..with sinus pressure!

So I've had a bit of an end of summer cold and I thought it best to stay away from work for awhile being as it’s about 30deg C in the work place and the huge array of fans would have sent that bad boy virus racing around the shop faster than a nip slip photo of Angelina Jolie would circulate the Internet!

On the second day away I rang the office and couldn't get hold of anybody so I decided it would be best to ring the boss directly on his cell.

He’s a bloody good sort my boss and we have a brilliant relationship, considering…

(story to follow… one day… maybe...).

While I was talking to him I was struck by a revelation, not quite an epiphany… no… definitely a revelation, but nevertheless engaging.

I had woken up and for whatever reason - either I had slept on one side of my head longer than the other - or the pressure on one of my sinus was greater than the other, I can’t be sure but I'm thinking probably the later, one of my eyes was lower or higher on my head than the opposing one.

I shit you not!

My head/face was all kind of lopsided…???

The first that I noticed of this enigma was that my vision was kind of blurry.

Not so unusual when you've got a cold right?

I went to the bathroom to look in the mirror.

Not a lot of joy there, my vision was so blurry I couldn't really make out my reflection.

It took me awhile but I finally managed to haul in some focus and yeah… my face was all bung!

You know what...?

It didn't bother me in the least.

So when I was talking to the boss on the phone I said to him, “dude I’m just ringing to let you know, today is a ‘no show’ for me”, he laughed and said something like “from the sound of it I’m not surprised, you sound like you've got a head full.”

I explained that my face was all cockeyed into the mix.

I guessed that most people would be horrified.

He wasn't of course because it wasn't happening to him, but… neither was I.

Then it struck me!

I said to him, “You know what mate?”

“The one upside of taking so many drugs when I was young is that when something like waking up with a cockeyed face happens because you've got a massive head cold, you find yourself staring in the mirror saying – oh well... Ive seen you looking much worse Daryl”.

“Nature did this to you and Nature will most likely put it right again”.

And that is the truth! It really is. It wasn't some green or red or purple little pills that did this so unlike those times when one eye was pointing up and one eye was looking left, this mornings little setback was nothing to get even slightly flustered about!

It’s small compensation for what I may have done to my kidneys or liver during those crazy times but heyyy… you wont find me freaking out when I wake up looking like a Scotsman has lost control of his Caber and tossed it straight into the side of my noggin.

WOOT!

Currently listening to:

Bubbles in my sinus and ringing in my ears.

....and nightmares!

I know this is going to sound a little strange but by now I should imagine your getting rather used to that...

I love a good nightmare.

As I once said to my friend Brigitte. A good nightmare is like the best fun park ride ever, without the queue's, the smell of vomit, candy floss in your hair or the struggle to find parking.

A good nightmare is value for money.

You know how it is when you wake up - panting, sweating, sheets soaked and tangled incomprehensibly around your body like some mystical yogi has come into your bedroom while you were sleeping and practiced his speed turban wrapping techniques and then blasted you with piss. You need a good few minutes to be completely sure that vagina's don't really have teeth or that you didn't fry a friends dog in your moms swimming pool that had mysteriously transformed into a gigantic deep fryer!

..Then comes the feeling of relief - it washes over you like cool waves of wind from an oscillating fan in a hot office - it's a real ride maannnnn!

Anyway, yeah I love it and some time ago I began experimenting with different foods just before going to bed in order to see if there were any foods in particular that would bring about the onset of night terrors.

It turns out that I personally got the best results from Dairy products like cheese and yogurts but high protein foods also scored reasonably well and the sure winner was anything that is extremely hard to digest. Combinations of these foods produced some spectacular results!

I have to be honest at this junction and admit that although I was meant to be experimenting with foods I had noticed that quite often when the sheets ended wrapped around you that this would somehow become a feature of the nightmare. Soooooo... one night I tied my ankles together with a bungee cord. The resultant dreams consisted of many trapped, maimed, unable to run away and drowning themes. The real nightmare was attempting to leap out of bed for a midnight toilet dash...!!!

The reason for these experiments, with the food at least, was to collaboratively put together a small book which I hoped to call "The Little Nightmare Cookbook". Basically it would become a list of recipes for other freaks like myself who enjoy a good 'mare'. And I hoped to present a series of recipes and list the potential themes one might expect from the resultant nightmares.

Weird - I know but hey, the interest at the time of poking the idea out there was surprisingly high!

Well the project has been on the back burner for quite awhile now but I now feel that the time is indeed ripe and I would like to get this project back on the move.

So please, although I have my own material what I really need is as much information from other people as possible. So if your mom or dad ever used to say to you, "you shouldn't eat blah, blah, blah before going to bed, it'll give you nightmares" please, tell me what it was that they believed you should have been avoiding.

Ask your friends, ask your parents and if you would be so kind as to forward your recipes to me at nevereverbloodyanythingever@gmail.com I would truly appreciate it and of course full credit will be given to those who's recipes appear in print.

Just in passing - my mom always said that you should never eat bread, spread with marmite or vegemite toasted with melted cheese on top before bed - to date, this concoction holds the current record for most vivid, terrifying and sustained nightmares... I highly recommend you try it - no really.

Currently listening to:

Dire Straits - Making Movies

Extreme Picnic - Compilation CD from Tanny and Mikes Wedding.

..with spear guns and stingrays.

My son Luke has become quite the outdoors man much to my delight.

It seems that everything we participated in together while he was growing up, he has taken to, like a duck to water.

Surfing, fishing, hunting, fast cars, excessive alcohol consumption and now diving.

He has become insanely keen on free dive spear fishing, something I have always been enthusiastic about due to the teeming fish life to be found around almost any rock outcrops on any part of our coastline.

When Christmas arrived it seemed obvious that what he really needed was a good quality spear gun and.. despite some very vague misgivings I had about spears in feet, it seemed the choice was a good one.

He has just purchased a new car (new to him). And as is often the way when young men get themselves a new vehicle, the first port of call is dads to get the broken bits fixed!

So while we were pottering around trying to get the headlamp high beam to stop turning on when making a right hand indication, we got to talking about his latest escapades below the waves.

I had noticed he seemed to be limping slightly and appeared uncomfortable when crouching in some positions, when I inquired to the reason he told me it was nothing really and a bit of a long story...

"Excellent.." I replied, "regale me...".

He and a good friend and fellow fisherman had driven some way north of Auckland to a favoured spot and decided to swim quite a way offshore to a small island probably 500 - 600 metres out.

The water was quite murky and after some time in the water Luke was tapped on the arm by his mate who indicated that they should stop to talk.

It seems he had become a little disturbed by rather large shadows he had seen circling them on several occasions. Luke having seen nothing similar and never one to be easily frightened or put off by the threat of danger put his head down and continued swimming towards the targeted island.

They eventually made their way ashore this tiny rock and took the time to catch their breath before Luke flopped back into the water.

The pickings were scarce for some reason... (for those of you who have as much experience under the water as I, you will know there can be several reasons for this but usually one really obvious one...)

So while Lukes friend sat on the rocks of the island Luke continued to slowly circle the water smashing up shellfish and sea urchins in an effort to attract more fish to the area.

Nothing doing...???

In what I can only imagine was an act of frustration borne of late adolescence he decided to launch a spear at a very large sting ray that was cruising the bed. (Once again; experience in this area was quite obviously absent!) He caught it somewhere directly behind the head in the thick fleshy area devoid of any critical organs where it lodged beautifully as per design.

and off they went...

..Luke refusing to relinquish his spear, the ray, probably only barely aware of a slight irritation and a bit of extra drag through the water began to head out into deeper territory.

This action placed Luke in somewhat of a quandary: being that the ray was probably close to his own weight and was well designed for the environment there was every good chance it would be able to drag him below the surface, but to cut the line connecting the spear to the gun would be to lose the spear...hmmmm (once again that much needed experience was sadly lacking).

So kicking frantically he did his best in an attempt to maneuver the beast toward a small mound of partially submerged rocks.

Always so understated; Luke spoke of struggling a little for a small while but did finally manage to get within grabbing distance of the rocks whereupon he wrapped one arm around them and hung on. His snorkel was above the surface and for the moment he took the opportunity to gather his thoughts, re-group his thus far, shattered ego and make some decisions about how best to move forward from his rather sticky predicament.

Well as it turned out it didn't take long for the situation to resolve itself.

With a gigantic heave the ray decided it was done with idling on the spot and it happily snapped the 300 pound break strain line connecting spear to gun and glided off with all the nonchalance of a bear sporting a tooth pick in its fur.

Bugger! No spear.

To be truthful, I was pissing myself the whole time he relayed this to me and finding the fault with the indicator in his car had ground to a virtual stop. I had managed to wipe my eyes and was about to get on with it but no - there was more..!

Having recovered from the disappointment of losing his spear he decided to make his way back to the place where his mate was sitting on the island and was surprised to find that the friend in question was jumping up and down waving fit to burst pointing and shouting at him.

It took him some moments to interpret the impromptu sign language but eventually realized that his mate was not pointing at him - but just slightly past and behind him.

Turning in the water he was confronted by the sight of a rather large tail and dorsal fin slicing through the water coming directly at him. Sore calves or not he reckoned he managed a good 5 knots through the water and his hands barely touched rock as he flew out of the water and stood gratefully on solid ground beside his near hysterical friend.

Together they watched the shark slowly circle their little island.

It's a great leveler the sea.

That kid of mine will fight anyone of any size and he's pretty damn handy, I'd have to give him that, but there was no way he was getting back in the water to swim those 600 metres to the shore.

And so, there they sat...

..luckily its summer and they both had wetsuits on.

After several hours a coastguard boat turned up to tell them that they should be careful swimming around the island because sharks had been sighted in the area...

I nearly wet myself!

...and electrical substations.

My daughter Alex has been wanting to get a part time job, I'm all for it as most parents are.

I think a lot of us take the entirely professional approach, "It teaches them about responsibility and money management and time management" blah, blah, blah - bollicks!

It reduces the loading on my own wallet if I am to be completely honest.

..that aside, my first job did teach me something about all of those things.

- I learned that I was hopeless at time and money management and, the time spent out from under the watchful gaze of my parents lent me the opportunity to behave in a most irresponsible manner...

My first job was like that of most young lads of the time - a paper route.

In New Zealand at the time there were two newspapers (yes a whole two..). One was a morning edition, and still is, The New Zealand Herald. The other was an evening edition, The Star.

I chose the Herald.

The upside was that the circulation was higher and therefore you got paid more because you had more papers to deliver. The downside was that it had to be in the householders mailbox when they awoke.

This saw me out of bed at about 4:30AM every morning except Sundays and home again at about 6:00AM for breakfast.

I would meet with a friend David who ran a route close to mine and we would smoke cigarettes and make prank phone calls from a public phone outside the local dairy while we waited for our boss to drop our newspapers off.

Every few days we would come armed with several wire coat hooks or hangers stuffed in our carry bags.

The last part of both our runs ended at the top of a long hill and at the top of the hill was a very large substation. This substation supplied power to many surrounding suburbs, suburbs that were all just beginning to awaken and switch on their lights and stoves.

David and I would ready ourselves for a fast getaway down the hill and once prepared would take turns to hurl our coat hangers over the compound fence and into the maze of tall insulators, cables and associated and vulnerable extremely high voltage electrical wizardry!

For David and I it was the sparks and occasional fire that we liked. But every now and again we were also rewarded by seeing the lights in the area shutting down. In fact once we watched as every light in every house we could see went out.

We pedaled like demons down the hill that morning and when I arrived home out of breath and looking as guilty as sin - it was to find, much to my chagrin, that our house was without any power!

What a pair of little shits we were.

Currently listening to:

Ministry of Sound 2010 US edition

A small collection of things one should not do...

Yes I know most of these will seem like common sense to most people but I had to learn this stuff the hard way and now it is common to me too.

1) Do not adjust your car seat position whilst driving downhill and applying the brake.

2) Never speak badly of anybody without knowing who is standing directly behind you.

3) Never use a cigarette lighter to see how much fuel you have in your motorcycle tank.

4) Never actually eat those edible knickers.

5) An electric hot air paint stripper should never be used as a substitute for a hair dryer.

6) If it looks like poo, treat it like poo - do not be tempted to smell it, under no circumstance taste it.

7) Never attempt to impress your friends with a CO2 fire extinguisher without first being certain that it is not a dry powder type.

8) Although tempting one should not fall asleep naked in the sun.

9) Never shine a red laser pointer at the police helicopter.

10) Never fall asleep when working on an old CRT television set.

11) Don't use a pogo stick on a wooden deck.

12) Think twice before attempting to whiten your teeth with toilet bleach.

..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.