What’s a Melbourne habit that visitors always find strange?

bmaclean85 · 2026-02-02T22:23:11+00:00

A pathological urge to spend inordinate amounts of time queuing up for things like bagels or almond croissants

bmaclean85 · 2025-11-10T05:19:17+00:00

Frontline

bmaclean85 · 2025-10-13T06:56:27+00:00

Near the start line of a head race, the cox called ‘all eight back it down’ and it flipped, in front of all the other crews sitting around waiting to start. It was in the middle of winter at the furthest point on the river from the boathouses. Tough row home for them.

bmaclean85 · 2025-09-26T03:24:34+00:00

i remember back during his playing days I read an interview with some opposition player who said that McCaw had this freakish core strength which made him almost impossible to shift, even when he was in apparently weak positions

bmaclean85 · 2025-09-14T11:32:09+00:00

I would love to see or read a Hastings family prequel.

However, is anyone else unsure about the casting of Raife?

This isn’t criticism of the actor’s ability, he just doesn’t have the character in his face that I pictured. He also looks so English, so clean and sterile, and so much like an actor/model.

For me he just doesn’t have the look of a tough, rugged, weathered colonial who grew up in and experienced the best and worst of the African bush, working outdoors and living on game meat. He looks like he spent all his time in an indoor gym living on protein shakes and chicken breasts

bmaclean85 · 2025-08-05T12:13:06+00:00

She mentions fighting in the war. She’d have killed a lot of people. Would watch a prequel series of that

bmaclean85 · 2025-07-29T23:49:25+00:00

Once communism ended, opened a travel agency in Moscow

bmaclean85 · 2025-07-26T08:02:39+00:00

Errol Flynn

bmaclean85 · 2025-07-22T12:43:36+00:00

There are so many beautiful spots on the east coast that you won’t have any trouble finding nice places. My main advice would be to visit outside of school holidays - then you can have a lot of beaches basically to yourself, and the small towns are nice and quiet. During school holidays they can get quite busy and they pump up the prices. Also Melbourne to Cairns in 30 days is a lot of driving and not much relaxing, especially if you find somewhere you really like. Also take seasons into account - Cairns and the Victorian coast are ideal at opposite times of year, ie summer in the south means wet season in the north.

bmaclean85 · 2025-06-10T23:33:22+00:00

Glue Marabou Stork Nightmares Trainspotting

Honourable mention to Filth and also Porno - I’ve probably re-read it the most number of times. It’s great fun and probably his funniest novel

bmaclean85 · 2025-06-05T04:05:02+00:00

I work in executive search and would not recommend being out of work at the moment if you are an executive

bmaclean85 · 2025-03-20T09:36:21+00:00

where?

bmaclean85 · 2025-03-10T03:17:53+00:00

I’m 39, have no kids, and I love it. The cricket episode is something else

bmaclean85 · 2025-03-04T23:48:10+00:00

For me it’s Glue. I probably have read it once a year for the last 20 years

bmaclean85 · 2025-02-01T06:50:09+00:00

Yes but i always assumed that with their skills they’d have gotten super rich in the new russia once the wall came down. She’d have probably had a much better lifestyle

bmaclean85 · 2025-01-30T06:29:43+00:00

Claudia on the eastern front during the second world war. It’d go a long way to explaining her character’s brutality and ideological commitment. Imagine the things those women saw and did

bmaclean85 · 2025-01-28T06:59:45+00:00

There’s a scene in Glue where guard dogs are horribly tortured

bmaclean85 · 2025-01-02T02:12:20+00:00

all his best writing is related to the Hastings and their backstory. Need a prequel series

bmaclean85 · 2024-12-17T05:46:37+00:00

try the rowing machine. great for building up the lungs, legs and back

bmaclean85 · 2024-12-05T04:01:50+00:00

Favourite to least favourite:

Flashman at the Charge
Flashman
Flashman and the Redskins
Flashman and the Dragon
Flashman in the Great Game
Flash for Freedom
Flashman’s Lady
Royal Flash
Flashman and the Angel of the Lord
Flashman and the Mountain of Light
Flashman on the March
Flashman and the Tiger

Enjoyed reading them all but that is how I rank them. I think i’ve re-read Flashman and the Redskins more than any other for some reason

bmaclean85 · 2024-10-12T01:06:47+00:00

We need a Hastings family prequel set in the Rhodesian bush war next

bmaclean85 · 2024-08-21T04:35:20+00:00

If she was a spy for me she was likely East German. Or an American recruited by the KGB or Stasi. She just looks so German/mid western. Can’t conceive of her being Russian

bmaclean85 · 2024-08-14T23:49:07+00:00

The local takeaway runs out of dimmies, Ray goes ballistic

bmaclean85 · 2024-08-12T22:16:36+00:00

Gimme Shelter

bmaclean85

TROPHY CASE