5:41 p.m., 24.08.04
My Dad's Tie

Happy birthday to Nous for Sunday! Well done on making it to 24, you old fart. Love you to bits.

For some reason, something just reminded me of the time my dad won the "worst tie" competition they were having at his office back at the Gas and Fuel.

He took the contest out in a landslide. The tie was a horror. Double-wide, shit brown with red and green highlights. People were coming up to him all day and asking "Jesus John, where did you dig THAT one up?"

He sat there all day looking bewildered until the award was presented to him. Which was the precise point at which he realised there was a "worst tie" contest on.

Yep, he was completely unaware.

So you can perhaps see why I have no sense of fashion and dress inappropriately for almost every occasion: It's in the genes. My father's everyday choice in ties was unanimously voted more offensive and vulgar than the combined efforts of dozens of co-workers who were going *out of their way* to look shoddy.

You'll be glad to know that he retired that tie from the rack, but it's still lurking around at my folks' house. Funny thing is, it wouldn't look remotely out of place around some hippie's neck on Brunswick street.

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