THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS

I know exactly what you are thinking... Hang on, if it's Christmas Eve, all the journalists are on holiday. What if something huge happens? Who is going to decipher newsworthiness for the country's most widely-read broadsheet in the middle in the early hours of Christmas morning?

Residents of NSW, fear not. I am here.

Alot of stuff actually happens on Christmas Eve. It isn't usually stuff you can publish, most commonly families beating each other up, and people threatening to do use themselves as a tree decoration. Dark humour aside, here is an example of a vital newspiece that only I am privy to:

"We have one POI - male, 18-25 wearing a pink shirt and a pink truckers hat running in front of traffic on the Pacific Highway in front of The Greengate Hotel."

From that description alone I can almost guarantee that I went to school with, or the private school two kilometres down the road from that guy. He is happy as shit because "everyone is here!" So happy that he even decided to match his shirt and cap. He is letting all the cars on the road know, that when is drunk he is invincible - and trying to stop him enjoying his evening jog is useless. He has been waiting all year for this and nothing will stop in, counting down days from August, and saying to everyone he runs into: "Greengate Christmas Eve? Gonna be huge!"

Anyway, as there is no paper to be released on Christmas day, I am the only one here. 27 floors of building, and I am on the top of these in my little room, flanked by darkness - If I walk to the window I can see the distinct mist of hopeless addiction rising out of the vents at Star City Casino. My regular security brother-in-darkness is rostered off, so I exchanged brief banter with a different man in a similar uniform who suggested I didn't fall asleep - to which I replied "I'll try not to!" Disappointed with my own wit I excused myself, returning to Sam In The City's yearly wrap-up post (I have since discovered that with my public holiday penalty-rates, I made over $15 reading it - which is more than I have ever made writing anything, kudos Sam).

Hurstville Channel has just informed me that two 20 year old females are fighting out the front of a pub somewhere. The bouncer believed that they were fighting over the attention of a male, I prefer to think that they were arguing over what the guy listening to the police scanner would think of it all. He thinks that girls fighting is a cliche fantasy championed by the likes of Al Bundy and Tim "The Toolman" Taylor. He would be interested to see, but is pretty sure you a both complete DON'Ts - the kind of folk who seem to be always in the regional train terminal at Central Station.

Eastwood Channel has piped up, letting me know that a man (I didn't get any earlier details) is standing on a street with his (tracksuit) pants down masturbating (probably furiously, I'll chase it up). The hardest part of my job is to know when something is important enough to wake up the Pictures Editor and Chief Of Staff to get them out there. I'm a bit worried that if I get them out of bed, by the time they get there he may have climaxed and the front page would be lost.

Merry Christmas from everyone currently in the Fairfax Building (just me).

-

If anyone needs to get in touch with me over the Christmas and new year period, I'll be the guy at Falls Festival wearing yellow zinc, footy shorts, an Australian flag and a t-shirt reading

"The Boys' Falls Trip '06

Beers, Bitches, Blunts & Biccies (sic)

GET A HAIRY DOG UP YA!"

Sincerely,

The Boys

working on Sunday...

Seemed like a great idea, it's not like it's Saturday night, I can still go out and sleep in on Sunday morning (which I did).

However, being horribly hung over after Saturday night means that I will feel like this until I get home from work at approximately 6:30am on Monday morning... around 24hours after I got physically removed from the Judgement Bar and sent out into the beautiful Crown Street morning: birds were chirping, the sun was shining people in a new-romantic state of dress were trying to remember where their phone was... so they could call their dealers, and I was having a laugh (not at women, with women).

Nina's birthday (why is it always Nina's birthday?) was good cause for food and longnecks to be consumed. After that we went to The Brag's Christmas party where I made my job sound far more important than it was to the door-list people - "I just didn't think I would need to RSVP... I am James from The Music Network!"

After our group managed to all get in (cool, much?) it wasn't long before I found myself in one of those states where the only thing going through your mind is "how did I get this drunk, I was just making fun of Ng today for falling asleep at dinner last night... And I'm not even Asian!"

At risk of turning this into "holy shit I got drunk last night, it was off the hook, you don't even know!" story, I will end it as I do not have the energy - it took everything I had to muster the energy to read Sam In The City tonight... Lucky I did, it turns out confidence is in and urinating on partners chest's is out.

The night was really summed up when, a touch before 7am I strolled through the door at home to dicover that our house now had a Christmas tree with presents underneath. I wrote a note to my flatmates expressing how impressed I was with the tree.

It read:
Nikki + Gerar(scribble)
You tree so beaatiful I wanted ta cry
- Here I signed some kind of name, I couldn't read it but I'm pretty sure the word "wanker" was in there.

Those who can, do. Those who can't, go into advertising.

"Is it unAustralian to watch cricket just because it makes Weiss Bars taste better?" I mused from my couch yesterday afternoon. Not having to work made me very happy indeed. The answer came to me quicker than Will Gilroy (you probably don't even read this) at a 'short tailored shorts and all-white canvas shoes' sale. "
Don't be a bloody idiot James," Australian Idol Damian Leith sneered at me from across the couch. "The simple fact is, Weiss Bars make watching cricket far more enjoyable. When was the last time you enjoyed watching cricket without one?"
"Well Damian, I can't really think..."
"Of course you can't! Dumb Fuck. That's the whole point. Weiss Bars make cricket more enjoyable."
"I get it now! Weiss Bars make everything more enjoyable!"
"That's right" (launches into song about Weiss Bars, entirely falsetto)

Considering that I may get sick of working in the middle of the night at some stage, I decided to start freelance ad-writing. The above was the script for a TV ad for Weiss Bars based loosely on a true experience I had yesterday. In reality, the afternoon panned out very smoothly. Steve shared a few of his innermost thoughts with me.

The first was not so controversial, being that he found "something very attractive" about the girl in the MBF ad that is aired frequently during Nine's coverage of the cricket. Observation number two proved far more newsworthy. After a minute or so silence during a seperate ad-break, I was just about to resurrect an earlier conversation discussing the pros and cons of a particular individual ("he's just a fucken' cunt," being most notable contribution) when I was interrupted with, "I really like the jeans Pat Rafter wears in that undies ad." He quickly pointed out that it was not so much the sight of Rafter in the jeans that he enjoyed, rather the thought of owning and wearing them himself.
I made him a cup of tea and suggested that he contacted someone from Bonds or Pacific Brands to find out where he could accquire said pants. If anyone knows, I think they are placed at number two on his Christmas wishlist, just under a pair of Mark Weber's driving gloves (signed preferably). My second day off lacked the same sheen. After an early sleep in I decided to do my washing.
"Who Cares?" you say, doing a bad Simmo impersonation.
"You do," I say (nodding).
In an attempt to wash my sheets and towels, I managed to also wash my mobile phone. My annoyance at being uncontactable on a boring Tuesday off work was only enhanced by the fact that I would also be unable to source a pair of jeans for my close friend and sometimes broadcast partner.

I also read an unauthorised biography of Ricky Gervais. Good read, no major suprises, he's still a comic genius, that feels nearly nothing for BB06 contestants:

"I watch reality shows to hate the people in them. Desperate wannabes. What will you do for fame? Anything. I'll show my fanny and wank off a pig. Well done."

I thought Gervais was particularly out of line with this call. Not all gays have fannies.