The Daley Rant

In the ’90s, goals were a big deal. It was the buzz-word in education and business and sport. Set a goal. Make it achievable. Make it clear and specific. Then go for it. It seemed you couldn’t so much as order a burrito without having some medium-long-term goal attached.

I got into it because I was studying a lot. Short term goal: Do a 3u maths practice paper. Medium term goal: Get XYZ marks. Long term goal: [world domination]. Easy.

But then school ended and, suddenly, I didn’t give a damn about [world domination]. As you can see, that’s a place-holder. I don’t know what I thought my long-term goal was. Maybe that’s the problem. All I know is, everything suddenly shifted. The century turned and I looked up from my desk and asked “What else is there?”

Then I got smacked in the face with an [anvil]. That’s a place-holder too. Sort of.

Suffice it to say, I’d missed quite a bit while my head was down looking at binomial theorem and international relations between the wars. It was like arriving on another planet. And whatever it was that I thought I could be or achieve was irrelevant.

So much of life is beyond your control. What if your goal depends heavily on the whims, passions, and powers of other people? Are you meant to just ask the universe to make everything align in your favour? And if it doesn’t, is it just that you didn’t ask nicely enough? What if none of these external factors go your way? Does that make you a failure?

I stopped believing in goals. Maybe I never did. For starters, I never understood what ‘achievable’ meant. Achievable for you, specifically? How do you know what that is – especially before the fact?

I don’t believe in lofty goals. I believe in deadlines. I need a given date, a given time and a particular purpose or pay-off. Some say this is how goals should work too, but how often is that the case? Why set the date at August 16th when September 25th wouldn’t make a jot of difference? Why make your word count 50,000 when it could be 49,847 or 68,125?

I’ve never been very good at narrowing life – or even my attention span – down to one thing. Saying yes to one thing means saying no to another. I have immense admiration for people who can set their sights on one sole, spectacular goal, and pursue it relentlessly their whole lives. Olympians, for example. Or ballet dancers. Or worker bees.

But in my experience, not setting goals makes me a happier, and certainly a more sane, person. If I’m not always striving for something, I’m not always falling short of something. Give me a lofty goal and I’ll probably fail. Give me 16 bars to learn by 5pm and it’ll be done. Tasks with deadlines.

Satisfaction to me doesn’t necessarily mean being or having anything in particular. Rather, it comes from completely enjoying each good thing that comes your way. Knowing you did a good job with the task at hand. Being present. Soaking every good moment in completely, and not expecting or demanding anything more of it than it is prepared to give. And letting it go when it’s time, to only occasionally look back with a contented nod that you did all you could and all you wanted. Being grateful.

And yet, I’m haunted by the notion that if you don’t see yourself anywhere in particular in five years’ time, that’s exactly where you’ll be.

…Humble pie

1. Sydney Opera House. I called you a jerk when you are, in fact, awesome. I called you to task and you stepped up. I’m going to write you a nicey nice feedback letter of thanks. And maybe make you a mix-tape. You have two ears and a heart, right?

2. Time is never time at all. So I thought I’d be able to do all sorts of other things with my time before and during the run of [title of show]. In reality, outside theatre time, I’ve been able to eat, sleep and occasionally wash things.

3. Promises, promises. I pledged not to whinge about the cold this winter. Yeah, about that…

Hi there,

I’m writing to make a complaint about SOH telephone box office.  The person I spoke to last Saturday – a man with a North American accent – was incredibly rude and patronising.  Worse still, the ticketing info he gave me was incorrect.

I phoned to book tickets for three shows in a package deal.  I’d only just mentioned the word ‘package’ when the man immediately assumed I’d got it all wrong.

“You can’t just book any three shows!” he said.

I told him I was booking three Adelaide Cabaret shows, and he momentarily settled down.  Then I started listing the tickets I wanted, which included some student concession tickets.

“You don’t get a discount on concessions.”

I hadn’t come across that on the website, so I queried it.

“If you look up the definition of concession, you’ll find it means it’s already a reduced price,” he sniped. “It’s the same thing.”

He needs to consult a dictionary himself because, ostensibly, he doesn’t know the difference between ‘concession’ and ‘discount’.

I said it might not be worth my while then and I’d have to double-check.  He told me to “do the math”.

Then I checked your website. It says: “Packages apply for concession as well as full-priced tickets.”

So not only was this person rude and patronising – he was WRONG.

I was so infuriated it put me off booking the 7 tickets my friends and I wanted.  We are all arts enthusiasts aged under 30.  I assumed SOH might want to nurture a younger audience.  Employing people like this man is not a good way to go about it.

Any performer would be horrified to learn that their show lost ticket sales because the phone operator was an ignorant misanthrope who treated potential patrons like idiots before they’d barely even got a word in to prove otherwise.

I would hope that this employee be replaced by a more sophisticated online ticketing system so nobody else has to experience his particular brand of ‘customer service’.

This is very disappointing and just not good enough for one of the nation’s most prestigious venues.

Yours Sincerely,
Keira Daley

…Taser temptation

1. Driven to the edge.  With some of the attitude I got in the US, I can understand someone being driven to do this.

2. Chestnuts roasting on an open fire.  Aside from its clear social benefits, I’d like a taser so I could toast marshmallows anytime, anywhere.  Just remind me not to use a metal skewer.

3. There’s nothing a taser won’t fix.  Except maybe a broken contact lens.

…Pizza

1. The clock’s ticking, dude.  I think the Ninja Turtles are responsible for my pizza obsession.  I won’t even begrudge them for once giving me the idea to bake my frozen ham-and-pineapple with jelly beans on it.

2. Gots the dough?  I’m a fan of making my own pizza because you can control the toppings (all the good stuff without the dreaded onions) and, hence, the nutrient/fat content.  Less fat in pizza = more pizza = win.  Fresh pizza dough is amazing and if a culinarily unco person like me can make it, anyone can.  I bought some pizza-specific flour (which I think means normal flour with a pizza dough recipe on the box), dried yeast, bit of salt, warm water.  Knead.  Let it expand for a coupla hours.  Divvy it up (my recipe made enough for 8 bases and you can freeze the dough for later), flatten, top, bake.  BAM.  Amazing.  

3. That wood-fired family flavour.  So there’s been a lot of hoohah about the wood used in pizza ovens in Naples – the fuss being that it may be from exhumed coffins.  Yeah, that old chestnut.  Prior to this, the hoohah was about the pizza itself – apparently the best in the world.  In Eat Pray Love, Elizabeth Gilbert talks about how pizza in Naples is so good it makes you cry with regret over all the mediocre crap you’ve ever eaten that was merely masquerading as pizza.  The stuff in Naples is the real deal.  If it’s that good, and it takes a few contraband logs to make it, then I say dig away…