Bender

I was on DJ 895 tonight, the 2045 MEL->SYD, and I have to say it's always with a great sense of relief that I get on the plane back up to Sydney. My kids are a real handful and the logistics of looking after them in Melbourne while being homeless are a bit, well, difficult.

As I sat down on 22C I noticed the young man next to me was wearing a baseball cap. My views on this aren't a secret, I don't think anyone should wear a hat on a plane, but instead of working myself up into a bender of contempt and silent fury I buried my head in the book I'd just started (literally - started while I was in line to get on the plane). It was a collection of short stories by Tim Winton, a writer I'd managed to avoid so far despite having had quite a few people recommend him. Now that I think about it, it's because of his hair. (Do I sound shallow enough..?)

The final straw was last weekend, I'd met a friend in a bookshop and she'd made me buy it. In revenge, I was going to make her buy Mr Philips but they didn't have it. (My favorite sentence: "And there is something about the limitless reserves of indifference she can express, the thrilling estuarine boredness of her 'Yeah'")

I take it all back. Tim Winton's great, even with that hair. It's impossible not to love a writer who can write "Now and then the hard laughter of ducks washed up the street..". I'm quite emotionally raw on plane trips - even short and uneventful ones - and some of the writing really got me. First paragraph of a story called "Small Mercies":

Peter Dyson came home early one day to find his wife dead in the garage. He'd only been gone an hour, kicking a ball in the park with their four-year-old son. The Ford's motor was still running, its doors locked, and even before he knew it for certain, before he put the sledge-hammer through the window, before the ambulance crew confirmed it, he was grateful to her for sparing the boy.

Ooooooohhhh! Nice.