The thing is, however, that before even so much as a single string has been pulled and one city road closed, I'm already over The Giants - the puppet show on steroids that will hit Perth's streets from Friday. And, as unpopular as it may be to say that, I kind of get the feeling I'm not the only one. Half of Perth's entire population is going to flock to the city to see this? Credit:Dom/ArtComArt On Thursday a colleague asked me why I was so anti-Giants. He suggested I'd rail against anything other than sport bringing people together en masse in Perth. He was wrong on the latter part but dead right on the former . I do suddently feel oddly anti-Giants, which is a little surprising to me since I thought they were a pretty cool idea when I first heard of them a month or so back. So what happened?

The Australian-flavoured The Giants storyline that has been cobbled together does strike me as being a touch contrived. I wonder how the hell I'm going to be able to get thorugh all that traffic and into work on Sunday. But these are just tiny little issues. Basically, I realise, I'm Giantsed out. Sick to death of hearing about them. Tired of being told 24/7 what a massive event this is for Perth. I'll scream if I hear one more person inform me that a million people will flock to the CBD over three days to see The Giants. I know we're used to getting served up absurd crowd figure estimates (think Christmas pageants, Skyworks) but those numbers really take the cake. In short, half of the entire population of Perth is apparently going to come to see The Giants live (either that or 500,000 people are going to make the trek twice or 300,000 for all three days. Take your pick, all seem highly improbable to me).

I'm done with picking up the paper every morning to find yet another "fresh" angle on The Giants. It's probably not fashionable in the media game to admit to liking your opposition but I rather enjoy my home-delivered daily copy of The West - or I did, until they started devoting a page a day to Punch and Judy's oversized descendants. Mind you, nobody appears to have gone as far as the The Guardian in the UK, which, according to the Perth International Arts Festival website, delighted in "inclusive theatre where young and old rub shoulders with The Giants. We walk together in their footsteps and we walk taller because they are with us." So everybody's self-esteem will improve because they get to walk along behind some massive puppets? Yeah right. And then you've got the Premier on Thursday gleefully labelling The Giants potentially the largest artistic undertaking in Australian history. I'm glad you like it so much Col, shame nobody in government seems as enthusiastic about scheduling trains after midnight on weekends from April onwards. Of course, the build-up to The Giants reached its nadir on Thursday after Fremantle mayor Brad Pettitt told this website the gigantic little girl and her diver buddy would be taking a barge trip down the Swan and hanging out off the Left Bank on Sunday.

In a somewhat confusing post-script Giants PR initially got annoyed at us for ruining a surprise, before the Perth International Arts Festival boss Jon Holloway referenced Harry Potter and told our reporter anyone in Freo expecting a Giants performance would be "bitterly disappointed". Folks at Giants land then declined to say very much more at all when it was pointed out to him a newpaper notice had earlier been published, outlining the fact the Giants barge "was scheduled to depart from Riverside Drive, Perth around 11am and transit downstream to arrive at East Street Jetty, East Fremantle around 5pm". Ah yes, The Giants, such a big deal they don't even have to answer perfectly legitimate questions. Lest anyone think I'm being overly pessimistic or cynical, let me state categorically that I'm an optimist at heart. I hope the little-known, jockey-sized Argentine Emiliana Grillo can win a European tour tournament this year and steer my fantasy team to glory in the Dude Where's My Par league (to quote another of my colleagues: "You don't have a girlfriend, do you Simon?").

I also hope families in their droves - quite possibly millions - will flock to the city, be enchanted by The Giants and tell stories about it for years to come. And most of all (and I write this sincerely) I hope when I wander down to Langley Park on Friday I'm moved to say "holy sh-t" rather than "what a crock of sh-t". I'll let you know how I go. BTW - if anyone is really impressed by The Giants, Transformers will properly blow their minds. Optimus Prime goes from semi-trailer to robot in less than 30 seconds and starts talking to Shia LeBeouf and Megan Fox about matters of interstellar importance. And you can't even see any cranes or strings attached or anything...who said I couldn't do culture? Stop the presses...or the pisses - my dubiousness about The Giants is only heightened by this: