.

But it’s not very interesting. I have a better idea: let’s do a switcheroo. Britney can enter the Australian Masters this morning and Tiger can turn up in fishnet stockings and writhe around in a cage onstage at Rod Laver Arena tonight.

I’d pay to see that.

Running
None yesterday. I did get to the pool for a quick km of my special brand of unco-swimming. With any luck I’ll get to run tonight or tomorrow morning.

just as I thought

If you added up all the traffic Ebay, Facebook, Google, Yahoo and Myspace get in a day, well then, that would be rather a lot wouldn’t it?

My post yesterday on Britney Spears was considerably more modest, but there was a definite boost in traffic. As these things filter through to the search engines, I expect it to only grow.

It confirms all my darkest theories about you lot out there in the internet. You’re only interested in gossip, celebrity, sex of the voyeuristic type, oh and poking people.

There’s only been one more popular post in recent memory, back in November: wanted. That one had sex (in a way), celebrity, international fugitives, popular music and lots of alcohol. Also, it had a picture. It’s pretty consistent with my aformentioned dark pessimism.

So, what’s the lesson? Start a blog called “celebrity, international fugitives, popular music and lots of alcohol.com”. Oh no, that’s already been done – Perez Hilton. I get pretty bored with that sort of stuff.

This blog was only meant as an excuse to while away the empty hours I spend “earning” a living. If I had to spend my time scouring the web for pictures of American “starlets”, I don’t think I could go on….

Running
A rather dull run this morning from the city up to Brunswick and back. I livened it up a touch on the way back by racing a tram from Albion Street into Melbourne Central station. I won, but only due to a fortuitous run of traffic lights at the Vic Market. Here it is on mapmyrun.com.

Marathon
The official results arrived in the post yesterday. Only two months late. Hmm…. How long can it take to put together a spreadsheet and print a bunch of A4 bits of paper? Anyway, it’s good to see.

Portishead
On a completely different issue, is there a sexier line in popular music than this?

For I’ve been a temptress for too long

From Glory Box, by Portishead.

Clearly not. Only Beth Gibbons could get away with stretching “tempt-e-ress” into three syllables.

It leaves Brit’s little strip-tease for dead. Ah…. if only that were possible.

britney spears, no knickers

I’m trying a little bit of an experiment, based on this article: Aussies think knickerless Britney is pretty flash .

Apparently the most searched-for topic on the Australian bit of the web was about Britney Spears sans briefs. Strange folks. Very strange. Having seen the film clip for her latest song “gimme more” in which she continually stumbles into a pole in a laughable attempt at “sexy“, I could think of nothing worse.

It worries me that all around me are people with a morbid desire to see, presumably, Britney’s hairy bits. Yuck.

Anyway: I figure if I keep mentioning Britney’s snatch I’ll boost the old traffic levels. We’ll see.

If you are one of those people in search of Britney’s lingerie, and you have the concentration span required to reach this far down the post, I apologise. This blog probably ain’t for you.

Zac Ephron
I have no idea who this is, but apparently he’s pretty popular too.

Jessica Alba and Jennifer Hawkins
That should get the male, horny demographic interested. Sadly, I have no proof these two have even been in the same state at the same time.

Running
I went out for a 17k run last night, after the thunderstorm and accompanying flash-floods. I inexplicably failed to meet Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, or Rihanna, but that’s probably to be expected seeing as they don’t spend much time in Ringwood

I can’t imagine why. Ringwood’s ace.

dad jokes

As a Dad, I’m genetically inclined towards fairly dodgy, embarrassing jokes. However, I do try to restrain myself in this forum.

I did come across a joke recently that I suspect falls outside the “dad joke” category, and may actually count as funny. So, after way too much of a build-up, here it is:

What did the Pope say to God after Luciano Pavorotti died?
Here’s that tenor I owe you.

‘phnar ‘phnar.

I’ve only been doing this Dad thing for 15 months now, I haven’t yet progressed to “Dad rock” stage. I don’t know exactly what that involves, possibly Nickleback, possibly Andrew Lloyd Webber like my Dad. Either way it sounds pretty dire.

Britney Spears
Speaking of embarrassing jokes, according to the Age, Britney Spears “just doesn’t like” the feel of underwear on her skin.

Hey, I can understand Britney’s point. I don’t like the sound of her music on my ears, especially her new song “gimme more”. I also don’t particularly like the sight of her on my retina, but I often don’t have much choice, sadly.

Running
A couple of circumnavigations of the tan this lunch-time plus a slightly longer trip there and back from the office. All well and good. I’m back to running about 50k per week, which is pretty comfortable, and should be enough to keep me in shape.

more sin and stupidity

km: 0 (yet, I should do some running tonight)

scha·den·freu·de (shädn-froid) n. Pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others.

It’s been a good morning for that sort of stuff… particularly if you follow news from our American cousins.

That’s right – one of the most corrupt, evil men in public life has finally got his comeuppance. After a career, if you can call it that, of lies, deception, endangering the welfare of his countrymen both within the armed forces and elsewhere, and generally being a rude, corrupt blight on the American scene, he’s gone.

That’s right – Kevin Federline, also known as K-fed, has been given the arse by Mrs Trailer-trash 2006, Britney Spears.

(oh, in other news, Donald Rumsfeld has resigned)

If, like most people, you actually like taking pleasure in other’s pain, then here’s some more, just to tide you over until tomorrow:

Here’s a photo of my thumb after hitting it with a hammer. Twice. That blue stuff under the nail is blood.

Just so you know – the photo was taken in May, and the nail still hasn’t grown back.

Beat that Em!