Everyone has their own way to deal with stress. As exams loom on the Year 12 horizon, I have noticed myriad outlets for students in the haven’t-studied-all-year-not-enough-time-to-cram-god-I’m-f***ed situation (i.e. most people), including proverbial binge drinking, eating large quantities of highly salted deep fried yellow things, combusting hapless Sims by buying them cheap ovens and not installing a fire alarm or phone, and eveyone’s favourite — denial. Personally, I go for long walks and cry self-pityingly.
All of this actually reminds me of a similarly traumatic era, one that has scarred my family and no doubt millions of others as we try to come to terms with our tragic, shared past: the re-election of John Howard in 2004. At this dawn of a new Dark Age, poor Mum, after much indefatigable campaigning for the Greens, could only find recourse for her pent up disillusionment by making pies. Lots of pies. As you can imagine, this made me happy, especially when they were cheese pies. But Mummy’s anguish still impacted on my Last Exile-infatuated Year 8 Smoothie Brain enough to write her a song, or rather, re-write a universally-loathed and unfortunately ubiquitous song to reflect the terror and economic rationalism of Howard’s prolonged reign…
Obey America Fair
Australians all let us extort,
for we must fund the war:
It matters not whose war it is;
As long as there’s blood and gore;
Our PM lusts for omnipotence
and we bow to foreign rule;
Let’s slash the tax, and never look back,
Obey America Fair!
Let democracy die and kill free speech,
Obey America Faiiiiiir!
Sung in my screechy faux choir girl voice I thought it was rather effective and jaunty. Of course, it’s slightly less relevant now than it was, but maybe in a few years when the Kevin ‘11 Brigade has rolled past and Mum once again commits herself to the kitchen in the service of pastry creation, I will take up pen and paper once more to write Driving Brendan Spare, or perhaps You Don’t Care (you smarmy hypocritical Queenslanderous bureaucrat), and then This Isn’t Fair! when I appear in court over libel charges. W00t.
Exam Duration: 2 hours (and 15 minutes reading time) in NHS’ mouldering hall, not that I don’t love its moulderingness and all.