#santa2019

What the world needs now …

Christmas is coming. Exactly what that means to you depends on a whole lot of variables. To us here at Legless.tv, it means summer weather patterns have settled in, sort of, and we’re winding up the working year while staring down the barrel at a long spell of onshore slop which may or may not be punctuated - possibly - by early cyclones and some more than welcome swell. Elsewhere in the world, Indo’s had some unseasonal swell, Hawaii’s been  turning it on for one and all, South Africa has seen waves and, although it might be colder than a pre-loved pisshole in the snow, even Europe seems to be getting some wave action. Here on the East coast of Oz, it’s traditionally the season to be merry, and also the season of sunscreen, bluebottles and bodysurfing mushburgers after frying the soles of your feet on a frantic dash across the sand. But all that’s of little real import. We have bushfires.

A long time ago, bushfires seemed to happen far away, in unfamiliar remote places where few people lived and we heard about everything a day or so after it happened. Now, fire is everywhere. It seems the entire country – and this is a big one - has been blanketed with smoke at one time or another this year. On the East coast our bushfire season used to get underway around December and ramp up through January. This year it began at the start of August. Five months later, the fires are still going, and not just on the East coast, and there’s nothing to suggest they’re going to stop. Australia’s a big country, all of it’s affected, and nobody really knows how it’s going to pan out: we’re in uncharted territory.

So, while you’re sweltering through the blazing hot summer days, while you hop across the sand for yet another swim to cool down, spare a thought for our firefighters, volunteers and professionals, and all the other poor bastards out in the bush and the ‘burbs. They can’t jump in the sea to cool down. They’re stuck with heat, fire, smoke and more heat, all the while wondering if they’ll be able to save their house/animals/neighbours/selves. That, for now and the foreseeable future, is summer in Australia.

Legless.tv has a little personal interest in this: we have a firefighter in our midst. We don’t talk about any of this stuff between us, but this Christmas especially seems a damned good time for us all to acknowledge the responsibilities our firies shoulder in protecting people and property, the risks they face daily in doing so, and the debt we all owe them for doing it. To say it’s a serious business doesn’t even begin to come close. Lives have been lost. We owe these brave people.