The Voice of a True Aberration

Many of you will remember my devotion to Pepsi Max; a love so enduring that when I die, I expect my remains to be pickled in a large vat of the stuff, Nelson-style.

Late last year, Pepsi began a promotion called "Summer Rewind". It offered free retro Pepsi t-shirts in a number of varieties - all you had to do was collect specially marked labels. Some were worth 1 point, some 2, depending on the size of the bottle, and you needed 10 to get a shirt. The best part was free delivery - you simply entered your codes into the website, clicked on the style you wanted, then sat back and wait for awesome commercialised vintage fashion to hit your letterbox.

Pepsi Max is our beverage of choice here at Chez Clumsy, so we made sure to buy specially marked bottles when we could, and I began collecting the labels.

It didn't take long to accumulate points, and through December, January and early February, Pepsi retro t-shirts began turning up regularly at Chez Clumsy. Pretty decent shirts too; nice cotton, with good quality screen-printing. I even "girlied" up a few - slicing off necklines and roughly cropping sleeves to make them more "stylish" (if you accept that unhemmed and uneven edges can be stylish).

At some point, the shirts ran out, but Pepsi obviously realised they were onto a popular promotion. People were happy to walk around advertising their product - as long as the garment doing the work was kind of trendy and old skool. So they restocked, and my efforts continued.

I *may* have gotten a little excited.

But then, a couple of weeks ago, I received a large envelope from Pepsi DEMANDING my labels and proof of purchase receipts. Turns out I'd ordered enough shirts to be seen as suspicious - or at least just a tad on the greedy side. They didn't accuse me of anything directly - but the meaning was clear: "You've had your share - now come up with the proof you really did buy all that carbonated cola or we'll think you're running a dodgy eBay resale scam."

But what I don't understand is how you're expected to follow their "rules" - which involve keeping all the labels AND your proof of purchase receipts. I do in fact have a bunch of the labels all rubber-banded together in a small box. But receipts? Ha! OK, I probably could've held on to supermarket dockets, but you tell me what little cafe or newsagent or foodcourt kebab shop gives you a receipt for your 600ml bottle?

So the fine print fascists at Pepsi are now holding my shirts, and as I'm unlikely to be able to send them receipts (OK, I've lost the reply paid envelope they sent me), will redistribute them to other, more conscientious consumers.

I mean, really. What has the world come to when a girl can't collect a Smorg-like amount of t-shirt treasure just so she can cut them up willy-nilly? I mean, didn't someone fight a war about something at some point?

If it wasn't for the fact I'm addicted to Pepsi Max, I'd seriously consider boycotting it.

Vote for Tassie Babes

I mentioned recently that The Tasmanian Babes Fiasco, my passion project of 2010, failed to attract any love from Queensland's Matilda Awards..

The Matildas work on a system of nomination by judges. There's a certain number of judges, and a certain proportion of them have to see and like your show in order for it to get nominated. As I understand it, not enough judges came along to see Tassie Babes, so we couldn't get nominated even if those judges who did come liked it (and I really don't have any idea if they did).

But never fear! Shaun King, who played JB in Tassie Babes, has alerted me to the Briztix Audience Choice Awards. It seems all you need to score a nomination here is the love of audience members with an internet connection.

This is where YOU come in!

If you saw our show* about a sharehouse in crisis - complete with glow-in-the-dark tantric genitals; socks-on-cocks; kangaroo roadkill; militant lesbians; cosplaying in City Hall; foul-mouthed South American revolutionaries; dancing teddy bears; frottaging sailors; hippykill bulldozers and best-ever exploding butt pump - then you'll remember the artistic triumph it was.

Actually, I joke about the naughtier elements of the show, but in reality, I'm proud of it for so many more reasons. It had a fresh style, a lot of heart and a damn good cast. And that's the reason I want your help - I would LOVE to get my amazingly talented and frightenly attractive actors some glitzy recognition for their efforts.

All you have to do is fill out this form by this Sunday 27 February - we're in the top section, entitled "Play".

Here's a list of names to help jog your memory, and assist your typing fingers!

Cast

Shaun King (JB)
Amy Currie (Stacey)
Daren King (Jordan, Ensign Le Marquand)
Jamie McKinnell (Taylor, Fingers)
Tom Yaxley (Elroy, Roger)
Michael Fitzhywel (Decoy, Dreamf***er)
Jenna Saini (Missy, Sativa)
Declan Ziemek (T-Bird)
Kath Kunde (Debbie, Bree)
Damien Campagnolo (Fat Cop, Tony)
Drew Jarvis (Phil)
Lauren Ware (Phraedom, Tassie Babe)
Elizabeth Best (Jhelise, Miss Waipukurau)

Crew

Director - Natalie Bochenski
Costume - Robyn Edwards
Set Design - Richard Hunt
Lighting Design - Tom Dodds

Sadly, they don't have a category for Best Playwright - but I'm sure Simon Bedak would be chuffed with any nominations for the play, as would author John Birmingham.

Thank you so much for your support - if we get through the initial nominations round, I will be back campaigning for your support again for the actual award!

*Hell, even if you didn't but heard good things. Or read about it here on the website. Or... actually, f*** it, just vote, early and often, OK?

Steamy Stormy

I'm on the verandah, and there's a storm before me.

Well, really, I'm on the balcony. It's not big enough to be called a verandah, and it doesn't wind around the outside of your two-storey high-set house.

But it does afford me a view of the lush, verdant, sub-tropical greenery, drenched in the downpour from the afternoon sky:

Scratched & Recycled

It started with Havock tweeting me late this afternoon with: "Was that you on the Scratchy bit on the news?"

Now those of you who know Havock might have been as surprised as I was by the absence of invectives such as FKN and MUPPETS. I didn't really understand what he was getting at, even when he offered the follow-up tweet:

"I swear the chickie babe looked like you on TV before, ya got a twin! lol"

I thought perhaps Havock had just spliced the mainbrace one too many times, but about an hour later, I received a text message from my friend Clare, exclaiming that she'd just seen me on Today Tonight talking about scratchies.

It turns out the good folk at Channel Seven's flagship current affairs program had decided to do a story on instant scratchie winners, and had included me as one of the "talent".

Only thing is - I did that interview FOUR years ago. Four! Early 2007. I remember because I'd not long been back in the country after a foreign sojourn. It explains the dodgy short haircut I was growing out:

Thanks to @EvanOnTheGC for
capturing this awful, awful freezeframe.

What a completely terrible head that is. That's just appalling. Look - here's a GIF I made of me pulling a series of grimaces which are STILL more attractive than the head featured on national television this evening:

I'm just a bit confused about the situation. Yes, I won some money on a scratchie. It was a fair while ago - before I even started this website. Is a four-year-old interview about something that happened seven years ago still relevant? Still, you know, a current affair?

I don't want to slag my fellow media professionals too much, because I honestly believe shows like A Current Affair and Today Tonight have their place in the TV line-up. Sure, watching them is probably like having sex with a priest - a bit wrong and not for the under 16s - but they provide a service. I mean, you can't go getting all your shopping advice from the Brand Power lady.

See, see! I said I wouldn't slag them off, and I just did it anyway. Naughty Clumsy.

Let's face it, maybe it's a situation where recycling old interviews is an efficient use of resources.

I mean, winning money on a scratchie is p-r-e-t-t-y much how you'd imagine it. There's the "BULLSHIT NO WAY" factor, then the "THIS IS F***ING AWESOME" high, then the "OMG I CAN BUY EVERYTHING" dizziness, then the "OH NO WAIT I CAN'T REALLY BUY EVERYTHING" comedown, then the "I SHOULD REALLY BE SENSIBLE ABOUT THIS" speech you give yourself after your Dad insists on going to the bank manager THAT AFTERNOON to tie up the money in some sort of digital Fort Knox to STOP YOU GETTING AT IT YOU IRRESPONSIBLE DAUGHTER AND ALSO YOU SHOULD GO TO BED EARLIER AND CLEAN UP MORE.

Well, that was certainly MY experience.

My point is - and I do have one, albeit a loose, esoteric one - is that I'm still alive, y'know? You could come and interview me now, Today Tonight. At the VERY least, I'd have nicer hair. Surely that would be better for your ratings?

Great Scott!

About a year ago, not long after we first starting rehearsing The Tasmanian Babes Fiasco (this week snubbed by the Matilda Awards for theatre by the way, a travesty against socks on cocks and exploding butt pumps), I suffered a near mutiny by the cast after confessing I'd never seen the Back to the Future trilogy.

"Great Scott! There's one person alive who hasn't
seen how adorable you looked in 1985, Michael!"

My goodness, what a to-do that was. I may as well have owned up to running a drug smuggling operation using orangutans as mules (as opposed to drug smuggling rings that use mules as mules).

Somehow my entire ability to direct a play that incorporated a fair number of pop culture gags was called into question. My lame attempt to get some favour back by making a crack at a "flux capacitor" joke was met with violent outcries of "Oh you don't get to SAY that, because YOU haven't seen the movies!" I can't even remember how I got everyone back on track. Probably threw out a bait of "Hey, let's discuss the glow-in-the-dark genitals scene" to distract them all (again, snubbed by the Matildas. You decide, people. Bioluminescent junk - cheap B-grade titillation or art?)

So, spurred on by a spectacular deconstruction of the films by international man of mystery Tom Salinsky, I have spent the past week or so watching the Back to the Future trilogy.

Are they great movies? Absolutely. Superbly plotted, well-acted, charming without being cloying and with lots of juicy history gags to keep nerds like me giggling. I can see why people have so much affection for them.

Am I a fool for not seeing them before now? Maybe. But then, I do have a lot of history documentaries and British comedies to rewatch. I mean,  I still can't quote Blackadder entirely off by heart - what kind of a nerd does that make me?

Anyway, I'm very pleased to finally be able to cross Back to the Future off the list of "Famous Trilogies I Have Never Seen". That just leaves The Godfather, Superman, Die Hard, The Bourne Series, Mad Max, Toy Story, Terminator, Aliens and those George Romero zombie ones.

But come on, I've seen almost all Jane Austen TV and movie adaptations a bunch of times. That's, like, a whole lot of trilogies! Right?

Clumsy Vs Marsupials

A test of patience and animal husbandry at Adelaide Zoo.

Houston, We've Had a Problem

Ground Control to Major Clumsy...

The Wah and I found ourselves at the Brisbane Powerhouse this evening, courtesy of a last minute offering of tickets to the World Theatre Festival from the divine Aurelie Beeston.

We were there to see Apollo 13: Mission Control, a New Zealand production brought over to help fulfil the WTF's manifesto of showcasing ingenious and different forms of theatre. And boy, did it ever live up to that!

The production seats its audience inside a meticulously recreated NASA Mission Control for the 1970 Apollo 13 launch. Of course, the Apollo 13 mission didn't quite go to plan, and the show's tagline of "Can YOU bring them home?" means it's up to the audience to make decisions to get the three intrepid astronauts safely back to Earth.

But as it turned out a job in Mission Control wasn't my destiny. Oh no, I was going to infinity - and beyond!

Rowan Doesn't Want to Help. Or Does He?

I met Rowan Barber at the Kelvin Grove Urban Village this morning. I recognised him from the description he'd emailed - he'd be wearing a baby girl strapped to his chest, a Tigger cap, and a "Make Poverty History" t-shirt, ironically.

"Why ironically?" I asked, after we exchanged pleasantries.

"Because, well, I'm scamming money out of you," he grinned nervously.

After my initial Getting Heavy on the Levy article, fears abounded both in the comments section and on Twitter/Facebook that I'd wind up shelling out hundreds to greedy anti-levy countrymen. But I had all the confidence in the world that no one would front up. After all, is $25 to $250 in cash REALLY worth putting yourself out there for social media humiliation?

So imagine my surprise when I received an email from Rowan, including a scan of his most recent tax assessment. He said he was prepared to pose for the photo, was prepared to adopt a smug look, and prepared to sign it with "That's right - I don't want to help" - in return for his levy contribution of $72.

I couldn't believe it. Surely not?

And then, at the end of the email, this line:

Would you mind terribly if I subsequently donated the $72 to the World Toilet Organisation?

I paused.

I thought about it.

Then I sat back in my chair and began applauding. Rowan - the canny, rat-cunning bastard - cleverly twisted my own post around, and in doing so, provided the most perfectly wonderful end to this story.