The Dogs are Having a Party! And Bellamy is Invited!

One more game, the Big One, and then the fall of civilisation i.e. THE OFF SEASON. Again. Christ. Cultural bankruptcy beckons.

Well, in the meantime, I hope it’s not rational opinion, objective analysis and up to the minute betting odds you’re here for. If it is, you are clearly lost. You are probably one of those dickheads who are not only inept navigators but are also unable under any circumstances to ask for directions due to your overinflated ego in which case I will offer unsolicited directions STRAIGHT TO COOPER CRONK’S WEBSITE coopercronk.com. Douches will find it informative and inspiring. Everyone else will find it squirmy-funny and unsettling on a sliding scale. Exactly how unsettling you find it will depend on your tolerance levels for new age rhetoric and raging narcissism. Mine, as it turns out, are low. Lower than Clint Eastwood’s balls, if you will.

I look forward to the day when I can invest emotionally in a grand final. Hoo boy won’t that be something? In the meantime, we have the Bulldogs playing the Storm. And while it’s a shame the Raiders or the Sharks didn’t get through (and what a final that would have been and one day will be god willing please god), it’s fantastic the Rabbits and the Broncos didn’t make it either. One hand washes the other, and so forth.

In any case, I’m not too concerned with who wins. I see pros and cons for each outcome.

For example, on the one hand I would love to see Craig Bellamy getting a giant bucket of Gatorade dumped over his head. Which indicates I would like the Storm to win.

On the other hand, I would love to see confetti and shredded raffle tickets mashed with glitter and whatever other garish pulpy matter they void onto the field and the heads of the victors from the air above rain down all over Michael Ennis. He does such a good job, not only playing a vigorous and antagonistic brand of football and captaining a team but in keeping track of what make and model of car every player from every other club drives so that he can cut any opponents brake lines at only a moment’s notice. That’s a real one-percenter. Take note, aspiring sociopaths. I would like to see him holding that big trophy thing aloft while grinning toothily and I would like  knowing that all the while the hamster wheel inside his head was still turning, turning….

If this is indeed the outcome, let it be known that the real reason for the Bulldogs’ hot blaze of glory has little to do with Des Hasler’s scientific and analytical style of coaching and penchant for making players ingest imported calf-blood milkshakes and everything to do with the fact that HE CREATED A NEW TEAM SONG PARTWAY THROUGH THE YEAR TO ‘MAKE IT RELEVANT’ AND WHEN THE PLAYERS, WHO ALL COLLABORATED ON THE LYRICS (AS IS EVIDENT) BELT IT OUT THEY ARE LED BY FRANK PRITCHARD ON GUITAR. It climaxes with the following:

“The Dogs are having a party,

The Dogs are having a party,

And (insert defeated team) are in the bin!”

Well, we’ll see about that. Literally. On Sunday.

Anyway, continuing with the one hand washes the other theme, I’d also love to see Cameron Smith really inconsolably upset, stricken, ashen, bereft, but, by the same token, I’d quite like to see him pleased and at peace too. I like to despise him and enjoy despising him but every time I see him on panel shows and hear him give his lucid analysis I end up thinking he’s great and admiring him for the obvious ice that runs through his veins. Is he going to make a great coach one day OR WHAT? It is my personal dream (not the only one, but one of several) that he coach the Raiders one day. To September glory, obviously. It is important to have long-range goals and dreams. That’s what the professionals tell me. The ones with framed qualifications hanging on their walls. But I digress. The other thing that impresses me about Cameron Smith, aside from him being very cool and very controlled and thus the ultimate big game player is that he is a great lover of history. I understand this to mean that he spends his free time on elaborate civil war reenactments and listening to Wagner’s operas at very high volume. Blake Ferguson and Sandor Earl spend theirs at Time Zone. Playing Guitar Hero.

Actually, I don’t really need to see Cameron Smith happy at all. I just remembered all those Origins. I’ve seen quite enough. Too much, as it were.  

This brings me back to Bellamy. Everything about the Storm brings me back to Bellamy. He’s the only thing I actually like about the entire outfit, including but not limited to the playing roster past and present, the shady fiscal history of the club and their associated moral transgressions, their colours, their mascot, their name, the name of their home ground, their wrestling skills and subsequent talent for slowing the ruck down to a slow benzodiazepine crawl, their staunch structure and their annoying and frequent habit of winning games with ease. What’s to like?

Well, Bellamy.

Bellamy coiled like a reptile in the coaching box.

Bellamy radiating a barely suppressed rage.

Bellamy contorting his elasto-silicone face into all manner of gruesome and painful expressions.

Bellamy inflicting irreparable damage on Mount Franklin bottles.

Bellamy rolling his eyes in their 360-degree-gyro-reticulated sockets.

Bellamy extending his telescopic hyper-stalk neck to full height.

Bellamy conveying the impression of a man perpetually on the edge of violent explosion.

Bellamy actually exploding violently.

Bellamy.

Recently Bellamy said that, retrospectively, he finds his behavior in the coaches box “quite embarrassing at times. [But] not all the time.”

“I don’t particularly worry about it too much but I don’t like it when they see me going off and saying the things I shouldn’t be saying. It is embarrassing for me and a little alarming for people at home watching.”

It’s not alarming, Craig. It’s awesome. Don’t change.

Bogan to the Bone.

"I've only been with my guy for six months, but he has an annoying way of speaking. He says 'youse', and 'youse all' when he's referring to other people. I like him but I hate his bogan ways. Any advice?" Lindsay, via email.





The bogan this bitch Lindsay is seeing? He's a lightweight. At the moment I'm working by one of the best bogans ever. He's bogan to the bone. He's not a modern-day bogan either, he's an old-school bogan. The good kind. Old-school bogans tend to have a fairly honest way of dealing with the world. New bogans are generally uncharitable and fuck-witted; they're all about conspicuous consumption and trying to stand out by fitting in. Their households have more remote controls than they do books, and they have the bizarre tendency to refer to magazines as 'books'. All this is vastly different to the yobbo of yore.

Everything that this bogan at work says is pretty great, and he tends to speak in handy soundbites. Two samples:

"Fuck workin' this weekend I'm goin' to the fucken show mate - I'm puttin' three hundred bucks down in the beer tent and sittin' back and goin' 'yewwwwwwww!'"

"I'm outta fucken ciggas, I'm outta fucken drugs and I'm fucken leavin'! I'm out!" - Leaps into raucous hectic ute and roars away...

It lifts my heart to know that old-school bogans are still being bred. This one looks exactly like Jesse Pinkman. Same stature, same face, same hair, same beanie and same cold glitter in the eye. He doesn't pepper his sentences with 'yo' and 'bitch' - he favours 'mate', as per tradition - and I don't know about the whole meth lab thing either, that might be a bit beyond him, but these differences aside he is Jesse Pinkman. Jesse Pinkman, only rougher. He's just about rough enough to be called a rough-cunt. This is pretty rough. It denotes a long term and instinctual committment to full-throttle feral behaviour and the maintenance of a menacing demeanor, attitude and appearance. This bogan, let's call him Ben, since that's his name, has all these bases covered. Even ordinary acts, such as basic sandwich consumption, are touched with a trace of grim-faced menace. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, and plenty right with it. I mean, it seems to work for him; it it lends him a certain pungent charm, and it keeps me equal parts amused and edgy, even if some of his more lurid comments don't make me especially proud to be human.

I've detected a subtle shift in the way my boss sees and talks about Ben over the last fortnight or so. Back then, it was with a speculative, musing tone that he'd say to me

"I don't know if he gets on the drugs or not...."

and it was me who emitted an explosive

"Hohhhh!"

noise to express my certainty on the subject before barking rhetorically

"Have you seen him some mornings - he's operating at acompletely different velocity - he vibrates for fucks sake!"

to which he replied

"Yeah, he does seem a bit....rough, some mornings..." 

Now, in the last few days, circumstances - being that Ben became progressively wild-eyed and clenched and sweaty enough as to necessitate the draping of a towel around his neck with which to mop his streaming face - have dictated that the boss has arrived at his conclusion - being that Ben has confirmed his suspicions and most definately "gets on the drugs". Apropos of this development he has adjusted his tone and outlook accordingly. Now he says things like

"Geeeez, see his eyes yesterday - out on stalks they were - hanging halfway out of his head!"

 and

"He must be on the drugs again today if he's forgotten where he parked his bloody car!"

in an authoritative and not-entirely disapproving tone. It seems that it was not so much the savage and flagrant amphetamine abuse that had him rattled so much as it was the not knowing for certain what was going on. Now that he has him pegged he seems almost entirely satisfied with the situation as it now stands, and appears content with letting it play out of it's own natural and highly entertaining volition. This looseness and detatchment is also pleasing; it triggers a rush of love for all the men in the world and makes this an altogether happy story. Which is nice.

Here's where you can find Bogan Shire in New South Wales. That photo of the sign? I nearly burnt my brakes stopping to take it. Which is apt.