Easy Gaol Time!

Presenting my guide to getting thrown into a cell, in 4 easy steps:

1. Download these satellite images.
2. Download this document.
3. Order shitloads of fertiliser and other handy materials from the document.
4. Sit back and relax!

There you have it, ASIO will be onto you in no time. Oh, it helps if you’re Islamic too. Maybe try converting first.

Oh, if you don’t hear from me for a while, I’ve probably been arrested for sedition.

Rules

Since the very dawn of time, mankind (and indeed all life on earth) has been striving. At the time it seemed to make sense, although noone was ever really sure what it was that mankind was striving towards. When that very first Devonian fish decided to take the first tentative steps out of the water, it could little imagine that it was just one link in the long, twisted chain that would lead towards the creation of a society that would eventually invent the 12 hour “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” TV1 marathon.

So what was it then, that our pre-historic ancestors were driven by? For 200 years it has been generally accepted that over the millenia evolution was driven by competition. By the need to survive. People everywhere were led to believe that the reason for existence is simply to
propogate your DNA as far and wide as possible.

Technology then, has also followed a similar course to evolution. If we are to believe Darwin, and extend the metaphor a little bit, then technology is simply a means of spreading our seed even futher than ever before. This has been the popular theory for the last 200 years.

However, recent reaserach of mine has begun to uncover a startling trend. There seems to be some kind of sinister trend behind all this. First of all, the evolution of humans. Darwin would have us believe that we got to the top of the food chain by virtue of our opposable thumbs, superior brain power, and charming good looks. But there is one other thing that sets humans out from the rest. Rules.

Before man, there were no rules. Nature didn’t have speed limits, or tax collectors, or instructions on how to open a can of tomatoes. And if there is one thing that nature abhors more than a vacuum, it is anarchy.

The first celebrated rule-maker was Moses. Since he walked down from a mountain clutching a couple of bits of rock, man has been fascinated by rules. The Greeks developed rules of mathematics and democracy. The Romans developed road rules. The British developed rules about which fork to use for your entree.

Mankind’s greatest discoveries of the last couple of centuries - the steam engine, automobiles, fight - they all come with a staggeringly large number of rules. On a simple walk around the block I am confronted with all sorts of rules. Stop. No Parking. Dogs much be on a leash. No entry. Trespassers will be prosecuted. The list goes on.

Competitive sports are another great example. Everyone loves to know all the rules of as many sports as possible. Joe Armchair probably knows more about cricket’s mysterious and never-used Law 31 than any of the Australian team.

But why do we love rules? Why have we spent the past 10000 years developing new and more intricate handbooks of what we can and can’t do?

The answer is simple. Without rules, life is dull. What is the point of sneaking into a concert when everyone else just walks in the front door? Why bother streaking across an oval in front of a thousand people is no-one is going to chase after you and try to crash tackle you? How can you enjoy illicit drugs if they are available at Coles? You can’t.

Just to recap - people like rules. People like breaking rules. But there’s one thing we don’t like: people who try to enforce rules.

I’ve had my fair share of run-ins with the man. On one memorable occasion, as I was being escorted stark naked through the university, it struck me that people who like enforcing the rules are a little bit different from the rest of us. They don’t care about the rules. For them, there is no glory in trying to bend the rules as far as possible. All they want is power, and rules are a means of accessing that power.

Fortunately, these kinds of people are generally very stupid, so the security guard escorting me at the time kindly allowed me to climb onto a roof to retrieve my pants. I did not return.

I have a quick message for all members of the law-enforcement profession. Laws are just rules. Rules form part of a game. Stop trying to fuck up my game! In life, rules are just threads. The winner is the person who can take all these threads and knit them together to form a nice warm scarf.

A homage to the humble goon bag

Now everyone know that the goon-bag was an Australian invention, but how many people know it’s inventor, hey? Not one of you, I’ll bet. This is the sort of stuff they should be teaching kids at school. It’s Australiana, for crying out loud. Here we are, with the inventor of a major Australian icon slipping into relative obscurity, while kids all over the country are being taught about some Dutch git who crash-landed on an island somewhere after he got lost sailing to India. What is the world coming to, I ask you?

Anyway, the humble goon bag was invented in 1965 by a man named Thomas Angrove. I couldn’t find a photo of him, but instead I’ve taken one of an actual goon-bag, in all its glory.

These creatures are normally found inside cardboard boxes, but when finished can be inflated and used as a pillow, as shown above.

Now many people acutally believe that “wine-in-a-box” (as the Lindemans website calls it) is actually somehow inferior to the stuff you get in bottles, but this is, in fact, a complete lie.

1. Cask wine (goon) comes in packages of anywhere up to 20L, whereas most bottles are only 750mL.
2. Bottled wine requires specialised equipment to open, while a cask of wine has all the instructions you need on the bottom.
3. When you open a bottle of wine, it starts to react with poisonous oxygen, which viciously attack the alcohols present in the wine, causing it to go off. Goon bags do not let oxygen come into contact with your wine, and so you can open a cask now and still be drinking fresh wine from it next week.
4. Wine bottles can be very uncomfortable if you sleep on them.

It is a sad but true fact that we have a public holiday dedicated to banks (now known as labour day, but originally called bank holiday), but there is no day whatsoever to celebrate the invention of the wine cask. I couldn’t find any date of birth for Thomas, so I propose that we make July the 14th the offical “International Goon-Bag Day!” Everyone go out, grab a bag of goon, and start enjoying this fine Australian tradition.

Cheers!

—EDIT 2/2/05—

Further research into the goon bag has led me to discover that the goon bag was patented on April 20th, 1965.

The fine art of sledging

It’s Saturday afternoon. You’ve just spent the entire week slaving away, working for the man (or in my case, drinking), and now you need some relaxation time. What better then, than an afternoon at the local football. This is where I spend all my Saturdays anyway, supporting the CC Strikers as they do battle on the field for honor, glory, and above all, the ladies.

Now, to truly appreciate a good solid afternoon at the football, you are going to need some equipment:

1. A chair of some description (an esky should suffice)
2. Some liquid sledge enhancer (aka VB)
3. A copy of my guide to the fine art of sledging (which you are now currently reading)

So without further ado, sit back, crack open a tinny, and start up those vocal chords, because here comes Stu’s easy guide to the fine art of sledging!

Background

Now, when I looked up sledging in Google, the first entries that popped up were about some kind of penguin that rides a sled around the screen for reason or reasons unknown. This game involved neither beer, nor sport, and so please stay away from these kind of false depictions of the great art of sledging. I’m talking about the kind of stuff dealt out by the Australian cricket team, although at a family event such as a local football match, you’d probably want to tone it down a bit from their advanced levels.

The Opposition

Now, the first objective of your afternoon, after downing a couple of tinnies, is to identify key targets in the opposition team. You should aim to give all the players nicknames, for easy identification. “Devon Head” never goes astray, along with “Angry Little Man” for anyone with small man syndrome, and of course, the old classic “Igor” for anyone with a particularly mis-arranged face. Nicknames can also be applied to players resembling celebrities - approximately half of all football teams have a smeone with a “Beckham” haircut, and last week we saw a guy who was the splitting image of Roger Federer. Once you have gotten a few nicknames, you should should them out as much as possible, so that the players know who you are yelling at. “Your fault [nickname here]” whenever they do something wrong will quickly give them the idea.

Next, identify your key targets. There will always be one or two guys who cannot help responding to your insults. As soon as this happens, concentrate all your abuse on this player. Jeer loudly whenever they stuff up, and call for them to be sent off at every possible opportunity. This constant stream of abuse will keep the player distracted, and is a potential match-winner in a crunch situation. Of course, this can backfire if your target player manages to score a goal. In this situation, you should take the opportunity to go and grab another beer.

One of the most important words you can use as a sledger is “noonen”. This should be shouted whenever an opposition player is about to put in a cross, take a free kick, have a shot, or just generally whenever you feel like it. Shouting “noonen” at key moments will distract and infuriate the opposition, and if used in conjunction with a loud jeer every time a noonen call results in a mistake, can have devastating effects on the opposition’s morale.

The Referee

The referee is one of the most difficulty people to deal with from the sideline. Continued abuse of this well-respected individual can not only result in him swinging his bias towards the opposition, but in extreme cases, it could get you banished from the park. The referee should be treated with the utmost respect, and remember, never use the phrase “Hey ref, you’re a %#!@*&”. This is not productive.

The best way to get through to the ref then, is to be polite. Always end any sentence addressed to him with “sir”. Make sure you yell loud enough that he hears all of your calls, for example “Offside Sir!” is always useful any time the opposition get the ball. Always claim that the ref’s decision should be in your team’s favour: even if the opposition were in fact 20 behind the last defender, you can still appeal for offside. “Foul throw”, to be used whenever the opposition takes a throw-in, is also a very effective call.

Now, the main area in which you will target the ref’s decisions is the handing out of yellow and red cards. Whenever one of your team is fouled, you should immediately cry out one of the following: “Last man, Sir!”; “He was on goal!”; “He’s been doing it all day!” (particularly effective in the first 5 minutes of the game). These calls are all classics which should be used as much as possible. You can intersperse them with some spontaneous calls of your own, and it’s always good to include something completely nonsensical, such as “Forward pass, Sir!”, “Knock On, Sir!” or “Head high tackle, sir! He’s gotta go!”. In the case of a referee actually handing out a yellow card to an opponent, always clap loudly, and in the very rare situation that an opponent is sent off, you must sing at the top of your voice: “Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah, waaayy-aayyy-ayyy, goodbye!”. In the event of an on-field punch up, siply stand up and yell your head off at everyone in sight.

And that’s just about all there is to it. A couple of final points however: don’t jeer at injured players, clap them off the field to display your sense of sportsmanship. And finally, remember, it’s only a game. Calm down. It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how drunk you get that matters.

Have another VB.

University Timetables

If there is one thing in the entire universe that can be said to be completely and utterly innacurate, and based on nothing but wild estimates and random number generators, with monkey-powered treadmills generating electricity which powers an electrified guessing machine, it is a university timetable.

According to my timetable, I will be attending uni between 8-5 straight on Tuesday, and 8-4 straight on Wednesday and Thursday. No breaks, no card games, no tea, no lunch, no beers. Then there are the other 10 hours rostered on for Monday and Friday.

It also says that there is no such thing as 11 o’clock. Whoops. I think I may have stuffed something up.

Anyhow, regardless of the existance of certain time periods of the day, universities should release, alongside your “theoretical” timetable, an actual “practical” timetable. It would look something like this:

“Stu’s Easy Guide to University Timetables”

• Monday: Wake up. Go back to bed. Recover from hangover. Rock up to uni around midday, have a cup of tea, play some cards. Go to a lab, spill acid on something. Go home.
• Tuesday: Rock up at 8am (Tuesday, in my book, is the real start of the week). Get some coffee. Fall asleep in the first lecture of the day. Take an hour off to play cards. Get some thai food and a case of beer for lunch. Go to a lab in the afternoon, dismantle some pumps and valves, put them back together with the knowledge of a job well done. Spend 2 hours trying to work out why the pumps and valves aren’t working anymore.
• Wednesday: Attend all lectures throughout the morning, spend them trying to finish off all of the week’s tutorials. Skip out early at midday, cook the weekly barbie, have a couple of beers, fall asleep in afternoon lecture.
• Thursday: Rock up at 8am, get some brekky and a coffee, spend the morning playing cards and drinking beer. Make a half-hearted attempt at a tutorial, play some soccer in the arvo and then go to the pub.
• Friday: Wake up in an unknown location. Try to work out what happened the previous evening. If you are lucky enough to wake up in your own house, try to evict any unknown guests you may have acquired. Spend the day testing out different hangover cures (the most effective one is pink champagne. I know is sounds girly, but hey, it gets rid of a headache, so being girly is just a downside you’ll have to live with). Have some lunch, make a vow to attend more of your lectures next week, and then go and party. Hey, it’s the weekend after all…

So all you kiddies, remember when you see your timetable: don’t panic. It may look like hard work, but it’s all superficial. All you need to do is follow my special exam timetable and you’ll be right.

• Every day within 2 weeks of exams: Wake up. Swear. Try and work out what they’ve been teaching you all these weeks. Give up. Invite some mates over, play some cards.
• Night before exams: Read the entire textbook. Write as much of it as you can on your body. DO NOT: Go and see a band play. You’ll have their songs stuck in your head all the next day.

Of course, these timetables do not apply to arts students. They get their own special one.

• Arts students: Upon reading your timetable, go to the student centre. Ask them to change it so that both of your lectures are on the same day. Preferably have the first one at 1, then the second at 3. This will give you time to have a cup of coffee in between. You deserve it - turning up to uni one day a week is really strenuous.
• You now have 6 free days a week. Use this time to organise student protests, paint communist propoganda all over the uni, and whinge about the government. Don’t bother getting a job, you can just scam money from the government. It’s okay, whining about them and then taking their money might seem like hypocrisy, but hey, everyone else is doing it so why can’t you? And besides, wen you and your commie friends are in power, you’ll change the whole system so it’s fair for everyone.
• Go to sleep at night happy in the knowledge that you pitiful protests are making a difference. Ignore the fact that you are actually paying 40% more uni fees than before the protests started. Hey, at least you tried.

modern day courting

it struck me this morning that the rituals of courtship have changed quite a fair bit in the last hundred years or so, primarily due to the advent of one exciting device: the telephone. many people underestimate this magnificent device, but without it, we wouldn’t have emails, instant messaging, sms, or any number of the myriad of methods used to contact the opposite sex. pity the poor fool who is “mobilophonically challenged”. not only will they have to give out their home number to anyone they meet in the pub, but they will be forced to resort to using a “pen” to write down any numbers they receive. noone will be impressed by this.

note: from this point on i am using the male perspective to demonstrate modern day courting, but by switching around the adjectives you could easily apply this to the fairer sex.

to understand courting, it is best if we go back to the beginnings of courtship, back in the days before the telephone. [and remember, i learned everything i know about courtship in this period from watching pride & prejudice.] in these early times, it was the sole responsibility of the male to make all the moves. you would pick up a fine young woman at the local dance, discreetly inquire of her address, and then woo her with long-winded love letters and the like. then, if she didn’t have any more-attractive sisters, you would propose, get married, and then be allowed to start calling her by her first name. alas, nothing is so simple these days. the letters have been replaced by sms, and instead of writing flowing poetry, you need to pick up a copy of an sms dictionary just to understand what they are talking about. you will probably also need to invent your own abbreviations to impress the object of your affections.

now, one of the main precautions you need to take before attempting any courting is to ascertain the availability of the person in question. in the old days, this was quite simple - if the lady had a wedding ring on her finger, she was out of bounds. anyone else was fair go. in today’s liberal society however, the rules are a lot different. if she is with a large group of friends, then there is a good chance that she is single. beware of attempting to go after a girl who is sitting with a couple of friends and boyfriends, after all, her boyfriend has probably just gone to the bar to buy drinks, and any advances might leave you on the wrong end of a large maori’s fist. also watch out for girls sitting on their own - their boyfriend is probably in the band, and we all know what happens when rock stars get pissed off (and it can be a lot worse than getting beer poured in your guitar). no, the safest way is to approach with caution, be observant, and if all else fails, ask her friends first.

once you are sure that your young lady is single, there is one important thing you need to remember. i know it’s been said a thousand times, but here it is once again: all pickup lines had expiry dates in the late 60s. they don’t work any more. do not seriously attempt to pick up a girl using apick up line. of course, i’ve got nothing against doing it as a joke, e.g., asking the bar girl “so, do you come here often?”. and yes, if they’ve been living in a cardboard box for the last 20 years then maybe it might even raise a smile. anyway, back to the point. replace those cheesy old pickup lines with blatant innuendo in your conversation. then, when she picks up on what you’re doing, protest innocence. “oh, i wasn’t thinking like that at all…” that way it will be her who first starts off the flagrant sexual remarks.

this is all very well and good, i hear you say, but where’s the easy guide you promised me? well, my loyal readers, i’m afraid i lied. there is no easy guide. if you want my advice, you’ll give up right now. either that, or start learning guitar. chicks dig rock stars. actually, that’s a lie as well. if you want a sure-fire way of picking up girls, just become jamie oliver. hell, i want to be like him, so why shouldn’t you?

sports spectating

with the amount of sporting events saturating our society these days, a lot of you must be wondering how to keep up with the fast-paced world of sport. just when you start to get the hang of one football code, someone goes and invents an new one. think that an over is a cricket term consisting of six deliveries? confused about the difference between a loosehead and tighthead prop? unsure about the offside rules in any sport? then you need my essential guide to sports spectating.

now, as most of us will realise, it’s not a real sport unless you have a beer in one hand. comfort is the number one priority for the seasoned sports spectator. after all, a six hour stint in front of the telly on sunday arvo isn’t going to be much fun if you have to get up every five minutes to get something out of the fridge. to start with, i strongly suggest you invest in some type of small esky, preferably with a remote holder on the side. you’ll ideally be watching a few different sports so you’ll need this holder for easy access to change channels. stock up the esky with your favourite beer. [VB is the beer of choice for watching sports events, but this is negotiable. under no circumstances should you be drinking anything that comes in a clear bottle. cans are optimal.] to create the right atmosphere, you should have some frozen pies, sausage rolls, and hot dogs ready for when you are feeling peckish. now, find a comfortable spot on the couch and settle in for the arvo.

of course, the home experience doesn’t nearly compare to actually being at the event itself. you’ll get the thrill of actually seeing all the sport live, but more importantly, there is someone to cook all the pies for you and pour your beers, and you’ll be surrounded by thousands of other sports fans, all contributing to the atmosphere. the highlight of the event will be the mexican waves that go around, followed by the invariable chant: “members are wankers” as the wave hits the members stand and dies in the arse. make sure you take a big group of people, and always dress in uniform. this will increase your chances of being on telly. to completely top off the day, the drunkest person should be made to streak across the field.

right, by now you should be relaxed, whether at home or at avenue, and set up for the day. the next step is knowing which team to support. rules number two of sports spectating clearly states that you cannot under any circumstances be neutral. now, this often makes for quite a dilemma as you may not know anything about the sport or the teams involved. i have compiled a simple checklist that should enable you to make the best choice in any situation.

1. first and foremost, if a team you like is playing, you will support them. if a team you hate is playing (eg. england, france, canterbury-bankstown, queensland, south africa, collingwood, pittwater), support the other side. this is the obvious step.
2. if you are ambivalent to both sides, then you need to know a few rules. look at the team mascots. if you like one better than the other, support that team.
3. if they’ve both got crappy mascots, look at the team’s colours. only losers support a team with bad fashion sense. go with it.
4. if both team’s jerseys really aren’t your style, then look through the lineup. choose the team with the biggest, ugliest player (if you’re a guy), or the hottest player with a spunky haircut (if you’re a chick).
5. still can’t decide? if you’re watching with friends, find out who they support. go for the other team. this will give you gloating rights if your side wins.
6. still having problems? flip a coin. i can’t help you. but make sure, whichever side comes up, act like you’ve been supporting them your whole life. after all, noone likes a bandwagon supporter.

right, so you’ve got your seat, your team, now you just need to get a hang of the rules of the game. if you know them, that’s fine. however, if you don’t, don’t worry. the rules are mostly unimportant in any case. watch closely for five minutes and you’ll soon get at least the gist of the aim of the game. now, any time your team is penalised, feel free to shout abuse at the referee. it is a little known fact, but most referees are biased towards the opposition team, and most refs know very little about the rules of the game themselves. nine times out of ten, if you disagree with the ref’s decision, you are probably right. he’s just a blind old doddering fool anyway, who’s probably sleeping with the opposition coach’s daughter. give him hell. a word of warning though: it’s probably not a good idea to start abusing the ref towards the end of the game, after you have advanced through your stockpile of beers. despite what you may think, your calls do not get wittier as you get more sloshed. instead, resort to simply cheering on your team and jeering the opponents. feel free to comment on their appearance and personal hygiene if you so desire.

now the final point to know about sports spectating involves the offside rule. many spectators can struggle with this rule, especially as it varies wildly throughout different sports. however, it really is quite simple. if the opposition team have go so far through your teams defense that they are able to score with ease, they were offside. on the other hand, if your team does the same thing, it is simply because they are brilliant players, and also fast runners. you should let the linesman/touch judge know this, with phrases such as “offside, sir! what game are you looking at!” remember, even if you are sitting at home you have a better view of what is happening than the linesman does, and so you’ll always be right. oh, and don’t be afraid to abuse the linesman even if you are at home. modern television technology actually picks up this abuse and transmits it to the match officials in the form of a niggling doubt in the back of their minds. they won’t be calling your team offside again for a while.

and that’s all there is to it. you can now enjoy any sport, any time. of course, this guide is kind of specific to team sports, but sections can be transcribed to such quality sports as lawn bowls, pool, darts, and caber toss. until next time, it’s bye from me.

rock stardom

a lot of people have been coming up to me in the street and asking: “how do you cope with the pressures of being an international sex symbol and a rock god?” with this question in mind, i now present to you: stu’s easy guide to rock stardom

the first thing to remember about being a rock star is that the entire universe revolves around you. forget ptolemy, forget aristotle, forget copernicus, forget everything your high school science teachers ever taught you. you are a fixed, inert, immovable mass, located at the center of the universe, and all terrestrial and celestial bodies, including the earth, the sun and the fixed stars, revolve around you. now, with this one fundamental truth in mind, you are ready to head off to your first gig. notice how a path opens up in front of you. doors will swing open for you, traffic lights will change to green, the population in your general vicinity stops beathing so as not to interfere with your precious oxygen supply. you are a rock god.

now, upon arrival at your venue, the first thing you need to check out is the rider. this time honoured tradition involves providing rock stars like yourself with everything they will need to get through a harrowing evening’s work. it is important to remember to demand exotic and bizzare things on your rider. there are often competitions amongst rock stars (like myself) to see who can get the oddest things server up to them on a platter. don’t worry if you don’t actually want any of the items, just make sure they’re there, and make sure they are top quality. rock stars, like the pope, do not settle for second best. if it’s not good enough for the queen, it’s not good enough for you. if you find any item of your rider dissatisfactory, make sure the staff know about it. chuck a tantrum. hurl items of food, clothing, staff members etc. across the room. jump up and down. smash stuff. it’s all part of keeping your image alive. demand that replacement items are flown in from the most inconvenient possible location. a good blow-up will help to get you psyched up before you go on stage. now all you need to do is sit down, have a few beers, and wait.

when you come to take the stage, keep the audience waiting as long as possible. remember, you are not here to give them a show, they are here purely for your benefit. you own the audience. make sure you give them a piece of your mind, and tell them what you really think of them. swear words and rude gestures come in particularly useful here. make sure you don’t acknowledge any of the male fans, but grin lewdly at all the hot girls in the crowd (or vice versa if you’re a female rock star). you should by this stage of the evening be fairly inebriated, so feel free to have a bit of a rant to the crowd between songs. if anything is chucked at the stage you can either chuck it straight back (preferably knocking the thrower out), or chuck a hissy fit and refuse to play until the offender has been torn limb from limb by the crowd. ask for the pieces of the corpse to be brought up on stage, and then tie them to the back of your tour bus as warning to the next crowd you play to.

an important part of your stage show will be controlling the crowd. this should be done with as little effort as possible, usually by simply pointing the mic at them if you want them to sing, or by waving one arm to signal jumping up and down. as they are you crowd to do as you like with, you might want to mix it up a bit by making them do star jumps, push-ups, or any other forms of physical exertion you like. get them to shout out stupid stuff if you so desire. just make sure you get your thrills out of bossing around a huge amount of people.

after the show, the first thing you will need is a beer. being a rock star, you will not attempt to pay for this yourself, someone should already be handing you one as you walk off the stage. rock stars never pay. rock stars never queue up for anything. don’t even walk to the front of the queue. if something is crowded enough to require a queue, someone else should be doing it for you. at this stage, beer in hand, you will be mobbed by adoring fans. give any male fans a quick handshake, and then turn your attention to the female groupies. make sure you are chatting up as many of them at once as humanly possible, if not more. because you are a rock star, they will need to fight for your attention. preferably some kind of fighting that involves jelly. after chatting to them for a while, start hitting the scotch, and pass out in the band room, rock star style. wake up the next day and do it all again. bliss.

well, there you have it. you now know everything there is to know about being a rock star. one day, maybe you’ll be as famous as i am. i doubt it. if this does occur, remember that rock stars must always hate each other in the public eye. pull pranks. blow up tour buses. spike the other bands’ water bottles. but behind closed doors, remember, the only thing that matters is who can get an item of food from the most different countries on their rider. adios, and good luck.

strolling

there’s a certain art in going for a stroll. strolls should only be attempted when you are being paid to do something that isn’t strolling. in other, non-paid situations you should always meander. in the rare event that you are actually paid to stroll (ie a stroll-a-thon, group strolling experiments, etc.) it’s probably worth your while to try and mix things up a bit by throwing in some unexpected manoeuvres such as a sidestep, skip, or even the odd barrel-roll. this will keep your employers interested and ensure that they won’t hire anyone else.

but i digress.

after recently returning from a particularly good stroll, i feel it is my duty to divulge some of the secrets of this ancient art. firstly, always remember that strolling is about the journey, not the destination. never attempt to go for a stroll with a final destination in mind. clear your head. take a deep breath. relax. right, now you’re ready for your first step.

now, the key to achieving a good strolling technique is the speed. there is no such thing as “too slow” as far as strolling is concerned. as long as you are making forward progress, you are doing fine. experts in remote parts of asia have practiced for years to be able to stroll so slowly that they’re basically not moving, but to a far off observer it looks like they are bustling along at full pelt. we will start off at a much simpler level. to achieve maximum effect, the stroller must look like they are moving quite quickly to the observer, or “strollee”. this is often achieved through arm movement, although more advanced strollers may accomplish the effect with other body movements. the correct arm movement is a laid back, full length swing in the direction of movement. the arms should be held out from the body, to give the strollee the sense that you are on a very important mission, and that nothing can obstruct you. it is also useful to add a small side-to-side swagger, to assure the strollee of your self-confidence.

with your arms now pumping back and forwards, the focus has been effectively removed from your actual progress. take very small steps, no more than a foot at a time. it is important that your arms cover about three times the distance that your feet do, because arm movement takes far less energy, but gives the illusion of high-speed movement. breathe in deeply. enjoy the fresh air. remember that you are being paid to sit in an office somewhere, staring at a computer screen, and you have now escaped to start up your new strolling hobby. the more relaxed you are, the less likely anyone is to question your activities.

my stroll today took me outside work and through the surrounding bushland. once you are free from the confines of your workplace, and unlikely to be spotted, you can modify your stroll. change your pace to suit your stroll. there are a lot of spots with good view of the valley around my work, so i went along a track and looked out at the river. taking a camera is probably a good idea, because then you can capture the experience. get a photo of yourself, with your work in the background (as far distant as possible). email it to all your co-workers, reminding them that while they were slaving away in the office, you were enjoying nature.

after about half an hour of solid strolling, i decided to head back to work. it was at this points that i discovered another member of the staff, who clearly had the same aim as i did, coming along the path towards me. now in this situation, it is important not to panic. in the rare event that the other staff member is doing work, you must continue on with your self-assured swagger, and never give the impression that you are in the wrong place. chances are, that they are simply enjoying a quiet stroll themselves, so just give them a simple greeting as you pass - a nod or quick “g’day” should suffice. then continue on as normal. easy.

now when you return to work, you may notice an interesting phenomenon. the closer you get to your actual desk, the slower your stroll will become. this can lead to disastrous consequences. if your starting strollocity is too low, then the decrease in speed will result in you becoming stranded some way from you destination, moving forward slower and slower until you’re effectively stopped. for this reason, it is important to always begin your return to work at a strollocity above the “critical speed”. this is difficult to calculate using conventional mathematics, but as a general rule of thumb, should be no slower than half a metre per second.

i recommend going for a one hour stroll at least once a week, preferably more. if you go at the same times every week, then your supervisors will assume that it is a standing appointment with someone, will not attempt to contact you in this time, or arrange any meetings. enjoy.