101 Ways to Tell if You Might be Obsessed

1. You watch Play School to see if Sandy’s wife is on it.
2. You know Sandy’s wife is on Play School
3. You know the name of Paul’s girlfriend.
4. You know the names of Paul’s parents.
5. Not knowing the above two is enough to get you reaching for the razor blades.
6. You’ve found yourself crying because you missed an episode of GNW.
7. You know which GNWE regular provided the voice for the rooster in Babe.
8. You know what outfit Julie was wearing when she got arrested at a protest.
9. You know which team leader had a recurring guest role on a popular ABC kids show.
10. Not knowing seven, eight and nine is enough to send you nuts.

11. You keep having to tell your friends, “It’s not an obsession, it’s a hobby”. And they don’t believe you.
12. You find yourself singing “Dogs” in class, and wonder why people look at you strangely.
13. The number of possible alternatives that COULD be Paul’s middle name is starting to make you break out in a rash.
14. All your card games degenerate into “have you got aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaone?”
15. You do a portrait of Paul for your HSC submitted artwork.
16. You scour the ABC stores for a deck of cards with the faces of DAAS on them, just so you can play “Go Fish” with Tim and Richard.
17. You’re on a first name basis with the manager and staff of your local ABC shop, and have their home phone numbers.
18. You smile stupidly at the sight of a black, 12-string guitar.
19. You name, or re-name, your cat “Smuffy”.
20. You name your pet duck “Paddlefoot”.

21. You spend hours discussing the Big Gig with your parents.
22. You have contemplated getting a pet boa constrictor.
23. You know why contemplating getting a pet boa constrictor would make you obsessed.
24. You nickname a sibling “Thulgore”.
25. You steal Barry Crocker CD’s from your parents so you can store them next to your recording of him singing with DAAS.
26. You name your pet rat “Commahahagrrrrr”
27. If you can’t read the Sun-Herald, you have to be physically restrained from going for the kitchen knives.
28. You sleep with either GNW book (or both) or pictures of Paul under your pillow.
29. You wouldn’t dream of putting these things under your pillow, in case they got creased.
30. You rummage through second hand bookstores searching for “Book”.

31. You call every McDermott in the phone book. Just in case.
32. You call every Ferguson in the phone book. Just in case.
33. You call every Fidler in the phone book. Just in case.
34. And all the Robbins’.
35. And all the McCrossins.
36. And all the Abbotts, and Livingstons.
37. You know whom all the above surnames belong to.
38. You already know all these numbers.
39. You phone these numbers every week. Just in case.
40. All the McDermotts, Fergusons, Fidlers, Robbins’, McCrossins, Abbotts and Livingstons you’ve phoned are now either good family friends, or have restraining orders out against you.

41. The operator at the 013 function refuses to take your calls, having an automatic response of “it’s a silent number, I can’t give it to you” every time you call.
42. The people who answer the phones for GNW tickets know your full name. And you know all of theirs.
43. You seem to spend an abnormal amount of time in Bondi doing nothing. Just in case.
44. You have bookmarked every single JJJ Webcam picture page.
45. You have bookmarked every single page that you got when you ran searches for “DAAS”, “Doug Anthony Allstars”, “Paul McDermott”, “Tim Ferguson”, “Richard Fidler”, “Mikey Robbins”, “Good News Week”, etc, etc.
46. You are woken by your teacher in class after you’ve been sleeping on your desk (“tired and emotional after a night on heavy drugs” *g*), only to be asked, “Who are Tim, Paul and Richard?”
47. Paul’s, Richard’s and Tim’s faces decorate all of your schoolbooks.
48. You hit people with these schoolbooks when they look at them and say, “Who are they?”
49. You are offered a spot on community radio and turn it down when told you can’t play DAAS because it’s too “controversial”.
50. You have read the first forty-nine ways to tell if you’re obsessed, and have agreed with ANY of them.

51. You’ve played your DAAS/GNW CDs so often that your parents/siblings/pets/entire neighborhood now know all the words as well as you do.
52. You use a cross stitch pattern maker on your computer to make a cross stitch of Paul.
53. You have entire folders devoted to anyone who has worked with Tim, Paul or Richard more than three times.
54. You send over to England to get a copy of the Times the day they ran a headline along the lines of “Doug Anthony: Australian Hero”
55. You sell copies of this paper for $50 each, but won’t let the original out of your sight for more than two seconds.
56. You undertake extensive research into the actual location of the filming of Live at the National Theatre, with the sole purpose of identifying “those” two women, and the guy who demonstrated the “mating of the Bengal tigers” with Paul.
57. You want to find the “14-year-old boy” too, so you can buy those jeans.
58. Your dream car is a Tarago.
59. You find the scent of stale beer and old Big Macs strangely arousing.
60. You call those party whistles “feathered curly toots”.

61. You see children watching Sooty or Skippy and can’t stop laughing.
62. You ask parents, teachers, and complete strangers, in fact, anyone over the age of thirty if they remember Bill and Ben.
63. You know the story of Mariah Hindly (I don’t, so I don’t know how to spell it).
64. Not knowing who the hell she is (apart from Tim’s babysitter) is driving you to yell at anyone else who you ask, and who doesn’t know, and even any books you look it up in without success.
65. The only reason you ever worked out how to use the VCR was so you could set it up to make copies of DAAS.
66. You played that bit in Dead & Alive backwards to see if it really is the words to Achy Breaky Heart.
67. You’ve seen a cloud that looks strangely like (insert favourite Allstar here).
68. You start analysing the political and social references and messages in DAAS songs.
69. You try to convince your English teacher/Drama teacher/Music teacher/Uni lecturer to let the class study DAAS as popular culture/comedy/political commentary.
70. You succeed.

71. You cried when Mikey left the Brekky show.
72. You have all the episodes of Captain Pants on tape and catalogued in chronological order.
73. Sleeping through Captain Pants results in a broken alarm clock on the ground beneath your second story window.
74. You wonder if you should follow the clock for missing Captain Pants. (If so, please seek medication. Lots of it.)
75. You paused the tape you made of Mikey on Burke’s Backyard on the picture of Paul’s artwork, so you could photograph it and have it framed.
76. You paid money for a copy of the Burke’s Backyard magazine solely for the article on Mikey’s backyard.
77. You record GNW even when you’re watching it.
78. You refuse to record over your GNW tapes, no matter how often you’ve seen them.
79. You now call jellyfish, “jellyblubbers”.
80. You think that Mark Trevorrow’s real name is Bob Down.

81. Your website is called “Good Morning Muwillimbah”.
82. The only instrument you can play is the newspaper apron and whisks.
83. You fall of the lounge laughing at DAAS jokes you’ve already heard ten times.
84. You bought Andrew Denton’s/The Big Gig’s Stairway to Heaven CD for one track.
85. You have a name for each of Paul’s different hairstyles.
86. You sat through three hours of Bert Newton selling stuff for five minutes of Paul.
87. You sat up till midnight to start a tape when Paul and Mikey guest hosted Rage, and actually made a sincere effort to like the songs they liked enough to play.
88. You succeeded. (You are a sick, twisted person.)
89. You can spot a picture of Paul McDermott from fifty feet.
90. Hearing the name of anyone who has ever been involved with anyone from DAAS for anything has the same effect on you as hearing your name.

91. You called every Ticketec office, not to buy tickets, but to ask them if you could have their Rocky Horror posters.
92. Every time you leave an ABC shop, you have another fifty copies of the Unseen and Obscene ad.
93. You have written an absence note using the excuse that you were “tired and emotional after a night on heavy drugs”.
94. You unconsciously quote ANY of the CD’s or videos.
95. Every time you get on a plane, the alphabet song comes to mind.
96. You spend two hours wandering around Sydney looking for a pub called “The Sailor’s Arms”.
97. You have compiled a fact file about any Allstar, and know almost every detail of their lives, up to and including their thoughts.
98. You would be prepared to sell either, or both, parents for a copy of the WA only GNW New Years’ Eve special.
99. You intend to name your first born son Paul Timothy Richard (or any combination of the three), and your first daughter Shevaun (I can’t spell this, so sue me!).
100. You classify the day you first saw GNW live as “the best day of your life”.

101. You compile lists of obsession indicators.

102. You go to see Rocky Horror seventeen times, for Tim’s sake, and just in case they do something differently.
103. You change English classes so you can legitimately study DAAS, GNW and Paul for your HSC.
104. You’re willing to put up with studying “Frontline” for the privilege.
105. You start calling your cousins Valmae and Vinny.
106. You ask your cousin Vinny (whose name is really John), if you can shave his head.
107 Your cousins have learnt not to go along with you when you suggest games on a rainy day (after an unpleasant experience with Mr Spicklehead.)
108. You start calling your niece Smuffy, and ask her to pretend to be a pussycat.
109. You now know the names all everyone at your local newsagents after a frantic search for the SMH from Monday 7th December (undertaken on the 9th).
110 Your idea of a great Saturday night is staying at home and watching DAAS videos and old GNWs.

111. Your conversations with non-DAAS-fan friends are getting fewer and shorter, and you’re running up a huge phone bill talking to those who share your obsession.
112. You’ve programmed the number for the GNW tickets into your phone’s speed dial function in preparation for March ’99.
113. Your alarm, organiser, and anything else that can be set to make a noise at a certain time is either set for 6am, March 1st 1999 so you can get up in time to get GNW tickets, or else it’s just set for 6am every morning, so by March, you’ll be used to getting up then.
114. You make Xmas decorations by adding the faces of Tim, Paul and Richard to cardboard angels already hanging on the tree, so you can have them at your house for Xmas.
115. You get into an argument with your mother/parents about the aforementioned decorations.
116. Most of the statuettes and figurines in your house have mysteriously gained the face of Tim, Paul or Richard, a la Xmas decorations.
117. You chase Paul through a Perth mall (this one’s just for you RG and fellow Perthies!) to record his voice, and then attempt to disembowel your sister because she left the recorder on pause.
118. You trail a guy in a hat, sunglasses and a false-looking beard and moustache just because he’s carrying a black, twelve-string guitar.
119. You program “I love DAAS” into the welcome message of your mum’s mobile. (Alisso: Mandi’s mum didn’t notice for two weeks, TWO big ones!)
120. Your teacher comments that all the little doodles you’re drawing on the sides of your pages are stars, crosses, or hammers and sickles.

121. You cry when required to return the copy of “Book” you borrowed from a friend.
122. You contemplate photocopying “Book” from cover to cover, then realise that (since you’re cheap and would only photocopy in black and white) that the cover would look wrong.
123. You colour photocopy the cover.
124. You play “Commies for Christ” at a Christian Youth Group meeting.
125. You are in the middle of a long-running argument with your parents over which makes the better Xmas song, DAAS or Jingle Bells.
126. You’re having, or have had, a New Year’s Eve party with only DAAS/GNW fans invited.
127. The crowning achievement of your year is not your successful graduation from high school, it is your conversion of a sibling/friend/total stranger/all of the above to DAAS fanaticism.
128. You spend four hours on the internet trying to find out where you can get this “Paul-in-a-can” before you realise it’s a joke. *Mandi blushes furiously*
129. Chay Neal is now at the top of your list of “People to Kill”. Or torture till they “die of their own accord”.
130. Your “letters to Santa” asking for Dead and Alive, The Last Concert, etc, are being returned, accompanied by notes that say “Good children don’t like DAAS!”. Your only response is “Your point being?”.

131. You’ve only agreed to attend the family Xmas dinner on the condition that DAAS is played.
132. You scan all the entries in your guest book, and everything on MOSH, on the off chance that something there was actually written by Paul.
133. You visit Fiona Horne’s web page to see if there’s anything about Paul there. (Alisso: There was last time I looked, a nice big picture!)
134. You compare your family tree with those of Tim, Paul and Richard in the hopes of finding a connection (not too close, just close enough to give you an excuse to talk to them.)
135. You’re sent to the school counsellor for sitting in class staring at your left index finger shouting “Johnny get some clothes on!”
136. Your mother has stopped asking “What do you want for Xmas?”, knowing that your eyes will unfocus, and you’ll reply, in a dreamy voice, “Tim, Paul, Richard, or all of the above. . .”
137. Your mother is taking you to a psychiatrist about your Xmas list.
138. You watch “Psi Factor” and “X-Files” to see if Paul’s voice is a creation of man, or something else (Hi LisaH! NB: This is a reference to Solo's DKR story, where LisaH was the "something else" responsible *g*)
139. You keep an eye open while watching these shows for mentions of Commahahagrrrr.
140. You return home after a particularly stressful day to discover, while watching TV and a soup ad comes on, Paul’s exact meaning when he said “At that moment, I truly believed that Rosella knew and Rosella cared.”