According to WordPress.com, if my blog were the Sydney Opera House, it would take three sold-out shows to accommodate all the people who visited in 2011.
Isn’t that nice? And here’s an awful graphic WordPress gave me to adorn the 2011 activity report for my blog.
I don’t know why anyone would want to see the entire report besides me, but here you go, just in case you’re curious.
I love end-of-the-year countdowns and retrospectives.
Recalling what happened in the last 12 months brings sepia-toned tears to my eyes.
When I go to the toilet, I get nostalgic for the last meal I ate.
But, as sentimental as I am, when it came to writing a retrospective blog post for Basement Life, I was of two minds.
On the one hand, every newspaper, magazine, television show and blogger does this sort of hackneyed thing.
On the other hand, I just drank a bottle of Glenfiddich.
I also have a couple draft blog entries I wanted to use up before the new year. You know, so I could start 2012 clean.
So without further ado, let’s take a closer look at the exciting events of 2011.
A milestone…
2011 was a year of anniversaries.
Every day, it seemed, was an anniversary of something.
But September 29 was the most special because Jacquie and I celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary on that day.
I wasn’t sure what the traditional gift for number four was so I played it safe and got her nothing.
But when I got home from work that night, I saw her through the window, preparing my favorite meal of salt.
I had to think quickly and get her something she desperately needed at that moment.
Parsley.
And a Nivea deodorant sampler, which I’d found on the street a few weeks before, but held on to just in case I ever decided to start using deodorant.
Dodged a bullet on that one.
Other notable milestones include December 21, the second anniversary of Basement Life; November 2, the second anniversary of our arrival in New Zealand; and that’s pretty much it.
…And a millstone
The other thing that happened this year was I watched the entire Star Trek franchise—after the Captain Kirk years, which I’d seen too many times already—from The Next Generation, to Deep Space Nine to Voyager to Enterprise.
As regular visitors to this blog may recall, I started down this path of misery in the throes of a deep depression at the start of 2011. I thought that I could numb myself to my suffering. It seemed to be helping. But by the time I reached the final series to witness Scott Bakula’s performance as Captain Jonathan Archer, I realized that I was no longer just depressed, but that I also had lost the will to live.
Luckily, heavy medication and an accidental chemical lobotomy, the details of which are too disgusting to get into right now, protected me and I was able to finish watching Enterprise and learn a valuable lesson, too.
Before this series, I assumed that the formula for a successful Star Trek spinoff was simple: feature an alien chick in a skin tight space suit emphasizing her prominent gazongas, and you’re golden.
That was based on the assumption that the average Star Trek viewer had never matured past the oral/anal stage of development.
Enterprise taught me that it takes a lot more than a pair of alien gazongas to keep a show aloft for more than four seasons. It takes at least two pairs of alien gazongas, some minimally engaging dialogue and story lines, and a compelling leader, since every spinoff pivots on the character of this or that captain.
While Enterprise does well in the gazonga department, it falls short in every other dimension, especially Archer’s character. Bakula gives this character no swagger or toughness, so instead of coming off like a ship’s captain, he seems more like the guy who changes the water cooler bottle at work and flirts harmlessly with the receptionist on the way out, while leaning on his idle hand truck.
One more thing
Another thing that happened to me this year was that I found out I am fat and boring.
In conclusion
And that’s pretty much it for the year. Apologies for the very lame blog post. I’m on holiday.
Have a happy new year, New Zealand and the rest of GMT+12.
I haven’t really been following the Republican Presidential Primary warm-up debates. But news of Rick Perry’s clumsy performance on CNBC the other night did catch my attention.
During the debate, Perry, the Texan governor of Madame Tussauds, explained how his flat tax plan “does the things to the regulatory climate that has to happen”.
This would include the elimination of three Federal agencies, Perry said, directing his comment squarely at America’s current most hopeless romantic, Ron Paul. The Governor was clearly responding to criticism the more-of-a-libertarian Paul had made earlier in the debate.
Perry said his plan would balance the budget by 2020, partly by getting rid of the Department of Education, the Department of Commerce…and the Department…of…
Well, we don’t know what the third one would be because Perry doesn’t know. The governor struggled for a few moments to come up with a doozie that would shut his fellow Texan up for good. But poor Perry wasn’t up to the task, much to Ron Paul’s elfin delight.
Later, Fox News-persona
leaped to Perry’s defense in an interview with Michelle Bachmann (US Representative-the Kuiper Belt) who’s also running for her party’s nomination. The interview really pissed me off, and I’ll tell you why after you watch the video. Pay attention especially from 1:o4 to 1:26 into the clip.
Van Susteren here accidentally reveals a streak of news media elitism when she said the “news media are going to have a field day with this”.
Why is it that any time something even remotely scandalous happens, some jerk always has to chime in with “the news media are going to have a field day over this”.
I’ve worked in various aspects of the news media for 15 years now, and I’ve never once been on a field day. I can’t even imagine what the news media would do if they went on a field day. Would there be potato sack races, balloon rides and one of those inflatable jumping castles? When a scandal breaks, does something like this happen at the desk:
Reporter: A good source in Wellington says John Key took a sheep for a long weekend in Bali on the taxpayers’ dime.
Assignment Editor: That’s a great story. This being election season and all.
Reporter: But that’s not all. Key tried to cover it up by having the sheep for Sunday roast the day after they got back.
Assignment Editor: This is hot stuff. We have to move quickly. Tell Murray to go home and collect his badminton set, and we’ll meet him at the Domain.
Reporter: That sound fun. I’ll make ambrosia.
Assignment Editor: No, you do potato salad. Jane will bring paper plates, forks and cups.
Reporter: I thought you liked my ambrosia.
Assignment Editor: I hate ambrosia. It’s not dinner. It’s not dessert. Only toothless morons like ambrosia.
I’ll admit I’m making a big assumption here. A field day doesn’t necessarily have to be a day in the park or a picnic. Maybe when the news media go on a field day, they all get together and rent a yellow school bus, drive for two hours singing 99,000 Bottles of Beer on the Wall, and go on all the rides at Great Adventure before vomiting up all the cotton candy they ate while riding one of those things where you sit and spin around and around and around.
Maybe that’s what the news media does when they have a field day. But I don’t know. And it makes me angry. And confused. I’m starting to wonder if I’ve ever actually worked in the news media at all.
I mean, the New York Post, yeah, I can understand the confusion there. But, what, the New York State Society of CPAs newsletter doesn’t count all of a sudden? I’ll have you know, I’ve also worked for the Harlem Valley Times (R.I.P.), The Meriden-Record Journal and the Poughkeepsie Journal. Surely, one of these publications qualifies as news media.
Assuming that is true, you’d think that at some point over a 15-year time-span, you would have at least heard of someone going on a field day. Probably in the same way you hear about how the reporter sitting nearest you just won a whole bunch of Associated Press awards for a three-part series about cats stuck in trees. But you never won bupkes, and this explains your serious problem with alcohol abuse. I mean, some reporter gets invited on a field day? In most newsrooms, you couldn’t keep something like that under a bushel for very long.
But no. I have never heard mention of anyone going on a field day. My only conclusion is that field days are reserved for an exclusive, secretive group cabal. They probably all met at Columbia University or something. It probably started innocent enough. A bunch of J-students, just looking to relax.
Indeed, there is an elite media out there, and whenever something scandalous happens, they pack whatever they’re doing, and go on a field day. We just weren’t supposed to know about it. Way to let the cat out of the bag, Greta.
There has long existed a humorous trope, already a cliché by the time I was born. It’s the one about a mother’s advice to wear clean underpants in case you get into an accident. I never received such instruction myself. In fact, clean underwear was considered optional through much of my childhood, if memory serves correctly.
Underwear was just not something you discussed at the dining room table. Such garments could only be referred to through cryptic allusions and innuendo.
Not the face of a child wearing clean underwear. The author (circled) enjoying the third grade at St Helena's in the Bronx, NY. (Photo stolen from Patrick Scully's Facebook page).
When I first heard this supposedly wise admonition in my teen years, it felt as if my parents had been denying me some vital information. I couldn’t cross a street without worrying about the state of my underpants. What if I got hit by a car? What would the EMTs think?
But as I got older, I started to question if that was even sound–let alone realistic–guidance. Its premise, at the very least, is a shaky foundation on which to base your personal habits. In the first place, it assumes that every accident that could befall you will require the removal of your pants. What, all of a sudden we’re supposed to drop trou’ every time we stub our toe? I don’t know about you, but I couldn’t live in a world like that. I could try, but I wouldn’t like it. Mostly. To some degree.
The premise also takes a dualistic view of reality. According to this conventional wisdom, one wears clean underwear or one wears dirty underwear, and those are the only choices you get. What if you’re not interested in wearing undergarments? You tell a Scotsman that he can no longer go commando when he puts on a kilt. He’ll be furious with you. For your average Scotsman, it’s either dirty underwear, or no underwear at all, end of story.
There is also a problem with timing. The adage presumes either that you will get into an accident as soon as you put on a clean pair of underpants, or it presumes that the underpants will remain clean up until the time of your accident. If I got into an accident every time I put on a fresh pair of boxers, it probably wouldn’t take me very long to start wearing a kilt in the traditional way, instead. But let’s say you take your mother’s advice and you put on clean underwear before you start your day. You hope that when you do finally get into some bloody car accident, the EMTs will be able to look down on your mangled body with a smile. How impressed and satisfied they will be with your forethought as they peel your underwear off the pavement with a king size Spackle knife, along with whatever else remains of you.
Daniel in the Lions' Den by Peter Paul Rubens, c. 1614/1616, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington. Here Rubens depicts the moment that Daniel, realising that God has saved him from the lions, offers another prayer that his highly prized underwear has remained immaculate throughout the ordeal, in the event of being seen in soiled underwear by King Darius' men once they've finally released him.
To be fair, most of us can get through most days without having to take our pants off in public, accident or no. But suppose you were a postal worker, and you’ve just eaten some bad sushi, and some dogs chase you for most of the afternoon, but when you finally do outrun them, there’s a huge line for the bathroom at Starbuck’s. Then, as you’re running out of Starbucks to use the bathroom in the Starbucks next door, a giant anvil lands on your head, followed by a grand piano. Your underwear is probably not going to look so good, despite your best efforts to keep it clean through a long and trying day.
And here’s another problem. What if this clean underwear thing takes off and everybody starts doing it. What happens when there’s a big aviation disaster in which each and every passenger and crew is wearing a brand new pair of Fruit-of-the-Loom. Some of them still with the pins attached. Think of all the hours that could have been saved identifying disembodied torsos if each person were, instead, wearing underwear befitting their station in life.
Now it’s hard to ask air travelers to get on a flight with dirty underwear. It should be required, however, at the very least for business class passengers to wear clean underwear, while those in coach should be required to wear the same underwear on their flight as they’ve been wearing for the last week. (You’ll know you’ve worn your underwear long enough if you’ve started to develop a rash). This will ensure an expedited identification of cadavers, in case of an accident. And one word to those who fly coach, I wouldn’t worry too much about the odor in your cabin section. Chances are that if you’re flying coach, you probably smell like shit anyway.
You see? There are just too many variables to make this clean underwear work. Practically speaking, it pretty much requires one to constantly change their underwear. So the adage shouldn’t be to wear clean underwear in case of an accident, but to not forget to bring 150 changes of underwear which will you use throughout a typical day, in the event of an accident.
The 2011 Rugby World Cup is over. The All Blacks edged out the French squad in the finals on Sunday night, 8 to 7. It was a heart-stopping finish to a six-week thrill ride that at times seemed more like six months.
Everyone celebrated with drink and song and spontaneous line dancing long into the night. By the time it was over, every Kiwi man, woman and child could hold their heads high above their toilets while vomiting and feeling a sense of pride they had not known since 1987, the last time the All Blacks won the cup. Admittedly, most of the people celebrating would have been holding their head high above the toilet on a Monday morning anyway. But at least on this occasion, they were vomiting with a purpose.
Auckland turned its Queens Wharf into a FanZone, one of the places around the country where people could watch the rugby games if they couldn't get in to the stadium. The one in Queens Wharf was called "Party Central". Somebody give that marketing team a medal. Party Central featured "delicious" food, beer, large screen televisions, people, and exhibits, like the one pictured above. I think the inside of "100% Pure New Zealand" was empty, to simulate the experience of living here.
I lived through most of the six weeks under fear that the All Blacks would lose. How many of New Zealand’s people would have thrown themselves off the top of Auckland’s tallest buildings if the All Blacks hadn’t won. By winning, the All Blacks averted a lot of sprained and twisted ankles. The depression would have been that bad, if not worse.
Many of my American friends will not know what the hell I’m talking about right now. And for once in my life, it’s not my fault. Rugby, after all, is a highly nuanced sport. Far too complex for the simple American brain to comprehend, some say. To which America would probably say: “We have nuclear weapons. And we’re not afraid to use them.”
But it’s true that Americans don’t get rugby, not the way they get baseball, basketball and football. That’s because the only way to make money off a sport, I mean real money, is to cut to a commercial break each time the Washington Nationals have to go back to the bullpen for a new pitcher. Rugby is played without breaks, which is why it will never gain traction in the US. Americans still tell time by advertisement.
The general idea of the sport really is easy to understand. But the rules may seem a bit arbitrary. So when people back home ask me to explain rugby, I struggle. Where do I even start?
Rugby. Nowhere else will you find 15 sweaty, fit young men “crouch, touch and engage” for 80 minutes with 15 other guys, without hearing “Cut! That’s a wrap.” at the end of it. This is a man’s sport, splattered with misunderstood intentions and hurt feelings. Sometimes a player has to be carried off the field, he feels so bad. The point is that everyone had fun. You can understand that, can’t you? You see? Easy peasy.
Party Central with the Cloud on the right and one of the old sheds on the left. I visited three times.
Psychology plays a huge role in this contest, as much as stamina and speed, strategy and tactics. The All Blacks perform a Haka before every game, a Maori war dance that combines intimidating gestures with a deep-throated chant. Total mind-fuck. In a subtler way, it felt as if some of the media were running their own PsyOps, belittling France’s chances–challenging opponents as they turned out to be–while the people on the street felt the zeitgeist of the mob mentality.
To see how riled up these mobs were, I decided to pretend to be a French man just before the game. I sat in a cafe wearing a beret, chain-smoking Gauloises and squeezing the waitress’ ass like it was a fresh baguette. I couldn’t believe how angry the waitress got, not to mention the other diners . I’m glad I’m not a French man, with that kind of reception.
I went to the FanZone three times to try out the Heineken Drunk Driving simulation. It had a bucket seat with a steering wheel and what looked like three high-definition flatscreens to give a 180° view. Each time I went, the simulator was not working. There was always a laser printed sign taped to the central screen that read "download in progress". Later, I realized this wasn't another example of technology failing to live up to expectations, but a clever message. If you're drunk, you shouldn't get behind the wheel of a car. That's the simulation. I suppose if you wanted to be literal about it, you could interpret that "message" as "if you're drunk, you shouldn't get behind the wheel of a simulated vehicle". Anyway, FanZone wasn't a total loss. At least I was able to select a lost child while waiting for my accreditation to be processed at the information booth. They were doing a two-for-one that day.
Still, I wasn’t convinced my treatment was completely related to the mob mentality of the rugby scene. When it got closer to game-time, I decided to go out again, this time with my face painted in the Tricolour. I came across a bunch of fans at a bar, dressed in their All Black fan jerseys. They appeared to have been drinking for several hours. I said, “bonjour, mon amis.” I don’t want to get into the horrific details of what happened next. Let’s just say the police were involved, and that I’m down one pair of pants, and leave at that.
Generally speaking, though, the RWC brought a lot of positive energy to New Zealand in the spirit of competition. 80,000 fans from other countries came to support their teams. The US fielded a squad, as did Russia and some other countries I didn’t expect. I watched the US beat Russia at a bar for a little Cold War nostalgia.
It was so hard to resist, even Jacquie got wrapped up in the excitement. The Saturday before the big game, she was watching a television interview with one of the All Black coaches. He was talking about what the team has learned from its experience since the RWC started back in 1987. Jacquie says he told the reporter, “We don’t go out drinking and eating spoiled oysters the night before a big match. Learned that one in ’95.”
If you ever have to play in a RWC final, don't eat this the night before. This tasty delight comes from the window of Liang Da Gu restaurant on Symonds Street.
In the end, New Zealand enjoyed a really great RWC, and I was very glad to be a witness to it. We saw many exciting games, and there was a big payoff for the country after a lot of anxiety. The only irritating thing was that all the permanent residents had to move to one side of the North Island so that we wouldn’t capsize when the 80,000 visitors from abroad went home.
Boost Cafe on Dominion Road sets a good example for how a cafe should treat its employees.
I come home from work with some shopping. Jacquie leaves for sewing class and after a short while I’m staring at my feet. She won’t get back until nine. She wants me to meet her half-way at Dominion after it’s done. She’s still not used to the neighborhood. It’s too dark at night, she thinks. What does she think I’ll do? At the first sign of trouble, I’m running.
Nine O’clock, she won’t be back til. Three hours for a sewing class. What on Earth could they possibly be going on about for three fucking hours? Who has the energy for that kind of industriousness?
I’m still on the couch and I haven’t decided what to do about the thing. There’s the couch, there’s the DVD with Star Trek again, the one with the atrocious theme. There’s dinner in a cold pot on the stove. I asked Jacquie to smell it before she left because it was in the refrigerator so many days we had to count backwards on our fingers to remember. The coil sparks against the bottom after the heat’s on long enough. I eat and look at Star Trek and look out the window and it’s going to be light for a while, and there in the wood tray by the laptop, underneath some jewel cases, stray bills and a USB cable, is the thing, nearly empty.
There is something, now that I think of it, that I didn’t get at the store on the way home from work that I can go get now. Jacquie won’t be back for more than two hours. She missed the first class because she was on shift that night, so she made arrangements not to miss the second. She paid a-hundred-something, two-hundred-something dollars. Disparate friends knew of the teacher, all saying the woman has a mean reputation for never refunding deposits to anyone dropping the class, regardless of reason. A prima dona of the Bernina. A prima dona. Instructing a sewing class. I don’t get it.
The overcast sky is at just before the color blue it gets at dusk. It will be like that in another hour, to make your eyes tear. Am I the only one that ever happens to? I pat the key in my right pocket, shaking the thing loose from my left pocket to get it to my mouth. I see the marigolds are doing well. It’s a good time to walk because it’s after everybody comes home, even after they go out for a run. A lot of people here make that healthy lifestyle choice.
There were these two couples I passed the other night. The girls jogged in front talking together side by side a few paces ahead of their male counterparts doing the same thing. I can’t even imagine the dialogue that led up to this scenario. Did they plan it? Did they mark it on their Outlook calendars:
Jogging with Stella and Pete, 6:00-6:30 :-b
It baffled me which among them said to their spouse, “We haven’t seen the lovely so-and-so’s for a while, let’s have them over one night after work. It’ll be fun. We’ll go jogging.” Them jogging meant that—as with any fucked-up relationship—the other spouse had to have enabled the first, saying something like, “What a great idea. I’ll mark it on my Outlook calendar.”
My timing now couldn’t be better. Some evenings you’ll come across a whole family of joggers. None of them are around. There’s a warm salt air to remind you you’re on an island, and birds being territorial in the trees barely in bud. A few doors down toward Sandringham, a late commuter slams the door shut to his car and makes one of those neutral-neighborly assessments of me as I take my hand down from my face and smile back as he turns toward the light of his porch.
There’s a bird carcass near the shortcut to Sandringham. I stop and look. There’s no blood and the wind animates its feathers. But it is dead. It seems to have crash-landed head-first, broken neck, left cheek pressed against the asphalt with its right eye staring up at god kn0ws what. It makes me think of a painting I saw at the National Gallery in Washington, The Meeting of Saint Anthony and Saint Paul, (1430/1435). It shows a guy talking to a satyr. When I first saw it, all I could think was, “What the hell is he doing there.” For a moment, I wondered if there were satyrs in the bible and I just forgot about them. But of anything in the bible, I think I would have remembered something like a satyr. This was a guy with cloven feet, not some no account leper or dime-a-dozen chick with an issue of blood. A satyr in the bible would make it about 1 percent more likely I would still be a theist today, not because I believe in the existence of mythical goat-men, but because goat-men are so fucking awesome.
It started to become apparent to me what was going on in this painting, even before I read up on Saint Anthony of Egypt. Here was this guy. He’s a bit on the devout side. He’s just minding his own business in the fourth century wilderness, thinking about god and stuff, going out of his way to talk about god stuff with another guy who thinks a lot of god. Out of nowhere comes this figment of the Greco-Roman imagination. An emblem of the same culture that inspired a secular, mercantile alternative to domination by the Catholic Church and her noble allies, was tempting a faithful man to stray from the path. I don’t know what was happening in 1435 Siena, but somebody sure was pissed off about the Renaissance.
I finish the thing at the corner, then wait for a car to round the bend before crossing to the short cut. Will the driver see the bird carcass in time or run it over again? I can’t imagine. I cross the road and head to Sandringham. Putting myself in the driver’s shoes, the question would not be if, but how many times I run it over. That’s a lie. There was that sea turtle they found a couple of weeks ago, and I felt really bad about it because I heard it might have eaten something plastic that got lodged in its esophagus. It made me feel depressed for a few days. I felt responsible, indirectly, by dint of using plastic. Then I found out I was invited to preview some new Xbox video games, and I haven’t thought of that turtle until now, for which I blame that fucking bird.
I toss into the rubbish can the empty box that the thing was in. The dairy is up and down. It doesn’t carry club soda all the time. It doesn’t sell peanut butter cups. I stand there looking for something else. Jacquie still won’t be home for an hour. A three-hour class. At least an hour of that has to be for announcements and toilet breaks. I mean, they use sewing machines in this class. You’d think with a machine, you wouldn’t need any more than 20 minutes. There’s nothing I want to eat here. Behind the cashier is the cigarette case on top and below the cabinet where they used to keep the legal marijuana. It was banned a couple of months ago, but there’s always something coming out to market under a new name and I guess just have to know where to buy it.
I get a new box of the thing and say thanks. Back on the street by the rubbish can, I unravel the plastic and tap the box open and look around with the lighter poised. Nobody coming. The clouds are that almost electrified blue that tears my eyes. I can’t believe I’m the only one who experiences this. But it has never come up in conversation with anyone. Outside the light from the dairy, there whooshes a passing bus. It is always a comfort to smell diesel exhaust. It gives a certain kind of license, as if demonstrating to the odd, sanctimonious passerby that one passively inhales fumes just as toxic as my second-hand smoke. Even with nobody around on the sidewalk, I’m still self-conscious about blowing cigarettes into the face of a pedestrian that might appear out of the blue. The plastic wrapper goes into the rubbish for the sea turtles to eat.
The walk home is unremarkable. That smoke stinks. Jacquie must smell it on me, in my clothes and hair, despite the washing, flossing, rinsing. The bird is still dead, not squashed. The door opens, and the new thing replaces the old thing under the USB cable and jewel cases. I watch Star Trek until Jacquie comes back, saying the teacher is nice, nothing like they said she would be. She loves the class, and the people are nice, and there is this one student that uses a very old, large pair of scissors with tape wrapped around in places as if it to keep it all from falling apart. They used to belong to the student’s grandfather, who was a tailor back in India, and again in New Zealand when he emigrated. They’re learning how to sew an apron. Jacquie wants to make a barbecue apron for her dad, out of the polyester material she bought to practice on. The teacher said it was flammable, but Jacquie asks if I think it would still be ok to make the barbecue apron. I think she’s joking.
Now that New York has been destroyed, Auckland is rubbing its hands in glee, anxious to fill the cultural gap as the premier city of the anglophone world.
The horrible bruising the Big Apple received in the arms of Hurricane Irene should be seen as a great opportunity, not just for Auckland to finally not suck in comparison to New York. But an opportunity for New Yorkers, themselves.
If you live in New York, and you’ve drowned, you might consider how moving to Auckland will improve your circumstances.
Here are three reasons why.
1. Superior Climate
Wouldn’t you love to live in a place where the temperature never soars above 80 nor sinks below 70? Where you are constantly refreshed by gentle trade winds, and where cocktails are served by sea turtles wearing cute little bow ties? Well, in Auckland, we wish we could too, so get over yourself.
A view of Eden Park, looking northeast from Sandringham Road, and a five minute walk from my house. Eleven of the 48 Rugby World Cup matches will be played at Eden Park. The surrounding residents look forward with great anticipation to the French Rugby fans urinating on our public and private infrastructure, just as they do in New York. The World Cup begins September 9, attracting something like 75,000 drunken foreigners to this city.
2. Superior Agriculture
Most New Yorkers weren’t prepared for the devastating affect Hurricane Irene would have on their flocks. Consequently, their sheep at this moment are being herded like cattle into high school gymnasiums. The luckier ones are shitting on their owners’ friends’ futons. And the luckiest ones have been able to make special friends of their own. Auckland presents a different story. You might think that story ends in a slaughter house. But it doesn’t. That’s just the beginning. It then goes to the part where you have a little too much to drink, but thank god the kebab shop is still open. But the story still doesn’t end there. Because after you’ve wolfed down your doner kebab, you say to yourself, “holy crap, I’m going to vomit.” But the story still isn’t over, because even though you’ve completely missed your toilet bowl, your cat is showing a keen interest in what’s been spewed on the bathroom floor, and the cycle of life continues.
Fresh lamb, warmed over, resting on a pleasant Saturday afternoon, not too far from their whoring mother.
3. Superior Lifestyle, Fantastic People
Close your eyes. Imagine yourself standing in a parking lot. You’re in New Zealand, so you’ll have to imagine yourself standing in a ‘car park’. I don’t use that term, myself, because I don’t like the idea of my car having fun without me. I’m not sure what Kiwis mean by car park. Is it a park where you can toss your frisby and your car will catch it in mid-air? Or is it the kind of park with water luges and roller coasters and rides that go in circle until you vomit and then all the cats come around to check out what’s been spewed on the ground? Well, no matter what kind of park it is, you’re standing in it. And you’re having a good time. At least you’re imagining that you’re having a good time. (I hope you’re still keeping your eyes closed). Now imagine yourself standing in the car park with a few friends. Perhaps one of them is smiling. Maybe another one is looking at his camera and realizing that the photograph of the hazy, rain-disturbed murk off the coast of Piha is actually not as interesting as he thought it would have been. Perhaps you have your hands on your hips because the ocean that you are looking over from the car park at the top of the coastal ridge is somehow displeasing to you.
Now with that picture in mind, open your eyes and look at the photograph below.
In Auckland, you don't have to imagine yourself having a good time.
A week in New York. I’d write something, but damn it, I’m on holiday.
