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Rarely Asked Questions
(Some of these are nicked from ABC Kids Online)
Has anything terrible happened to you in St Kilda, where you live?
I did find a naked body in the garden one morning. It was just after I’d moved into the area and I was late for a meeting so I was really annoyed about this naked body. He wasn’t dead, just very unwell, because he’d been to a buck’s party and his mates had stolen his clothes. Someone came to collect him.
What is your earliest memory?
Being in the back yard and feeding my baby sister plums. I loved eating the plums that had fallen from the tree. But I gave my sister too many and she had diarrhoea for three days.
Can you cook?
No. Mum’s a good cook but she sometimes gets it wrong. She made pea soup in a pressure cooker and it tasted like rubber. This was because Mum had accidentally dropped the kitchen sink plug in the cooker. (You probably don’t need ‘accidentally’ in that sentence because I can’t see anyone doing it deliberately.) My little sister Heather is a good cook too, though she once made roast lamb in a bin liner because she confused it with an oven bag. The result was extremely poisonous. She’s better at biscuits.
What’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done?
I played Spiderman in a pantomime with Melbourne clowns Zig and Zag at The Myer Music Bowl. The guy who was supposed to do it sensibly didn’t turn up. A friend of mine was playing the piano in the show and she convinced me to put on the blue and red body stocking. I had two minutes to learn the script, which was plenty. It taught me a valuable lesson in life, which is never to wear a body stocking in front of two thousand people unless you’ve thoroughly checked it for holes.
What do you like to do when no one is watching?
I put on my Spiderman costume and dance. This is a lie.
If you could be any animal which would you be?
A monkey.
Why?
Why not?
What’s your biggest fear?
I do worry that one day publishers may no longer accept my books. Of course, there are greater fears. Being hit by a giant meteorite comes to mind.
Are you a gamer? What game do you kick bum in?
There is no call for bloody rude language. I have never kicked anyone’s bum, except my own when I tried an advanced aerobics class and got some of the moves wrong.
Who is your role model?
Kevin the troll. He is a seven hundred year old troll who eats people, though gradually he sees the error of his ways. He’s ever so funny. This answer is in no way intended to plug my book, Kevin the Troll.
Which is your favourite Doctor Who?
Patrick Troughton, the second one, because I grew up with him.
But Peter Davison was also pretty good.
If you could talk to birds, what advice would you give to a chicken?
Do not under any circumstances cross the road. People will keep asking you why you did it.
How do you feel when you see yourself on TV?
I am so plain that I really shouldn’t appear on TV unless it is as a contestant on The Einstein Factor or an extra on Kath and Kim.
Do you have a nickname?
‘Stupid.’ Teachers can be so cruel.
What’s the worst present you have ever been given?
A bunch of celery dressed as a baby. My gran gave it to me one Christmas and told me I was so difficult to buy for that she decided to put a nappy on some celery. She was an odd woman.
Do you often dream of other jobs you'd like?
Every now and then it disturbs me that I have no work tools. I’d like to be a person with a bag of tools that are very specific and not things that anyone could use. Being a dentist must be interesting because of all those unusual instruments. I told this to my dentist and he agreed that his job was very interesting. I was hoping he’d tell me that being a writer must also be interesting, but he didn’t.
Have you ever written the perfect sentence? What is it?
Of course I haven’t written the perfect sentence. But here’s one I like from I’m Being Stalked by a Moonshadow:
I was in love, Miranda was in a swimsuit and her father was in a cemetery; the ghost gums gave off their robust scent while Churchill grazed on some grass and was quietly sick.
What do awards mean to you?
I have some nice ones for the TV work and I’ve made two speeches at The Logies, even though I wasn’t meant to make one of them. That’s me in the red bowtie in 1989.
I was walking on a beach in Mackay during a writers’ festival with fellow authors Maureen McCulloch and Alison Lester. We were complaining about how we should get more awards and recognition, then we realised we were walking on a beautiful beach on a perfect day in The Whitsundays, so we should probably shut up. Below is a picture of us at the festival, except the man on the right isn’t Alison Lester, he’s Leigh Hobbs. The girl in the middle isn’t Alison Lester either, she’s Horrible Harriet. And we’re not on a beach. Apart from that, this picture captures the moment perfectly.
Thank you for talking.
Thank you for listening.
Pardon?
