Why are you being so stingy?”, Sobakevich demanded. “It’s cheap at the price. A rogue would cheat you, sell you some worthless rubbish instead of souls, but mine are as juicy as ripe nuts, all picked—they are all either craftsmen or sturdy peasants.” Dead Souls – Gogol
Whenever I get a submission from Bento, no matter how outre or even obscene the content, he always signs off with, “Should you have any queries, or wish to discuss the matter further, please do not hesitate to contact the undersigned.” Which I think is lovely. Yes, I definitely do wish to discuss further the idea that Rockingham should have a crime fighting (or should that be crime retardant) penguin. There is no subject I would be more eager to discuss further with the undersigned. I assume Oscar will be undertaking Colin Barnett’s new bong confiscation project Bento?
Gogol wrote Dead Souls as the work that would redeem Mother Russia. Who is to write Rockingham’s Dead Souls? Tim fucking Winton? Who is to be Rockingham’s Chichikov? Mark fucking McGowan? The most remarkable thing is that if you substituted Rockingham for backwater Russia, the novel makes even more sense. The second most remarkable thing is that I’m not even drunk while preparing this!
Russia! Russia! Rockingham! Rockingham! I see you now, from my wondrous, beautiful past I behold you! How wretched, dispersed, and uncomfortable everything is about you…
Oscar is dead by now, right Bento?
The Worst of Perth 
hmmm, interesting because the only penguin i know of who has anything to do with crime is this one and he is not best known for his crime fighting abilities
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Wonderful, mp.
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Just caught up with those references, Snuff.
Back in the good old (?) days before ‘gay’ was hi-jacked by the same-sex lobby and meant something completely different.
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As often, Rolly, it’s an interesting ongoing etymological journey. Batman and Robin ? Who next ? Liberace ?
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oh snuff, things just aren’t like they were the good old days are they?(the liberace vid is gold)
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That penguin is my dad….
I note they are introducing a “new mascot”. I wonder what happened to the last one?
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Might not have been as smart as this one, whom I’m sure you remember, shaz.
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Yes Snuff, I now have two heroes. Super smartarse penguin and .Dan Savage.
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I believe the last one mascot eaten by Tosh, the organised crime shark.
Tosh – Tell O’Callahan to Screw Himself
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Haven’t had ay fine words from Clag O’Calamty lately. Maybe this will bring him out of Fort Apache.
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you possibly did not see the news last night
Barnett made a tit of himself regarding his bong laws, by saying that the new possession limit of ten grams was ‘equivalent to ten to twenty of those…what do you call them..”
‘joints?’
“that’s it”
been trying to find the video of it.
Karlo was interviewed saying how very happy he was that Barney is giving him unrestricted powers to stop and search anyone, or enter any premises he likes, without the need to even suggest he has reasonable suspicion.
good on Tom Percy for coming out with the necessary ‘it’s like the fucking Gestapo’ quotes
hopefully this will be the catalyst to this country getting a Bill of Rights
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aussie, karl is in fine fettle, looking forward to fortress perth.
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Did I hear correctly (ABC radio news this morning) that Labor are supporting it and suggesting that it does not go far enough?
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i do believe eric the ripper was saying somethng like that on the 7pm news yesterday. obviously it’s perceived as a vote winner.
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or even ‘something’ like that.
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By-election in Willagee, anyone?
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Willagee is safe as houses hence the “support”, but he qualifies that support in The West though.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/6196145/police-search-laws-cop-civil-rights-lobby-flak/
Quite different from Crazy Colins boots and all approach, but disappointing, yet understandable response from Labor considering the grief they would’ve copped from the Rattlers etc if they outright opposed it, as well from the WA Police Union, who are basically the CFMEU in a blue uniform :-)
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so what you ae saying is that he is a spineless weasel who does exactly what the police and talkback radio tell him to do, regardless of conscience or principle? No different than Barney, then, except that he might know what a joint is.
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No, it’s called damned if you do, damned if you don’t. I don’t like it one bit, bu I do understand it politically, especially in a place like Perth.
Oh and stories like this.
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Don’t let him off the hook so easily Frank. Ripper is a spineless poll-watcher, and this is a bullshit sellout of all principles.
There are already plenty of laws which enable the police to take action against people who are disorderly, violent, carrying weapons, selling drugs, or whatever. All the police have to do is show reasonable grounds for suspicion.
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I know that, you know that, but try telling that to the Kath & Kims who hang off EVERY word of Beaumont, Sattler & Co and Dr Karl etc.
If Labor had stuck to their prinicples and opposed it, you would’ve seen the Libs win by a 10 seat majority.
That I’m afraid is the political reality.
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whatever happened to those 500 officers that Barney promised?
I don’t see the Laura Norder media brigade holding him accountable to that, or to any of his other bullshit election promises.
all it shows is laziness, on behalf of the pollies and the media. The media are happy to have the police media department write their stories for them and create a climate of fear.
Get rid of the Police media office, and make the police directly accountable to the electorate. I am sick of seeing coppers making their own statements in the media, as if they have some say in policy. They enforce the law, they do not make it.
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Jesus, I hope you don’t get pulled over for speeding today Skink…
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And note Dr Karl’s Media bugle is none other than former Ch 7 & 9 CCrime Reporter Neil Poh, and another bugle is Ch 10 Crime Reporter (and lawyer (he studied externally) Rex Haw. Oh and one of Dr Karl’s colleagues at Curtin FM Peter Newman was Bob Falconer’s Media adviser as well, plus another well known media media identity and one time National Party candidate Ian Haselby also is in the inner circle of police Meeja.
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Political reality pig’s arse Frank. Barney and Dripper are the kind of spineless wonders who allow the police to put police in police state.
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no frank, it’s called selling out.
i would pay good money to see a politician actually stand up for something that is right.
but i guess my money is safe.
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And be massacred in the following election.
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What’s the point in winning elections if you don’t stand for anything?
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exactly bento.
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Promising the world is one thing, delivering in a political reality is another thing altogether.
Two words why:
Matthew Butcher.
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but only because the pollies allow the police to control the stories, and are too gutless to take on the coppers, and the media are to lazy to mount any real investigations.
Boris Johnson took on the coppers in London. I am no fan of Johnson, but at least he showed that he had a pair.
It would be quite easy for the Government to just sack Karlo, and get in a new Chief. The previous one was more open minded, but did not have the political backing to make the reforms he wanted and to get rid of the redneck rump that still runs the force.
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If that was the case, then why are the Greens only winning lower house seats in By-Elections instead of in a General Election ? :-)
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Bigger golden handshake when you finally lose?
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You funny idealists. It’s all about the glory.
Nicki had it, than TLA had it all at his house, and now Barnett has it and Ripper wants it. It’s all about the glory I tells ya.
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My initial reaction to unrestricted stop & search powers was much the same as yours, skink. But on reflection, I find the idea of being patted down at the Swinging Pig by a penguin a little intriguing, to say the least.
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Oh there is now a Facebook group created on the Crazy Colin’s Gestapo laws.
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=152052573386&ref=nf
And even if Labor opposed it in the lower house with Queen Adele’s support, it would’ve passed with the help of Liz Constable, Janet Woolard, John Bowler and the Nationals including Vince Cuntania :-(
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And I forgot that the Nationals have the balance of Power in the Upper House and thus guaranteeing a free run.
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Colon knows nothing about cannabis, but wants to change the related laws anyway.
And, presumably, this is all aimed at combatting the cannabis fuelled crime epidemic. Mars Bars will be free to walk the streets again, and the bean bag will finally become desirable for the non-stoner.
Better ban rollie papers too Colon, some of us are traditionalists.
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Skink,
Here is the Video from our ABC of Crazy Colin having difficulty in mentioning the J word :-)
http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2009/10/11/2710952.htm
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There was Percy Penguin once (cue Frank for links), but he allegedly had illicit drugs issues himself, even before he was supplanted by the obese feline.
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I still think TWOP should have a caption competition for this, Vic.
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According to the WA TV History site (and Peter Harries excellent thesis on WA TV, Percy was originally given life by Tod Johnston’s father, Kevan, who I doubt would be a partaker of non legal pharmaceuticals, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it was during Todd McKenney’s time in the suit that the alleged pharmaceuticals were consumed, though I do know from a former second cousin in law, that when she portrayed a baby penquin during a Miss West Coast final ( I do hope they play the footage on Friday Night’s TVW special) ol Percy was quite drunk and apparently vomited in the suit before the performance.
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Dear TLA
I used to like your blog
It was funny
Now you wankers have upset all the bns apologists and they all ran away.
Would you mind going to the top paddock and opening the gate.
Or perhaps you could talk about the plan to move Muresk to Bentley. What a crackpot plan. The soil type is comple tely wrong for cattle and beef. It is much better for AWOL/FIFO and FOWF stickers…
Cattle and wheat grow well at Muresk alongside a smattering of obvious metaphors.
Perhaps we can stand side by side with our country cousins on this one?
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My employment situation does not allow me to comment on Curtin Muresk situation. I am now apparently less funny but three times more popular. How worst is that?
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I think it is a comedians’ version of ‘Animal Farm’
unpopular, laconic and snarky stand-up comedian attempts to disturb the established order, but slowly changes to resemble those he replaced.
At some point he becomes so popular, and so unfunny, as to become indistinguishable from Daryl Somers
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2 jokes good. 4 jokes bad.
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White face good. Black face bad.
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All comedians are equal, but some comedians are more… , no I can’t do it, I’m not a comedian.
To paraphrase Bob Monkhouse: They laughed when I said I that I wanted to be a comedian, but they’re not laughing now.
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Shouldn’t that be “all comedians are funny, but some…”
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Not Worst. Don’t flatter yourself.
I probably should comment on the post.
I think Rockinham have nailed it with this one.
They’ve created a safer community and added much needed vibrancy in onr fell swoop. It is reminscent of the highly successful Captain Cleanup program. Kudos to Rockingham.
You WAnkers shouldn’t sit around and snigger.
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At least Cleanup has some kind of getaway vehicle. Oscar has no chance. No need to keep on topic.
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The Cleanup car is still kicking around. Could we revive that program as part of Luke Pomersbach’s community service?
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Hello, I would like to hire a superhero costume… What do you mean you have no superhero costumes?… Oh, Spring in the Valley. Right… Umm… Police uniform?… What about some sort of vicious animal?… No, more vicious than that… No lion?… Eagle?… Oh. Fucken Spring in the Valley. Just give me the fucken penguin, then.
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WA-tching///////
Has undertones of tWAt Chong…….
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No relation. I am flattered though…
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There are huge risks moving an Ag college to Perth.
What if their Round Up resistant strains of RM Williams stickers cross pollinate with our local FIFO/FOWF strains. Or even worse… Mike Ward
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mad fucking cows everywhere.
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I knew this would happen. Has Tealou got something to do with this?
McDonald’s names a burger after her son and all of a sudden there’s a crime fighting penguin sharing my son’s name… coincidence? I think not!
BTW, I met Harry Connick Jnr in Glass restaurant at the Sydney Hilton last Friday morning. I was tempted to do something hilarious with Vegemite, but opted to buy him a wheatgrass shooter instead.
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I just heard a loud thump
did you drop something?
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A namedrop, three product placements, and a travel story, in one comment. That’s why you get the big dollars, Cookster. Kudos.
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…and a topical news reference
the wheatgrass shooter was obviously a metaphor
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Shhh, WA police are cracking down on ‘wheatgrass shooters’…
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I was going to ask you Cookster. What’s so special about Angus beef? It’s just normal bog standard beef isn’t it? If not, does that mean they’ll be going back to lower quality when this terrible campaign is over?
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Well, lucky me, it’s the Skink & Bento show. Three product placements, but only one paying customer.
If I’m getting the big dollars Bento, then you must be living in a cardboard box?
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here we go…
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/6207773/psych-patient-first-to-face-mandatory-jail-laws/
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And Nik started out so well with her comment to the article, then totally fucked it up.
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See my last response – re Constable Matthew Butcher and the stage managed hysteria by Mike Dean & Co just because the Jury lawfully aquitted those who were charged with assaulting him.
That is why we have such oppressive laws, oh and Crazy Colin & Redneck Rob Johnston were trotting out the line that the offenders were getting let off on “Technicalities” re the use of search orders.
Oh and if you want to see an example of cops being arseholes, may I suggest last night’s The Force.
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Hmm, so the general knowledge question is:
The extra powers the police want would help them how in this situation?
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Oh and the Ghost of Matt Butcher rears it’s ugly head again.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/breaking/6208118/const-butcher-style-assault-in-perth-hills-union/
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Oh and there are 2 “Unions” a Govt will stand up to:
The AMA and Police Union, the latter will make your life unbearable if you upset them, as demonstrated in the Matt Butcher protests.
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Own up, please.
Who’s got the keys to the fucking hermitage?
I need them right now.
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TLA – I must congratulate you on taking a picture of a crime retardant penguin, and turning into a treatise on Russian intellectualism. Bravo, sir.
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Rockingham intelectualism. Haven’t had any other Dead Souls fans so far today. It is a wonderful and often hilarious book. Gogol went crazy afterwards, and a religious nutjob convinced him to burn his work, but most of Dead Souls was saved.
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It will no doubt mark me as a philistine if I say my first thought was of Nine Inch Nails. Not only did I not think of Gogol, I did not even think of Joy Division. For shame.
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Crime
Reduction
And
Prevention
Would probably be more appropriate
Why one would want target the under 8 year olds in a crime prevention operation seems just a little strange.
Getting them early is one thing, but………..
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It’s Rockingham, Rolly. Most of the residents have committed at least 1 one-punch murder by the time they get their pen licence.
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Rolly,
Does that include Constable Care indoctrinating Children in Primary School ?
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CC really indoctrinated the brighter kids with the absolute conviction that all coppers are tossers.
The less switched on just screamed in terror.
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Surely you’re not questioning the efficacy of the rhyming couplet as a weapon in the war on crime, Rolly?
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You clearly haven’t been to Rockingham Rolly. Most are divorced parents of four by age 18.
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Oh bugger, I wrote this Bento and Frank did theirs but didn’t post til just now. Iv’e ended up looking like some unoriginal non funny person.
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You’re still miles ahead of me, shaz.
I know it’s only Rocky, Rolly, but I like it. Try the goat’s head soup.
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“I wrote this before Bento and Frank….”
Fuck it, I can’t parent and do TWOP. The kids have to go.
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you sound a little muddled
have you been smoking it all before Colin can take it away?
how about some bumper stickers: “I smoke and I vote. Fire up or fuck off.”
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Good god, on rereading I do sound like Iv’e been tucking into the bongs.
Being in a mellow mood I’d prefer the less angry – ‘reefers or leaf us’
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Don’t worry our shazza. As soon as I read that I thought “Yeah she’s typed that with a kid on her lap.”
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I most certainly did poor lisa.
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shazza, i completely understand. am feeling your pain and will back your decision entirely which ever way you go! at least send them to a good home….. then they can think back and have fond memories of you in the future.
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Mothers who abandon their children are frequently idealised by them.
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I hear that the penguin has been issued with a taser
if any of the little kiddies start getting lippy, then under the new legislation the penguin has the power to zap the little bastards
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Those piezoelectric mozzie bite zapper things are quite a good taser alternative on the very young skink. You can conceal it in your hand and they don’t even know what’s hit them!
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Note to Rockingham kiddies – as an official crime retardant penguin, OSCAR is a public officer for the purposes of mandatory sentencing legislation. Pulling his flipper will unavoidably land you in the Big House for 6 months.
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Hope OSCAR has a Working with Children Card :-)
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And there’s nearly 100 comments and I’m like Meh. Whatever. I don’t get out of bed for less than 150 comments.
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Dear P Nurry
Arguably the biggest problem facing Mark McGowan’s mooted “premiership” is the weight of expectations placed on his shoulders.
The downside to building up everyone’s hopes too high is that the time eventually arrives when many more people will realise that he is a complete tool.
You need look no further than the time he was the opposition spokesman for local government (circa 1998) to see what a total whitewash this clown actually is.
Had McGowan been a character in Dead Souls, no doubt even the ever resourceful Chickikov would have been totally dumbfounded as to how how to fleece this idiot of the rights to the dead Rockingham peasants who, no doubt, passed away from sheer bordom after sitting in on a few council meetings when this wet rag of a politician was a local alderman.
And now, thanks to the piss poor leadership of the Labor Party, which has somehow deteriorated to even further incompetent lows post the Carpenter reign, McGowan is expected to bring law and order to this fair coastal hamlet.
A measureness of McGowan’s hollowness was the way he threw his hat in the leadership ring before the stench of Carpenter’s rotting carcus started to fill the halls of parliament.
Sure the Labor Party is desperate – anyone would be with the goofy Ripper at the helm. But to even entertain the idea that McGowan is leadership material is the product of a demented mind that doesn’t even have a drug induced sense of humour to go with it.
I was going to quote a few passages from Hansard here to build up the word count, but for the life of me I can’t find anything McGowan has said in parliament quote worthy – not even when I’m being paid 80 cents a word!
To hell with it – I’ll cut to the end.
People of good faith would wish Mr McGowan well in reaching his peaceful aims of making Rockingham crime free.
But even soaring rhetoric in this case would be prefeable to what this bonehead has to offer – which is nothing short of uninspirational aspirations.
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Finally someone who has read Dead Souls. The regional dumbarses of Russia are “so Rockingham” that the book is uncanny. The petty politics, the stupidity, the bad fashion. The colour of the sea at Rockingham is also the exact shade of “The flame and smoke of Navarino.
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Russian peasants have southern cross tattoos and have the model car they drive emblazoned accross said car in ten inch letters?
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Troikas. The make of their troikas in big letters at first blush.
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Wife Beaters and Stubby shorts are an international costume of social superiority.
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Rockingham, are you not speeding along like a fiery and matchless troika?
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Fair suck of the sauce bottle, Snuff…
If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing Rockingham and the rest of Perth cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?
And not forgetting…
In the winter of 1934, the agronomists of Rockingham sowed flax on the snow — exactly as McGowan had ordered. The seeds expanded, grew mouldy and died. The vast fields stayed empty throughout the year. McGowan of course couldn’t call the snow a kulak or himself an idiot. He accused the agronomists of being kulaks and distorting his technology. And the agronomists were sent to Siberia.
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And tattoos of Ursa Minor, presumably.
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“there is no word so perk and quick, which bursts from the heart with such spontaneity, which seethes and bubbles with such vitality, as the aptly spoken Rockingham word”
The word in question being ‘export’ or perhaps ‘centrelink’.
I really can’t comment, being a permanent resident of BunVegas.
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Mr LA – don’t forget the fact that the mere mention of McGowan or Rockingham will make every vein in one’s body shudder with revulsion….also, at the end of book one, Chickikov was undone by malicious gossip – if only McGowan was interesting enough to gossip about….
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It’s been too long since I’ve read a My Ning effort…
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So very true.
Hasn’t lost his touch it seems.
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TLA – just identified a kick arse opportunity for you to flog a few Bunbury of the North tees:
http://bit.ly/1f4Zxp
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“…everywhere in Rockingham was the same as everywhere else, except that in the tavern, the nymph in the oil painting over the fire had such enormous breasts that the reader cannot possibly have seen anything like it before…”
Dead Souls
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I hope that these quotes will get a few readers turned to Dead Souls. Outrage, surely you have read this hilarious masterpiece?
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I don’t know why I’ve never gotten around to it, TLA, but I will on your recommendation.
Anyone else who wants to download it, (it’s tiny, and free), can do so here from Project Gutenberg.
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The tragedy of the writing of the book is so very interesting too, with the religious nutjob almost suceeding in getting Gogol to burn it. I think he starved himself to death on religious grounds. The Penguin edition is good because of the foreword. It bridges the gap between some of the burnt bits which are lost. And just substitute Rockingham for Town N.
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Natch, TLA. Lermontov, Turgenev, Gogol, Babel – the old Russians are the original funsters.
As much as I like them all, I believe you can’t ignore the Gulag. Now there’s a yarn of epic proportions.
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And Crazy Colin’s crackdown on Graffiti will also affect legitimate art students as well.
http://blogs.abc.net.au/wa/2009/10/under-18s-artists-or-criminals.html#more
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He’s not going on a flange crackdown as well Frank? It would cut out a lot of my material.
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Done with the same mental processes which conjured up the Kimberley to Perth Water canal.
Processes as deep as the water level in the canal would have been after its long, evaporated, journey.
The man is a mental midget.
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After all the kerfuffle you don’t know that the midgets should be left alone.
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I like the story about Rockingham police officer’s ear being ripped off. Where was this penguin?
http://click.email.watoday.com.au/?qs=b7e5b52c89588b363bd92afba2ffc4963212eec496c28dcba586bbfae696cd1b
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‘During this conversation the man got aggressive and spat saliva onto the shirt of one of the officers.’ Definitely saliva then? Not ‘a quantity of fluid’?
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LOL this is funny and I love the penguin.
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