GSOAT: The Greatest Survivors Of All Time

Ok, brace yourself for some finality. Here are the 18 GSOAT, up to the end of Season 12

In no particular order:

• Richard Hatch - Borneo - the original player
  
• Colleen - Borneo - first love is never forgotten
• Greg - Borneo - the first to subvert the game
• Colby - Outback - so strong, yet such a poor strategist
• Tina - Outback - totally outplayed Colby
• Elisabeth - The Outback - America's favourite footwear designer
• Tom - Africa - Big Tom the goat farmer
• Ethan - Africa - possibly the coolest player ever
• Frank - Africa - a gun-nut and a loner. Who wouldn't love him!
• Brian - Thailand - a manipulative used-car salesman slash actor
• Robb - Thailand - easily the dumbest Survivor ever. The guy who brought a skateboard to a desert island
• Matthew - The Amazon - a very very strange guy
• Sandra - Pearl Islands - a worthy winner
• Jonny Fairplay - Pearl Islands - he changed the way the game was played. The first to combine Survivor with the strategy of a pro-wrestling villain
  
• Rupert - Pearl Islands - a sentimental favourite. Picks himself.
• Shane - Exile Island - the most maniacal player ever
  
• Cerie - Exile Island - a brilliant strategist
  
• Terry - Exile Island - he played a strong, strong game
  

Honourable mentions: Kelly cuckoo! cuckoo! (Borneo) - , Shi-Ann (Thailand), Lex (Africa), Brandon (Africa), Darrah (Pearl Islands), Ryan S (Pearl Islands), Dolly the Sheep Farmer (Vanuatu), Chris (Vanuatu), Gary sshhh don't tell anyone I played football (Guetamala), Lydia (Guetamala), Judd the objectionable (Guatemala), Bruce the sensei (Exile Island)

dear diary

It's been busy busy busy over here at samizdatland. I've just moved into new chambers (ie. an office for the non-barristers out there) and have been busily furnishing, unpacking books etc etc. Exciting times. No really. Come up and see my lawbooks.

Seeing Superman tonight which may or may not be good.

Went to The Give and Take - Melbourne Theatre Company - on Tuesday night. Gary McDonald was great, but the material let him down. The dialogue was not great and written by a baby boomer for other baby boomers - it displayed no understanding whatsoever of GenX / GenY / GenWhatever. Saw a play about the disappearances in Chile in 1973 on Sunday night at Red Stitch. A little uneven, but definitely worth seeing.

I WILL finish my top-18 survivor list VERY SOON i promise.

a true nail biter - Australia 2: Croatia 2

My heart was in my mouth the entire game. In the end Australia did all it had to do and is through to the second round of the World Cup. An incredible achievement!

For what it's worth, following is the samizdat version of an expert commentary on the game.

Australia was by far the more aggressive team and was the better team on the day, although at times the Croatians' superior level of international experience was apparent. From 2 minutes in when Croatia scored its first goal, it appeared to be playing for a 1:0 win. A poor strategy against an aggressive team like Australia, and one which showed insufficient self-belief as to their chances of scoring further. Given their lack of scoring power, perhaps the Croatian lack of self-belief was well-founded.

Australia clearly had the worse of the refereeing. A number of very poor decisions which went against Australia:
- a penalty on Viduka at 6 minutes
- numerous infringements against Viduka (and other Aussies) missed by the referee
- numerous half-there infringements against Australians found by the referee
- the clear hand-ball by the Croatians in the box at about 72 minutes
- Simonic (sp?) getting 2 yellow cards but not being sent off!!

Overall a very very poor refereeing effort. And not a great showing by the Socceroo goalkeeper either. Bring back Schwarzer!

Who knows whether Australia can produce the goods against Italy. But in any event, it has been a very exciting world cup so far for Australia. Hopefully the run will continue ...

A Scanner Darkly

I know I'm setting myself up for disappointment, especially after the horror of Waking Life, but my excitement levels are building for A Scanner Darkly. Linklater is capable of making fantastic films where nothing happens but which capture a mood or the tone of a time and place - Suburbia, Dazed and Confused - so ... I'll stay hopeful. Not sure how closely it sticks to the book - I read the Charlie Kaufman script a few years ago and it stuck surprisingly closely to the book, but on IMDB the script is credited solely to Richard Linklater.

I am a huge huge fan of Philip K Dick, and A Scanner Darkly is my favourite of his novels, so a well-made film of the book would be awesome.

Tarrawarra - Queen's Birthday weekend

 

Sun, sand, snow, a forest and bridal wear

 

weekends away + oz 2.0

Have been lucky enough to enjoy two weekends away in a row - one in country Victoria and the other on the coast in Queensland. My next posts after this one are a few photos of my weekends away.

Meanwhile, things are heating in up in the world of Oz Web 2.0. You can tell the penny has dropped among the so-called smart money when the capital is aggressively chasing potential investees, rather than the other way around. Like any hot market, there will be more losers than winners - but the underlying opportunity is there and no doubt there will be some winners.

REVISED - I posted the photos straight from Picasa 2 (the first time I've blogged direct from Picasa) and it was actually an impressively easy, well-integrated process.

A little early?

Flew Jetstar this morning - leaving A at 10:30 and arriving at B at 12:30. Cabin service (ie. food and drinks) were coming down the aisle and I was reading the paper until my attention was caught by the orders of the people around me. Two aisles ahead, a middle-aged woman ordered champagne - I thought, an unusual choice for 10:30 on a Friday, but ok - she's celebrating something. Then the man immediately in front of me (the one juggling 3 sub-10-year old kids) ordered a scotch'n'coke for him, a rum'n'coke for his wife, then at the last minute changed the order - he wanted a beer ("make sure it's a heavy one") as well as the mixed drinks.

Who are these people?

Survivor II

Still thinking about my Survivor top-18 list. I can probably do without Rudy - he's probably just a little too senile and his charms are wearing thin after 2 series. But I'm sure I've missed some good ones. Well aware that Rob and Amber aren't included in my draft list. Don't worry, I didn't forget - they were deliberate omissions. As was Lex.
And some others that I liked a lot at the time (like Sii-Ann) I now think were comparatively entertaining rather than entertaining when considered on an absolute level. .....

In other news, my blog has had a sudden (and surprising) surge of comparatively massive popularity on the back of last week's post about Emmalina - it appears the rest of the world has cottoned on to her charms and my post is apparently ranking high on a google search for her name. Weird.

Greatest Survivors of all time

This is a hard one, but I'm going to try and pick the top 18 Survivors of all time, based on entertainment value. I am going to try and work out the most interesting tribe - not necessarily who I think are the best players from a strategic perspective, but the ones I think would be the funnest to watch head-to-head.

I think I'll have to come back and add a few and whittle a few back over the next few days, but my first thoughts are:

Jonny Fairplay - Pearl Island
Rupert - Pearl Island
Richard Hatch - Borneo
Colleen - Borneo
Greg - Borneo
Big Tom - Africa
Ethan - Africa
Cerie - Exile Island
Elisabeth - Outback
Colby - Outback
Tina - Outback
Shane - Exile Island
Rudy - Borneo
Frank - Africa
Robb - Thailand
Terry - Exile Island
Brian - Thailand
Kelly - Borneo
Judd - Guatemala
Lydia - Guatemala

Yes I know this is more than 18.
This is gonna need a LOT more work...

A late night, but well worth it

At 83 minutes in it was looking ugly, but we pulled through in fine style! The 3:1 win was awesome!!! As always, success has many fathers and I am proud to be one of them. I think all Australians can (or at least will) claim a little credit for the win against Japan and I am hereby claiming my share.

Had a good long weekend - in Warbuton with M and Karen & Jon. Saw snow at the top of Mount Donna Buang, visited Tarrawarra Gallery and generally hung out and relaxed. And worked on my bioethics take-home exam.

Emmalina

Right on the bleeding edge here, I've just today become aware of Emmalina - I'm either the last person in Australia, or nearly the last, to meet the young Tasmanian - given the article in today's online version of The Age (and a matching article in the SMH). Emmalina has rapidly become online-famous for her youtube vblog, and less so for her text blog.

Scanning the comments for her youtube videos, it's funny the number that specifically comment on her accent. Another reminder that anyone who's not from the USA 'talks funny'. We forget sometimes, especially when communicating with our American friends by text, that we're WEIRD over here in Australia.

Emmalina is pretty straight up and down - she's an 18 year old from Tassie who likes dancing, yoga and animals and is pretty happy to use her webcam to chat to whoever wants to watch and listen (evidently hundreds of thousands of people) about her weekend, her new dress, how it sucks when people post nasty comments on youtube and whatever else seems relevant to her at the time.

Her youtube videos (and the reaction they're provoking) are another reminder of the number of doubtful / creepy / straight-up freaks (and not in a good way) out there on the net.

A temporary reprieve

Saved a company from insolvency at the hands of the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation yesterday. For a few weeks at least. More fun than my crash'n'bash brief in Ringwood on Monday.

Dr Octagon

Am very excited; have only just found out that there's a new Dr Octagon album out on 27 June 06 - The Return of Dr Octagon. The first album - now 10 years old amazingly enough - was one of the greatest hip-hop albums of all time [and yes i am aware that's a big call] so I have high expectations and hopes for this one... One track features Princess Superstar, which is cool.

end of the weekend

Went to the St Kilda Film Festival yesterday to see Lucas' short film - was great to see it on the big screen. It's funny, sad and very emotionally affecting. Highly recommended. It screened together with some other films, one of which - The Saviour - was fantastic. Last night M returned from Hong Kong and China - was a fun and successful trip for her and it's good to have her back.

And gnoos is going from strength to strength (in its very short public existence). An absolute barrage of publicity - the AFR, The Age / SMH, chatter all over the web (including on techcrunch) and traffic numbers are very strong.

A sunday evening and i'm preparing what is (I hope) the most devastating cross-examination ever written. In court tomorrow and plenty of preparation still to do.

gnoos - a day and a half in

one day in and the gnoos juggernaut is gaining momentum: first-day visitor numbers well beyond those that could possibly have been predicted and massive industry/media/investor interest. most impressively, the infrastructure is holding up to the strain - the site remains functional and quick. am very much looking forward to the forthcoming updates/improvements/expansions...