Greetings everyone!!
I’m back – and blogging. Expect a blog from this website every Saturday morning.I will share insights about the Creeksong print book in my Stories blog,In this blog, called Stories, I’ll some draft chapters that didn’t make the final cut. I hope they will give you a glimpse into my Creeksong journey.
Christopher Baudat is the mastermind behind the Creeksong audiobook, and he’ll bring you firsthand accounts of his experiences and shed light on our shared creative process.
So here is a favorite chapter that did not make the cut into my 2023 Creeksong book. It’s 1991. I’m deep into suffering about climate change, Global Warming and the Greenhouse Effect. And nobody is listening to me. I mean NOBODY.
And then Australian television captures exactly what I am feeling. My Australian planning colleagues pray someone will find a place “beyond the environment” where we can throw the discarded aspects of modern human life.
“Fixing the Environment, ’91 Style”
Way back when the world was still wrapping its head around the whole “Greenhouse Effect” thing, and Australia was flexing its feeble Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) muscles, there wasn’t much to chuckle about. I mean, who could find humor in global warming when we couldn’t even agree on what to call it? It was a time of climate confusion, not climate crisis.
But leave it to the Aussie Broadcasting geniuses to bring some laughs to the doomsday narrative. In 1991, two comedic legends, John Clarke and Bryan Dawe, took a crack at “fixing the environment.” It was their way of saying, “Hey, let’s lighten up, mate!”
Picture this: Clarke as a bumbling Senator and Dawe as a sharp-witted ABC interviewer, discussing how to deal with a disabled oil tanker. In one hilarious mock interview called “The Front Fell Off,” they turned ecological disaster into comedy gold.
One chilly Adelaide night, I realized if even our funniest folks could find humor in environmental chaos, it was time for me to pack up and head to the bush. Sometimes, you just need a break when the world’s gone bonkers.
And that’s what I did. And here is how they did it.
Huddled by my heater, close to my little portable television, I observe these two illustrious nutbars in “The Front Fell Off”:
Interviewer (Dawe): So what do you do to protect the environment in cases like this?
Australian Senator (Clarke): Well, the ship was towed outside the environment.Interviewer: Into another environment...?
Australian Senator: No, no, it’s been towed beyond the environment, it’s not in the environment.
Interviewer: No, but from one environment to another environment…?
Australian Senator: No, it’s been towed beyond the environment, it’s not in an environment.
Interviewer: Well, what’s out there?
Australian Senator: Nothing’s out there!
Interviewer: There must be something out there...?
Australian Senator: There is nothing out there, all there is sea, and birds, and fish.
Interviewer: And?
Australian Senator: And 20,000 tons of crude oil.
Interviewer: And what else?
Australian Senator: And a fire.
Interviewer: And anything else?
Australian Senator: And the part of the ship that the front fell off. But there’s nothing else out there. It’s just a complete void.
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