Ties that blind

WE might have to get Kevin Rudd to rethink his sporting bets (Strewth, yesterday) after his latest saw him don a necktie so powerfully hued, it could have injured anyone not wearing a welding mask.

WE might have to get Kevin Rudd to rethink his sporting bets (Strewth, yesterday) after his latest saw him don a necktie so powerfully hued, it could have injured anyone not wearing a welding mask.

Patterned like a broadside of laser bolts from a platoon of Imperial stormtroopers, it was a Western Bulldogs tie, the result of the Julia Gillard-supported Bulldogs trouncing Rudd's Brisbane Lions the other night. Rudd may have been the loser of the bet, but he wore that tie with a vengeance. Every time it appeared on the TV screen, the lights in our office flickered and went dim. And as he spoke, Rudd turned now and then to expose the victor to the tie's full horror. Each time he did, it was apparent there was a conflict of epic proportions going on in Gillard's facial expression: a powerful urge to not look like she was gloating, and an equally powerful urge to not go blind. Speaker Harry Jenkins - himself sporting something that looked like a knotted strip of Christmas paper - didn't escape being dazzled, explaining away a fumble thus: "The tie made me call the wrong title." Anthony Albanese, on the other hand, was far too clever to get caught out and kept his gaze steadfastly averted.

Joe caught in a spell

MEANWHILE, Joe "I will not be silenced" Hockey had his own Steve Fielding moment as he twittered during question time: "Julia Gillard always rolls out Work Choices as a destraction (sic) from her problems." Then a minute later, a corrective tweet: "Distraction ... fat fingers." He was probably just suffering tie glare.

Tuckey's time warp

ALSO during question time, as Housing Minister Tanya Plibersek bashed the undead corpse of Work Choices, saying it was bad for women, up piped Wilson Tuckey: "Yes. They want a job on the weekends when dad's home to look after the kids." Whereupon an unidentified Labor interjector called out: "Who's home to look after you, Wilson?" Your taxpayer dollars at work.

Plane silly placement

WE were enjoying a yarn on The Sydney Morning Herald's website about a cock-up with pre-recorded announcements that led all the Francophone passengers on an Aer Lingus Dublin-Paris flight to believe - erroneously, as it turned out - they were about to ditch in the sea and, in all probability, die hideously. The shortest but most telling quote was: "All the French freaked out." As good as the story was, it was lifted that much higher by the big ad next to it for Qantas's sight-seeing flights to Antarctica, complete with footage of a wing and the threatening, snow-swathed peaks below.

No language barrier

ANOTHER top choice from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is Douglas Trappett, our new ambassador to the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Trappett's area of foreign language expertise? Burmese. Judging by the frequency with which this is happening, it's becoming either a tradition or a running gag.

Tasteless joke warning

WELCOME to Strewth's special low-fat, low-taste sealed section, where we present a gag enjoying currency in the NSW parliament. If you're feeling even remotely refined, we suggest you skip ahead to the next item. Otherwise, here goes:

Q: How do we know the NSW Labor Government didn't kill Michael McGurk?

A: It got done.

Barnett busts boom

WEST Australian Premier Colin Barnett could barely contain his glee yesterday as he signed approval for construction of the gargantuan Gorgon LNG project. But even the pleasure of a $43billion development to lift the economy from the doldrums was not enough to get him to use the feared B-word. Barnett recently banned "boom" as a misleading description of WA, saying it built unreasonable expectations and he wouldn't use it. Yesterday, as all around him struggled for superlatives for Gorgon, he stuck to his guns. "I refuse to (use it). We've had periods of hectic economic activity in this state before and they have invariably ended in tears," he said. So there.