18.
.
Wow. What a slow few weeks I’ve been having. I feel sorry for anyone reading this drivel. Which, I’ve realised, isn’t many. Hence, The Mad Scorpion will be stopping at number 20.
There. You’ve been forewarned.
Besides, there’s really only so long I can talk about my cousins shed parties every weekend. Or what tv show I watched this week. Isn’t there? God, even I’m bored. If I was watching me on TV, I’d have switched me over months ago.
So I guess I’d better try and say something profound in these last few weeks….
…
..
.
Yeah, I got nothing.
.
Sometimes, I wonder what the hell I’m doing here, and other times I know I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. As slow and boring as this town is, the people in it continue to fascinate me. For all the Right reasons, I might add. Mostly.
I have encountered so many characters here. The raving homos who run the oldest pub in town are but a speck in the landscape. My whanau take up maybe a fiftieth of the whole picture. Everyone I meet continues to be a complete individual. With adventures and experiences under their belt that, while not completely out of the ball park (especially in my chain of friends) are still pretty amazing.
People my own age and lower own houses. Run businesses. Have two or three kids. Go diving in weekends. Play sports.
I’m concerned that my life is not filled enough… stuff.
I’m concerned that I’m unable to, either physically or financially, do the stuff I want to.
I’m concerned this it for me.
I’m concerned that sooner or later, I will BE the crazy but harmless loner I live next door to.
Only possibly hunchbacked.
.
Wow. What a slow few weeks I’ve been having. I feel sorry for anyone reading this drivel. Which, I’ve realised, isn’t many. Hence, The Mad Scorpion will be stopping at number 20.
There. You’ve been forewarned.
Besides, there’s really only so long I can talk about my cousins shed parties every weekend. Or what tv show I watched this week. Isn’t there? God, even I’m bored. If I was watching me on TV, I’d have switched me over months ago.
So I guess I’d better try and say something profound in these last few weeks….
…
..
.
Yeah, I got nothing.
.
Sometimes, I wonder what the hell I’m doing here, and other times I know I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. As slow and boring as this town is, the people in it continue to fascinate me. For all the Right reasons, I might add. Mostly.
I have encountered so many characters here. The raving homos who run the oldest pub in town are but a speck in the landscape. My whanau take up maybe a fiftieth of the whole picture. Everyone I meet continues to be a complete individual. With adventures and experiences under their belt that, while not completely out of the ball park (especially in my chain of friends) are still pretty amazing.
People my own age and lower own houses. Run businesses. Have two or three kids. Go diving in weekends. Play sports.
I’m concerned that my life is not filled enough… stuff.
I’m concerned that I’m unable to, either physically or financially, do the stuff I want to.
I’m concerned this it for me.
I’m concerned that sooner or later, I will BE the crazy but harmless loner I live next door to.
Only possibly hunchbacked.
I was told by my psuedo-aunt the other day:
"If you fail to plan, then you're planning to fail"...
This is Deeply Unsettling.
How exactly do you plan to be a soap opera writer other than by writing soap operas???
Methinks I need to start stalking some soap opera writers. Perhaps kill them, then wear their skin to work??
.
DEAD TATTOOS:
Ok, get this.
A grieving New Plymouth mother is pissed because the Public Trust Fund Office hadn’t informed her of a special request in her son’s will before he was cremated.
Said Special Request was that the son’s tattoos be removed from him and preserved.
All fair enough so far. I’d be pretty pissed too if I found it out after my son had been cremated.
But then you read what his tattoos actually were:
A playboy bunny.
An Aries sign,
A Taurus sign,
And a DB Export Beer logo.
And yet all I can think is… Thank Fuck his mother didn’t find his will in time.
I mean, come on. What an utterly tacky legacy.
Mind you, for New Plymouth, it all fits…
.
THE GREAT GATE DEBATE:
In Masterton, at the Queen Elizabeth Park, there have been problems afoot.
A gateway known as the Hosking Gates were recently moved from the north to the south end of the park, at a substantial cost to ratepayers, only the gates were left unaligned.
A front page debate in the Wairarapa Times-Age has been raging for weeks – Who oversaw the project, What was going to be done about it, When were they going to be fixed, Where were the people responsible, Why were the gates unaligned, How were they allowed to be moved in the first place, … Etcetera, etcetera.
It was, of course, front page news last week, when at long last the gates were realigned, for free no less, by a generous crane company. Hoorah! Ratepayers could rest at last!
…Or could they?
In a truly stunning affirmation that in small towns just about anything can appear on the front page of the paper that day if nothing happening happens to be actual news, this was the front page headline of the weekend Wairarapa Times Age edition:
“GATE DEBATE: NEW TWIST:
SHOULD THEY BE KEPT OPEN OR SHUT?”
…
.
DINNER WITH SARAH:
Last week I had the pleasure of meeting up with an old friend for dinner.
Her name is Sarah King, and I went to high school with her, and for a while we lived across the road from each other in Wellington, and times between us have pretty much always been great.
So it stood to reason that when we met up for dinner, it was pretty much a laugh fest, and I really enjoyed seeing her. It was especially nice because lately I’ve really felt like all my teenage-hood friendships have been disappearing into the ether faster than you can say “Let’s go park up at McDonalds.”
In the soap opera that I wrote for years and years during my teens and beyond, the character of Sarah was pretty much a teenaged version of Kimberly from Melrose Place, times ten, and also had a psychotic older sister. It wasn’t pleasant when I had to tell her that her character had been cut from the new rewrite I am working on, but I’ve figured with a psycho like that, Sarah will eventually be written back in.
As will Lucy… and Julie… and Janine… and Melissa… and Olivia…
Hey, I’ve had to be ruthless.
ANYway, Sarah praised The Mad Scorpion. Long time fan, she called herself.
When I told her about my decision to end it, she was not at all impressed, and asked why. I told her because fuck all people read it.
.
DEAD TATTOOS:
Ok, get this.
A grieving New Plymouth mother is pissed because the Public Trust Fund Office hadn’t informed her of a special request in her son’s will before he was cremated.
Said Special Request was that the son’s tattoos be removed from him and preserved.
All fair enough so far. I’d be pretty pissed too if I found it out after my son had been cremated.
But then you read what his tattoos actually were:
A playboy bunny.
An Aries sign,
A Taurus sign,
And a DB Export Beer logo.
And yet all I can think is… Thank Fuck his mother didn’t find his will in time.
I mean, come on. What an utterly tacky legacy.
Mind you, for New Plymouth, it all fits…
.
THE GREAT GATE DEBATE:
In Masterton, at the Queen Elizabeth Park, there have been problems afoot.
A gateway known as the Hosking Gates were recently moved from the north to the south end of the park, at a substantial cost to ratepayers, only the gates were left unaligned.
A front page debate in the Wairarapa Times-Age has been raging for weeks – Who oversaw the project, What was going to be done about it, When were they going to be fixed, Where were the people responsible, Why were the gates unaligned, How were they allowed to be moved in the first place, … Etcetera, etcetera.
It was, of course, front page news last week, when at long last the gates were realigned, for free no less, by a generous crane company. Hoorah! Ratepayers could rest at last!
…Or could they?
In a truly stunning affirmation that in small towns just about anything can appear on the front page of the paper that day if nothing happening happens to be actual news, this was the front page headline of the weekend Wairarapa Times Age edition:
“GATE DEBATE: NEW TWIST:
SHOULD THEY BE KEPT OPEN OR SHUT?”
…
.
DINNER WITH SARAH:
Last week I had the pleasure of meeting up with an old friend for dinner.
Her name is Sarah King, and I went to high school with her, and for a while we lived across the road from each other in Wellington, and times between us have pretty much always been great.
So it stood to reason that when we met up for dinner, it was pretty much a laugh fest, and I really enjoyed seeing her. It was especially nice because lately I’ve really felt like all my teenage-hood friendships have been disappearing into the ether faster than you can say “Let’s go park up at McDonalds.”
In the soap opera that I wrote for years and years during my teens and beyond, the character of Sarah was pretty much a teenaged version of Kimberly from Melrose Place, times ten, and also had a psychotic older sister. It wasn’t pleasant when I had to tell her that her character had been cut from the new rewrite I am working on, but I’ve figured with a psycho like that, Sarah will eventually be written back in.
As will Lucy… and Julie… and Janine… and Melissa… and Olivia…
Hey, I’ve had to be ruthless.
ANYway, Sarah praised The Mad Scorpion. Long time fan, she called herself.
When I told her about my decision to end it, she was not at all impressed, and asked why. I told her because fuck all people read it.
She didn't care about that, and felt that it (this blog) was like keeping in touch with me, without actually having to! Like talking on the phone, without actually having to do the pesky 'talking' half of the conversation.
She urged me to continue...
And so I shall. It seems a little arm twisting was all it took.
Even if I’m just writing to Sarah once a week, that’s ok with me.
.
And so I shall. It seems a little arm twisting was all it took.
Even if I’m just writing to Sarah once a week, that’s ok with me.
.
RANDOM FACTOID:
My favourite number is 18.
It makes sense to publish this post in my favourite colour.
Keep writing. Write like your life depends on it. Because it does. Mine does.
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