"Blerrrrgghh. Oh my god. I am never ... drinking ... again."
Familiar words, and often spoken by countless millions over the ages.
Folks in the death-grip of a heinous hangover – after being "grossly over-served" – usually utter these words at least once in their lives.
These words are usually spoken in a woeful, desperate, brow-beaten manner, between violent heaving sessions ... making calls on the Big White Telephone ... "Hello, operator, can I speak to BEULAH? She's in EUROPE. I want to know if she would like to buy some BUICKS."
I have witnessed this many times. However, I feel somewhat smug, and a bit cheeky by announcing here that I have never uttered these words. I seem to have inherited my dad's cast-iron constitution, and must have heeded his words of advice lo those many years ago: "What the hell would I be doing puking up all that perfectly good booze I just paid hard-earned money for?"
These words ... "Never again" ... spoken by hungover and desperate souls ... are a bold-faced lie.
Anyone who drinks to total destruction, and wakes up "laughing at their shoes", is a repeat offender.
While they may spew out these words – betwixt sessions of blowing their groceries – they know it's a lie.
I guess it's one of those faux rationalisations we all do ... like stuffing yourself to bursting at a big holiday dinner, and then moaning something about never eating that much ever again. Lies, lies, lies!
The latest adventure in "venting protein at high speed and volume" comes down the pipe in an email from a friend and fellow imbiber.
Here's the rumpus.
My Canadian mate tells me his girlfriend went out to a staff Xmas party (two, actually) last night ... the first shindig started at noon. The second was sometime later, when everyone was ejected from the first venue. She was a regular drinker, and so it was anticipated she'd come home feeling "merry" at the very least ... and fairly wasted at most.
He had to work late, and so in an extremely rare moment of responsibility rearing its ugly head ... instead of lurching out to catch up with a bunch of people who'd been drinking for 7 hours already, he opted to go home after work, to await her sodden arrival.
The fun started with the sounds of the front door crashing open, and some audible stumbling, bouncing off walls, giggling and cursing. She was in a state of dishevelment – of the sort that can only result from drinking oneself down the food chain, to somewhere just slightly above "moderately hungry squirrel".
Shoes were kicked off, clothing was roughly and clumsily shed (a couple of popped buttons on a blouse and a ripped zip on a skirt), the purse (which was being dragged) was dropped (and the contents of same strewn in a trail through the lounge), and she landed spastically on his lap.
My buddy knew what he was in store for ... she was completely fucked up.
Form there, some REALLY drunken and uncoordinated sex ensued. Once in bed, my buddy was convinced she had finally passed out some time later ... and he nodded off ... only to be awoken by the first of many, many honking sessions into the bedside trash can.
And several shambling, shuffling, zombie-like lurching movements to the bathroom, to 'launch lunch' (and drinks ... and as he says, from the sounds of it, her stomach lining and chunks of lung).
Rinse, repeat, wipe hands on pants ... this continued on into the night, the wee hours of the morning, and then well after the clock radio went off to alert sober people it was time for work.
He got up to prepare for the day's toil, and handed her the house phone to call in sick (she had thought ahead and had already taken that day off, however! Clever girl).
He laughed, and said that timing his shower was a bit of a mission, as he had to seek a launch window in between the (now dry-heaving) desperate runs of his girlfriend to the bathroom.
He got the shower in, had a coffee, and prepped for departure for work.
The sounds of more woeful whining and stomach lurching emanated from the bedroom, as he went in to say goodbye ... and he nearly got spewed on.
Out he went to catch the bus, and for reasons he can't explain, he peeked into the mailbox (the mailman woudn't have delivered that early) ... and within was his girlfriend's cell phone. He said he nearly fell over laughing.
Someone passing by the house that morning on their way to work must have noticed it on the path, and tucked it in there to protect it from any potential precipitation. Good samaritans abound!
My pal said it was the prefect comedic ending to the whole affair. He took it back into the house and left it on the kitchen counter for her, and told her where he'd found it.
This, of course, inspired some more woeful moaning ... and he couldn't help but to prime the pump one more time, by asking her if she wanted any of the leftover spicy chili from the previous night?
"BLEEERRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!"
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
What's the frequency, Kev?
Radio.
How the fuck does it work?
Marconi and Tesla figured it out back in the 19th century (albeit simultaneously, from opposite sides of the Atlantic). My money's on Tesla being the actual first, he seems way cooler and almost magical with some of the other stuff he had brewing in the lab ...
Anyway.
This question – "How the fuck does it work?" – is one we might ask in awe and amazement of the inventors of the Large Hadron Collider. Or dudes who do thermonuclear physics. Or string theory proponents (although my cats seem to have a firm grasp on that).
But we should not need to ask this of radio.
Why?
Because radio is not super-big-complicated, brainy mo-fo's-in-lab-coats-cool-techy-type science.
It's been around for a long, long time. People who broadcast radio ... and the makers of radios ... seem to have this down pat.
Except here in Wellington.
Unless I missed the memo about Wellington's unique geography, where the earth's crust does some weird counter-geo-stationary orbit thing, where it spins one way and the actual rest of the earth spins another ...
... WHY is it that I cannot get an FM radio station to stay locked in on my clock radio?
(And for that matter, how does the strength and clarity of a Vodafone cell phone signal change and flicker and go up and down WHEN I'M STANDING PERFECTLY STILL?)
Anyway, let's stick to the radio thing here.
Here's the rumpus.
I need to wake up in the morning to get to work.
I like to do this with a bit of music and information about shit that might be going down, outside.
So, I tune in a radio station on my clock radio. I pick a moderately tolerable station (ie, the music doesn't fill me with the burning hate of 1,000 suns, which would cause me to propel out of bed and beat my radio to dust ... nor is it the most fantastic music ever, which would cause me to stay in bed and continue to slumber and be happy about the tunes ... thereby missing work).
The goal here is to have some OK music, presented by some not-completely-barking-mad morning crew, with intermittent information about what I might face should I stumble to my front door and open it ...
Rain? Solar flares? Zombies? Dinosaurs? Jazz Chickens? Inquiring (sleepy) minds need to know!
So I lock in a station. It meets my criteria. It sounds clear. I then set my alarm, taking great care to NOT change the settings or bump the dial. I'm good to go!
Or ... am I?
Fast-forward to 6 am the next morning, the alarm goes off, and I'm greeted with War Of The Worlds-level static and screeching. The station isn't even CLOSE to being tuned in.
I fumble with the dial. No joy there ... the thing cannot be tuned in for love, money, or a Jazz Chickens greatest hits CD.
So in disgust I flick the radio off and look out the window, expecting perhaps a lightening and thunder storm has caused this terrible situation.
But no ... mine eyes are greeted with sunshine. Clear skies. Moderate winds.
While these conditions regularly seem to completely flummox and wreak havoc on the commuter train system in and out of Wellington, causing trains to break and tracks to buckle and conductors to go insane and start knifing people ... why should such perfect climate cause the radio stations to fail to come in clearly? Why has this changed from the previous evening when it was tuned in perfectly?
How the FUCK does it work?
I get similar results from experiments where I awake to a rainy or cloudy day, or a howling rainstorm. Except sometimes, during a howling rainstorm, or wind, or even sun ... the reception is PERFECT.
What ... the ... fuck?
Are the broadcast towers here mobile, and constantly floating around to different locations? Is it Space Aliens jamming our signal, cutting us off from the all-important traffic report? Does the cacophonous racket of an entire Jazz Chicken orchestra play hob with the signal?
I've been looking for a new station recently, as MoreFM has suddenly and dramatically changed its format entirely, having fired most of its usual not-quite-barking-mad morning crew ... and now they're running the entire country's network from Auckland.
And who the FUCK gives a rat's ass what some idiot Aucklander might be facing each morning? Have they thought this cunning plan through?
We know what is happening in Auckland. Every day. It never changes.
People wake up at 3 am, and start driving – which they need to do, and I'll tell you why, in a second. They are by themselves in their car, because heaven forbid you're such a loser you need to share a ride with someone, even if you're going to the same job. Aucklanders need to get up this early to start driving, because it is 637 km to work.
This is because Auckland is such a travesty of a city for how it's designed, no matter where you live, you are close to NOTHING. No stores, no bars, no parks, no job is ever near where you are. You must drive great distances in dense traffic to get to anywhere you want to go.
So MoreFM is useless now. I need a station that is Wellington-centric.
I've run the gamut attempting to find radio stations this week. Radio Hauraki is hopeless on all fronts ... the morning crew are a bunch of thick, shouting, redneck bogans, and the music is primarily classic rock (which has a time and a place, like when you're sweet-talking some half-drunk bogan chick from the Hutt ... but not at 6 am) ... and most importantly, it just doesn't lock in AT ALL on the clock radio. I tune it in and it's fine ... then as soon as I set the clock back down (taking my hands off of it) it launches straight to taxi-in-a-Manhattan-tunnel static.
RadioActive is a cool station that takes chances and plays interesting local stuff, but for some reason they like to play the craziest, eerie, and most irritating avant-garde crap at 6 am. Plus there doesn't seem to be any actual news that might help me prepare for Zombies at my door ... or an pickup-jam session of Jazz Chickens in the lounge.
The Breeze is too lame, and the national radio station is just some droning drone of a boring guy droning on about something that no one cares about. Like cricket. Or a politician who has been caught with his pants down. Again.
I'm now going to try setting a timer on my computer, so that it sparks up at 6 am, and plays an internet radio station ... but now, the key here seems to be finding one that plays via iTunes. Most radio station websites here seem to have been programmed by the owner's clever nephew Billy, who has his own unique internet radio station player he made himself, that must run in its own window, so as to dazzle you with how blindingly clever that little bastard Billy is.
I did briefly consider having it launch into playing my favourite net radio station, radioparadise.com ... however, it's out of Los Angeles. So that means no local Wellington news ... and I really like the music. So that means I would NEVER get out of bed.
Then I thought about having it play a song from my massive playlist ... but I like all my music, and once again, I'm going to go back to snoozing happily as I listen to it.
The solution here is simple. Get back to the fundamental problem ....
Attention radio tower engineers and broadcasting wizards: FIX THIS SHIT!
However, after 11 years here, I'm beginning to think this is an impossible goal.
Like air conditioning in most Wellington office buildings, this seems to be some mystical Holy Grail that no one can find, solve, or work out.
And yet, both radio and air conditioning is NOT rocket science. I've witnessed both work in many other cities on the planet.
Sure, it does require SOME skill. Like breathing, walking upright, and having opposable thumbs so as to be capable of using tools.
I hear they teach these things at community colleges ... you don't even need a University degree.
So how's about finding someone who knows what the fuck they are doing?
OK. I'm up now! Where's my coffee?
Oh look ... Jazz Chickens in the lounge again ... turn it down, you scurvy fowl!
How the fuck does it work?
Marconi and Tesla figured it out back in the 19th century (albeit simultaneously, from opposite sides of the Atlantic). My money's on Tesla being the actual first, he seems way cooler and almost magical with some of the other stuff he had brewing in the lab ...
Anyway.
This question – "How the fuck does it work?" – is one we might ask in awe and amazement of the inventors of the Large Hadron Collider. Or dudes who do thermonuclear physics. Or string theory proponents (although my cats seem to have a firm grasp on that).
But we should not need to ask this of radio.
Why?
Because radio is not super-big-complicated, brainy mo-fo's-in-lab-coats-cool-techy-type science.
It's been around for a long, long time. People who broadcast radio ... and the makers of radios ... seem to have this down pat.
Except here in Wellington.
Unless I missed the memo about Wellington's unique geography, where the earth's crust does some weird counter-geo-stationary orbit thing, where it spins one way and the actual rest of the earth spins another ...
... WHY is it that I cannot get an FM radio station to stay locked in on my clock radio?
(And for that matter, how does the strength and clarity of a Vodafone cell phone signal change and flicker and go up and down WHEN I'M STANDING PERFECTLY STILL?)
Anyway, let's stick to the radio thing here.
Here's the rumpus.
I need to wake up in the morning to get to work.
I like to do this with a bit of music and information about shit that might be going down, outside.
So, I tune in a radio station on my clock radio. I pick a moderately tolerable station (ie, the music doesn't fill me with the burning hate of 1,000 suns, which would cause me to propel out of bed and beat my radio to dust ... nor is it the most fantastic music ever, which would cause me to stay in bed and continue to slumber and be happy about the tunes ... thereby missing work).
The goal here is to have some OK music, presented by some not-completely-barking-mad morning crew, with intermittent information about what I might face should I stumble to my front door and open it ...
Rain? Solar flares? Zombies? Dinosaurs? Jazz Chickens? Inquiring (sleepy) minds need to know!
So I lock in a station. It meets my criteria. It sounds clear. I then set my alarm, taking great care to NOT change the settings or bump the dial. I'm good to go!
Or ... am I?
Fast-forward to 6 am the next morning, the alarm goes off, and I'm greeted with War Of The Worlds-level static and screeching. The station isn't even CLOSE to being tuned in.
I fumble with the dial. No joy there ... the thing cannot be tuned in for love, money, or a Jazz Chickens greatest hits CD.
So in disgust I flick the radio off and look out the window, expecting perhaps a lightening and thunder storm has caused this terrible situation.
But no ... mine eyes are greeted with sunshine. Clear skies. Moderate winds.
While these conditions regularly seem to completely flummox and wreak havoc on the commuter train system in and out of Wellington, causing trains to break and tracks to buckle and conductors to go insane and start knifing people ... why should such perfect climate cause the radio stations to fail to come in clearly? Why has this changed from the previous evening when it was tuned in perfectly?
How the FUCK does it work?
I get similar results from experiments where I awake to a rainy or cloudy day, or a howling rainstorm. Except sometimes, during a howling rainstorm, or wind, or even sun ... the reception is PERFECT.
What ... the ... fuck?
Are the broadcast towers here mobile, and constantly floating around to different locations? Is it Space Aliens jamming our signal, cutting us off from the all-important traffic report? Does the cacophonous racket of an entire Jazz Chicken orchestra play hob with the signal?
I've been looking for a new station recently, as MoreFM has suddenly and dramatically changed its format entirely, having fired most of its usual not-quite-barking-mad morning crew ... and now they're running the entire country's network from Auckland.
And who the FUCK gives a rat's ass what some idiot Aucklander might be facing each morning? Have they thought this cunning plan through?
We know what is happening in Auckland. Every day. It never changes.
People wake up at 3 am, and start driving – which they need to do, and I'll tell you why, in a second. They are by themselves in their car, because heaven forbid you're such a loser you need to share a ride with someone, even if you're going to the same job. Aucklanders need to get up this early to start driving, because it is 637 km to work.
This is because Auckland is such a travesty of a city for how it's designed, no matter where you live, you are close to NOTHING. No stores, no bars, no parks, no job is ever near where you are. You must drive great distances in dense traffic to get to anywhere you want to go.
So MoreFM is useless now. I need a station that is Wellington-centric.
I've run the gamut attempting to find radio stations this week. Radio Hauraki is hopeless on all fronts ... the morning crew are a bunch of thick, shouting, redneck bogans, and the music is primarily classic rock (which has a time and a place, like when you're sweet-talking some half-drunk bogan chick from the Hutt ... but not at 6 am) ... and most importantly, it just doesn't lock in AT ALL on the clock radio. I tune it in and it's fine ... then as soon as I set the clock back down (taking my hands off of it) it launches straight to taxi-in-a-Manhattan-tunnel static.
RadioActive is a cool station that takes chances and plays interesting local stuff, but for some reason they like to play the craziest, eerie, and most irritating avant-garde crap at 6 am. Plus there doesn't seem to be any actual news that might help me prepare for Zombies at my door ... or an pickup-jam session of Jazz Chickens in the lounge.
The Breeze is too lame, and the national radio station is just some droning drone of a boring guy droning on about something that no one cares about. Like cricket. Or a politician who has been caught with his pants down. Again.
I'm now going to try setting a timer on my computer, so that it sparks up at 6 am, and plays an internet radio station ... but now, the key here seems to be finding one that plays via iTunes. Most radio station websites here seem to have been programmed by the owner's clever nephew Billy, who has his own unique internet radio station player he made himself, that must run in its own window, so as to dazzle you with how blindingly clever that little bastard Billy is.
I did briefly consider having it launch into playing my favourite net radio station, radioparadise.com ... however, it's out of Los Angeles. So that means no local Wellington news ... and I really like the music. So that means I would NEVER get out of bed.
Then I thought about having it play a song from my massive playlist ... but I like all my music, and once again, I'm going to go back to snoozing happily as I listen to it.
The solution here is simple. Get back to the fundamental problem ....
Attention radio tower engineers and broadcasting wizards: FIX THIS SHIT!
However, after 11 years here, I'm beginning to think this is an impossible goal.
Like air conditioning in most Wellington office buildings, this seems to be some mystical Holy Grail that no one can find, solve, or work out.
And yet, both radio and air conditioning is NOT rocket science. I've witnessed both work in many other cities on the planet.
Sure, it does require SOME skill. Like breathing, walking upright, and having opposable thumbs so as to be capable of using tools.
I hear they teach these things at community colleges ... you don't even need a University degree.
So how's about finding someone who knows what the fuck they are doing?
OK. I'm up now! Where's my coffee?
Oh look ... Jazz Chickens in the lounge again ... turn it down, you scurvy fowl!
Monday, December 5, 2011
You will now address me as LORD Steve Cossaboom ...
... or it's off with your head.
Yep, it's official.
Y'all knew it was the case anyway.
But now, according to the FlyBuys people (and who could be more trusted to know), my official title is Lord Steve Cossaboom.
Here's the rumpus.
I applied for a FlyBuys card last week. For you not-Kiwis, this is a card like Frequent Flyer. You swipe it while buying stuff, you amass points. Points can be applied to flights on Air NZ, or you can get some pretty cool toys out of their toy catalogue.
So I went online to apply for mine.
Never before have I witnessed so many options for the honorific thing in a dropdown menu box.
Of course there was the usual "Mr." and "Dr."
But there were others.
"Master" (Considered that one at length).
"Shrimp Boat Cap'n" (Not really ... but that would be fun).
"Dame" (How quaint!)
"Lady" (Couldn't get the Tom Jones song out of my head for HOURS ...)
"Judge" (Heh. Also tempting ...)
"Reverend", "Sister" and "Brother" (I'd do this ONLY if I could play and sing the Blues ...)
"Lord" was in the mix, as mentioned ... and after a few practice runs saying it, I went for it.
Now, to acquire a wench to demurely call me by this new title whenever she kneels to address me, and while fetching me grog, and when slowly disrobing ...
Oh, wait!
Yep, it's official.
Y'all knew it was the case anyway.
But now, according to the FlyBuys people (and who could be more trusted to know), my official title is Lord Steve Cossaboom.
Here's the rumpus.
I applied for a FlyBuys card last week. For you not-Kiwis, this is a card like Frequent Flyer. You swipe it while buying stuff, you amass points. Points can be applied to flights on Air NZ, or you can get some pretty cool toys out of their toy catalogue.
So I went online to apply for mine.
Never before have I witnessed so many options for the honorific thing in a dropdown menu box.
Of course there was the usual "Mr." and "Dr."
But there were others.
"Master" (Considered that one at length).
"Shrimp Boat Cap'n" (Not really ... but that would be fun).
"Dame" (How quaint!)
"Lady" (Couldn't get the Tom Jones song out of my head for HOURS ...)
"Judge" (Heh. Also tempting ...)
"Reverend", "Sister" and "Brother" (I'd do this ONLY if I could play and sing the Blues ...)
"Lord" was in the mix, as mentioned ... and after a few practice runs saying it, I went for it.
Now, to acquire a wench to demurely call me by this new title whenever she kneels to address me, and while fetching me grog, and when slowly disrobing ...
Oh, wait!
Today's forecast: Insane responses to weather
Weather.
It's the most crutchy of things to lean on for something to say when in an elevator with another person. Good, bad, whatever sort of climate conditions ... that 30-second lift ride demands someone say SOMETHING. Why not comment on what's happening outside? Quick n' dirty ... and everyone can rapidly agree. For the most part.
Then there is the visual impact of weather.
I love watching how people react – and dress – for the weather here in Wellington.
On any given day, if you looked out a window on a main street, it would be virtually (literally!) impossible to determine what the weather was like. This is because the people here are out of their minds about how to dress for the weather.
Looking at a group of any 25 or 50 or so people on a city street, you would think perhaps they'd all escaped from an asylum. Of the entire group, there may in fact only be ONE who is dressed correctly for the conditions of the day. The rest ... hoo, boy. Get the net!
This is a two-tier bit of insanity.
(1) The locals – Folks here have a whole different idea as to what is "cold". As a Canadian with molasses and maple syrup for blood, I can take most weather here down to the odd 10º C day in "winter" (as they call it), and get by with just a light jacket, or no jacket. I'm most often in shorts, too. Once the weather crosses the +14º C threshold, it's light shirts and shorts for me. However ...
Kiwis think anything under 20º C but above 14-15º is "cool". And will dress accordingly ... so upon glancing out a window on a day that is 18º C, I will see a few people in shorts and singlets (likely "Gringos", and most likely, Canadian or someone from a similarly nordic climate) ... and, right next to them, people in heavy jackets ... and yes, even gloves, and hats. And sweaters. And scarves.
Am I to assume the shorts/singlet people are crazy, Canadian, or both? Or are the folks with the layered Inuit look bananas? Or is it really horribly cold out? Well ... it certainly never is 'cold' here. For me.
After 11 years here, I discovered I am quite safe in assuming that anyone bundled up in layers, hats and gloves is a great big giant mewling baby ... with either NO metabolism to speak of (mostly dead!) , or, has the metabolism of a Sahara Desert rattlesnake, which requires it to be a bare minimum of 30º C and sunny for it to be out in public ... anything lower than 30º, it's too cold and it slinks away and hides.
Presumably, in a fully-fired kiln.
(2) Gringos – AKA visitors from other countries ... they are no help either, unless I know that the one I'm seeing is in fact Canadian.
Because Canadians, as mentioned, can take cooler weather in stride (from 10–20º C, without dressing like the Michelin Man). Canadian males, in general, dress properly for most weather.
However ... if said passers-by are Australian, they are even worse at being whingy about cooler weather than Kiwis. They are in fact human rattlesnakes, and require it to be a minimum of 30ºC before they might even consider wearing shorts. To get an Aussie to admit they're hot, it has to be at least 40º C, and they have to be under a really big magnifying glass, on fire.
The same can be said for anyone from Southeast Asia (including India), China or Japan. Or the southern USA, Mexico, Central American, South America, and of course all the Euro countries that get hot.
While these countries are hot most of the time, Asians seem to have thinner blood/lower body fat, and find temperatures below 30º C "cool". Once below 20º C, it's "polar". If it dips below 10º C – they don't even come outside.
They are hunkered down around that fired kiln, with the rattlesnakes.
Crossing over a seasonal threshold
The sudden and dramatic change from a nice day (18º) and a fantastic day (22+º) catches many Kiwis unaware. Or, aware that it's indeed nice out ... but they seem confused as to how to react, or dress.
Like the rainwear story below, the shift to weather that's fantastic seems to bewilder and befuddle a lot of folks here. On a brilliant warm sunny day, we still see many Kiwis in long dark layers of woolen fabric ... coats, jackets, burkhas ... clearly sweating, yet not understanding you can take some of that shit off!
Or read a weather report before you leave home, and dress accordingly.
Also mind-boggling is the equation comparison:
A sunny day @ 25ºC = lots of people attired in the proper summer wear, yet;
A cloudy day at THE SAME TEMPERATURE = people in longer, heavier clothes, jackets, and burkhas. And they have that shifty, panicked look in their eyes, like they're thinking about fired kilns.
Other weather
A rainy day is the next best amusing thing to witness here.
I have a raincoat.
It is a light Gortex© one ... not polar-strength warm at all. It gets worn occasionally in winter.
But if it's raining in summer here, I might as well not wear it, as I will sweat like a malaria-infested jungle rot victim with the thing on – the end result being, I will be just as soaked as if I got rained on.
Only, it'll be my own sweat.
If I'm to be soaked, I'll gladly take "rain" over "hog sweat" any day ... and so will my friends and co-workers.
So I bust out the raincoat only on "winter" days, when I'm relatively safe from basting in my own juices for a few minutes ... until of course I get on a bus being driven by a Pacific Islander, an Asian, or a female of any race. They will have the bus heaters on full, which turns the bus into a rolling blast-furnace of a sauna, steaming and reeking with the putrid sweat of humanity.
What Kiwis wear when it's raining is ... hilarious. Here in Wellington, locals are thankfully too wily to be carrying umbrellas (the occasional wind gusts of legend here quickly turns brollies into modern works of avante-gard art). However, I have noted many Kiwis wearing parkas (with fur trim!) in the rain. In all seasons, including summer.
Noted for NOT being waterproof, parkas (with fur trim) do have the amazing ability to absorb up to 10 times their weight in water. And so many Wellingtonians can be seen dripping and oozing water in streams from over-saturated parkas ... and, from the fur trim. Weaker individuals seem ready to collapse under the water-sodden weight.
Guys who wear suits to work will often have a cotton or wool-style heavy overcoat to wear when it's "cold" ... and this is their go-to garment for rainy days as well.
These coats also absorb up to 10x their weight in water ... and are also an amusing vision to behold, when said jacket wearers have been walking in the rain for a while. A previous flatmate of mine did that constantly here ... a 20-minute walk home from work in the rain turned his long wool coast into a 100-lb workout weight. And, he was soaked to the bone. Double bonus for mocking fun!
Now, onto sunshine, and warmth (+ 20º C) ... and what else needs to happen to get Kiwis into proper summer attire?
Well the only Kiwis I care about here are the good-looking female ones. And as it is in most countries, for a woman to dress in proper, revealing, sheer, summer-like attire (and to NOT dress in jackets, long dresses, heavy woolen garments, burkhas, beekeeper costumes or full-length chemical spill suits, etc), the weather has to be:
It's the most crutchy of things to lean on for something to say when in an elevator with another person. Good, bad, whatever sort of climate conditions ... that 30-second lift ride demands someone say SOMETHING. Why not comment on what's happening outside? Quick n' dirty ... and everyone can rapidly agree. For the most part.
Then there is the visual impact of weather.
I love watching how people react – and dress – for the weather here in Wellington.
On any given day, if you looked out a window on a main street, it would be virtually (literally!) impossible to determine what the weather was like. This is because the people here are out of their minds about how to dress for the weather.
Looking at a group of any 25 or 50 or so people on a city street, you would think perhaps they'd all escaped from an asylum. Of the entire group, there may in fact only be ONE who is dressed correctly for the conditions of the day. The rest ... hoo, boy. Get the net!
This is a two-tier bit of insanity.
(1) The locals – Folks here have a whole different idea as to what is "cold". As a Canadian with molasses and maple syrup for blood, I can take most weather here down to the odd 10º C day in "winter" (as they call it), and get by with just a light jacket, or no jacket. I'm most often in shorts, too. Once the weather crosses the +14º C threshold, it's light shirts and shorts for me. However ...
Kiwis think anything under 20º C but above 14-15º is "cool". And will dress accordingly ... so upon glancing out a window on a day that is 18º C, I will see a few people in shorts and singlets (likely "Gringos", and most likely, Canadian or someone from a similarly nordic climate) ... and, right next to them, people in heavy jackets ... and yes, even gloves, and hats. And sweaters. And scarves.
Am I to assume the shorts/singlet people are crazy, Canadian, or both? Or are the folks with the layered Inuit look bananas? Or is it really horribly cold out? Well ... it certainly never is 'cold' here. For me.
After 11 years here, I discovered I am quite safe in assuming that anyone bundled up in layers, hats and gloves is a great big giant mewling baby ... with either NO metabolism to speak of (mostly dead!) , or, has the metabolism of a Sahara Desert rattlesnake, which requires it to be a bare minimum of 30º C and sunny for it to be out in public ... anything lower than 30º, it's too cold and it slinks away and hides.
Presumably, in a fully-fired kiln.
(2) Gringos – AKA visitors from other countries ... they are no help either, unless I know that the one I'm seeing is in fact Canadian.
Because Canadians, as mentioned, can take cooler weather in stride (from 10–20º C, without dressing like the Michelin Man). Canadian males, in general, dress properly for most weather.
However ... if said passers-by are Australian, they are even worse at being whingy about cooler weather than Kiwis. They are in fact human rattlesnakes, and require it to be a minimum of 30ºC before they might even consider wearing shorts. To get an Aussie to admit they're hot, it has to be at least 40º C, and they have to be under a really big magnifying glass, on fire.
The same can be said for anyone from Southeast Asia (including India), China or Japan. Or the southern USA, Mexico, Central American, South America, and of course all the Euro countries that get hot.
While these countries are hot most of the time, Asians seem to have thinner blood/lower body fat, and find temperatures below 30º C "cool". Once below 20º C, it's "polar". If it dips below 10º C – they don't even come outside.
They are hunkered down around that fired kiln, with the rattlesnakes.
Crossing over a seasonal threshold
The sudden and dramatic change from a nice day (18º) and a fantastic day (22+º) catches many Kiwis unaware. Or, aware that it's indeed nice out ... but they seem confused as to how to react, or dress.
Like the rainwear story below, the shift to weather that's fantastic seems to bewilder and befuddle a lot of folks here. On a brilliant warm sunny day, we still see many Kiwis in long dark layers of woolen fabric ... coats, jackets, burkhas ... clearly sweating, yet not understanding you can take some of that shit off!
Or read a weather report before you leave home, and dress accordingly.
Also mind-boggling is the equation comparison:
A sunny day @ 25ºC = lots of people attired in the proper summer wear, yet;
A cloudy day at THE SAME TEMPERATURE = people in longer, heavier clothes, jackets, and burkhas. And they have that shifty, panicked look in their eyes, like they're thinking about fired kilns.
Other weather
A rainy day is the next best amusing thing to witness here.
I have a raincoat.
It is a light Gortex© one ... not polar-strength warm at all. It gets worn occasionally in winter.
But if it's raining in summer here, I might as well not wear it, as I will sweat like a malaria-infested jungle rot victim with the thing on – the end result being, I will be just as soaked as if I got rained on.
Only, it'll be my own sweat.
If I'm to be soaked, I'll gladly take "rain" over "hog sweat" any day ... and so will my friends and co-workers.
So I bust out the raincoat only on "winter" days, when I'm relatively safe from basting in my own juices for a few minutes ... until of course I get on a bus being driven by a Pacific Islander, an Asian, or a female of any race. They will have the bus heaters on full, which turns the bus into a rolling blast-furnace of a sauna, steaming and reeking with the putrid sweat of humanity.
What Kiwis wear when it's raining is ... hilarious. Here in Wellington, locals are thankfully too wily to be carrying umbrellas (the occasional wind gusts of legend here quickly turns brollies into modern works of avante-gard art). However, I have noted many Kiwis wearing parkas (with fur trim!) in the rain. In all seasons, including summer.
Noted for NOT being waterproof, parkas (with fur trim) do have the amazing ability to absorb up to 10 times their weight in water. And so many Wellingtonians can be seen dripping and oozing water in streams from over-saturated parkas ... and, from the fur trim. Weaker individuals seem ready to collapse under the water-sodden weight.
Guys who wear suits to work will often have a cotton or wool-style heavy overcoat to wear when it's "cold" ... and this is their go-to garment for rainy days as well.
These coats also absorb up to 10x their weight in water ... and are also an amusing vision to behold, when said jacket wearers have been walking in the rain for a while. A previous flatmate of mine did that constantly here ... a 20-minute walk home from work in the rain turned his long wool coast into a 100-lb workout weight. And, he was soaked to the bone. Double bonus for mocking fun!
Now, onto sunshine, and warmth (+ 20º C) ... and what else needs to happen to get Kiwis into proper summer attire?
Well the only Kiwis I care about here are the good-looking female ones. And as it is in most countries, for a woman to dress in proper, revealing, sheer, summer-like attire (and to NOT dress in jackets, long dresses, heavy woolen garments, burkhas, beekeeper costumes or full-length chemical spill suits, etc), the weather has to be:
- Windless ... in fact, for some, it has to be negative-windy. If that's possible.
- Sunny, without a cloud in the sky.
- Minimum 25º C (but more likely if it's 27 or 28 minimum).
If these three stipulations are met ... boys, get your ass out the door and prepare for endless visions of excellence, soft porn and high art ... featuring the female body, cheekily, sexily, alluringly presented in most of its potential glory.
If any of these three criteria isn't met, there shall be no sundresses ... no mini-skirts, no shorts, no thigh-length yet sheer skirts with a cheeky slit up one side ... no sheer tops, no sporty, form-fitting singlets or tube tops. No low-cut blouses, or any sort of almost-lingerie-like attire being passed off as proper clothing ... ... ...
And under THOSE sorts of disheartening, spirit-crushing conditions, I resign myself to a darkened pub and hope for all things to be aligned perfectly tomorrow ...
The magical wonders of a liquid lunch
Ahhh, that time-honoured tradition of Liquid Lunch.
A magical thing to indulge in on a work day. Wondrous, even. Nay, 'tis verily the BEST thing a civilised human can do! This is what separates us from the animals ... as if animals even could think of such a magnificent bastard of an idea ...
For anyone who isn't clear on the concept, Liquid Lunch goes thusly: the 'idea person' of the group (usually me) invites one or more of The Usual Suspects out to enjoy "a drink" at lunch. This rapidly de-evolves and degenerates into more than one drink. Multiple drinks, in fact. Soon, much more fun than sense ensues.
Often, actual lunch (food) is eschewed. Because any actual chewing would detract from the rapid and guilt-ridden joy of just guzzling down some smart cocktails (or wine, or beer) on a sunny patio ... with like-minded individuals. Eatin's cheatin', after all ...
Here in Wellington, this time of the year is even more wondrous (if that's possible), as the hot summer weather rolls on in with the Xmas season. So establishing yourselves on a sun-drenched café patio, ordering alarming amounts of alcoholic beverages (and consuming same at alarming speed) is a party.
P.J. O'Rourke defined a "party" as a thing to be doing (having fun and getting wrecked) when you should otherwise be beavering away at something responsible.
Like work.
And when your two choices for the day are (a) Boring and stupid old work, or (b) having a fantastic time with your suave and charming friends, swilling down delicious alcoholic beverages in a smart and sophisticated manner on a sunny café patio ... come on.
Now the trick is to determine what type of Liquid Lunch you should indulge in.
There are three kinds of Liquid Lunches.
(1) – The Insidiously planned Liquid Lunch, where the entire afternoon has been booked off from work in advance.
With this plan, friends amass on aforementioned sunny patios, safe in the knowledge that the next time you need to be at your desk and making sense is tomorrow (hours away!) ... and participants start knocking back the hootch with carefree abandon. Despite there being no pressure to actually return to work on that day, the twinge of a guilty feeling persists ... that you should be doing something responsible (work, Xmas shopping, picking up partner, attending a funeral, etc).
If you can somehow maintain your position on the café patio (and your upright position in your chair) this all-afternoon swill-up can continue until well past sunset. Then things get interesting ...
Will you charge on out to other clubs and pubs? Will there be wild dancing or karaoke in your immediate future? Will you purchase booze to take home and continue the onslaught?
The night is your oyster!
(2) – The Quick'n'dirty, 'let's see how fast we can knock them back and then get back to work!' Liquid Lunch.
Here, friends amass as above ... only no one has booked the afternoon off.
So now it's a race.
And, this is the true test your mettle: how many drinks can you consume without become appallingly and noticeably drunk? This is a fine line that is quite often surpassed, to disastrous consequences.
Staggering back in to your office with clothing disheveled, reeking of booze, giggling and smashing into things (and vastly overcompensating to try and cover it all up) is not good.
The goal here is to get somewhat tipsy, keep your clothing intact, eat a few breath mints, and soldier through the rest of the afternoon without giving away your tipsy-ness.
(3) The Impromptu lunch that has spun out of control, gone well past 2 hours, and everyone is shit-faced, and now must call in to work feigning a sudden illness or doctor's appointment.
This one is the MOST fun! Because, while a party is always fun, a surprise/impromptu one is about 1,000 times MORE fun.
Now you have a group of amassed funsters getting well sozzled, and realising that going back to the office now would be crazy, stupid, senseless, potentially career-limiting ... but most importantly, a lot less fun.
So the panicked phone calls to respective offices begin ... the group attempts to stop laughing and grinning and sound serious, and not too drunk ... bosses and managers are alerted ... can't make it back, nuclear war has broken out on the streets. Or zombies.
Once the duplicitous and deceptive phone calls have been made, the REAL fun begins. Lurid, illegal, immoral, tricksy fun! It's a full-on party now, because you KNOW you should have been back at your desk ages ago (sober and actually working).
One of the best parts of the lurid liquid lunch is, if you're still at it well into the afternoon, at some point you are going to sit back and realise you are The King (or Queen) of your Realm, and all that you survey ... just think, all those bored rubes and losers lashed to their office chairs, working on such a day.
And here you are on a fantastic sunny patio snorkeling down way too much alcohol ... feeling fine ... LOOKING great ... damn, in fact, you are DEAD SEXY!
Hey, let's start thinking about where we can go for some wild dancing and karaoke!
A magical thing to indulge in on a work day. Wondrous, even. Nay, 'tis verily the BEST thing a civilised human can do! This is what separates us from the animals ... as if animals even could think of such a magnificent bastard of an idea ...
For anyone who isn't clear on the concept, Liquid Lunch goes thusly: the 'idea person' of the group (usually me) invites one or more of The Usual Suspects out to enjoy "a drink" at lunch. This rapidly de-evolves and degenerates into more than one drink. Multiple drinks, in fact. Soon, much more fun than sense ensues.
Often, actual lunch (food) is eschewed. Because any actual chewing would detract from the rapid and guilt-ridden joy of just guzzling down some smart cocktails (or wine, or beer) on a sunny patio ... with like-minded individuals. Eatin's cheatin', after all ...
Here in Wellington, this time of the year is even more wondrous (if that's possible), as the hot summer weather rolls on in with the Xmas season. So establishing yourselves on a sun-drenched café patio, ordering alarming amounts of alcoholic beverages (and consuming same at alarming speed) is a party.
P.J. O'Rourke defined a "party" as a thing to be doing (having fun and getting wrecked) when you should otherwise be beavering away at something responsible.
Like work.
And when your two choices for the day are (a) Boring and stupid old work, or (b) having a fantastic time with your suave and charming friends, swilling down delicious alcoholic beverages in a smart and sophisticated manner on a sunny café patio ... come on.
Now the trick is to determine what type of Liquid Lunch you should indulge in.
There are three kinds of Liquid Lunches.
(1) – The Insidiously planned Liquid Lunch, where the entire afternoon has been booked off from work in advance.
With this plan, friends amass on aforementioned sunny patios, safe in the knowledge that the next time you need to be at your desk and making sense is tomorrow (hours away!) ... and participants start knocking back the hootch with carefree abandon. Despite there being no pressure to actually return to work on that day, the twinge of a guilty feeling persists ... that you should be doing something responsible (work, Xmas shopping, picking up partner, attending a funeral, etc).
If you can somehow maintain your position on the café patio (and your upright position in your chair) this all-afternoon swill-up can continue until well past sunset. Then things get interesting ...
Will you charge on out to other clubs and pubs? Will there be wild dancing or karaoke in your immediate future? Will you purchase booze to take home and continue the onslaught?
The night is your oyster!
(2) – The Quick'n'dirty, 'let's see how fast we can knock them back and then get back to work!' Liquid Lunch.
Here, friends amass as above ... only no one has booked the afternoon off.
So now it's a race.
And, this is the true test your mettle: how many drinks can you consume without become appallingly and noticeably drunk? This is a fine line that is quite often surpassed, to disastrous consequences.
Staggering back in to your office with clothing disheveled, reeking of booze, giggling and smashing into things (and vastly overcompensating to try and cover it all up) is not good.
The goal here is to get somewhat tipsy, keep your clothing intact, eat a few breath mints, and soldier through the rest of the afternoon without giving away your tipsy-ness.
(3) The Impromptu lunch that has spun out of control, gone well past 2 hours, and everyone is shit-faced, and now must call in to work feigning a sudden illness or doctor's appointment.
This one is the MOST fun! Because, while a party is always fun, a surprise/impromptu one is about 1,000 times MORE fun.
Now you have a group of amassed funsters getting well sozzled, and realising that going back to the office now would be crazy, stupid, senseless, potentially career-limiting ... but most importantly, a lot less fun.
So the panicked phone calls to respective offices begin ... the group attempts to stop laughing and grinning and sound serious, and not too drunk ... bosses and managers are alerted ... can't make it back, nuclear war has broken out on the streets. Or zombies.
Once the duplicitous and deceptive phone calls have been made, the REAL fun begins. Lurid, illegal, immoral, tricksy fun! It's a full-on party now, because you KNOW you should have been back at your desk ages ago (sober and actually working).
One of the best parts of the lurid liquid lunch is, if you're still at it well into the afternoon, at some point you are going to sit back and realise you are The King (or Queen) of your Realm, and all that you survey ... just think, all those bored rubes and losers lashed to their office chairs, working on such a day.
And here you are on a fantastic sunny patio snorkeling down way too much alcohol ... feeling fine ... LOOKING great ... damn, in fact, you are DEAD SEXY!
Hey, let's start thinking about where we can go for some wild dancing and karaoke!
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Drunk-dialed
OK, which one of you 3.5 billion women on the planet drunk-dialed me last night?
In uncharacteristic fashion, I was firmly ensconced in the fart sack by about 10 pm (give or take, I wasn't checking my watch). This is early for me, on a Friday night. This is due to dinner consisting of two (or maybe more) bottles of wine, and nothing solid.
I only discovered the drunk-dial (two in a row, actually) when checking my phone this morning.
The number was blocked in both instances. The calls were a minute apart.
No message was left at all on the first voicemail. On the second, it wasn't a direct, slurred, mumbling, gibberish message TO me. It was some drunken, slurry, rambling bar talk going on between two or more women ... not aimed at me. It was a woman though. This much I could ascertain.
Couldn't quite place the voice, but I have a suspicion ...
So of the 3.5 billion females on the planet who may have made the call, we can remove a large portion of that number for many obvious reasons (women old enough to operate a cell phone [no babies], women in a country where they can afford/have a cell, women who know my number, and women in all likelihood who don't live here in New Zealand, or more specifically, here in Wellington).
It may have been someone from Canada or the USA, but, that's a low probability.
So my drunk-dialer was someone here in Welly.
For most guys, being drunk-dialed by a woman we know (who we think is hot) is 2nd only to having an appealing and drunken woman you know show up at your door at midnight (aka "booty call").
The mysterious "Who the fuck WAS that?" drunk dial is a distant 3rd down the list for being appealing. It's still pretty good though ... a compliment, but a sneaky one. One that makes you think. Who could it have been?
A blocked number means a few things ... it's someone I know, but for some reason she had the wherewithal to block her number before dialing me. Does that mean she hoped to get me in person, to see if it was OK to drop by? Or at least, to have 'drunken fun happy chat'? But otherwise ... blocking her number means she didn't want me to call HER back today to see if she was into a hung-over booty call?
The call came at about 11:20 pm. Not late by Friday night standards ... except, here in Wellington, many people bolt straight out from work and go immediately to a pub to start drinking (so between 5 and 5.30 is when the first drink gets hoovered). Given this behavior, a call from a woman at 11.20 pm means she'd been drinking for a good solid 6 hours.
This also means said woman can hold her liquor fairly well, and, she can take the pace of a good night of marathon drinking. Which is impressive.
Based on this sleuthing and conjecture, I have compiled a short list of 3 suspects.
Any of the 3 can drop by today to apologize.
Bring wine.
And don't wear anything complicated.
In uncharacteristic fashion, I was firmly ensconced in the fart sack by about 10 pm (give or take, I wasn't checking my watch). This is early for me, on a Friday night. This is due to dinner consisting of two (or maybe more) bottles of wine, and nothing solid.
I only discovered the drunk-dial (two in a row, actually) when checking my phone this morning.
The number was blocked in both instances. The calls were a minute apart.
No message was left at all on the first voicemail. On the second, it wasn't a direct, slurred, mumbling, gibberish message TO me. It was some drunken, slurry, rambling bar talk going on between two or more women ... not aimed at me. It was a woman though. This much I could ascertain.
Couldn't quite place the voice, but I have a suspicion ...
So of the 3.5 billion females on the planet who may have made the call, we can remove a large portion of that number for many obvious reasons (women old enough to operate a cell phone [no babies], women in a country where they can afford/have a cell, women who know my number, and women in all likelihood who don't live here in New Zealand, or more specifically, here in Wellington).
It may have been someone from Canada or the USA, but, that's a low probability.
So my drunk-dialer was someone here in Welly.
For most guys, being drunk-dialed by a woman we know (who we think is hot) is 2nd only to having an appealing and drunken woman you know show up at your door at midnight (aka "booty call").
The mysterious "Who the fuck WAS that?" drunk dial is a distant 3rd down the list for being appealing. It's still pretty good though ... a compliment, but a sneaky one. One that makes you think. Who could it have been?
A blocked number means a few things ... it's someone I know, but for some reason she had the wherewithal to block her number before dialing me. Does that mean she hoped to get me in person, to see if it was OK to drop by? Or at least, to have 'drunken fun happy chat'? But otherwise ... blocking her number means she didn't want me to call HER back today to see if she was into a hung-over booty call?
The call came at about 11:20 pm. Not late by Friday night standards ... except, here in Wellington, many people bolt straight out from work and go immediately to a pub to start drinking (so between 5 and 5.30 is when the first drink gets hoovered). Given this behavior, a call from a woman at 11.20 pm means she'd been drinking for a good solid 6 hours.
This also means said woman can hold her liquor fairly well, and, she can take the pace of a good night of marathon drinking. Which is impressive.
Based on this sleuthing and conjecture, I have compiled a short list of 3 suspects.
Any of the 3 can drop by today to apologize.
Bring wine.
And don't wear anything complicated.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Strange mumbles in the night
Lately I'm reminded that we're getting older. Yep, every last stinking one of us.
Certainly I'm handling it better than most, if you disregard the various bits that have been chopped off of me over the last year or so. Didn't need that leg, or that toe, anyway ...
What's worrying me though (and in retro-examination, needlessly) is the concept that I'm not communicating clearly any more.
The villain in this story seems to be technology.
And also, friends who are ageing badly, or who attempt to cadge advice from me while being three sheets to the wind, rat-arsed drunk, or stoned out of their trees.
Here's the rumpus.
I seem to have become "Google" for a few people ... the go-to guy when my friends can't remember, or don't feel like Googling their questions themselves.
The queries usually come at panic pace, either by email or by IM ... "HELP! Something has gone awry, or at the very least, I can't be bothered to think about it myself ... "
Moments later when engaged over IM as "Online Helpdesk Guy", it becomes apparent my friends are also fairly shitfaced.
And so I gird my loins for a session of repetative "not listening", "skipping steps", "drunkenly wandering away to go get more booze when I'm in mid-help", and best of all, "not answering my simple questions" so I can figure out what in the FUCK it is they are doing. Or trying to do.
This usually starts out in the middle of a drunken train of thought from their end – the outpouring of an emotional or hate-filled diatribe, involving something about the gizmo in the widget isn't doing what they want, because they just did this one thing and then this happened. OR didn't happen. As the case may be.
I then have to deftly steer them back to the beginning. What is it you're attempting to do, and what program are you using? What kind of wine is that, and HOW MANY bowls have you smoked?
Then the benchmarking questions: what version is this, and did you do it the way I told you to do it the last 9 times you asked me about this? Did you put in the right password? Oh, you don't remember your password, because you use a different password for everything, but you don't write them down, and trying to remember passwords after 7 huge buckets of wine/vodka is a silly thing to try and do?
Do I remember your password? Ha ha.
And on it goes.
At various points during my typewritten IM instructions, I find myself scrolling back up to see if I typed some gibberish, or something wrong. Nope, there it is, plain as day and clear as a bell, in language a 6 year old could understand (providing of course said child hadn't snorkeled down two bottles of wine, or half a litre of vodka ... or smoked 5 bowls of Alabama Ditch Weed).
It's all good fun, because I exact my revenge in sneaky, underhanded ways ... as we attempt to fix the problem, I subtley and deftly encourage my pals to continue consuming their alcohol/drugs at alarming and increasing speed (and volume).
So that by the time we're finished, they're REALLY finished ... blithering, twitching messes who have melted into the sofa. Or have fallen on the floor.
Of course I too am imbibing, because where's the fun in encouraging the destruction of someone else if you don't at least keep pace enough to enjoy it too?
Anyway, it's good to know I haven't become an unintelligible, babbling, mumbling mess, incapable of getting my points across.
I just need more sober friends.
Ahhh, who am I kidding!
Sober people are no fun.
(In extreme cases, or when really pressed for time, I have taken to making a video screen capture "how to" video, which decreases the insensible "not paying attention/skipping steps" portion of the game ...)
A man needs a base to operate from
Hola amigos.
It's been a while – and I was reminded of my hiatus when I happened to mistakenly click on this Blogger thing, and noticed it had been a while. It's a vicious circle, doing deals with yourself to agree to babble away on a blog, then slacking off.
And so, the title of this one ... some random neuron firings the other day reminded me of a trip back from Vancouver's famous Wreck Beach, in the passenger seat of a monstrous old '67 sedan driven by a friend of mine.
We'd imbibed heavily that day, rapidly ingesting myriad samples of Wreck's cornucopia of mind-altering delights.
In retrospect, letting my friend drive (or even getting in the car with him) was a bad idea. Especially considering how the circumstances of the divvying-up of the last mushroom-laced chocolate went.
We uncharacteristically decided to share one of these chocolate delights, instead of each purchasing and gobbling one. We knew they packed a punch, and we'd already rendered ourselves fairly inoperative with everything else we'd consumed. In retrospect (again), this seemed oddly not like us, exercising responsible ingesting of hallucinogenics ...
What we didn't take into account was, your average hop-head who makes a stab at baking up mushroom-laced desserts to sell at a nude beach might not always take care to ensure the Psilocybin is equally distributed throughout each chocolate.
My pal got the lion's share, if not all, of the 'shrooms. And as he settled in to take command of the helm of his gigantic car, it all hit him at once. He announced he was far more blazed that he thought he should be ... I responded with a bit of disappointment, that I wasn't anywhere near as blasted.
As we drove down the "back road" from the UBC peninsula to the city, he uttered the titular line.
He then mumbled something about the very existence of the planet we were driving on was shifting, the base was gone ... and certainly, when commandeering a multi-ton vehicle down a road, you do need a base to operate from.
Ahh, the good old days. We somehow (as always) arrived home safely, the car and ourselves unscathed from any mishaps or mayhem.
Don't try this at home, kids. We are trained professionals.
It's been a while – and I was reminded of my hiatus when I happened to mistakenly click on this Blogger thing, and noticed it had been a while. It's a vicious circle, doing deals with yourself to agree to babble away on a blog, then slacking off.
And so, the title of this one ... some random neuron firings the other day reminded me of a trip back from Vancouver's famous Wreck Beach, in the passenger seat of a monstrous old '67 sedan driven by a friend of mine.
We'd imbibed heavily that day, rapidly ingesting myriad samples of Wreck's cornucopia of mind-altering delights.
In retrospect, letting my friend drive (or even getting in the car with him) was a bad idea. Especially considering how the circumstances of the divvying-up of the last mushroom-laced chocolate went.
We uncharacteristically decided to share one of these chocolate delights, instead of each purchasing and gobbling one. We knew they packed a punch, and we'd already rendered ourselves fairly inoperative with everything else we'd consumed. In retrospect (again), this seemed oddly not like us, exercising responsible ingesting of hallucinogenics ...
What we didn't take into account was, your average hop-head who makes a stab at baking up mushroom-laced desserts to sell at a nude beach might not always take care to ensure the Psilocybin is equally distributed throughout each chocolate.
My pal got the lion's share, if not all, of the 'shrooms. And as he settled in to take command of the helm of his gigantic car, it all hit him at once. He announced he was far more blazed that he thought he should be ... I responded with a bit of disappointment, that I wasn't anywhere near as blasted.
As we drove down the "back road" from the UBC peninsula to the city, he uttered the titular line.
He then mumbled something about the very existence of the planet we were driving on was shifting, the base was gone ... and certainly, when commandeering a multi-ton vehicle down a road, you do need a base to operate from.
Ahh, the good old days. We somehow (as always) arrived home safely, the car and ourselves unscathed from any mishaps or mayhem.
Don't try this at home, kids. We are trained professionals.
Monday, September 19, 2011
I'm an accidental twerper
The things you say you'll never do ...
I bought an iPad after initially saying there was no need for such a thing in my life, as I have an iMac, a Macbook Pro laptop, and an iPhone. But I succumbed to the ads and the frenzy ... and got one. Did I need one? No, of course not. But I loves me some shiny toys ...
And lo and behold, I'm on Twitter now. I've actually been signed up to this seemingly inane thing for some time ... but after a couple of half-hearted twerts (thwaps?) I gave up on it.
I initially didn't see the point of it, when I first heard of it. Then after joining up due to ... what else do guys do things for?* ... a woman, I quickly decided it was indeed a silly thing. And that I should stop. And so I did. Until now.
* I believe it was Chris Rock who opined that if a man could get a woman by just living like a hobo in a cardboard box on the street, not bathing or caring about how he dressed, that's the way things would be ... but no, we have to constantly be on our game to ensure we have a chance at female companionship. So we do things ... ANY thing, it seems, that it takes to stay competitive in this gotta-have-a-woman-world.
So I've revived the Twitter account. I'm helping a friend suss out a multi-media promotional concept, and part of this help involves seeing exactly what and how these social networking things are all about. And, if they're useful or just so much e-fluff.
I have loaded up my Twitter "followees" with a few well-known comedians and a couple of mates, and someone who's deploying the same sort of "multiple social network" idea to promote something.
So now I sit back and study, and ponder, and go to school on this stuff. I had heard there was a method of posting on one site and having said post appear on many such things ... and a-Googlin' I went.
I had a look at Tumblr, but it's limited to just itself and Twitter. But then I found Ping, and it appears to be a good method of posting to a whole bunch of things all at once:
I bought an iPad after initially saying there was no need for such a thing in my life, as I have an iMac, a Macbook Pro laptop, and an iPhone. But I succumbed to the ads and the frenzy ... and got one. Did I need one? No, of course not. But I loves me some shiny toys ...
And lo and behold, I'm on Twitter now. I've actually been signed up to this seemingly inane thing for some time ... but after a couple of half-hearted twerts (thwaps?) I gave up on it.
I initially didn't see the point of it, when I first heard of it. Then after joining up due to ... what else do guys do things for?* ... a woman, I quickly decided it was indeed a silly thing. And that I should stop. And so I did. Until now.
* I believe it was Chris Rock who opined that if a man could get a woman by just living like a hobo in a cardboard box on the street, not bathing or caring about how he dressed, that's the way things would be ... but no, we have to constantly be on our game to ensure we have a chance at female companionship. So we do things ... ANY thing, it seems, that it takes to stay competitive in this gotta-have-a-woman-world.
So I've revived the Twitter account. I'm helping a friend suss out a multi-media promotional concept, and part of this help involves seeing exactly what and how these social networking things are all about. And, if they're useful or just so much e-fluff.
I have loaded up my Twitter "followees" with a few well-known comedians and a couple of mates, and someone who's deploying the same sort of "multiple social network" idea to promote something.
So now I sit back and study, and ponder, and go to school on this stuff. I had heard there was a method of posting on one site and having said post appear on many such things ... and a-Googlin' I went.
I had a look at Tumblr, but it's limited to just itself and Twitter. But then I found Ping, and it appears to be a good method of posting to a whole bunch of things all at once:
Here's the Ping dashboard. Just tick and add
all the other social network sites you want to post to
simultaneously. They're almost all covered, except
for the new Google+. But I'm sure that's coming.
Et voila, here is the current list of Ping-able
social network things. Many I have not heard of.
But it certainly makes sense to have a
"one and done" idea with posts.
For my friend's project, there'll be a specific FacePlant page, YouTube, and a proper website as well. Most of this 'net stuff is free. But there'll need to be some marketing bucks invested at some stage, to facilitate running around making a nuisance of ourselves, physically getting the idea across to the media by pestering them. It's all about getting the word out.
It's kind of fun to have a reason to be dabbling in all this stuff ... because really, why else would you? Unless you are trying to promote something like a business, how up to date do we all have to be? It's out of hand ... with just the general Joe or Josephine Public posting up minute-by-minute updates re: where they are and what they're doing ... no one cares. You are not unique. You are, in fact, a bothersome entity, and you're in the way. Order your drink and step away from the bar before you start posting up about the cocktail you just bought, you jackwagon.
Why would you want to be that connected and accessible?
I'm now witnessing how deeply embedded it all can get. Besides posting from a desktop computer, there are apps to post from phones and tablets, too. The only way this can get any more all-encompassing (or invasive?) is if we all got tracking collars or microchips, like raccoons (or lemurs?) in a game park. Just log in to follow the antics of your favourite person/cheeky critter, 24/7.
Handy info to have, little buddy! And with that tracking collar and the
live satellite uplink, we know exactly when the
wee beastie is chowing down!
Windows update – Click here to download a man with some power tools ... Dean the Landlord is here now, fixing my busted-ass window. For now, it's a temporary swap-over with the window in the laundry room moving over to the bedroom ... until the broken one can be fixed. He is outside in the rain doing the fix ... and likely wishing he'd sorted these old n' busted windows out earlier. Heh.
Winning the nurse lottery – The district nurse was by earlier to inspect my one-little-piggie-down foot. She has proclaimed it doing magnificently well. But never mind that. What has become poignantly noticeable is the level of attractiveness I am being rewarded with, vis-a-vis these home-visit nurses.
Today it was Claire, a lovely brunette Scottish lass, who is the third smokin' hot nurse I've had visit me in the past few weeks. I have also been inspected and delighted by Nicki (also brunette and gorgeous) and Karen (a honey blonde) – each a stunner in her own right.
While it sucks that I have to go through this medical nonsense yet again, at least I'm getting a good daily dose of eye candy.
Candy coated special delivery – My ISP just sent me a box of top-quality chocolates via courier. Within was a card thanking me for my patience, for how long it took them to swap me over to their new high-tech scheme, featuring a modem that does phone and net all in one. Not to mention, a cheaper monthly rate with more gigs per month in my cap. Thanks Orcon! These are damn tasty.
Lose 20 pounds, look years younger, win friends, get rich, influence people – Well maybe just the 'look years younger' part ... I have dropped a bit of weight due to once again living off of Wellington Hospital's kid-sized menu (where oddly, they will not provide a bottle of wine with each meal).
As for looking younger ... I sprouted a goatee whilst most recently incarcerated, because once again I broke out in a few pesky cold sores due to the medication and such. This infestation makes it impossible to shave while thusly pock-marked. I hadn't grown the goatee in many years, and it seems now the auburn I was used to seeing in bygone years has given way to a distinguished shade of grey.
Today however, I decided to reclaim my inexplicably youthful appearance (considering the rate and frequency at which I abuse myself), which comes with being clean-shaven ... judge for yourself, here are the before (goatee'd) and after (shorn) shots from today:
Don't look a day over 60 now!
Wedding news down the pipe – As I type this, the sordid and motley crew of friends recovering from a big wedding and pissup (oops, reception) in Parksville, BC, Canada checked in via Gmail Chat. The newly-joined Mr. and Mrs. Knoop (oops, Findlay – sorry Allan!) informed me that Meagen did a keg stand in her wedding dress at the height of the shenanigans yesterday.
Gillian is claiming no hangover. But things suddenly went dark on Gchat, when it was also announced there was a bit more beer left in the kegs to drink.
Stay classy, you crazy kids!
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Randomly unexpected - that's so 'gay'!
OK "Take 2" on this post.
I started this in hospital (again) on my iPad with "Blogger+", an iTunes Store application meant to make it easy to post up on Blogs.
It was easy all right. Right up to the point where I spastically wobbled around in my hospital bed and erased the entire post ... and a half hour of searching the thing turned up bupkiss. Nada. Zilch.
So I'm home and back on the big iMac. I'll now see if I can recall whatever the hell it was I was rambling on about ...
I recall starting out by saying it was going to be a collection of various observations of late – and although I was in hospital, I didn't want to make it another whinging hospital thread ... although there were a few things in hospital that amused me to the point where I will list them.
But first ...
The hip and trendy new terms all the kids have been using, and using incorrectly.
Random – This became about as ubiquitous as "gay" as a knee-jerk thing to say about something (not meaning the same thing of course). In the case of "random", it's deployed to describe something surprising or unexpected. Which is incorrect. Random means "not specific".
Reboot – A term now commonly used to describe a "remake" of a movie. Initially this term was used to describe a process with a (Windows) computer that wasn't working. It was the "go to" instruction from IT gurus as the first thing to try ... to restart the wonky thing and hope for the best ... which psychologists will tell you is one of the prime indicators of insanity – repeating exactly the same thing and hoping for a different outcome.
Restarting a pile of shit will only result in the pile of shit to reappear in the same steaming heap it was before you restarted.
With Windows, it is recommended to use the literal meaning of reboot – re-apply your boot to the side of the useless thing. Then go to the store and get a Mac.
And so with movies, if you could actually "reboot" one, you would remake the movie shot-for-shot, using the same actors (and they'd have to be exactly the same age as they were the first time). What people mean when they say "reboot" is the movie is being "re-made" or "updated" – usually by someone with absolutely zero creativity or without a single original idea in his/her head, but who thinks by applying their own deft touch, and the latest technological marvel, their version of the original movie will miraculously be better.
Most often, this is not the case.
And now for something completely different ...
Vomit buckets – Not the nicest of concepts. But while in hospital most recently, one of my flatmates (I was in a room meant for four people) was a man with many issues. He had broken his shoulder badly, but also suffered from wonky kidneys (needing daily dialysis) and was a diabetic. His 24-hour routine involved trying to get him stable enough to move around a bit and hold some food down.
Usually at some point in the night, he would wake up and chunder his guts out. Volumes of it. And the item on hand, provided by hospital staff, to contain such eruptions? A shockingly small plastic bucket ... about the size of a large beer mug. The average amount of spew erupting from an unwell adult human far exceeds the capacity of such a thing. Anyone who has ever drank too much, or been sick with the flu, can attest to this fact: you need a decent sized bucket. As in the mop or dirt-digging variety.
And so it was bemusing to watch the nurses and orderlies repeatedly cleaning up after one of these biscuit-blasting sessions – the floor, his sheets and pillows, etc.
Graffiti – Here's a positive observation! Lately in Wellington, things like bus shelters and brick/cement have been festooned with art ... of the good kind. Not just the infantile scrawling of some punkass with a can of spray paint, but actual art.
Exhibit A: the closest bus shelter to my home –
I started this in hospital (again) on my iPad with "Blogger+", an iTunes Store application meant to make it easy to post up on Blogs.
It was easy all right. Right up to the point where I spastically wobbled around in my hospital bed and erased the entire post ... and a half hour of searching the thing turned up bupkiss. Nada. Zilch.
So I'm home and back on the big iMac. I'll now see if I can recall whatever the hell it was I was rambling on about ...
I recall starting out by saying it was going to be a collection of various observations of late – and although I was in hospital, I didn't want to make it another whinging hospital thread ... although there were a few things in hospital that amused me to the point where I will list them.
But first ...
The hip and trendy new terms all the kids have been using, and using incorrectly.
Random – This became about as ubiquitous as "gay" as a knee-jerk thing to say about something (not meaning the same thing of course). In the case of "random", it's deployed to describe something surprising or unexpected. Which is incorrect. Random means "not specific".
Reboot – A term now commonly used to describe a "remake" of a movie. Initially this term was used to describe a process with a (Windows) computer that wasn't working. It was the "go to" instruction from IT gurus as the first thing to try ... to restart the wonky thing and hope for the best ... which psychologists will tell you is one of the prime indicators of insanity – repeating exactly the same thing and hoping for a different outcome.
Restarting a pile of shit will only result in the pile of shit to reappear in the same steaming heap it was before you restarted.
With Windows, it is recommended to use the literal meaning of reboot – re-apply your boot to the side of the useless thing. Then go to the store and get a Mac.
And so with movies, if you could actually "reboot" one, you would remake the movie shot-for-shot, using the same actors (and they'd have to be exactly the same age as they were the first time). What people mean when they say "reboot" is the movie is being "re-made" or "updated" – usually by someone with absolutely zero creativity or without a single original idea in his/her head, but who thinks by applying their own deft touch, and the latest technological marvel, their version of the original movie will miraculously be better.
Most often, this is not the case.
And now for something completely different ...
Vomit buckets – Not the nicest of concepts. But while in hospital most recently, one of my flatmates (I was in a room meant for four people) was a man with many issues. He had broken his shoulder badly, but also suffered from wonky kidneys (needing daily dialysis) and was a diabetic. His 24-hour routine involved trying to get him stable enough to move around a bit and hold some food down.
Usually at some point in the night, he would wake up and chunder his guts out. Volumes of it. And the item on hand, provided by hospital staff, to contain such eruptions? A shockingly small plastic bucket ... about the size of a large beer mug. The average amount of spew erupting from an unwell adult human far exceeds the capacity of such a thing. Anyone who has ever drank too much, or been sick with the flu, can attest to this fact: you need a decent sized bucket. As in the mop or dirt-digging variety.
And so it was bemusing to watch the nurses and orderlies repeatedly cleaning up after one of these biscuit-blasting sessions – the floor, his sheets and pillows, etc.
Graffiti – Here's a positive observation! Lately in Wellington, things like bus shelters and brick/cement have been festooned with art ... of the good kind. Not just the infantile scrawling of some punkass with a can of spray paint, but actual art.
Exhibit A: the closest bus shelter to my home –
The inside of this shelter is well done too – blue sky on the ceiling, and some other stuff on the walls. An exceptional example of what can happen when you hand kids the proper painting materials and encourage them to be creative.
Talking the talk – I pitied the poor fellow next to me in hospital this last time (not the serial puker from across the room, but another fellow on the same side of the room as me ... he was in for kidney issues) ...
Charles was an older man, and really nice to chat to. Then one afternoon his wife showed up ... and holy christ on a crutch did this woman TALK. Wait, no, it wasn't talking ... it was a rapid-fire, incessant, ceaseless stream of neuron firings in her brain, spewing forth as words, without the benefit of that little filter most of us have to prevent such ceaseless, mindless babbling (most of us when we're sober, anyway) ....
The woman never shut up ONCE the whole time she was there. I was wondering if she was getting any oxygen at all, as she didn't seem to even stop to breathe. And she was there for a few hours. It was painful for ME to endure, but only for a short time, as I had the easy out of putting my earphones on and cranking up some music. She just went on, and on ... no two topics linking logically to each other. Just blathering. Sometimes she'd aim it at some poor hapless nurse or orderly. But mostly, the stream-of-consciousness babbling was aimed at the dude. And he was helpless to escape, confined to his bed ...
FYI to my friends: if I ever end up in a relationship with a ceaseless, mindless babbler like this, you have my permission to shoot me ... if you don't get in quick enough to stop me from letting it become a relationship.
The change, it is not a-timing – Catching a cab ride home from two hospital trips ago, I realised I was about $1.50 shy of the fair once I got home. So I told the cabbie to put $9 on my ATM card (it was the day before payday), and I'd wobble into the house and get him the balance (from some change I knew had on the dresser).
This concept completely flummoxed him. He couldn't work out how to do this ... and after much blustering, he just told me the $9 on the bank card would suffice, as "time was money, and he had places to be!"
This was at 1 pm in the middle of a week day. I boarded his taxi, which was the first in line of no less than 12 other taxis, all parked up and idling away the day in front of the hospital.
I guess they pay taxi drivers to sit there in big lineups now. Good gig, pal. You don't want to be late for that!
Stand back, we're from the government – All hail the NZ Federal Government! Just when all seemed lost ... to save Auckland rugby fans from a repeat of the massive debacle of the Auckland city council being completely unprepared for the transportation screw-ups of the first World Cup Rugby game, the government stepped in to handle things.
During that first night, thousands of fans were left stranded on broken trains (after being brow-beaten into taking said wonky transit by Auckland city council) ... many not making it for the Opening Ceremonies OR the actual game. Trains sat dead in their tracks, and the news had excellent coverage of people breaking out of the trains after a few hours trapped inside, to crawl up along rocky cliffs strewn with bits of railway metal and detritus, to wedge their way through fences, to try their best to get to the game ...
After a week of embarrassment being repeatedly shown on TV, and the municipal government types being grilled by the news media, the City Council was duely informed that the feds would take it from here, thanks.
Because, when things go wrong and aren't running smoothly, a bigger form of government is who you want on the case to fix things ...
How the cocky have fallen – After watching an inspired Canadian rugby squad defy the odds and win a thrilling Pool Game opener against Tonga (classy win guys!), we were treated to the spectacle of the cockiest (for no good reason) mouthpiece of the whole tournament getting his ass handed to him.
Australian Wallabies captain and general dirt-bag and mealy-mouthed malcontent Quade Cooper was humiliated in the finest style, when he and the rest of the Wallabies were humbled by a ramped-up Ireland side.
Ireland played an excellent game, outclassing the wobbly Roos, and were helped along in their cause with Cooper throwing up a few choice "bricks" in attempted cutesy one-handed flick passes ... including the last one, into the hands of an Ireland player, as the clock wound down to 80 minutes.
Looks good on you, you mouthy prick. Enjoy your quarter-final elimination round facing South Africa.
Windows crashed again – No, not the oft-maligned (and rightfully so) Micro$erf operating system.
Actual windows. The kind you see through. In my house.
I've been plagued with the old (some would say "well past their prime") windows in this heritage house falling out of the frames. Twice now the bifold ones facing out and down into Aro Valley have been sucked out of the frame by wind ... and twice now, my landlord Dean has had to clamber down the über-steep cliff to retrieve said window. The second time, the pane of glass actually broke.
These windows are held in place by what can only be best described as hope ... they're just wedged into the frame and secured by a couple of $2 flimsy metal latches. With two sessions of the things NOT staying put, it's safe to say this scheme isn't working.
Yesterday when my friend Brandon drove me home from hospital, we sat out on the patio to enjoy the sun and sensational vista of my view down into Aro Valley, and out to Wellington Harbour.
As I've done quite a few times on sunny days, I popped open one of the bedroom windows, and played music via a set of speakers hooked up to an Apple Airport Express. It was an excellent day ... until, without warning, the window completely separated from the hinges in the frame, fell to the patio, and shattered. There was no wind, the window just sagged off the hinges and splintered all to hell.
I now have the utmost in home security,
with the amazing TitaniumCardboardBox™
window screen! Totally burglar and wind proof!
Note the hinges with
screws still hanging there.
Closeup view of the rotted window frame
where the screws just waved bye-bye.
The old n' busted window. Brandon was
a champ and swept up all the busted glass so I
didn't hazard stepping into it with my one good foot,
which just had a toe cut off of it.
I have a txt message into the landlord about the window, so we'll see how long it takes for this one to get fixed. Good thing I'm home for the week with my recovering foot.
Things fall apart – Aside from the glaringly obvious with the window saga above, it's been a few weeks with lots of things just breaking or failing to work. Maybe it's something to do with the spring equinox (cue the Styx album ...)
With this latest hospital visit being the FOURTH one in two months, I did spend a week or so at work between this one and the last. Demons doth vex me ... the sort of demons in charge of busting up shit.
My work computer took a major dump (I suspect meddling by incompetent IT weasels), my network connection to the material I would be working on took a similar crap, the elevators at work went from slow to glacial ... and the air-conditioning (ha ha) system in the building went from Hades Blast Furnace to Meat Locker and back again ...
Busses to and from work moved like sedated snails through molasses ... I couldn't do my usual walk to work as my foot was slowly melting down (not quite at "going to hospital" level yet, but almost there) ...
At home, light bulbs continue to pope at a prodigious rate. This may or may not be the work of a cheeky poltergeist. Enroute to work one day, with iPad in backpack, the yoghurt in a container decided now was a good time to make a break for it, and exploded all over the iPad case ... and, the inside of the pack. That was a good two hours of cleaning. Thankfully the iPad remained unharmed (yet still smells faintly of Berries Of The Forest).
In a doomed attempt to clean up for a district nurse visit a couple of weeks ago, my vacuum just sputtered and died in the middle of it (it's always a good idea to tidy up before a DN visit, because if your place is too much of a tip, they have you committed and sent back to hospital!)
So some of my surfing this week was along various websites of stores that carry vacuums. I have one picked out ...
Ah and an external hard drive packed it in too. So I need another one to be the 'workhorse' that holds all my downloads, and regularly runs my music, movies and TV shows. More spending ...
Well that should be enough whinging for now.
A new week beckons – home alone (with the cats) waiting for my newly-piggyless foot to heal.
Oh and the piggy that bit the dust?
"Stayed Home".
This little piggy stayed home ... for good.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Old news - Once more, into the breach ....
* apologies readers, for some reason the first try had NO paragraph formatting whatsoever. I did it on my iPad. I'll need to look into that.
Here it is again, with paragraphs, and a bit more info.
... and onwards through the fog!
Back in hospital again. Like the old Apollo missions, and then the Space Shuttle launches, after the first few trips in here, it's old news. Not many care.
This makes three times in the last month and a half. It's due to three separate reasons. But the common denominator is, IV anti-bees.
This isn't even worth posting on FacePlant (but I did). I prologue this Blog with the "in hospital" info to set the tone - the atmosphere, if you will. Each foray into this particular breach always has a twist at the start.
This time I started with a foot tune-up at the podiatrist. A toe decided to light up and start glowing a nice bright shade of red - cellulitis time again.
So here I sit in ward again, counting down the four-hour cycle of drippy-drip-drips.
It's early days, so none of the usual symptoms (flu-y-ness, fever, chills, appetite gone) have surfaced. This time, however, the orthro-pods trussed up my leg in a removable backslab. Not sure why. This is because I haven't seen an actual sawbones yet. And it's Saturday evening ... I've been inside since Friday morning.
I got the drips going, but somehow the blood results were nowhere to be found once I got a (temp) bed last night (hospital chockers yet again). So they wouldn't give me my other usual drug, the blood thinner. I just went through the umpteenth session of getting back ON these damn things, following a week of injections due to being taken OFF them two weeks ago. That was another mission into uncharted Absurd Territory ...
... as my discharging doc failed to submit the right form last time, I was led on a merry chase around town trying to get this one particular drug, to have it on hand for the district nurse visit. Which I then had to finish by coming to that clinic in the hospital, because this cowboy ain't gonna jab himself with this stuff.
Anyway. Where was I?
Ah yes. Back in 'stir' again. Not long ago here in 'real time', they got me into a quad room, after one night in some sort of 'secondary recovery' ward. Not as heinous as The Pit Of Despair from three visits ago, but, a bad layout unto itself.
Twelve beds, one combo bathroom/shower. At least this time I had phone and net reception. For reasons that were never explained, this ward closes at 3 pm Saturdays, and doesn't function at all Sundays.
But wait, I digress. What the HOLY hell was all the constant chatter with the night nurses about? I don't mean subtle whispers every so often. These two sat there ALL GODDAMN NIGHT talking at a normal office-day volume. I was maybe 15 yards from them. So not a lot of sleep ... and when I did nod of, it was drugs drip time.
I mentioned I'm in this pseudo cast. Not sure why. Nothing is broken. No one told me I'm not meant to walk much in it ... but like jabbing myself, Homie don't play "bedpans" either. So I walk to the bathroom.
However ... I was soon to learn that was as far as I'm allowed to roam. I wanted supplies from the cafe and store, but was told in no uncertain terms, "No crutches for YOU." Crutch Nazis .....
So plan B - a wheelchair. No to that too ... But I wonder if they get how wheelchairs work? There is no walking ... A nice nurse went and got me a soda, in the interim - and now Tina is enroute with chips, Powerade and cookies (Tim Tams).
It wasn't long ago that I noted I had no water here in this room - and, come to think of it, I had to ask for the usual jug of aqua in the first ward too. I got my jug here finally ... but no cup. Woo hoo, drinking right out of the pitcher! Just like college!
This whole mess started with an odd week at work (my only week at work in a month or more ...) Lots of tech was failing. Epically. The network, my computer. Printers. The elevators. The heating and air con.
Then on Thursday morning, I pulled this iPad out of my pack to discover it covered in yoghurt.
A package of it exploded inside the pack ... Which took me 90 minutes to totally clean up. Strange days, indeed. No clue how long I'll be inside this time. But seriously, I've had a guts full of this. I don't want to be broken any more. I am starting to feel THIS >|< close to snapping, like The Champ from the old radio comedy shows.
My wardmates were mostly non-entities this time too ... due to one senile old fellow who would not ... shut ... the fuck ... UP. He had the nurses constantly running for the exact same question almost every time. He ranted and rambled. He was THIS >|< close to experiencing what a plastic pillow felt like being pressed on his face ...
What exacerbated this was, the night nurses who insisted on trying to TALK to this gibbering fool. Besides being senile, he was also deaf. So they had to YELL at him. At 3 a.m. And again at 4 a.m.
At 2 and 6 a.m., I was being awoken for the drips ...
So I'm home now. Somehow, miraculously released after only a few days, AND early in the day.
I'm whipped. Put butter on my forehead, I'm toast.
Back to more fun tomorrow – the Limb Centre for a total recasting and refit of the leg socket!
This should be a good day.
And ... it's payday. There may be a beer involved.
Here it is again, with paragraphs, and a bit more info.
... and onwards through the fog!
Back in hospital again. Like the old Apollo missions, and then the Space Shuttle launches, after the first few trips in here, it's old news. Not many care.
This makes three times in the last month and a half. It's due to three separate reasons. But the common denominator is, IV anti-bees.
This isn't even worth posting on FacePlant (but I did). I prologue this Blog with the "in hospital" info to set the tone - the atmosphere, if you will. Each foray into this particular breach always has a twist at the start.
This time I started with a foot tune-up at the podiatrist. A toe decided to light up and start glowing a nice bright shade of red - cellulitis time again.
So here I sit in ward again, counting down the four-hour cycle of drippy-drip-drips.
It's early days, so none of the usual symptoms (flu-y-ness, fever, chills, appetite gone) have surfaced. This time, however, the orthro-pods trussed up my leg in a removable backslab. Not sure why. This is because I haven't seen an actual sawbones yet. And it's Saturday evening ... I've been inside since Friday morning.
I got the drips going, but somehow the blood results were nowhere to be found once I got a (temp) bed last night (hospital chockers yet again). So they wouldn't give me my other usual drug, the blood thinner. I just went through the umpteenth session of getting back ON these damn things, following a week of injections due to being taken OFF them two weeks ago. That was another mission into uncharted Absurd Territory ...
... as my discharging doc failed to submit the right form last time, I was led on a merry chase around town trying to get this one particular drug, to have it on hand for the district nurse visit. Which I then had to finish by coming to that clinic in the hospital, because this cowboy ain't gonna jab himself with this stuff.
Anyway. Where was I?
Ah yes. Back in 'stir' again. Not long ago here in 'real time', they got me into a quad room, after one night in some sort of 'secondary recovery' ward. Not as heinous as The Pit Of Despair from three visits ago, but, a bad layout unto itself.
Twelve beds, one combo bathroom/shower. At least this time I had phone and net reception. For reasons that were never explained, this ward closes at 3 pm Saturdays, and doesn't function at all Sundays.
But wait, I digress. What the HOLY hell was all the constant chatter with the night nurses about? I don't mean subtle whispers every so often. These two sat there ALL GODDAMN NIGHT talking at a normal office-day volume. I was maybe 15 yards from them. So not a lot of sleep ... and when I did nod of, it was drugs drip time.
I mentioned I'm in this pseudo cast. Not sure why. Nothing is broken. No one told me I'm not meant to walk much in it ... but like jabbing myself, Homie don't play "bedpans" either. So I walk to the bathroom.
However ... I was soon to learn that was as far as I'm allowed to roam. I wanted supplies from the cafe and store, but was told in no uncertain terms, "No crutches for YOU." Crutch Nazis .....
So plan B - a wheelchair. No to that too ... But I wonder if they get how wheelchairs work? There is no walking ... A nice nurse went and got me a soda, in the interim - and now Tina is enroute with chips, Powerade and cookies (Tim Tams).
It wasn't long ago that I noted I had no water here in this room - and, come to think of it, I had to ask for the usual jug of aqua in the first ward too. I got my jug here finally ... but no cup. Woo hoo, drinking right out of the pitcher! Just like college!
This whole mess started with an odd week at work (my only week at work in a month or more ...) Lots of tech was failing. Epically. The network, my computer. Printers. The elevators. The heating and air con.
Then on Thursday morning, I pulled this iPad out of my pack to discover it covered in yoghurt.
A package of it exploded inside the pack ... Which took me 90 minutes to totally clean up. Strange days, indeed. No clue how long I'll be inside this time. But seriously, I've had a guts full of this. I don't want to be broken any more. I am starting to feel THIS >|< close to snapping, like The Champ from the old radio comedy shows.
My wardmates were mostly non-entities this time too ... due to one senile old fellow who would not ... shut ... the fuck ... UP. He had the nurses constantly running for the exact same question almost every time. He ranted and rambled. He was THIS >|< close to experiencing what a plastic pillow felt like being pressed on his face ...
What exacerbated this was, the night nurses who insisted on trying to TALK to this gibbering fool. Besides being senile, he was also deaf. So they had to YELL at him. At 3 a.m. And again at 4 a.m.
At 2 and 6 a.m., I was being awoken for the drips ...
So I'm home now. Somehow, miraculously released after only a few days, AND early in the day.
I'm whipped. Put butter on my forehead, I'm toast.
Back to more fun tomorrow – the Limb Centre for a total recasting and refit of the leg socket!
This should be a good day.
And ... it's payday. There may be a beer involved.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
The hospital, snowstorms, a wily Russian and ... snowstorms?!
It snowed in Wellington.
For the first time in 30-something years. Not just a one-off few minutes of it. Five days of it.
For a Canadian, it wasn't much of a siege. It would snow, then warm up a degree or two and rain. Or just warm up enough to melt the snow. Then it would snow again. Then some hail, sleet, porridge, styro-foam, dust, milkweed, and whatever else might fall from the sky in varying degrees of semi-frozen wetness. (The Inuit have 6,789 words for snow ... )
I took some photos of this horrible onslaught – that so terrified Wellingtonians, brought the city to its knees, caused schools to close, and had most people wringing their hands that this was alternately the most beautiful/most heinous event they'd ever witnessed.
For the first time in 30-something years. Not just a one-off few minutes of it. Five days of it.
For a Canadian, it wasn't much of a siege. It would snow, then warm up a degree or two and rain. Or just warm up enough to melt the snow. Then it would snow again. Then some hail, sleet, porridge, styro-foam, dust, milkweed, and whatever else might fall from the sky in varying degrees of semi-frozen wetness. (The Inuit have 6,789 words for snow ... )
I took some photos of this horrible onslaught – that so terrified Wellingtonians, brought the city to its knees, caused schools to close, and had most people wringing their hands that this was alternately the most beautiful/most heinous event they'd ever witnessed.
Snow piled up in millimeters, and once, it almost
made it to a centimeter. It dusted the grass and
nearly made it impossible for me to use my BBQ.
made it to a centimeter. It dusted the grass and
nearly made it impossible for me to use my BBQ.
As much of a non-event this was for me, and a Russian cab driver who made it up the hill in the slushy ice to take me to the doc's ... it did cause me some grief when it came to driving my prosthetic leg. I never though to ask for all-terrain capabilities when I got fitted ... at some point on the weekend when the deluge hit, I noticed I developed a robust, tennis-ball-size haematoma on the back of my knee. Right precisely where the pirate leg met the real me.
No clue how this got there, but, it was making it nigh-on impossible to bend my knee and walk anywhere. And it hurt like a right -royal bastard.
So off to the doc I went on the Monday (day 2 or so of Snow-Pocalypse).
After a quick inspection, the GP hot-potato'd me to the Orthropods / A&E, and after a mere 12 hour wait, I finally got ensconced in ward room, and hooked into (yet more) anti-biotics. (It seems the treatment for big bloated haematomas is the same as what they dish out for cellulitis/infections). Drip, drip, wait 6 hours ... drip, drip wait ... rinse, repeat, wipe hands on pants.
And so we come to the fun and the absurd. The snow was funny yet pesky, as everyone else was panicking and sliding off roads (no snow driving skills) and the city's electricity was nearing FAIL levels ... and office heating systems were neither heating, or anything resembling a system ...
After calling a cab to get to the doc's, I went out and noted the road WAS indeed that nifty über slippery combination of ice and slush and snow and water, and maybe even black ice. Nothing serious for a Canadian, but I reckoned no Kiwi was going to be driving up that hill to get me.
A Russian, however, is a whole other bear ... the comrade showed up driving the cab backwards up the hill, an SOP for getting anywhere in a front-wheel drive car going uphill in snow. He got me back down the road professionally, too. Enroute however, we noted several heinously dented and bashed cars and trucks ... many of which were clearly the victims of being parked by a rogue band of half-blind cretins, who prowled under the cover of darkness. The cars and trucks stuck out at odd angles, and a few feet from the street's edge – which of course on my narrow street, meant they were pretty much in the middle of the road.
My new Russian mate asked me to pull my mirror in as we skirted past this fool's parade of stupidly parked (and dented) vehicles. Before long we were down the mountain, and on the main road beelining for my GP's office.
Once in A&E and checked in, I was triaged minutes later – with the sensational news that an Orthropod doc would be coming to suss me out. And so began my 40 days and 40 nights in the waiting room ... the Orthropods, apparently, were outrageously busy. In the interim, I was treated to the spectacle of four women behind the "check in here" counter panicking as the large heater over the entrance doors suddenly cakked it. For no reason, apparently, other than it had been on for a while. It was now just blowing cold air. So they turned it off ... and then each of them (and several other employees who came by to see what was happening) took their turn activating the heater, staring at it for a few minutes, and then declaring: "Yes, it is only blowing cold air".
Rebooting a heater apparently does NOT cause it to fix itself. Perhaps Microsoft was now in the wonky heater business? It was anyone's guess.
After about 4 hours, with no appearance by an Orthropod, someone in A&E proper thought it might be a good idea to get me in and at least check my vitals, and rig me up with a canular and take a blood sample. Good plan ... at least now I was no longer sitting upright, but rather prone ... and waiting. And ... waiting ...
Finally the much-vaunted Orthropod materialised, to pronounce me in need of being admitted, and given drugs. This was the specially-trained expertise that was well worth the 6 (or was it 9?)-hour wait. Money well spent there.
But the waiting was not over ... a room was declared necessary for me to complete this complicated admission cycle. When I was finally wheeled in, it was indeed 12 hours after checking in to A&E.
In the interim, however, I can say they fed me twice in A&E. Sandwiches and tea for lunch, and a decent fish dish for dinner.
And so began my week-long session 'inside'. Nothing unusual or absurd happened with the usual 6-hourly drip feeds, but on day 3 (or was it 4) there was a sudden splurge of activity around 9 pm, where it was announced pretty much everyone on the floor was being shifted to another room. I had visions of being plunged into the Pit of Despair like last time, but lo, I was awarded my own private room – because, as Adam the head nurse whispered to me, I had been subjected so much adversity ... and I indeed had, as they set a new record for attempts to put a new canular in me the day before. It took SEVEN tries to 'get 'er done ... Adam tried and failed twice, a house surgeon repeated his FAIL, a reg came by to try his hand and kept the "two failure" thing rolling ... until finally another reg materalised and nailed it on the 7th attempt.
Well done you lot! Money well spent again ...
Especially when compared to how many tries it took the A&E nurse to get one into my arm (first time, both times I've been in there in the last month) and the 'once-upon-a-midnight bleary' time it took a gorgeous house surgeon to do it (again, just one – she got it first go) after the thing had collapsed yet again. (I'm lucky if I get 48 hours of out a canular before my veins bolt for the hills).
During the week, I glanced around my new palatial private room, and noted:
- I had an ensuite bathroom. But I shared this with a room on the other side of the wall. And the doors accessing the bathroom from my room, and from the other room, did not lock. It was a crap shoot (literally) to see who would walk in on who!
- An A4 (8 x 10) photo was stuck to the top-shelf door of my storage cupboard. In the photo were folded sheets and other things sitting on a shelf ... a modern-day hieroglyphic depicting what said cupboard was meant to be used for. Well done you champions of communications!
- The tap handles (on the sink in my room, and in the bathroom), was a bizarre, ultra-long thing that jutted a good foot above the sink on an angle almost 90º from the tap itself. Anyone with wonky eyesight, or who was sick, crazy, or whacked on medication could easily poke an eye out on this lovely feature. Fortunately I seemed to be just shy of the level of whacked-on-medication-ness needed to do myself a grievous ... so I didn't succumb to this ninja-like death trap.
- For reasons that may never be explained, food orders were taken each morning via the swanky new wireless hand-held iMenu device (with plenty of details extolled - by the orderly - about each meal possibility). Then, come meal time, a completely different meal was presented. Not even close to what I'd asked for. This is the first time I've encountered this ... and, no explanations were forthcoming. Good thing I am a total omnivore, and don't have a real dislike of any sort of food ...
- There seemed to be some sort of elaborate "let's hide the good blood pressure machines from everyone", as each time a nurse came by to do the BP, temp and O2 checks, the trolleys available featured completely munted versions of each device.
- And finally, my release to 'home detention' was a mission ... vying for the new record, compared to the time it took to admit me. I was pronounced release-able by my doc just before 9 a.m. I finally walked out of my room at 4 pm. It apparently takes 7 hours to fill out the form that says I can go home, print out what they did to me, and get me some crucial drugs from the pharmacy ... that is IN THE HOSPITAL. It's not even a narcotic, just a blood thinner. But there is a PROCESS. A long one.
Thankfully, my downstairs neighbour Sarah - who is a nurse - came by just before 4 to offer me a ride home. Her shift was just ending ... which means she started work right about the same time I was pronounced release-able.
How sweetly, exquisitely absurd! But this time, it was a GOOD, FUN kind of absurd. Yay for Sarah!
And onwards and upwards ... I'll need to go see the Limb Centre guys in a day or two, to get the pirate leg tuned up so it doesn't abrade the spot where it hurts ...
These guys usually have their shit together. I'm sure that'll go well.
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