..of failed attempts

I quite often find I am inspired to write, either by a rekindled memory, an experience, a rather heavy dose of red wine or simply because of an epiphany.

However inspiration it would seem, is certainly a fickle friend indeed (so too is red wine..) and of late I have not been able to maintain the necessary inspiration (or sobriety) required to finish some of the pieces I have started.

No big deal I thought. Create a drafts sub folder within my blog documents directory and get back to them when next I’m ‘feeling’ it.

The only problem is that when I re-open these documents I find that I don’t like the mood I’m generating, I’m going nowhere, the syntax is poor or I’ve meandered off and completely sidetracked myself to the point of combining one story with another!

Two of them I can’t even seem to work out why I got started on because nobody, including myself, would be interested in them anyway.

I suppose I should just junk the lot and start afresh but a certain side of me can’t seem to bear the apparent waste of time that this action would equate to.

To date I now have three or maybe even four blog doc’s that I cant seem to finish and I cant seem to dispose of – what a plonker!

Ah well... I guess I’ll procrastinate about it a bit later.

What I need now is a beer or maybe a very large red wine... oh gawd Daryl when will you grow up!!!???

Currently listening to:

The Bloodhound Gang – Hooray for Boobies.

Fall Out Boy – Infinity on High.

Eyes...

I wrote this some time ago and it should have copied across from my FaceBook Archives but the font was too small so it ended up auto drafting and I've only just realized that it didn't publish.

Anyway, perhaps I have noticed it right at this moment because it is relevant...

Eyes are the gateway to the soul. Of this I have no doubt.

Sometimes sustained eye contact can be almost physical...

have you noticed..?

.. as if the person with whom you made that contact actually reached out and gently brushed the hair back from your face or placed a finger gently to your lips.

Eyes will quite often meet across considerable distance, flitting briefly across each other with only the slightest brush.

But, if contact is made and held, whole conversations can be transferred at light speed across that distance without the speaking of a single word.

Some people have eyes that can hold me captive for hours, as if staring into them wraps me in a form of warm, luxurious blanket that I never want to lose. I like the way you seem to fall forward into those eyes until all else fades to oblivion and only the obsidian black pool of the pupils exists.

Those are the eyes of the gentle and honest.

Those are the eyes I love.

The ghost of Walt Tip

O.k so those of you that know me well will already be aware that the presence of ghosts in my life are about as likely as pixies and fairies but the other day Walter our very much loved cat of ten years made an ethereal return from the dead...

So yes the passing of Walt was a very sad moment in both Alex's and my life but to be honest it wasn't without its share of humor and being that three weeks has past it seems a reasonable amount of time to wait before bringing forth the truth surrounding the sad event.

Walt was not what you would call a lightweight of the species. Weighing in at a reasonably hefty 11 kilos dry it would be fair to suggest that his little heart was probably under more stress than that of the average hippo.

On two previous occasions we had discovered him lying on the ground, semi catatonic with drool coming from the corner of his mouth and a look on his head vaguely resembling the look you see on the heads of clubbers stumbling out the door of their favorite night spot at 5AM in the morning.

We assumed he might have fallen badly from the handrail of one of our many decks and taken a reasonable knock to the head because given a day to recover he generally came straight back to normal health and showed no sign of carrying any further injury.

In hindsight (and after consulting with a friend trained in Veterinary services) it was probably most likely he had suffered a small heart attack on each of these prior occasions and very likely it was a massive coronary failure that had finished him in the end.

Just so nobody gets me wrong; Walt was not force fed, no, no, no! He had simply developed a love for food and all things food. It was his primary motivation, his life skill, his kung fu, if you will and he had trained long and hard - as such, his kung fu was strong!

Anyway, we discovered his lifeless body lying on his favorite deck beside his beloved barbeque early one morning before leaving for work.

Alex and I both cuddled and patted him before I wrapped him lovingly in an old towel and left him to lie in state in the middle of our dining room table.

At work that day I found a suitable sized cardboard box in which we could bury him along with his well worn food bowls.

Alex and I returned home later that afternoon armed with our impromptu burial casket and began the mournful task of disposing of our much loved 'fatty'.

The first thing we did was to unwrap him for last hugs and it was while we both had our faces buried in his thick fur that we became aware of just exactly how many fleas he was truly lugging around on him; many, would be the understatement of the year!

It seems that although we had never seen a single flea on him while he was alive this was not due to there being none on him, it was mostly due to them never exposing themselves to us and losing the opportunity to live long and comfortable lives housed on a mobile fast food franchise and I don't mean fast food outlet, no way, he was the whole damn franchise! But when the fryers and hotplates went cold those fleas were out of there faster than a streak of weasels piss and because we had a towel wrapped around him it appeared they were somewhat trapped.

They were of course, more than happy to make a hurried escape when offered the altogether tempting new premises that Alex's and my, face and hair offered. It was, to say the least, an altogether most unsatisfying farewell snuggle!

Having had to guess the necessary dimensions of the box while at work I had drastically underestimated the girth of Walt and it soon became obvious that the lid of the casket would in no way remain closed by its own means. This necessitated the application of much sticky tape which on a whole, greatly diminished the decorum and aplomb normally associated with these solemn occasions. It also meant, on a much more selfish but practical note, that the hole I would now have to dig would need to be at least another six inches deeper.

I had decided that Walters final resting place would be in a small and much overgrown garden at the back of the house directly under our bathroom windows, where if we wanted too, we could look down at when having a pee or brushing our teeth.

The topsoil here was as thick as could be found anywhere else on the property and with darkness and rain threatening to close in I set about digging Walters grave.

Now anybody reading this who lives in Auckland will understand that digging any hole deeper than 12 to 14 inches deep is going to mean digging clay. Auckland on a whole is built on clay. In winter it becomes impermeable and so sticky that should you be fortunate enough to get a spade into it you can never get it off the end, in summer it becomes impermeable and something akin to rock. So all in all the Auckland clay is simply impermeable 365 days of the year.

After digging the top 14 inches of top soil away from my roughly 3 foot by 3 foot hole I promptly broke my spade on striking the aforementioned clay. Darkness was by now threatening to beat me to the close so I raced to the neighbors and borrowed the stoutest spade I could.

Two hours later after much sweating, swearing and cursing I had managed to get down another 14 inches if I was lucky and ignoring the rather unceremonious bulge in the box this gave me at least 6 inches of soil to cover the box with. Plus I figured, rather lazily I might add, a small mound on top would mean all was in order, the job would be complete and the box would be covered by a good solid foot of soil.

What I hadn't figured on was how hard it would be to put all that clay back into the hole and I quickly decided that covering the box in the easily shifted topsoil would be far more optimal. The only problem with this line of thinking was that the topsoil was quickly swallowed by the pit and I was left to try and fill the remaining space with large chunks of unforgiving clay. By the end however Alex and I were both reasonably satisfied with my efforts and we stood quietly and tearfully over the remains of Walt and said our goodbyes.

Fast forward two weeks to approximately one week ago. We have had rain everyday of the two weeks following Walt's funeral except for the weekends which have been extremely warm.

The mound on top of the grave has sunk - I guess the cardboard box has finally collapsed and the remains have no doubt got rather wet, extremely decomposed and then nicely warmed on the weekends...

Monday morning last week I went into the bathroom and threw open the windows before taking a shower.

The ghost of Walt leaped through the window and smote me directly in the olfactory gland!

Oh my god now that is some very special shit right there and talk about staying power.. The extractor fan in the bathroom had the undesirable effect of spreading the odor throughout the entire roofspace whereby it proceeded to fall in large clumps from every available unused penetration in the ceiling, to slap us rudely about the face!

So it would seem that though he may be gone Walter Tipuna Wawatai has not yet finished extracting his final pound of flesh.

And I have been sagely reminded of two important facts:

1) Dead things stink to high heaven whether once beloved or not.

2) Don't be lazy when burying said dead things.

Currently listening to:

The Prodigy - Baby's got a temper.

Taylor Swift - Fearless. (don't be hating)

...of crappy cars

I was sitting having a few wines with a friend the other day, she was telling me that her car was a 'piece of shit'.

For my part I tried my best to convince her that a car that started reliably, ran reliably, didn't cost a fortune in fuel bills and didn't cause you to have to walk to work was in my humblest of opinions, a whole load better than having to hoof it!

She was not persuaded to believe me but did eventually concede to it being reliable.

It not only reminded me of another story but made me remember many of the 'pieces of shit' cars I had owned.

There was the '69 Gremlin, the '74 Corolla, the mark 3 Ford Zephyr (three speed column shifter, only second gear was missing so it became a two speed consisting of low gear and high gear - imagine it.. I was either tearing the ass out of it in first or laboring it like a pinky old tractor in third!!! Oh yeah, that's right, and it wouldn't key start so you always had to park on a hill so you could roll start it and you always had to carry a minimum of three passengers, that way if you stalled on the flat you had plenty of push power to get started again), a communal 50cc scooter, a borrowed Honda City and last but not least a Nissan Bluebird 2 litre turbo automatic. Stylish motoring indeed!

There was one thing all of those vehicles had in common. Not only were they ugly in shape and color and entirely embarrassing to be seen driving, but it appeared the designers had also decided that something that disgusting must now last forever so that your shame might continue for many, many years.

To that end it seems they made the motors, gearboxes and running gear indestructible!

I lived with a bunch of guys once, there was about 5 of us living in a big old house in St Lukes and our house transport was the aforementioned 50cc scooter.

We utilized this pathetic excuse for mobility for one reason, namely, pot pickup and delivery. You see, cops hardly ever pull these puss ridden shitters over because generally they are only ever carrying Grannies, Asian university students or homo's so there was every good chance that if you were heading home with the house stash, that you would not get pulled over and possibly sprung.

Eventually over time we came to realize how incredibly tuff this little turd of a motorbike was.

We had a giant front yard approximately the size of the standard rugby field. One half of it was flat and well mowed but the other half had been let go and seemed to be littered with piles of "stuff" that the grass had simply grown over, it appeared that half our lawn was made of lumpy grass hillocks.

It was in this section that we built, 'the track'.

The 'track' was filled with muddy challenges, bone shaking corrugations and gnarly jumps. It soon became the scene for many a drunken 'time challenge' and even the occasional exceptionally drunken night time rally. The biggest of our bunch was a monster of a guy, 6'4 - 200+ pounds called Gary. I'm not shit'n you that poor little bike survived the track with Gary perched tenuously astride it. From memory the worst that befell it was the loss of the rear mudguard due to an overenthusiastic wheel stand attempt by one of the lads.

The crappiest car I have ever had the misfortune to drive was lent to me by a friend.

A red Honda City - oh revel in the glory of its awesomeness!!!

I think the fact that I could lift the back of it off the ground by myself could have been the reason I so despised the little horror. Driving this vehicle on the motorway was frightening, something akin to flying a spacecraft made from balsa wood and cling wrap through a meteor field!

Nonetheless this vehicle was, like all the other shitters of the world - indestructible!

One night, midway between travelling from my mate Johns place to mine I decided to prove the indestructibility of this little vehicle to him.

I bet him that I could drive the remaining five or six kilometers home without lifting my foot from the full throttle position...

...and so we went, stopping at red lights to sit beside our fellow road users with the engine screaming and us, with tears pouring down our faces laughing fit to burst .

Shifts between gears had the same effect on us.

It was during a particularly rough upshift into third, heading up the second to last major hill before home that something went wrong..

By wrong I mean the engine simply stopped - dead!

Oh fuck! Still quite a way to go to get home.

Damnit - I hadn't quite considered this possibility.

Oh well - out we get, up with the bonnet, hmmmmm give her a bit of a crank.

Whooooa sparks everywhere - cooool.

O.k looks like the main lead from the ignition coil has come out the top of the distributor cap. See if you can jam it back in there John and I'll just go and... CRANK THE IGNITION!

Poor John - that shit really hurts.

So we threw away the stupid 'spark booster' which is some sort of magical device that plugs into your distributor cap and mystically makes a more powerful spark (what a load of rubbish) and stuck the lead straight into the dizzy.

What do ya know. One crank and she fired up again.

Foot straight to the floor! Engine screaming - off we go again! Yeehaa look out!

Well we got home and yeah, o.k. so she was running a little warm but honestly, I reckon that little car would have done that all day. Legendary.

So next time your hurling obscenities at your 'piece of shit' car just think about how many times it has let you down and left you to 'foot it' and maybe you might feel a little better about it's color or it's shape.

Currently listening to:

Supergroove - Postage

Cafe De Mar - Dreams

Alex had her braces fitted today.

Perhaps I'm showing my vintage by saying this but..

When I was at school getting braces was almost unheard of and those that did have them hated that fact and spent most of their day hiding behind one or other of their hands whilst blushing profusely.

The secondary school I attended was one of the largest in Auckland at the time but you could've counted the kids with braces using your toes.

When Alex was informed by the dentist that she would be sporting a mouthful of stainless steel for the next two years I thought she would be mortified - instead she seemed happily overcome with joy???

Turns out that braces have become the 'must have' fashion accessory for teenage girls and Alex was kind of tired of being the odd one out.

Dang - humans are strange critters.

Currently listening to:

The Beat - Industry

Rest in Peace Walter Tipuna Wawatai

Today marks the loss of a beloved family member. Our cat of 10 years died peacefully in his sleep last night.

I'm truly gutted.

He was my friend and a great source of comfort and peace.

Alex and I will never forget him so I guess in that sense he will never really be gone.

So gutted...

...of large butane bottles

Is it just me or have others noticed that whenever you attempt to show somebody how excellently awesome you are at something, it all goes pear shaped and lemon smelling.

I'm sure you know what I mean; 'Dad, look how fast I can ride my bike', 'mom, see how high I can climb up this tree'.

You know what I mean?

Well yeah, it happened to me a lot.

It still does.

At my high school we had several art classrooms. One of them was equipped with a large gas fired kiln. It was used for firing and glazing ceramics. It wasn't part of the classroom as much as it was only accessible through the classroom.

This classroom had a set of double French doors that gave the students access to a small courtyard and within this courtyard, the far corner of it, was where the kiln was situated.

Our art teacher was one of those strangely abstract women who seemed to be stuck in a continuous daily cycle of reinventing herself. Don't get me wrong she was a fantastically warm woman and we loved her dearly - it was just that her randomness always had you wondering who she would be when next she stood in front of the class!

The thing I liked best about her was that she held strongly to the belief that everything everyone did was just simply a form of artistic expression struggling to be let free.. To this end she saw the fact that I smoked cigarettes to mean that I was struggling with some sort of artistic self destruction that really only needed to be harnessed.

Anyway, one of the reasons I loved her, more perhaps than most, was that she would let me smoke out by the kiln in the courtyard during our classes with her.

It was during one of these highly irregular 'smoko' breaks and accompanied by one of my friends who also had a propensity for tobacco that I discovered two newly refilled gas bottles that had been delivered earlier that day. It appeared that the two being used to power the kiln were nearing empty and the replacements were ordered before the old ones actually ran out.

These bottles were not unlike the one sitting below your BBQ at home only they stood about 5 or more foot high and didn't have that guard thingy around the valve on the top, so they looked more like gigantic dive cylinders - I'm pretty sure I've seen bottles like this around recently so it must just be the ones for home use that have the guard around the valve - who knows.

I had learnt from experiments I had conducted at home on the gas bottle attached to the front of my parents caravan, that a most spectacular and self sustaining flame could be generated by opening the valve on the top of these bottles and applying a lit match to the valve outlet. In fact the bottle at home when newly refilled had managed a flame a good 7 - 8 foot long and I could only imagine what length flame we could get out of these freshly delivered monster bottles sitting so temptingly available in the art class courtyard...

Having already dealt with gas before I was well aware of the need to strike the match first before opening the valve so after having told my friend to move to one side a little so I could show him something 'excellently awesome' I struck the match.

Now as I said these bottles were quite tall - or at least tall in comparison to us, so I actually had to reach up a little above my own eye level in order to put the match near the valve outlet and I couldn't really see what I was doing exactly.

Nonetheless I turned the valve on hard and waited for the stream of gas to ignite..

- nothing -

Hmmmm.

There was certainly the sound of much gas escaping, plenty of it.

Suddenly it struck me... idiot!

I was holding the match on the wrong side of the valve!

No worries, that side was clear of everything, we both shuffled a little to the left and I moved the match to the other side of the valve...

I still cant really remember the exact sound - it was more like a feeling really, much like the feeling you get from an excessively powerful sub woofer. I think that the ground might have actually shook.

There was a dull blue flash at the same time as the sub woofer feeling and then a very brief sensation of extremely intense heat on my face, neck, ears and hands.

When I opened my eyes I found myself looking at some strange brown fuzzy critter that was standing where my friend had been a couple of seconds ago, not only was this strange beast brown and fuzzy but most alarmingly it was smoking! Every part of it was smoking! The clothes were smoking, the socks were smoking the brown fuzzy head was smoking! There was even smoke coming off the eyebrows!

A little too late I suppose I turned off the gas valve.

Holy sheeeet!

"Man - that happened quick" was all I had.

"Fucking right!" was all my friend had.

His name was Malcombe Jones and he used to be shock blond - now it seemed there was only the shock left. Almost exactly half of his hair from the front to the middle of his head had gone a funny type of ginger and looked markedly shorter than that hair which remained his normal blond. His eyebrows and eye lashes were the same matching ginger brown. Being blond he had very light skin but this was quickly turning a majestic shade of puce. He looked for all the world like a cartoon character who had just had one of those little black round bombs go off in his face. In retrospect I suppose he had just had a bomb go off in and all around his face!

It took Malcombe a few minutes if that, before he started pointing at me and laughing. I suppose it was just the relief of knowing that we had just had a very near miss but we both started roaring with laughter.

As it turned out my hair, and not just half of it but most of it had changed color to rusty brown as well and I was sporting matching eyebrows and lashes all of which were smoking!

The worst of it was yet to come - when we rubbed our newly tinted eyebrows and hair it all fell off!

Inconveniently the wind had blown the smell of burning hair straight through the open French doors and filled the art classroom which, when combined with the explosive thump had brought our beloved art teacher and half the class haring outdoors and into the courtyard where Malcombe and I stood half bald, eyebrow less, scorched red and smoking.

Even more inconveniently another teacher of a less understanding nature had now appeared on the scene and after quickly appraising the situation sent both of our scorched asses off to see the headmaster. The headmaster upon listening to our tale proceeded to cane both of us and inform our parents of our indiscretion.

When I arrived home that afternoon I was treated to a rather sound tongue lashing from my mother and a bloody good hiding from my old man.

So to recap, we both now had hair that made us look like monks from an old fashioned Kung Fu movie, we had no eyebrows or eye lashes and our faces looked like we'd both fallen asleep in a sun bed. The headmaster had caned our bums till we couldn't sit properly and to add further insult to our injuries our dads had kicked our already highly tender and broken butts.

Could always have been worse I suppose but all in all, rather a grim outcome for a bit of "see how awesome I am" I thought.