G'day from the North of the North!

I made it, everyone, I made it as far north as you can make it in New Zealand. The sense of achievement is great, and I am a better person for it. Let's step back a little and bring you up to date, okay?

Mount Maunganui was nice, very nice indeed. We got there fairly late, after a late start to the day in Rotorua. We checked in to the hostel, dumped our stuff, and a few of us headed for the Mount, which is about the size of a pimple compared to the rest of the mountains here in New Zealand. Still, it was nice to get some exercise and the view from the "summit" was beautiful.

An early start to the day got us on the road to Auckland, and we were there by early afternoon. Just enough time to check into the hostel and have a wander around the city centre. Everyone bags Auckland and says how crappy it is, but I got a pretty good feeling from it. It's nice and green and there seems to be enough stuff to do to keep oneself busy. But then again there are lots of big cities that are exactly like it. As far as big cities go, though, I thought it was okay. I'd better like it because I'll be back there tomorrow! Haha!

Anyway, on Wednesday morning I caught the bus again for the north, and a town called Paihia. Northland New Zealand is beautiful, and the ride was great. I'm in a great hostel here (far and away the best I've been in while in New Zealand, actually), and the atmosphere is great. Yesterday I did a LONG day trip up to the northernmost tip of New Zealand, Cape Reinga, and along the way we did some sand boarding on 100metre high sand dunes. I had the most runs out of everyone, I'm pretty proud of saying...

Today I've already gone for a walk along the beach into the town centre, and this afternoon I'm going on a four hour walk to the Haruru Falls and back. I'm also going to pop into the Waitangi Treaty Grounds and inform myself of Maori/European History. Should be good I think.

And awaaaay we go!

YIKES!!!

That's right folks, I have now achieved both my "adventure goals" for New Zealand, that being jumping off a platform with nothing but a rubber band strapped around my ankles, and now I have lept out of a plane with nothing but a piece of fabric and a tiny dwarf strapped to my back. I have to say, though, that it was one hell of a ride. Mind you, it DID sort of feel like we were being cattle-herded into the plane... There just wasn't that personal feeling about it. Oh well. Can't have everything in our "adventure goals", can we?

So Taupo was nice, and now I'm in the rotting egg hell of Rotorua. Actually, the smell isn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Rotorua is the spiritual centre of the Maori Kingdom (or so I've been told to tell everyone), and it's also a major hotspot for geothermal activity. This means that the town has a faint odour of sulphur constantly hovering over it. Luckily that managed to mask my own smell (I had a bit of geothermal activity myself last night!)...

This afternoon we're off to a place called Mount Maunganui, which is a popular coastal resort town. The hostel I'm staying at there is giving me a free meal tonight, which I'm really looking forward to. Should be good...

Where do I begin?

Hells yeah, y'all, I'm back on the road! Well, it's not all fun and games, of course. I had to leave several good good friends back in ChCh, which is probably the worst thing about travelling. That, and not having enough money, EVER, to do the things that you want to do... But I'll be raking in the casheesh soon enough, so it's not all doom and gloom! Thanks (huge thanks, in fact) go out to Tam, Mel, EmJizzle, and Phil for the last south island road trip, it was fun. I'll miss you all, and already do.

Of course all the other folks back in good ol' ChCh will also be missed, and you know who you are. Thanks for the memories. So long, and thanks for all the fish.

Now, back to the travelling bit. Hopped on the ferry to Wellington on a beautiful cloud free day. Waved goodbyes across the bay to the ones I love the most, and set off into the distance. The trip itself was pretty uneventful, but once I arrived in Wellington I was determined not to get stuck in a rut and stay at the hostel. Nice city, Wellington, and my only full day there was spent walking around taking a few photos, visiting a couple museums, and generally being a tourist. Luckily there were plenty of other tourists to blend in with. Met a couple nice people, which always makes the stay that little bit brighter.

Wednesday morning I got on my Magic Mystery Bus (beam me up Scotty was our driver, in only his third ever solo trip. What joy awaited me!) at the oh-so-early hour of 7.55am. Off on the road we went, with fresh-faced Scotty telling us interesting banter that he read out of the Magic Bus Driver Handbook along the way... I'm sorry, but please don't re-hash all the same stuff you have been told in training. But if you absolutely HAVE to, at least get the facts right and remember names.

After a few gratuitous stops along the way we arrived in Napier, the art deco capital of New Zealand. Napier was levelled by a massive earthquake at the turn of the 20th century, and it was rebuilt in an art deco style. Unfortunately they seemed to have forgotten over the years that art deco is a fairly boring style of architecture, so it just ended up being any other town. Oh well. The hostel I stayed at was interesting. It used to be the local prison, and we got to sleep in the old prison cells or officers' buildings. The shower blocks were, well, interesting, with a small plywood board covering your tiddly bits. Thankfully there weren't any extremely tall or short people staying at the time. The creepiest bit about the hostel though, was the fact that they had decorated some of the cells with dummies and other "prison-esque" articles. You'd be walking through the halls and suddenly see this person looking at you through the bars, only to turn around and see that it was some mannequin. Wierd.

The next day we were off to Taupo, where I'm writing this right now. Nice little town, with the cheapest skydiving in the world. I signed up to do a 12,000ft jump, all for the low-low price of $145. Unfortunately when we arrived it was really windy, so the jump was called off. We arranged to jump in the morning (today) weather permitting, but it's been raining since yesterday evening, so no jump today. Now it's scheduled for 8.30am tomorrow morning, exactly two hours before the Magic Mystery Bus is scheduled to come and get me to take me to the next spot. Talk about cutting it short!

Anyway, instead of skydiving yesterday I walked to this little stream that is heated by thermal vents in the earth's crust, so I had a bit of a free hot spa by the side of the river. Mind you, it was bloody freakin' hot, so I didn't stay long. Instead I went back to the hostel, cracked a beer, and hopped in the hot spa there. Haha! Made a few friends, which was nice, and had a good time.

So today is a bit of a write off, really. I can't go for a walk along the lake, which is what I wanted to do, because it's too rainy and wet. Instead I've already watched "The Incredibles", eaten breakfast and lunch, played pool with an englishman who didn't know how to play pool, walked into town to buy some dinner food, and now I'm writing this. Oh well.

Tomorrow should be more eventful. Early morning skydive, bus to Rotorua for a stopover to see the bubbling thermal pools, and a couple nights in Mount Maunganui. The hostel there is meant to be great, with free breakfast AND free dinner. Who could ask for anything more?

All that is old is new again.

I've noticed yet another idiot fad coming through in the youth of today. Recently we've had such gems as the fashion mullet come back into style, or the genius style of the 1980's coming back, which to me is just ridiculous. Even people that were teens in the eighties would tell you that it was complete stupidity that got them to wear such hideous articles of clothing.

Since I work in a busy shopping centre in Christchurch, New Zealand I'm able to observe quite frequently what the youth of today are up to. Mainly I just shake my head and laugh, but over the past week or so something has come to the forefront of my embarrassment for them. Somehow kids of today have decided that it's once again cool to shave interesting shapes into the sides of their heads, much like the Fresh Prince Of Bel Air used to shave ladder effects into his hair back in the early-mid nineties. I think if you were to ask Will Smith (aka. The Fresh Prince) what his biggest fashion faux-pas was in his entire life, I think he would say it was a toss-up between fluorescent clothing and funky hair designs.

Today alone I've noticed two of the youth of today with things shaved in the SIDES of their heads. One had funky ladder designs, and the other had what looked like a shockwave-esque line, much like what a heartbeat looks like on a heart monitor. I'm sure one of them was even wearing a pink polo shirt.

Now, if the youth of yesterday can see, in hindsight, that their fashion choices were horrible, why can't the youth of today see, with foresight, that their choices will inherently be horrible? Smarten up kids, think before you shave.

If you could, would you? (Part 1)

If you could fly, what would you do? I mean if you had the power of flight... Take, for example, birds. Not any old birds though, I'm talking about seagulls and ducks. You know how they sometimes will fly around in the air (duh, where else would they fly, Adam?) and randomly crap on people? Well, if you could fly, would you randomly crap on flocks of seagulls? I probably would. It would look pretty funny if anyone on the ground saw you, but I think it'd be worth it.

Or how about magpies? They seem to get immense joy out of harrassing us land-dwellers, swooping down on us and sometimes stealing our "shiney things". To be honest, I'd probably do the same thing. It'd be so much fun doing dives and barrel rolls in mid-air, and then catching a set of keys in your mouth, only to deposit it a few hundred yards away from where I got it from. So much fun...

Or, if you wanted to completely abuse your power of flight, would you fly around rich neighbourhoods and pool dive? Or maybe crap on the bonnet of their expensive cars? Or watch as they sunbathed nude? That's taking it a bit to the extreme, and not something I would do, but the option is there.

Or would you use your powers for something good, like solving crimes, or transporting people around the world for free, on your back? All they'd have to pay for would be a meal to keep your stamina up, and you'd get to see the world! That's what I'd do. I'd just travel around the world whenever and wherever I wanted, my backpack in tow. I could be the first person to climb Mount Everest in under twenty minutes!

Sweets for the sweet!

What a start to the day! Last night as I closed the shop I made sure I had most of the next day's fruit prep done, so I could just come in and relax and do whatever I wanted. That was a good start to the morning.

Then another mall employee that works at a gourmet candy shop came up and asked if he could use the internet for a few minutes to check something, and in exchange he'd bring me a bag of candy. This is real gourmet stuff, you know, hand made sweets. In the middle of each of the lollies is a picture of what it's meant to taste like: orange, passionfruit, strawberry, et cetera. I haven't tasted them out of fear that they may be laced with arsenic.

However, slightly more exciting than a free bag of candy also happened to me today. One of the mall managers came up to the shop with a piece of paper in her hand (turned out to be a mall comment card). She showed me that and asked if the person that wrote it was talking about me. Sure enough, at the end of it was a description of me: Tall, mid-twenties, with an American accent (how was she to know that I'm actually Canadian?). Then mall manager tells me that I've been selected as the mall employee of the month! So she then asks me if I drive, because the usualy prize for being selected mall employee of the month is two free months parking in the secure staff car park. When I say no, she tells me that she'll go away and try to organise something in place of the free parking. Then she takes my photo with a very old digital camera, says congratulations again, and walks off.

I can only imagine that either she really IS going to sort out some other prize for me, and that my face will be plastered in the next mall newletter, or she's actually a bounty hunter hired by Vodafone and she's tracked me down and is going to extradite me back to England to pay my unpaid mobile phone bill. I still haven't recieved a prize, so it's entirely possible you know...

Look everyone! It's a Sun-day!

Watch those steps, you might slip on the two centimetres of snow! I woke up two mornings ago to see this sight outside the front window. It's mid-spring here in New Zealand and people are wearing winter coats and long johns... Granted, I'm no different, but when you're travelling you have to try and fit in with your surroundings.

So I got to work yesterday morning and the place was completely dead. By ten o-clock I'd recieved word that all the schools in Christchurch were closing one-by-one, probably in an effort to flood the city with rampaging children gradually, so I thank the city council for that one. By 10.30 the mall was bulging at the seems with school kids, and by 11.15 we were back to normal. Maybe they figured out that being a MallRat wasn't a good life-long job...


Around 11.30 I'd heard through the grapevine that all the city buses were going to stop running for the day, even though the snow had stopped a half hour previous and I'd noticed brief moments of sunshine peaking through the television static sky. About the same time I heard that the buses were stopping I'd also heard that the mall management was giving shops permission to close up early if they wanted. I thought to myself "Well, that seems pretty silly since the snow has stopped..." Then again, I'd been at work for three hours and I hadn't sold anything at that point, so maybe it would be a good idea for me to close up shop.

Which is what I did, after getting the word from the manager. In the end I'd finished on $5.00 worth of sales for four hours' work. At least I had something to show for, however pathetic it might have been. So I picked up a case of beer and got some friends to come over for my first "Snow Day" in nearly three years. "Snow Day" eventually turned into "Kind Of Sunny And Nice Outside Day". I couldn't help but feel ripped off in the fact that I got sent home for just about no reason. There were rumours that the storm was going to come back that night and dump even more snow on us, but mostly it just rained and was cold. I woke up this morning and didn't notice any difference in snow levels.

So in the end I got a little bit drunk, complained about the state of New Zealand Weather Preparedness, and laughed. Here's a couple more picture of what caused Christchurch to come to a stand-still...

Bend it like Blogger.

That great British film of a few years ago "Bend It Like Beckham" is on television right now. I can't help but wonder if that great British football star David Beckham gets royalties from the producers of the movie for using his name in the title. I don't even think they use his name in the actual script, but he's in the title, so surely he's entitled to some sort of cash settlement... Not that he needs it.

Also on television right now is that doyen of reality tv "Growing Up Gotti". It features the Gotti family, of the famed modern-day mafia variety. Does a high profile mafia family really need more money by selling themselves into the worst thing that has ever happened to television (I'm talking the reality type)? And how come one of the richest families in the USofA has such horrible taste in everything? Their house looks like it's made of plastic and came out of a bad Eighties movie, as does their fashion and plastic surgery sense.

Speaking of bad taste, I watched "World's Wildest Police Chases" earlier on television. My main problem with this program is that it's in fact "America's Wildest Police Chases", and not the World's.

I just peaked up from the compter monitor and saw a Gotti family member with a mullet. WHAT THE HELL?!?

A Cryptic Wing-ed Horse Has Landed...

It's been a fairly good few days, everyone, and here's why. On Sunday last I went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which was good, but not as good as I'd prepared myself for. There was just something missing, and I think it was too easy for me to compare it to the original Gene Wilder picture. Thanks go to Mel for shouting me the tickets, and thanks go to Kim for hooking us up (you know what I'm talking about, don't pretend you don't!).

Monday and Tuesday were pretty standard, really. I worked a full ten-hour shift at Tank on Tuesday that simply DRAGGED on and on and on, so in the end I was very happy to park my ass on the couch for the rest of the night.

Wednesday, today, is where the big even unfolded. I woke up and had some breakfast, a cup of tea, and Tam and I went to the vet to get LB the cat's stitches out of her foot. She was such a good little cat, and we're all very proud of her. Upon returning home I had some leftover pizza that I had for dinner last night and readied myself for my visit to see Steve The Tattooist. Steve is very talented, and I'd brought a sketch over to him on the previous Sunday to see if he could come up with something. He did, and after 90 minutes the wonderful work he did was etched for eternity on my inner left arm. Here's a bit of a photo to see him in action:



So thanks to Steve, and thanks to my mum for not giving a crap what I do to my body. I've uploaded more photos of the event into a new folder of my yahoo.ca photos, which you can find a link to (second from the top) on the right. ENJOY!

I do not know everything.

I'm going to get a t-shirt made that says "I Work At A Juice Bar, Not An Information Desk". At least eight times a day when I work at Tank I get people coming up and asking me where this or that store is, or where they can buy lottery tickets, or stamps, or if they are as dumb as they look.

Case in point an elderly gentleman just came up and asked me where he could buy some bread to feed the birds. I pointed to the GIGANTIC BRIGHT YELLOW SUPERMARKET DIRECTLY BEHIND THE TANK STORE!!! For some reason he still couldn't comprehend what I'd just said, and asked if they sold bread there.

I must need a vacation, or at least some time off on a tropical island, to get my head back in the the "I love humanity" mode that I generally am in. Preferably there would be hula girls there...

God help us all... Part 2.

Old Meathead: You do coffee too, do you?
Me: (Standing right beside a large cappuccino machine and huge coffee bean grinder) Yep.
Old Meathead: I'll have a long black please. Back in a minute.
Me: Sorry, what size did you want? (Pointing to the small, medium, and large paper cups we serve them in)
Old Meathead: You don't do coffee in cups?
Me: No, just these paper takeaway cups.
Old Meathead: I'm not drinking coffee out of that...!
Me: (Sigh) Okay. Bye.

God help us all...

I thought for a second I had escaped them all. Yesterday I worked a long shift at Tank Juice, at the normal location of Northlands Mall. Now everyone knows that shopping malls around the world are filled with homeless and hearless wierdos that have nothing else to do but hang around shopping malls being homeless and heartless. For some unknown reason yesterday there was a disproportionate number of wierdos in the mall, and for some further unknown reason they all seemed to gravitate towards me and my little wee shop. I can't explain it. But when I finished at the end fo the day I thought I'd gotten away from them, and that it would go back to the normal number of homeless and heartless wierdos. How wrong was I?

Today I'm filling in for a couple hours at the work-out-gym capital of the world, Les Mills Christchurch. Meatheads and protien junkies from all over the world seem to come here to pump iron (this comment is not directed at those of you that I know that come to Les Mills, I know you're not like the regulars that come here every waking minute of their day). I figured that these people couldn't possibly be a bunch of wierdos that would annoy the shit out of me, but for some reason it happened. Here's an exchange I had with two people, one wierdo and one ultrawierdo, about half an hour ago as they came in to get some nutritious and delicious Tank drinks...

Wierdo: Hi, I'll have the veggie combo juice, but with spinach instead of spicey tomato juice (Sidebar: You cannot get a whole hell of juice out of wilted, dead spinach. Trust me on this one.).
Me: Uh, sure, not a problem, I'll work it out.
Wierdo: (Insert Ultrawierdo's name here), are you getting anything?
Ultrawierdo: (In a voice loud enough to hear across the busy street outside) I'll, uh, mmm, huh... I'll have one of these ones on the board up here, but I don't want frozen yoghurt or strawberries.
Me: Okay, no problem. I can leave the frozen yoghurt out of anything that's up there, and there are quite a few that don't have any strawberries...
Ultrawierdo: Well I definitely don't want frozen yoghurt, that's for sure! And no strawberries! How about this one, on the board up here! (Sidebar: At Tank Juice, we have six different boards of options, all with on average seven or eight juices and smoothies. For me to pick the exact drink he's looking for is a near impossible venture.)
Me: (Sigh) Uh, okay...
Ultrawierdo: This one, with peach nectar, oranges, strawberries, and orange sarbet (He meant sorbet). But I don't want any strawberries!
Wierdo: I think he means the Tank Up. He'll have the Tank Up. Give him the large. No strawberries (just in case I didn't catch it the first four times...).
Me: Actually I'm sorry, but we haven't got any orange sarbet at the moment.
Ultrawierdo: Well put some frozen yoghurt in it then...
Me: (Sigh).

Did I mention that he was missing the front four teeth from both the top and bottom of his mouth?

Bring it on (with or without Kirsten Dunst)!!

I'm going hard out. I've promised myself, just this instant, to have a good week. Last week was fairly good, but at the end of it I was pretty tired and a bit bummed out from not doing too much. So this week I'm going to be happy chappy Adam again. I promise.

I haven't had a full day off from work since Tam's birthday over a week ago, and won't be having one again until this Sunday coming. At least I'm not stuck in a hurricane or going without food or water for days on end (and even if I was, I'd probably still blame George W!). I'm working 30.25 hours this week at the juice bar named Tank, plus I've got three shifts coming up over the weekend at The Club, so this should make my bank account grow significantly next week. This past week I did 28 hours at tank and 15 at The Club, which will be very nice to see when I get my next bank statement.

Yesterday, unbeknownst to me, Mel went out and got a new tattoo. She claims that she only went in to see him about the design and to book in a time to get it done, but I think that she actually called ahead and arranged it. I'm all full of conspiracy theories. Either that, or I'm just jealous. Yeah, well, you just watch and see when I call in sick for work and actually go get a full sleeve done!!! Then who'll be laughing, eh?

This is also the week in which I start to harrass Bridgette on the telephone. For those of you in the know, well, you know what I'm talking about. Those of you who don't know Bridgette probably don't need to know at this point. Let's just say that if it all comes together I'll be a very happy person, as will Tam and Patsy probably.

Two days ago I came to the mall with Tam to get a few groceries and we popped into a shop called JayJay's. They have some nice clothes there, and since I'd been thinking about buying a new pair of jeans for a couple weeks I thought I'd go have a look. Normally I hate shopping, but I bit the bullet and swallowed my pride. They had one pair in particular that I liked, and low-and-behold they were even on sale. But alas, they didn't have my size. Oh well, not to worry, thought I. The next day I ran off to another branch of the shop at another mall. Wouldn't you just know it, but they had my size. Now, I'm no dummy, but would you expect these to be on sale too, since they are from the same shop? Me too, but these weren't. I liked them, but I didn't like them "full-priced like them". So fast forward to today, and I got to Tank Juice a bit early so I could run in and see if my size had magically appeared at the shop here. Amazingly they had, and even more amazingly they were on sale!! Now here I am with a fresh pair of jeans sitting on the bench next to me, and I'm quite looking forward to showing them off.

Look out world, here comes Mr. Skinny Arse!!

Ps. Hey Kirsten, call me!

Link it up!

Hi everyone. Just a quick note to let you all know that there is a new photo file under the "My Photos Page" link to the right. It stars one Tamara Peace, and if features the events of her getting inked at Planet Tattoo here in Christchurch. The other person in a few of the photos is Steve, the tattooist. He did a hell of a job, and it only made me want to get my next one... soon.

So the good news is that I've been looking over my finances over the past couple days, and it looks like I'll be above target. This means that I'm going to have more room to play around and decide what I want to do next, and it also means that if I did want to think about getting my pegasus stars done then I can start to seriously consider it.

At any rate, enjoy the photos, and Tam's little piece of art. I like it.

Hair and Cake - A Beautiful Mix

I'm sure by now you will have figured out that I've been and had my hair cut. Here's the low-down on how it went...

I got there bright and early, right on time at 10.00am. That's in the morning, by the way (shown by using the "am" after the numbers, in case you couldn't figure it out). I was greeted with a hello and asked if I wanted a drink. I chose orange juice, and thought to myself "Wow, I get refreshments AND a free haircut??!!" I was asked to fill out this form describing my current hair situation, then Sophie came over and introduced herself. She asked me what I wanted, and I told her to make me look good. I gave her virtual free-reign on my head, if you will. She checked over her plans with the superviser, and away we went.

An hour and a half later I looked like I had just had my hair cut at the normal $10 price I pay for Harold or Jim to snip away, only they had put something called DiFi (a funky way of spelling defy, because hair salons HAVE to be funky...) in my hair to make it look trendy. In actual fact when I asked people what they thought of my new locks, a common concensus was that I, in fact, looked like the famous Belgian comic book character Tintin.

Cheers Sophie.

Now onto the second part of this entry. Yesterday was my pal Tam's birthday. We started the day bright and early by having Adam-baked chocolate chip pancakes, which went off really well. We quickly readied and got our acts together to run down to the tattoo parlour so Tam could get inked up, and they did a very nice job. I'm hoping to post some photos of the event on my photos page, linked to the right, in the near future. Next we were off to Coyote's, a mexican-themed restaurant, for lunch. I was hoping to have the potato skins, but when they came they had bacon on them, even though on the menu they didn't say anything about being coated with pig. Oh well, live and learn. Next Tam went off to have her hair cut, and an hour and a half later Philip and I picked her and her sexy new look up from the salon.

Dinner was spent at a lovely place called Winnebago's, filled with gourmet pizza, a birthday tequila shot, and jokes flying from all corners. I have to say, I was on FIRE! I even organized for half the restaurant to sing Tam happy birthday, which was much appreciated. After dinner, and being totally stuffed, we all headed off to have a couple rounds of late night bowling. Bowling is an interesting activity for me. One round is fun, two rounds verge on extreme boredom. I think most people felt the same way as I did. The main thing, though, is that everyone had fun, and my pants fell down (I hope you all enjoyed the bum wiggling!).

After a long day, we all headed our seperate ways, and ten seconds after I lay my head on my pillow I was asleep. A sure-fire sign of a great day. Happy birthday Tam, the next one is going to be even better...

T-minus 11.25 hours.

I'm getting a haircut. In just under twelve hours I will have some random Sophie running her fingers through my hair, trying her darndest to make me look respectable.

Here's the thing though... Sophie is a "trainee" hairdresser. Now, let me get one thing straight -- I don't normally go to "hairdressers". I go to the cheapest damn place to get some large, cigarette stained fingers to snip away at my locks with these horribly dull scissors. This time, however, I'm going to Sophie. It's a free haircut, at a proper salon, and my haircut might make or break Sophie's soon-to-be booming career. She's going to be judged on speed, accuracy, and probably her answer to "How would you bring peace to the world?" Apparently this whole ordeal is going to take upwards of one hour.

Don't get me wrong, my best ever haircut in the entire world has been by a trainee hairdresser. That, however, was in the fashion capital of the world: London, England. And that haircut was in one of the trendiest parts of London, that being Notting Hill. Now, I know it's not fair to compare Christchurch, New Zealand, with London, England, but...... COME ON! I just hope Sophie doesn't massacre me and make me even more unattractive to women.

I know I shouldn't complain. It's a free haircut, whereas normally if one was to go to this particular salon it might cost me upwards of $39.90 (by the guide, anyway). I just get nervous about people deciding what I'm going to look like for possibly the next three months, or until I run straight out and pay my normal $10 for Jerry, or Ralph, or whoever, to shave me bald...

Oh my god, what's that smell??!!

I'm just watching television while I'm typing this (I know, pretty good multitasking on my part, eh?), and I thought it was fitting that an interesting fact just came up because this was exactly what I was going to write about anyway.

"Most people fart between 10 - 15 times per day, with men and women farting about the same amount."

The other day I had pizza for dinner. Mel and I had just arrived home from delivering, or attempting to deliver, her mini to a garage so it could get fixed when Patsy declared we should order it from the place up the street called "Papa's Pizza", or something to that effect. It's a good place, and you can pile as many toppings on as you want, at no extra charge. I thought this was amazing, so I agreed we should try this place. We did our ordering and waited patiently whilst watching a pirate dvd (Shhh! Don't tell!) that Patsy had picked up on her recent trip to Bali. A knock on the door later told us that the pizza had arrived. Remarkably the delivery guy was actually super nice and friendly, which only made me respect Papa's Pizza even more.

So we break open the pizza and tear into it. I do have to say that it was very, very good. Toppings to the edge, crust was exactly as it should be (although they forgot to put on the feta cheese that I asked for)... It was great. UNTIL half an hour later my stomach decided that the pizza wasn't as good as I first thought and I started to fart up a storm. I didn't understand what was going on, it was pretty gross. I decide to sleep it off and go to bed, and see what happens in the morning.

The next day, nothing changed. I had to work in the morning at Tank Juice, and then the evening at The Club, but that 10 - 15 fart average was EASILY exceeded by a factor of four. I'm not even kidding. Not only that (you might want to skip this sentence if you already think this entry is disgusting), but I actually crapped about six times yesterday. I'm sorry if you didn't listen to my warning and have now lost all respect for me. I must have had a very mild case of food poisoning, but I don't know for sure. I'm okay this morning though...

I suppose there's some good in this: I have now brought the average back up in the fart category. By farting four times as much as most people over the past 36 hours, I make up for all those girls that say they never fart. Cheers ladies!!

Happy 21st Dad!

Hello again everyone. Welcome back.

Last night I worked at "The Club", which was, for the most part, fairly enjoyable. I just wanted to tell you about a couple things that happened during the night. First off I started in the main club bar, serving the regulars and having a fairly chilled out time. It was good and steady, and was quite looking forward to the night. There was a Wallabies/All Blacks tri-nations match on late in the night, which I was eager to watch, when suddenly the Boss asked me to move downstairs to help out at the 21st birthday party that was being held in one of the large function rooms. As soon as she asked me to do this my heart sunk, because I had seen the other barmen running around all night.

I moved down and immediately hated the situation. Like I said, it was a 21st birthday party, which is a very big event here for the youth of New Zealand. What made this particular 21st a highly distressing event to work at was the fact that it was a completely open bar tab, so we had stupid guys coming up and ordering four bottles of Jim Beam and Cola, for example, at a time. It just got completely out of hand, and we went through about seven one litre bottles of vodka alone. I won't get into the exact numbers, but at the end of the night the tab had reached a staggering $5000 plus.

Now, I ask you out there... If your father was paying this amount of money for you to have a 21st birthday, would you go along with it, or would you ask him to fork over that money for a car, or to contribute it towards a loan on a house, or possibly to help pay off your school loans? I know one thing, I for sure wouldn't ask my dad to spend five grand on a party so all my pisshead friends could get off their heads.

Maybe I'm becoming cynical in my old age....

Work, Play, or Both?

Well, what an eventful weekend and early week I've had. It's been most exciting and tiring. Let's have a quick run down, shall we?

Friday I worked a bit of a shift at the Workingmen's Club (read: a place where the older generation goes to spend their money on cheap drinks and fried food), then had to wake up early to start my shift at Tank Juice, which went rather well. It was fairly busy, and on one of my trips to the toilet I passed a bookshop that had a sale on. I bought "The Photo Book", which is a book of popular photographers and their seminal works that defined their style. It's very famous and I'm sure you've all heard of it. Check it out, sincerely. That night I was back at the Workingmen's Club until 1.15am, which gave me a grand total of nearly 15 working hours for the day. Not too shabby!

Sunday was pretty relaxed, which was lovely. Went to the pictures with my friend Sarah, which was also lovely. We saw "Land Of The Dead", the new zombie movie that came out. I would highly recommend NOT seeing this one. Sorry folks. Afterwards Sarah and I caught up on each others' lives, something we hadn't done in seemingly forever. Everybody say good luck to Sarah on her move up to Auckland and her new job at NPR. Good luck Sarah!!!

Glad to say that my movie watching experiences on Sunday weren't completely ruined by the undead, as Tam and I watched "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind" on dvd. I hadn't seen this one before, and thoroughly enjoyed it... If you haven't seen it, and want to be wierded out, have a look. Sincerely.

Monday was pretty standard, watched a skateboarding dvd that I bought alongside "The Photo Book" (at 75% off, you can't really turn it down, can you?), played video games, and then went off to work a quiz night at the Club. It was quite fun, I must say. In between the five rounds they had a blind bottle auction. They were mostly bottles of wine and bubbly, but there were also a few bottles of spirits thrown in for good measure. I just have to say that I was a mere two dollars away from winning a one litre bottle of Kahlua. Gutted. Totally gutted I missed that one.

And there, in a rather large, rambling nutshell, was my weekend. How was yours?

Oh, and how do you like my profile photo? Pretty good, eh?

Pants, Pants, Pants!

I did something a little bit crazy a couple days ago. I bought new underpants. Four sets of them, actually. I won't call them "pairs" of underpants, because to me a pair of underpants would be two seperate sets. So I bought four seperate sets, or two pairs.

They are quite nice, too. I bought them on sale, for a mere five dollars each. Normally they range in price (when not on sale) between 19.99 and 36.99! 36.99 you ask in disgust??!! Yes, I reply, 36.99! Now, if anyone out there can explain to me why they would spend that amount of money on a set of undies, and actually justify it in a reasonable way, then please go ahead. Don't get me wrong, they ARE nice undies, and I'm actually wearing them now. It's just that there's no way in holy hell I would consider paying that ridiculous amount of money on one set of underpants.

So I bought one of dark grey, one dark navy blue (almost black, the 36.99 pair), and two sets of sort of blue/green ones. I'm super stoked to have some new undies, especially since I bought them for a steal. Usually I get my undies as part of my Xmas stocking, but since I don't know when I'm going to be home next, I don't know when Santa will be delivering me some new ones.

Besides, five years with the same undies is getting a little bit ridiculous, isn't it?