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The doorbell rings four times, not three, not a polite ding, but four. A herald of elbows and joy. That’s E. “You’re weird,” she announces, flinging off her backpack like it mouthed off. “So are you,” I reply, how love sounds when it's casual but true. “What are you doing?” She asks, already converting the living room into a command centre of chaos. “Roblox, Dad.” And just like that, I’m enlisted, in a war I don’t grasp, with weapons I can’t find, in a supermarket full of undead specials. “You’re so slow. Join me.” So, I do, fumbling my avatar like an old man in a nightclub, bouncing off walls, pressing wrong buttons. “What are we playing?” “Vampire Zombie Supermarket,” she says, like everyone knows this one. Of course. Of bloody course. “Dad, you’re crap.” “Stop dying, Dad!” Turns out, death is neither noble nor poetic when it’s digital and you’re being eaten by pixelated lettuce. “Didn’t you play games on your iPad as a kid?” I explain gently that my childhood was more Etch-A-Sketch and existential weather than anything touch-screened. We do almost nothing. No lessons, no outings. Just snacks, screen glare, and the sweet humiliation of being bad at something she excels at. But somehow, this…being called useless while she revives me from digital doom, feels like a perfectly spent Saturday. And somewhere, I imagine a man at a keyboard smiling at the absurdity, thinking: Let her drive. She's got this round. &nbsp; FSF

Weekends with E

In corridors paved with pending thought, Where filing cabinets sigh and rot, A clerk sits still. his name unsure. , Entrusted with what none endure.They spoke of colour, number four, Beyond the spectral office door, A shade not seen, nor rightly named, In systems never yet proclaimed.Trinary echoes shaped its birth, No eye beheld it, not on Earth. It hummed with taste, but not with tongue, A note of grief forever sung.It tasted, so the memos say, Of stars that dimmed and lost their way, Of neutron hearts that never fell To black hole’s deep, euphoric hell.Denied collapse, they simply burned, While time ignored them, clocks unturned. Their sorrow, dense, distilled, confined, A flavour borne in form of mind.The clerk, in ink, did try to speak Of flavour mournful, dim and weak: “It lingers like a law unsigned, A silence left for none to find.”His paper filed, his task complete, No answer came. Just dust. Repeat.FSF

The Flavour that Mourns

Good morning, you flickering bulbs, half-charged batteries sparking in rows. Sit. Screens off. Eyes sharp. This isn’t a lecture, it’s a live wire.Where chaos churns, profit hides, sharpening its teeth in the shadows. That’s the whole damn course. Etch it into your palms if you need to.Stalk any industry’s pulse. Hear the groan of rusted gears, the murmur of “That’s how it’s done.” That’s your cue, your target’s exposed. Take Devansh: no genius, just awake. Saw a process stumble, shouted, “Test the blood!” Cash flowed before the lab coats blinked. Point is: See. Speak. Win.Paul Christiano stormed theory’s temple, kicked the altar, said, “Your dogma’s wrong.” Redrew the map while they groped for stones. Lesson? Torch the script. Seize the chalk. Truth doesn’t bow to tenure.Some ideas sway like shaky scaffolding. Let them. A wobble reveals the cracks. Failure’s not a grave, it’s a scout. Every wreck pays tuition to brilliance. In short: Bleed for it.Path One: Committee. Smells of toner and fear. Produces safe, beige sludge. Path Two: Lone Torch. Stinks of burnt wire and coffee. Risks ruin, but sometimes, sometimes, it splits the sky. Choose. The market ignores fire drills. It crowns the arsonist who builds from ash.No spark? No blaze worth chasing? Fine. Rest. Learn jazz piano. Sketch crows. Curiosity’s the ember that never fades. Next term, the world might be kindling. Keep your matches dry.Not hope. Not prayer. Belief is facing a door and pushing because you don’t see a lock. If it splinters, you’ve learned its grain. Write the paper. Sell the splinters. In short: Push.List three processes on campus run like drunken emus. Write a one-page fix for one. Deadline: Friday. Budget: $50 and shameless grit. Extra credit: Prove me wrong. Win, and you’re at this podium next week.Professor snaps notebook shut, downs coffee. Questions? Complaints? Existential dread? Silence means you’re already rust. Prove you’re not.FSF

Break Glass in case of Insight

I wake to the radio blaring that today is sacred, Grand Final Day, as though the universe itself bleeds red-white-and-blue. I’d planned to spend the morning in bed with a joint and the cat, but, no, it’s our turn to host the annual footy circus. So, I drag myself downstairs, already hung-under from last night’s pinot, and find my husband, let’s call him “Mister Enthusiasm”, cranking the barbecue like he’s auditioning for MasterChef: Bogan Edition. Outside, the wind howls down the street, south-westerly, ice-tip, perfect for funerals, and flips the neighbour’s gnome flat on its smug face. I smile; one less thing standing upright today. The Guests They arrive exactly thirty minutes before bounce-down, clutching supermarket beer and tribal scarves. Hawks, Dees, Tigers, a lone, tragic Saint. Twelve of them if you count the better halves—though after three sauv blancs most will prove far worse. They clog my lounge like cholesterol, yammering about West Coast versus Collingwood as if it were Armageddon. I hover near the antique table (Gran’s pride; my dust-trap) laying out fruit and “appetisers”, code for anything I can tip out of a packet before the edibles kick in. I’d rather be anywhere else, preferably 1994, back when I still liked my husband, footy, and the idea of hosting a party. The Corporate Chorus The telly shows the MCG corporate boxes: suits neck-deep in cocktails, betting thousands they’ll never miss. One bloke whinges that Melbourne’s exit ruined his ski weekend. My eyes roll so hard I see last Tuesday. Skiers grieving the Demons.....spare me. Dave Bloody Marshall Enter Dave Marshall, Collingwood scarf strangling his neck, brand-new six-pack in one fist, ego in the other. Dave and I have been scratching each other’s itches lately, more out of boredom than lust, maintenance shag, nothing artisanal. Everyone knows except Mister Enthusiasm, who plays oblivious like it’s his super-power. Dave beelines to the kitchen and scoffs a brownie fresh off the cooling rack. I’d baked them for the puppy’s obedience class, chicken livers, wholemeal flour, no sugar, so naturally Dave proclaims them “five-star”. He grabs another before I can warn him he’s essentially eating Labrador cuisine. I sidle up to Mister E., glass in hand. “Your mate’s into the dog biscuits,” I mutter. He stares, baffled. “Dog food?” “Technically ‘dog treats’. High in protein, low in self-respect.” “What’s the worst that could happen?” he asks, proving once again he lacks basic imagination. Kick-Off Bounce-down. The living room erupts: shrieks, slaps, spilt Shiraz. I retreat to the back deck, light up, and watch the barbecue smoke coil into the grey sky, tiny freedom spirals. Inside, Mister E. is reciting useless stats while his mates grunt in agreement, the linguistic equivalent of belly-scratching. Footy: men paid a fortune to chase a demented egg while grown adults tie their identities to the result. Spare me twice. The Dog Biscuit Aftermath Ten minutes in, Dave rises, not for a goal celebration but to wander glassy-eyed into the garden. He unzips and christens my new tomato seedlings with Carlton Draught-flavoured urine, then flops face-down on the grass and commences snoring like a chainsaw in therapy. His legs twitch, chasing imaginary sticks. “Should we check on him?” Mister E. asks. I sip. “He’s lived through worse, he married once.” A Hawthorn supporter yells about holding the ball; I yell inside my head about holding my sanity. Final Siren Two hours later West Coast wins. Collingwood tears flow on screen; in my garden Dave is still horizontal, mumbling, “Another brownie… another brownie.” The party dribbles away, leaving half-empty glasses and my half-empty marriage. I nudge Dave with my boot. Nothing. Fine, let the night air do the nursing. At least the tomatoes got watered, though I doubt they ordered a lager chaser. I close the sliding door, twist the lock, and pour myself the day’s final pinot. Somewhere upstairs my husband hums the Eagles’ theme song, convinced the afternoon was a roaring success. I exhale smoke through the fly-screen and consider texting Dave a breakup essay, not that he’d read it. We’re all chasing sticks out here; some of us are just honest enough to admit the fetch isn’t fun anymore. &nbsp;Marty Shevelove Fan Fiction by FSF

Grand Final Day..... as June saw it.

What’s the cruelest whisper?Strive for perfect. It hums from billboards,flickers in screens,coats idle chatterwith a sterile gleam. Yet every star worth chasingignites in chaos,swirling dust,untamed gravity,no blueprint in the blaze. We hunt better,steps tracked, flaws mapped,a race toward a vanishing line. A deaf child clasped a piano,teaching silence to sing. A girl, stitched by steel,dragged her fractured spineacross canvas, history paused. A scientist, stilled,blinked at a cursor;it wove black-hole hymns. A singer, scarred,let cracks carve the song. None perfect,all fiercelymagnificent. So shed the polished lies,the chase for flawless shine. Wear your scars like emblems,freckles like galaxies,mistakes like hidden keys. Be magnificent,not perfect. You nod,reach for a rulerto align the words. Chaos hums.A star is born. FSF

Magnificent

wake to my phone, not buzzing, but meditating, email spinning its little zen wheel. downstairs, in pyjamas, clutching a dumb Oura ring, I find my daughters staring into blank glass. “Daddy,” says the eldest, “Instagram’s dead. how will I post my smoothie art?” I suggest toast, maybe conversation. they blink, like I proposed exile to a cave without sockets. by nine, the whole street has surrendered. no "can you hear me?" calls, just neighbours waving phones at clouds, conducting a techno seance. over the hedge, Mrs Johnson, barefoot in the dew, screams at her router: "Get me Elon Musk!" at work, the CIO pounds the conference door. email is dead. servers hum in mockery. "It’s global," I say, guessing wildly. the first fallacy of apocalypse: hasty generalisation. lunch: the newsreader asks how we will survive. suggests books, letters, pigeons. dinner: toasted cheese, guilt. tears: a half-drawn owl lost in the wires. “paper,” I whisper, "there’s always paper." night: kids with footballs, neighbours trading gossip like rare coins. tucking them in, I see: the strongest networks have no passwords. lying awake, the ceiling breathing above me, I wonder— will the signal ever return? or have we, at last, come home? FSF

F.S.F

Writing, Poems and Rants

Weekends with E

The Flavour that Mourns

Break Glass in case of Insight

Grand Final Day..... as June saw it.

Magnificent

Wi-Fi Wake