Te Radar: Maximus Moronicus-style spleen-venting proves infectious

I am sure that if an enraged Russell Crowe confronted me at 4.30 in the morning I would be tempted to smash myself in the face with a telephone too, if only to make him shut up.

Our Russ (as he is parochially known, except when involved in any intemperate fracas, when he becomes "the Australian actor Russell Crowe") is a renowned method actor who apparently immerses himself completely in his roles.

In light of current allegations, it seems clear that he is preparing for his forthcoming part as Maximus Moronicus.

I can understand his anguish when it comes to issues of the telephonic variety and hotel staff.

I, too, once felt like throwing a phone at an employee of a Moscow hotel, a rather large and over-rouged Russian woman.

The fact that she happened to be in possession of my passport, which she was refusing to release until I had paid $150 for the privilege of simply dialling a number that never answered, meant I resisted my urge to assail her with said phone.

That and the fact that the swarthy concierge kept winking at me as he rubbed the butt of his submachine gun against his gently gyrating crotch. I wasn't entirely sure what he was intimating, but I can't imagine it was an entirely good thing.

It was all rather amusing, as it occurred in a hotel that took the term "room service" to extremes.

Throughout the night the hallways were constantly patrolled by packs of svelte women who randomly knocked on your door while cooing, "Administration, administration". This remains one of the best euphemisms for their particular services that I have so far heard.

Members of Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior crew were assaulted this week too - not by telephones, but by potatoes fired at them from compressed air guns on a Nelson-based fishing boat.

Given Greenpeace's stance on GM food, I found this innovative use of the potato rather humorous, as it seemed they were being assailed by what I would describe as Weapons of Mass Irony.

The reason for this tuber assault was that the Greenpeace folk were trying to prevent the boat from engaging in the most lewd of abuses against nature, bottom trawling.

Oddly, bottom trawling seems to be the preserve not only of fisher folk, but also of our politicians at the moment.

This does not refer to the quality of some of the candidates at the lower end of the various party lists, but to their quest to succeed in the MMP world, where it seems they have mistaken the term to mean Most Maligned Politician.

As the various minor parties jostle for obscurity, it appears that hate speech, rather than being banned by politicians, seems instead to be a legitimate election tactic. While demeaning to all involved, it is nonetheless hugely entertaining, and a welcome departure from tedious talk about tax.