Saturday 25 May 2013

Idle pleasures for an idle bastard

Attila in typical pose when inspecting housework.
This post finds your author just a bit bored with things. It has been a fairly quiet Sunday and I have been pottering around polishing things and doing a bit of generalised cleaning but I have run out of impetus to do anything remotely productive. Actually, while I think of it, most of the polishing and generalised cleaning has been done toward entirely selfish ends anyway: my bookshelf is dusted and waxed with the books also similarly freed from dust; my shoes have a layer of polish on them and are drying awaiting a treatment to make them the shiniest things in the universe; and everything else such as hanging out washing and cleaning the kitchen have only been done to escape a verbal hiding from Attila the Wife which I shall probably get for doing/not doing something else.

I'm bored.


"Hulk not like Cohiba smell. Smell bad."
I'm bored and I am also procrastinating from doing study for an Advance Land Law exam that occurs next week. Advanced Land Law is the second most boring thing in the world* and I doubt I have retained an iota of information given to me in lectures and readings throughout the last semester. Instead of studying for this exam I would much rather be outside in the fresh air, tainting the drying washing with the smell of a superb, aromatic Cuban cigar while I idly scan a book with a tall glass of rum. It's a funny thing, cigar smoke. It makes Attila even angrier than she usually is, similar to the picture above. I rather like the smell of cigar smoke with its suggestions of sultry Caribbean evenings, coffee, dusty cocoa, nutmeg, sandalwood and dark chocolate. The result of any suggestion of those aromas in the air, on the washing or on me, no matter how many times I brush my teeth, shower or change my clothes afterward, is that I get an endless tirade about how she doesn't like the smell. She doesn't elaborate as to her reasons, she is just completely intolerant. Her diatribe takes place at a vocal pitch that causes glass to consider shattering and at a volume that would have a Scandinavian heavy metal band wide eyed with wonder.

Attila the Wife is currently out of the house, so with that in mind I shall wait until she gets home and I will get my Advanced Land Law book and sit outside with a stogie. I find this will be a nice compromise of forcing myself to do something I hate with the reward of enjoying something I love. The residual satisfaction of irritating Attila will be a bonus that should alleviate some of my current boredom and amuse our neighbours.
*I was going to add what the most boring thing in the world is, but meh.

Sunday 19 May 2013

What do you want to be if you grow up?

"Are you sure that's what you want to be when you
grow up?" "Yep. Definitely taller, you chilly torrent
of dribble."

When I was a child and knew everything, there was one question that would always leave me stumped. It was a fairly innocuous question usually asked by adults who were either making conversation or trying to get some perspective on a piece of some particularly bad behaviour. What do you want to be when you grow up? I could only offer a facetious retort that I either wanted to be taller or older because I had no idea what the answer actually was. As an eight year old this was of least concern. At seventeen and contemplating my final year at school before going out to work, this became quite concerning. I tried to do subjects that would be useful whatever I ended up doing like maths with statistics and biology but my heart wasn't in them and my complete lack of interest led to ignominious failure. My mother wasn't angry, although she had every right to be as a concerned parent, but I could tell she was disappointed. I did rather well at English and Geography (note that they have been capitalised and maths and biology haven't) but they weren't enough to get me into university, thank God because if I had gone to university at 18 I would have wasted my time and someone else's money. 

The author in dress uniform at 
Government House Feb 2002, ready 
to guard the Queen. I'm sure she felt 
much safer for it.
School ended and I mooched. I lent a hand around the orchard sometimes, I played a bit of rugby but doing bugger all was my stock in trade. Eventually fate, guided by my mother who was a careers advisor at the local school, intervened. She decided that I was going to join the armed forces and while she didn't care which one as long as they would have me, my brothers both declared that if I joined the Navy they would leave. I can happily report that both brothers are still career naval officers and have done well for themselves to our family's enduring pride. It just so happened that the Army recruiter arrived in Cheviot first and so after hitting a speed bump in the form of ballsing up an officer selection board, I wound up in Waiouru as a Sapper, Royal New Zealand Engineers where I was to remain occupied amid this august group for five and a half years. I picked up some valuable skills, got into some minor trouble, got out of minor trouble and gained a black belt in drinking. I got to play with things that went bang and things that went boom and I particularly enjoyed doing anything with maps. However, I knew all along that I wasn't the best fit for a military career and that my sub-conscious had been steering me away from doing something that I didn't enjoy for quite some time. Fate crept up behind me with a metaphorical piece of lead piping splitting a disc in my spine so I was medically discharged never to return (although for my sins, I did consider going back in a different role later). 

I won't go through my entire employment history, but since exiting the Army I have engaged in a number of jobs, studied for a couple of qualifications, picked up some age-related wisdom and drawn a few conclusions: I don't want to be a lawyer; I don't want to be a barman; I do want to drink beer semi-professionally; I am happy when I am writing humorous nonsense; I will suffer regular business hours but am over working nights and weekends; and you can stick teaching up your arse - there's absolutely no way I'm doing that. For all my conclusions I am left with the original question of what occupation to enter. I suppose I have hitherto undertaken a path of determining my ideal job by process of elimination but sooner or later this has to end - Attila the Wife understandably wants some certainty and so do I. So what do I want to do if I grow up? My immediate facetious answer has changed to becoming a midget pornographer but I still have little idea of what I want to do for a job. So troops, any recommendations?

Tuesday 14 May 2013

What the hell is wrong with you people?


Emeritus Prof. John Hogg OAM*
There is something of the sublime and ridiculous about the latest headlines surrounding 3D printing. While this apparently isn't new stuff as I learned to my mild surprise on National Radio this morning, it is at the cutting edge of various technologies. The first announcement from the University of Wollongong was that within a decade we will have the technology to use a 3D printer to create custom made human organs suitable for transplants. This is science at its finest: endeavour at the very forefront of human ability for the betterment of humankind as a whole. Last year I was privileged to make the acquaintance of a friend of my wife's family, foundation Dean of the School of Medicine at the University of Wollongong, Professor John Hogg before he succumbed to cancer a few months ago. Ever the gentleman, John's chest would have swelled with pride at the thought that the department he created had taken an idea and developed it for the good of all mankind. The current shortfall in usable organs for transplant is a headache the medical profession has been helpless to address in the past. It has been hamstrung by the reluctance for people to come forward as donors and also by the fact that in most cases the donor has to already be dead. Couple this with issues surrounding genetic compatibility and you have a problem of excessive curliness. If the researchers are correct this is a breakthrough of wide-ranging beneficial implications.

The 'Liberator'. What the hell are you liberating
with that?
For every step forward though, there is some (brilliant) nutter intent on abusing the new technology. John's head would have shaken sadly had he known of the other piece of news that a law student in Texas had developed a plastic firearm capable of being downloaded and printed on a 3D printer. I am surprised that the primary outcry has been that as the only metal component is the firing pin, which is a common household nail, the firearm is almost undetectable at airports. Hang on a minute, that's the only worthy issue arising out of this? Admittedly, the current cost of a 3D printer makes it much more cost effective to make your own firearm out of old tractor parts yourself in the shed, or at least more cost effective to go and buy one somewhere. Surely the worrying issue is the greater proliferation of firearms to a population that isn't mature enough to use them? The inability for the United States to rein in its gun nuts has become a source of incredulous mockery (and here) and rightly so. It is ridiculously easy to point to the sheer number of incidences of serious gun crime in the US, especially in a week where 19 people were shot in a Mother's Day parade. Honestly, a Mother's Day parade. What is also bizarre to think is that this is a country which is not widely regarded as being in a state of civil war when so many people are shooting at other people. To me the argument that the second amendment right to arm bears holds less water than a small child with a bottle of fizzy drink on a long car journey but others make better arguments for imposing gun control in the United States. My incredulity stems from the notion that 3D printing is an amazing advance and has enormous capability for the good of all, but some schmuck can smell a dollar in it and wants to use it to sell some guns. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why we're all fucking doomed: greed will be the power that will eventually undo us as a species and steward of the planet and a plastic firearm that you can download from the internet is symptomatic of that. I believe it's called the thin edge of the wedge.

* John and his wonderful wife Lindy got their gongs for their immediate and selfless actions following the Bali bombings. They were very nearly victims themselves but kept their heads to set up a makeshift triage to tend to the mutilated and disabled. Without their efforts dozens more would have died. John died at the start of the year from a particularly virulent strain of cancer and is dearly missed by everyone who had the good fortune to know him.

Sunday 12 May 2013

Bye Bye Dickhead


Finally Aaron Gilmore has stuck his sword upside down in the ground, run up and jumped on it. There is a slew of lessons to be learned from this sad, sad episode. Let's start with the soon to be former list MP:


  • It would be rather trite to remind him not to be so rude to serving staff when being a public figure. I say public figure, he didn't really have much of a public profile before this. There was an immediate outpouring of public sympathy for the poor bastard who Gilmore threatened to have sacked, but knowing bar and restaurant staff as I do it is likely our man in the Heritage wasn't entirely innocent. However, I wasn't there and cannot speculate as to his behaviour, but I know what I would have done and it involves dragging the Hon member out the back of the hotel and giving him a bloody good hiding with a cricket stump.
  • That chasing publicity and taking every opportunity to remind people that you're an MP is spectacularly unedifying. This piece of advice is way too late as he'll be gone after his valedictory speech tomorrow, never to return. Chances are, he won't crop up on the local council again either.
  • If you're going to get on the tiles and make a tit of yourself, apologise once and apologise properly or don't apologise at all. If Aaron Gilmore had fronted the following morning, looking tired, tense but dignified and said "I was a bit of an arse last night. I'm sorry troops." he wouldn't be facing the boot from a job he was obviously proud to do. But no, it was "my group" and "we" and more amazingly when he released that he was quitting he made the main reason the stress he had inflicted upon his family rather than the fact he had made his own position untenable with the Prime Minister. Let's not forget that he is not being given the boot because he called a waiter a dickhead but because the version of events he gave His Keyness did not stack up against a set of text messages that ended up in the media. 
  • Further, on the subject of apologise once or not at all: Gilmore took to facebook to give his spurious apology on behalf of his group as well as a media release. Just the once should have done the trick. It gives you a chance to cut and run and then get on with your job. What would have been refreshing was if Gilmore had fronted the media and actually said "Last night while at dinner, I got a bit plastered and got cut off by a waiter. I called him a dickhead and I do not apologise. I might have been pissed and behaving like a cock, but it happens sometimes. In the cold light of day, I am also not certain that the waiter wasn't a dickhead either." I would have voted for him next year if he'd said this.
  • Treat every social media device as loaded. Any text message, facebook update and twitter can end up in the hands of someone who will use it to damage you. This is why his apology to the PM had to contain the facts, not some doctored version of them. If you're going to your boss about a balls-up you're responsible for, it is best to give an unadulterated, factual and preferably chronological recount of events. Trust me, I have had to do this before a few times. Any public figure should not be surprised when social media or text messages come back to bite them. This is why I will never run for public office - I have written the words midget pornography too many times.
  • When Brendan Horan is coming out in support of you becoming an independent MP when you're booted from your own party, it must be time to go. At least ACT's David Garrett had the good sense to leave quietly, and he was a world class stupid bastard.
A significant contributor to Gilmore's downfall was The Media and while it made for a wonderful circus, there are a few points that the media could learn from as well:

"Mr Gilmore, we spoke to your mother this morning.
Well, not so much spoke as saw her in the shower."
  • Accord some credit to the public for its intelligence. We did not need to be given a rehash of the story in every single article. I got as sick of hearing what happened in the hotel as I did of seeing Gilmore's stupid face in the headlines. It was like watching American reality television, which has to recount every single thing with added sound effects for the moronic viewing public who can not remember what had happened prior to the ad break. If someone was interested in this story they would have followed it from the very beginning and not needed to skim over half the article waiting for some new piece of information.
  • The rapacious pursuit of Aaron Gilmore did not do much for the appearance of the press in this country. This was hounding on a British Red Top scale. It was just a few steps short of hacking his phone. It was always going to be likely that some hack was going to dig into his past  and find a few things, that while weren't illegal, did not make him look angelic. Ditto finding people who didn't like him as a person. Gilmore prided himself on being a controversial character so he was always going to have ruffled a few feathers somewhere along the way. The real story was that he bullshitted the PM when the PM was relying on his integrity, not that he bullshitted some bloke in a pub about how he was the Energy Minister in waiting.
The Prime Minister will have a well thought to-do list arising out of this too. I suspect that on it will be:

Armed with a taser, His Keyness looks forward to
Gilmore's valedictory speech.
  • Electoral law reform prior to the next election to streamline giving recalcitrant list MP's the arse. While Aaron Gilmore has finally realised it is time to go, Brendan Horan still sits in the debating chamber around six months after being fired by NZ First for allegedly dipping into his sick mother's savings. True or not, this sort of allegation is not a good look for the party come election time. Winston is seething that he has to see the back of the former weatherman's fat stupid head* walking down the corridors of power like he owns the place. 
  • "Have you two ever thought about having a tilt
    at parliament?"
  • There may be a radical overhaul of candidate choice by the party in future. His Keyness has not been ably served by certain back benchers, lower list holders and electorate candidates in the past: remember Bob 'the builder' Clarkson? Melissa Lee, who missed a cracking opportunity to steal the barely cold Helen Clark's Mt Albert seat? It has been rightly pointed out that there is a dearth of suitable candidates and while certain character traits should be overlooked (Darren Hughes, a capable MP but a bit of a perv), being a cock isn't one of them.
So we say goodbye dickhead, but I wait in anticipation of a snorting valedictory speech to the house tomorrow. There is trepidation that Gilmore is going to leave with a few parting shots to his party, but it is unlikely that any personal comments will cause too much damage. It is the factual parting shots that should have them worrying. I can't wait.

*As a TV weatherman, Horan was wooden, unlikable and I used to want to throw rocks at him even then. When he burst into song in the debating chamber I nearly broke my glasses with the strength of my facepalm.