Archive for the 'General' Category

Last night. Red Thursday. A night I do not remember a lot of.
I’ll start at the start. Or at least I’ll start not at the end, you know, as most good stories do (well, The Usual Suspects is a great story, and it starts near the end. As does Fight Club actually, and Memento now I think of it. Maybe I should actually start near the end then recap everything else after [before] that point? Yeah. that could be fun.)

I am in my room. I have been here many times before. But have I really? It is clean, it is dark. My pants are on the ground, my phone is in my hand.
Did I just get here?
Was I going somewhere? Calling someone?
I look at my recent messages – I told Rockstar I have her ID, interesting. I remember having it, it’s in my jeans.
I search the pockets, the ID is not there. Did I lose a lost ID? I call Ben, maybe he knows – granted, its 4.30am, but still, this is apparently important.
Ben was sleeping, maybe. He does have the ID, that is some weight off my mind – but now the bigger problem, why am I home?

Oh, it’s 4.30, that makes sense. But how did everyone else get home? I know I walked, I always walk, but what of the girls? When did I last see them? My mind races back as far as it can go. Apparently that is only up to the phone call to Ben. Damn Alcohol! (no, I take that back). Surely I saw them safely into a taxi, or at least safely somewhere. Ben wouldn’t have just walked home with me otherwise. Right?
There is one way to solve this, texts. Two of them, too Pocket-Spoon, she will say it’s all fine and that will solve everything.
No reply. Well, when being indirect doesn’t work you make phone calls. Lots of them. No answer. I am freaking out about this for some reason. For some other reason I get over it and pass out. So is my life.

Suddenly I realise that all of this, has got something to do with a girl named Marla Singer.
No, wait. Back up. Let me start earlier. For six months, I couldn’t sleep.
I couldn’t sleep.

OK, now I have my Fight Club moment out of the way I can carry on.

It was just going 6 o’clock. Dinner was ready but I had other plans. I raced [walked] up to the liquor store and brought a box of Fuse. I give my ID to the girl at the counter knowing full well she knows who I am and has ID’d me many times. She reminds me of this fact and together with the owner we laugh. I could be wrong but I think she wants me. Scratch that, I am wrong, it’s a nice thought though. As I race [walk] back home I am amused and disturbed by the fact that the liquor store staff are so well acquainted with me.

After dinner I retire [go] to my room and have a beer while playing around on the net. I don’t yet understand the full plan for the evening and assume people will text me with my required activities.
No one texts. I have another beer.
Being proactive as I am I text Ben and soon find I am at his house. All is well (except for the fact I now realise we didn’t watch zen master – does it still count as a red thursday without it?).
Four more drinks down and Ben and I depart. We have had wonderful conversations filled with laughter and deep and meaningful messages [massages?].

Red Thursday, a day like no other (except for being so similar to many other days). Good turn out, lots of red, happiness fills me.
Events tend to blur here, I know as much as I didn’t walk to town. Ben gave me a ride? Thanks Ben, it is much appreciated. I don’t know where we parked.

I wasn’t going to jump the line but I saw John and he called me up.
Hey, when you are this popular what can you do?

I don’t remember 101. My bank account does. I am going to step out and say I am a good friend. It is much more preferable to the alternative – you know, an alcoholic. I can see I was still getting grandfather claused in, this pleases me.

Bakehouse also saw my business. Weird. I don’t so much like bakehouse. I burped, I had garlic bread, I am happy about this (you didn’t need to know that did you?).

I remember a girl called Sarah. Hannahs friend. Have I met her before? I wish I was not so bad with names. She tells me to find Hannah, I seem to accept this as a reasonable mission.
Wow, I have confused the timeline, that was at 11.24. Why was I so drunk at that time?
I make a Chasing Amy reference though text. It is not understood, that makes sense, no one has seen that movie. Oh well.

That was actually one of the funnier parts of the night. I was writing a text message, looked down and then realised I didn’t know who or why I was texting so finished the messages with a song reference. I mean, how could that possibly ever go wrong or lead to dramas?

I know I was just getting you hooked, but I think I have basically told as much of the story that I remember or need to tell. Plus this leaves you wanting a sequel? I don’t know, I am no book-writer-guy.

Bring on Saturday, Red Thursday didn’t finish me off (Is that a dirty reference? It is up to you at this point! (was that one?))

The other night I was having the sweetest dream. I was at some apartment complex with a mate and we were sitting round the pool with some chicks who were hot. I mean seriously hot. Hot to the point that if you were watching a movie that these chicks starred in, you would be so powerless against their beauty that you would have no choice but to sneak off after the movie for some sexy times with yourself.

Anyways, so we were sitting round the pool with these tastey chicks – nothing strange so far given we do that all the time. Then the hottest chick leads me back to my room and begins to suck on my lollipop!!! This was fantastic!!! No other suck off could ever come close to this – real or otherwise.  Next thing I know, most of beertuesday is at the door pushing their way in which obviously puts a dampen on the situation. So of course I try to push them out the door – blows before bros and all that. But they wouldn’t fucken leave!!! I am fairly certain that every single member of beertuesday had a hand in preventing this chick from finishing what she started. I specifically remember Green Griffin and White Warrior sitting on the bed with their laptops seemingly oblivious to the situation they had interrupted. Then my leggy blonde left the room. Gone from my crotch forever. So just like that it had changed from what could have been a fucken sweet wet dream into a dream about a dozen or so semi-homosexual guys jumping around on my bed….. This is the reason why I currently hate BeerTuesday….. you are all a bunch of CUNTS!!!!! STAY THE FUCK OUT OF MY SWEET FANTASIES….. and if you must intrude – at least finish me off you inconsiderate fucks!!!…………. that is all I have to say on the matter……

S.A.

So this day had high expectations coming in. The Foo Fighters are one of my favourite bands, and arguably one of the greatest bands of all time (or at least our generation). They also put on awesome live shows (as I have seen them several times already), so I was expecting an great night.

The day started pretty early, woken up at 6.30 by SA having a show. I then proceeded to get up once SDC and NK had gone to work, and sat around watching some cartoons while surfing the net. Before I knew it, 11.30 had come around and I hopped the bus to town to meet up with SDC for lunch. Little did I know my cousin was meeting us there as well with his army buddies.

So I arrive and the boys had just finished ordering their meals and had a round of beers on the table, I quickly got my own beer and ordered a dozen buffalo wings (Degree is an awesome place, and these wings are amazing – I had been crazing them since I left Auckland). So drinking took place, and then SDC arrived and got his own beer and ordered food. Drinking and eating occurred and SDC headed back to work (three beers down at lunch – nice). I, being a student who had decided to take several days off, hung around and continued to drink many more pints with the army boys.

This was a highly positive idea on my behalf, as these army guys were good freaking quality. I have never had so many laughs about weird conversations and events at lunchtime before. Just for a taster, one of the guys explained to us that when he was younger (at primary school) he beat off to Officer Callahan from Police Academy. Police Academy the Animated show that is. The reason that is worth noting is because this guy was quite loud – and it was 1pm in a public place. Yeah, it was heading to be that kind of day…

Continued drinking till about 5, then came back home and before long we were down at the concert. Originally I had been a little disappointed because I was seated, but once I found my seats (stage right, not to far back in either direction) I realised that the view was awesome, and that I was not going to be disappointed.

The concert started with Let it Die, followed up by The Pretender, and then still without saying a word they went into Times Like These and Breakout. After that point I kind of forget the order the songs were played, but the set list looked something like this

· Best Of You

· Cold Day In The Sun

· The Pretender

· Let It Die

· Long Road To Ruin

· Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make-Up Is Running)

· But, Honestly

· Times like these

· Breakout

· Staked actors

· Monkey wrench

· Everlong

· Breakout

· Big Me

· All my life

· Ballard for the Beaconfield Miners

· Marigold

· This is a call

· Learn to fly

· My hero

· Long road to ruin

· Skin and Bones

Clearly an awesome set.

But not only was it sweet music, there was a good portion in the middle where a second stage came down from the roof and they played a bunch of acoustic songs, similar to Skin and Bone (the DvD). This was extra awesome because it also allowed for Dave to do a whole bunch of talking, which is always entertaining.

So, they played for a few hours, and it was the best few hours of my short little life. Afterwards I just could not stop smiling.

I am very excited about seeing them again tonight.

The only bad thing I have to say is about Vector. As everyone has said time and time again, the sound in Vector is not really great. It was noticeable again last night. Not very bad, but there were bits of the show I felt that Vector was letting them down.

Oh well, I was seeing the Foos twice in two days, I am probably not going to complain.

- GG

Friday was “a day just like any other day, no work, and no play.  I knew that paradise was some other place and I’ll get there, another way…”

OK, so that was just a stupid reason to put some Bad Religion lyrics in the blog.  Get over it.

Anyway, Friday was my Mums birthday, so, after doing the lovely son things in the morning I took off to Uni as I had to go to work.  I stayed there for a few hours then went and did a very important tax presentation.  This went really well, so to celebrate, I went back to work.  A few hours later the wine was flowing at work, and all was well in the world.  I hung around for a few drinks before remembering I had a real party to get to that night, so could do much more drinking there.

I got home and opened a beer.  The next steps involved showering and listening to music while I waited for 830 to come so I could go and get drunk.  Like clockwork (hahahahahahha!!!!) 830 rolled around and as did I do Duncans. 

I really can’t talk up drinking with my hockey friends enough.  Sure there are times I pass it up because of other engagements, but when I do drink with them it is always really good times.  This night was no exception.

I will admit that I don’t recall a lot of the happenings.  This was proven more when I saw some photos of the night that I had no recollection of at all.  I am quite the photo slut though, I can’t be expected to remember every shot I was in.

After several many drinks there I somehow got a ride to town, where we all quickly proceeded to Bar 101, the best new bar in Hamilton.

Things go blank again here.  I do however remember carrying Geoff into the bar as he was far to drunk to be let in alone.  I also know I did buy some drinks there – though I have not seen a charge for these yet, so, I don’t know what happened there.

A few hours and a kebab later I was back at home.  Much worse for wear, but in a very happy state.

I do so love alcohol.

The best bit was that I knew this was just the start of an epic weekend.

- Green Griffin

I have not done the whole blog thing for a while, so after great weekend it seemed like a good thing to write about.

Friday night was large. It began with after-work drinking, and eventually ending up in a the Northern Steamship where drinking continued. At one point I lost Rock Paper Scissors and ended up having to walk to the next closest bar (200m or so) to by a couple of packets of cigarettes. The confusing this about this is that I don’t smoke, and I am not sure why I was involved in the RPS in the beginning. Upon the purchase of these cigarettes, I decided for revenge I would open both packets, move a bunch of the cigarettes around, so that the package appeared to be tampered with, which technical I guess they were. When I returned to the group I handed them the packets and told the smokers that I had removed one cigarette from each packet, put it down my pants and did a little dance. Both of the smokers believed me, and tried to pick which cigarette looked like it had been removed… and then decided to smoke the packets anyway. It occurred to me that they were actually not too concerned about smoking my nether-regions, so I told them I didn’t actually put anything in my pants. In hindsight I kind of wish that I had, who knows sweaty ball-sacks may even taste good when mixed with tar and carbon monoxide and all of the other ingredients, maybe that is one of the things that Russel Crowe’s character tried in The Insider, maybe that is why he had an ethical problem in the first place.

The next step of the night was the Casino, this was great, I ended up sitting down at a hot table, and winning a lot of money, as did the American guy who was on the table at the same time. They couldn’t calm down the winnings, even when the automatic shuffler mysteriously jammed and they needed to hold us up and change out the ten of diamonds, this did not interrupt the table karma. It got to the point where we were openly mocking pit bosses with comments like “exactly how much do I need to win before I get some free drinks” (you do not actually automatically get free drinks just for gambling in New Zealand casinos), and when cashing out “if only I could get a free drink I would probably sit here for another hour and keep playing”, still no free drinks. We then had celebratory drinks with the American guy, and reminisced about how much greater Vegas is, he went to college about 3 hours away from Las Vegas so had plenty to share.

Friday night wrapped up about 3am, with a return to our place where Green Griffin, Cream Crusader and I stayed up to 5am watching Skin and Bones, good times.

Saturday morning, surprisingly not feeling too bad. Not a lot planned for the day aside from watching the Rookie v Sophomore game for the NBA’s all star Weekend. This has to be my least favourite event from the All Star weekend, however I was optimistic, given the level of talent from the past two drafts. Yet again this game turned out to be disappointment. The problem is that this game has no intensity, and there is no defence played at any stage, it is like watching 18 Vince Carters. The highlight of the game is usually when the game is over and everyone clears out and it turns into a dunk contest, and even this didn’t happen this year. Also Yi looked so out of place in the game he has no place in this game (I agree he is one of the top rookies, but he looks so out of place), almost like Yao has no place in the All Star game, the Chinese players just look like they have no idea what is going on in this game, they do realise that the game is an exhibition right? while we are on the topic of players who didn’t belong Daniel Gibson shot 11 threes and won the MVP, what is the point of this? the game is about dunks and layups, how do you have 20 three point attempts, this is not the Euro league, sure in the regular season when Lebron clears the defense and leaves you with open shots you can take the threes, but in a game with no defence to start with, why are you shooting these threes?

How does this get fixed? I have always been against the idea of a International vs USA game, only because almost 80% of the players in the league are from the states, so it is not really representative, also in an international game, an international team can beat a US team, but this is because the US team is an all star team, and the international team is actually a team, if both teams were all star teams then the US team should win comfortably. However imagine if on Friday night there was an international vs US players game, using players who were not in the actual all star game. Think of the potential teams, the only international players in this years All star game were Yao, Dirk, and Nash. So that could leave an international team including Andrea Bargnani, Andrew Bogut, Pau Gasol, Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker, Leandro Barbosa, Loul Deng, Andrei Kirilenko, Jose Calderon, Andris Beadrins, Mehemet Okur, Hedo Turkoglu, Yi (considering you need a mix of players and positions), I am sure I am missing people too. That team should beat the next best 12 US players who were not in the All Star game, and they would all have something to prove, the international players, and the US Born All star snubs.

Then consider there are players like Dirk who played like he should not have been in the actual All Star game, there is a lot of depth in this game, and it will only get better as more players from overseas come into the league. This would also increase the international emphasis in the NBA, which David Stern clearly wants to do if he wants to have a European division (more on this), and still showcase the young players, as a lot of them would still make this game.

Speaking of this European Division idea, I think it is a great idea, both for increasing the international popularity of the game, and because of the potential size of the markets revenue wise. However adding 5 teams to the NBA will ruin the league, so you would need to move 5 teams. If you moved New Orleans, Memphis, Seattle (OK City), New Jersey, Mikwaukee to London, Paris, Madrid, Amsederam, and either Berlin, it would be fantastic. Also you would need to move a team to Vegas to balance out the East having Amsterdam in their conference, so move the Kings out there. Travel will be a factor, but not much of a factor, it is not like these teams are flying on commercial airlines. The NBA wouldn’t need as many minor leagues if they had teams in Europe, there would be way less need for totally inferior leagues like the ABA, CBA, WNBA and the D League. When Europe already has an inferior league.

That evening White Warrior and I want to the first Waikato game of the Super 14, an always good local derby against Auckland at Eden park. It was a good time, unfortunately for Waikato it was too early in the season, so there were not many Waikato fans there, because it is February and it is hard to get into the mood for Rugby season. There was a good Auckland crowd, surprising because generally Aucklanders don’t show up for things. Overall I thought it was much closer than the final score showed, however I have been told that it did not look good on TV for Waikato. We snuck out of the stadium 10 minutes early to avoid the abuse from Auckland fans, and to beat traffic (I cannot figure out how that stadium is going to host World Cup games, it is going to be an embarrassment for New Zealand).

On a related note, I am now ready for Rugby season. Last week I thought it was too soon, and still summer, but now that I have been to a game, and watched about 3 more I am ready to get into this. I went into the season thinking that Auckland and Canterbury would be New Zealands best teams with Waikato not far out in Third. I still think this, because Wellington clearly will not be good, and Otago will win a game somewhere, just hard to see where.

Later that evening was Blue Streaks Birthday at the Ivory Lounge (there was a dinner first, but I was at the game). It was fun if uneventful, just drinking, which is always fun. After the bar closed we all returned to our place for more drinking, the problem was we only had spirits, and had no mixers. The solution was Green Griffin who produced a case of Red Bull, and we drank Vodka and Whiskey and Red Bull, going through about 13 bottles between not many of us (while watching Skin and Bones… once again good times). Unbelievably I was able to sleep when it came to that hours later.

Sunday was uneventful, aside from the NBA Saturday. Again it is an overrated night, but always fun to see NBA players wearing their suits, and their reactions to what is happening. It was fun to see Deron Williams and Chris Paul take the skills challenge seriously, and their rivalry. It was fun to see the 3 point shoot out, and see Chris Bosh look legitimately excited to see Jason Kapono, I was surprised that he even knew who he was and that he was paying attention to the event, do you think they hang out? does Chris Bosh have to hang out with with Jason Kapono because there are no other Black people in Toronto?

Finally the Slam Dunk contest. Normally I think that the Slam Dunk contest is a little overrated, but this year, with Rudy Gay asking for dunks on You Tube, Dwight Howard not getting respect last year, Gerald Green returning from last years great performance, and Jamario Moon playing this whole year trying to prove he should have been in the NBA all along. I thought Moon’s first dunk was awesome, and Rudy Gay’s Dunk throwing the ball off the back support was great and underrated, but Green and Howard took it to another level, If there were scores in the second round, Howard could have scored 200, they were all amazing, original, and fun. Greens shoeless dunk was great, as was the Birthday Cake dunk. It was the greatest Dunk contest ever.

The weekend finished watching Crank on Sky. Now I don’t want to say that the overall quality of movies has decreased over the years, but Sunday night used to be a night where there would be a decent movie on. Crank is a terrible movie. Jason Statham who was once a good actor, and was in great movies, Lock Stock and Snatch, is now reduced to making movies like this and The Transporter II. Even though the Transporter should never have been made, the Transporter II is even worse, it also has the biggest stretch in movie history. At one stage there is a bomb on the bottom of his car, the solution is the jump the car flipping it over under a crane, so the bomb gets hooked on the hook of the crane, and unhooks the bomb, while the car continues to rotate landing on its wheels, and driving away… If there is ever a Transporter III  I may have to kill someone.

Now all I have to look forward to is next weekends Boat Trip… wait that will be awesome.

There are a variety of things I have been meaning to blog for a long time, some I won’t get to with this post, but at least a few of the most recent things I will (in hindsight I got to only one of them).

Let’s start with the good stuff – Mathematics in Mercer.

I was down in Hamilton for the most recent weekend and on our way home we stopped at Mercer. I was very hungover and decided I would buy some garlic naan bread. While this was being prepared I walked to the service station (Mobil) and got something to drink.

Now, anyone who has been around me buying drinks on these hungover days may know that I tend to:

a) Make bad decisions
b) Not know what I want
c) Buy many drinks

So, I wander around Mobil and not knowing what I want, I get a bottle of fresh up, a 600mL carton of milk and 2 Mizones.
See what I mean?

(It is important to know I bought two Mizones because they were $3.99 each, or two for $4.99. I am a sucker for things like that apparently)

So, I go to the counter, the guy scans the goods, I pay (eftpos) and I am ready to go. However as he is looking at the receipt he notices that he only scanned one of the Mizones. This doesn’t bother me much as I can see I just need to pay an extra dollar and all will be solved. (Un)fortunately the guy at the counter does not see this simple solution, and because of my aforementioned hungoverness I don’t actually verbalise the solution. Instead I just kinda stand there staring at him blankly.

So, the guy is confused and doesn’t know what to do. He knows something needs to happen, but clearly doesn’t know what. He scans the stuff again, but doesn’t really know why. Eventually he calls over another lady.

The lady comes over, gets the problem explained to her. She then gets the receipt of what I paid and asks “how much did you pay”. I continue with my staring blankly, unwilling to respond to such a stupid question. She too scans the things and knows something is wrong, but apparently can’t figure it out. Noticing the $1 difference between the receipt and the screen is too difficult for these people.

Anyway, the first lady then calls a second lady over to help with the problem. Now I have three staff members trying to figure something that a hungover guy figured out in less than 3 seconds. Oh well, I guess I am in Mercer, I had to expect them to take a little bit to figure it out.

So, I continue waiting, not saying anything, just waiting for them to figure it out. Then I hear something that I find too shocking to actually react to, the third lady says:

“Yeah, you have to give him $4”

I am not sure if she is telling me I have to pay the first guy who served me $4 (meaning I get no discount as I was meant to), or if she meant he had to give me $4 (meaning I hadn’t paid for either Mizone and would then need to pay $5 for both).

Turns out she didn’t mean either of those alternatives. What she meant was that the guy would give me $4, put the second Mizone in the bag and let me go on my way.

Not one to question idiots I take my ‘change’ and all my goods and head back to the Indian store (sells Indian food, not Indians).
So, the moral of the story is that I got both the Mizones for free and only paid for the juice and the milk (that I probably shouldn’t have bought anyway).

After I got the naans I went out into the parking lot to get back in the car. Unfortunately the car is not where I thought it was. So I take the obvious course of action. I stand around in the middle of the car park looking. Looking at nothing in particular, I assume looking for the car but who really knows.

Eventually I see the car with the other guys in it laughing quite a bit. Apparently it was highly amusing. I can only imagine.

I saw an amusing image, not sure if I did it justice

I write this as we are just leaving the small Northland town of kawakawa. We stopped there because they have a nice public toilet.

Yeah, that’s kinda weird

What was weirder was going to look at them and finding people taking photos. What is the deal with that? Taking photos of a public toilet, who is impressed when they see that?

Furthermore, why is a town so proud of having nice toilets?
Having the best public toilet is like winning at the special Olympics, you are still retarded in the end.

Or, as SDC put it

It is like being the worst* Nazi. It doesn’t make you awesome, it just makes you slightly less crap

*by worst Nazi I mean the Nazi who was the worst at being a Nazi.

This town did get better however, as across from where we parked there was a coin save store, and hanging outside there were three different colours of Paul Pierce shirts – that’s right, in this small town that no one should ever go to, you can buy a Paul Pierce jersey in green, red or blue.

I thought it was pretty great, seeing as I had met Paul Pierce last year.

GG

(You could have also got a Vince Young jersey or a pink LeBron James, if that’s what you are in to)

My hunger for frozen treats got the better of me today, and I did the unthinkable, something I vowed never to do again, Return to Erdington.

It was actually fairly straight forward, and nothing over the top exciting took place, except for answering one of life’s many mysteries’s, the question being, where is milli vanili these days? I can now confirm after my brave walk down Erdington’s main street that they are residing in Erdington. And yes they still have those same nifty outfits. Seeing all the inbred Erdington locals brought back memories of mine, and WW’s time there, and I left fairly hastily after purchasing my Iceland goodies.

It has been pretty mad lately as I imagine it is everywhere with Christmas coming up. Birmingham is getting into the full swing of things by constructing an ice rink in the of the square, and after watching Blades of glory 8 times on the plane on the way over here I am determined to give it a crack. I have never been very good at skateboarding or roller skating which is a little worrying, but I am not going to let little things like skill or common sense get in my way, and now that I have a national insurance number I can go to the doctors without being deported.

I had my credit card limit raised the other day which has helped with Christmas, it is a rather long winded story as I was just trying to pay my rent, but my payments hadn’t cleared, and my card wouldn’t let me have any money. So I got on the phone to one of those annoying call centre persons, I think she was new as it sounded like she was reading the terms, and conditions off her computer screen after a elongated spiel she finished with, ‘and it could take up to Six years to clear sir’. Six years for my payment to clear are you serious? After I had finished laughing hysterically I asked her to confirm that she had indeed said six years. She had. This call wasn’t like any other annoying call centre call I had made before. She said the only other thing I could do beyond waiting up to six years for my payment to clear was to in crease my limit. I suggested my landlord would probably not be willing to wait up to six years for the rent so we should go ahead with the increase. This girl had an American accent, which was a little strange. I was only 30 pounds short without my payment clearing so I rounded up, and said lets increase it by 100. She started asking the usual question about jobs, income, outgoings etc.. She asked if I was still Surveying, and then proceeded to tell me her life story about how she had studied civil engineering at uni, it was very very bizarre, she ended up increasing my limit by 500 pounds as they do, and I got the feeling she didn’t want to hang the phone up I guess that’s just the impression I have on women over here, it is the DAWNING of a new era after all.

Work has been chugging along nicely, and on Sunday after a 12-hour shift, which brought back memories of before I left New Zealand I still managed to cook dinner, and to do some laundry. I am still enjoying cooking a lot, it’s fair to say some of my M & S work buddies don’t like to cook Michael said “I don’t like how food smells when it’s cooking so I just microwave”, Right! Jay on the other hand confessed tonight to eating 2-minute noodles for the last 23 days straight.

I had a job interview with the Royal Mail last Tuesday which, and I quote was ‘Very successful’. The interview was ok, now being that I already have two jobs I was a little unsure of whether or not I wanted this job, but it paid more so greed was the contributing factor. I had thought about pulling out of the interview the week before, and giving someone else an opportunity at the job, but I couldn’t find the correct phone number to ring so I decided to go to the interview, besides I probably wasn’t going to get the job, and I could always say no if I did. They gave me a link to some information they suggested I read before the interview about the services they provide, but being that I wasn’t sure I was going to attend I didn’t bother reading it. Now I had also come to the realization that I had never failed a face-to-face interview, and I was hoping I might not get the job to break the high expectation. It turns out I probably should have read that information as the interview involved a role play scenario of selling a credit card I had a quick look over a leaflet, and winged. It went ok. Then the interviewer asked me to sell him a bag of balloons, and finally an apple, now fortunately for me the crazier the stuff he brought out the more I thrived, and began to take the piss. Finally he asked me if I would be ok wearing a uniform, now their purple uniforms are pretty lame looking, and the guy was wearing a bow tie, but I love bow ties, I hope I get one. I am not sure the moral of this story, because I really didn’t prepare for this interview at all, I shot from the hip, and talked the biggest load of bullshit ever, using clichés, and catchy phases, and still got the job, and my record stays intact now I’m going to be even more nervous for my next interview.

So it looks like I have three jobs now, and I don’t think I’ll give up my bar job after working with the lovely Nena the other Friday. I was meant to be working in the upstairs bar, but it was pretty slow, and they needed some help downstairs, we had two new kids starting Nena, and Michael like a good senior I let them do most of the work they would ask me question now, and again strangely I actually knew the answers to some of their question although most of Nena’s questions I didn’t understand due to her Polish accent. Halfway through serving a customer, and for no apparent reason to me Nena grabs me, puts a cube of ice down my shirt, and rubs it into my chest. I still have no idea why this took place, but I enjoyed it, it was very porn movieish. I considered returning the favour, but I probably would have ended up in prison, so instead I took the less arrestable option of throwing ice on the floor where she had just swept, but I hadn’t wagered in the fact women are stronger, and more violent than me, now I know the Polish are still probably a little angry after the whole Hitler trying to erase them from the face of the earth (did I mention she was a brunette) she then proceed to jump on my feet, and assaulted me with the broom (not in a perverted New Plymouth way either before anyone starts thinking that) I was beginning to like this girl, but before she could lock on the scorpion death lock I was asked to restock some bottles, which took me away from the lovely Nena, and outback with some really nice bloke, we were chatting away, and I was stacking the fridge just behind the door when Nena came charging though the door to get some lemon cracking me on the back of the skull. She came past again swore at me, and told me to get out of her way. So in the space of about twenty minutes I had two bruised kneecaps, a couple of squashed toes, an icy cold chest, and a mild concussion, thankfully for my health’s sake I was sent back upstairs, until I finished. As I was leaving she was at the bottom of the stairs I winked at her, and she smiled, I’m so in! The DAWN of a new day.
To follow up this story I haven’t seen her since.

The people at Lloyds are pretty cool in a work environment sort of way, at M & S on the other hand though….

Michael is one of the most useless people I have ever worked with, and he constantly ads the word ‘innit’ to the end of every god forsaking sentence It amazes me how the English don’t know how to use their own freaking language I brought this up with Mo the other night when he asked me ‘how was the outback treating you’ I looked at him sideways, and thought for second about if I plunged my marks and Spencer pen into his chest whether it would spear his heart. He continues ‘you’re a bit slow on the uptake tonight’ I replied, “don’t you mean how is the outback treating you?” Then he looked at me strangely, at that point tumbleweed rolled past, and I walked away.
I did however have an interesting conversation about dog fighting in Pakistan. Mo went to visit his brother over there a few months back apparently it’s really cheap to live over there because everyone has stitched up their power, and gas meters which leaves them plenty of money to train fighting dogs, of course. He told me how great it was over there, and how they had everything, yeah except a little thing called freedom. His brother had been training his dog for a few months, and apparently it was treated like a king, well the day came, and the dog had its first fight, which it lost. Mo’s brother was a little disappointed so he pulled out a pistol, and shot it in the ring. Wouldn’t that be cool if every time something didn’t go to plan you just pulled out your PP7, and shot it, maybe Pakistan is the place to be? Mo was a little confused after his brother had poured all this money into the dog, and then just shot it, he asked ‘why didn’t you sell it’ his brother replied ‘it lost we’ll get a new one’. After telling me how great Pakistan was I asked if Mo wanted to move there he said no, well there’s just no pleasing some people.

Another British saying which really grinds me is instead of saying hello you get ‘you alright’ which I have had trouble adapting to as I am use to hearing this when some is crying, or has hurt themselves, and am always looking for someone in distress when I hear this, but alas it’s just another retarded English person.

I decided after carting a pair of long johns half way around the world I was going to wear them this week, now I have never had the privilege of donning a pair of long johns before, but figured I would buy some for my trip as it would be a lot colder over here. I am going on the record right now as saying long johns are the most useless piece of clothing in the universe, except maybe in Antarctica, surely no ones legs ever get this cold, if my legs are cold I put pants on. This is the equivalent of putting a jumper on a chicken, and then putting it in the oven, I am standing to be corrected, but I don’t think this kind of warmth is necessary.

When I first started at M & S people kept telling me of this girl named Katherine (who after all this time I still haven’t actually met) who apparently said I had a sexy voice, I have received a bit of stick over this from the boys, and I think they think I’m a bit of a ladies man. Tony is always asking me questions about New Zealand girls (as if I know anything about them) Tony is married to a Ukrainian which he purchased off Ebay I believe, and Michael keeps asking about the Polish which I have only mention once to him about. (Maybe he reads my blogs. Oh crap….) I think I remember talking to a girl about something around the time this all starting happening, and she bared a striking resemblance to a certain well rounded celebrity…. DAWN FRENCH.
Now this girl looked even more like Dawn French than the Erdington girl, and I was sober when I spoke to M & S Dawn. There must be something in the water over here or that Dawn French has a lot of illegitimate daughters.
So the Dawn of a new day doesn’t mean the sun will be shinning, and I can’t help but point out the fickleness of girls with my newfound sex appeal even if they do all look like Dawn French as It seems the accent plays a major role which is a little shallow if you ask me, I could be an absolute prick, but I have an accent so I must be cool. I think the same applies to my interview success I have the stereotypical small white male look, which sells although I do have the gift of the gab.

In summary the world is full of a bunch of shallow fickle Bastards, F**k you and F**kin merry Christmas I hope you all choke, just a little bit!!!

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