December 2006 Archives

Another year draws to a close, and I am going AWOL (Absent without leave for you non military types). Except unlike last year when I went AWOL and got fired for it, I actually HAVE holidays and leave this time, so its more like I'm just going "absent". Which sounds like a mental condition (or rather a lack of mental capacity) and not a holiday. But holiday I shall.

Back to the place where I first learned the subtle art of spearfishing. There is nothing more stealthy, more manly and more noble than donning oversized goggles and flippers, sneaking up on an unsuspecting fish, and firing a rod of metal through a fishes stomach. Or in my case, missing all the fish and hitting rocks... and being scared by giant rays that look like sharks.

When I spear fish, the gun I carry is really only for two things:
a) Make me look cool in front of the ladies (and lets be honest... some of the guys too)
b) Protect me from sharks.
c) See "B".

I really hope I don't see any sharks. But if I do, rest assured I will be brave, pee myself on the spot, and then swim to the nearest shoreline / rock / cliff face faster than you can say "Will isn't so tough after all!".

Anyways, the unit on the beach is calling, I hope the end of the year finds you well, that your New Years Eve is spectacular, and most importantly, you remember NOT to get caught being photographed in your bikini on the beach. (That goes for the guy's too).

Will out for the last time (in 2006).

Today it rained. Hard. Very hard.

Hard enough that our dog hid under the bed, or under the desk, or behind the bedroom door. Hard enough that it made the gutters overflow. Hard enough that when I walked into the upstairs room, there was hail on the floor 3 metres from the window.

Water came in EVERYWHERE. It swamped the upstairs room, and started leaking through to the middle level of the house, dripping from the ceiling, dripping from the cupboards, and even from the light fittings. Which was the scary one.

The light was switched off, but so much water had come through, it was causing electrical sparking in my sisters light. In fact, the light globe was glowing and flashing on and off. I walked underneath the light to see how much water was leaking through, and a few drops splashed on my face and almost burned me! The water was HOT!

It was obviously causing an electrical short, and with all the sparking and glowing, the water had heated to around 70 degrees. And I had it drop straight onto my face. That sucked.

The gutters overflowed, it hailed inside, water leaked through the light fittings, we had to cut the power to the house... and through all that rain, through all that hail...

...the possum poo stayed stuck to the bonnet of my car.

Santa used to have game.

I remember once spending every minute of a six hour drive to my grandparents farm on Christmas Eve staring up at the stars looking for Santa in the sky. I remember being so nervous, I couldn't sleep, I just stargazed hour after hour.

Christmas was magical and exciting. One time I honestly believed I caught a glimpse of his sleigh shooting across the sky. But that was back when I was just seventeen. I've moved on.

Now, Santa is just overweight, overpayed and obviously overdosing on drugs (As you can clearly see from the images). Whatever happened to you Santa? Why did you fall off the wagon?

You used to bring me gifts like giant water pistols and boogey boards, radio controlled cars and lego sets, cricket sets and soccer balls. You used to excite me. And now? Oh now how things have changed Mr Saint Nick... Mr Kringle... Mr poopy pants... now?

...Now you just bring me underpants and deodorant.

You didn't even bring me a seven-pack of underwear, so as I can wear a different pair of underpants each day. And lucky I wasn't holding my breath for a three-pack, so I could wear each pair for two days, and spend the 7th day in the week naked and pant-free as was commanded in the bible.

You bring me one pair. One solitary pair of underpants. Why Santa? You know that I am too lazy to wash them every night. What am I meant to do with one pair of underpants? You place me square in the middle of underpant crossroads and make me choose...

...to wear, or not to wear... that is the question.

Do I dare endure the smell of unwashed underwear for seven days, or be underwear free, and risk catching myself in my fly...

Santa, you used to have game... next year I'm putting Arsenic in your cookies.

man (mahn) noun — plural men (mehn)
: an adult male human being
Example: Hundreds of men, women and children; a four-man team

tantrum (tan-truhm) noun
: a violent demonstration of rage or frustration; a sudden burst of ill temper.

mantrum (mahn-truhm) noun
: a violent demonstratopn of rage or frustration from a man, usually after being subjected to hours on end of aimless wandering through a shopping complex on the insistance of spouse / partner.
Example: Poor guy... he just broke and had a mantrum!

Ok, I noticed something about my mantrum post. Apart from it being an absolutely brilliant piece of social observation, it appears to be part of a yearly cycle. Just look at this post from December 2005.

"I have never been more pushed, shoved and bustled around in a shopping complex in my life. Mostly by women who cant drive shopping trolleys. I shall refrain from making the obvious connection between shopping trolley's and cars *cough*. Women shoulder charging is NOT a good look.

When I shop, there is never any perusing and fluffing about. Its all military style... quick insertion, hit the target, fast extraction. Thats it. End. I get in, get what I need, get out. But at Christmas, it seems Women turn into bloodsucking vampires, and dads are destined to be dragged around by their toenails, forced to carry over-loaded shopping bags, and enter thousands of shops just to look, even though the female fully knows they will not buy a single thing. Just cruel."

History truly does repeat itself.

P.S. My sister agrees, that Women are far more erratic in their trolley behaviour, far more likely to stop in the middle of the aisle, blocking people while they weigh up whether they would rather eat Cheese Supreme OR Nacho Cheese Doritos...

P.S.S. Today an announcement came over the intercom...
"Due to a recent incident, customers are reminded that children are not permitted to ride in, or on the shopping trolleys."
Cause my little 5 year old sister totally surfs those things down the Omo washing powder aisle. THEY HAVE SEATS IN THEM!!!

P.S.S. Suffered severe case of foot in mouth disease yesterday. Working with someone from company "C" (not real name) talking about how much better company "A" was than company "B". Really started slagging off company "B". Today, I found out that the person I was talking to works for BOTH company "C" AND company "B". Crap.

Wil out.

Once again, a new (and rather obvious) grab for hits and readers has come along... I'm on 25 peeps *again*, a site designed purely to drive traffic to my site. Although, the owners of twentyfivepeeps don't actually know that yet.

Anyhow, click here please :) to vote for me, and hopefully beat the little asian guys butt that is pretending to be a pair of breasts... and all the females pretending to be naked... you will know what I mean when you see it....

Will out.

Finishing off my life re-lived series, it is time to look at what I have seen to be the most important influencing factor on my life in 2007.

Not surprising for many people, I am awarding top spot to.... (drumroll) ...my Ego.

Firstly, my Ego is so big it deserves its own entry on lifeofsuch. In fact, it almost deserves its own website. Well, maybe not quite a website... more like an institution, possibly the 'crazy' kind of institution.

Yeap, my ego takes out position number one on the life re-lived series. How does my ego take number one?? I shall explain...

This year, I really started trying hard to craft my writing a little better. Granted I still have rambling streams of verbal diarrhoea, but I am attempting to make things a little funnier, a little more edgy, and a little more... um... readable I guess.

This year, my site was featured on the front page of cssmania.com. It got an overall rating of 8 (I think), and on that weekend over 2000 people visited my site. Two thousand in two days. Sure, it has settled down to an average of 20 people per day (Who NEVER say hi!) but it was a thrill for me seeing the stats jump like that. Makes an old dog feel loved.

I also wrote in a small uni magazine called 'RE:' this year... and was 'published' in a sense. The website is coming soon at remag.tv Also good.

So as far as lifeofsuch and my writing goes, the top award for my life re-lived goes to my ego. And if you don't like it, talk to the hand.

The top three again?

1) My Ego
2) Being fired... twice.
3) Teaching all year.

They have been the biggest influences on the life of such this year. On to 2007!

Continuing the life re-lived 'countdown' series of the three most influencial happenings for me personally in 2006, and having already looked at my teaching experience at number three... it comes time to look at number two.

Being fired. Twice.

The first time came *technically* last year 4 days before Christmas... but spilled over into the new year period. I was fired for taking my first holidays over Christmas in 5 years. It was 2 shifts. I am still bitter over it.

To refresh your memory of the monkey incident:
"BP and 1RQ Riverside Quay is being run by monkeys. Much like the Church of Scientology I suppose. But please forgive the bitterness today. To make matters worse, I got booked by the police for using my phone in the car about 45 mins later. I was on the phone to a mate talking about the monkeys, and if monkeys were allowed to fire me like that. It never rains... and when it does, it rains monkeys."

And then I got this job:
" Those of you that have heard about my drama with the monkeys at BP may be aware that I now have a NEW job for the year. Gone are the lazy apes, incompetant gorilla's and stinky chimps from BP. I now work for rebel sport in chatswood.

Apparently they had over 100 applications come in, I was invited to, and made it through both stages of a group interview, and at my final interview, I was offered the job on the spot. No call back or anything. SWEET. It just goes to show, that sometimes you really CAN get by 100 others based soley on your skills and merit as a worker."

*cough* or you could have connections *cough*

And then I got fired for being late. A couple of times. It didn't help that they changed the rosters, or that I had to walk about 2km's in Chatswood after parking my car...

The real irony? The day I was fired from BP, I got fined by the police for using a mobile while driving. The week I got fired from Rebel, I got a parking ticket (which I am contesting in court in Feb 2007). Being fired sucks. Bad for the self esteem... bad for the wallet. REALLY bad for the wallet. There were times where I honestly had no idea where my money was going to come from, but it always arrived... just enough, just in time. *phew*

So being fired comes in at number two on my life re-lived list.

man (mahn) noun — plural men (mehn)
: an adult male human being
Example: Hundreds of men, women and children; a four-man team

tantrum (tan-truhm) noun
: a violent demonstration of rage or frustration; a sudden burst of ill temper.

mantrum (mahn-truhm) noun
: a violent demonstratopn of rage or frustration from a man, usually after being subjected to hours on end of aimless wandering through a shopping complex on the insistance of spouse / partner.
Example: Poor guy... he just broke and had a mantrum!

I have seen about one per day. It starts with a poor defenseless man, being dragged around the shopping centre all day to 'shop' by an addicted wife. Now, at this time it is important to clarify the different definitions of the word 'shopping' from both male and female perspectives.

Shopping (shŏp-ping)verb -female
: the action of aimlessly wandering from shop to shop, picking up every single item in the store and examining it before returning it to its original position, and moving on to the next item / store.
Example: "I went shopping for six hours today and bought a pair of shoes."

Shopping (shŏp-ping)verb -male
: a high precision mission, whereby one enters the shopping complex and the store via the shortest possible rout, purchases required items, and exits the complex again via shortest possible rout - to purchase without distraction.
Example: I went shopping on the way home from work today because I needed new shoes."

The above definitions are the EXACT reasons men have mantrums after afternoons of shopping. I could identify with the latest mantrum thrower at Woolworths yesterday.

"We just need to have a look in this aisle"

"You always do this. You need to learn to plan things, and not just walk around wasting time without thinking."

So true brother. I hear you. Men are the hunters, Women the gatherers. We get in, attack quickly and return home. Women, you are free to browse and waste time. Just do it when we are not around. There is no shame in having a mantrum after hours of pointless drawn out shopping. There is no shame here brother, you are among friends...

THE DRIVING POST NOTE:
Another thing I have noticed. I know know why most Men are better drivers than Women. It all comes from the humble shopping trolley.

Next time you are in the supermarket, look at the difference between Men and Women driving shopping trolleys. Women are far more likely to be erratic in their trolley behaviour... veering side to side, failing to keep left, likely to suddenly stop without warning, bumping into other trolleys, and frequently leaving their trolley (and at times children) unattended.

Men on the other hand tend to keep to the left, are more likely to maintain a constant speed whilst grabbing items from the shelves, display a more accute awareness of trolleys and people around them, and are less likely to leave a trolley blocking the middle of the aisle.

Disclaimer:
And before all you women jump down my throat... I said "Most" women. That means if you feel the urge to kick me in the 'little Wills' next time you see me... I obviously wasn't talking about you.

No matter how bad life gets, no matter how much it feels like you are being stretched, no matter how much the ride hurts... just be thankful you are not an 85kg marshmellow shaped 13yo on a faulty show ride with an uncaring stepmother.

Turn the sound up, and laugh.

Poor kid thought he was about to die. Isn't very funny is it? Huh? Laughing at someone else's misery? Shame on you. Whoever posts stuff like this on websites should be punished. Punished with a whole box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts...

The youngest two girls in my family are spoilt. They don't know how good they have it, especially compared to the way I was raised...

I've been thinking about this since last night, when my youngest sister actually went and used the downstairs toilet without much weeping and gnashing of teeth. (That happens to be the toilet that Josh refers to as 'the look-in toilet', because it is in the laundry, and for a while was blind-less.)

For goodness sake child, the whole family had to use the laundry for years, because during the long term renovations of the house, that was the only toilet and shower we actually had! There was no where else to go! Actually, I lie.

We used to have an outside toilet. Seriously. It used to be emptied every single week by a worker we affectionately referred to as "The dunny man." Charming I know. If we needed to pee in the middle of the night, we had to get a torch, and walk OUTSIDE in the dark to pee. (I found that it was much easier to just pee out my window!!)

Another thing. The girls Christmas wish lists are getting very expensive. Laptops, DVD players and televisions seem to be the mainstay of their lists, along with the mandatory "$50 in cash" entry. I mean, these kids are only JUST in school!!. When I was younger, I remember dad forking out $50 for a second hand bike out of the trading post for my present. Part of the 'gift' was that I had to drive with him, to check out the trading post bargain, and learn about the haggling process. Sad.

Lets not even mention the food. When I was a kid, Mum gave me a vegimite sandwich, and a few arrowroot biscuits wrapped in gladwrap for lunch. If I was lucky, she might put honey on the arrowroot biscuits so they didn't choke me during recess... but now, the kids get fruit packs, roll ups, fruit bars and tiny teddies!!

"Don't eat the fruit bars!, they are for the girls William"

"Put the tiny teddies down! Now! They are for the girls recess!!"

"Don't eat all the chocolate yo-go's... otherwise the girls won't have anything to eat at school tomorrow!"

Seriously. These girls don't know how good they have it.

Well, it's fast approaching that time of year again, where bloggers the world over pause, think and reflect on the year that was. And what a strange 12 months it turned out to be.

Put bluntly, it has been one of the strangest, most difficult years of my life. I have never been so stressed, or had more things to laugh about in previous years. So over the next life of such entries, I will re-live three of the more interesting, and at times more challenging parts of the year that was two thousand and six.

Probably one of the biggest events for me, was being 'released' into Asquith Girls High for my year long teaching prac. What a strange experience that was.

I now know what it feels like to be the hot mini-skirt wearing blonde walking past a construction site... teaching was my first true experience with sexual harassment. On my very first day, a year nine girl shouted at me across the quad.

"Yeah boy!! Work that Booty!!". For goodness sake! I was on playground duty... with another teacher... a 50 year old female teacher. I guess it is Karma in some ways... we had a female teacher at my high school, who we thought had a big backside. So one lunch our group attempted to measure it... imagine, a group of students wandering around the basketball courts with rulers, secretly trying to measure the teachers butt while she was on playground duty, without getting caught and suspended.

But the year nine girl wasn't the end of the female attention. Oh no.

My master teacher became an instant celebrity after my arrival. With students spelling out her surname YMCA style in the playground, with a full repertoire of chanting and waving.

My fame affected other teachers in my department too. Students began offering the other teachers bribes and chocolates, trying to get me into their classrooms to teach.

I'm surprised that some of these kids learned anything at all... other than business and boardroom negotiation skills. Some of them made me a card when I left... out of their workbooks. I guess I can't be too picky... a card is a card.

I still see my former students around regularly. I'm related to 2 of them, my brother is dating another, and some live in my street. I'm surrounded.

Sometimes they smile, sometimes they even wave. Sometimes they shout at me and get all excited. Other times they just ignore me, or even give me death stares from behind the counter at Ali Baba kebabs. It's hard to look tough in those white uniforms, with the little white cap and a handful of tabouleh and homus. Seriously.

Anyways, that is life relived number three.

You might remember the sexist remarks thrown by the year 5 boys in the proverbial battle of the sexes tug o' war... if not you can read it a few posts down.

It seems that the same kid is at it again... and this time, his barbs are a little more personal than before. Last time he was refering to tug o' war, this time it is wrestling, and the card game called 'cheat' (or bull**** depending on where you are from).

His official comment regarding the wrestling were "Wrestling proves women are still weaker than men". Or perhaps that women have better and more complex social engineering games to play than sandpit wrestling...

But things turned personal against my sister when it came to his evaluation of 'cheat'...

"Cheat proves that Elissa isn't very good at any card games because everyone always beats her... HAHAHAHA." Well, that one seems pretty much on the money as far as I am concerned... Not only is Elissa easily put off her game with a little bit of pressure, but there are some pretty shady card sharks in year 3 that need close monitoring. They will fleece you for all you are worth and spend up big on sherbet and coke. Not the drug coke. The drink. Which is just as bad really... I have seen people high on drugs, and children even higher from coca-cola...

However, regarding the whole battle of the sexes taunts that are appearing at primary school, we are still awaiting for any official response from the female side of year 5...

AN American Airlines flight has made an emergency landing after a passenger with severe gas problems struck matches to mask the odour of flatulence.

The flight from Washington to Texas landed at Nashville airport, in the southeastern state of Tennessee, after passengers alerted the crew to the smell of burning sulphur.

Lynne Lowrance, a spokeswoman for Nashville International Airport Authority said all 99 passengers and their luggage were taken off the plane and searched.

An unlucky canine team was also brought in to sniff the aircraft for explosives.

After intense questioning by the FBI, a woman passenger admitted to lighting matches on board the aircraft to conceal her gas, Ms Lowrance said.

"For a long time she did not admit to striking matches and I think that was just out of embarrassment," she said.

"She did finally admit to it saying she had a medical problem about excessive gas."

The unidentified woman was not charged, but "American did ban her from flying on their airline for a very long time," Ms Lowrance said.

(from news.com.au)

Once again USA, I salute your ability to keep the rest of the world smiling... Then again, if the lady was a bogan from Australia, there would have been no attempt to disguise anything... just loud noises, bad smells, and lots of cheering.

A couple of days ago at after school care, we played a game of tug o' war. We had a few rounds, including one where all the children took on the carers (and lost... thanks to their attempts to make us fall over backwards when they let the rope go all of a sudden).

But the longest lasting tug o' war was the boys VS the girls. Granted, the boys were bigger overall, but the girls outnumbered them almost two to one.

At the end of the day, we evaluate the days games and activities, and get a couple of the children to write down what they liked most (or least) about the days programs.

You might like to read the entry from one of the year 5 boys about the boys VS girls tug o' war contest.

"This proves that Men are stronger and Women should stick to knitting and weaving."

Nothing like a bit of boasting in your victory to help combat gender equality differences. I'm just thankful that the school is nurturing such well balanced gender opinion among the males... Thankyou!!

"Spiderman Two made me cry"

"Really?"

"Yes!... It's so full of angst!"

"So are Emo's, but I don't cry every time I see one..."

"But you want to."

I think you are mistaking the word "Cry" with the English word "Throw a handful of sand into their eyes..."

If you read this you will notice that there has been another whale stranding in Tasmania. I feel sorry for the whales. I don't understand why so many whale beachings happen in Tasmania. Is there some connection with Whale strandings and secret Navy sonar equipment? Are whales just unable to see in the water? Essentially it raises two questions for me...

1) Why ARE there so many whale strandings in Tasmania, and not in NSW and QLD? I say share the strandings around, because I want to see whales two.

2) Why are they called "pilot" whales, because they obviously can't navigate. Maybe they should call them "the wife that can't read the street directory" whales instead.

I distinctly remember saying to my father, that the only reason Lou wanted to cook chocolate brownies at my house last night was so that in the event that things went horribly wrong, she could tell her work colleagues that it was my fault. Surprise surprise.

Things didn't really turn out the way we had hoped. Things started promisingly, I mean, we had two packet mixes, and actually had all the ingredients. Lou bought extra eggs as well, forgetting that my mother holding fast to her bogan roots, and owns two chickens, that regularly lay eggs in between their raids into the neighbours yard to rip up her lawn and plants.

Lou and I poured, mixed and cooked away to our hearts content. Actually, I was the one that cooked to my hearts content... I actually took the brownies out of the oven about 5 minutes too early. Hey, I did the *skewer* test AND the *bounce back when you jam your finger into the cake* test, and it seemed fine... so I took it out.

Later on, just before we iced the brownies, Lou decided that they were not yet cooked, and decided to put them back into the now severely broken oven. On the top shelf. Under high heat.

After a couple of minutes, we could tell that the oven was trying to speak to us... smoke signals started pumping out the top of the stove and oven... After about 2 minutes of deciphering this smoke signal code, we realised what the message was....

(Begin Transmission) "So... *cough*... hot in.... hot in here!... burning! *cough* I cant *gasp* breathe... ugh... Abort!! Abort!!... *cough* Get out while you still can.... give my love to the *gasp* girl scouts brownie movement... *cough* (End transmission)

We all stared at the oven as the realisation of the whole situation had come to hit us... Lou had decided to grill the top of the brownies, turning the top layer to charcoal. The black kind of charcoal.

Lou was pretty cut up by this stage, because she knew that she was in for a lot of ribbing at work the next day, when she turned up for the lunch party with nothing but a handful of ash.

Dad went into salvage mode, attempting to cut the whole burnt section off the top of the brownie carcass. It didnt work. He ended up with 3/4 of a mangled brownie sludge, that had now been pressed through the metal cake rack, slicing it into extremely long fingers that were now stuck firm to the bench.

After 5 half hearted minutes of icing the brownies, which was like trying to put a pretty pink collar and bow on a dead cat, Lou finally admitted defeat, and decided to abort the brownie mission.

But not before trying to get a photo of ME posing with the Brownies, so she could attempt to shift all the blame, and use the picture as evidence that it was ME who killed the brownies.

Leave brownies to the girl scouts.

I am Wil, and this is my story.

After just taking a bite out of your grilled cheese and tomato sandwich, cooked in the sandwich maker that has been sitting in the cupboard for 6 months without being used...

Dad - "Hmm. Something smells like mouse... can you smell that?"

*Will stares at grilled sandwich*