http://www.worldsfunniestisland.com/
Worlds Funniest Island- Cockatoo Island Comedy Festival. Click on this link to learn about this ambitious comedy festival taking place in Sydney on October 17th and 18th. I’m doing 2 shows on the Saturday and there are loads of great people performing over the 2 days.
What am I doing right now?
I’m learning the art of ice sculpting. Right now I’m in my cubist period.
Put Better Looking People On The Money
The Global Financial Crisis could be solved if we had better looking people on the money. After discussing this on Triple J with Scott Dooley, listener Sarah Geeson kindly created this mock-up of a new and improved $50 note, featuring Natalie Portman on one side and Johnny Depp on the other.
THE VICTIM OF CRIME
I tell you what, things have certainly gotten a lot more interesting around my place since this violent home invasion started. To think, just ten minutes ago I was slumped on the couch in my pyjamas, watching TV, bored out of my mind. Then all of a sudden SMASH! My front door gets kicked open and these three insane looking guys come crashing in, with machetes and baseball bats. Ever since then my dull Wednesday night has been transformed in to an all action thrill ride. I’m pretty sure these guys have the wrong house. For one thing, I don’t know anyone called “Wayne”. And I certainly don’t know anything about his “hundred grand”. But that hasn’t stopped them from doing anything they can think of to torture information out of me. I was passing out on the couch half an hour ago and seriously thinking about packing it in for the night. Now I’m getting cigarettes put out on my face and I’m hog tied, face down on my lounge room floor. Nuts. One thing I admire about these home invaders is that, as well as ski masks, all three of them are wearing suits and ties. That somehow makes them seem more frightening to me. Wearing a suit and tie to a home invasion. If they’d come in dressed in tracksuit tops and jeans it would have been OK. But when they came in wearing suits I thought “Oh my God, they mean business.” And man, do they ever. I hope they aren’t serious about wanting to cut my legs off if I don’t “start giving some straight answers”. But how can you be sure with people like this? One other good thing is that I doubt this will last much longer. A fast home invasion, it seems, is a good home invasion and they seem pretty anxious to move this home invasion along. So realistically I could be in bed by 11 o’clock. That still gives me a solid 8 hours. Which I need. The people at work aren’t gonna believe this. “Did you do anything interesting last night?”, “Well, let’s see, three masked maniacs came to my house by mistake and tortured me for an hour. Is that interesting enough for you?” The people I work with are such a bunch of dick heads. I should just take tomorrow off. Think of some excuse. I’ll tell them I have conjunctivitis. No one wants you in the office if they think you have conjunctivitis. Whatever they just did to the bottom of my foot, it hurt like a son of a bitch. Is that a nail gun? I tell you one thing; I wouldn’t want to be “Wayne” when these guys catch up with him. But I would like to be me, the next time I’m at a dinner party and the subject of home invasions comes up. Cos I’ll have this great story about a violent, unprovoked home invasion. I’ve been needing a new anecdote. It looks like this thing is going to wrap up even sooner than I expected. They’re convinced I don’t know anything, using the old “no man could withstand a beating like that” logic. And they’re right. If I’d known something I would’ve talked. But instead it’s a couple more hard kicks to the face and ribs and then, as quickly as they arrived, the three home invaders are gone. I guess I’ll try to untie myself and begin to straighten up the lounge room, which has been destroyed. It’s just a memory now. Like the great love affairs you may have had. I think they broke my arm. But what an anecdote. So next time you see me at a dinner party? Pull up a chair. davejory.com
This Thai Prison Is The Greatest.
I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but my life has been pretty damn good since I got thrown in to this Thai prison for trying to smuggle heroin through the airport. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s a living hell and people all around me are dying from staph infections and spider bites. But I guess I’ve always had a knack for looking on the bright side of things.
The time has flown in here. Sometimes I can’t believe it’s been almost four years since I kissed my wife and baby daughter goodbye, flew to Thailand to be a drug mule and got caught at the airport with an inexplicably large quantity of heroin inside me. I remember at the time thinking “This aint good”. But I think there are two types of people in this world. The first kind get charged with drug smuggling and stand in front of a furious Thai judge while he shrieks about making an example out of them, and all they can think is “My life is over”. Then there are those who get charged with drug smuggling and stand there thinking “This could be the start of an amazing new chapter.” That was me four years ago.
The news back home always seems to focus on the negative aspects of being locked up in a Thai prison for drug smuggling. No one ever talks about the good stuff. When I first arrived in Thailand, I didn’t realise what a beautiful place it was. I was here to be a drug mule, not a tourist. I spent two sleepless nights chain smoking in my hotel room, waiting for my connection to bring me the package for my flight home. Then it was back to the airport to attempt (unsuccessfully) to get through customs.
If I hadn’t been apprehended trying to board my flight, I would’ve missed out on all the fascinating aspects of Thailand. To really understand a country you have to spend time there, getting to know the wonderful people and the fascinating customs. Four years here and I like to think I’m something of an expert on beautiful Thailand. Ask me anything! And to think, I would’ve missed out on all this if I’d made it on to the plane and gotten home to my family to resume my life. Instead I’m going to die over here, with an understanding of Thailand that most tourists can only dream about.
I was happy back home with my family and my friends, but I think I always felt like something was missing from my life. That’s probably why I agreed to become a drug mule in the first place. Why I came to Thailand for what I can see now was essentially a suicide mission. I’m a nervous person at the best of times and I’m a terrible liar. I was never going to succeed as a smuggler. Walking through customs with a franger full of heroin inside me was not for me. It was so frightening I threw up in to my hands. The customs officers saw me coming a mile off. I guess that makes me sort of a loser. But of course the real victims here are the people who hired me to smuggle the drugs in the first place. Those men trusted me and I let them down terribly. Fortunately they haven’t yet paid me the $2,300 they promised me. Even if they did try to pay me I wouldn’t accept it. I can’t take money for work that was never completed.
But that’s all history now. I can either sit here on death row, completely devoid of hope, feeling sorry for myself, or I can put a positive spin on things and make the most of the time I have left before they hang me in the exercise yard. Get busy living or get busy dying. I mean how many people can say they’ve been on death row in a Thai prison and had the Prime Minister of Australia himself intervene (unsuccessfully) on their behalf? Boy, if the gang from high school could see me now. I’ve got it made.
A Fete Worse Than Death
I have some issues with kids, but in general they’re alright.
I say this because I was recently roped in to a role as face painter at a school fete. This occurred due to a disastrous series of events and quite frankly I would’ve done almost anything to get out of it.
But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you can’t get out of everything. Sooner or later you’ll have to make good on a commitment.
So there it is, Sunday morning, I’ve turned up at this fete, and I was sat down at the face painting table. I’ve never done face painting before and all I had was a laminated book of photos showing how the paint jobs should look, a pile of paints and one thick, cheap paint brush.
The first kid of the day was about three, flanked by his exhausted parents. He wanted to be Spider-man and I wanted to make him Spider-man, so I opened the laminated book and used that as a rough guide as I began smearing the kid’s face with red paint. Then a few thick, black lines down the face. Face painting is hard and I was botching it up. I was looking at his parents mouthing silent apologies. When it was finished it looked nothing like the photo in the book. It looked the way Spiderman might have looked if someone had kicked the shit out of him and jumped on his face.
But when I held the mirror up to the little kid’s face so he could see it- he loved it. His little imagination filled in the blanks, blocked out the shoddiness of my paint work and he convinced himself he looked like Spider-man.
Seeing how pleased that kid was by my half-assed effort made me wish we could maintain those low expectations well in to adulthood. Imagine disappointing a sexual partner, only to have them use their imagination to convince themself that you were really very good.
Anyway I spent the day face painting and every kid wanted to be Spider-man, so by the end of the day the fete looked like it was raising money for to assist Spider-man’s deformed children.
I will never be dragged in to something like helping out at a fete ever again. The organisers of that event are dead to me now. But I will never forget the looks of joy on those little kid’s faces.
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