Tis' the season for reflection, consolidation and partying. With that in mind, fridaysixpm will be taking a hiatus of sorts over the next month while I think and play. I'm not ruling out sporadic posting by any means.

Happy holiday season everyone.

UPDATE #1: I'll definitely be back posting every weekday by January 5th.

UPDATE #2: If anyone would like to send a "hiatus breaker", I'll happily publish.

The Hawaii-based Pacific Magazine recently named John Howard as its Pacific Man of the Year. First, I find it ironic that a man hell-bent on participating in war in Iraq is presented with an award involving the word "pacific."

Second, I find Pacific Magazine's justification of Howard's award unconvincing. Certainly Australian intervention in the Solomon Islands was a good call, as far as I can tell, and seems to have had a positive effect. But can we really say that Howard's focus is on the Pacific region, given the dominant role that our relationship with the US has played over the year? And what about the "Pacific Solution" to Australia's alleged problem with asylum seekers? How helpful has that been for Nauru?

About all we can hope for is that pride in the award will encourage the Liberal government (if it stays in power) to renew its efforts to maintain harmonious relationships with in the Pacific region: a bit like an encouragement award.

In the heat haze which has settled on Melbourne during this week (27 degrees last night! 36 today!) it's hard to think in more than fragments. Gwyn-sect married Chris Martin. Good on her, I guess. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King is meant to be absolutely brilliant. Inside, I'm leaping for joy, but at the computer, I'm limply folded over the keyboard.

So it's good that there's at least one story that's put a kick into my typing fingers: the High Court yesterday ruled that a gay couple who would be forced to live "discreetly" in their home country could be granted refugee status in Australia for that reason. It's a world-first! This means it has the potential to influence other jurisdictions. It also might influence other cases, such as women who refuse to wear traditional dress, since the Court rejected the idea that the onus is on the applicant to hide from persecutors.

So, hooray and thank god for the judiciary. At least there's one forum in Australia where human dignity and freedoms are the focus, rather than the government's bloody-minded adherence to poll-driven policy.

Isn't it interesting that we don't change the 'y' to an 'ie' when spelling Grammys? Maybe just interesting for me. Whatever mystical grammatical forces they have at their command, the Grammys are on tonight. I've been feeling lately that 2003 was a rather disappointing year for me, musically. Total highlights have been:

* Beyonce, Crazy in Love (single and clip)
* Radiohead, Hail to the Thief (album)
* Cat Power, You are Free (album and concert)

And that's about it for twelve entire months. I have a soft spot for Kelly Clarkson and Christina Aguilera - getting "Dirrrrty" stuck in my head has helped no end with the Christmas Carol Torture I endure at work. As for the Grammy nominees, my picks (in selected categories) are based on "If Beth Were Boss of the Entire World These People Would Be Rewarded" criteria:

Record of the Year: Beyonce, Crazy in Love. Sexy Sexy Sexy. Coldplay are not allowed to win under any circumstances. Black Eyed Peas, Eminem and Outkast are all acceptable nominees, so I won't feel too upset if they win.

Album of the Year: Missy Elliott, Under Construction. Yeah! Or perhaps Elephant, the White Stripes, even though I don't own it (they're so cool). If Justin or Evcanescecnce win, someone will pay.

Song of the Year: Every nomination in this category is categorically awful, from Christina's "Beautiful" to Avril's shmuckiness.

Best Dance Recording: Groove Armada, Easy, all the way. And no more awards for Kylie Minogue ever.

Best Traditional Pop: How traditional can pop be? What a weird category! The genre is like, only about 50 years old. Maybe it should be "best old person singing pop", cause the nominees are Rod Stewart, Bette Midler etc.

There are 105 categories, so I'll just make the observation that there should be enough Grammys to go around. It's a season for sharing and caring, after all.

Last night I made my way to "Videos That Rock", part of the resfest program showing at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Federation Square. For an hour and a half, I watched some of the best (US and European) music videos from last year on the big screen. It was such a treat! My personal favourites were the videos for The White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army", Goldfrapp's "Strict Machine" and Queens of the Stone Age's "Go With the Flow." Lots of red, and strange shapes, and watchability.

I noticed two things. First, almost none of these creative, forward-looking videos actually showed substantial chunks of a person singing (I think Goldfrapp, Radiohead and Super Furry Animals were the only exceptions). Many of the videos used the song more as a soundtrack. That seemed to turn the clip into a jointly-authored work between director and musicians.

Second, at the end of the session I felt bloked out. That's a technical term, and it means that I found the whole experience rather testosterone-filled. I remember reading somewhere that one of the reasons there are so few female directors in Hollywood is that one of the main entry points is through music videos, and these are primarily directed by men. It showed last night - there were so many male fantasy shots (girls in bikinis, car chases, bank robberies, more cars, nerdy lab science, buildings falling down etc). Most of the bands were male, too - real Triple M cock rock stuff.

It's a pity. To restore the balance I would have added these more girl-oriented and equally excellent clips: Tori Amos' "Sort of Fairytale" and Missy Elliott's "Work It". I'm sure there are others if you look.

I knew there'd be problems working in retail at Christmas, and I was pretty sure those problems would be accompanied by synthesisers and saccharine voices. Yes - the 5-track Christmas CD on permanent rotation in my department store has driven me insane, and it's only December 4th.

Admission: I prefer traditional Christmas carols (file that away with "does crosswords" and "calls television stations to complain about news coverage"). Your Silent Nights and Joy to the Worlds manage to be special and festive without first being coated with a cubic kilometre of sickly sentimentality.

But even within the genre of new Christmas Carols - the ones without any religion, I guess, that they feel compelled to play in public - I'm starting to prefer the old favourites. Frosty the Snowman and I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas are hands down winners on the aforementioned work CD, purely because they have (a) melodies and (b) internal vocabularies exceeding 10 words.

The worst of the worst? A little ditty called Santa Claus Got Stuck In My Chimney. It's sung by a middle-aged woman pretending to be 5 (she even talks about "Daddy"??!!), and it goes a little something like this:

Santa Claus got stuck in my chimney,
stuck in my chimney, stuck in my chimney,
Santa Claus got stuck in my chimney,
When he came last year.

Repeat!

Blah blah, blah...not quite up, and not quite down!

Santa Claus got stuck in my chimney,
stuck in my chimney, stuck in my chimney,
Santa Claus got stuck in my chimney,
When he came last year.

Sheesh. It's enough to drive people back to Jesus. And there's my other nemesisical number, which is sung (and I kid you not) to the tune of "nyah nyah nee-nyah nyah." All three notes of it:

I'm getting nothing for Christmas
I'm getting nothing at all.

I can see why, beeyatch, if you whinge like that all year! My only consolation is that times like these bond a community. All the sales assistants have perfected the supportive eye-roll that accompanies the involuntary shudder around tracks 2 and 4. We cover for the person who needs to go outside and scream, we've accumulated the stash of ear plugs. We'll get through this together.

The narrow leadership ballot that delivered Mark Latham as the new ALP leader was greeted by John Howard with the following words:

Not only is the Labor Party bitterly divided over policy but now it's bitterly divided over personality and leadership.

To which I say, at least the ALP has personality over which to be divided. Personality in bucketloads, if we're talking about Mark Latham. The plain-speaking, aggressive, edgy 42 year old will without a doubt make federal politics more interesting. The choice by the ALP was risky but brave and necessary: as Mike Rann said, "A low-risk strategy basically is a losing strategy."

But will Latham move Labor, and Australia, in a good direction? It's hard to tell. Latham has focused attention on "outsiders" - those living in the suburbs - and has correspondingly disassociated himself from the "insiders" - the wealthy, and the inner-city dwelling educated elites. Such a division may be a bit simplistic, a move towards One Nation style appeals, and bad news for thinkers, but it could also produce popular and positive policy outcomes.

We'll see. And despite his assurance that he'll be a larrikin Aussie who tones down the crudity, I hope Latham still finds a way to incorporate "suckholes" into his political vocabulary.

However cute one's ass may be, it cannot make up for a total absence of personality, charisma and talent. As I watched Kylie perform and present at the European MTV awards, I was reminded of several hateable aspects of the supposed Aussie pop princess. First, she still cannot sing in any convincing sort of fashion. Australia was right to call her the Singing Budgie. England was wrong to embrace her. Across three decades of releasing albums, Kylie is yet to demonstrate anything other than a lamentably thin, tinny voice that is only made bearable by extensive computer modification.

Second, her accent is just plain weird. Sort of British, sort of Australian, sort of posh, with a hint that she might be trying to appear friendly. There is nothing natural about the way she speaks - Kylie is like a doll who blurts out pre-recorcded phrases when you pull a string.

Kylie is unattractive. I don't mean she isn't pretty - she's got a perfect littly body and a cute face - it's just that her overall presentation is cold and repellent. Again, it's like a plastic doll somehow got a recording contract. The cosmetic surgery she's had done is starting to show, making her look even less human. It's no wonder she appeals to gay men and calendar-buyers: her (hetero)sexuality is remote, passive.

Kylie is a glossy blank screen, with a talented songwriting and production team. She is not someone in whom Australians can take pride. She is a freak of the postmodern pop world - marketing without product - and for me, even the marketing is distasteful.

Happy first day of summer! In Melbourne, it's cold and raining, but hey. At least there's some unexpected poetry in the final paragraph of George Megalogenis' article, Facing new home truths:

Work-family is one of those hopelessly bureaucratic terms that fail to define what we are supposed to be talking about. In new Australia, as in old Australia, we engage in discussion by buzz words. It is the dialogue of the deaf, in which opposing sides shout at one another from the trenches of their prejudice.

It's not a bad article, either. It argues that women going back to work very soon after having a child has less to do with feminism, and more to do with materialism - hi-fis, televisions and expensive home loans. We need two-income families now. And the shift has happened just over the last decade.

There's also some exploration of gender-inequity in the workplace: "In August 2001, women held just 28 per cent of the 765,000 positions of authority in the economy [eg managers and administrators]." There may be many reasons for that figure, but it still sucks - I mean, 28% is really low.

Anyway, interesting article, and it's an extract from a book which might be worth a flick through: "Faultlines: race, work and the politics of changing Australia."