Sunday 25 June 2017

RESTAURANT REVIEW/AUSTRALIA/MELBOURNE/KEW/THE GRILL ON THE HILL

Restaurant Review: Kew, Melbourne, The Grill on the Hill
The Difficulty with Reviewing The Grill on the Hill at Kew is that it is both very good and also very horrible.
The food is brilliant and yet the cost is ridiculous.
The 20 or so page extensive wine list made for interesting reading of just how many bottles of wine there are between hundred dollars a bottle and eight hundred dollars a bottle, and that was fun...passing it back to the waiter saying "we don't usually drink at all, so just a glass of your house red."
The response: "Two glasses sir?"
"No, just the one."
"Oh, well, I will see what i can find..."
[Image of him going out to the alley and beating up some old bloke and stealing his flagon of plonk...]
...but the house red was okay.
Altogether, the cost/benefit equation just didn't work at the Grill on the Hill. There was an all pervasive sense of the narcissistic anally retentive menace that people oddly call professionalism these days, but, in fact, it wasn't professional, just rather overall menacing with an obvious and hard $ profit/person equation being the only standard the place has. 
Two simple entrees, 2 simple meals, and very good food it was, to be sure...some free bread, one glass of house red, two glasses of tap water, and the cost was AU$175. Great food, indeed, and yet, at an dreadful overall cost.
The waitress was kind enough to point out to me that I could add a tip to my credit card bill. I thanked her for so clearly pointing this out to me but said that it wouldn't be necessary.
On the way out the bullish manager was there at the door intent on shaking my hand, but I refused fearing I might lose my watch.
Would I go again? Absolutely not.
On the Fitzpatrick World Food=Value Fine Dining Equation Graph, where A McDonalds Cheese Burger scores zero out of a possible 5 stars, as the base standard....The Grill on The Hill, whilst having great food indeed, scores a minus 4.
I was particularly fascinated by the rampant generosity in the amount of the complimentary bread in the 4th picture.
SCORE: THE GRILL ON THE HILL: MINUS 4 🍽️🍽️🍽️







Thursday 15 June 2017

Australian News Round Up


    Oh, dear me, the Prime Minister of Australia, Malcolm Turnbull...and the Opposition Leader, little-boy Bill Shorten...talking about the importance of Patriotism...oh,for fuck's sake, it is fucking 2017...where do we dig up these absurd knuckle-dragging low-life brainless wankers? We are Australian...we are NOT fucking retarded like the Americans. We are not THEM. We are far more troublesome and far more radicalised. Fuck off Malcolm, fuck off Bill.
    Comments
    For ten years I was a poetry literary editor with a very avant garde small publisher in Neutral Bay in Sydney...very left winger commie set up...I loved it...working hard and then talking socialism whilst drinking Grange Hermitage on the balcony over looking Sydney Harbour...sigh. That was a decade in time indeed. I recall one night being in a punch up with Gerry Bostock, the remarkable indigenous film maker from 'outback' Redfern, just after his brilliant film 'BBQ Area' a savage indictment of Australian white culture, was in the cinemas/ I helped him a lot...and then...He called me a White Cunt and so I hit him and we wrestled around the floor there for some time before we both realised we really had no need or desire to hurt each other at all, and so, as really good men, him, being a classic black cunt, and me being a classic white cunt, we were simply too tired from the effort of hitting each other to even vaguely dislike each other anymore. I think I taught him a lot about real men in all cultures. I sincerely hope the cunt learnt his lesson. I still think BBQ Area is the best film ever made in Australia by anyone. It is just brilliant. ..and even though Gerry was a real cunt, he made a great film indeed. He made that film many many years ago and to indicate how important it was, and is, it is still hidden away from white cunts. Great film. you won't find BBQ Area on Netflix, that's for sure...why? It was just too fucking good.
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    We BBQ'd the TBones for about 5 minutes one side, and 3 the other, whilst roasting the peppers/capsicum, and some purple onions on the grate.
    Had them with some sour dough bread stick oven cooked a bit too long, burnt, and butter, and some salad, and some good wine.
    And me and Mrs Fitz talked over dinner for about an hour and a half about our journey to here, and about the future.
    It is hard to beat that kind of day.
    AND We still have some chocolate coated ice cream hearts in the freezer for later.
    All up, nothin' much to complain about.
    If the day has something to do with the love you share, then there's nothing much else to be wanting in the now.

Sunday 11 June 2017


on islamists and christianists etc

There's nothing wrong with having one's own ideas and building up a world view based upon them and upon both curiosity and experience.
There's nothing wrong with rejecting the swill we are fed in Australia, whether we be citizens or immigrants or hard battled refugees...it is the same swill.
There's nothing wrong with believing in our own notions, with thinking our own remarkable thoughts, with sharing them, and with speaking our own ideas (if you can think it, you can speak it), and acting upon these ideas, as we see fit.
The structural and cultural limitations on thought are pretty fucking obvious in Australia, and have been backward, white, xenophobic, bizarre and sick, and self-defeating for 200 years, but that doesn't mean shit in the long term if you are prepared to think for yourself, as you are, right now. Keep That Faith. There ain't no church for that, except yourself.
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On The Subject of Islamist (I doubt that 'Islamist' is actually a real word yet, because it doesn't actually define anything, but we do tend to drive it into currency, even though it can't actually mean anything...it is the same as saying a Christianist, or a Buddhistist, or a Jewistist) De-Radicalisation, as a psychological fantasy-phenomenon...I tink I missed my callin', you know. I think I woulda made a damn fine Irish Jesuit rogue priest, all in black, with samurai sword on the back, and AK47 under the underarm in South America...and with five children...sigh, ah well, only the one life, so it goes, so I should find some peace in that, to be sure, to be sure...but I am not without regret. 'Be Mindful. Change your Mind, Change the World' that's what they say, these days, but you know in your heart that whether they be psychologists or jihadists, they are teaching the same shit, and they're just as fucking crazy as each other, after all.

Wednesday 7 June 2017

My Democracy Poem

My Democracy Poem

If life was just a line of perfect scripted
instead of a circle strange ellipted
we'd have eaten a pie and just gone to bed
instead of worrying with our head
but there's lots of lies
that form our truth
Most times all there is is... Strewth!
So, pick up the ball and take a punt
Why the fuck did we elect that cunt?

At 63, I have, about, maybe, at a stretch, 8 or 9 poems I wrote that I really like, and this is my favourite one. I hope you like it too. She can be changed to He...a few syllables can be adjusted, to suit a lot of things. The 'little poem' has got a great amount of versatility built in but remains very personal at the same time. /////////////////////////////// The Escape Cage She wanted what she wanted until she got it then didn't want it so she could want it again when it was gone. Oh my dears, the tears, the fears, the years. Each escape became a cage to escape and then one day when she realised that she was unrealised she bent the cage into a bicycle and rode it all the way to China ringing the bell she made of me. John Fitzpatrick 2012

At 63, I have, about, maybe, at a stretch, 8 or 9 poems I wrote that I really like, and this is my favourite one. I hope you like it too. She can be changed to He...a few syllables can be adjusted, to suit a lot of things. The 'little poem' has got a great amount of versatility built in but remains very personal at the same time.
///////////////////////////////
The Escape Cage
She wanted what she wanted
until she got it
then didn't want it
so she could want it again
when it was gone.
Oh my dears, the tears, the fears, the years.
Each escape became a cage to escape
and then one day
when she realised that she was unrealised
she bent the cage
into a bicycle
and rode it all the way to China
ringing the bell she made of me.

John Fitzpatrick 2012

"There is nothing good that isn't in some way broken.There is nothing good that isn't in some way unspoken." John Fitzpatrick 2017


Terrible Thing: My Camel Brand (as in Cigarette Company) brilliant black mid winter jacket torn its non-tear outer nylon cover near the pocket on my tough Russian Fuk-U-Jak steel steering wheel lock as I got in the Nissan this morning. I know terrible things happen, sometimes, by why? And especially why to me? Coming home from work I stopped at the Chinese IGA and bought some Gaffa tape, satin black, and kind of fixed it up...but it was a very tragic event. Once such an injury occurs, there is always a weakness there. Damn. Mind you, as Melbourne gets seriously into winter, it was just, at its best, at being a useful jacket...it was beginning to look better than it felt as the temperature dropped down to about 3 degrees. So, I have had to resort to the warmer old black leather coat I bought from Cairns St Vincent de Paul for $25 2 years ago to get me through the horrors of winter. I just took it to the Dry Cleaners to see how much it would cost to clean, as it has some maybe 20 year old 'natural discolourations in the black patina' or maybe someone else's sputum stains...and the guy at the shop said it would cost $81.50 to Dry Clean...and I thought...am I being taken to the cleaners about this? So I declined his kind offer and will invest in a tub of Dubbin instead for maybe $15. From my motorcycle jacket days I'm a great fan of Dubbin anyway...so I am, as always, happy to take the more reasonable economical root. Night shift was good. I get really tired, as anyone should, around 4am but have to spark up for the drive home around 730am...now I'm home after all the traffic and its 9am...and I am all fired up. Interestingly, and truly, someone stole my identity on line the other day. the bank informed me they would send out a new credit card, the darlings. I asked if because my identity had been stolen, shouldn't the NEW John Fitz be responsible for the entire debts anyway? They didn't think that was reasonable or funny at all. As Mr Trump would say "What a bunch of babies!"


Sunday 4 June 2017

Sigh. Who would we be without our young dis-enfranchised radicalised men? We expect our useless young men to lie down and just shut up, but, the bastards, they just won't. Instead, they just go off and find things to believe in all by themselves., as if they didn't care at all about how more important we are.


The Corporate Global Market poem: Let us all get off on work. There be the gherkin. And there be the jerk.


My God, what a frightening future, the loan interest rates start to rise and every fashionable cafe goes out of business...all those bizarre baristas wandering the countryside, like Kane, in Kung Fu, wondering what to do with their respected professionals skills, and their pig tails...like the new poor...like...immigrants. yech.


back to the malaysian plane being brought down in the South China Sea...I remain amazed that no 'proper news journalists' on earth have ever sought to find out why, following this mysterious event, the Prime Minister of Malaysia was given a personal US$800 million as a gift from the Saudi Royal family when he identified that the plane turned around and went away...or why President Obama landed in Malaysia soon after and offered them a really good deal on Defence. Isn't that odd to anyone apart from me? Doesn't that kind of raise a bit of a flag about the events? Just a little flag?


Locally, with the exodus of Chinese buyers, the property bubble in Melbourne is starting to pop and, nationally, loan interest rates will begin to climb to about 5%...and that will mean about 8% on home loans. Start saving.


There are a bunch of things that you do notice as time goes by. For example...the plan for the USA to accept our refugees on manus Island etc in exchange for Central American refugees the USA wouldn't accept because they weren't refugees at all, but rather narcotic criminals, was ,in fact an agreement with Mr Obama...but after it was made Australia said it wasn't an agreement at all, but it still is...


You don't have to look back very far to see how things have gone. There was the 2008 Global financial crisis...a Massive World Recession that wasn't allowed to be called that. A Recession with a big impact for 20-25 years...still rolling out. In response to this, wealth went from countryside to city, thus the new Rising of London City and New York City (+LA) as Elite City-States with all the money. Then, There was the Brexit vote... people in England countryside were far worse off than people in London, so they wanted things to change...thus Brexit. In the USA, people in the country were much worse off than the City States of New York (+LA) so they wanted change and thus Trump. In the Middle East the impact of the GFC was catastrophic for anyone not really rich...thus the rise of terrorism. Fortunately, through the wisdom and intelligence of the Communist Party of China, the impact of the GFC was minimal...and the bad guys who participated in this remarkable theft there were in fact taken out and shot rather than given more money, as the west gave their criminals. Thus China leapt ahead 30 peaceful years in a day...and the West receded into the new beginnings of real poverty and a lot more war...which is simply a larger form of terrorism.


Saturday 3 June 2017

Good Thinkers and Tinkers

I like a few modern thinkers, but not many. I liked Christopher Hitchens because he was a great and eloquent Atheist, especially when he had had a few drinks, even though I do believe in a very personal God, myself. I do. I just do because I choose to, even though it makes no sense at all. My life doesn't need to make sense. that is not why I am here.
Christopher was a brilliant light of 'passionate reason' and you don't get that kind of person in 7 billion once in maybe 5 hundred years on this world. I miss him.
He went on from being a devout Atheist to being a devout Contrarian, and I felt sad for that change...but still I respected that what his mind and heart chose was totally up to him...as it is with us all.
I joined the Church of Reason for some time after I heard him speak. I wish he was still around, but, alas, he is very dead now. Extinguished. Such is life.
After him, really, for me, there was only the Reformed Church of Spongebob Squarepants, that held any allure. I must admit that the notion of a belief system that will not accept your money is a pretty damn good one...and the Reformed Church of Spongebob Squarepants does indeed set forth this Primary Condition in its Doctrine...and I just wish all Churches did. I hope they all will, one day.
As we have all done, since the Dawn of Time, or at 5am on a Tuesday morning, instead of putting one's head in the oven, we all simply believe what we prefer, and why not believe some good things? Why not believe in the capacity of people to think for themselves and work out what they prefer? Isn't this the base of all belief, in the self, in others, and in the gods? There will be a time when sticking one's head in the oven does make sense, if we are lucky to have the choice and take it wisely, but before then, well, here we are...and some of life is pretty good as far as I know. I've noticed that the longer I live, the better life gets...and there is a scientific equation for this...childhood is basically happy, as you progress through teens and adulthood, its pretty unhappy, but when you get older, its is okay, and quite happy again. That's the Science of human life. this is not rocket-science or rocket-surgery, it's just how life is for most people who get there.
As for a good death, well, there is no such thing. This is one of the great myths of our time...but that's not important. Death only takes a few minutes. You just breathe out and don't breathe in again. That's not rocket science either, and its all as natural as it has always been.
If I had to send love to anyone dead, apart from folk I love as kin, then I would send it to Christopher, for being so passionate about the Mind, and way back 500 years to my hero, Michel de Montaigne, for being so passionate about Being. Well done! Love to you both from way over here in time. You 'done us' and yourselves so very well with all the love of your hearts and minds, and in your wondrous word-smithing craft. Fine bhoys both, and bright as buttons, to be sure, by any reckoning of the lot of us.

Friday 2 June 2017

I was enjoying waxing poetically and philosophically, just then as I like to do from time to time, and then I got the fucking gas bill. I can't even afford to stick my head in the oven now. bastards.


Poem

Poem

The soft moaning
of the girl
is that pain
or just the world?

Is there light
and is there shade
and who is who
for what is paid?

Is there darkness
is there fright
or do the meanings
make it right?

Shall we sit
awhile and blink
and let the light
absorb the ink.

On we live
from this to that
with prophets who
absorb the fat.

Shall we find
some way of knowing
beyond the moment's
burden flowing?

Tis not me
who knows a thing
a suit and tie
and wedding ring.

Shall we sit awhile
and think
and let the light
absorb the ink?

We were born
and so we live
and take what is
what is to give.