HOW TO COOK A GOOSE

One of our roving correspondents spotted the Honourable Kon Vatskalis, MLA , at Casuarina Square energetically leafing through a pile of those dreaded remainder cookery books which have inundated Australia like a tsunami .

Vatskalis has a smorgasbord of ministerial responsibilities- health, children and families, child protection, mining, fisheries , primary industry , etc. On top of this, the ALP says he is a tireless doorknocker. With all these tasty responsibilities and moving about his electorate like Roadrunner, you would think he hardly has time to whip up a sunshine cake, mix an instant pudding , or open a packet of alphabet soup to help the Legislative Assembly and baffled TV viewers understand what he is saying on matters of Territory importance.

So why is he taking such a big interest in cookery books ? Surely he is not cooking for himself at night, inspired by one of those mind- numbing , crappy TV cooking shows? None of the books he was thumbing through, we are told, specialised in Greek tucker, but then he should know how to turn an octopus inside out , moider a squid and shower with a sponge to save water seeing he is of Grecian descent , his parents having come to Australia in search of the Golden Fleece.

One political cynic we know with a colourful and endearing turn of phrase , a bit of a fang man , on hearing Kon has been seen browsing through cook books like a seasoned Margaret Fulton , said it is because the Henderson government’s goose is cooking and the CLP is burnt to a crisp , there also being an outbreak of salmonella in its ranks.

PROUD TO BE AN AUSTRALIAN GIRL

To mark International Women's Day , Little Darwin runs this old real photograph from our ephemera collection of a patriotic girl called Phyllis dressed as Australia . Her attire is made to represent panels in the Australian flag, possibly for an an Australia Day Parade, about 70 or more years ago .

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RATTY ROADRUNNER

A pedestrian vows and declares he saw this event which sounds as if he has been watching too many Roadrunner clips , especially the latest hilarious one which finally sees Coyote clobber the speedster after 20 years of trying to do him in .

Our eyewitness says he saw a large RAT jump out of the undergrowth near the KON VATSKALIS electorate office sign at Casuarina and then dash across the two- way busy lanes of traffic, bounce off a SUV, continue on , narrowly avoid being squashed , make the footpath and disappeared like Fine Cotton in the direction of the ANZ bank . Was this Rattus Bubonicus leaving a sinking ship or just playing chicken with Darwin’s many troppo Coyotes ?

EDITOR IN BURMESE PRISON

There are several tenuous NT links with the Australian media man,Ross Dunkley, co- editor of the Myanmar Times, who is languishing in the Insein Prison, Rangoon, but we will cut to the chase . Held for breaches of immigration/visa , it was also claimed that there had been an assault of a sex worker -shades of Julian Assange?- but the woman involved withdrew her statement , yet the hearing proceeded just the same . Dunkley was placed back in the slammer .

Little Darwin has been told the real reason for Dunkley’s troubles seems to be that he has fallen out with his major Burmese partner, one of the wealthiest men in the country and bagman to the generals who have the country under a brutal iron fist .

This person has media interests of his own and has already taken over Dunkley’s building and plant , worth US $10 million , which it is speculated will be confiscated and handed over to him.

Dunkley’s Australian backer is mining magnate , Bill Clough ,who is said to have a big holding in a joint venture with the Burmese regime’s oil and gas body , just one of many westerners in deals with the ruling military men . The story is getting little run in the Rangoon press.The Myanmar Times operates with a censorship board of military men on the premises .

SECURITY BLOWN AWAY

It has been pointed out that during Cyclone Carlos signs declaring various premises about Darwin are protected by named security firms were blown away or are now skewiff. If the security outfits have not noticed that their placards are lodged in shrubs ,dangling from perimeter fences or gone with the wind, just how smart and observant is the security? Darwin is ripe for an old fashioned in depth media report about the security business. Last year there was a southern expose about an organisation allegedly making bundles of loot handing out what seemed like dubious qualifications in security.Follow ups are rarely undertaken in Darwin where the media seems secure in its ways.

MORE TIMOR LESTE TENSION

The March 1 edition of Tempo Semanal states that 17 well armed Indonesian National Army (TNI) members crossed the border into the Oekuse enclave on February 24 at Naktuka and destroyed warehouses. This is not the first time . The report goes on to say that despite the frequent disturbances , Jakarta has not yet taken any serious action against its forces. The two governments of Timor-leste and Indonesia have been working for a settlement about the demarcation dispute, but TNI pays no heed to the effort by the civilian authorities. Once again, the situation has not been mentioned in the Darwin media which is hard to understand considering there is a large Timorese population here and we have troops over there trying to keep the peace.

CURSE OF THE MUMMIES & DICTATORS

The new Government in Egypt has asked the city's taxi drivers to drive around Cairo sounding their car horns. It is hoped these and other familiar sounds of the city will induce a return to tranquility and normality. Operation Toot 'n Calm 'Em will last for the rest of the week