Pieces of the jigsaw puzzle

The humble jigsaw is absolutely essential, according to Scott Morrison.

There’s good and bad news for dissectologists (the official descriptor for puzzle lovers). The humble jigsaw is absolutely essential, according to Scott Morrison. “Our kids are at home now, as are most kids, and Jenny went out yesterday and bought them a whole bunch of jigsaw puzzles,” the PM said on Sunday. “I can assure you, over the next few months we’re going to consider those jigsaw puzzles absolutely essential.” He’s not alone. “They’re the best,” Hugh Jackman said during a 2018 live Instagram video, where he finished and then destroyed a 1500-piece Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh. But Quiet Australians may have trouble finding one. After telling journos his wife and two daughters are now living with him at the Lodge in Canberra, Morrison said: “We’re keeping each other entertained, as I said the other day, we’re doing lots of jigsaw puzzles. Jigsaw sales are soaring, I understand.” Hobbyco says online sales are up 300 per cent. Jackson Heenan, stock controller at Mind Games Melbourne and online game retailer Gumnut.io, told the ABC an 18,000-piece Sistine Chapel puzzle (selling for about $350 and sitting in the shop for two years) sold in the past fortnight.

Hamish acts the Goose

Known rascal Hamish Blake has a novel approach to beating isolation boredom — he’s hijacking virtual conference calls, after-work drinks and even a high-performance swim squad meeting (wearing Speedos and goggles). How? The comedian has been encouraging fans to send him login IDs and passwords as part of his new social-distancing Instagram series Zoom For One More. “I was at a wedding reception, I’ve been to a 30th, I’ve been to a 40th, a lot of staff meetings and quite a few uni tutorials,” Blake told Nova 969. He even managed to crack into a secure air force chat, wearing a gold Top Gun style flight jacket. “There was a meeting with the air force, it’s a flight log meeting, a guy emailed me and said, ‘hey mate just pop into our flight log meeting, there will be a few sergeants, few high-ranking people but should be interesting for you!’ So I went in there, the lady running it, who I assume is a high-ranking officer as soon as she saw me come up she said, ‘Ah, no this is a work call’.” Fran Drescher and the original cast of 1990s show The Nanny are doing a live table-read on Zoom next week — will Blake sneak in there?

The tribe has spoken

This paper’s very own Peter van Onselen took a break from politics a few months ago to fly to Fiji for the finale of reality TV series Australian Survivor, which finally aired at the start of this week. The show has a cult following in the Canberra Bubble; Labor MP Anne Aly’s son Adam Rida even has a podcast recapping each episode. For those not across it, Survivor contestants compete in physical and mental challenges (including puzzles) to win immunity, then at the end of each episode, the tribe votes on who should be sent home. Wearing his The Project hat, self-confessed superfan PVO asked the unwitting contestants whether any of our cunning federal pollies would survive in the cutthroat game, where backstabbing and leadership spills within alliances happen daily. Fan favourite Shonee, an Aussie expat who lives in London, asked PVO: “Who is the Prime Minister?” “Scott Morrison,” he replied. “Never heard of him. Literally, wouldn’t know him from a bar of soap,” Shonee declared. Fourth-place player Brooke answered: “I think ScoMo wouldn’t last a day. I would love to go against him and destroy his reputation, even more. Sorry, that was a bit savage!” Wedding DJ AJ gave a backhanded compliment to our first female PM: “I reckon Julia Gillard could go far in the game because she’d probably grind on that many people’s gears everyone would want to sit next to her at the end.” What about Tony Abbott? AJ said: “I just hope that he would wear a bit more than budgie smugglers at challenges otherwise I might want to just vote him out for that alone.” Ice-cream maker Harry concluded: “I think all politicians would do well, it is a game of making promises and whether they come true or not doesn't matter.” Harsh!

Wag the dog

Strewth’s colleague Steve Waterson sent through this tall, ahem, tail about a friend who conference calls with a colleague in Madrid. The Spaniard was asked how he was coping with the lockdown. Happily, he said, people were allowed to walk their dogs so he was able to get out for a bit of fresh air. When he saw one of his neighbour’s dogs being walked by three different people on the same day, he asked after his health. The neighbour was fine but had decided to make a little pocket money by renting his dog to people going stir-crazy in their flats. Before long Spain will have the fittest dogs in the world!

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