Tuckerucci Fairytales

  ACHILLES & PRIAM   It’s a couple of thousand years and more since the Greek and the Trojan Armies made war And Achilles slew Hector and refused him the fire and his vengeance unquenched stoked demonic desire. if you murder the living you can pay with your life but what have you to forfeit if you murder the dead you’d cease to be human the gates of hell would arise and consume your existence yet keep you alive Just so was Achilles contempt for the gods when he dragged Hector’s body round Troy’s wailing walls a war crime so vile yet the Greeks took delight in defiling the dead by day and by night King Priam, the father Of Hector, disguised Came bereft as a beggar Before Achilles own eyes And he cried like a woman Till Achilles cried too And gave back the body For what it was due. If you thought that old Homer Wrote to glorify war Think about how Achilles Won his soul back from hell he could have killed Hector’s father but he gave him a meal and they both drank together fro...

This series was posted on Facebook in December 2022 1  “... IT WON’T CLOSE THE GAP ” The Uluru Statement from the Heart calls for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament as a means of improving policy development and service delivery to overcome historic disadvantage -  in other words, to close the gap. The Nationals oppose The Voice because “… it won’t close the gap ”. This is business as usual - the latest instance of Whitefellas asserting that they know what’s best for Blackfellas. But what about Jacinta Yangapi Nampijinpa Price who opposes The Voice because “… it won’t close the gap ”? Shouldn’t she and those she speaks for  be heard? Isn’t that what The Nationals are doing? BREAKING NEWS Non-indigenous Australians have to choose between contrary views within Indigenous Australia on The Voice. So, yes, what about JYNP? Is she “a majority of one” or “the exception that proves the rule”? See the next page for a consideration of those two terms. 2  UNDULY INFLUENTIAL,...

  Preamble addressed to serving military personnel and veterans Reconciliation with former enemies ought to be prominent in the ethos of the Australian military - serving personnel and veterans alike. What greater example is there of such mutual generosity than the existence of Turkish Sub Branches of the RSL in NSW and Victoria? The very people Australians fought, in what most people once thought was the war that made Australia a nation, commemorated ANZAC Day with Australians in Korea and have done so, virtually ever since. Furthermore, veterans of the war in Vietnam know the warmth  of genuine welcome whether visiting the south or the north of the now unified country. In fact, there is no former enemy on whose land Australians veterans are not welcome. Every day in every part of Australia non-indigenous Australians are welcomed by Indigenous Australians to the land of its traditional owners. This is an offer of friendship that non-indigenous Australians can fu...

 EULOGY - DAVID JAMES SMITH 30/3/1981 - 17/2/2023 [ Editorial note : There is more in this written version of the eulogy than was delivered on the day of David's funeral. It will continue to be edited until all that needs to be said has been added.]   Today we gather to remember, to mourn and to celebrate the life and existence of David James Smith. I use the words life and existence together because there good reason to think that life is an aspect of existence. I hope to catch some sense of that in what I say about David today. David was born in Ipswich, Queensland, on 30 March 1981 to Beris and Jim Smith. His elder brother and sister are Michael and Wendy. We extend our condolences to Jim and Beris, David’s partner Cassie and their children, Jasmin and Jayden, To Michael and Denni, and to Wendy and her children Chloe, Nicola, Georgia and Nikita, and her husband, Steve; and also to the extended Bell and Smith families. David grew up first in Ipswich and then, while still i...

"I don't hold a hose"   This post resembles an email thread. The issue that kicked it off is at the bottom. But don’t go there yet. What started as a flippant comment on the banality of urging people to pray for rain, became the opportunity to ponder the level of maturity required to thus exhort the nation; and then to suggest the response of a mature spirituality to the nation’s distress; and finally to get serious about the question that is begged by the ill-conceived assurances of the half-baked - nay, the processed and packaged  - prosperity franchise of Christendom. You could scroll to the end and read your way up, but I don’t recommend it , because the effect of reading the material in reverse order is like being hit by a sledge hammer before tapping the funny bone. It’s, like, bootcamp first, the better to see the funny side of fool’s gold. ACQUIRED HUMAN INFANTILISM IN PARTNERSHIP WITH GOD-AS-MAGICIAN YES           DON’T KNOW   ...

An amusing piece, All Possible Plots by Major Authors , published on the website Lit Hub, suggests that everything an author writes is a variation on a single idiosyncratic plot. Here are some examples: Jane Austen Your obligation to make a judicious alliance with an alluring newcomer is constantly pressed upon you by your relations. You despise them all. Ernest Hemingway On the journey you drink beer from cold bottles, and peasant’s wine from the big leather sacks the fisherman gave you. When you arrive in the town square, you stop by a café for a bottle of champagne and a bottle of cheap wine. You hate the man you are with. You order more beer. Soon it will be time for lunch. F Scott Fitzgerald Ginevra Beauregard and Redmond Ingram (known as Red at Princeton) are honeymooning in the South of France. They are beautiful, clever and rich. For reasons never fully explored, they have resolved to make themselves unhappy. D H Lawrence You look upon his bright loins of darkness as they g...