So we’re now into the final week of May, the 7-year-olds have been booted out of government, and because nothing interesting happened on May 25, I’ll make note of a historical event from May 24…

In 1998, the legendary spearheads Tony Lockett and Jason Dunstall faced off for the last time in the Sydney vs Hawthorn clash at the SCG, in a game that featured Plugger kicking 11 goals, including his 1200th goal, joining The Chief and Gordon Coventry as the only players in the 1200 Goal Club.

That gives the game the historical distinction of being the only game in VFL/AFL history to feature two 1200 goal kickers on the field, and another interesting fact is that it’s the last game in league history to feature two 1000 goal kickers, as Dunstall retired at the end of 1998, leaving Plugger as the last 1,000 goalkicker in the league, until Lance Franklin reached the millennium this year.

Randomly enough, today is also 45 years to the day since Star Wars was released

Among the many insane stories that came from the production & release of A New Hope, like the fact that a mere 32 theatres in the United States screened the film on it’s opening day, was that George Lucas was so certain the film would flop that he spent the opening day in a Los Angeles sound studio, then he went to Hawaii with then-wife Marcia and friend Steven Spielberg to escape what he thought would be an enormous flop, only to see a TV report on the enormous lines to see the film, which was when he realised that Star Wars was the greatest financial hit in the history of cinema.

Of course, the other noteworthy event of that fabled trip to Hawaii?

Indiana Jones was created.

“I remember George got word that all the 10-o’clock-in-the-morning shows had sold out all across the country. And at that point George was the most giddy I had ever seen him in all the years prior to that that I had ever seen him. He was just beside himself, with relief more than anything else. He had been inward for a long time, waiting for those numbers, and then he turned to me, he said, “So what are you going to do next?” And I told him that I wanted to, for the second time, approach [film producer] Cubby Broccoli, who had turned me down the first time, to see if he would change his mind and hire me to do a James Bond movie.

And George said, “I’ve got something better than that. It’s called Raiders of the Lost Ark.” He pitched me the story, and I committed on the beach.”

Steven Spielberg’s interview with Vanity Fair, January 2, 2008

It’s nice to see Nike produced something to help Rafael Nadal celebrate that historic Australian Open win

From what I saw on Monday, it appears Nadal is now sporting an Australian Green & Gold outfit for the French Open, which he ironically wore against an Australian (Jordan Thompson) in Round 1.

It’s akin a scene from the 12th Man:

“Rafael Nadal too, looking very smart in his lemon yellow.”

“Lemon Yellow? That’s Australian Gold my friend, and don’t you ****in’ forget it! Lemon Yellow indeed…”

There’s a strange correlation between Richmond and Essendon fighting on Election Day, and a subsequent Labor victory

May 18, 1974: Richmond defeat Essendon in a game marred by violence (The Battle of Windy Hill), Gough Whitlam’s Labor win the Federal Election that night

May 21, 2022: Richmond defeat Essendon in a game marred by violence, Anthony Albanese’s Labor win the Federal Election that night

Further to this completely useless fact, every time Richmond and Essendon have played on Election Day, which is 1974, 1987 and 2022, Labor has won the Election.

What you can’t see in this all-time great photo is about 400 Richmond & Essendon fans punching each other in the background

It looks like those great shots of New Orleans Saints fans wearing bags on their heads in the Superdome during the 1980s, when they were affectionately known as ‘The Aints’.

After a score review from the AEC, we can confirm the final score for the 2022 Political Premiership

There may be a few more behinds after the final siren over the coming days, but Saturday night saw a comfortable 3-goal win to the Labor Redlegs, 75-57, claiming their first Political Premiership since the Hung premiership of 2010, and their first outright Premiership since 2007, so congratulations to Captain-Coach Anthony Albanese, ‘Gentleman Jim’ Chalmers, Penny Wong and the rest of the Labor team, and weren’t there scenes when Albo and Chalmers accepted the cup from Kevin Rudd!

As expected, the Menzies Medal for best afield went to Senator Wong for her performance in the midfield, the Billy McMahon Medal for worst on ground went to Kristina Keneally, and I think the decisive blow for the ALP was during the 2nd Quarter, when a couple of Teal-clad pitch invaders got onto the field and smashed Josh Frydenberg’s shoulder in a career-ending injury, John Howard pinged a hamstring while campaigning in Bennelong, then Ken Wyatt broke his ankle after a hard tackle from Tania Lawrence in Hasluck, forcing the Libs to play the 2nd Half with one on the bench, which unfortunately for them was Katherine Deves.

So as to be expected with those key injuries, the Labor defence were rarely threatened as the LNP’s avenues to goal and a majority lead dried right up, especially with Chalmers and Richard Marles keeping Barnaby Joyce and Simon Birmingham goalless, and Birmingham’s frustrations boiled over when he went on the ABC in the 4th Quarter and gave away several 50 metre penalties for umpire dissent, leading to Albanese kicking the game-sealing goal.

See if you can vaguely make out what this donkey voter voted for above the line on Saturday night

I think he preferenced it from A through to S, instead of 1 through to 6.

Benoit Paire, immediately after losing in Round 1 at the French Open, segues straight into one of the great takes on the world’s richest exhibition tennis tournament at Wimbledon next month

I admire his honesty.

Ariarne Titmus is now the 400m Freestyle Olympic Champion AND World Record Holder, so to that I say Merry Titmus Everyone

Appropriately, Dean Boxall was captured going off his collective face, just as he was in the Tokyo Olympics when he humped a guard rail.

I knew it couldn’t be a coincidence that Harvey Norman started belting out the Ariarne Titmus brand ambassador ads this passed weekend….

Like Ariarne, they were 8 lengths ahead of the pack.

Hawthorn don’t have any fit ruckman for Saturday night’s game against the Gold Coast

While there could be a claim that it’s poor list management, for context, a club like Melbourne only have 2 permanent ruckmen on their list (Max Gawn & Luke Jackson), but even Melbourne haven’t suffered a run like this:

First-choice ruckman (And captain) Ben McEvoy fractured his neck in a training collision in March, and won’t play until the end of the year.

Second-choice Ned Reeves dislocated his shoulder in Round 5 and is still a few weeks away from playing.

And on Sunday, third-choice Max Lynch suffered a second head knock of the season and will have to spend a week in concussion protocols.

In fact, Max Lynch’s luck this season is something else – Concussed in Round 1 against North, then he was a Covid close contact, then he suffered anaphylaxis from a bee sting before Round 5, got through Rounds 6-9 despite having to undergo another concussion test in Round 8 against Essendon (He passed), then he got in another head clash in the last quarter against Brisbane.

So, don’t be surprised if Jarrod Witts has a field day in Darwin on Saturday night against comparative 6 foot 4 midgets Mitch Lewis and Jacob Koschitzke.

If things go as expected, then Australia’s next Opposition Leader will be Ralph Fiennes

Mark McGowan telling the Federal press pack to take a long hard look at themselves after their behaviour during the Election campaign

Of course, the national press pack realising they’ve behaved like dickheads is about as likely as my dog deciding to hop in the bath instead of routinely licking her privates, as shown when the shrieking banshees followed Albanese to the Quad meeting in Japan, and kept shouting questions towards the PM and President Joe Biden, and it took that American lady a solid 8 attempts at ‘Thank You’ to get the message across and kick the lot of them out.

Yes, who’d have thought that shrieking in a country like Japan, where silence is a way of life, would go down so poorly.

I wonder at what point do you stop saying ‘Thank you’ and start leaning towards ‘The Angels’ Approach…

No way, get fu-

And finally, for the third year running, the return of the Finnish MotoGP has been put to bed, this time because of the Russo-Ukrainian War affecting Homologation work on the KymiRing

So you’re telling the Finnish track isn’t Finnished?