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Are you okay with the fact that we pay our cleaners more than our childcare educators?

I’m not. And I haven’t been for a long, long time.

Particularly considering the epidemic in helicopter parenting, clipboard holding school shoppers, attachment parenting, after-school cramming classes, co-sleeping, ‘mummy blogs’ and general obsession with providing children with some imaginary perfect life.

The notion of ‘best care’ seems rather selective.

The obsession with the perfect diet, germ free homes, attempted social engineering by selective socialising, harm minimisation through choice of the correct fabrics, risk minimisation with helmets, knee and elbow pads, stranger danger and safe searches.

There has never been more time, energy and thought spent on the raising of babies, toddlers and children, yet we pay our childcare workers such dismal wages it’s leading to 180 childcare educators leaving the sector every week.  That’s not good. For anyone. Kids, parents or childcare educators. Why don’t we care? We should.

I am proudly un-Australian. The whole sport, barbie, tanned, blonde and beachy business was never really me. For a while I identified more with my Irish heritage. It seemed a better fit: loud-mouthed, wide hipped, total disrespect for authority, love a good yarn and a plate of spuds. All with bad teeth.

But these days, I know what I am. I am a Melburnian to the core. If I wasn’t born here, I would have moved here.

I love Melbourne. Which doesn’t mean I can’t love anywhere else. I’m with Samuel Johnson, “patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel”. I adore the breathtaking glittering city of Sydney, and Tasmania is one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been. When I was in a plane on my way to Port Douglas a few years back, I spoke to people from Los Angeles who had been travelling for more than 24 hours. I said to them, “I promise, it’s worth it.” And it was.

The mercurial Melbourne weather allows you to wear all the clothes in your wardrobe and eat all the food you love. Melburnians are informed, opinionated, love a good feed and are always up for a chat. This time of year is particularly intoxicating. Blue skies, cool nights, clothes drying quickly but warm stuff in your belly for dinner and the kids in bed early. I wake up in Melbourne, but feel as if I have died and gone to heaven.

It’s the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. I really, really love the Melbourne Comedy Festival. And no, I have not been asked to write something on the festival. I write compelled by love or truth. If I could be bought, I’d be turning tricks for advertising.

When I get my hot little hands on the festival program, my heart starts pumping as I go nuts with the red pen and the Post-It notes. I then sink as much as I can afford on tickets and babysitters. Then it’s counting down the sleeps and it’s on with the boots, tights, scarf and red lipstick and down to the Melbourne Town Hall. This dull, soulless building is transformed into an exhilarating, vibrant palace brimming with people queueing, blabbing in the bar or hanging round the coffee wagon waiting for their caffe lattes. Listen and you will hear every other person say: “This is amazing. Is it always like this?”

The whole experience is life-affirming and glorious. And the festival is like a drug; maybe it’s more like gambling, as I promise myself: “OK, just one more show.” People accost friends between shows with “What have you seen? When are they on? You’ve got to see him/her/them.”

The beauty of this festival is that it is accessible and it’s cheap. Some shows feel like a fun night out with mates, while others drag you abruptly out of your comfort zone. And others are crap and you slag them off on the way home. Which is all part of the experience. Watching the audience is almost as much fun as the show. You’ll see all types: bogans, old folks, ladies from Malvern, Goths, students, pimply teens and suburban mums and dads all hoping for something to make their hearts sing.

I always get asked for suggestions. Because the programme can induce a bit of decision paralysis.  Here are my top ten picks. 

Rhys Nicholson filthy, wrong and insane. Five stars. Must see. Total genius.

Don’t Peak At High School Crip comic Stella Young, adopted only child Fiona Scott-Norman, one-time girl Jacq de Vere and a rotating host of other comedy misfits on life after bottoming out at school.

Greg Fleet what a magnificent man and comedian. This year talking about the shame of substance abuse. 

Diana Nguyen in PhiL and Me The Vietnamese iconic sewing machine Mum, Kim Huong is insane and hilarious! Think Wogs Out Of Work. But a Vietmanese woman.

Khaled Khalafalla This guy is going to be famous. Smart accessible ethnic humour. And a spunk. 

Geraldine Hickey if you like your lesbians, laconic look no further. Equal parts hilarious and warm. 

Harley Breen Part bogan. Part genius. Solid pair of hands, cracking jokes and brillant physical comedian. 

Jack Dee an utter arseho

le, an old hand at comedy. Hates everything and everyone and touring again after six years because ‘I want to spend less time with my family’

Aleisha McCormack rising star of Melbourne comedy. How To Get Rich (directed by Julia Zemiro) is Aleisha’s second one woman show and has already had a sell out season at Fringe. 

Joel Creasy is an acid-tongued prince, a foodie, momma’s boy and total bitch. See him before you have to go to Rod Laver Arena to do it. 

Margaret Cho if you like your comedy grown up, rude and transgressive, you’ve probably already bought tickets to Margaret Cho. If not. Get cracking.

Sarah Millican sweet and caustic Nominee Barry Award 2009 Melbourne Comedy Festival. Considered “The funniest woman in Britain.” 

Stephen K Amos loves Melbourne and Melbourne loves Stephen. Slick, fast and piss funny.

Felicity Ward Returning to Melbourne for ONE NIGHT ONLY! The Hedgehog Dilemma was nominated for Best Comedy at every major comedy festival across Australia in 2012. As it bloody should have been.

Denise Scott and Judith Lucy Can’t. Go. Wrong. Like spending the evening with your naughtiest aunties.

The List Operators Looking for a family show that’s not childish, patronizing and will have you all fully coughing your lungs up, this is it. 

Here are some wild cards….. Some young up and coming ones to watch Sam Peterson and Andy Matthews, Headliners, bunch of expert US comics and Best Of British is always good.

I’m also doing a show called Curvy Crumpet, “Brassy… the audience were delighted” The Age. It was also picked in the Time Out Melbourne Comedy Festival Top 20 (see clipping above). Love to see you. I’m thrilled with it and the big noisy audiences are loving it. 8.15pm Trades Hall. 

See something. Anything. Book a night. Do three shows. I’ll babysit for you. Don’t turn around and say: “I meant to go.” There’s plenty of time to sleep when you’re dead.

THE first thing I saw as I got off the plane in London was a sign that read, “Do you want to complain?” It was like landing in Germany to “Do you want to engineer something with precision?”, the US to “Do you want to be annoyingly cheerful and tell me to ‘Have a nice day?’, made all the more irritating by the fact that you mean it?”, or Australia to “Do you want a beer and is your sister’s name Kylie?”

I asked my English friend Dan about the Brits’ reputation of complaining. “It’s not that we’re whingers,” he explained. “It’s just that we like talking and everything happens to be shit.”

I love the English. Their default setting of forming an orderly queue as soon any more than two people are assembled. Their sweetness. “Mind the gap.” Their passive racism: “Oh, Catherine, you Australians are so refreshing!” (Really? Then it must be true that 70 per cent of communication is non-verbal because your face just screamed “vulgar, coarse and tactless”.)

I love how desserts are all “puddings” and have names like Spotted Dick. And how adorable is their justification – or better still, denial – of the class system despite the existence of second-class stamps, the monarchy, hereditary titles, posh hotels that won’t serve you a drink in the bar unless you’re a guest with a room number, and the nationality of your nanny being a social marker?

I love the English response to every request as “sorry”, like they had forgotten to deal with my request, despite not possibly being able to pre-empt it. “Could you pass me my handbag?” “Oh, sorry.” “Could you tell me where the loo is?” “Terribly sorry. First on your right.” “Would you be so kind as to take off your pants, hold that chair above your head and do the hokey pokey?” “Frightfully sorry. Yes. Just a moment. How dreadfully rude of me.”

I wasn’t in Blighty for the weather. Or the food. I was there for the chat. I love how the English speak English. Words like “lodger”, “knackered” and “wankered”. Terms like “feeling poorly”, “she’s a right nutter” and “he’s a pompous git”. The fact children say “bottom” instead of “bum” in an attempt not to appear “common”, yet the pubs have names like The Badger’s Arse, The Vicar’s Cock and The Hairy Snatch.

Over a dessert of Gooseberry Fool with a bunch of people (two named Hector, and all of whom described their ageing parents as “barking”, “batty”, “bonkers” or “barmy”), a midwife spoke about labouring women. “They always want to know how it’s looking ‘down there’. I say, ‘It’s beautiful, like a gently blossoming rose, petals slowly unfurling.’ The truth is, it’s like looking down a dog’s throat.” Only an English person could come up with that.

The English are, undeniably, the funniest people on earth. How else can you explain such place names as Clench (Wiltshire), Twatt (Orkney), Dull (Perth & Kinross), Nasty (Hertfordshire) and Cuckoos Knob (North Yorkshire)? 

But what a bunch of wusses. An announcement an Clapham station; “The temperature is expected to be high.  Please take note of information on the platform posters and carry a bottle of water with you at all times.  If you are feeling unwell please approach a member of staff.” It was 23 degrees. How much did I love non-chalantly, putting on a jumper, scarf and mittens and asking if there was anywhere I could buy soup.

Two complaints. Anything I wanted to buy was double the price plus a bit more than I estimated (then convert that into pounds) made even worse by the English customer service mantra “First world prices. Third world service”.  And that the place was teaming with Australians. At one point I found myself thinking, “Crikey, there are a lot of English people here.”

I was trying to overhear the natives with their “stark raving mad” “fancy a pint” and “he’s a jumped up little plonker” but instead my ear drums were constantly pierced by screeches of, “Hey, Gaz! Check this out! What a pisser!”

Catching up with English mates I hadn’t seen for 14 years began with excited ejaculations of “You haven’t changed a bit”. Then the backpacking photos were dug  out to reveal that indeed we had and are now clapped out and middle aged.  So overwhelmed with how beautiful I looked in one photo I said,   “I wished I’d known how good looking I was back then.” My mates then corrected me “That’s not you, Catherine, you’re the fat one at the back with the face like a slapped arse.” And I was. Lie back and think of England?  Don’t mind if Ido.

I’VE HAD a few good laughs this week. One of them was driving through Malvern and seeing large photos of Peter Costello’s face in people’s front yards. “Well, that’s an effective way to deter intruders,” I thought. But I wondered why people would spend all that money on landscaping, an automatic watering system and a gardener just to go and spoil it all with a picture of The Smirking Gun.

John Howard’s coming over a bit Sir Joh at the moment, so it was refreshing to see the face of The Man Least Likely. Poor old Pete. The last time I caught a glimpse of him was during the worm poll dancing debate. The camera would occasionally cut to him in the audience and Pete would strap on the fake smile faster than you could say, “You should have gone straight for the jugular when you had that chance”. I did think it was fabulous that Costello managed to chew through his restraints and escape from his cage for the night. I’m sure they upped the sedation after that.

As I jog round the People’s Republic of Moreland puffing and wheezing in my Kevin07 T-shirt, I do enjoy the delicious irony that every front yard with a Greens placard in it is overgrown, unkempt and knee high in thistles. It’s a case of, “Sure we’re into the environment, we just can’t be stuffed mowing. We’re flat out weaving.” And it seems you can’t put up a Vote Labor board unless you have the obligatory Tibetan prayer flags flying from the veranda and a recycle bin overflowing with Coopers Red stubbies.

The Socialist Alliance may be short of money, but they’re certainly high on effort. Power poles are plastered with black and white A4 photocopies of their team, which includes a man with a goatee wearing a hood. The Honourable Member For Utopia I assume. And I thought I saw a Democrats bumper sticker the other day. But it just said “Magic Happens”. Here’s hoping.

Placards in people’s front yards are one thing. But receiving a personally addressed letter from the spouse of a candidate is hilarious, outrageous, tragic and appalling on so many levels – which leads me to the other good laugh I had this week.

Malcolm Turnbull’s wife, Lucy, (Turnbull of course, Mrs, thank you very much) wrote a personally addressed letter to the constituents of Wentworth. All 90,000 of them. She wrote because, “I thought it was important for you to have the opportunity to hear about the Malcolm I know and love”. Why? What’s with this guy? Does he get his mum to ring up work when he’s taking a day off sick as well?

Mrs Turnbull goes on to attempt to dispel the myth that he comes from a privileged background by explaining that as a child, Malcolm’s family hit rock bottom and had to move from Vaucluse to Double Bay and – shock, horror – lived in a flat. The shame. Family values. Supported my career choice. Our kids our greatest achievement.

Reading the letter smacks of “never mind how he presents, he’s actually a good bloke. Never mind the born-to-rule accent, the deep sense of entitlement and the patriarchal walk. And the nuclear reactors.” Political spouses should be not seen and not heard. Can you imagine getting a letter from Kevin Rudd’s wife, Therese Rein? “This is an automatically generated response. I have my own life and he has his. If you see him, give him my best. T.”

Or a postcard from Bob Brown’s partner? As the two of them shuffle about in their sarongs and mandals cleaning up after a big night on the tofu, does Bob’s partner think it’s his place to tell voters what Bob’s really like?

I’d love a letter on flowery paper from Janette. “Dear Mrs (insert husband’s surname here),

“Let me introduce myself. My name is Mrs John Howard, or as my husband calls me, Mother. I’d like to tell you about the man I have been sleeping in a single bed next to for more than 30 years.

“Contrary to common belief he’s not old-fashioned. His favourite band is the Seekers and he once had a conversation with a woman whose daughter had a child out of wedlock. And he’s not racist. We have many friends from overseas. Well two, George Bush and his wife, Mrs Bush. Even though they talk funny and don’t know who Don Bradman is, we treat them just like normal people.

“Despite my supportive wordless wife routine, let me assure you, I’m the one who wears the fawn slacks round here. We’ve never disagreed on anything because if we did, things may become unpleasant. And we couldn’t have that.

“Your husband should tell you to vote for my husband. If he hasn’t already you’re probably poor. Or foreign.

Yours forever cardigan clutching,

Mrs Howard.”