Circumlocutions

Dungeon Hence Dragon

2007-04-21T17:06:00.000+10:00

For those of you into the "Lingo" you may have noticed a comment on the previous post concerning DMing. And you people will already be aware, pray tell, what this acronym represents. For those of you not in the know I shall illuminate.

DM stands for Dungeon Master. Now before you reach for the back space button like some mad... Back Space Buttoning Type Person, hear me out. Much is misunderstood about Dungeons and Dragons and if you don't believe me read up at Mr Wikipedia for a history lesson.

Now, personally, I don't give a hoot or any other onomatopoeia's what other people think about me playing D&D but I do get a little tetchy that the stereotype has become so ingrained in mainstream media that the mere mention of a protagonist's having D&D as a hobby immediately turns that character into not only a geek (for which I proudly wear the mantle) but more disturbing gives such a character an unverified and undiagnosed mental disability by giving the impression that any minute he (or rarely she) will soon don a medieval weapon of some sort and start shooting/slashing at passers by with little regard for human life. I realize I may not be helping matters by having just created the worlds largest sentence but you know where I'm coming from.

It's a hobby. It's something to do. Now I'm not saying that there are absolutely no "strange characters" out there playing D&D. Of course there are. There are also some very unusual people barracking for sports teams, some who play video games, some who find collecting cutlery stimulating, some who go to work and come home and do nothing every day, some who mow lawns, some who go to nightclubs, some who balance cheque books, even some (and they are very few) who write blogs. In other words there are unusual people in every walk of life.

And maybe, just maybe, if we embraced them all with equal compassion and interest, those who actually do have mental conditions might be diagnosed sooner and get the help they need and perhaps feel better about having done so.

A Life Most Fortunate

2007-04-11T18:32:00.000+10:00

I have just gone through and read all my previous posts.

My dear god, I am an immeasurable twit am I not?

So I shall get you few, you wondrous few, up to speed. I am once again back at my Fathers abode, but my father, not here. He is off and about the world entertaining the masses. As he should. His last couple of years doing "A real job" was not only painful for himself (I'm sure) but for those of us watching. A man of that talent is a veritable crime scene in such a job. And I shall say no more about it.

So here I am unemployed (yes, once again) but living in a mansion in the swanky part of town. It is a strange affair when one looks out from one's (well someone else's) balcony, knees shaking from malnutrition, and sees a wonderful view, knowing well that no one in an eighteen kilometer radius has ever looked though a bin for a cigarette butt. It's humbling, but backwards.

I quit my job because I could no longer handle people yelling at me. That is the be all and end all of it. I know in previous posts I have made fickle rants about my lack of enthusiasm of large company policies, but that was not it. I just could no longer handle being the brunt of others aggression. I have worked in pubs and call centres for going on fourteen years now and quite frankly I think I have used up my "Abused Because You're There" quota. Let a younger and more absorbent pleb run the gamut of idiots that only think in hindsight. Let a more robust and idealistic person try to argue the merits of reading "Terms and Conditions" before clicking "I Agree" to people who believe that the Duty of Care does not stop at actual breast feeding them facts.

I'm done.

So once again I blog to you without a foreseeable future. Once again do I display the characteristics of a shopping bag adrift on air currents yet without so much of the So Lovely Your Heart Will Burst but more of a Why Doesn't This Abandoned Shopping Bag Get It's Act Together And Make It's Way Back To The Shopping Centre And Do It's Job. That will make a lot more sense to those of you who have seen American Beauty.

So in summary, I'm here, I'm alive, I have no intention of going anywhere, and I ain't gunna give up until I do it right.

And there, I think, is essentially what everybody is doing.

Just most people are using more magenta than cyan.

Why I don't have a music collection.

2006-12-12T03:24:00.000+11:00

Many friends, family, girlfriends and acquaintances have been baffled, over the years, by my complete lack of a taste in music. To them it seems as though something is wrong with me. When asked what music I like my usual response is shrugging, pointing to the nearest band/person/thing playing music and say “That's ok”.

Needless to say this infuriates people. It seems that the human genome is meant to have a music appreciation DNA supplement that I, apparently, am lacking. It's not that I don't like music as whole. I do. I love it. I just don't go out of my way to remember who does it. And I don't buy it. All in all I have five music CD's. I didn't buy any of them. They are Gorrilaz, Killing Heidi, Martika (I have no idea where it came from), Uncle Cracker (I have yet to listen to this and have no idea who this person is) and Bing Crosby's Christmas Album.

I used to say that “I know what I don't like”. Rap. But I have since stopped saying that. Not because I like Rap now but because I have heard a few Rap songs that didn't seem to be abusing the listener for doing somebody wrong and a few that I grudgingly liked. And here's where the problem starts again, I have no idea what those songs were or who they were by. My theory is that my addled brain has a finite memory and is hard at it holding up to the strain of remembering where I put my pants and which way is “tighty” and which way is “loosey”.

I'm also a little shitty at music. It has been said before, mostly by stand up comedians more eloquent and certainly more amusing than I, that when one is in a relationship songs are just songs. Maybe uplifting maybe fun to dance to and mostly nice as a background score for the walk to train station.

Then you break up. And the songs change. Suddenly they are all about love, meeting the perfect partner, breaking up, the things you've done wrong in love, unrequited love, love, love, love. And not just some of them. All of them. Even Rap songs that have up until that point been about putting caps in peoples bottoms is now suddenly about putting caps in peoples bottoms because of the love of a girl. So thinking that lyrics are the culprits you switch to Classical and you quickly find what the composer was trying to convey without words. Love. The pain of loneliness. The ecstasy of finding one's soul mate. Elevator music now brings tears to your eyes.

Yet, when I was in a relationship I cannot remember a song called “How do you make so many dishes?” or “Your kindness and understanding is killing me” or, on the other side “Did you go out with the boys last night?” or even “You're lying and I will try to pretend you're not.”. And when out of a relationship I have yet to hear a song called “I read a good book today” or “The bus was blue and my shirt was green.”

So that's why I don't have a CD collection. Because music is a crafty sod that can change without changing.

And I have yet to learn how to do that myself.

(Edited: Did the "your - you're" thing. Thanks ZB)

To Sleep perchance to Wake..

2006-10-28T11:24:00.000+10:00

The line about blogging more often now that I am settled doesn't come off all that well now that I blog months later. Well if I blog again in another couple of months I suppose that technically can be considered "regular". I am to Blogging what Genghis Khan was to the professional manicure industry.

So what is happening in the life of Tobbë I hear you blatantly fail to ask? The best answer to that question would probably be, Everything and Nothing. I am still in my abode (but not for much longer), I am still seeing the wonderful Miss ZB (but if I don't keep my act together she may go "postal" on my bottom), I still work in a call centre in a job best described as bearable (and here again I have nearly lost the job on no less than three occasions), and I am still drawing whenever someone asks me to (although I have many jobs backed up, promises unfulfilled and I think I am in an artistic rut).

So like us all, my life saunters precariously down the edge of a knife, maddeningly feigning from left to right but never actually getting down from the damn knife and walking on the footpath like a normal life. I believe this scenario is a constant in most peoples lives but unsurprisingly this does not bring me comfort. Possibly brings me to a heightened sense of panic actually. The thought of all of us careening through life with a compass made of string and hope made of glass makes for wakeful nights and dreams full of cliffs and pulled teeth.

Or possibly I'm just a bit of a drama queen.

Home Again Home Again Jiggedy Jig!

2006-06-26T18:32:00.000+10:00

It's been a long time coming but finally I am able to put my feet up on my own coffee table (two unemptied boxes of books covered by a tatty sheet) and sleep in my own bed. My couch hopping days have come to an end. I am once again king of my own little kingdom.

And now that I have been here for a week or two I suddenly cannot remember how I could have possibly survived without an abode. It's impossible isn't it? How can one survive? With the gracious kindness of others methinks. The human brain and soul has amazing capacity for blind compassion. No doubt this is in order to balance out the brain and soul's other occasional nifty trick of being chronically rotten. We are a funny species, us lot. And considering I don't have a basis of comparison when it comes to supposed Intelligent Self Aware Life Forms, that's saying something.

But before I saunter down a side track of inane ramblings about my take on the universe and all that encompasses it, I just wanted to mention that now I have a stable port of call, an oasis of cable fed interwebs of my very own, I shall be updating this very blog on a much more regular basis. Just for the information of my fans out there.

Both of you.

Ba doom tish.

Working for The Asthmatic.

2006-05-10T18:53:00.000+10:00

I have worked for large companies before. It’s not something I particularly like but it’s usually something I can handle. It’s the statistics that make me cringe. The unilateral condensing of all communications into an indiscernible and totally unnecessary melange of numbers.

I have never thought of myself as a very moral man. My time on this spinning ball of mud is my own and I have been too enthralled to really take notice of the plight of others. A nasty and hard estimation but the truth. Yet here I am, working for a large conglomerate and finding myself fighting for “the little guy”, be that a hick from the outback or a struggling artist on the North Shore. And I think I know what it is. Somewhere and somewhen I was either on the phones or watching a programme and someone said to the programme's protagonist (or me) “I’m sorry sir, it’s just the system.” and the person on the show or the person I was speaking to said “ But don’t you realise, you are the system.”

So here I am, working for a large communications company answering the phones. Whenever I have come across a situation that shows the immense and inhumane ramifications of our company's “system” I have jokingly hummed the theme tune to Star Wars “Enter Lord Vader” to show my contempt for the rotting vine of imperialism of which I happily suck the teat. But it got me wondering. It would take quite a few people to run a Death Star. No doubt somewhere in that immense moon of metal struts and model glue was a call centre. Taking the calls of many billions of inhabitants over thousands of worlds asking “What is this new dictatorial oligarchy doing for me?” The office would be decorated in bright colours in a vain attempt to cheer up the workers. The workers, who are not volunteers, not slaves, but paid employees, just doing a job because they could find no other. And there they sit, unaware of the battle outside, telling the people under the rule of the emperor “No Madam, your credits will remain the same.. Well, yes of course they will deduct for a service not rendered… I’m sorry sir, did you read the contract?”

And then Luke Skywalker gets his end in. And the world blows up.

Statistics are evil. I don’t care in what circumstances they are offered. Average height of the eastern population, obesity in the western countries, shoe size of the average New Guinean, eighteen children will die by the time I finish this sentence, calls should be completed within seven minutes, six out of ten people will die from lawn motor accidents in a room full of lawn mowers. I DON'T CARE! SHUT UP!

We live. We die. Do we really need to be annoyed in-between?

Well.. Looks like I have to give someone my kingdom.

2006-04-17T18:46:00.000+10:00

It has finally happened. After many long, fruitless and sufferable minutes of looking for a job some crazy person has hired me. In hindsight I probably shouldn't have spent so many months sitting around hoping that someone would give me a job for no apparent reason. Hence the reason for not Blogging in such a long time. This is one of those jobs where you get training. Very swish. Not a spatula for flipping burgers in sight. No booze either. Well, none that I've found anyway.

So I am now onto part two of my wacky zany "Hey, how about you get a life, Wanker?" campaign. A place to live. This will take a little bit longer as I have to save up for bonds, rent in advance, jumping castles and all the usual palaver. But so far so good.

Now all I have to do is keep the job.

And there's the rub.

Working.

Ick..

A Job! A Job! My kingdom for a JOB!

2006-03-23T19:16:00.000+11:00

And the search continues. 'Tis a strange and daunting world out there and one with which I am loath to interact. Not that there are not wondrous and venerable people to be found out there. On the contrary. There is a plethora of fantastic, witty, honest and interesting sorts out there. It's just unfortunate that none of these people employ people.

I blame HR. Human Resources. Which to me sounds like a ministry department in a highly developed cannibalistic society. In the good old days (oh my god! I'm a grumpy old man at the age of thirty one!) people were employed by the boss, or failing that, the boss's right hand man (and when I say "man" I also mean "woman", I just didn't say right hand "person" because it sounds stupid. Sue me.).

But today, in our faced paced world where idiocy is at your fingertips and mind numbing bureaucracy is only a short email away, the boss has done away with hiring and firing altogether. Instead giving the task to other employees, even giving them there own little department. Human Resources. A whole department dedicated to the noble pursuit of hiring like minded sycophants and masochists and weeding away the talented and even competent.

The main problem is that, essentially, you're giving ultimate power to, intrinsically, the powerless. In most cases these very young women of Human Resources (yes, that's a generalization. But one based on fact.) know what the company does but not how it does it, know the "essential criteria" that must be exhibited by a potential employee but lack any of these skills themselves, can hire someone with a pay package quadruple their own but be hard pressed to have a say in the colour of the office kettle. Yet here they are, Gods amongst mortals. And if you think that it's the heads of the different departments who have the final say on a hiring (or for that matter a firing) then think again. From my short stints in various large offices I came to fear the girls in HR, as everyone did. You see, they can hold back information, diddle with your file, and if you really piss them off, they can start a rumour. I was once witness to the near collapse of a large institution's subsidiary office all because a HR lady thought her stapler had been stolen (it ended up being found in the office fridge. Ain't they always?).

So be careful out there, Kids, because it ain't the boss that can make your life a living hell any more. It's worse.

It's middle management.

Would ya look at the time!

2006-03-18T21:35:00.000+11:00

A few days can pass us by in a rather unexpected and plausibly accurate flash, can they not? I would normally fill the next few sentences to bursting with excuses piled on reasons, stuffed with accusations and maybe even a red ripe rant on top. But I shan't. For I am sick to near vomitous regurgitation (note the wonderfuly superfluous adverb) with my inane babblings about the state of my own life and how amazingly, and without apparent training, I have absolutely no control over it.

So I shall instead babble about what is happening in my life without the accustomed tirade on the almost spiteful neutrality that fate, destiny, people, the world, and small mammals have towards me.

For the last couple of days I have been hopping, if not skipping, between abodes. For you see, I am homeless. Not shopping cart, hand scrawled pleas on cardboard, shouting at strangers kind of homeless (although I must admit to shouting at a few strangers in my time) but not far off. A famous person (so famous, in fact, that I don't know who it was) once said that any civilised society is only three square meals from rebellion. I shall now try and be forgotten by some future blogger by adding my own quote to the fray.

"Any person with a home is only two arguments and one hefty bill from being without one."

This is not actually how it came about for me, but the logic of it seems plausible. So I find myself adrift in the world. Not that I am without lodgings. Far from it. I have a wonderfully generous family and a fantastic girly so I will always have a roof over my head and a snuggly blanket (if not said girly) to cling to on those muggy summer nights. But the thing of it is, the strange feeling of dislocation, that intangible feeling of not quite being able to "get it together", as there is no steady location in which to stand and gather said things. I think it may be the deep down feeling that, should everything go pear shaped with the loved ones, that there is no place to go to lick one's wounds, sulk, watch TV till four in the morning, smack yourself for being an idiot and then go back and apologise. No siree, straight to the merry aforementioned streets for young tit head.

Do not collect $200.

Do collect your complimentary shopping cart.

Do collect your free cardboard and marker.

And we see, sir, that you have the shouting at strangers down pat.

Luckily, I'm not the worrying type.

If I were President of the world...

2006-03-11T11:55:00.000+11:00

Okay so I feel like a big rant, so sue me. Aha! There would be the first thing to go. Suing. Take away that over indulged crutch of the masses that wish to blame everyone but themselves.
"I became overweight because I ate too much food."
"I got lung cancer because I smoked cigarettes."'
"I am an uncoordinated lackwit and wish to sue you over your perfectly flat unimpeded surface that I fell over."
"Amazingly, upon sticking my head in a band saw, I no longer retained the ability to think." Not that said person had a great penchant for overabundant thinking in the first place.

It's ridiculous. I hate it. And I hate the fact that Australia is happily trotting after America like some overanxious puppy with lemming tendencies. A litigious society run wholly on fear and trepidation of the person standing next to you. Not only might that person be a terrorist but he might sue you for passive smoking, blocking his sun therefore leading to vitamin deficiencies, owning a mobile phone, looking at him funny, pervasive iconism of his perceived deity of choice etc.

One perfect example of this is when I was managing a bar and one of the new staff complained about the smoke. I was dumbfounded. What did she think she would find in here? Placid twenty-somethings sipping carrot juice and eating cucumber sandwiches whilst playing gin rummy? Fresh cool air being pumped in from the alpine slopes of Gutenberg? I mean PLEASE! IT'S A PUB!!

Scaffold Rigger. First day on the job. "I'm not sure about all these heights?"
Garbage man (sorry, person). " Bloody horrible smell. Didn't think it would be so smelly. I might catch something!"
Politician. "People keep photographing me and writing down the words I say!"
Train driver. "This thing goes awful fast. I might crash and be killed!" (Obviously this is not a Sydney Train Driver as they are hard pressed to find the cabin let alone make a train go)

There is danger in every profession, circumstance, love affair, shopping expedition, sporting activity, sleeping pattern, marriage, divorce, incarceration, growing up, growing old, hobby, bath, shower, cooking adventure, relaxation exercise, night in, night out and sitting still. It's been said before but the one thing that is certain in life is that, one day, you're not gonna have much of it, in fact none at all.

Now I realize that keeping one's limbs and head attached in vaguely the same place in beneficial to most (cue class action by Amputees Against Humour, acronym AAH), and that continued health is a high priority on most peoples "to do" list but going for a job in a pub and then complaining that people were drunk and unruly and had the audacity to smoke is tantamount to intentional idiocy. I felt like suing her for making false pretences in her interview claiming that she was a rational human being with a firm grasp on reality.

As President of the World I will make it mandatory that everyone to turn to the person next to them and shout at the top of their lungs:

"I AM A HUMAN BEING AND THEREFORE FALLIBLE. I ADMIT AND ADMIRE THE FACT THAT ONE DAY I SHALL MAKE A MISTAKE, IF NOT MANY, AND THAT PEOPLE AROUND ME ARE GOING TO DO THE SAME. I AM TOTALLY OPEN TO ALL LITIGATION AS I AM RESPONSIBLE FOR MYSELF, MY ACTIONS AND THE CONTINUED ENJOYMENT OF MY LIFE."

Now if everyone said that, then everyone could sue everyone and get it out of their systems. Life would trundle merrily forward and saying "Oops. That was silly of me. Oh well" would creep it's way back into the vernacular of the human race.

Then we would kill all the lawyers.

Just a quicky...

2006-03-10T20:20:00.000+11:00

Not up for a big rant on this hot and sweltery day. Merely a bit of a notage to allay the worries of my thousands of readers... both of them.

The morrow doth be the weekend so I shall be up to as much as I was during the week. Unemployment, you glorious Mistress of Lethargy you. I will endeavor to do something of worth, but I'm not promisin' no-one nofin'!

To those of you out there that said goodbye to someone today:

May you dream sweet those times of joy
Find warmth in memories full
Don't forget
Don't regret
And gracious the heart shall feel
Upon knowing them at all

Weekday Whimsicals

2006-03-08T22:00:00.000+11:00

A Wednesday, when all is said and done, is much like a Thursday. Perhaps a little more cyan than magenta but really and for all practical purposes, the same. Identical. Indistinguishable. Duplicate. Matching. Carbon copy. Dead ringer.

...

I forgot what day it was today. Seemed to think I had already done Wednesday. Had the feeling Wednesday had already done its thing. Felt that I'd been "Wednesday'd". But alas, no. For Wednesday had just started. But it was a sneaky Wednesday. Unlike most of it's anscestors before it, today it jumped up and in a loud and distinct voice (with breath smelling slightly of gooseberry) stated "Hello Tobbë! I'm ... Thursday!". I should have realised then that something was amiss. Weekdays very rarely exclaim their intentions. It's more of a weekend thing. But not having the stomach to, nor really the knowledge of how to, I did not argue.

So merrily I went about my day (well, not my day, the day belongs to all, whether they want it or not) and thought no more about it. Upon hindsight, though, I realise that this Wednesday was (and at this hour of the night, still is) a foxy character. You see, his brothers and sisters would be hard pressed to get away with this ruse. Grumpy Monday and the strict Miss Tuesday are far too close to the wild and raucous Saturday and his regretful twin sister Sunday to manage the sting. Methodical Thursday and excitable Friday are already in anticipation mode for any type of shenanigans. But bored and crafty Mr Midweek, good ol' Wednesday, is in the perfect position to create mild mayhem by careful misidentification.

Well, you've won this round, Wednesday, and considering that you will be around long after I have shuffled (kicking and screaming) off this mortal coil, I gather you are pretty much predetermined to win the whole boxing match. But still, I have your number now sonny jim! I will be on the look out for your insipid prankstery, and when that time comes my friend, haha, well then.. I'll .. you.. *shakes fist with little conviction*

I'll see you next week, Wednesday. I'll bring the crackers, you bring the timeline.

I'm a wanderin' wanderin' wanderin'...

2006-03-07T15:37:00.000+11:00

So here I am, once again adrift on the tumultuous seas of chance. Guided by lady luck and occasionally kicked in the goolies by random happenstance. Hunkering down at the abode of none other than the irrepressible Papa Bear I find myself looking back and wondering how I got here. Bored, I then look at a tree outside for fifteen minutes before walking over to the fridge, opening it, and staring blankly at the inside for another ten minutes. Thinker I may be, industrious thinker perhaps not.

Today has been a day of settling. Settling in the manner, of course, of someone who does not intend on settling for long. I look forward to finally having a little place of my own. A place where I can leave Mr Guilt grumbling outside the door and get to making a habitation mine and mine alone. I had this discussion with Miss ZB the other day about not really "decorating" (for lack of a better word) our own abodes. In the past, I unthinkingly advised ZB, I had relented to former girlfriend's tastes. Let their style be a substitute of my own. I did not think about it at the time. It was just a way of keeping the peace. How the place looked didn't rank very high with me (I didn't think) at the time. To ZB this sounded like I was having a go at women, as though I was brow beaten into submission. But this was not the case. I was just doing what I thought was the path of least resistance. I see now that this a bit of a plaster cast of what I have done a lot in my life. Something I'm trying to change.

"Insert witty yet slightly maudlin life changing quote here"

All in one day.

2006-03-04T23:19:00.000+11:00

I wasn't going to post something today.

It has been a day of sad events. A day to which waxing lyrical would be crass and base. When the world just seems that little bit too serious, as though someone out there wishes to remind us that life is not all fairy floss and rainbows.

ZuckerBaby lost a friend today. He passed away this morning. I shook his hand once, upon meeting. I did not know him but from the grief I am feeling from ZB and the posts from all his friends, it's obvious he was, and is, well loved. It is, of course, a grief that I am feeling for a stranger. Someone I did not know. I suppose what I feel is the pain my girlfriend is going through. A vicarious grief I wish to alleviate from her. I know I cannot and more importantly, know I shouldn't.

When I was roughly thirteen years old my house burnt down. Actually it didn't burn down, just out. The inside. It would have been a lot better in some ways if it had burnt to the ground. Having remnants of a house bulldozed is a lot more expensive than most people would think. I can't remember much about what happened. I was the first person to show up (none of the family were in the house at the time, thank god). I can't remember much. The constant stream of people trying to console me. People standing on the side of the road. And the smell. I smelt that smell tonight. It doesn't smell like a wood fire. More plasticy. Never forget the smell.

I walked out the back of ZB's house and took a whiff. Definately not a normal fire. Not burning off. I walked out the front. A woman was screaming "I'm on FIRE!" from two houses down. A couple of lads were walking back down the street from the nearby pub. We all ran to the house. A little old lady in hair curlers and a pink nighty was running back and forth up her hallway. Smoke was billowing out the door, starting to fill the house. She was trying to get her dog. One of the guys ran straight in. So did the old lady. It was all a little sureal. A little old lady in curlers and a pink night gown. Trying to get back into her immolating house to save her pets. It just seemed far too cliched to be real. Unfortunately it was all too real. The strangers passing by made a gallant attempt to get the hose from the front of the house to reach out the back to where the fire had started but the hose was too short and the smoke too thick.

The fire brigade came and quite frankly I can see why women (and I'm sure a lot of men) find them sexy. It's not the uniform. It's the fact that when that truck pulled up a guy jumped off, donned his helmet, and stolled straight into a burning building like he was popping in to buy some milk and bread. Selfless bravery has quite an attraction.

So the lady survived. So did the pets. The house is still standing but I would imagine the back of the house is pretty bad. It strikes me now that the clichedness of the situation must have been catching. At one point the lady, who as you can imagine was quite hysterical, wailed that there were valuables in the house before attempting to go back in. I stopped her and said that the only true valuable was her. She spat back with such gusto and venom that I'm still reeling:

"NO I'M NOT!"

That's going to reverberate in my head for a while.

A lot can change in one day.

I hope you all the best little old lady. You showed great bravery tonight.

Goodbye Mr Chocolate. You have a great many friends who love you very much and will miss you dearly. I wish I had gotten to know you.

An Utterance. Loud and indistinct.

2006-03-03T19:43:00.000+11:00

So I said "A pox on your house!"
And he said "Who are you and why are you waving a spatula?"

So where was I. I just had the good fortune to find out that someone other than the Wonderous Miss ZuckerBaby and the Spectacular Miss Mim actually takes the time out to have a look at this cantakerous conconction of consonants and credulities. So a big hello to Mr Placid Grin, Master of All Board Games He Surveys.

Today, like most others in my life, the sun came up, hung around for approximately twelve hours, and then buggered off "to the other side of the planet" (if you wish to believe those scientific type boffins). The difference with today was my uncontrollable lack of enthusiasm with the idea, nay even the thought, of thinking. Now, I know a lot of you out there may be thinking that this is a contradiction in terms and bully for you, you're right. But my point is that usually, even in my most downest of moods, I was (am?) quite the Walter Mitty. For those of you not au fait with such an archaic movie reference, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty was a Danny Kaye movie in which the lead character was a rather obsessive day dreamer. I was one such Mr Mitty. Always drifting off into my own little world where Tobbë fights off nasty muggers with powerful martial arts that he's never learnt and can, at will, turn a loaf of white bread into a wad of cash the size of .. well, a loaf of bread.

But today saw a change. I am yet to determine if it's a good or bad one, but today Tobbë did not find himself with an ability to fly and have CNN do a live broadcast as he attempted the first solo flight around the world unaided.. by anything. Today Tobbë did not kidnap the world leaders, put them in a room with fairy bread and fruit crush cordial, and tell them they're not coming out until they can play nice. No, today, Tobbë was just Tobbë. Nothing overly spectacular. Nothing of earth shattering or news worthy to report. Just a guy. Having a day. And that was just fine with me.

2006-03-01T19:23:00.000+11:00

A Ratopotomus.

Yesterday never happened... really.

2006-03-01T18:52:00.000+11:00

Ok so I missed yesterday. One blog just after spouting my fervour at never missing a day. All I can say is I just found myself swept up in the day's events. Mostly it was a day of nothing much in particular. Just one of those days when you just seem to be waiting for tomorrow.

Tomorrow (as in today) turned out very productive. Sent off drawings to said and sundry, got myself a long anticipated packet of cigarettes, met up with the ZuckerBaby for tea and crumpets. Altogether a wonderful day.

So what shall I talk about on this wild and woolly day. A day that encompases a yesterday in it's rumbling embrace.

Vwallah. I shall talk about this word because the wonderous Miss Zucker and her unfathomable brain brought up the fact that I spell it incorrectly. At this point, some of you may be wondering what Vwallah is. Vwallah is voilá. It's a french word that means.. well.. TA DA! Sort of. The reason I bring this up is that I find one of these words everyday. Every day another word that I have either been spelling incorrectly for going on thirty years or a word that I have been using in a totally unsuitable if not contradictory context. I find it bizarre. Not so much that I spell so badly or use words incorrectly (all of us children of the 70's were taught by hippies, I accept this) but the fact that nobody has brought me up on any of these words before. It astounds me. But then with my poor excuse for a memory, I probably have been told on numerous occasions but have no recollection and just slide back into my strange but sometimes cute habits.

And another thing... no I can't think of anything. The sugar from my fizzy drink has shooken up me brain bits and I no longer have needed thinky power to continue... so I shall post a drawy thingie instead.

We're on the road to nowhen

2006-02-27T22:19:00.000+11:00

Well, I knew the day would come but I didn't think it would happen in the first week. I can think of nothing to say. Nothing up my sleeve... Hey PRESTO!! ... an elbow.

But I promised myself I would write an entry every day and so I shall.

Today was productive. I coloured a few drawings. Cleaned the kitchen. Posted a rather disturbing caricature of myself on this blog. Not a bad stint as far as long term unemployed days go. Certainly a lot more than I would usually do than when I was back working in pubs. It would be quite an accomplishment to return home at all in those days. Alas, and thank god (or Whomever the strange humoured entity is that thinks it's in charge of all this), I shall no longer be working in the wonderful realm of fermented beverage serviture. 'Tis known not to mix well with my Alcoholism (or too well, as the case may be). I shall miss the bar in some respects. The exhiliration to the ego of turfing some tosser out the door. The hob nobbing with the permanently inebriated. The smell of the urinal cakes, the roar of the bouncers.

So it is that I shall wrap up another short entry. My neck has decided it wishes to get off at the next stop and I'm having a hard time trying to convince it that it's rather essential to the job of keeping my head attached to my body (...I have a headache), so until next time kiddies, remember:

Out of all the millions of people in the world, past and present, you're the only one that's you. So you're doing pretty well straight off the bat.

2006-02-27T10:30:00.000+11:00

Your host for this evening...

The Great and Noble Memory

2006-02-26T21:08:00.000+11:00

Oh ye, what a day. A wonderful and glorious day.

I have no recollection of what I did today. I surmise that my apparent lack of recall has something to do with the scrumptious meal that ZuckerBaby and I just whipped up. I have plates the size of garbage tin lids (probably not a very tasty simile), so the servings tend to be extravagant, if not painful. We made up a wonderful potato salad and a bean salad and Baby had some pre-made (by her very own hand no less) vegan patties. I just kept serving it up until the plates were full. So here I sit, blood surging to my hidden and no doubt rather complicated digestive system, leaving my poor cranium to function on very little oxygen.

So I remember helping cook. So let's work back from there. Before that I was at Miss ZuckerBaby's pad. There we discussed the current affairs of the Empire over Indian Tea and cucumber sandwiches. Well something like that anyway. Ahh thats right, we were busily working on my applications to prospective employers. Oh the joy. I'm afraid to say I'm not a very good resume writer. I tend to try and be humourous. From previous experience (no matter what they tell you) I can honestly say that funny CV's are not welcomed. Ahh well.

Before that I seem to remember some kind of domestic chore. Maybe washing or the like. I must remember to start remembering things. Tomorrow I shall do just that.

Maybe I'll write myself a note.

Thoughtful discordantly

2006-02-25T20:00:00.000+11:00

I think a lot.

I'd like to point out that doing so does not denote intelligence. Forthwith I shall give you a small example which shall illustrate that, unlike the thinking of greater men, I am not a thinker of great and practical intent.

The human face has a myriad of different shapes and forms that it can morph into in order to emote the feeling of the user. Strangely though, it seems that the human brain has yet to catch up, and in a great deal of circumstances the onlooker can be perplexed as to what the faces user is trying to say... Without saying it. I blame language. Before the advent of "One, Two, Lots of Woolly Mammoths!" our pre-verbalite ancestors could just look at a fellow colleague and he would instantly know to double back, grab a big pointy stick, and throw it at the big kitty cat with the long teeth. Preferably pointy end first. And preferably at its bottom. Yet, now in this age of information technology, one could stand in an elevator and try with silent intent to tell the lady next to you that her skirt is firmly wedged into her underwear, using only rolling eyes and subtle twitching of the lips, and get absolutely nowhere. Yet send her a text message saying "UR DRESS IN PANTS :)" and it's all clear.

These things keep me up at night. If left in a room by myself I have been known to stare blankly at a chair, deep in thought, arm poised half way into a jacket sleeve. When asked what I'm thinking about I will be unlikely to answer. Not because of a lack of manners or a fear of stumbling through a sentence. Nay. I cannot answer because I do not know. I know only that I have been thinking. What about, is between my neurons and my subconscious and seemingly not me. So I thought I'd just share that with you.

I've been thinking about it.

Anthropomorphic muscularity.

2006-02-24T18:10:00.000+11:00

Not unlike prison, the currency of a rehab centre is cigarettes. So, having very little in the way of hard cash for purchasing of said coffin nails I decided to prostitute my modest abilities in the field of caricature. Things went well for a while and I found myself without withdrawal for most of the first week. Then one of the inmates asked if I could draw one of the mascots from a footy team. Now here is where things go pear shaped. I said yes. Not something one would foresee as being a tremendous fault but its with this little word that all other pain and suffering comes from. For instance:

"Should we go to war?"

"Yes."

"Would you like to join our cult?"

"Yes."

"Can you draw a very muscular man wearing football shorts with the head of a dragon?'

"Yes."

"Can you now draw the other fourteen mascots from the other teams and then colour them and put a football in the background and then I'm gunna sell em on t-shirts?"

"...... oooookay."

Hence I have been busily drawing said figures for going on three weeks now. I shouldn't really complain, I do quite enjoy doing them but I just kick myself that I never see these things coming. I seem to have a blind spot for Stupidly Obvious Foreseeable Events.

I hear some enquiring minds asking "But you're no longer there, why keep doing them?". And I must admit that on more than one occasion I've asked myself the same question. I'll tell you why I'm still scribbling away at these steriod enhanced rejects from Dr Moreau.

"Can I have your mobile phone number so I can call you and see how they're going?"

"Yes."

That and, to be perfectly honest, I really want to start finishing things. I am a wonderful starter of things. Top notch starting. Uber starter as it were. Finishing, though, is when I tend to let down the home team. I'm not sure why. Maybe it has something to do with my attention span. "Span" being a bit of an over statement. Ledge maybe. Attention precipice. That sounds about right. Look upon a project and then "Whoomph" hurtling into an empty canyon yodelling like a Disney character all the way down until I hit with a distant cloud of dust.

What was I talking about...

28 days later... on

2006-02-23T13:16:00.000+11:00

Day One

"Day One of what?" I hear you ponder. Distantly. Probably.

Well, it's "Day One" of the outside world for me. That's right folks, for the last four weeks I have been a guest at the funny farm. Well, not really. I have been in rehab. Had myself a wee battle with the Booze you see. It won. On many occasions. Left me with a scar on my hand, three pissed off ex-girlfriends and a memory with the catching ability of a colander made entirely of smoke. Wasn't so much your everyday drinker. More your "Start drinkin' and don't stop until sweet blissful unconsciousness lays me down in discreet bramble bush or the money runs out" kinda drinker. So when I once again woke up with half a kebab in my bed, a hangover that professional torturers would care to study, and only snippets of recollections regarding the previous nights debauchery, I decided I may need a bit of a hand. And off to rehabilitation therapy I trotted, skipped, trudged, and sauntered (blended together this walk actually turns out determined).

Rehab is like going to school camp. With all the fun bits taken out. But the food's the same. What I found most daunting about the whole experience was not really the classes or the abstinence but the socialization. Upon first arriving I was greeted by three men that looked as though they had been made from six. Huge fellas with tattoos and muscles and that look in the eye that says "Just try me! Grrr." Well, maybe not the Grrr. But still. When the ward started filling up with more and more people I came to the realization that we were all so diverse. Our only common link was that we couldn't control our habit(s) of choice. That and smoking. Cigarette smoking I mean. Although some of the gang there would have smoked a deck chair given the opportunity. But I digress.

Obviously what goes on in these places holds a rather sturdy confidentiality clause (not in the form of a written contract but from the more ironclad "Well, you were there too" basis of legal non-disclosure) so I will not go into details of my experience. I just felt like getting it out there. To lay it out for the world to see (or the three people who fell into this site accidentally) so I need not feel as though I hold to my chest a dark secret. Well, not this dark secret anyway. But alas it now occurs to me that some might think this blog a droning parable of a man's battle with addiction. I do not intend this to be so. I was Tobbë before the booze and I am still Tobbë after it. In fact I was still Tobbë during it, just with a goofier look on my face. So this will not be a day to day account of my battles with demons nigh. Sure, it may happen time to time. I would imagine that something would be terribly wrong with me if I found myself happy and docile on a 24 hour basis. Some kind of hippie bug perhaps but I certainly don't want to be labeled "The Alcoholic" because there is so much more to me than that. Plenty more...

Heaps more....

....

cornucopia of interesting um.. things...

Let me get back to you.

Strange beginnings

2006-02-22T19:19:00.000+11:00

So here I am. A Blogger.

For reasons best left to professionals in psychiatric fields I did not think it would come to this. True, as a child, I wrote fervently in a diary with the express purpose of someone finding it and having the gall, nay the impudence! to read it. But alas my hiding place under my bed was too mainstream for my family. I kept it in my school bag and surreptitiously dropped it into the middle of a gaggles of girls. Still no luck. Once I even left it on the coffee table and hid behind the couch and watched with anticipation for someone, anyone in my family to read it. I would then leap out and admonish them for their horrendous invation of my privacy. After they had read all 114 pages of course.

But still my battered little exercise book that held all my dreams and thoughts remained unopened by another's hand. I was devastated. How on earth could I be praised and coddled when no one knew of my inner angst and my supernatural ability to spell words that had yet to be discovered. So I finally accepted the awesome truth that nobody wanted to read my diary and in fact, when I asked my little sister to do so, were quite horrified at the thought.
"What use is a diary if no one reads it?' I pleaded with my sis.
She quietly, and somewhat nervously, explained to me that a diary was something one wrote for one's self. I was perplexed.
"I wrote it! It holds no surprises for me!" (At this young stage of my life I had recently discovered the exclamation mark and was determined to get as much use from it as possible, even in speech, as though there where a limited number allocated to planet earth).
"It's for you to look back on in the future. To know you yourself as you are now from the observation of your future self", subtly implied my sister.
After this sentence there was a small hiss and pop from a region deep within my brain. Just behind my left ear. The tangy smell of fried neurons drifted through the room.
"What!!" I said (noting my clever use of two exclamation marks with the small price of just one word.)

To cut a long, and altogether embarrassing, story to an overdue close, I never did catch on. Whatever lonely and sporadic brain cells that did perish that fateful day, they held the key to understanding the riddle of an unread diary. Some people just don't get clogs. I don't get diaries that I can't read. So here I am, many years later, and thanks to modern technology I can do what I always dreamed of. Write a diary for someone else to read.

Granted, once again I may be hiding behind my sofa waiting with baited breath for a "hit" (the interwebs equivalent of Mum stopping the vacuuming to thumb through an exercise book that looks like it once belonged to an Alsatian with an oral fixation), but I think I can handle the suspense.

Anyway, I could always call my sister and ask her to look.