for Harry's 21st: 'A twenty first speech is much like a circumcision', by Simon, Tony and Peter - 1994

April 1994, Melbourne

Good evening everyone.

A twenty first speech is much like a circumcision - both involve blood letting and it's best if the parents don't watch too closely. If we continue the analogy, which some might argue is an unwise move, I suppose we three are the doctors here tonight. I hope for Harry's sake we have steady hands.

There are a few things that twenty-first speeches are not about. They're not about justice. They're not about fairness. They are an opportunity to focus in on the 0.1 percent of a person's life that is basically of any interest to a drunken audience.

Take Harold Antony Burnett as a case in point. How many hours has he spent helping young kids. How many hours as he spent saying nice things and thinking nice thoughts about old people. He is a man dedicated to both family and community and has probably given as much to the cause of Dr Seussian poetry as anybody alive today. Nelson Mandela won the Nobel Peace prize last year. Harry must have been an unlucky second.

But are we going to pay homage to these hours of benevolence here tonight? Are we going to put up a slide of Harry helping a small child cross the road?

No. We are in fact going to show you a shot of the fifteen seconds Harry spent standing naked in front of the Eiffel Tower.

Harry has always been a bit of a writer. Indeed, most people would agree that most of his work is quite alarmingly well-written. During his trip away to Israel he regularly wrote back, but very rarely did he ever say anything about either the trip away or Israel. He did however have plenty to report on green lemurs, eukeleles, whale penises and fridge lights. He is often silly, sometimes weird and nearly always strangely brilliant. Receiving a letter from Harry is a joy.

He also writes on his envelopes. Take the following examples.

- This one has an arrow pointing to the seal - "Please do not feed the seals".

- "Contents - coded message regarding the development of Tibetan nuclear

arms"

- "To read secret writing, hold envelope in hot flame"

- " Note to Postal inspector - do not open for inspection unless you really wantto. "

- "Dehydrated letter - just add water"

One month ago, he composed the following RSVP to a friend's 21st.

I'm coming. Let there be no mistake, I will be there. Drunken and joyous. Dancing the two-step with nubile beauties and mooning the moon in symbotic recognition of your transition from adolescence to manhood. I will also be there the morning after - sallow and forlorn, as together we attempt to stop various internal constituents of our manhood from escaping to fairer climes. I undertake to swill beer, spread cheer and decorate each of my ten digits with an encircling cheezel. I pledge to spar mercilessly with both proponents and opponents of VSU and to compel scholarly admirers of modernist fiction to retreat ashen-faced to their squatid academic hovels. I furthermore will endeavour to ensure that no party-goer leaves unaccompanied by a traditional cellophane wrapped lolly-bag. Thank-you for your splendiferous summons.

And yes, as good as his word, Harry did indeed perform some tricks with cheezels before departing - stone cold sober and before eleven o'clock.

At school Harry was at the bottom of almost every scandal and every big bust that involved Weet-bix cards. When he got his hands on card number eleven of the much sought after and often under-rated "Great Australian Motor Races" series, he was crowned the undisputed Mr Big of the Weet-bix card collecting fraternity. Which I think we'd all agree was some achievement.

What this passion of Harry's demonstrates is just how scary a place our school was in the late eighties. The closer one got to adulthood the more one felt like collecting cereal novelty items. Just ask RM. Or ask Simon here - he's still got his snap crackle and Pop 'Under the Sea' mobile'

Harry's car looks forever like it really wants to kick your teeth in. A meaner looking fender I've never seen. It has an attitude. It harbours grudges. There is some evidence supporting the thesis that this avocado green FJ has in fact a grudge against Harry. I refer in particular to one September night which as memory serves me was both dark and stormy. We were in Collins Street. The fairy lights were on the blink. Harry was doing a handbrake start on a fairly substantial incline. All of a sudden we started rolling.

"Harry we're rolling"

‘Yeah, I’m aware of that. The handbrake isn't actually strong enough to hold the car. It’s really only here for aesthetic purposes and to make that comforting handbrake noise."

"'When are we going to stop?"

"Oh soon enough"

Some of you might be acquainted with the concept of touch parking. Harry that night introduced me to an expansion on that idea - "touch stopping". We just rolled back into the Valiant behind us.

There isn't a lot you can say about Harry's music taste. He was once asked to list his top five songs of the eighties. Number one was "We Built This City" by Starship. Number Two was "Current Stand" by Kids in the Kitchen. That's either an indictment upon Harry or the eighties.

But Harry and I have shared several very special musical experiences. Musical here is to be taken in its loosest possible context. One day we decided to translate all the theme-songs to Australian soap operas into Latin. Soap opera operettas we called them. i think I can safely say that we have since that day proceeded to sing them in nearly every possible public forum. It seems a shame to stop here. Harry.

[Neighbours in Latin]

I've got some bad news - the songs just keep on a-coming. ! We have in fact put together another tune. It's song about hardship, it's a song about pain. In fact, this song could be likened to a circumcision .If you take the bits we had to cut...

[To Gilbert and Sullivan's The Very Model of a Modern Major-General]

He is the very model of a modern vegetarian

Eats cabbage lettuce-lentils-rice-brown bread-potatoes, never ham...

He never would profess to having kissed a fair librarian

He is the very model of a modern vegetarian.

 

For years we thought he was in fact a USA imperialist

But now we know that he's a zany madcap hip idealist

A shame to every self-respecting Camberwell Grammarian

He is the very model of a modern vegetarian.

 

A travellin' went our Harry to discover his identity

Instead his photos all reveal much unashamed nudity

He swears he simply imitated hairy well-Hung- garians ...

He is the very model of a modern vegetarian.

 

Our Harry loves his Turkish coffee, Weet-Bix and focaccia,

Although his favourite dish must be a lightly spiced young Kathya,

And if she were a mermaid she would live in his aquarium

He is the very model of a modern vegetarian.

 

Oh give him water, flour eggs and he will make you mallo'ach

If we were crass we'd definitely rhyme this with a word like fuck.

But we are really new age sucky touchy-feely caring men

Just like our very model of a modern vegetarian.

 

And so we wish the very best of birthdays to our dear old friend,

It's sad indeed lamentable that in our speech the truth did bend

But if we had the choice there is no way we'd ever vary him,

We love our very model of a modern vegetarian.

Ray Wilson's 70th: 'The eightieth is always something very special, isn’t it?' by John Clanchy - 2015

21 January 2015, Melbourne, Australia

Note: Ray is 70

Maaaaaaaaa-te!

21st  January 1935 – 21st  January 2015. What a journey!

The eightieth is always something very special, isn’t it? And not just for you and your family but for all your friends too as we look on and wonder whether we’ll ever get there ourselves (let alone get there in your condition).  So celebrate!  Eight decades is not to be sneezed at.

Ray, I was thinking of you today, and so many great memories popped up. I’ll spare you the full-length movie for now and just re-run a few shorts – the first one personal, the other two sporting:

1.      As your Uni mates, we always looked up to you – and only partly because you were half a generation older than us. But even we were surprised when you carried off one of the most gorgeous belles of the University in your final year. I remember Roger Gay and myself shaking our heads when you declared you were going to court Margaret. Jeez, we thought, the guy’s got guts, but the idea of a Northern-Westie Newman boy heading out into the Protestant-infested waters of the abstinent EASTERN suburbs in search of love naturally filled us with dread. We knew this couldn’t work.

‘She’s already said No to him twice,’ I told Gay.

‘Well, he’s heading out there for another try,’ Gay said.

‘What’s the bait this time?’

 ‘He’s gonna tell her that you and I are mates of his.’

‘You reckon that’ll work...?’

It did of course, but Gay and I continued to shake our heads. She’s a Science student, we kept telling each other; she must know that if he’s a decade older than her now, then she’ll never make up the difference. The day he turns eighty, she’ll still only be seventy. ‘Ray’s an Arts graduate,’ I told Gay, ‘he’s full of it; he’ll find a way to fudge it.’ ‘Even when he’s eighty?’ Gay frowned. ‘He’s very fit, I reminded him.’‘True,’ said Gay.

2.      Sports: You were always a superb footballer, Ray – you left the rest of us for dead in skills and attitude. And probably did the same in every field of ball sports - with one exception. No doubt you’ll remember as vividly as I do our first ever game of golf. I was drunk and played superbly. You were sober and totally naff. You sliced the trees to ribbons on one side of the fairway, and you hooked baby starlings out of their nests on the other. You chopped when you should have chipped, and the sight of a sand-trap or a green gave you attacks of the yips. It was the first time on a golf course for both of us, and afterwards (mostly out of feeling for the starlings) I took you under my wing and promised to show you everything I knew about the game. It’s a great memory for me. Especially now that people tell me you’ve become a fabulous golfer in the six decades since, and I take profound comfort from knowing that if you’ve ever had a bad day on the golf course from that day to this (whether it’s the youthful octogenarian yips or the ‘Lazy-Susan’ return of the slice) then it’s got fucking nothing to do with me!

3.      Footy: It’s Grand Final Day, Newman vs Ormond (1960-something). It’s  late 3rd quarter and we’re in deep do-do’s. Ormond has just kicked a goal and taken the lead. The ball comes back to the centre, the umpire (a hired idiot called Minson) is about to bounce it and our leader – Captain Wilson – pushes his opposing captain into Minson’s back, and spoils the bounce. The Ormond captain whirls on Wilson and cries, ‘You prick!’ Wilson’s face turns white with shock. He glares at the Ormond captain and shouts, ‘Who just called the umpire a prick?’. Minson blows his whistle and tosses a free to Wilson. The Ormond captain looks at Wilson and again he shouts, ‘You prick!’ Minson blows his whistle and give the Ormond captain a 50-metre penalty for verbal abuse. From 30 metres out, Wilson slots the goal, and Newman is never headed again.

Brilliant!

Those were the days!

Happy Birthday, Ray.  And may the second eighty be just as memorable as the first!

Bones.   

For David Rios's 50th: 'We're both middle sons from large families, with very strong religious backgrounds' by Pat - 2008

Dave's actually asked me to say a few words, so I actually spared no small expense with this (waves A4 paper)

When Kimber called and asked me if I would say a few words in toast to David, the first question that crossed my mind was, 'why me'? Well maybe it's because we've been friends for 15 years. Maybe it's because we come from very similar backgrounds. We're both middle sons from large families, with very strong religious backgrounds, mine happens to be Irish Catholic, and David is Baptist and Mexican.  Quite possibly it's because we share the same birthday.

But whatever the reason, I think that there's one reason why all of us have gathered here tonight to celebrate Dave's birthday. Dave is just about the best friend any one of us could have. In fact, he's the kind of person that no matter whom you are or how long you've known Dave, you cannot help but feel like he is your best friend. He makes us feel that way. And while many of us have known David for quite a few years, I cannot help but believe there's a whole bunch of BFFs, in Finland, Japan, San Jose, and many other places around the globe, who wish they could be here with us to celebrate.

So .let's raise our glass to our friend, brother, father, and soon to be grandfather! To David Rios on his 50th birthday! And let me leave this with an old Irish toast, which seemed to be particularly appropriate today: 'May you live to be a hundred, and one extra year to repent!'

Cheers!