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I'm sure you've all been on tenterhooks waiting to hear about Alan and the outcome of his mad complaint about calling people "Elder". Well, we had our readers' meeting today and it very nearly became an all-in brawl.

Alan has one supporter, Bernie (another beardie too - I'm beginning to form a theory about Bearded Men And Their Dislike Of Mormons). Alan is quite agitated about this and Bernie is belligerent at the best of times, so the meeting got quite heated. Sanity prevailed, of course; the formal directive from head office in Melbourne was that people are entitled to be called whatever they wish and "Elder" is not advertising the Church of the Latter Day Saints, end of story.

After all that, Liz and I had, yes, the current Elders as our producers this afternoon. Callow youths, the baby-faced pair of them. They don't look old enough to be out of the nest. There had been talk about inviting them to the readers' meeting to explain about their names, and maybe if it had been some of the past Elders - older and more articulate - we would have done. The incumbents, though, are very young and extremely polite and achingly shy, and have already been upset by one meeting with Alan. They would have been overwhelmed encountering two shouting bearded fools together. Far better to let Alan and Bernie do their venting on unflappable, voice-of-reason types like Chris and me (and even I was getting tempted to tell them both to shut up and get a grip by the end).

Deb the Volunteer Co-ordinator phoned to thank me later, and was going to phone Chris too. She'd already spoken to Alan and Bernie and their options are: (1) call the boys "Elder" like any sane person would, (2) officially request that they not be rostered on the same day as the Elders or (3) leave. We think they might choose option 3, which would be rather sad; but rather them than the blameless baby Elders.
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The radio station changed its logo recently, so we were given shiny new name badges today. While I like the new logo, I much preferred the old, solid badge with my name engraved on it to the new cardboard label in a laminated pouch. It's got a clip on it, but we have to provide our own lanyards if we want them. Hmph.

Liz wasn't on air today, as she was off having a tooth filled. It does put her wisdom tooth-related hissyfit a few months back into perspective. Perhaps her teeth were playing up at the time.

Our regular producer, Nola, has been absent the last few weeks. She has a chronic illness, so that wasn't unusual. She was back today, with the news that while she had been in hospital, it wasn't for the usual problem. Rather, she had been truly and suddenly taken sick, surprising all and sundry with exciting new symptoms, a medical mystery solved only when one of the nurses realised the pharmacist had given her the wrong pills when filling her regular prescription.

In place of Liz was Alan, a cheerful middle-aged builder with a diamond stud earring and a bushy white beard edged with ginger. There was a notice on the board, asking us to write down any issues we want to discuss at the upcoming readers' meeting, and Alan wrote down: "What to call the Elders". God, give me strength. I like Alan - top bloke and all that - but he's been pushing this barrow for over a year now and I thought it was well and truly in the past.

Two of our fellow volunteers, you see, are Mormons doing their missionary year. They're not always the same Mormons - they seem to have a two-month turnaround - but while they're doing their bit in the City by the Sea they work as producers at our station as a general "getting out in the community and doing good deeds" thing. There was a lot of discussion initially because we're not a religious station at all, so they agreed that there would be no proselytising either on- or off-air. They've stuck to that, and everyone's happy. Except Alan.

His issue is that the Elders insist on being called "Elder". They give up their given names while they're being missionaries, apparently, so we have had a succession of people all called Elder Lastname. I don't see an issue here: if the producer wants to be called Queen Pandrox the Twelfth when I do the thanks at the end of the show, I'm happy to go along with it. Alan, on the other hand, thinks it's a form of publicising their religion. To which I say, how can it be, when we don't mention what that religion is?

Anyway, he's going to lose again, because most of the other volunteers don't have a problem with the name Elder and because the station checked the policy with the head office in Melbourne and they don't have a problem with it either.
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Isn't it odd how some people can be incredibly passionate about the most unexpected things? My fellow newsreader Liz, for example, is as mild-mannered as a person can possibly be. She's a sweet, clucky (and slightly wet) hen... until today, that is, when she became insane.

We were preparing an article about a new dentist in Portland (first with the major breaking stories, us!) and got to talking about dental treatments we have had, and it came out that I still have my wisdom teeth.

"Oh my goodness!" shrieked Liz, in a manner suggesting she'd just seen an extremely large spider crawling up my arm.

"What?"

"You'll have to get them out!"

"No, they're fine."

"No, no, they have to come out!"

And on it went, Liz shrieking that wisdom teeth must come out and me saying that my teeth are fine (actually, one is growing outwards so I can scratch it on the side of my mouth if I want, but I deemed it prudent not to mention that - besides my dentist said if it doesn't worry me, it doesn't worry him either). It emerged that Liz is so passionate about this that she made all her children (she has five) get their wisdom teeth out as soon as they appeared. She then described in great detail the very nice orthodontist who did it and this wonderful routine he's developed so you get your drugs before the operation and a little chart of when to take them (at this point I was wondering, "what drugs?") and then you go and have the surgery in the morning and you're home by the afternoon! Wonderful! She highly recommends it!

I eventually calmed her down by saying that I'd remember him in case my teeth ever play up, and she said ominously, "Well, don't leave it too long." And then she went and made a cup of tea and was quite normal for the rest of the afternoon.
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My old primary school is closing down. I've known this for a while; earlier than almost anyone else because my boss is also the chairman of the school board and he told me the morning after the decision was made. It's not really a surprise but it's quite sad nonetheless: the school is nearly 120 years old and has played an enormous role in keeping a tiny township together. My mother was a pupil there when the new building opened in the 1950s, and I was one of the last to be taught by the Old Skool nuns who ran it independently (it's now run by lay teachers as a subsidiary of a larger school in the City by the Sea). Imagine: forty or fifty children aged between four and eleven, all squashed in one classroom and taught by one nun. No wonder the nuns were all crotchety.

Today's paper had an announcement in the public notices about a farewell Mass and dinner to be held when it closes in December, which I cut out as a reminder to go. As I snipped, I was vaguely aware I was cutting off the head of a man from the photo below. "Sorry," I said to him, and then I looked closer. "I mean, sorry, Brian."

Brian is a producer at the community radio station where I read the news. In fact, the photo showed him hard at work behind the mixing desk as part of an ad for new volunteers. And who should be sitting opposite him behind the microphone, gesticulating wildly as she announced something of (no doubt) momentous significance? Why, little supermodel me! (Ahem.)

Can a rock star boyfriend and a crack habit be far behind?
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Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake anyone.

The mild wind and the light rain made the cats skittish last night; they kept trying to climb the walls and gazing into the corner of the ceiling with mad looks in their eyes, entranced by something I couldn’t see (and, perhaps, didn’t really want to see). I found Blue Ratty (recent replacement for the late, lamented Ratty, who lost his nose, tail, fur and squeaker before we decided that a piece of plastic tube with beady eyes wasn’t really much of a toy) and tossed him down as a distraction. Lysis lost interest quite quickly – her gift is her beauty rather than her brains, but she can tell the difference between a mouse she can eat and one she can’t – but Pinkie was still creeping up on it and flinging it about when I went to bed.

I woke up in the wee smalls and discovered that my water glass was empty, so I padded out to the kitchen. I don’t put my glasses on if I get up at night, and since I can’t see anything without them, I don’t bother turning the lights on either. I navigate by sense and the only trouble I have is that I have to shuffle because Lysis likes to sleep in the middle of the passage; a black cat, the chronically myopic and the dark are the ingredients for disaster. Last night, however, she was asleep in my doorway and having passed her so soon, I stopped shuffling and walked normally, barefoot, to the kitchen.

That was a mistake, because as I strode into the kitchen, my foot squashed something soft and cold that made a loud “SQUEAK!”. I made a similar – but louder – sound.

It was Blue Ratty, of course. I realised that mid-screech, and had to lean against the kitchen bench, giggling uncontrollably for a minute. I'm certainly glad I don't have a weak heart.

What else? I got a badge today, for one year of volunteer service at Vision Australia. It's a large golden eye with a 1 dangling from it. Very tasteful, as I'm sure you can imagine. The Entertainment for the Elderly there today was very cute - a troupe of old men dressed in Victorian-era sailor suits singing a selection from Gilbert and Sullivan. The radio studio is just across the passage from the hall, and in the preparation room we can hear the entertainment. There's nothing quite like an eighty-year-old man singing "I'm Called Little Buttercup" when you're trying to put a news program together. It was shaping up to be a reasonably good day today - for once my co-presenter wasn't driving me mad - but then 15 minutes before we were due to go to air our producer hadn't arrived. We were madly reading the instructions, but he got there with two minutes to spare.

Guess where I’m going next time I’m in Melbourne? Right here! Just too cute for words...

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