hardtack

I thought maybe it was a portent of a nuclear strike, just as Hogan was lining up and about to kick what would have been the winning goal for our first premiership in 55 years.

11th best out of the 22 players... hardly a shabby performance

Well they are both trying hard to convince themselves that it's not a step back towards the monarchy.

I'm wondering how Malcolm feels.

As safe as this one I hope: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/10403111/Church-beloved-by-John-Betjeman-destroyed-by-lightning-strike.html

I blame my time spent in Canberra :-)

Actually, I realised afterwards that I made a mistake... should have been HIRD it through the Grapevine(y)... never mind, as far as jokes go, that was pretty Gaye.

Well it is his birthday... maybe they all went to the pub?

You heard that through the Grapevine(y)?

And courtesy of Channel 10 news, Tony caught on a visit to our rural communities:

Some would say that "Peds" hasn't done us any good.

Is it an insight into the man that he didn't run this past his own Cabinet?

I hope you're right... I hope for his sake that AFL (like boxing for Fenech) wasn't going to be the thing that would keep him out of trouble.

True... but the problem for him now is that probably no team, not even in the west, will want to touch him. Very sad.

I was a bit of a Bennell fan and was pleased to see him go well on the weekend. One of the criticisms that came up on here often was his "squibbing" the contest (based on a single occurrence mind you), yet on the weekend we saw him go into some pretty strong contests and take a couple of pretty courageous marks - did not see him flinch once. And if my eyes don't deceive me, he appears to have put on a bit of muscle definition he didn't have when he was with us.

I think of it as being similar to the school classroom where the badly performing kid is likely to be punished more severely by the teacher, purely because he has not earned the teacher's respect. The MFC have done nothing in the past few years to earn the respect of the umpiring fraternity, and so they tend to be punished more severely for what might normally be considered touch and go free kicks. What we need is an umpire with a Robin Hood complex.

Unfortunately in the case of this topic, there are no known facts.

It's ok to have the feeling... but there are some that want to blame Mitch for that.

No... it just happened that you were being discussed by Lordweaver when I jumped into the conversation. Mine was a general comment not directed at any one person in particular, but probably prompted by my memory of mjt's rantings.

Did I mention you BD? I was responding to Lordweaver's seeming justification for the comments flying around. I cannot even recall what you said and don't feel like going searching through this thread at the moment.

I'm saying no such thing, but whether he reads them or not, they are unwarranted. I do however believe, and have said a couple of times already, that the kinds of thoughts expressed by a few on here probably do find their way to him via social media, his own website and possibly even in public and that is not good if he is in a fragile state of mind.

It's not just about what might offend us... I have found some of the comments to be utterly disrespectful of Mitch Clark and more often than not, based entirely on conjecture with not an ounce of fact involved.

I think more often than not you will find it is not necessarily the difference of opinion, but the way that opinion is expressed.

That was just a pretty brief radio sound bite... he was just expressing his disappointment over the fact they couldn't get their season off to a good start.

It was Luke Hodge so I switched off... maybe dementia is setting in, but I'm positive they were advertising Jones as being on over the past few days.