The epic voyage of an inanimate thing
Mar. 2nd, 2006 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
todayiamadaisyIn a couple of weeks, Melbourne will play host to the Commonwealth Games (for those who don't live in the British Commonwealth, imagine a summer Olympics in which Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and the individual countries of the UK celebrate beating Tonga at lawn bowls). I'm, well, a touch underwhelmed by it all, I must admit.
These Games don't have a torch but a baton, and we have been getting regular news updates on where it is and what it's doing each day. Torch or baton, this always strikes me as odd, as if the thing has free will and the ability to move itself about. "Today the baton went to Gippsland, and tomorrow it will be heading out to sea." Not like there's any people carrying it at all, just a baton jaunting about on holiday.
The baton will be sight-seeing in the City by the Sea later this week, and because it's predictable that there's always someone unhappy about something, there's been a bit of a kerfuffle about it. The baton's big photo opportunity here was that it was going to be carried down the beach by an ex-jockey on a locally famous, 28-year-old ex-racehorse. The jockey has hurt his foot and can't ride, so the organisers have given him another leg to run alone, and given the horse-back beach leg to another ex-jockey on another locally famous ex-racehorse. So the first jockey has gone to the paper, complaining that while he's happy with the new thing he's got, he's disappointed for his horse.
So the horse is upset it can't carry the sentient baton. Right.
*****
I stopped at the bakery on my way home from work and just as I was paying for my pasta dura loaf, a woman marched in. She had a self-righteous bearing and unpleasant, smug manner that made me dislike her on sight, and then she spoke in one of those loud, permanently aggrieved voices (there's an awful lot of them about, I've noticed) to confirm my impression. She and the shop assistant had the following conversation:
Shop Assistant: Can I help you?
Unpleasant Woman: Do you have any tuna pie?
Shop Assistant: No, sorry, we don't have any. Is there anything else you'd like?
Unpleasant Woman: Did you have tuna pie at all today?
Shop Assistant: No, none today, they didn't make any today.
Unpleasant Woman: What day do they make them?
Shop Assistant: Well... (looks at Other Shop Assistant, now getting my change, who shrugs)... it depends on the baker, you know, what ingredients, what...
Unpleasant Woman: Well, I'm getting sick of coming in here and asking!
By then, sadly, the Other Shop Assistant had given me my change so I had to go. I like to imagine the scene finished like this:
Shop Assistant: Well then, don't come in and ask, you fat cow!
But I'm pretty sure it didn't.
These Games don't have a torch but a baton, and we have been getting regular news updates on where it is and what it's doing each day. Torch or baton, this always strikes me as odd, as if the thing has free will and the ability to move itself about. "Today the baton went to Gippsland, and tomorrow it will be heading out to sea." Not like there's any people carrying it at all, just a baton jaunting about on holiday.
The baton will be sight-seeing in the City by the Sea later this week, and because it's predictable that there's always someone unhappy about something, there's been a bit of a kerfuffle about it. The baton's big photo opportunity here was that it was going to be carried down the beach by an ex-jockey on a locally famous, 28-year-old ex-racehorse. The jockey has hurt his foot and can't ride, so the organisers have given him another leg to run alone, and given the horse-back beach leg to another ex-jockey on another locally famous ex-racehorse. So the first jockey has gone to the paper, complaining that while he's happy with the new thing he's got, he's disappointed for his horse.
So the horse is upset it can't carry the sentient baton. Right.
I stopped at the bakery on my way home from work and just as I was paying for my pasta dura loaf, a woman marched in. She had a self-righteous bearing and unpleasant, smug manner that made me dislike her on sight, and then she spoke in one of those loud, permanently aggrieved voices (there's an awful lot of them about, I've noticed) to confirm my impression. She and the shop assistant had the following conversation:
Shop Assistant: Can I help you?
Unpleasant Woman: Do you have any tuna pie?
Shop Assistant: No, sorry, we don't have any. Is there anything else you'd like?
Unpleasant Woman: Did you have tuna pie at all today?
Shop Assistant: No, none today, they didn't make any today.
Unpleasant Woman: What day do they make them?
Shop Assistant: Well... (looks at Other Shop Assistant, now getting my change, who shrugs)... it depends on the baker, you know, what ingredients, what...
Unpleasant Woman: Well, I'm getting sick of coming in here and asking!
By then, sadly, the Other Shop Assistant had given me my change so I had to go. I like to imagine the scene finished like this:
Shop Assistant: Well then, don't come in and ask, you fat cow!
But I'm pretty sure it didn't.
