Some people are having problems believing the seagulls in Finding Nemo were saying “Mine!”. Apart from issues surrounding the operation of the human ear, some have ignored the evidence of how seagulls behave and the context of the dialogue. One person insisted that since they’re Australian seagulls, they must be saying “Mate!”. Yup, ‘cos Australians just say “Mate!” all the time.

So my mate Tony offered to grab a still off the DVD, with the subtitles turned on. And here it is. Thanks mate.

I rest my case. Smug mode on. (Yup, I would have been grumpy if I’d been wrong.)

I didn’t watch the life expectancy survey thing on Channel 7 last Sunday, though I see a minute or two while channel-flicking. It was showing reams of statistics, read out by an unseen host whose voice I thought I recognised, but who didn’t appear on-screen so I could work out if I was right or not. Then they went to a commercial break. When I flicked back a minute later, there were more statistics, and I still couldn’t work out who was talking. Most irritating. So I looked elsewhere for my viewing.

But I did do their test on the web, which told me:

According to our calculations, you are expected to live to the age of 88.1.

88! That seems like a long way away.

That is of course if my bedroom light doesn’t fall on me. It appears to be coming loose from the ceiling. Tried to ring the repair person at the real estate agent today, but only got her voicemail. Great huh. Just makes me more determined to get myself organised and buy my own house.

Amazon UK and the bank seem to be conspiring to make me spend my money more wisely, by refusing to accept my otherwise healthy credit card for payment, and blaming each other for the refusal.

Strangest sight so far this week: Two women glammed-up, with an ancient-looking carpet sweeper, standing in the cold outside Parliament Station. One wore a banner proclaiming “Stepford Wives, coming soon!” Does it make me want to see it? Uhh.. no, not really.

Update 6pm. Amazon UK have now deemed my money to be as good as anybody’s, and accepted my order. Oh, and I like the way they suggest making some spare dosh (£40.01 no less) by selling the products I’ve bought from them in the past. Which includes the things I bought as gifts for others, and the latest order of stuff I haven’t even got yet.

Where once were bats, now are possums.

They seemed to be eating. Don’t know what — the tree is devoid of leaves. No doubt a little later tonight they’ll be merrily running riot somewhere up in my ceiling.

The bank sent me another letter last week detailing how much they would welcome me being in debt to them by. The letter never arrived, so I rang them back and sure enough they had sent it to my old address. Whoops. Double-whoops, considering that included in the envelope were lots of fun financial statements they’d wanted to see. Thankfully whoever lives at my old address now returned it to sender.

Looked at a house on Saturday afternoon, that was rather dodgily advertised as having 3 bedrooms and a dining room. On examination of the house, this clearly wasn’t the case. When asked, the real estate agent reckoned this was because it was 2 bedrooms, plus a third which alternately could be a dining room. Uh huh. Hell, why not list it as having a study and a family room as well? All at the buyer’s option, right?

In any case, my suspicion from the advertising was correct: gorgeous house, great location, but virtually zero back yard, small and no room to extend — and of course damn expensive for what it is! The agent rang me on Monday, and tried to convince me that one could build storage space or rooms in the roof cavity. And she also quoted a previous agent I’d dealt with last year (who worked for a different company — what’s this, they exchange customer lists now?) as saying “You’d be mad not to buy it”. Well, colour me crazy, but I’m not going for it. Not that I’m sure I could afford it anyway.

The thing about real estate agents is that, like used-car salesmen, some of them live up to the cliche. You only have to look at the advertising. If there’s no pictures of the inside of the property, you can be guaranteed it’s hideous inside. If there’s pictures of nearby cafes and parks and the railway station, but none of the property itself, that means the whole thing is hideous and probably falling down, and the best feature is it’s in a good spot.

You can’t even trust what suburb/postcode they quote. My sister (who is looking from afar) asked why a house listed was in Elsternwick but the web street directory couldn’t find the street. That’s because it isn’t in Elsternwick at all, but over the border in (slightly less-desirable) Gardenvale. They’re not content with lobbying Aussie Post and the local councils to move the boundaries, they ignore them too when it suits.

All part of the game I suppose.

The problem with shopping on the Net on UK web sites is that prices in pounds make everything sound so cheap. So it was hard to resist the lure of three movies I kinda sorta wanted, at 8.97, 8.97 and 6.97 each. Bargains, every one! No, wait, that’s UKP, dammit. Multiply by three, pretty much. Take away the VAT*, but add the postage. Still a bargain? Ummm…

(*Amazon UK subtract the VAT, as they should. Some other online shops pocket the VAT, which is naughty. They’d claim they’re subsidising the international postage with the proceeds, but still…)

What finally swayed me to BUY! BUY! BUY! was that (a) I’m in a splurging mood (not sure why) and (b) while all three movies are available in Australia, two of them have features you can’t get in the shops here. Yet again my multi-region DVD player pays for itself.

So, winging their way towards me are:

Y Tu Mama Tambien, the seminal Mexican road movie that I originally saw at the film festival in 2001. It was great stuff, and hopefully just as good on repeat viewing. The UK edition has a bunch of extra material that’s not in the Australian one and, it’s rumoured, a 64 page book to boot. £5.93 plus postage. Ch-ching!

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone isn’t available in Australia in widescreen. Well, unless you want to spend twice as much and get a crappy soundtrack CD that you’ll never listen to. (Soundtrack albums only work if the music is significant in its own right. O Brother, Lost In Translation… now they were good soundtrack albums. Harry Potter? No thanks.)

Why widescreen? Why not? Mumble mumble original aspect ratio mumble cinema mumble mumble matches the Chamber Of Secrets DVD. Insert roll of eyes here if you don’t care about this stuff. Actually the kids and I almost bought the full screen version of this last week on my day-off. We walked down to Dick Smith (the day’s exercise) only to find they were out of stock. £7.63 plus postage. Ch-ching!

Nine Queens I also saw in 2001. It’s an Argentine movie about a couple of con-men chasing a set of rare stamps. Really good stuff. As far as I can tell, the Australian release is the same, but it’s cheaper buying it from the UK. Another £7.63 plus postage. Ch-ching!

It came out at about $71 for the three, including the postage. Not too bad. I’ll be watching my mailbox in anticipation.

All this talk of movies reminds me, must look through the Melbourne International Film Festival programme and see what’s worth seeing.

Yes, I saw the other car at that roundabout. Despite the rain, the dark, I was quite aware it was there. And it would have been entirely my fault if we’d collided. I failed to give way to the right.

Because I thought it was turning left.

I ask you: those dickie little driving lights that look like indicators lit up — are they a good idea?

Friday night DVD: School Of Rock. Not at all deep, and obviously a Jack Black post-High-Fidelity star vehicle, but very funny, very enjoyable.

I rang the bank to ask what happened with my alarm clock points reward thing I ordered. The lady told me it would take up to 28 days to arrive. TWENTY EIGHT days?! Where’s it coming from, the moon? Do Sony put these things together especially by hand after ordering or something? Obviously they don’t just send a bank minion down to Harvey Norman to buy it and put it in a PostPak. Obviously I’ll have to be patient, and keep using my mobile phone for my alarm clock.

Saturday was party night. Collectively Marita and I were invited to three of ‘em as a matter of fact. See, sometimes it’s a Saturday night at home with the biscuits, a game of Scrabble, and an X-Files DVD, sometimes it’s social butterfly time. Since Beth got in first, hers was graced with our presence. The required early night and its close proximity helped, mind you. A little wine, some nice snacky party food, some good company and My Brand New Party Shirt(TM).

I had bought the Party Shirt on Friday. I’m usually hopeless at buying casual clothes. Some kind of impetus is always required. Sometimes it’s my existing clothes falling apart. This time it was an attempt to go to a party with a stunning woman on my arm and not look completely like an unworthy dag. I don’t know if the plan worked or not, but I kinda like the shirt. It’s stripey and in a style quite unlike previous shirts I’ve owned. Once I got over agonising whether it should be tucked in or not (definitely not, I think) I relaxed a bit and felt quite comfortable in it.

The early party night gave way to Sunday morning, and we walked Marita’s dog at Altona Beach (much canine hilarity with The Chasing Along The Sand Game). The afternoon was spent lazing at home with the kids, continuing to play the Harry Potter game on the XBox, a video or two, and between showers jumping high on the trampoline, playing Totem Tennis, and a short walk.

And now the weekend has ended. 7 out of 8 in the tipping, and my team won! Could it get much better? Depends whether or not my tipping competitors crashed and burned.