Stop whinging, Benny, here's a new one...

... the only problem is that I have no idea what to say. Um. Nice weather we're having, isn't it? Oh, that's right. Sydney-siders are sick of rain, and I have no clue what the weather is like in either England or Italy. I guess that's put a dampener (boom boom - it's raining here in the boondocks, finally, and I couldn't help myself. Sorry.) on that topic.

I've been wondering about TGA on tv. I really can't see how it can compete with the original. The more I watch the original, the more I think 'nah, can't be replicated or duplicated, even in an authentic Aussie fashion'. Isn't it due to launch soon? I've forgotten, with all the excitement and success of TGA mag.

Anyway, I'll watch it, form an opinion, and then no doubt rant about how much better it would have been with the Corbster in the lineup. I am such a journo-groupie. (Not in that way, Mrs MOS, I just like his view of the world, and the way he puts it across. His view, that is. Oh dear. Maybe I'd better shut up now.)

Anyway, must fly. Today's to-do list is horrific: haircut, queue for 7 hours at the RTA to register one of my parents' trucks, deliver the newspaper to Nanna, shop for the influx of 10 year old girls (Grace's delayed sleepover/birthday party, as we were in Sydney on her birthday), pay the solicitors bill (ouch) from the legal crap that daddyo brought on, collect payment for an invoice (can you believe that this particular 'business' still pays everyone in cash? Including their staff??? Hello, Russells Stock Feeds, welcome to the new millenium - not only are there funny bits of paper called 'cheques', you pronounce it 'checks' not 'chey-kews', but you can use your computer, it's a box connected to a thing called the internet, to access your bank account and put money directly into someone elses account! Amazing, isn't it? I hope the sarcasm isn't too much), drop in the overdue DVD's & PS2 games to the video shop (why do we still call it a video shop when they don't have videotapes anymore?). Oh, and I have to fit in a few hours work at my favourite job too. At the moment we have a wicked 1950-something Dodge truck parked in the yard.

You know what I find amazing? Open the bonnet of the Dodge, and there's room to sit your butt on the panel with your legs inside the engine bay, to work on it. Open the bonnet of my car, gulp, Heidi the Hyundai, and you'd be lucky to fit a straw anywhere within the engine bay. (Not to mention the fact that you wouldn't dare sit on a panel. Hell, Dane running down a hill and slamming into the door - deliberately - dented it!) But Heidi struggles up hills (doesn't it, KT? Especially when you're racing a train), and the Dodge just powers on through.

I know the Corbster isn't a fan of old cars, but I am. They just don't make them like they used to. Sigh. I would happily swap reliable performance for general all-round coolness. The cost of replacing a tie-rod end now & then is a small price to pay for being able to cruise around in a cool old car. Don't you agree, Benny?

PS: I'll tell ya what else is cool. VB-Misser & Annemarie are converted to semi-revheads thanx to TGA mag, despite being not-very-interested-in-cars. Yay! Welcome to the club, girls. Oh, VB-M, can't you make it to Melbourne in November for the 3rd Not-Annual Un-MOS drinks? Or should that be the Inaugural Top Gear Australia drinks?

Issue 2 rocks!

I love it. 9.25 outta 10.

Page after page after page of great reading, drool-inducing pics, the Classic not Plastic features that seem written purely to make me yearn, some funny stuff (I can't WAIT to show my stepdad how to backflip a truck - think he'll let me borrow the new Iveco to try it?), and now I finally understand just what's going on with Mark Webber.

And the Repco ad (above) made me laugh. When I first turned the page, I thought,"oh, god, not a bloody anti-domestic violence ad to bring the mood down". Not that I have a problem with anti-domestic violence ads, but I was happily flipping through Issue 2 for the first time, and didn't need, um, reminders.

UPDATE: The caption is hard to read, sorry - the tear-streaked woman is thinking, "He told me I had to put on 12kg to offset the corner-balancing." And the text across the bottom of the page reads, "Good news, all you Stig wannabes - performancerepco.com.au is now online. Our sincerest condolences to your better halves." I like it.

Oh! My! God!

The title doesn't relate to anything contained within, I just thought it was catchy, and if it's good enough for the cover of issue 2 of Top Gear, then it's good enough for Malibu. (And I thought I used exclamation marks excessively!!!)

Subscriptions rock, fair dinkum. What a lovely surprise to find issue 2 in my letterbox this arvo, after a semi-nah-mostly-horrific-day. And I was informed when I subscribed that my subscription wouldn't kick in til next month.

So, while my kids are enthralled by Disney on Ice tomorrow (yaaaaaaaaawwwwwnn), I can sit with a torch and read to my hearts content. Yay!

But... hang on... where's my t-shirt???

Please God...

... if I promise to never swear again, can you help Cadel Evans win?

Please? Pretty please with sugar on top?

He seems like such a nice boy. And he came so close last year... and it would be so frustrating to have yet another drug cheat take it out.

Go on, God. Let the good guy win for once, okay?*

(* Surprisingly, a good guy has already won in another area - Dr Armellin - who delivered my daughter with the delighted cry, 'IT'S A GIRL!', and who is the obstetrician that all expectant mothers should have - has won the case brought against him by the couple who were apparently devastated because they had IVF twins, instead of just one child. Might I add these are Canberran 'professionals', who can afford to raise twins. They just didn't want to. Poor pets. I shudder to think what would have happened if the twins had been boys!)

I think I might be raising a little Malibu...

Check this out, she says with a grin.

We were watching Spicks'n'Specks tonight. Grace had just arrived home after 3 days of being a truckies offsider with her grandfather. (It was a handover thing - her brother is going tomorrow. Meanwhile, I haven't even BEEN in the new truck, Ivy the Iveco Stralia. I think I've said before that it's like the bloody space shuttle. It's automatic, FFS! But the kids do regular truckie-offsider gigs during the school holidays, they get paid $10 a day for helping to open & close the curtains & whatnot, and they love it. And I think their grandfather loves having them along, too.) Anyway, as I was saying...

The 'contestants' had to identify a piece of music played by someone who also didn't know what it was, on one of those 1970's keyboards with numbers corresponding to the keys.

'Hmm', says I. 'It's classical. It rings a bell...'

'Oh, DER,' says Grace. (Insert strong heavy male-type-singing-voice-here.) 'It's a big ad, expensive ad. It's the Carlton Draught ad!'

I felt both horribly stupid and immensely proud that my almost-10-year old daughter knows a beer ad so well.

Just don't tell DOCS, okay?

Feeling obliged, but uninspired, so here's Grapes & Drano.

... so... here we are. Halfway through the wait til issue 2. I've read issue 1 to tatters. My subscription doesn't kick in until issue 3 apparently, so I have to endure the excuse-for-customer-service at Mudgee Newsagents again next month. God help me.

Um. What else can I say... Casey Stoner won! And he rides for Duke, Duke! Does he have the potential to become the next Doohan? Discuss.

Watched Brit Top Gear tonight. LMAO at the test where they drove pieces of crap over cobblestones @ 30 miles an hour with a colander full of eggs suspended over their heads. And drove the cars FILLED WITH WATER (as in the cabin filled with water, snorkels & all) to see who got the furthest. (Or furtherest. Or longest distance from the start line. Whatever. It's been too many years since 3 Unit English, sorry.)

Oh, and didn't the handbrake-test-on-the-hill kill me. The Hamster leaping out of his car before it screamed backwards down the hill was funny. Clarkson just trying to get his car to the start line was hilarious. Not terribly environmentally-friendly, but hilarious anyway. I can understand why he rubs people the wrong way, but I like him. He'd be a great father-in-law. Or father. And I'll bet he would be a legendary grandfather. I can just imagine him turning to jelly at the sight of his grandkids, suddenly becoming all soft and pushover-ish.

Nothing else exciting to report. My baby turned 7 yesterday. Yes, the short, fat, bald one in the photo is now a tall, lean, smart-arsed primary-schooler. Sigh. He was too fat and too lazy to learn to walk, so he used to bounce on his knees to get where he wanted to go. Truly. He'd hop on his knees! He had callouses on his knees & the tops of his feet! And he used to eat dried cat food whenever I turned my back. Bugger of a kid. Insert very satisfied maternal smile here.

Okay, back on topic... when is the TGA wesbite going to be up and running?

Oh, that's something I meant to say. Had a bit of a deep & meaningful, reflective evening last night, and went back through the comments on previous posts. I'd missed a LOT! So, thanx (again) for the birthday wishes, and good to hear from ddeebb, Anon, Annemarie, and y'all. Yeah. Alright. I'll admit it... it's even nice to hear from you, Benny!

And something else has occurred to me. It's 2 years since I found MOS. It was either July or August 2006 when I first commented there. In case y'all didn't notice, I became a tad addicted very quickly. I remember getting excited when the comments hit double figures. I wish Dave of Greifswald (sp?) and Miss Pat were still around to reminisce with me. And Beer Baron. I think we were almost the only commenters back then.

And then I remember getting VERY excited when the comments started hitting triple figures. Who'd have known that lil ole MOS would have led to TGA, eh?

And for my MOS-addiction, I must thank Dakota de Brito. I first discovered news bloggers & commenting on his page. And then, after gushing all over me (after I made a joke about Rove McManus that quickly became tasteless), he had the hide & audacity to call me an attention-seeker! Can you believe it? Shy, retiring, sweet Malibu. Hmph. So I searched for another blog that would understand my innocent, gentle, ladylike ways. (I can't even type that with a straight face.) And I found MOS. And now... here we are.

Happy anniversary, MOS. Though you are now deceased, I will forever treasure the memories that you & I share. Not to mention the fabulous life-long friend and honorary god-mother to my children that I met through you.

(And I will forever thank Mr Corby for exercising restraint about immediately publishing comments that were submitted, drunkenly, late at night. Imagine if my mother had read that! EEEK!)

Late-birthday-present suggestion. (They say redheads look best in green!)

I'm sorry. I can't help myself. It's been hammered into my brain, courtesy of the Mudgee Guardian printing 'public' without the 'l', for most of my life. An ordinary garden variety typo leaps out at me. They jump off the page and poke my eyeballs and say 'see me? Now you've got no idea what you were reading, have you, because you've noticed 2 little letters that have been transposed and now you're all distracted'.

So, while I'm idly wondering what I'd bid for a bottle of Smells Like Ewen McGregor, remembering how I used to love wearing the bloke-du-jour's aftershave, the dreaded typo leapt out. And yes, poked my eyeballs.

When is the wesbite going to be up & running, anyway?

Well, hasn't it been a big week, boys & girls?

I love good car photography. I'd forgotten how much, but TGA brought it all back to me. I enjoyed the reading, too. Haven't read all of it yet, I'm doling it out to myself to make it last longer. I'm even enjoying the ads. Weird.

I'm going to give the first issue, um... 7.5 outta 10, leaning towards 8 outta 10. I'm looking forward to a bit more Aussie content, but on the whole, considering its fledgling status, I'm impressed.

Annemarie, can you please email me at zdacey@hotmail.com so I can forward your address to Ben? It could be worth your while... I hear there might be a copy of Top Gear involved. Hmm.

Oh, and thanx for the birthday wishes. My 40th rocked, and being 40 rocks, and life is pretty damned good right now. (And many thanx to KT for coming a hell of a long way to spend a drunken weekend with an old chick - surprisingly we still have 3 pubs not crossed off the pub crawl list.)