A dream achieved: no more 'things to do'

One of the best things I've done during 2012 -- no, the best thing I've done -- is throwing away my to-do list.

When I say to-do list, I don't mean a few odd jobs scratched on a scrap of paper clipped to the fridge door. 'Fix the tap', 'Call the lawnmowing woman', that sort of thing. I mean a spreadsheet. A database. A designed system. With, if I remember rightly, importance ratings from 1 to 3 and urgency ratings something like 'deadline!', 'immediate', 'soon', 'fairly soon', 'whenever', and 'just an idea'. I kept track of my ideas in a database. WTF?

I've always been a list-keeping sort of person. I remember being 8 or 9 and having written lists of my clothes (a weird assortment of hand-me-downs... some things never change) to make sure I wore them in turn so I wouldn't have all my favourites wearing out before my less-favourites.

If you're thinking of Sheldon from Big Bang Theory you have a point, even though Sheldon is a caricature and nobody's really like him. I'm somewhat autistic, I think. Either that or I just have an unusual brain. Which amounts to the same thing, really. If you are not autistic at all the technical word for you is neurotypical.

But I digress. The to-do list! Sometime during my first year at university life seemed to get more complicated. I wrote a list of things that needed doing, to outsource them from my brain so it could get on with more interesting stuff, like studying, hanging with friends and fantasising about the opposite sex. I was studying computer science, and I made the analogy that I was putting my tasks on peripheral storage instead of keeping them in RAM, freeing up RAM for currently running jobs. My to-do list was like a removable USB drive for my mind. (We didn't have USB drives, by the way -- a few really geeky kids had personal computers, but my to-do list was a piece of paper pinned to the wall.)

But I digress. (I'm creative, alright? And kind of autistic. Deal with it! :-) Since then I've always had a to-do list, and it got longer and longer as life got more complicated, with a job, and kids, and (for a while there!) a husband, and voluntary work, and eventually, the worst of all, self-employment as a computer consultant, and later, ie, now, as a writer. At one point the amount of different stuff I wanted to remember got so out-of-control that I couldn't figure out what I should be doing next. I'd be flipping from one thing to another, trying to do three things at once, or just standing there looking at the list going 'aagh'. Major stress. The kind of thing that puts lines on your face and gives you backache.

I did some research on how to handle things, how to Get Things Done. Unfortunately for me, most of it's probably written by people like Sheldon. Everything I read about 'time management' talked about prioritising: triaging your tasks based on their importance and urgency. I immediately thought, assign numeric ratings... use software to sort... focus on whatever's at the top of the list... easy, right? Back in control, right?

Not.

What happened was that I managed, each day, or each week, or each month, to cross off a few of the topmost items: the things with deadlines and some of the things that were really urgent and important -- and each day, or week, or month, a few new tasks and ideas would get added, and most of the new tasks would be urgent. I never got to the terrific ideas that weren't urgent, were lower down the list. I would look at them longingly: some of them were going to be really fun, when I eventually got to them. 'Start a non-fiction blog' was there, for example.

And I used to mentally beat myself up about all the things that had been on the list for six months, a year, two years. What was wrong with me, what was I doing wrong, that I could never get to these things?

What was wrong with me was that I needed to sleep, and eat, and exercise, and parent my kids, and hang out with friends, and fantasise about the opposite sex, and, well, live.

Since I made my first to-do list, back at uni, the list came with a dream: one day I would finally get all the things done. And then I could spend all day playing again, just like when I was a child. I'd been carrying that dream around for almost 30 years.

Not only that, when I looked at all the things I'd told myself I'd do some day, I felt like I'd broken an enormous promise to myself. For 30 years.

Some time in the first half of 2012 I thought, what if I just threw it away?  It occurred to me that I was making life's journey with a gigantic suitcase full of things I'd probably never use. I'd learned to travel light, physically -- anything that doesn't fit in my cabin-bag-sized wheelie case doesn't come on tour (except for my guitar... but that's another story)! What if I just threw it away? Wouldn't I feel lighter? Better? Happier?

Okay, I thought. So what would have to happen, what would have to change, in order for me to throw it away?

I would need some other way to keep track of deadlines and commitments to other people. That stuff really does have to be outsourced to something more reliable than my wetware.

And I would still want to keep a few things written down. The stuff I really had promised myself I would actually do, the stuff I wanted to plan out, to make happen. But the less important stuff, and the stuff that was just ideas -- that'd have to be cast once again upon the Darwinian mercies of my soggy neural network, just like it had ben in the wonderful before, when I could spend all Saturday afternoon practising somersaults or writing to imaginary boyfriends.

I'd kept a diary since my uni days (because you don't want to think about exams and lectures all the time but it helps if you can remember when they are!). I used to have a paper diary, then a software calendar that I would print out each month and carry in my bag for 'on-the-go' appointments, but now I had an Android smartphone and was using the wonderful Google Calendar.  Accessible from my computer, from my phone, downloadable, printable, sharable... and I was well into the habit of looking at it every day, which is the trick with diaries. So I thought, well, I can put the deadlines and commitments on Google Calendar. I'll use the Calendar Flair gadget to give them a red star! Yes! Of course! And the things I really, really want to do -- the bucket-list things! -- I'll think about how and when I could actually make them happen and put them on the calendar as all-day 'appointments' on certain days or weeks. I'll schedule them.

And it worked! That heavy suitcase feeling disappeared. Not overnight -- at first I scheduled too many things and had to learn to let go even more: schedule less for each day, block out whole days as unscheduled, and stop scheduling things that didn't really matter. I'm still learning. The calendar is gradually getting less cluttered. But I'm still achieving lots of stuff. Maybe more than before, maybe not, but that doesn't matter, really, because I'm happier.

The feeling of liberation is hard to explain, but it's very like when you get off a plane with your cabin bag and go straight to the bus or taxi rank while most of the other passengers are waiting around the baggage carousel.

OK, I still have the cabin bag -- I have a short list of tasks for each day, most days. I can't live without that. (Not yet, anyway!) But I'm living more in the moment, not worrying about next week until I get to it, except at certain times when I sit down and plan. And if my plans don't work out, I don't beat myself up. When I get to the end of the day and I haven't done some task or other, I can just pick it up with my clicking finger and drag it to another day, or another month, or sometime next year, and forget about it until then. Or I can just hit Delete and say, well, too bad, I never did that thing, but so what? And I'm getting better at hitting Delete. Which gives me more time to do the stuff I really want to do. Like writing. And hanging out with friends, and fantasising about the opposite sex. Hurray!

Ginsberg misses out. My mum's chocolate slice recipe

If you've been to one of my poetry workshops you'll know that everyone becomes much more creative after a serve of decadent northern European home baking, preferably involving chocolate. By popular demand, here's the recipe for my mum's chocolate slice.

Allen Ginsberg, who died before I got around to inviting him, wrote a satirical poem entitled 'Cmon pigs of Western civilisation, eat more grease'. Hmm. Well, if it worries you, substitute a politically-correct binding ingredient for the melted butter.

Ginsberg might have called this a brownie, but my mum is English. When I was a kid we had slices and biscuits, not brownies and cookies. Cookies existed only on Sesame Street.

Jackson's mum's chocolate slice

Slice

• 125g butter
• 1 cup self-raising flour (I use half wholemeal, half white)
• 1 cup desiccated coconut
• 1/2 cup sugar (use less or more as you prefer. I use brown sugar)
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder (find a nice dark organic one)
• 1 egg

Icing

• 1 cup icing sugar
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
• Hot water to mix until runny

Topping

• About a tablespoon of dessicated coconut

Method  

• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.
• Line a slice tray with non-stick baking paper. Let the paper extend a little beyond the tray.

• Melt the butter.
• In a large bowl, mix flour, coconut, sugar and cocoa.
• In a small bowl, beat the egg.
• Add the egg and melted butter to the large bowl and mix well.
• Tip into the tray and press down firmly. (Make a fist and press using the flat surface formed by the middles of your fingers -- or if your hands never worked a day and can't take the heat, use the back of a spoon.)
• Bake for 20 minutes.

It has to be cut while hot and still soft, and iced immediately so that the icing melts in. Otherwise it's dry, biscuity and not half as yummy.

• While the slice bakes, sift the icing sugar and cocoa into a bowl, and boil the kettle.

• Use a sharp knife to divide the baked slice into squares or rectangles.
• Gradually mix hot water into the icing mix, a teaspoonful at a time, until it's runny.
• Quickly distribute the icing over the slice and spread it with the back of a spoon. There's an art to doing this quickly and evenly so it melts in nicely and doesn't pool in the gaps between the cut squares. (Oh, and you have to spread it right to the edges of the tray. I insist! My mum used to be lazy about that. I considered it grossly unfair when I got a half-dry edge piece and my little brother got a choc-soaked middle piece.)
• Sprinkle it with coconut.
• Leave to set. Put it in the fridge or freezer to speed this up.
• Once it's set you can grasp the edges of the baking paper and lift the slice in one piece from the tray onto a cutting board. Use a large sharp knife to separate the squares.
• Hide it well if you want it to last.

This freezes really well and tastes great straight from the freezer.

It occurs to me now that it might be even better with rice bubbles added to the mix. Or chopped hazelnuts, perhaps.

Best served with excellent coffee, although children might prefer a glass of milk.

Toilet cleaners are my heroes: musings on a better society

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I've been thinking about what kind of society we might have in the future, what kind of society I'd like to see develop, if humanity survives the current scary but rather exciting period of turmoil and change. And I've written some of it down.
I'm nervous about posting these thoughts. I'm nervous that what I'm about to say has already been said -- or debunked! -- more coherently by someone much more distinguished than me. And there's not one 'ism' in it, except right at the end. But what the heck.

What would it mean to have a good society, a just, harmonious, peaceful society?

My current answer is that in an ideal society, everyone's needs would be met, at all the levels of Maslow's hierarchy (see my previous comments on this). Physical, psychological, social and spiritual needs. For everyone in the world, young or old, male or female or in-between, able-bodied or not, able-minded or not. (Human, animal or vegetable? Hmm. Maybe.)

For 100% of needs to be met 100% of the time for 100% of the people is maybe impossible -- a theoretical outer limit, like absolute zero or infinity -- but I see no reason why we can't move closer and closer to it. When I look at history -- especially as a woman! -- it looks like we are moving closer to it. As transport and communication improve, and as psychology and neurology develop and start to merge with the ancient Eastern study of mind and body, we are gradually becoming more conscious of one another's needs, less inclined to violent conflict, and more gentlewith our children.

So what would it take to have a society where everyone gets their needs met and nobody gets left out? And where nobody is abused, violated, coerced or neglected -- where no-one has that much power over others?

A workable society would have decision-making carried out at the appropriate... level isn't the word, too loaded... size is more what I'm after. Or sphere. Decisions affecting a household made by the household; decisions affecting a village, by the village; a city, by the city; and so on, all the way to the world: decisions affecting the whole world made by the whole world. Decisions made by the group they affect, rather than being imposed from the next level 'up', or imposed by a leader who is supposedly at the same 'level' but isn't really.

Being a leader in a hierarchical system is pretty uncomfortable. You're not really a member of the group you're leading, you stand outside it. Leadership can be very lonely. And there's always going to be someone who hates you! In a non-hierarchical setup there might be no leader, or there might be temporary leaders depending on the situation. A trusted person might take responsibility for coordinating the group. They might be chosen by the group or they might be someone who comes forward to serve (not boss!) the group. But nobody will be able to coerce anyone else to obey them. There'll be guidelines for behaviour and activity, but people would follow them because they buy into them -- because they are involved in the making of the guidelines. Decisions would be made using methods that are okay with everyone. It might be consensus, it might be a vote, it might be letting a trusted leader decide, or it might be some combination. If we're steering a boat through a patch of icebergs we might not want the whole crew at the wheel! but if we're deciding where to build a tramline, a consensus solution reached at a community meeting might be more appropriate and would allow for brainstorming, for new ideas and innovative concepts to be discussed.

In spheres where it is not practical for everyone to meet, even electronically, decisions would be made by working groups. What sort of decisions? For example, at the city size, there'd be decisions about providing services like sewage, transport and health care that need large numbers of people to cooperate... industrialised production, perhaps... library and information services... communications services, without which none of this could work in the first place. Why working groups? Because you wouldn't want to have a city-wide referendum on every little thing. I think it would be better to have groups made up of people who are interested in contributing in this way and who are trained to be experts in their field, trained by the working groups and perhaps also by training groups.

But the actual structure isn't the point, here. I can imagine all kinds of workable possibilities, and the groups and boundaries and guidelines would be fluid, dynamic, always changing.

Getting rid of the coercion, the physical and economic threat that pervades current society in all spheres from the domestic to the international, is what will make it work. For this to happen, would you have to do away with money, exchange? I suspect so -- but perhaps not. Private property? perhaps not completely... but it would help a lot if people could stop comparing themselves to others, measuring status, by how much people have. I'm not keen on status at all, deep in my heart I believe status is bullshit, really... but I'm aware that not everyone feels this way. Status measured by how much people contribute, that might be okay: a person who gives a great deal would have a higher status than a person who behaves lazily and selfishly. At the moment rich people have high status just because they have a lot, and it's this mindset that needs to change. If you could change this mindset you could still have exchange and private property but it would have a different meaning.

People's various needs would be met by the various groups they belonged to, and the provision of needs would not be linked to contribution. Everything would be voluntary. No coercion. A person who is too lazy to contribute would... well now, what would happen? Well, if they were denied their basic needs they would probably turn to crime, so it would be better to just give them their needs anyway and just factor that in. However, if we go a bit deeper here and look at why they are not contributing, perhaps it's just that they haven't found the work that is right for them and could use some help to find it. Perhaps our system needs to be adjusted to accommodate them. Perhaps we need to adjust our way of doing things so that the person becomes engaged and wants to join in.

All kinds of contributions would be valued and recognised, from public-toilet cleaning to neurosurgery. (Toilet cleaners are my heroes. There's no point having your brain in tiptop order if you can't relieve yourself without risking infection.) People could do what they enjoy, what they excel at, and also feel good about taking a turn at the less pleasant tasks like nursing the terminally ill and dealing with the sewage.

You would still have miners, perhaps large mining organisations. It's difficult to imagine any sort of human civilisation without metals. Even if we didn't have money. Gold and diamonds have a lot of industrial uses.

You would still have farming. We've got too many people to live by hunting and gathering. There would be large and small farms and gardens run by people who are good at organising or who particularly enjoy farming and gardening. Lots of people would help with this, I think -- they'd get a lot of satisfaction from doing their bit to help grow the plants and animals that provide their food, textiles and other raw materials.

You would still have factories to make stuff (unless we want to go back to the pre-industrial age, and I don't! No phones? No cochlear implants? No precisely machined mechanical parts? No bicycles? No solar panels? No thanks.) but if people were show up for work without economic coercion, what would have to change? 

I'll let you think about that.

In the society I'm trying to imagine, a lot of current tasks would be unnecessary. For a start, I don't think you'd have police or lawyers. If money was still used, you might have bankers, but it's really starting to look like the whole borrowing and lending thing was a bad idea (as Jesus, or whoever wrote that stuff, tried to point out). One of my hopeful predictions is that people will gradually lose faith in privately-owned banks and desert them in favour of community-based financial organisations.

What about conflict? What about violent crime? What would happen to a person who hurt another person? Or where people aren't getting on, are finding it impossible to live harmoniously? This would be dealt with by the group of which both persons are a member, which might be family or household but might also be city or even world if a person hurt some random they met on the street. At the city level we might have a working group of people, call them counsellors, who are trained, train each other, to help those who get into this situation. To help them and perhaps their families talk together and understand what happened and grow and become greater people as a result of the experience. Each group could perhaps have its counsellors, people who are especially interested in helping others... but I hope that in an ideal world, everyone would be interested in that! A small family or neighbourhood group might not have any counsellors, but if they are having trouble sorting out a conflict they could ask for help from a neighbouring family or neighbourhood.

When I say families, I don't necessarily mean blood families. I also mean people who have chosen to bond and perhaps live and work together in some way and who feel a sense of responsibility for each other, who love one another in a personal way.

A person could be a member of several families.

What if two groups have a conflict? For example, a conflict over who gets to use a patch of land. Or about how to use some external resource, how to treat some animal species, whether to log some patch of forest or mine some mountain. Whether to do some big concerted action like maybe sending people to Mars. Rather than having a fight they would talk and try to find a way through the difficulty.

There would have to be an acceptance that conflict is normal, that it is okay to be in conflict, that it is not a disorder, but that violence, especially group violence, is not an effective way to solve conflict.

It would help if people were not so attached to their outcome being correct. In the case of the patch of land, if everyone feels safe that their needs will be met, if people aren't in fear of insecurity and hunger, then there wouldn't have to be a war. The groups would either decide to share, or a second patch will be found, or perhaps they might just choose at random and the 'losing' group look for another patch... or perhaps the whole project might be abandoned and the interested parties would find some other way of doing things.

The groups might use a ritualised conflict to decide... throw a dice or have a game of football perhaps. This sounds silly, but chance is how lotteries are run and how cricketers decide who is going to bat first, and people are quite content to lose those contests, because they're not personally attached to the outcome.

Aggression and violent feelings would be channelled into ritualised conflict such as sports.

If babies were raised in complete love and security there would be a lot less aggressive violent feelings anyway.

Perhaps if two people (two 'men', let's say) really did want to have a physical fight to sort out a disagreement, it would be arranged by the group? No, that makes it a spectacle, glorifies it. Two men might have a physical fight now and again, to express their aggression and let go of it. If that didn't work they could get help from other men in their group, and perhaps also from women, to sort it out. Perhaps they could be helped to find other more useful ways to channel their aggression and passion.

This kind of society does seem to be what we are gradually fumbling towards. There's a long way to go, though, and we can't get there overnight.

Perhaps the current totalitarian trend isn't entirely bad. For those of us who didn't grow up with all these cameras and rules it's pretty uncomfortable, and the possibilities for abuse of power are terrifying, but I can't help seeing a positive side: raising awareness that society as a whole is not okay, anymore, with people fighting, spitting, verbally and physically abusing their kids and spouses, driving dangerously, and generally not giving a damn about others. I suspect most grown-up people would support the police in enforcing the laws against violence, discrimination and the neglect of children. Perhaps a bit of coercion is okay, for now, if it helps people break the cycle of abuse that leads to rage and violence. Maybe. I'm not sure whether it's worth the risk.

Coercion is so often used to protect money, to guard the greed of individuals and of amoral, inhuman corporations. Where it's used for that, it's a scourge. And where it's arbitrary and unjust. And where the power of the state-sanctioned weapon-carrying agent is abused, not used to serve. Where the agent uses their weapon and position to express their own rage instead of to protect.

Anyway, that's enough  -- for now! -- of the sociopolitical musings of a middle-aged poet, parent, and occasional reluctant community leader. I don't have a recipe for any of it, other than gradual change, gradual raising of awareness.

Robert Fuller has a pretty good suggestion though. He suggests we abandon rankism, which, as I understand it, means 'us-and-them' thinking. On his site Breaking Ranks, he says:

RANKISM: The Common Thread
Rankism is the exploitation or humiliation of those with less power or lower status. Simply put, rankism occurs when the somebodies of the world use the power of their rank to take advantage over those they see as nobodies. Rankism is the root cause of a wide variety of dominating behaviors.
...
DIGNITY: The Cure For Rankism
How do you change something that’s so pervasive and that has for so long gone unnamed? With dignity, Fuller says. Treating people with dignity, no matter where they fall on the corporate, social, familial, or political ladder is the key to overcoming rankism in all its manifestations. In rankist environments, creativity is stifled, students can’t learn, workers are disloyal, health is compromised, families suffer dysfunction, and victims want revenge. Dignity is the antidote.

I couldn't agree more.

Some advice for would-be poets: Judge's Report, Glen Phillips Poetry Prize 2012

When the Peter Cowan Writers Centre asked me to be the judge for their recent poetry competition, I was pleased, but a bit hesitant. I don't often enter poetry competitions because choosing one poem as the 'best' from a whole field of entries seems kind of arbitrary. But I'm always up for a new experience, and they wanted me to commend twelve poems altogether, so I agreed. Besides, getting paid to read poems and write about them was too good to pass up. On Sunday I made my way through the rain to Joondalup to present my report and announce the winners. Thanks to Sue, Susan and Pedro of Peter Cowan Writers Centre for a nice lunch and a very enjoyable afternoon.

I believe the poems are to be published in the next few issues of the Centre's members' e-newsletter.

§

If my count is correct there were 348 entries. Reading them all was fun, like exploring a new English-speaking city: at first it seems familiar but it soon reveals quite a few surprises.

Several times I recognised a poem from a reading or workshop, but rarely did I remember who'd written it. When I did, it was difficult to be objective and judge the poem without thinking about the poet, but I did my best.

126 of the entries went into the reject pile on the first reading. I wanted to tell these writers, you are not Keats. Be yourself! Stop trying to be 'poetic': it isn't working. Listen to your own 21st-century voice and write down its words. In many cases I wanted to shout, for heaven's sake, drop the rhyme! It's crippling you! Rhyme can be entertaining; rhyme can increase the impact of a poem by highlighting and unifying ideas. But it must be done skilfully or it's a fast-track to dreadfulness. If your idea of a poem is a string of clichés with lame or painful rhymes at the line-ends, you'd be better off to spend your entry-fee money on...

...poetry books! If you want to be taken seriously as a poet, read widely. Familiarise yourself with all the ways in which poetry has been written during the past 50 years or so, and let this cornucopia of styles influence you. Perhaps start with a recent anthology aimed at students. A 'poet' who doesn't read new poetry is like a 'painter' who never goes near a gallery.

118 entries went into the 'meh' pile. These poems were reasonably well-written and often expressed worthwhile ideas, but lacked the 'X-factor', the 'grab', the originality or depth to draw me back for a second and third reading.

52 entries went into the 'frustrating' pile -- poems that contained some original ideas or language but were not well-written enough to shortlist. I felt like writing to each of these poets individually to say, you've got something! Keep writing! Keep reading! Go to workshops!

52 poems were interesting enough for a second look. At this stage my left brain wanted to help with the judging, so I made a spreadsheet. I gave each poem points for six aspects of specialness -- impact, appropriate tone, aesthetic quality, originality, economy of language, depth -- and deducted points for weak spots. A numeric sort floated up most of the poems my right brain had already picked. After that it was fairly easy to choose the winners and highly commendeds, but I agonised over the commendeds and the encouragement award. There were about ten more poems I would have liked to commend or encourage! Choosing the overall winner was difficult, too, like looking at the fruit-bowl just before shopping day: there's one apple, one orange, and a weird tropical thing that no-one's dared to try. Which has the best flavour? It depends who's tasting.

Encouragement Award: 'Poems are gifts' by Nicholas Langton

The title and first few words of this seem bland, and I find the ending weak, but I really like the imagery and the unforced tone. Poems about writing usually leave me cold but the humour and insight in this one made it stand out. I particularly like 'languages stumbled across / going round corners' and 'pain pinned down / so it cannot spread'. Judging from this small sample, this poet has a good ear: a sensitive mastery of rhythm and linebreak.

Commended

'Days' by Keren Gila Raiter

This poem has a hypnotic combination of striking imagery ('the world is the chain come off my bicycle... hands covered in cuts and black grease', 'a big black bear looming over a beetle') and meditative philosophical exploration; its concerns are both personal and political; and its tone is finely balanced between conversation and cadence.

'For Jean' by Jerry Dolan

I like this poem for its effectiveness - it does a great job of showing us, using a natural tone, how it might feel to have Alzheimer's. It's refreshing to have a poem on this topic that just describes what's happening and doesn't descend into lamentations. The poem is economically written and well-structured, with each stanza exploring one image. I particularly like the sustained metaphor of the birds and mayflies in the first stanza.

'The Fall' by Carmel Summers

This poem captures the shock and strangeness of tripping and landing flat, and in doing so asks deep questions about the meaning and nature of aging and death. The voice is authentic and human ('mid-sentence it happened', 'lying there / your foot caught / in an awkward hole', 'oomph').

'Under the Jacaranda' by C Millner

This poem is questioning, paradoxical, Zen-like, speaking of both naming and unnaming, of both the individual and her or his human and ecological context. I enjoyed the recalcitrance -- the grumpiness! -- of part II, where the speaker complains, 'But I'm down the garden' and 'Besides, I'm not finished'. This recalcitrant voice contrasts nicely with the meditative voice of parts I and III.

Highly Commended

'An ugly convalescence' by Rafael Scomazzon Ward

This is one of those poems that make you go 'ewww'! But life can be 'ewww', especially for carers, and this poem uses plain-spoken description to make us see, smell and feel the squalor and desperation of not quite coping. The present tense is well-chosen here, evoking a sense of endlessness. This is a really good example of how to 'show, don't tell'. Poetic devices are used sparsely but effectively. (By the way, you clean handkerchiefs by soaking them in salty water before you wash them.)

'Passing Through' by Giancarla Curtis

I think a poem is a text whose form is at least as important as its content. As the only shaped poem that was submitted, and one of the very few that departed from traditional sentence structure, this poem states that boldly. Like its shape on the page, like the conversation it narrates, this poem is so deceptively simple that it's difficult to talk about. I read it aloud several times, enjoying the economy of the parataxis, which creates a space, a silence, into which the flower names cascade, and in which the dialogue arises comfortably and naturally.

'sonnet breathing' by Kevin Gillam

Reading this poem is like visiting a small gallery of colourful, playful paintings. 'The shag-piled silence.' 'Gills of dawn.' The rhyme is subtle ('allemanded... sarabanded') and the rhythm and patterning are masterful, as they should be in a poem that is about rhythm and pattern. Are we breathing, swimming, dancing, playing the accordion, writing a sonnet, or just coming home, going to bed, getting up and going out?... Yes.

'They came' by Rachel Freebury

This poem is an example of how traditional metre can be used effectively and appropriately. The tone is plain and dignified: there is no florid language or thunderous rhyme, no ranting or emoting. The relentless rhythm evokes the driving assault of the colonisers, as does the repetition of 'They came'. The linebreaks after each 'They came' slow down the poem so that it doesn't become singsong, and, if you read slowly enough, they create a menacing quality.

Third: 'On Final Things' by Christopher Race

I love the way this says so much without appearing to say anything at all. One of the poet's jobs is to record the here-and-now and show us the way our ordinary dailiness connects and contrasts with our wider context, and this poem does that extremely well. The speaker reads the paper and goes out to look at the world, with all its creation and destruction, but is perhaps more concerned about his or her own body and mortality, just as the kookaburra is hunting for its own 'hot lunch'. Appropriately, this poem's speaker, even when talking about a 'they', is full of 'I'.

Second: 'Tenebrae' by Alison Flett

I thought this was the most beautiful poem that was submitted, and also one of the deepest and most poignant. 'Tenebrae' means 'shadows' or 'darkness'. It also refers to a Catholic ritual in which candles were successively extinguished, and I suspect the poet knew that when she chose it as the title of a poem inspired by the rituals of a household at the gradual coming of dusk. The shadows slowly blot out the natural world until we close the curtains on it, leaving us with only the lights and noises of our machines... until we remember and -- in a while! not just yet! -- part the curtains. At the point of remembering, the poem, appropriately, abandons its tidy mechanical layout to jump around and crisscross the page like the tracks of the nocturnal animals. This poem has a striking precision of imagery -- 'the plain / and purl of their trunks, ribbing the dark', 'wi-fi rustling in the folds of our brain', 'the spindled / pinpoints / of their insect / legs' -- but the overall tone is restrained and dignified, as befits a poem centred on ritual.

First: 'Domesticity' by Jim Murphy

This might be a controversial choice, but I couldn't resist giving it first prize. It so perfectly renders the flat voice of a long-married and probably retired man^* who seems to have forgotten how to feel. He speaks of the dog or cat as if it's a machine. Its death is merely an inconvenience. He doesn't care that his book and TV program are mediocre -- they're less of a challenge than talking to his wife. The one-word rhymes thud each stanza closed like a fridge door. The rhymes, and the description of the pet ('leaking -- at both ends!') add a touch of levity: we suspect the character is quietly having a laugh at himself. The title, 'Domesticity', seems to imply that the character thinks this state of affairs is inevitable. The only glimmer of hope comes at the end when he hears his wife saying she has no-one to talk to. We are left to wonder what he -- or she! -- will do next. The poem is stylishly and economically written: there is nothing missing and nothing superfluous. To put it another way: there's no bullshit.

*OK, this poem could be about a lesbian couple. But I suspect not.

One beggar on James Street and one mother's thoughts on greed and love

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At 6:30pm on James Street last week, with a bellyful of cheap Indian food, I came across a young man sitting on the pavement with a cardboard sign at his feet. 'Homeless, please help'.

If you're living in Mumbai, I imagine that might seem unremarkable -- but I'm living in Perth, Western Australia. A very spacious modern city that is having, so we're constantly told, an economic boom. Big companies are digging up bits of Western Australia and selling it to other big companies that have factories, mainly in Asia, making Ipads and roofing sheets and jewellery and mining trucks. Apparently we're rolling in jobs and money. The place has a severe rash of construction sites building houses, apartments, shops, offices, hospitals, highway flyovers and railway underpasses.

And we have more homeless beggars now than ever before.

Many of the beggars around here look pretty fucked-up. They have a jumpy junkie look or a wasted wino look, or they're mooching around near the betting shop. Or they hang about the train station asking for money for fares but you just know they're going to spend it on their habit. Some people give them money anyway, out of pity, but I prefer not to. It's not that I don't care about them, and I certainly don't think their problems are their own fault. However I think giving them cash only supports their addiction to whatever kind of trouble they're in and doesn't really do them a favour. It isn't money they need, it's something more basic: love and care.

But the young man sitting on James Street seemed different. Something about him made me stop and bend down to look at him. He had a clear face, clear eyes and a red graze on the side of his face as if he'd been hit or fallen. As I rummaged for my purse, I asked him how he was.

'Hungry,' he said.

'Hungry,' I echoed, hoping he might tell me more.

'Yes, to be honest, hungry.'

'Would you like me to buy you something to eat?'

'Yeah.'

'What would you like?' (A really stupid question, in hindsight.)

'Uh...'

There was an awkward moment. Then I said, 'I don't really have time, anyway -- there's somewhere I have to be,' which was, more or less, the truth. I gave him what change I had and said, 'Will that help?'

'Yes,' he said. 'Thank you.' He gathered up his cardboard sign and faded backpack.

'Good luck,' I said, and walked away.

I didn't look back to see where he went. Along to the kebab shop or the food hall, I hoped. I'd looked him in the eye and felt he was for real, but maybe I was wrong. Either way I hoped that if a few people were kind, it would give him the strength to find his path.

Why am I not a beggar? How come, at least for the moment, I have what I need? Even if the bankers and dirty-energy peddlers somehow manage to avoid cooking the ecosystem as well as the books, my future is pretty uncertain. I really don't know how my life is going to turn out. Anything could happen. I could end up on the streets -- but I'm pretty sure I won't.

Why not? Because, luckily, I have a caring family who, although not perfect, do love me, and more-or-less accept me as I am (as difficult as that may sometimes be!). Because, luckily, I'm smart, well-educated and healthy. And because, from this fortunate base of love, security and knowledge, I've been able to reach out to others to make and maintain friendships. Because of all this luck, I've never gone hungry, never had nowhere to sleep, never had no-one to turn to. If my family or friends were in need I would take them in, and I'm pretty sure they'd do the same for me.

I don't think 'homeless' is the right word. Not having an owned or rented permanent shelter isn't the point. The real problem is that these unlucky souls are people-less. They don't have anyone to give them a home.

Maybe they have no family and, even more sadly, no friends. Or maybe they do have family but living rough seems a better choice. When I consider why someone would choose to shun the care and company of others to that extent, I don't think there's a real difference between that and being forced onto the streets. Maybe their family are abusive or neglectful or can't accept them as they are because of prejudice. Or maybe their family believe money is the only measure of value, and whatever it is the person can contribute (which might not be money) is not acceptable to their family, let alone to those who own or rent the roofs.

And I guess some homeless people do have loving family or friends who would give them a home, but they're too ashamed to ask, or too worried about putting themselves in the other person's debt. We're brought up to think it shameful to be anything other than self-reliant, and that to have no possessions is to have the lowest possible status, to be powerless.

Some people -- often they're young, vigorous and childless -- choose a form of homelessness, sleeping in communal squats, dumpster diving, scavenging the stuff suburbanites throw out on the kerbside, maybe appropriating supplies from the big corporate stores. Maybe growing vegetables, too. They're trying to create an alternative community that exists outside the economy and will survive the possibly imminent collapse of civilisation.

There's part of me that wants to join them. Living that way could be a lot of fun, and if civilisation does collapse it might be the only way to survive. But it doesn't feel right for me, somehow. I want something more stable, more peaceful. I'd like to live in a collective house, but I'd want it to be warm and comfortable, not a chilly, decrepit squat -- and, maybe this is selfish, but Virginia Woolf would back me up -- I'd want some privacy: if not a room of my own, at least a cubicle in which to arrange my few personal things and in which to write! And I have two kids, so any living arrangement would have to meet their needs too.

Anyway, I don't want civilisation to collapse. I want it to morph into something sustainable that works for all kinds of people -- parents and children and old people, people with disabilities and illnesses, people who are good with their hands and people who are good with their minds. People who can contribute ideas and services as well as people who can contribute goods.

I like living in a civilisation. I'm in favour of technology -- especially communications and medical technology -- and I'm in favour of change. With change comes the risk that some things will get worse, and a computer factory is not a garden (but maybe it could be!), but, let's face it, if not for technology I would be dead several times over. I wouldn't have survived childhood, let alone my daughter's breech birth, and even if I had lived, being a 46-year-old woman I'd most likely be illiterate, unenfranchised, in continual pain, married to someone I don't like, and knowing nothing about the world outside a radius of twenty miles or so.

Technology has created, at least in industrialised countries, the conditions necessary for the average person to think, at least some of the time, about the fate of the whole world instead of just worrying about how to fix their toothache or get their next meal. Because of communications technology (from the printing press to YouTube) everyone -- even in America! -- knows that there are people living in other countries, and in doorways, whose lives are different to theirs.

But we -- humanity, you, me -- we've got a plague. We know what it is. The clear-eyed young man begging on the street in a boomtown is one of its symptoms.

The plague is called greed. But where does greed come from? Why are we sick with it?

Greed is caused by fear. We're afraid -- and given our evolutionary and social history we have good reason to be afraid! -- that our needs for food, security, affiliation, etc, will not be met. We're afraid that if it came to the crunch no-one would look after us, because our past has convinced us there 's no-one who loves us unconditionally.

But unconditional love does exist. As a mother, daughter and friend, and as an occasional helper of beggars, I can vouch for it.

I try to put it into everything I write.

Can you feel it? Not in your head, not in your genitals, not in your belly. In your heart. Can you feel it there? A warm thing? A sense of connection, or of wanting connection?

If so, ask yourself, as I'm always asking myself: what am I using it for? What does my heart (not my other bits) tell me I should be doing? Am I doing what I should be doing? When am I doing it, and when am I not?

And when will I stop doing the things that feel wrong, the things I'm doing out of fear rather than love?

Confuse your would-be enemies! My apple crumble recipe

In The Legend of Dick and Dom, Mannitol's evil Nan used her addictive apple crumble to enslave the adventurers (and a giant troll, if I remember rightly).

My crumble may not cause a dependency, but if you feed it to your would-be enemies it's sure to confuse and disorient them.

Jackson's apple crumble

Filling

• 800 gram tin bakers apple or 4 or 5 big apples
  
• a sprinkle of sugar if the apples are tart

Topping

• 80 grams butter
• 3/4 cup self-raising flour (I use half white half wholemeal, but whatever)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup quick-cooking oats
• 1/4 cup dessicated coconut

Method

• Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C.

• Melt the butter.
• In a large bowl, mix all the other topping ingredients, then mix in the melted butter.

• If you're using fresh apples, peel, core and slice them.
• Spread the apples into a medium-sized baking dish or pie dish, eg 20cm square or 23cm round.
• If the apples are tart you might want to sprinkle them with sugar.

• Spread the topping over the apples and press it down a bit. 

• Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown on top and smelling YUMMY.

It's nicest served warm with some kind of dairy blob, like custard, yoghurt or whipped cream. Or icecream if you must.

Rough measurements are OK.

Variations

• Use other fruits. Apple and rhubarb is good but add some sugar!
• Put a few cloves in with the apples.

Perth Poetry Club, the mathematics of publicity, and Maslow's hierarchy of needs

Today was going to be my Day Off. It's a beautiful sunny day and I was going to wander out, maybe take in some art, maybe have coffee with a friend or see a movie. But I find myself thinking -- worrying! -- about Perth Poetry Club, the weekly community event I instigated in early 2009, inspired by Melbourne's weekly readings, the Dan Poets and the Spinning Room, and the way they brought poets together into a genuine community as well as giving poetry a chance to be heard.

I'm worrying about Perth Poetry Club because I've had enough of the responsibility of running it -- of being the manager, the one who makes sure that everything happens, the one people look to for direction, the one who fields most of the the questions and complaints as well as the thankyous.

It's not that I'm tired, or bored, or that I don't care. Quite the opposite: I have new ideas, I want to do new things, and the tasks involved in running a weekly show are getting in the way, consuming my energy. Here I was, planning to have a Day Off in the sunshine, and I've spent the whole morning and half the afternoon at my desk, thinking and writing about Perth Poetry Club and trying to figure out my next move.

Maybe I need to step off completely and walk away. Not just give away this task and that, not just step back and let others take the lead. I've been doing that for a while already and, weirdly, I feel more of a drain on my energy than I did when I was doing most of the jobs myself! That isn't a good sign. So perhaps I need to step right out of the organising group. Perhaps my presence in the group is holding back others as well as myself.

In late 2008 when I first had the idea, people said, 'a weekly reading won't work in Perth, there aren't enough people, it will be too much work. Try monthly or fortnightly.' Only one person (Helen Child) offered regular help. Eventually we found a venue (The Court Hotel), Allan 'antipoet' Boyd of radicalhack.com generously created visual imagery, a website and a striking poster, and the rest is history. In October 2009 we moved to The Moon Cafe, whose owner Georgia Mathieson provides not only good food and drink but a welcoming space for community arts and artists.

On a good Saturday, Perth Poetry Club is exactly what I wanted it to be, and what the slogan says -- 'where slams meet sonnets'. Well-known literary poets reading alongside unknown bloggers and street poets, and everything in between. Influencing each other and getting to know each other. Becoming friends. And sometimes getting reviewed in the press!

The naysayers had a point, though. It's been a lot of work. I think people who offer to help sometimes get a shock when they realise that what happens on the day of the event -- MCing, introducing luminous poets, waving your arms about, being photographed, selling books, collecting donations -- is only a small part of the story. It's like the deck of a ship with a band playing. Underneath, there's a greasy engine room and a whole lot of machinery and repetitive activity. And there will be someone doing the steering -- or at least overseeing the electronic navigation systems -- ideally, someone who can read charts and who knows the ways of icebergs.

Enough metaphor! I was talking about running a poetry event and how much work is involved. For example. Having featured poets each week is not just a matter of casually asking them -- not if you want them to turn up at the right time and put on a good show. (Thank you to Jake Dennis for your recent help with that.)

Looking after the money, which is contributed by the audience in good faith, is not just a matter of keeping a box of cash somewhere. There are spreadsheets. (Perth Poetry Club has been very lucky with this -- we've had a reliable treasurer, Elio Novello, from almost the beginning.)

And then there's publicity.

My approach to publicity (for Perth Poetry Club and anything else I do) is based on what I learned in my years as a volunteer with the Australian Breastfeeding Association, another community concern that needs a constant inflow of new people to keep it going.

I learned that publicity is mainly about having a catchy, descriptive name and image, providing just enough information, and getting it in front of as many people as possible as often as possible.

Publicity also means stepping outside your own headspace and realising that most people aren't interested in what you're doing. Maybe one in a thousand are interested enough in poetry to consider coming to a reading -- which means that to get one new person you have to make a thousand contacts.

Actually, it doesn't, because you target your publicity so it reaches those more likely to be interested. In the case of poetry this means the literary community, people who frequent libraries and bookshops, and the weird people you see at train stations. So let's be really optimistic and say one in a hundred are interested. Marketing theory says that, on average, people need to hear about something three times before they'll do anything about it. (Before you get cross about that, remember it's an average. Think bell curve.)

So if you want one new person a week you have to make three hundred contacts a week. In the right places. Sounds a lot... but it's not so bad, because you use technology and existing social and organisational networks to duplicate your contacts. You run off a whole bunch of flyers and leave them in as many places as you can. You send your publicity to another organisation and get them to publicise it. You use the viral power of social media. You find out who the right reporters are and send them media releases. You make a really good website (thanks, Allan) and get everyone to link it, and give it descriptive, literal keywords and titles (like 'Perth' and 'Poetry') so that Google searches find it.

Then, when the people turn up, you give them what they're after. It occured to me this morning that the reason Perth Poetry Club is so popular, especially with what we might call 'emerging' poets, is that being part of it helps them get what they're after at all the levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs: physical, security, affiliation, personal power, self-actualisation. Starting from the most basic need:

• Physical (food, shelter, sleep, etc). You can eat and drink and the venue is cosy (sometimes too cosy, admittedly). If you have no money someone will probably buy you a coffee and share their food with you. There is no obligation to pay -- the necessary money is provided by those who can. The venue is okay if you're disabled or come with a pram. The afternoon timeslot doesn't stop you from sleeping in or going to bed early.
• Security. The event has a consistent format and happens at a consistent time, every week, so people know what to expect. The venue feels safe and casual: the decor and the people are friendly, arty and scruffy.
• Affiliation. People feel included, feel a sense of belonging, feel that they have friends.
• Personal power: this means the ability to make a difference with others and to be recognised for that. To be heard, to be applauded, to be given credit.
• Self-actualisation, which means achieving, creating, using your skills.

I never wanted people to identify me with Perth Poetry Club. For a while, I guess, I identified with it, but I don't any more. It isn't my thing -- it's just something I started. I wanted to get a weekly poetry event going in Perth and then hand it on to others. Hopefully it will to continue to be successful... or, thinking more broadly, hopefully, the poets and poetry fans of Perth will continue to run a weekly event that is well-publicised, entertaining and welcoming, whatever it may be called.

As I try to edit this ramble of thought into something that hangs together well enough to publish, my phone rings. It's another arts organisation wanting to link up with Perth Poetry Club. The lady doesn't know me -- she got my number from the website. People more often email, but sometimes they need the reassurance of actually talking to a human before taking the risk of getting involved.

As Yeats said, 'In dreams begin responsibilities.' But the heck with that for the rest of the day. First, some hot soup. And then, a walk in the sunshine, and  perhaps a movie.

4 weeks in the ghost house: Writing in Residence at Mattie Furphy House

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It's a wintry day, but the sharp Perth light pushes its way through the clouds onto my donated desk, a yellowed pine dining table. The antique table and chairs in the corner are roped off, presumably too fragile or precious to sit at, but not sacred: powerboards, papers and stationery obscure the white lace tablecloth. At my back a brick fireplace is surrounded by copper-panel grapevines and burnished jarrah. In one corner a cheap fan heater oscillates hesitantly.
I'm almost at the end of four weeks' residency at the Fellowship of Australian Writers WA (FAWWA). I've been living and working at their writers centre in the Allen Park Heritage Precinct, hidden behind the trees at the beachward end of Wood Street in the upper-middle-class Perth suburb of Swanbourne.
The Fellowship have two houses here: Tom Collins House and Mattie Furphy House. Their denizens call them Tom's and Mattie's. I'm living and working in Mattie's, which was built between 1908 and the 1920s by Joseph Furphy, aka novelist Tom Collins, for the copper-panel artist Mattie Furphy (nee McCausland), the wife of Joseph's son Samuel. The Furphys built the house in Clement Street, five minutes' leafy walk away, but in 2005 the Fellowship rescued it from the McMansion-developers, moved it here and spent seven years restoring it. In March 2012 they launched it as the Mattie Furphy Centre for Creative Imagining.
There are quarters for the resident writer, a kitchen and two work rooms. I'm sitting in the smaller work room, once the family dining room. It's is big enough for a small workshop or conference, but I've appropriated it as my office. I call it the sunshine room. Outside the cream-painted windows and French doors there are jarrahs and marris, green plastic tree-guards, walking paths, a pile of planks, a stack of bricks, and Tom's in its white-weatherboard red-roof mediocrity, leaves piling up in its gutter. There's one car: a battered wagon belonging to FAWWA's caretaker, the poet Peter Bibby, who's away at the moment.
I'm hankering to finish a particular poem, but that can't be done quickly, so I've delegated it to my subconscious for the time being while I reflect on my stay here.
Everyone I meet says, 'How's the residency? How's the writing going? I'll bet you're getting lots written. Not having any distractions must be nice.'
Well, yes and no.
Yes, I've done lots of writing. I've written every day, worked on many different poems, made a zine and started this blog. I brought in Seventh Continent Productions to film a performance video. Because I have to write a report I started keeping a logbook to track my work, and that's been so encouraging that I'm going to keep it up after I leave. Being my own manager, I can't stay away from email for longer than a few days, but I've kept away from the rest of the Internet as much as I can. I've done a lot of reading and thinking. My writing journal and logbook are electronic, which makes it easy to tag and search, and the last four weeks are full of Poems, Opportunities, Things Learned, Ideas and Insights. I get to be only a writer except when my kids call me -- it's opulent luxury!
But it's not true that there are no distractions. I'm living in a writers centre! People come and go, especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the office in Tom's is open and busy with volunteers. On Tuesdays lunch is served for the volunteers: good bread and homemade soup set out on placemats for ten or more seated around the sagging main table among the antique furniture in the front room at Tom's. When it's time for soup someone wanders over and taps on my window.
And guess what happens? I get talking! People can be very distracting. On the other hand, they give me ideas, energy and drive, especially when they're the ones who did so much tedious grant-writing and -- how can I put this nicely? -- networking, in order to get my funding.
People also come in for workshops and mentoring sessions. Some are mine, as required by my contract, and some are run by others. While I've been here there have been several meetings and workshops complete with teamaking and noise (and some useful contacts for me).
Most events are held in Mattie's front room, a big, beautiful, timber-scented room with a mirrored fireplace. If it were mine I'd bring in overstuffed leather couches, funny little tables, brass candlesticks and portraits of dead poets -- but that's not going to happen, because its size and acoustics make it perfect for classes and meetings as well as intimate performance events like readings, house concerts or book launches (and yes, you can hire it). So it's furnished with stackable chairs and plastic trestle tables.
But most of the time I've been alone with the walls. And the floors. And the chairs. And the cushions. Are you getting the idea? The biggest distraction is the house itself. I meant to tell you all about my writing and activities and my ideas for the writers centre, but -- rather like the Fellowship itself -- I seem be kind of stuck on the house.
From outside Mattie's house looks empty, unused. The wide front verandah contains two ratty doormats and a picnic table. That's all. It could use some seating, perhaps some potted plants, and a big friendly sign on the front. But I suspect that would require formfilling, phone calls and long difficult meetings with the local authorities. Welcoming signs are definitely not the civic style around here. The whole suburb is as smoothly groomed as the dogs and owners who walk, jog and personal-train on the oval outside my bedroom window. From the street there's no evidence that a writers centre lurks behind the vegetation. A small sign near the house says 'Beware of Venomous Snakes': if I added 'and Poets' it'd be the only graf for miles.
People say there's a ghost here, but I haven't seen it. I think the house itself is the ghost, caught between two worlds, the past and the future, unsure of how to move on.
Here's an idea for you, ghost. I can Creatively Imagine this house as a drop-in centre for writers, open all weekend every weekend, with a roster of experienced writers in attendance, with formal and informal talks, discussions, readings and workshops, with quiet writing times, with ambient music, with a lending library (gold coin donation?), with a book and zine sales table in one corner, and in the entrance a large, prominent box with a slot in the top, into which the community who love coming here contribute according to their not inconsiderable means to keep the centre going.
Making something like that a reality wouldn't take much funding, just time, enthusiasm, organisation and community connection. But it's just one idea.
The writer-in-residence coming in after me is another career writer and educator, Horst Kornberger. It's Friday morning, so he's here now, teaching his year-long course 'The Writers Passage'. He has at least fifteen enthusiastic students. I can tell when he takes a break by the eruption of noise around the tea urn. I ask him what he thinks of the house. 'This place was conceived, built and used by artists', he says, 'and should continue to be used by artists. It has a potent spirit of place, a powerful creative effect.'
This being Perth, the sun has come out. It's shining on the jamjar vase of foliage and flowers I've stolen from nearby houses with more garden than they need. In a minute I'll go into the gloriously modern kitchen and make a snack. Then maybe I'll walk down and look at the sea. After that, I suspect I'll get my poem finished.

Welcome to Wet Bird, I mean Raw Text

Welcome to Raw Text. The title is ironic. And not.

The hardest thing about making a blog is picking a name. Especially for me! It's a pain in the [arse|ass] having a name that's already far more famous than anyone could possibly want to be. But I might write some more about that later.

I was going to call this 'I am therefore I think' but there are at least three of those already. 'I love therefore I am' and 'Amo ergo sum' are also floating around out there. Go have a look, they're all quite interesting. (Just a minute! Finish reading this first!) But damn! I thought I thought of that. But it seems lots of people are thinking of that now <quiet smile>.

So then I was going to call this 'Jane Truth', my middle name being Ruth, but there's a Christian writer in America using that handle, and, sadly, I don't think she's being ironic. There we go, that's the first value judgment made here on Raw Text. And I didn't even check out her site. I just read the description in the Google search. Sorry, JaneTruth, whoever you are, and may your childishly personified God be with you.

Anyway then I looked out the window and nearly called this 'wet bird', which pretty much captured how depressing it is trying to name a blog.