My Manifesto: The Incoherent Ramblings of a Madman

Here I sit in Bourke. It is about 38 degrees celcius at 8:20 am. There are flies everywhere. The sky is black with storm clouds brewing in the distance.

I am attempting to download 476 email messages from my work email account - the problem is that it has been stuck on email message number 2 for the past 15 minutes,however, if I don't download them all I will not be able to get any new email messages. I have them all kept on the server so they do not dissapear into the deep abyss that is the internet or dissapear onto whatever computer I am using outlook on at the time. Eudora is my prefered email client, however, the work computers rarely (or more correctly - never) come with it because my collegues have ne'er heard of it. I like the added features Eudora has - and the fact it saves the attachments in their native format so you can access them more readily.

The bridge seems to be coming along well. It looks good - despite the fact it is painted the wrong "historical" colour according to the state and national historical societies - or the correct "historical" colour according to the local historical society. The local historical society literally went around and asked all of the old people what colour they remember the bridge being back in the day - the issue is that memories fade - and the power of suggestion is very strong on someone with a poor memory. The fact that the colours they decided on were not available in the type of paints that they painted bridges with is insignificant in the scheme of things - they have their bridge painted the colours they want it painted - national icon or no national icon - wrong colour or no wrong colour - it does not matter anymore.

Other than the huge socio-economic issues in Bourke - I have the most trouble here with breathing and getting clean. It is so dry and dusty that the air is filled with fine particulate particles that choke me. I always come here with all of the intentions in the world to run in my spare time, like I always have, but inevitably endup running one-block before gasping for a breathe of the heavy air. The "clean" aspect of Bourke is more to do with the level of hardness of the water. You cannot get soap to lather here. So no matter what I do I always feel dirty - this coupled with the dust that is all over everything and the rank smell of the water is not exactly the ideal situation for someone that almost had at one stage an obsessive compulsiveness about cleaning his hands.

I forgot to bring my toothbrush (again) and I forgot to bring some sunglasses (again). The last time I went toothbrush shopping here I realised that people in Bourke either don't clean their teeth, or clean their teeth so much that they have bought out the entire stock of toothbrushes in every store. The sunglasses issue has not been looked into (REM - I am still holding you responsible for ruining my good sunglasses - the only pair of good sunglasses I have ever bought).

It is so peaceful here, between roadtrains and obnoxious children. It is bizarre where they come from (the children). We are essentially 5 kilometres North of the township of Bourke, at North Bourke (aka Back O'Bourke, Gate Way to the Outback, Gate Way to the Never Never, etcetc). There are three houses and a pub at North Bourke, and yet, come school holidays there seem to be children running everywhere. Jumping over the bridge, throwing rocks at the bridge, spray painting the bridge, jumping off the bridge - at one stage there will be anything up to 15 children "playing" on the bridge. They come from the North Bourke side, walk across, and seem to dissapear in the distance - where they come from and where they go I will never know. If it was midnight I would swear they were supernatural.

Anyways - I must bid thee farewell for now.