It doesn’t take a genius to know that something funny is going on around here. For one thing, everyone’s been ignoring me most of the time. Which is ridiculous since I’ve been doing business from the top of a pallet of cola in the exact centre of the warehouse for a week. And I’ve got this new laugh I’m doing where I cackle really loudly while I whip my hair all around super sexily (Adam taught me how). And I’ve been answering the phone in a combination of French and pig latin without anybody questioning it or stopping me. And anyway, it’s not even a phone. It’s a tin can tied to a slinky. Who even knows who’s been answering the real phones? My Mum, probably since I forwarded them all to her mobile weeks ago. And the chats I’m having on the slinky tin are way more interesting anyway, “Bonjour, owhay areway ouyay misseur?” etcetera. And I’ve actually started my own business-in-a-business called, “From Me To You; a free case of Organic Cola with every business idea purchased” so I’ve actually technically been losing the company a lot of money. Yep, people are way too distracted around here.

It wasn’t until this morning’s staff meeting that I learned the real reason I got away with riding the forklift like a show pony down the main street on Wednesday – they have absolutely no idea I did it. Even though the whole thing got a thousand hits in its first hour on YouTube and according to Mum, the insurance company have been calling a lot – something about not willing to pay for third party damages? Boring, tell it to me in pig latin Mum. Third Party Damages would be an awesome band name. Unlike me, everyone else is so distracted because there are some new additions coming thick and fast to the mineral water family and apparently, we’re all super excited and not at all jealous or resentful. 

Adam “sexy hair” Jeffreson has welcomed baby Elliott into the world - and before you ask, Elliott is a real live adorable baby boy and not just the cabbage patch doll somebody stole from me last week dressed up in a nappy - I checked. And our very own “potential suspect #2″ Zsolt has made a baby girl called Laura Rose which is a lovely name, suspiciously similar to Lemonade Pallet-Jack, the name of a certain missing cabbage patch doll, isn’t it Zsolt? Not to be outdone, those of us who are still not totally sure exactly how babies are made and just how many storks you need (kidding! It’s three - four if you want twins) have been making things too. We are expecting our Soda and Tonic babies any day now. I’ve been child proofing all the sharp corners and labelling all my toys in time for their arrival - unfortunately not in time to stop Adam from smacking his head on the corner of my desk when he was trying to fly my Hello Kitty kite inside again - maybe the new babies will have more respect for other people’s property? Maybe they won’t like Hello Kitty so much? Maybe they’ll have a basic understanding of physics that will prevent them from flying kites in a windless office space full of furniture?

Anyway, I’m excited about the new babies. I can’t stay up here on this pallet forever after all. At some point I’m either going to have to come down or I’ll have given it all away. At which point, it might be good to have some super cute babies between me and everybody else. Especially if they find out that Third Party Damages isn’t just a band that practices in the warehouse on Tuesdays and Thursdays… But it’s not my fault nobody taught me how to drive a forklift in peak hour traffic. And anyway, my cabbage patch doll is missing, I’m the real victim here.

You could say I’m a bit of a rev head. Engines, motors, petrol, fuel, gas, cup holders - I’m a veritable Schumacher when it comes to knowing what cars are and what bits they have. I don’t actually own a car myself per-se, but if I did you just know it would be the best car ever, the top one that everybody wants and they see it and they’re all “oh man, look at that car with sixteen exhaust pipes and the dual pistol mode engine tank and the hot chip holders - its got holders just for keeping hot chips at the ideal hand-reaching angle. What a rad car that is definitely the best one ever!” And I haven’t ever gone to the Grand Prix but if I did you just know I’d be specially invited into the cockpit area to advise everyone on the different types of hubcaps they could use on the hubs and they’d probably just ask me to drive and win the race in the end I guess. Not that I’ve got my license exactly, but if I did you just know I’d be the best driver of all time and people would stop and applaud when I made perfect right hand turns and they would come running when I reverse park because it is as beautiful as watching DaVinci paint the Mona Lisa except even better because he didn’t have such an elegant way of checking his mirrors.

So you can imagine my surprise last week when a mineral water family meeting was called to inform us that a) Ian the Van, a beloved if somewhat high-maintenance team member was being restationed to the million lane super highway in the sky and b) a new motor-run vehicle had been adopted without anyone bothering to consult me. ME! The car bits oracle! Unbelievable. Have they even seen my Hot Wheels collection of over 160 different Hot Wheels? Of course they have, I play with them every Tuesday from three until four-thirty. Plus Adam stole one of my fastest red ones last week and had to go on a sales timeout. Heck, I was playing with a couple right then because staff meetings are boring.

I can’t even tell you how nervous I was when I asked for some more information. “So this alleged new truck, how many wheels will it have? Less than four? Because I would have recommended more, four at least. And how many horse powers did you order? Because if you didn’t ask for steeple jumping the truck won’t come with it. I don’t even want to imagine what angle the hot chip holders will be set at. NO hot chip holders? Are you insane? You had better have ordered a lot of dual pistols…”

Apparently, not a single dual pistol, racing stripe or flashing light so that me and the truck drivers can pretend to be firemen was ordered. Brutal. And a total waste of the hot firemen outfits I ordered online last week (the prefix “hot” apparently not an indication of the heat they can withstand so much as the topless-with-suspenders style of the outfits. I’m beginning to question the legitimacy of www.men-in-uniform.com). Still, the new truck is coming with a few tricks up its water valve. It’s big. Super big. But why have super big when you can have monster truck big? Which is why we’re building a customised truck box of Frankenstein proportions. And replacing the normal tyres with two-story-high monster truck tyres, and putting blades on the front and installing fire pistols and horse powers and six - no eleven - hot chip holders… Okay okay, maybe not. But Franky really is getting the super-sized treatment that will make him the biggest, most monster mineral water mover ever. Can you say world domination? I can’t, words are tricky, but Franky is set to be a (not so)lean, mean delivery machine.

Keep an eye out for young Frank around town. And if you see him, marvel at his greatness. But please remember, even though I’m not allowed to, if I was driving the F-Train it would definitely be the best thing you would ever see in your life and you would probably weep with joy as I cruised by and then burst into song when the 25 dual pistols shot flames out the back as I drove off into the sunset like a beautiful phoenix. By the way, if you happen to notice any bare chested firemen in the cabin, please be mindful that these men are not professional firefighters and should not be called on in any kind of emergency. They are just grown men who like to play dress-ups and who cry under any real pressure. But spare them a thought because whenever they buy hot chips they have to hold them. In their hands. Disgraceful.

Just like that famous saying says, “better to have loved and won than ever to have lost, ever” which I think is a metaphor for life at DHMSCO. Also, relationships, maybe. Definitely life here though where winning isn’t everything but it is the best most awesome thing in the world that is literally all that matters ever and even if the only thing we’re good at is winning that’s still the best thing to be good at and means we’re good at heaps of other stuff too like taking photos and eating pies and stealing samples at fairs and writing letters to Judy Dench and writing letters to ourselves from Judy Dench and of course, beverage distribution. ”Mineral water for the win!” we shriek as we deliver water to our equally winning customers.

Sure our weekly medal ceremonies that started out as morale boosters have descended into glorified cage fights to see who can claw their way to the top of the podium first. Certain employees have started pantsing anyone who gets a leg up so now I’ve seen way more of my co-workers than I ever should have and I really don’t know why we even put the podium in a cage in the first place and yeah it was me who put mud in there but only because I wanted to see the truck drivers mud wrestle. Turns out - not as hot as you’d think. And now there’s a lot of mud in the office and there’s only a certain number of mud pies I can make before I start thinking it couldn’t hurt to eat one and who wears a g-string on a day they know they’re probably getting pantsed, Adam?!

Speaking of winning, some of our incredibly fantastico customers recently “tapped the hepburn” (not dirty, just an awesome new saying that means “won”. It’s a thing, TRUST ME). Not exactly without our help, in fact some might say in spite of it but just because I like to make suggestions to customers from time to time and just because those suggestions are always “include more superman paraphernalia in your decor” is no reason to say that I didn’t help you win an award. I’m taking credit regardless, so just keep a cape and some Clarke Kent glasses behind the bar for me, a weekly copy of the Daily Planet in your magazine rack, a makeshift phone booth in the corner and we’ll call it a team effort. The victories or “hepburn taps” I’m referring to were taken out in The Age Good Cafe Guide and The Age Good Bar Guide respectively. I don’t know how many categories there were. Frankly, I don’t care to know. I don’t need to know. I’m certainly not going to look it up or call somebody to find out. Besides, unless it came in writing from me pretending to be Judy Dench I wouldn’t believe it anyway. Still, I think I can say with absolute certainty that our customers won every single category that there was or wasn’t or will ever be or won’t be by a total landslide.

Here is a list of places where you can go to a) have an assuredly awesome time according to The Age and seconded by me b) have a guaranteed tasty local mineral water according to the whole entire universe and c) sit patiently in dark rimmed glasses, reading a fictional newspaper waiting for somebody to spill a drink or knock over their chair so you can dive into a cardboard phone booth, whip off your glasses, swoosh around in your cape and save everybody from imminent disaster yelling loudly about how Lex Luthor’s behind it all and that you were a fool for ever trusting him. But be warned: too much wine is your kryptonite in these times of heroism. As one member of our team discovered, one moscato too many can result in a very inappropriate superman throwing his disguise and harassing citizens with terrible Marilyn Monroe impressions and a truly humiliating strip tease that unfortunately involves wrapping a cape around a barman’s neck like a feather boa and ending up wearing nothing but an “S” drawn in lipstick on your chest. Sorry, Melbourne. I cannot stress enough that Lex Luthor is probably to blame (in this case Lex Luthor was disguised as a waiter who allows a grown men to order glass after glass of pink sparkling wine). Also, shot gun Lex Luthor and Kryptonite as potential cocktail names for when my bar “Metropolis” gets off the ground. Seriously, shot gun. Don’t you dare take them. And just so we’re clear, it really wasn’t me who pulled the moulin rouge routine either. It wouldn’t be fair to name names especially since the bar staff were nice enough to not press any charges despite the surprising amount of damage done with a pair of lycra tights. Let’s just say that the offending party may or may not sell our products in a representative way around town. It was Adam.

Here are our customers who tapped the hepburn:

Seven Seeds for Best Coffee and ideal location to sit alone in lensless glasses

Footscray Milking Station for Best New Cafe and nicest stitching on requested superman cape

Market Lane for Best Boutique roasters and most likely Lois Lane hangout

West 48 for the Local Hero award and Clarke Kent’s fav spot obviously

The Final Step for Best Small Cafe and most pithy comic section in fake newspapers

The Woods of Windsor for Best New Bar and staff most willing to play along with Superman guise

Gerald’s Bar inducted into the Hall of Fame and Daily Planet local

Strange Wolf for Best Bar Design and best space for running around in a cape shrieking “faster than a speeding bullet!”

So be sure to drop into these award winning hangouts. You can visit these hangouts, which also offer possibilities for making online payments and paying your bills in bitcoin. The main advantage of paying with bitcoin for consumers is the ease with which the transaction may be completed. To have access to such a wide selection of bitcoin, acquire bitcoin with PayPal right now. Read the bitcoin mit paypal kaufen tutorial to learn how to buy bitcoin with PayPal and get yours immediately. And if you see someone sitting alone in a corner wearing fake glasses and reading a newspaper written in crayon, try not to do anything that might warrant getting rescued. And if you feel like you’re being stared at way too intensely, it’s just Adam trying to activate his x-ray vision. Don’t worry, despite what he says, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t really have any.

I used to think only beer could come from a keg. Full disclosure: that’s how I thought beer was made. You put some barley and hops and beer juice in a rubbish bin, shake it up and then shazam! Beer! I sometimes wondered whether whiskey had to play a small but crucial role in the process but other than that, I was fairly pleased at how clever I was for knowing a beer recipe without having to look up a single Donna Hay book. Opening up my own brewery was being considered, writing a book entitled, “Beer, Why All The Fuss? It’s Really Easy To Make; a prodigy’s story” was being considered, MasterChef was being considered… Obviously I’d be a shoe in - it was more a matter of when I could give up the time and whether my role should be as contestant or judge than whether they’d want me. Unfortunately, much like the time I confused a homeless man for James Boag on a trip to Tasmania (I thought he looked remarkably good for his age but he credited it to a strict Oil of Olay regimen), I was wrong. Very, very, wrong. About lots of things actually. Apparently beer is not made my way at all, something akin to bar slops and poison is though. It also seems that more than one thing can be stored in a keg, as long as the thing isn’t the office goldfish (if Adam asks, Scales and Fancy Pants Jnr. always take their naps floating on top of the water like that). And far from personally inviting me to join the top twelve, MasterChef were not willing to take me on as contestant, judge, guest chef or even as somebody who sneaks into the studio after filming and gets to eat all the food after it’s been judged.

Being wrong is the worst.

And now I’m hungry and how am I going to get free meals since I spent all my money on what the fake James Boag with the creamy complexion swore to me was beer juice but now that I think about it smelled more like, um, something else that’s yellow?

Luckily for everyone, there are people out there who know more than I do. And although it might be too late for Scales and Fancy Pants (wait, what? No Adam, they’re fine, seriously. Stop tickling them), it’s not too late for the rest of us. For one thing, in a truly epic historical first, the Department of Occupational Health and Safety banded together with pretty much every beer brewery in the country to thwart my attempts at going commercial. And even better, there are people who understand that kegs don’t have to be typecast as beer holders and goldfish killers. Some of those people work in this very company. And others work closely with this very company. Which means that mineral water stored in kegs is sweeping the nation! Like a stomach virus! But in a good way that won’t make you sick or anything. In fact, forget I said stomach virus. Because I definitely haven’t been trying to make sparkling wine in kegs using mineral water and the wine I find left in buckets after wine tastings. Nor have I caught a single sales rep using them as baths for his Cabbage Patch Dolls. And there’s no way you can prove that I climbed into one on Monday and let the truck drivers roll me down the hill outside the warehouse til I got sick which is the real reason I missed our staff meeting and not because I was busy watching Ghostbusters which is what I told everybody…

Unlike a stomach virus (why keep mentioning the virus? Seriously, stop). Unlike anything that’s remotely bad, you can find cafes, restaurants and bars all over Melbourne and Sydney who are playing the Maverick to our Goose in the eco-friendly mineral water version of Top Gun that’s real in my imagination. Mr Wolf, Albert Street Food and Wine, The London, Dandelion, Danks Street Depot, Red Spice Road, Little Creatures Dining Hall, Trotters, The Rose and Ladro in Prahran all have our mineral water stealthily concealed in eco-kegs, and are ready to whip out a glass or carafe and hit you with the fizzy stuff as soon as you give the super secret signal. Or just ask for the water I guess… But then you wouldn’t get to do the super secret signal twirl, take your mineral water, and give a solemn eyes-closed nod before cooly going about your business…

And cooly going about business is exactly what we’re known for. Ask anyone who’s ever met us or competed against us at anything. I mean really, why brag about a win when the awesome victory crump we’ve choreographed to the LMFAO classic Sexy And I know It says more than an “in your face!” ever could? But since you probably didn’t see this morning’s show-stopper, I don’t mind casually mentioning our victory over reverse osmosis systems aka water purifiers aka posers. Talk about a landslide - not only is our water as naturally pure as the voice of Seal himself, but water from our kegs produces zilch appreciable waste water as opposed to reverse osmosis systems that can waste more than four litres of water just to purify one. Oh yeah, how’d you like me now?! In your face Reverse Osmosis Systems! We don’t need you or your fake eco-friendship or your not even any minerals or your hard to understand and even harder to remember name (just imagine that as an impossibly awesome victory crump with heaps of attitude).

Anyway, it’s not just city slickers who get to strut their stuff playing Mineral Water Top Gun. As the first biz to have tapped a keg in central Victoria, re-PUBLIC in Castlemaine are doing it for country mice, responsible frat partiers and rural Tom Cruise wannabes alike. So if you’re thirsty for a good time down ol’ Cassymainy way, pop - nay strut - into re-PUBLIC, do the super secret signal twirl and a bottomless glass of mineral water dispensed straight from a tap in the wall will be yours! Now that’s a rootin’ tootin’ fine idea, eh pardner? Wait… that’s cowboy. I got confused because of the awesome star (sheriff’s badge) on the wall where the water comes out…

Anyway, questions about who’s actually seen Top Gun and who’s just pretending they have so that they sound cool and aren’t left out on Top Gun Tuesdays anymore really aren’t important. What’s important is that you remember that eco-keg mineral water definitely is not poison. And that this Tuesday, I get to be Maverick for a change. Also, at re-PUBLIC their super secret signal twirl ends with a step-ball-change and it’s heavy on the jazz hands. No judgement here.

Trees are really important. They’re pretty and leafy and they grow and make oxygen (used for breathing) and if it wasn’t for them we wouldn’t have the awesome tree house out the back of the office that I go to sometimes when I’m sleepy or bored or angry because I’m hungry or that one time when somebody broke the arm off my yellow Power Ranger and tried to blame one of the truck drivers. And without our tree house where would we hold our staff meetings and come up with all our best ideas and decide what the super secret password will be for next week and who’s turn it is to be lookout and who’s turn it is to bring lunch tomorrow and who keeps forgetting that I don’t like vegemite sandwiches unless they’re cut into triangles with the crusts off? Yep, trees are important. We love trees so much that we’re in cahoots now with Greenfleet who help us love trees even more…

I’ll be honest, when I was first told that we were going to meet a new gang called Greenfleet who love trees as much as we do, I got a little bit territorial. Okay, okay, I stormed up to the tree house, put the super secret invisible force field up, raised the pirate flag and wouldn’t come down til Mum came and said I had to.  But after she gave me some sultanas and changed the dressings on my Power Ranger’s dislocated shoulder, I was willing enough to meet the new kids and see what they’re like. They. Are. Awesome. They don’t just love trees. They have forests where they plant more trees. Know what forests are good for? Playing Robin Hood.

Even though I’m pretty sure the trees in Sherwood Forest are a bit taller than the shrubs we’re prancing around in ours (a tree that you can step over doesn’t provide the best shelter from a throng of oncoming enemy arrows), we put on our Lincoln green every lunch time and set about catching all the baddies. I’ll admit there were some early disputes about who gets to be Robin Hood and who’d be wearing a ringleted wig and a petticoat as Maid Marian, but we resolved them like grown-ups once everyone realized that my dad can make the best cardboard swords. Sometimes we get the neighborhood kids in on the action and the kids from Hepburn Wind are the best because we’ve known them for ages and they’re allowed to stay out after dark on Fridays. And sure, some townsfolk seem a little weirded out with the sight of fully-grown adults running around in tunics and tights throwing sticks at each other. But we’ll see who’s weird once we’ve overthrown the monarchs, returning justice to all and there’s a big parade that we throw ourselves in the town square. Although it probably wouldn’t hurt our image if a certain sales rep didn’t insist on having his tunic quite so short.

Adam’s enviably feminine legs aside, Greenfleet and Hepburn Wind are awesome friends to have. Greenfleet are helping us to offset our carbon footprint by planting trees for every single ounce of energy we use which is super important because any good outlaw knows never to leave a footprint.  And Hepburn Wind is Australia’s very first community owned wind farm and we support them with funds to create renewable energy which we aim to be fully reliant on here at headquarters making us exactly like Robin Hood in a rob-from-the-rich-and-give-to-the-poor kind of way. Except for none of the money was stolen and I don’t even know who the rich are in this metaphor but it’s important to keep drawing comparisons because otherwise it might be weird that I’m sitting in a tree house wearing pantyhose and a green hat with a jaunty red feather.

If you want to know more about the coolest outlaws around you can visit their websites. Or you can come ask me in person. Tomorrow is stocktake so I’ll probably have a tummy ache and be in the tree house all day. The password is littlejohn, bring snacks.

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Apparently, lots of different cities have food. Which is confusing and frankly inconsiderate. As a seasoned traveler who’s owned houses in more than two (less than four) different Monopolies, I don’t appreciate having to worry about what I’ll be eating on my worldly adventures that have seen me check into eleven different places on Facebook.  My concern is this: how do I know if I will like a city’s food until I get there? And how do I know where to find the food that I want at the temperature that I like? And what if it’s too late by then because Mum forgot to pack my emergency supply of freeze-dried Doritos and canned Tiny Teddies? Nightmare.

The good news is that there’s really no need to be too panicked about travelling to the exotic far-aways of Woolloomooloo or Paddington or Community Chest. Well, you can be a little bit scared but not too scared. Feel free to be Desperate-Housewives-is-in-its-final-season alert but not Terri-Hatcher-hasn’t-got-any-definitive-new-projects-lined-up alarmed. But how to avoid potential starvation and / or  culinary disaster? Um, it’s easy peasy cross my heart no duh infinity. To find out about a city’s food you can visit a “Taste Of City” show and taste all the different not to mention available food and drinks and people a city offers (yes of course people have different tastes depending on the city they are in – lick someone and then go to a different place and lick somebody there, you’ll see).

So we trooped off to Taste of Sydney to a] find out how many jars of preserved Fruit Loops and dehydrated Pop Tarts we’d need to pack on any future visits to the Bondi Vet set (a golden retriever who’s been attacked by a parrot shouldn’t be the only one allowed to lick Dr Chris) and b] to reassure the nervous crowds with the knowledge that you can depend on yummy, fizzy, fruity and minerally drinks being available in Sydney whenever you’re in town for a trip to the Sydney Harbor Bridge Club or whatever (talk about high stakes - the last game I went to my mouth went so dry I played my trump card way too early and it cost me the under 65s metropolitan final. That’s the last time I let Ira psych me out into thinking the bar’s gone dry. He walked away with the trophy and I was left licking ginger beer off a coaster, trying to convince Val and the girls to renew my contract for next season).

Ira’s impending epic and very public embarrassment at the hands of a whoopee cushion aside, knowing that you don’t have to BYO mineral water on any interstate travel saves a lot of luggage space not to mention the time and tears wasted at domestic check-in when security realizes that your hand luggage is full of glass bottles and you’re left with no choice but to chug down a long weekend’s supply of organic cola before spending a very uncomfortable 70 minutes at high altitude trying to suppress the amount of gas that can only be produced by boat-racing ten liters of carbonated soft drink. It’s really no way to make new friends (travel bingo is the way. You’ll have the whole cabin asking who the cool cat is with the plastic bingo set and the bag of Columbines. Trust me).

To borrow a term from my bridge buddies, our Taste of Sydney stand was pretty bingo-bango-bongo. Unlike the fridges at certain bridge clubs that will remain nameless, ours were well stocked and psychological warfare free. Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t Calombaris or Zumbo pulling all the babes. I guess word got around pretty quickly that there was a mineral water enthusiast who’s recently won second prize in a beauty contest and collected $10 for their trouble working the water stand. And Ira said I’d never pull again in this town. Never underestimate the power of local mineral water and a fail-safe pick-up line. Now, before I go I just have to ask, is that a Columbine in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?

I don’t trust change. Never have, never will.  I mean, why make something different when it’s already pretty good? Name me one thing that’s been made any better by change and I’ll name you something incredulous that you wouldn’t believe because it’s impossible and totally unimaginable and could never happen no matter what and would sure teach you a lesson (note to self: think of a list of those things just in case, you don’t want to look stupid later). So, yeah, change is the worst.

Lucky for me and change-haters everywhere, all old things become new again one day. So if you can just resist change long enough, you’ll be cool eventually and you can claim you were doing it first. It’s what the hipsters do - stay ahead of the trends by looking backwards and never forwards. Good advice when you’re riding your penny-farthing down Gertrude Street, good advice when you’re deciding what length jeans to wear. And hells yeah, staying true to my lycra power suits throughout the more breathable fabric favoring naughties was hard and at times pretty awkward work. And sure, a year ago you might have laughed at my stockpile of tasseled push-down socks and water-proof stirrup pants. And yes, since getting around town on my sweet “new” one-wheeler there have been more recorded penny-farthing related accidents in Melbourne since 1880. But yesterday I saw a group of hipsters riding backwards on horseback in Brunswick so who’s laughing now?

Still, you can imagine that when I was taken aside one day last week and told that DHMSCO would be releasing not one but two new drinks, I maybe freaked out a little bit. Threats were made, my pre-colonial urban bonnet was thrown, and more than one limited edition signed Baywatch poster was destroyed. That’s when I should have known I’d gone too far - you just don’t mess with the Hoff in Speedos. I’m genuinely sorry about that. But when not even a cordless phone maimed David Hasselhoff was enough to convince a clearly delirious staff that change is how Saved by the Bell: The New Class got made, I did what any mature, cool-headed adult would do: I threatened to destroy the entire mineral water industry and then called my mum to come get me.

After Mum calmed me down with a sippy cup of apple juice and a hard boiled egg with buttered soldiers, I agreed to take a look at these two “new drinks:” Organic Lemon Lime Bitters and Organic Orange Soda. Organic Lemon Lime Bitters and Organic Soda! Even despite the hyperventilating and tyrannical swearing, it was becoming clear that actually, they really weren’t as offensive as I’d assumed they’d be.  The labels are contemporary retro (yeah it’s a thing), the bottles could easily have been recycled from my last abandoned milk bar party, and the taste is frankly Hoff-in-jocks dribble inducing. Conclusion: what could be more hipster or more amazingly forwards-backwards than sitting on an upside down rubbish bin outside a roasting-warehouse-meets-nana’s-sitting-room styled café, ordering an Organic Orange Soda float? Nothing, that’s what. Unless you do it while you’re wearing a poncho as a skirt. Which would prompt me to doff my propeller cap to you. Or it would if I hadn’t already done it weeks ago. Sheesh.

DHMSCO’s new organic Orange Soda and Lemon Lime Bitters have landed. Make sure you get in before the hipsters do. Because once I’ve tied some string to one of the empty bottles and used it as a satchel, you won’t be able to get your hands on one anywhere.

So this whole internet thing really took off, huh? I remember being told about it a few months ago and I was all “Inter-wha? It’ll never last. I didn’t buy shares in telegrams and pigeon mail because they’re not awesome.”  But then I saw The Social Network (not to become better informed, but because J.T has – allegedly - been the recipient of one too many pigeon-grams and consequently, seeing his movies in 3D is as close to Sir Timberlake as the recently invoked restraining order allows) and it started to dawn on me that if Justin’s taking the time to make a movie about the interwebbity, maybe there’s more to it than I originally thought.

So I had a bit of a poke around and after tearing myself away from justhot4justin.com and then justinspeedos.org and finally, justinstimber.net (turns out this one was actually a timber sales yard in Adelaide, although the owner Justin was happy to send me some personal polaroids, and from that angle the resemblance really is uncanny - I’m also looking at ordering a few hundred meters of Baltic pine) I’ve conceded that yeah, there are some bits and pieces going on in the WWW and yeah, some of them are kind of awesome. Obviously I’ve dabbled in the blog writing market, but when I click “post” I until recently assumed that meant post literally, like by mail, pigeon, whatever…

“Goodbye fair blog, and up another point go my beloved telegram stocks, as strong today as they were during WWI. God bless the stock exchange and all who sail in her.”

I haven’t Wikipedeed it yet but I’ve a sneaking suspicion that a dapperly dressed gent in a brass buttoned suit with a harmonica in his pocket and a nattily combed moustache isn’t arriving at Internet’s front door to announce my posts with quaint yet assertive aplomb. Apparently I haven’t been doing my shares any favours stop

Still, I’ve decided to embrace the online scene. I’ve been trying to contact Bill Gates to see if I can be a partner or president or whatever, but unless you count the twelve disheartened telegram boys who’ve arrived back on my doorstep and thirty-nine emphysemic pigeons, no response as yet. Is it crazy that I feel like there should be a way I can contact him directly? Like an intermail or a net-message? If you know of something like that, instant telegram me. In the meantime, I’m utilizing as much cyber space as I possibly can. I’ve made some totally amazing new friends, like Chris who’s got some seriously creative ideas about attracting celebrity attention…

And while I was at it I thought hey, since I’m pretty much spending my entire workday refreshing JT’s twitter feed and chatting online to babes, I might as well bring my work online with me. I mean if Chris can go on to create a mildly successful music career online, who am I to dismiss the strength of the web?

Which is why DHMSCO has gone full internet. Boom. Click on the picture of Simon the Online Shop Keeper (should he be getting the full salary plus benefits we’re paying him for guarding the web-shop? I’m still not sure…) on the right of your screen there and be transported to a magical place where mineral water comes by the case and a t-shirt can appear on your torso in the merest click of a button!

Impressive isn’t it? Equally as impressive is the delivery of a case of Blood Orange by a team of carrier pigeons. Or if pigeons with the beak strength of a hippogriff don’t excite you (pfft!), keep in mind that we’re coming into summer which means short shorts for the telegram boys if you catch my drift (that’s a winking face, apparently they’re all the rage online). Service with a smile and a well-oiled indecently exposed thigh? The internet really is a magical place…

Oh and if anyone’s got any spare food they’d be willing to donate to feed a sizeable flock of pigeons and some particularly fussy telegram boys who refuse to eat refined sugar while I’m waiting for some stocks to liquidate using some of the best micro investing apps Australia, please contact me asap!!