Sam de Brito is rapidly becoming a must-read on The Age/SMH 's Blog Central. Sam's short story entitled The hummingbirds prompted a number of highly intelligent responses from different viewpoints.

To prevent these gems being lost in the comments, I have extracted them and posted them here. (Technically copyright infringement, yes, but I think it's a useful exercise. We shall see if lawyers jump up and down.)

Original post
The hummingbirds (Sam de Brito)

Perspectives
Second bird (catgirl)
The bouncer (Tim)
The observer (JB)
The roid boys (ThePirateKing)

(From All Men Are Liars)

Scorps, the Fish and Ned climb the stairs three at a time feeling the DJ through the handrail. They reach the landing and the acreage of pool tables, grooving ferals and sweet young things in midriffs spreads before them.

"Whattaya wanna drink?" asks Ned.

"Veebs."

Ned leans at the bar, foot on the railing with a 50 dollar note scissored in his fingers. Next to him, two 20-ish girls stand staring at the crowd over their mixed drinks, straws pinched between their fingers, nipping drips of the sticky plasma like hummingbirds. He looks them up and down ...

(Posted as a comment on All Men Are Liars)

"He's checkin' you out," Shazza spat under her breath. "Nah, don't look now, he's lookin' but he's lookin'". Nyomi jiggled her straw in her drink nervously. "But whaddya think he's gonna want?" "Dunno, same as last time?

Shazza pushed one of her straw platform shoes on and off her foot as she stared down thoughtfully. "Sit here long enough, they're all askin' for the same."

"Let's dance" Nyomi yelled over her shoulder as she buttonholed a footy head in a footy pastel shirt who did the mock bump and grind to his mate's approval while Shazza did the mock spew to her mate's tipsy dry hump. "Can you get on?' she queried to a nuthin nobody who had propped himself beside her, and missed his response as the alcohol clouded her cirhottic, coke scarred mind.

(Posted as a comment on All Men Are Liars)

"Hungry!" muttered Number 24 as he scowled at the room, looking for trouble. He felt especially twitchy tonight; the new stuff he'd shot up at the gym was good, but it made him him agitated, and he was worried about these zits that were popping up all over his body. He was definitely going to root that chick behind the bar soon, but the spots were not a good look.

The DJ put on a new song. F**king house sh*t again! Why couldn't he put on some Chisel or Oils instead of this poofy sh*t? It was a pool bar for f**k's sake! Then he saw them. Some dickhead in a poofy blue shirt and that fat sheila who had told him to f**ck off last week were sneaking off to the dunnies. "That'll do" he thought.

(Posted as a comment on All Men Are Liars)

She'd come with friends, she always came with friends, and they always ended up leaving her on her own. Unintentional of course, they honestly thought she meant it when she said she was happy playing the pinnies on her own, that they should go and dance. It's not that she couldn't dance, but her size inhibited her, she was afraid of being laughed at. The looks and comments she got while she was standing to the side were bad enough.

She watched from her post at the goings-on around her. There were the three guys over near the bar, she knew their type. They were the kind of guys that tricked themselves into believing that they were "cool", that they could have any girl they wanted, but they were in reality, complete tools. Still, if they paid her an ounce of interest, real interest that is, not the "I'd do her coz some has to" interest, she'd enjoy it. She'd love to be able to turn someone down, but as it was she wasn't getting any offers in the first place.

(Posted as a comment on All Men Are Liars)

There was me, Joey, Vinny and Anon.

We were just hanging out, playing pool and cruising for snatch. Our style of cruising is just to hang out & play pool. S***s come up to us every time.

Joey was holding the stash.

Anyway, these two stupid westies came up and asked us for coke. We laughed. What moron actually askes for "coke"?

The bouncers had been giving us the dirty look earlier. So we kept an eye on them while Vinny went into the dunnies with one of the girls.