Leaving Australia

As I leave Australia, I would like to say I've changed the country. Or it's changed me. But no. Not really. It has rained more than I'd expected. And the television is worse than you'd believe.

On my last night, Paul takes me to the local pub. There's a room of pokie slot machines, and there's a room for horse-racing betting. And there's a big screen tv showing an episode of Medium. A curly red-head in a tie-dye shawl is shouting at the screen "No! It can't be him! Oh Melissa!". The caption "To be continued" flashes up on the screen and the ginger woman howls: "No! They keep doing this! They can't do this to me!"

But the pub is mostly empty and the only answer comes from the ever-chipper pokie machines.

Paul and I stand watching The Footie Show. It's now missing its lead, Matty Johns, after all of the unfortunate gang-banging. But the show continues.

Matty Johns is a national icon in tatters. His autiobiography ("The Inside Story of Rugby" - curiously leaving out the group sex) is all over the bargain book stores. Worse, on the same edition of The Footie Show that he apologised for his sexual shenanigans, he also starred in a sketch which effectively said "Well, it could be worse, I could be gay." Curiously, Australia was unimpressed. So he's now Australia's biggest gang-banging homophobe.

In good news, however, all the stress has given him a haunted air and he now looks quite hot. Rather than like Rob Brydon's leftover chins. I'm just saying.

Anyway, the Footie Show is on, and a sketch has a cast member apologising for being late - he was at a strip show. "Hey man," says a colleague, "We don't do that any more."

"Hey! No worries!" he protests, "It was a male stripper!"

"Well, that's okay then." And it's all smiles. Hmmmn.