The greatest place on Wednesday night in Wellingtown...

Come on down to the Backbencher across the road from Parliament. It used to be an institution (when they actually played parliamentary radio over the PA for political hacks to enjoy), but now it's a run-of-the-mill pub/restaurant with "satirical political themed menus (The B.B. Dining Amendment Act) and unique puppetry mounted on the walls" - they've really got to update their site.

Anyway, Wednesday nights find the TVNZ7 programme Back Benches hosted at the Bencher in a vain attempt to hark back to the good ol' days where people who gave a toss about politics tuurned up to listen to a bunch of people point score. It kicks off at 9pm and runs for about 20 minutes, but it's well-worth turning up to for a good laugh. And hey, if it's good enough for our favourite Kiwiblog, it's good enough for a baby hack like meself.

'Twas a solid show last Wednesday (yes I know I'm a day late in reviewing this - sue me) - nothing outstanding but a good group who got some nice too-ing and fro-ing. Definitely worth having a watch on the web-site.

Hone Harawira continues to impress me - he's a solid speaker who's getting quicker in his retorts. He was the obvious candidate to dominate.

Lynne Pillay was better than I expected, and while she didn't stamp her authority on the show, she held her own as she sidled up next to Hone. And she got extra points for hanging around afterwards.

Doug Woolerton (and here's a turn for the books) was the one who you could turn to for acting as the voice of reason (yes, it was difficult to type that), although the most telling slip for me was when talking about the Guvmint, in something of a Benson-Pope moment, he called it "we".

Eric Roy should have done better. Even for a lil' ol' mouthpiece, something more interesting should have come out. The moment that I realised he was going to be a muppet was his explaination about how the 'boys in blue' should be the only legal gang - I found myself shrinking in embarrassment. Poor poor Eric, better luck next time.

Is there anybody out there?

Yeah, obviously not me. I've been a filthy salesman for the last however many months - living off the words of others. A giant leap has been taken - I've gone back to school, and am doing Whitireia's Diploma in hackdom - otherwise known as a foot in the door to a career in journalism.
We be playing with some fancy stuff that's way beyond my limited ken, but I shall endeavour to be slightly more interesting than I have been in the past (I gots my Nokia N95 yesterday - it's a dream. There's even a button that will summon a family of migrants that come do your bidding, but due to the costs involved, it isn't utilised much).
Anyway, I think I'll try and get into this gig again - I seem to have a bit more time, but we haven't started running yet. Might have a couple of interesting side-gigs going soon as well, but there's time for us to talk about that later.

Until I have something more interesting to say,
Pablo.