There'll be a change at Brisbane's Triple M's The Cage breakfast program next year. George Macencroe tells me she will be moving to Melbourne for family reasons but will still be heard on air in Brisbane. There's more on my other blog.

My hotel is near Kings Cross, so I took a little wander there late yesterday (before the darkness fell, thanks to daylight saving here in NSW). I was curious to see a great number of "gentlemen's clubs" but not a lot of what I'd call gentlemen. I was also a little alarmed to see, too late, a man with a professional camera walking purposely along the street filming the pedestrians (inlcuding me). If that footage turns up anywhere, please note that I am not up to no good.

At the approaches to both Brisbane and Sydney airports, a major bank has billboards with the slogan: "Each generation should live better than the last." If this is the last generation (and I hope it isn't), there is no next generation. Perhaps they mean the previous generation rather than the last one.

1) My aircraft today, we were informed by the attendant, had two captains rather than the usual captain and co-pilot. This made me rather uneasy, because I can't see how two people can be in charge of the same plane. I couldn't help picturing them wrestling over the joystick and crashing the plane. That didn't happen - but I did notice that neither of them took the time to make the usual weather and time call topped off with an insincere wish that we enjoy our flight and patronise the airline again. They probably felt too important. Or were too busy wrestling.
2) When I was on the plane, the guy on the other side of the aisle discovered, apprently for the first time, that the arm rest between him and the vacant seat next to him moved up and down. He then enjoyed a "Homer Simpson moment"* ensuring that it wasn't a fluke the first time.

Why do some people book and pay for flights, come to an airport, check in and then don't board their plane? It happened the last time I flew, when my plane was delayed while airline staff removed the bags of a no-show passenger from the plane. Today I watched as an airline employee at the neighbouring gate paged a passenger in vain, and presumed the same thing had happened. Do some people suddenly get a fear-of-flying attack, change their plans at the last minute or get stuck in the toilet (or the bar)? Maybe there are incredibly rich people out there who have no intention of flying but just do it to mess with the rest of us.

I caught a plane to Sydney today, and ...
1) I was asked to take my shoes off after I set off the security alarm - but there was nowhere for me to sit or even to lean to do so. I managed without falling over, but I'm sure old or infirm people couldn't.
2) I noticed there are two coffee outlets of the same brand within close walking distance in the Virgin Blue terminal. One was staffed with three or four people who appeared to be doing very little to address the long queue of caffeine-hungry patrons. But that's OK because they looked damn fine and extremely pleased with themselves, as all coffee-shop staff ought to. The other had two pleasant staff members who actually served customers and made coffee quickly.

I was having a very tasty dinner with a group of vegetarians last night, and the subject of "nut meat" and vegetarian sausages came up. I asked: "Why would committed vegetarians have to pretend they are eating meat?" One of my dining companions pointed out that these foods were a device to help people make the transition from meat-eater to vegetarian. Another, a relatively recent convert himself, said vege sausages were a particularly good way for him to join-in at a barbecue without sticking out from the crowd.

What ever became of verbs? I've just heard a teenager telling a story that included the phrase: "He was like ..." It wasn't a similie, I think the "like" was meant to mean "saying".

This happened some time ago, but I just remembered it. My wife and I witnessed an accident in the Brisbane CBD and went to help a woman whose car was forced off the road by hoons. When the police arrived they asked her: "When was your last drink?" The woman stopped to think for a while, and then replied: "Eleven years ago."

The world has lost two stars - veteran Hollywood actor Jack Palance and young Australian Belinda Emmett. Details are at my Celebrity Deaths Archive.
11.37am update: US singer Gerald Levert, of I Swear fame, also died on Friday.

On my this blog yesterday, I posted an item about recorders as instruments of torture. I feel I need to clarify this. Now I know there must be some wonderful recorder players out there, but the fact is that recorders are most commonly played by young children who don't have a lot of musical expertise and, consequently, the sound they make is shrill and tuneless. The same can be true of the accordion (which can sound wonderful - honestly!) and the violin.

I had the unpleasurable experience this morning of hearing some young children playing the recorder. In common with all instruments of torture, the recorder seems to be able to inflict great pain on the victim whilst giving enormous pleasure to the perpetrator.

This morning on 612ABC, Spencer Howson and I spoke about Varekai, which is apparently not his scene, and why the Brisbane City Council is apparently replacing perfectly good signage.

Overheard at the celebrity-studded Brisbane opening of Cirque du Soleil's Varekai last night:
Crowd member to handsome young man: "Are you famous."
Reply: "Not yet, but I'm working on it."

PS: The audience did include the likes of The Veronicas (much smaller in real life than I imagined), Bernard Fanning and lots of radio and television types.

Another of life's little irritations. I was trying to find a business in the Yellow Pages and I found the name of the place and a street number. What the book didn't say is that the place I was looking for is actually in a huge shopping complex that doesn't display a street number. Would it kill them to name the shopping centre in the listing - or for the shopping centre to prominently display its street number? In fact, I thought all businesses were legally required to do that.

"I'm 20 years old. Is it a crime to go ... dancing with your friends?" That's what party girl and actor Lindsay Lohan said to Oprah Winfrey in her own defence - and it's a pretty good one. Lohan has been accussed of unprofessional behaviour in the past, but her latest director Emilio Estevez says she turned up on set on time and did the best work of her life in his movie, Bobby, about Robert Kennedy's assassination.

In light of the mid-term electins, I wonder have the people of the United States finally take George W. Bush's own words to heart? You may remember his famous mixed-up quote that went something like this: "There's an old saying in Tennessee -- I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee -- that says, 'fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me' -- you can't get fooled again."

I didn't back the Cup winner yesterday. Serves me right for not listening to 4KQ yesterday morning, where a listener correctly predicted the first three horses. There's audio over at my other blog.

My betting plan for the Melbourne Cup today? Highly unscientific, I'm afraid. My Dad used to say the Cup was the one race where form went out the window and any horse could win. With that in mind, I could:
* back them all and hope a long shot gets up to cover the investment;
* go for No. 5 because I like that number;
* pick a name with a pin;
* have a mystery trifecta; or
* buy a Lotto ticket instead and briefly dream about untold riches.

I'm outraged. On page 11 of today's issue of The Courier-Mail, booze merchant BWS is advertising "Cup favourite's". Surely this is an advertisement created by an advertising agency whose staff ought to know better.