Osaka bandits

In a time where men walk the fine line of having a drink poured over them for labelling some a clichè (...and she was), when colourful language no longer becomes amusing and sounds quite common (...and it was), its always good to have a friend by your side to either laugh with you at your audacity or chip in with an amusing story that smacks of innocence, ignorance and the whole raw deal in between. Alas, I digress, oh yea.

My friend Jet recently purchased a bicycle. Not a special event, not something worth writing about. His bike however is not located near his home, his current place of work or really anywhere you can think for which a bicycle might serve its purpose of allowing him a touch of mobility - oh no, so, pray tell kind Helisher of the Caffeine Death, where is this miraculous mechanical monument to self serviced transport. Well of course it's in Osaka, Japan. Now, you may ask, what the hell is the story behind that ?
Good question - here's the deal.

One Mr Frichot purchased himself a bike to get around Osaka on a recent excursion to the land of the rising sun. He got his wheels on the cheap so really, no fiscal demands were made on this young warrior. However, instead of giving his bike away, selling it or throwing it away, Mr Frichot simply chained it up in front of the hotel he was staying and left it there. You know, there's something very cool and very transient about that act. As explained in our discussion, the simplicity and clarity of thought surrounding this was simply that a) It was his bike b) Nobody would take it and c) It would be there upon his next trip (more than likely 5 yrs away). You see, the beauty in this story is the line which more than likely will join the dots between the past and present. Now, I'm a touch sentimental and I'd like to imagine then when Jet finally does return that his bike is in the same place that he left it. Call it poignant , corny or soppy, but I found the little snippet charming. Anyway, enough male appreciation from me.

So where was I, oh right, a drink almost being poured over me. The amusing thing was that the girl even feigned a pour, spilling half her drink and making the act of spite all the more interesting for me. I just had to laugh. If I can make someone want to pour a drink over me within 90 seconds of meeting them then I think I have a real shot of going into politics or better still, becoming a great lawyer ! Even better, on the way out of the bar I had two friends of hers accost me and come back with 'witty gems' on behalf of their down trodden sister. I believe they went something along the lines of, 'You're ugly' - *aha, pure magic there* and 'You're old, you should be at home with your wife and kids'...Ouch, I mean cut me to pieces ladies. I can't help if you're sister is a clichè, but she was ! LOL You know, I think my calling in life is to walk the earth and make it as unpleasant as possible for all its people. Helisher 1, people of the world 0 (Game on !)

Helisher's Air Crash Investigation

I'm sure I've spoken about this before but for the absent minded, in the last few years started to suffer from the anxiety of air travel. Its bizarre in that I'm no stranger to air travel and up until a few years ago had no issues at all but a couple of incidents and a lot of watching 'Air Crash Investigation' on Foxtel can certainly change perceptions and thoughts of what could happen in the 3 mins that it takes to exit a plane and hit the ground.

My latest encounter of flight anxiety came on an early morning hop to Melbourne. These days I'm hyper vigilant, if there's a delay with boarding I automatically think 'technical problem'. On my way back from Europe this year the Captain made an announcement that a doctor was required - I interpreted that as 'We're preparing you for an emergency routing to somewhere very close and I'm using the old 'sick patient' excuse' !

Anyway, our flight to Melbourne was delayed 30 mins and our gate changed. As I correctly assumed, to change planes. So I'm getting on and settling in when one of the cabin crew makes the following announcement;

'Ladies and Gentleman, apologies for the delay this morning but we now have a SAFER aircraft for you'

Aha, a SAFER aircraft ? Wow, thanks for the confidence inspiring pep talk. So the aircraft that I'm on now is 'safer' than what exactly ? The aircraft that's on the tarmac that won't be flying ? I'd rather be on a plane not flying than one up at 30,000 feet that is moderately safer than the one with technical difficulty. I mean really, what the hell did that announcement mean ?

Then it was the turn of our inspirational Captain. I assume the 'safer' terminology didn't wash well with him or general Virgin Blue business practice because he came up with the following;

'Ladies and Gentleman, we'll be pushing back shortly, apologies for the delay but it was due to a technical fault, but now, ON A MORE SERIOUS NOTE, our cabin crew are here to assist with your every need'

Ummmm Captain, if I'm ranking customer service and the safety of the aircraft then I know exactly which one I'd regard as more important. How much more freakin serious can customer service be over a 'technical fault'. Was the comment on the technical fault not serious enough or do Virgin Blue just take their customer service desperately seriously ? I mean serving coffee and handing out muffins is not a stretch in anyone's books but is more of a stretch than having a functioning engine ???

My flight back to Sydney is on Friday, here's to safe landings !

The Objective is to be Subjective

I've said it before and now I have to say it again, when it comes to law, nobody has a clue. The again, for any social science, as long as you can construct a logical enough argument you can prove the theoretical sky to be red.

I guess my complaint is directed at the assignment I'm currently doing. It's about a 'reasonable person' test when it comes to assessing the breach of duty in the tort of negligence. The idea of an objective standard for the reasonable person sounds pleasing and the use of it would be ok but for fact that all of us are quite different and have varying degrees of knowledge, physical characteristcs and mental capacities by which we act in a given situation. Thus the compentencies by which a 'reasonable person' should act in a situation really needs to be dictated, to an extent, subjectively. Considering I've read a few bullsh*t papers for this assignment I think I could crap on for some time as to what I think of the theory, how it plays out and whether it makes sense to me but the point I'm driving at is, it doesn't seem to make sense to anyone. Judges, juries , lawyers and anyone else interpret legal principles in a hundred different ways and tend to use the escape route of distinguishing facts in a given case as a reason as to why legal principles developed in earlier cases shouldn't apply in the current case. So now the rest of us are left wondering what the hell we're supposed to do with judgments that are conflicting and varied ? I don't freakin' know, I can't make heads or tails of certain reasoning sometimes. If it were me I'd simply say, 'this is the rule', you break it, you're gone, I don't care if you have two left feet, have a single digit IQ, are the most competant librarian in the world. Once you've accepted the fact that we live together, in a society, then our freedom of action is dictated by the security of person that we owe to the people that we're interacting with. A reasonable standard of care owed to another person needs to be the same across the board as the injury that a person suffers doesn't make a difference after the action has happened....ok....so I really don't believe that line but whatever, it's said.

I'm over it, I'll be back later.

Between the eyes

Sometimes I think I'm a little too nice. Now, there's components within that which I'll never be able to change but I think that coming back with retorts to dumbass comments might just have to be one area where I'm going to have to up the tempo. Here's a little overview of what I'm getting at:

The classic observation: 'Man, you're short' or 'Aren't you short ?' .
Now this is just a 'classic' observation of me, I mean really, did it take a person just that split second for it to trigger in their mind and for them to spit out their dumbass observation or had they been waying up the critical point of male height / 'shortness' for sometime. You see, now if I was a midgit/dwarf or anything that could be considered as such I wouldn't get such a flagrantly stupid comment ...but...because I'm under the 'average' male height then obviously I need to be interrupted and told that in fact I am short ! So, this is where I think there needs to be a little turn around. If people are going to dare be so stupid and 'call it as they see it', well, it's time for me to do so as well. I think I might just go with anything, perhaps, you're bald, you're a fat sh*t, you're particularly ugly, you've got the personality of a ravaged hermit, your IQ actually is double your shoe size !?, you've got the co-ordination of someone that is in fact handicapped. I could go on for days, so I think you might understand what I'm driving at and my sense of purpose. Usually I don't partake in the 'calling it as I see it crowd' but if I'm going to cop it from people that feel it's their right, well, I should offer them a little clarity in return.

The 'intuitive' observation: You know, I could tell you were an only child.
I'm always amazed by the insight here and perhaps the obvious bullshit nature of the line which often is an attempt by the said individual to be insightful. I usually get this several stops in a conversation after I've said, 'No, I don't have any brothers or sisters'. By the magic of deductive reasoning the individual always comes back at me with the observation that I somehow gave away that I was the one and only. I don't know but methinks that it is perhaps the power of the dumbass mind of the individual to somehow manipulate what is auditory, transmit it through the short circuit f**k up that is their mind and then relay it to me in an almost mystical, revelationary way. Now, I'm not pointing this towards people that have known me for a while, just those that within a handful of conversations can somehow pick up on the vibe. I don't know, is there a sign on my back ? Is there some aura about me that shouts 'only child' ? Is it perhaps the number plate on the car I drive that reads ONLY1

The 'multicultural' observation: 'You aren't Australian are you ?' or 'Hey, where are you from ?'.
To the later I usually just say Seven Hills and that ends that but the first one particularly gets under my skin. Born and bred here my friend, am as Australian as anyone else and just because the colour of my hair is dark and my skin a little towards the olive side doesn't make me more or less 'Australian' than the next person. I mean really, is that an attempt to identify my 'race' ? What the hell does 'race' mean in anycase, it's just a nonesense notion. The ability to identify a person or group of persons by physical attributes and then charaterise them by that is a croc. As we know, there are sub groups and sub groups of sub groups and all we really are are the total sum of the social and environmental characteristics that surround us. I like watching Cricket, I support the Swans, I'll support Australia in any sporting endeavour, I love the country that I'm born in and just because my parents are born elsewhere doesn't make me more or less Australian than a person whose parents are born here. Ok, I laugh at the fact that on several occasions I've had people ask if I was Uruguayan (lol, that's actually amusing) but more often than not I get Italian or Greek, although once a taxi driver went out on a limb and asked if I was Chinese...well, maybe if I was born there and spent all my years in that culture. So if I get this one I again I might just go with the response, 'hmmm, too bad you're a dumb sh*t otherwise I might just have told you'.

That's it for the moment, more to come as my levels of irritation increase.

The day is darkest before the dawn

I'm really unsure of how I'd like to write this entry. From a personal point of view the last week has been one of the worst I've had in quite sometime. I had already been on a motivational and emotional low when the week kicked off but that paled by comparison to the loss of two people that have had an impact on the people that I care about plus myself directly. Coupled with that, today is also the anniversary of my uncle passing away. Even though it was three years ago it's still quite raw and there are a hell of a lot of things that I see, hear or do that remind me of him. Ditched, kicked and hit - that's my week. I'm not saying that these things have affected me more than anyone else, just that the combination of all elements has made it personally trying in terms of work, study, socially interaction, etc. So right now I'm trying to find the way out. Usually if I can cling on to one thing and get it working then most other things tend fall into place - pity that all facets for me generally suck right now and there's nothing that I can really hang my hat on. Anyway, that's all I've got, will be back, hopefully on a brighter day,

Reach out and touch faith

What is so difficult about giving a 'High Five' or for that matter any sort of five ? It's pretty easy from what I've seen, a simple slap of the hands acting either as an indication/acknowledgment of either success, a greeting, an agreement etc. Now I'm not sure how long its been around but its definitely not a new phenomenon. What I can't get is why old people seem to F**k this little greeting up, time, after time, after time. For some reason they treat it as a quasi handshake and when you decide to put one of them to the challenge the both of you end up looking like graduates from the 50 and under IQ camp.

Here's where they get it all wrong;

1) When the offer of 'the five' is provided, i.e, a younger person being the instigator, the old person somehow confuses it with an horizontal handshake. The strange hybrid that they come up with you involves them sliding their hand across the palm of the instigator rather than slapping it.

2) The actual 'Hi Five' fails even more critically as the older person either goes for the a) hand clasp or b) uses option one and does a little push away. Either way that manage to get it all wrong with the intention of the younger person being blown out of the water by the ineptitude of the older, dilapidated, retarded geezer/geezress.

What can we do to solve the problem ?

The 'Hi Five' or 'the five' is a casual thing, it's hip without being over the top. I'd say education would be the logical option but when you get to a certain age you're just set in your ways and just can't get past the concept that 'your way' isn't necessarily the best. I personally think the best option is a solid diet of hip-hop/r'n'b videos because the one thing that an older person is not getting any of is stimulation in the nether regions. It's going to have to be a form of 'selling the five' via titillation. What better way to get an oldie to give you a five than by spinning Cisco's 'the thong' song 100 times and by your alloted geezer mimicking their actions ? Of course, the geezer my start calling you 'hommie' and ask you 'where all the hoes at ?' but hey, you've got to give a little to get a little. As for the geezress, well I recommend something by Usher or maybe a Denzel Washington movie or two. I think the geezress needs to be worked a little more but with the necessary cajoling she to can be offering the one handed slap with the enthusiasm of a little 'Bow Wow.

I see RED !!!!!

Today is just so dumb !! I have no issue with Valentines Day per se, I've been single for most of my life so it's never been a particularly important day. There are however two types of people that really get under my skin when it comes to V-Day;

a) The individual that takes the 'intellectual' tack and decides to point out to anyone that will listen that the day is distinctly a commercial pursuit that obligates many amongst us to part with our hard earned just so we can profess a love that we know already exists. A-ha, so well picked up Captain Obvious but where are you when it comes to Easter, Christmas, Mothers Day and Fathers Day ? It's all freakin commercialised but I'm sure you partake without a consideration on those days. So why don't you just let your pathetic diatribe slide, just because you're single and think/feel the desire to 'intellectualise' your way out of feeling pathetic, worthless or ugly doesn't mean that anyone else has to agree/care or even feel the need to listen to you. Just as a side note, there are some people I know that do think that ALL the days I've mentioned are commercialised and nonsensical - so this attack isn't directed at you and you know who you are :)

b) The pathetic whiner who forlornly looks at the gifts and cards and whatever else that their work colleauge or sibling or whomever else received and comments what a waste of money it is. NAH - please see answer for person a)

For me, well, I'm happy to see other people get gifts and of course to give them out, why the hell not ? We do it on a number of other days. If I'm not involved with it then that cool, it just means I'm single and I've dealt most of my life with being that. I would just like to strangle the people in both categories mentioned as it comes over like a broken record and for me usually hearing stupid stuff like that once is enough.

So for all the pathetic losers that somehow feel inadequate or feel the need to justify why they hate the concept of Valentines Day all I can say is take a good look at yourself, figure out why you're feeling like a limp gherkin slice and wake up. To all people that actually feel happy today and have something to look forward to then I genuinely bid you a Happy Valentines Day ! :)