Off

I'm officially on holidays. Hooray! By the middle of next week Mrs W, the Apprentice, Ned the Bear and I will be lounging around on this very balcony, gazing lazily across these very rice fields (if somebody hasn't plonked a resort on them since the pic was taken). If we're passing by any internet cafes I'll pop up a quick post every now and then.

And a reminder that NT News and Sunday Territorian readers can enjoy the adventures of Dan Dingo while I'm away. The strip kicks off in tomorrow's paper and runs for 30 days.

See you round like a rissole.

Plenty

Alice Springs is officially the number one place in Australia for finding women. The Australian Bureau of Statistics says there are 84 men to every 100 women in Alice Springs. There you go. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Full of it

A sewage outlet that pumps 3 gigalitres of crap into Darwin Harbour each year will keep on pumping until 2011. Affectionately known as the 'poo-shooter', the CBD outlet will plop a further 12 gigalitres of untreated raw sewage into the harbour before it's 'fixed'. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Not quite Kylie

Meet Patric (pa-trice), Indonesian Hotel Singer. As you can see Patric belts out a fair Kylie Minogue tune. Sort of. She's got the moves down, at least. (Note the mesmerised kiddie.) Patric and the keyboard guy are the nightly floorshow at one of the hotels we stayed at on our last trip. We'll be lobbing there again next week. I hope they're still there.

Funny because it's true dept.

This year's Father's Day Tombstone Territory. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it. Click for a larger version.

Advocate online

The twice-weekly Centralian Advocate, the Alice Springs-based sister paper to the NT News, now has its own website. I work for them too. Not sure if they'll be running my stuff on the site just yet but anything's possible.
Anyway, if you think Darwin's a uniquely quirky sort of place it'd be well worth keeping an eye on the even more uniquely quirky goings-on in the Red Centre, gropers and all.

Busy bee

Working up to holiday mode this week. Lots to do. Bzzz.Bzzz.

Watered down

The Federal Government's blanket ban on alcohol in Aboriginal communites across the NT (which takes effect tomorrow) will be amended so tourists can still enjoy a tipple at places like Uluru. The thirsty visitors would have to be part of an official tour group. Aboriginal organisations have branded the move racist, saying tourists would be able to drink right in front of landowners who won't be allowed to. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Plugging Dan

The NT News has started plugging Dan Dingo - Private Eye, which means it's not long now until I go on holidays. Hooray! It's all good.

Ned the Bear and the weighty decision

Cross-posted at Club Troppo

T-shirt designs

I've mentioned a couple of hundred times (before the blog blew up) that next year will be my 20th with the NT News. Apart from putting together a new book and an exhibition I'll be flogging off some t-shirts as part of the whole anniversary deal as well. Above are the cartoons I've re-jigged to go on the shirts, which old-timers may recall as two of my more notorious ones.
The croc cartoon was first published during a very busy week around these here parts. A fisherman was taken by a crocodile near Jabiru and a day or two later Lindy Chamberlain's conviction for the murder of daughter Azaria was quashed in the Territory's Supreme Court.
The dingo toon appeared the day after the final, final coronial finding into Azaria Chamberlain's disappearance, with the NT coroner refusing to rule absolutely that a dingo had taken the baby. This also happened while tourists were being lured to the Territory by the astoundingly successful "You'll never never know if you never never go" tourism campaign, fronted by Daryl Summers. The court's open finding remains in place, by the way.

Anyway, the shirts'll be available later next year. If they do okay sales-wise I'll set up something so they can be purchased online as well. Stay tuned.

On terrorism

One from a couple of years ago, following several terrorism-related arrests in Australia and just before the introduction of tough new federal anti-terror legislation. Given the superheated debate surrounding the new legislation - and dire predictions by lawyers, journalists, writers, painters, professors and cartoonists that it would mean the end of Aussie life as we know it - it's surprising there hasn't been a peep out of anyone in the context of the upcoming election. We seem to have forgotten all about it. I guess with every single political entity in the country backing the new regime it's be a bit like playing a dead rubber. Oh well.
Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it. Click for a larger version.

Just super

Queenslanders aren't the only ones going through forced local council amalgamations. The Territory is heading the same way in a big rush, using the same 'super shires' model, with pretty much the same results: anger, confusion and claims of little or no consultation by the government. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Ned the Bear and the second language

Cross-posted at Club Troppo

The tray

Because I work from home it's pretty rare for me to go into the actual office where all the real newspaper work happens. But I did today. I have a tray that needs checking every couple of months, you see. This is where my mail and payslips and such are meant to go but nothing ever ends up where it's supposed to. Everybody else's trays get stuff put in them. Mine doesn't. The only thing that is in my tray is a toilet roll. It's been in my tray for almost two years. Maybe someone is trying to tell me something. Anyway, nobody knows where it came from, so I just leave it there in case its rightful owner turns up. Or there is some sort of emergency.

One more on feral cats

Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Blurts so good

One thing you positively don't want your child blurting out when you go to pick him up from a classroom bustling with kids and parents and teachers at 2.40 in the afternoon is:
"Dad! You're still in your pajamas!"

Special Project - Update 4

All done! I've just finished drawing up the last episode of Dan Dingo, Private Eye. There are 30 all up. You can follow Dan's very first adventure daily in the NT News and the Sunday Territorian from September 22 while I'm on leave. (And right here on this blog around November.) Have to say it's been quite a bit of fun putting it together. I think the readers will enjoy it. It's certainly a major departure from my usual editorial cartooning stuff. The very last panel has Dan, his sidekick Lenny and his first client, Trevor the Duck, walking off into an outback sunset. Why is Dan swearing? You'll just have to buy the paper to find out, won't you?

The Dark Side

Former Darwin Lord Mayor Peter Adamson has been sentenced today to 7 months jail - suspended after two - after being convicted last July of stealing and false accounting. He was also slapped with over five grand in fines. Adamson's defence team immediately lodged an appeal which saw the ex-mayor granted bail. He was released from custody, which is a real bugger because I had a corker of a cartoon ready to go if he'd gone to prison. I still might get to use it if the appeal fails. This is, after all, probably the most spectacular fall from grace of any political identity in Northern Territory history.
Adamson was found to have wrongfully obtained $1800 in gift vouchers from Darwin City Council. The former TV presenter and CLP cabinet minister spent the vouchers on personal items including a Darth Vader voice changer and women's underwear. He also used a $958 fridge he bought with council money for months before donating it to charity. As one who knows Adamson personally I'm mystified by his continued lack of remorse and strident denials of any wrongdoing, an attitude that's done him no favours (obviously) with the courts or the people of Darwin. He's tenacious, if nothing else. Must be the politician in him. It's kind of sad that the man's downfall has been seen, thanks to Vader, as a bit of a joke (even, early on, by Adamson himself). I've seen it that way too. But I'm a cartoonist. It's my job.

News reports here and here.

No point

The Territory has finally succumbed and fallen into line with other Australian states with the introduction of a demerit points system for bad drivers. The first bad driver pulled over by NT police - just 15 minutes after the new laws took effect - didn't accrue any points...because he didn't have a license. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Ned the Bear and the great wall

Cross-posted at Club Troppo

On the waterfront

Work has started on two el flasho hotels as part of Darwin's Waterfront redevelopment project. One's a four-star, the other is a five. Construction is set to finish in 2009. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Father's Day, Territory style

One from a couple of years ago. Click for a larger version. Cartoon copyright © Northern Territory News. Please don't pinch it.

Oh, and have a good one if you're a dad.