Greenough is Greenough

Yesterday, the daylight saving bill was finally accepted by the Legislative Assembly. In memoriam of a sane time zone, I thought I'd share another one of the member for Greenough's brilliant compositions:

Mr G. WOODHAMS: [...] During my browsing in the National Gallery of Australia and the National Library, I came across, not unexpectedly, a poem dedicated to daylight saving. It was written by that well-known poet or poetess - not Dorothea Mackellar. The poem is called I Love A Sunburn Daily -

The love of beaches and stubbies
Of chardonnays by the pool
And doing deals in Sydney
With Coles and Woolies too
Strong love of wearing raybans
While driving in your Govvie car
I know but cannot share it
Because this time you’ve gone too far

See I love a sunburn daily
An extra hour will not work
The last time we were asked to try it
We were still recovering from Premier Burke
I love my faded curtains
And cows producing latte
My clock on Western Standard Time
And more bloody hours at Bunnings on Sunday

The tragic Labor government
And those swingers Matt and Johnny D
Long lunches with revenge intent
Giving Eric an extra hour to spend our surplus. Free.
Let the Greens tangle in the upper house
Where the Ljiljannas coil,
And trendies deck the lounges
After a hard day’s toil

Core of my heart, my rolex
Her ticking body so sweet
Mum and Dad rolling around in the morning
There’s a scene hard to beat

Mrs D.J. Guise: That’s too much information!

Mr G. WOODHAMS: Members will read into this bill what they want to read into it; that is what I have been hearing throughout the debate! The poem further reads -

But then the clockheads gather
And we can bless again
The dopey daylight savers
Who haven’t got a brain

Core of my heart, my cheap imitation bought in Thailand Rolex
In this land that time forgot
An extra hour every day,
And Carpy wants the lot.
We now have one fat time zone
All lined up with the Congo
Even the Mandurah line can run on time
With Alannah the Station Master keeping time on the bongo

The filmy veil of woopy weed
That thickens in the air
Pot smokers another hour to burn and indulge in vacant stare.
A summer of endless daytime
No clock to hold her back
This wilful, lavish land sucking mid strength
Can’t catch a taxi, mate they’re enjoying the sunset at Cottesloe
And the flag fall will set you back.

Mr Acting Speaker, this is the last, I think very important, verse of one of Dorothea’s lost poems -

All you who have not loved her,
Daylight savers You don’t understand -
Though sunburn holds many splendours,
And of it when I die,
I know to what Time Zone
My homing thoughts will fly.

Mr Acting Speaker, I am in an emphatic mode; maybe you did not gather that. Maybe some of the soft-headed modernists, as I refer to them, on either side of the house do not understand it, either.

There was a forum in ancient Rome, during the Roman Empire, known as the senate, in which there were several Caesars. Members may know about the senate and about Caligula, who appointed his horse as his successor emperor.

Mr R.C. Kucera: A bit like the leadership of the Liberal Party!

Mr G. WOODHAMS: The member may be correct, and I will not dispute him on that note.

Subject: DAYLIGHT SAVING BILL (NO 2) 2006 (WA Legislative Assembly)

Date: Tuesday, 31 October 2006

Hansard reference: pp. 7886b - 7952a (online (PDF))