Great Scot

It will be interesting to see if Scotland has the appetite for independence.

There are many arguments pro and con.  Only the people of Scotland can decide.  It is not for Englishmen or OZTRAILYANS or Europeans to tell the Scots what to do in their moment of choice.

Still, I hope that Scotland has the courage to seize its freedom and say 'aye'.  Scottish patriots have given their lives for the last thousand years in the cause of Scottish independence.  They fought to the death like men, in the face of daunting odds - they were hard nuts.

It would be a damn shame if their offspring - their modern heirs - quailed at their moment of truth.


Alias:  Frank Satyr

State of Origin

Queenslander!  QUEENSLANDER!!

If that rallying call means nothing to you, it's not your fault.  You born and raised under different skies.

If you are a Queenslander, however, you know that you are part of an enormous force of nature - a family of parochial northerners who will never give up or take a backward step.

They call us banana-benders.  Wrong.  The only thing Queenslanders have ever bent is the odds - the odds against us winning again and again.

Why?

For decades, Sydneysiders, Melbournites and even the snobs in Adelaide regarded anyone born north of the Tweed as some sort of second-class citizen: a semi-Australian redneck, perhaps, in their eyes.  This kind of shit eventually gets your back up.  It makes you want to prove yourself.  Again and again.

Queenslanders are proud of their achievements.  Like the good folk of W.A., we made something out of a vast, sparse area.  We made it our own, and woe betide anyone who ever forgets it.

We go to war with New South Wales every year to show that we are entitled to more than a bit of respect. This is more than just symbolism. 

They treated us like hicks for decades...scoffed at us and slighted our profound love of our home turf.  For that, they will pay forever more.

Every player who plays for Queensland knows that they must be willing to keep battering forward when every sinew and muscle is screaming with pain and exhaustion, for such is the spirit of a people who chuckle at cyclones and tell floods to XXXX off and die.  Nothing breaks us in the north.

This is the Queensland spirit. 

We are legion - we are drawn from so many small towns and places in a vast tract of land.  Our legend demands that we never give up - for we are - and will always be - Queenslanders.

Alias:  Frank Satyr