I’ve been tagged by a couple of other bloggers, so here we are:

I’m pressed for time, so for a while, instead of a carefully-edited
bit of prose, you’ll be getting a raw feed from my notebook, entries
arranged by topic.  So this will leap about a bit.  Bear with me.

In the hotel, flipping on the TV for the last ten days or so:

In
the commercial broadcast world, the influence of media barons seems
as obvious here as at home.  Kerry
Packer (imagine an Australian equivalent of Ted Turner with a dash of
Montgomery Burns) just died.  No one I’ve met on the ground here seems
to care, to be honest.  Not even slightly.  But the media mourned
deeply, with roughly the same sort of coverage you’d expect for the
death of a president or king.  (It was hard not to laugh, actually,
seeing Packer’s former employees — many of whom now work for Packer’s
son — struggle desperately for words of praise.  "Really, um, sometimes he
wasn’t that big a prick, sometimes" seemed to be pretty much the subtext.)

But that doesn’t mean the media culture strongly resembles the U.S. in every respect.  Nope.

In addition to the ABC (think BBC, but Australian), there’s also the
SBS, a national free-to-air service at least as ubiquitous here as PBS in the U.S.  This
morning, according to the listings in the newspaper, the SBS aired news
broadcasts from around the world in Japanese, Mandarin, Italian, German,
Spanish, French, Russian, Greek, Arabic, Indonesian, Polish, and of course English.  Then
in prime time they show "South Park."

This may, all by itself,
explain why I love this country so.

"The Simpsons" seems to be on 24/7.  Seriously.  Obviously, that can’t be true.  But it sure seems like it.

During
the lullaby hush of cricket matches, commercial interruptions
invariably involve some voiceover guy shrieking about cheap furniture
as if it’s crammed up his own ass.  One minute, you’re listening to the
articulate purr of Richie Benaud,
who could make Armageddon sound like a fine day with a good cup of tea,
and the next minute, a soulless drone having a pre-orgasmic spasm is
urging you to buy an end table:

This is the audio equivalent of a sudden convulsive shock to the groin.

Incidentally,
I want Richie Benaud to do the commentary on my funeral someday.  He’d
make everyone feel just splendid by the end, ready for a glass of
something chilled.  And never mind that he’s 75 years old.  I’m sure
he’ll outlive me, even if I live to 100.

"The Corporation",
a documentary which compares the behavior of the companies controllling
the world to sociopaths, is being broadcast nationally on SBS tonight. 
To my knowledge, this is the first national free-to-air broadcast of
the film in the world.

While cable is ubiquitous, there are only
three broadcast commercial networks here, just like the States had for
decades.  One of them, Channel Ten, is showing the
questioning-the-official-version documentary "911: In Plane Site"
tonight.  (Incidentally, in my opinion, the video is a deeply mixed bag —
containing a few provocative questions which remain unanswered and some
truly dopey stuff which makes it hard to take any of it seriously — but that’s
not the point.)

Think about this: Australia is one of America’s
key allies in the War on Tara, and a major broadcast network here is about
to show a video questioning the entire story of 9-11, and — get this
— it’s not even controversial.  There’s no outcry, at least none that
I’ve seen.  Nobody’s hollering about it in the paper or accusing anyone
of treason.  Nobody’s scared of dangerous ideas, or the public thinking
for themselves. 

Try to imagine NBC airing a 90-minute
documentary questioning the official version of 9-11.  This is
impossible, of course, but just try.  And then try to imagine the
whirlwind if they did.

So much for the "free marketplace of ideas" you hear hacks in the U.S. media trumpeting all the time.

UPDATE: I’m informed by several readers that "The Corporation" aired a few weeks ago in the UK.  This is excellent news, and thanks for that.  And btw, it’s really worth a see.

UPDATE again: "The Corporation" also aired in Canada, where it was originally financed.  So when I say "to my knowledge," please be aware that those words have significance, and it’s entirely possible I don’t know squat.  I’m sure we’ll shortly find out that the film was projected on the full moon when I wasn’t looking, and everyone knows this but me.

About 17 hours ago, near the tip of Mrs. Macquarie’s
Point, I was one of an estimated million revelers who lined the many harbors
and beaches of this fine city.  I can’t speak for every nook and
cranny, but as to the 25,000 or so folks where I stood, we ushered in
the New Year together with full and delighted voice.

This was a remarkably peaceful evening.  With a million people packed
bum-to-back in mid-90s stickiness for many hours of alcohol-assisted
revelry, as of midnight, police reported exactly seven arrests, all for
relatively minor infractions.  At the 9 pm family fireworks at Darling
Harbour (the word "family" here not having been hijacked into implying
a specific religion), Muslim headscarves intermingled with kids in
clubwear and retirees in shirtsleeves, and I couldn’t detect the
slightest trace of the sort of conflict which made news in one
community a few weeks ago.

Except for temperatures which have now pushed up to 41 degrees Celsius (about 106 Fahrenheit), the last 24 hours could not have been more pleasant.   (The rest of this week will be cooler.  Thank gods.)

There are many things to love here.  A flock of wild cockatoos in the Domain, for example, one of which wandered right up and started playing with me:

Or perhaps the spectacular Eclectus Parrots which flock to spilled food in the Blue Mountains the way pigeons do in Cleveland:

But most of all, I love Australia for the welcome it extends to visitors and immigrants.  The Lord Mayor of Sydney, Clover Moore, ushered in 2006 here by saying
the following: "My New Year’s wish is for Sydneysiders and Australians
to be diverse, tolerant, and compassionate."

These values are generally held in great esteem here, not as lip
service, but in the actual building of the society, and it shows almost
everywhere you look.  I am lucky enough to feel at home in many places
in this world.  But Sydney may be my very favorite city.  I am glad to
be spending a few more weeks here while finishing up the book.

I hope you feel as fortunate, happy, and at home, wherever you are.

Thank you for visiting, and I wish you an optimistic, exciting, and peaceful 2006.

UPDATE: Several emailers have correctly pointed out that the colorful bird pictured is not an eclectus parrot; it is a crimson rosella.  My apologies to the Avian-American community.

… our engineering officer Colin has done a wonderful job of keeping this site online, updated, and secure.  My sincere thanks.

Once you get past the Wombat Crossings…

You can stumble into something as breathtaking as Fitzroy Falls.  And find not one other human being present.  With luck, even the park people will have gone home for the night.  So it’s just you, and this 250-foot waterfall.