Finding Damo

The story of a man, his job, two cats and the meaning of success.

Archive for the category “conspiracy theories”

25 Feb 2012

The Money Fairy

So.

Have I told you about the Money Fairy? He or she is both blessing and curse. Throughout the years my relationship with money has been a tenuous one. I’ve never felt incredibly poor, but every time I try and get on top of my debts and into the black, something happens to dump me right back in the red again.

The Money Fairy

I get an unexpected windfall from the taxman, and then my car stops dead in the middle of Burwood Highway.

I work in Japan for a year, saving up a nice little nest-egg and then decide to go back to university full time.

I’m almost done paying off my loan, which will leave a good percentage of my wage free for savings and then I fly off to Europe for a couple of months.

Some people, including my fiancé, scoff at the Money Fairy. They tell me there is no such thing. But every time you say you don’t believe in the Money Fairy doesn’t exist, another Money Fairy dies, people!

Which may not be such a bad thing.

My point being, the Money Fairy won’t ever let me starve, but she never let me get ahead either. So when I find that there isn’t enough money to pay for the car rego one year, someone pays me back some money I lent them a couple of years previously.

Or I ask my Mum. She’s been a good agent of the Money Fairy.

But this isn’t about me.

I want to inflict Money Fairies on certain people. Kevin Smith? Needs a Money Fairy. Tripod. Money Fairy. Three of them to be sure.

Sam Raimi? No, he’s fine. Give him heaps of money and he makes Spider Man. I am NOT complaining there.

But I was saying to my fiancé last night: “I really want to watch Chasing Amy again. I love that movie!” I’ve always put Smith down as one of my favourite directors. His writing is brilliant and his movies are incredibly edgy.

Oh, hang on. No. Not are. Were. Someone in his or her wisdom decided to give him a massive stack of money and see what he could do with it. It’s hard to write about the woes and escapades of a bunch of New Jersey misfits when you’re eating a Nobu-burger from a gold-plated dining setting while your maid massages your toes. Kevin’s best work is now coming out of his Twitter account.

When Tripod released Open Slather, my friends and I all became instant fans. We went to gigs, bought t-shirts and cds and hoped that soon everybody would know how cool Tripod were. And then some people found out how cool Tripod were. And they got on TV. And started releasing studio versions of songs that were really only funny live…

But they did do Tripod Versus the Dragon. And I live in hope that they stay funny and stop releasing albums of re-recorded old material just to make money. And have to start scrounging for gigs again. And get funny.

Does true genius only come laced with a tinge of desperation? Is Stephen King’s Carrie superior in every way to Bag of Bones? The former was written while he was doing night-shifts at a laundry and teaching. The latter was written in his Maine mansion between signing limited editions and dabbing truffle oil from his chin with a lace napkin.

In my head, Claudia Christian is saying “I’m not bitter!” which was her catchphrase at the Multiverse Con, shortly after being cut from Babylon 5.

I’m not bitter. Or jealous. I really mourn the loss of quality, edgy writing that we discovered from these famous writers, directors and performers.

Simply because nobody thought to inflict a Money Fairy upon them.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go and reset the Fairy trip-wires around the house.

Posted in Celebrity, conspiracy theories, fame, Money and tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
19 Jan 2012
2 Comments

It’s not paranoid if they’re actually out to get you!

Ok. It’s been a week and my mention of conspiracy theories hasn’t invited any short term reprisals. I feel confident enough to make some general observations on the subject.

In Finding Damo, one of my characters is a bit of a conspiracy nut. Nothing is to chance. Everything has a reason, whether benevolent or sinister. If it isn’t the government, it’s the aliens, the big corporations or computer hackers. I feel quite safe attacking the government and the aliens, but being ‘Net based, I’m leaving the hackers alone. A lovely bunch, no matter what anyone says.

So, as research, I started to read up on conspiracy theories… and my life as a sane person ended.

Did you know:

There is a plot, by the Majestic 12, or the invading aliens or whoever, to undermine the world’s economy. The evidence is overwhelming. Ok, here’s the deal. We are slowly moving towards a cashless society. Credit cards and debit cards, online banking and iTunes vouchers. Cash is pretty much a thing of the past. Who has even seen a giant vault full of gold lately? Once we’re all online, cash wise, those secret purveyors of power will destroy the Internet, completely wiping out all financial records throughout the world. From the ashes of our society, the Evil Bunnies (or whoever) will rise, having secretly hoarded all of the world’s material wealth. Just remember, it was me who warned you. And if there are shortages of CC’s at your supermarket, that’s me stocking up.

The amount of stuff packed into our drinking water and immunization needles makes me wonder that we don’t all die out due to dehydration or measles. There are tracker chips, tiny DNA markers, hallucinogens, neural inhibitors and probably alien embryos. Taste the chemical rainbow!

There was no moon landing. There was a moon landing, but they forgot to turn the camera on. There was a moon landing, but the aliens kept getting in the shot, holding signs saying “hi Mum!”

The oil companies and Giant software companies hire assassins and thugs to get rid of innovators who could impact their profit shares. There are any number of green renewable energy sources out there, held under lock and key by the greedy oil moguls. It’s all about the mighty dollar.

Every now and then, an entire community will disappear. This is usually due to secret testing of a new and wonderful weapon. Apparently voters make good cannon fodder. Maybe there’s a list of towns that the weapons testers can daw on. “Says here, this town is full of people who don’t like Glee.” “Fine, nuke ’em.”

Everything you do is being monitored. Someone knows your preferences in DVDs, your favourite brand of peaches and your shoe size. Someone takes note of each of your friends, their affiliations, your relationship status and sexual preferences. You thought you were so tricky, ordering that chicken taming kit in the brown paper bag! Big Brother IS watching.

And there’s no conspiracy involved in that last one.

Get your shiny tin foil hats on and organise your end-of-the-world parties before the Aztec calendar finishes, civilisation along with it.

Posted in aliens, conspiracy theories and tagged , , ,
12 Jan 2012
2 Comments

Finding Damo’s Guide to Online Dating

I was going to do this blog on conspiracy theories, after the aliens and angels got into my head from last time. Two things stopped me:

  1. The secret government group that monitors all web sites referencing conspiracy theories (hi guys) and stops us when we get too close to the truth, and
  2. A friend contacting me to find out what she should do to improve her online dating profile.

lunatic fringeNow, this might have been at the request of the secret government group – I’ve been quite lax in wearing my tin foil helmet lately – or it may be that I’ve just gotten engaged to a girl… that I met through online dating.

You decide.

Either way, apparently now I’m a success story (don’t get me started on success. That’s a whole ‘nother blog). I hit the firewall running and came out, oh, fourteen years later with the future Mrs. Perry (or not Mrs. Perry – a whole ‘nother blog).

Some might say that fourteen years counts more towards statistical probability rather than success. I’m a cup-half-full kind of guy. I say it’s hard work, perseverance and a winning smile. But a goodly number of my friends regularly use online dating (for some, it’s like a heroin addict uses needles). I’ve seen my fair share of dating profiles. I know what works, and I’m willing to share.

So read on.

Finding Damo’s Guide to Successful Online Dating

First up, it helps to be incredibly attractive, wealthy and fit. If you’re all three of those, you’re pretty much set, and you can just write “hi, I’m single” and wait for the contact requests to start flowing.

If, like most of us, you just have to get by on being incredibly attractive, the following might help:

1. Choose your site.

I’m only going with what I know, and there are thousands of dating sites out there, but there are a few major types worth mentioning.

The major dating sites include RSVP, Match.com and eHarmony. These are the ones that advertise in Prime Time rather than after 11pm. They are usually associated with a major publishing firm. RSVP belongs to the Fairfax Group. Match.com was, last I looked, attached to Yahoo7. They’re slick, well populated and a good safe starting option.

There are a number of free dating sites, for the cheapskates and the brave amongst us (yes, I’ve been there). Oasis and plentyoffish are the two I know about. My experience of both of these is you get what you pay for. My contacts through Oasis included two amiable lunatics and one island girl who wanted me to buy her a web cam and a plane ticket.

There are also a number of “adult” dating sites out there. I’m not linking to these, but it’s enough to say that members of these sites are not, in general, looking for a long term relationship (and no, I’m not accepting comments on here from people who claim otherwise).

My most success has been with RSVP. I’ll concentrate on that one.

2. Choose a pen name

This can be an absolute date-killer. Or it can be an instant in. For example, I was searching for a friend of mine on RSVP to show the girl mentioned in the opening. I looked for a guy between 35 and 40 living on the bay. Here are some guys I would never date, without even looking at their pictures:

CuteEuroMale, Metrosexual007, Laidbackguy71, Kissesdeep1000m, Hawkz2011

Here are some guys who, if I was a girl with similar interests to me the guy, would pass onto the next round:

Shivermetimbers (gotta love a pirate), Bombadill, EdRooneysOffice (save Ferris!), BashfullyCheeky, ilikebooks (but I wish he’d used capitalisation), JustGotBackToAus (travel: tick!), EmbraceAdventure (ditto).

My own moniker was OmenToo. It amused me, did nothing for anyone else, except for the girl who said that she was slightly disturbed by the demonic references. See? Names help.

3. Choose a photo

Once they’ve gotten past the scary screen name, they’ll have to deal with the photo. For all of you out there reading, gorgeous folk that you are, this shouldn’t be a big problem. However, there are a few pointers that might help:

–       don’t wear sunglasses – your eyes are your best feature, no matter what you think.

–       Don’t use photos that you’ve taken yourself by holding your phone out at arms length, or standing in a mirror. Self-taken photo = “I have no friends”. It might be false. You may have hundreds of friends. Then, we ponder, why couldn’t one of them  taken a photo for you?

Do as I say, not as I do

The highlighted section is one of my profile pictures

–       Don’t use photos of you and your ex with your ex cropped out. Seriously, that disembodied arm could either be an ex-girlfriend or Thing from the Addams Family. Either way, not pleasant.

–       If you’ve been somewhere brilliant or done something breathtaking, AND you had a friend or total stranger take your photo, AND your ex or Thing wasn’t in the shot with you, why not use it as a profile shot? You in front of the Sphinx is way cooler than you in front a brick wall.

4. Write your profile

The penultimate step. Also, the hardest. I’ve written a novel. I’ve written three full-length plays and innumerable short stories. My online dating profile was the hardest thing I’ve ever written (to my darling fiancé: don’t worry, I haven’t started on the vows yet). Profile writing is an art. Compressing yourself into the breathtaking first-impressions-count summary of the century isn’t just difficult, it’s virtually impossible. But the following might help:

People who run these sites keep saying “don’t say you have a great sense of humour, show it.” My profile ran to Dad jokes and Monty Python quotes, but it worked. And girls knew what they were getting: bad puns and pop culture overload.

Living in Australia, it was useful to stick a bit of Nihongo in my profile, because it was unusual here. What is special about you? Make sure it’s in your opening statements.

You should increase “How do I look?” from “Average” to “Petty damn good”. Don’t tell me you’re “a little overweight” when you’re actually quite slim, as far as Australia’s average is concerned. A lot of guys (and girls) will do searches with a baseline of Great or whatever. One of my fiancé’s more embarrassing stories about me is that one of her reasons for seeing me in the first place was that I wasn’t overly interested in body image, as I picked “average” body type and upwards. My response was “Oh, no. I just know that women usually underestimate their attractiveness and didn’t want to discount a beautiful woman with low self-esteem”

Conversely, don’t lie. On one date, my supposedly “slim” date (with no photo) sat in the booth of the restaurant where we were to meet, red flower in her hand. I had to look twice to make sure she wasn’t under this 150kg imposter. And I’m not so callous as to just cut and run, which was my first impulse. But I felt a little betrayed at the lie, and the date went absolutely nowhere.

5. Go on dates

This sounds obvious, but the fact of the matter is, you can be on all the dating sites you want. You can have the perfect profile and have guys or girls contacting you in a flood of anticipatory longing. But if you never meet any of them, you’ll die alone. With your cats. And an old dressing gown. Yelling “WILL YOU KIDS GET OFF MY LAWN?” But you don’t have a lawn. Trust me. It’s not good. And don’t have unreasonable expectations. I’ve been on some shocking dates. And some ok dates. And a couple of fantastic dates that went nowhere but both of us had a good time. And a couple of fantastic dates that led to long-term relationships.

And one that ended in proposal by the water in Williamstown, with her laughing through her “yes” because I’d pretended to drop my sunglasses so I could get down on one knee.

So online dating can be fun. It is a minefield of hidden messages and secret rules (and codes for meetings of secret government agencies) which you’ll only decipher after going on a few dates and saying “ah, so THAT’S what it means”, but it’s worth it. My friend told me:

“I work seven days a week, so if I have spare time, I want to spend it with my friends.”

Which is totally fine. And as I said, go on a few dates and you’ll start to learn how to weed out the unsuitable from their profiles. But in today’s 7-days-a-week lifestyle, with our insular, Facebook-driven social lives and our forsaking of bush dances, ballrooms and church picnics, we need other avenues to find that special someone and propagate the species.

I found my special someone. Now, Grasshopper, I have taught you what I know. Go out into the world and become a man.

Or get yourself one.

Posted in aliens, conspiracy theories, online dating, Relationships and tagged ,

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