When it all comes down.

I used to get around 2000 hits a week on this thing, now it's more like 200.

It's my own fault- I stopped inputting data. The content froze. The crowds moved on.

I've been working on a novel, so anything remotely clever I may have had to say got slipped into that. And I have an iPhone too, which means if I need to self-diagnose, I record a voice memo instead. Very therapeutic.

Today was a little odd. I have trackers on all of my social media, so I know when my exes are stalking me online, or their friends. I see them poke around, look at my life, and leave (usually without incident). I have a policy to NEVER EVER look at their feeds, as that would indicate an interest in the past. I know there are no answers there, so there's no point looking.

But today a sister of someone I used to be involved with decided to drop a totally ill-informed rant on my Instagram, with the intention of hurting my feelings. I will tell you now, facts hurt my feelings. But barbed invective of exactly the kind you find being shouted by angry schoolgirls doesn't have any effect other than to make me feel sorry for the people closest to whoever is doing the ranting.

This rant got the wrong end of every stick currently available, and was factually incorrect at every level, so the capacity for offence was obviously diminished with every new word typed.

It also accused me of being "old", which I fail to see as an insult (it's an inevitability). And considering the amount of friends I have lost to disease, suicide, and misadventure, I wear it with pride, to be honest. It accused me of a number of things, all of which were baseless, but the net result was that it made me pause and think for a moment.

My first instinct was to think about all of the obvious faults inherent in my accuser. The family secrets that I know, and they don't. I was sworn to secrecy by those closest to them, and despite my lack of affection for any of these people any more, those secrets have been, and always will remain, firmly hidden. If my accuser knew what I know, their personal world would end, both because of the facts involved, but also from the shock that their own family never told them about it. It's all very juicy, but that's all I'm going to say about it.

Then my mind wandered to marinate on my own inner journey lately.

This is my blog, so I'm allowed to be as honest and blatant as I want (especially as I don't have a large readership to cater to any more).

I have struggled with suicidal feelings for so long, but it's not something that needs an intervention. I mean, I probably do, but please don't do that. What I'm saying is I feel so remote and disconnected from a world I'm really disgusted by. By people.

I don't fit in anywhere, but I'm not depressed about that. I can fool people into thinking I'm part of their group/scene/whatever when the necessity strikes. You have to if you want to remain employed. But it's all an act. On my weekends, I stock up on everything I need, I go home, shut the door, and don't come out for two or three days. I don't talk to anyone, I don't arrange to meet people, because I am far happier being alone. My housemate is exactly the same way, so it's perfect. We're ghosts.

My suicidal feelings aren't related to belonging, I'm horrified at the thought of belonging! I opted out on purpose, after all. No, they are related to the apparent pointlessness of life without whatever the singular form of gregariousness is.

There is a nagging, ever present background hum that says "You're doing it wrong", because the idea that of the thousands of people I have met in this lifetime so far, they have all meant so little, that I purposefully elect to actively stay away from people and avoid fresh interactions completely.

Is that what life turns into?

I mean, I know I could change it if I wanted to... it's the not wanting to that seems so out of place and which makes me question what the point is.

I keep myself very busy. I have 3 jobs, two of which are my own businesses. I sleep a maximum of 6 hours a night, I simply cannot sleep more than that any more. I have creative pursuits that I lend myself to regularly, despite my bleak outlook that after I die, my computer will be wiped and given to someone else, and all of the music and writing I have poured into it will simply be deleted. But I mean, that's true, isn't it?

No one is going to give a crap about any of it. And why should they? I have never claimed to be talented or necessary. I'm just another ant, doing ant things. And when I dry up and cease to function, other ants will take my place in this great and magnificent dance we call life.

And, shock/horror- I'm fine with that. I guess I just concentrate too much thought energy on "Why wait?"

And I'd be remiss if I didn't tell you that I laugh every day. Quite a lot. I'm very entertained, I do a lot of fun things, I enjoy myself immensely. But a large part of my personality is that I get tired of things very quickly, so even if I'm laughing and having fun, my inner cynic is still always waiting to yawn and point at its watch.

I work very very hard, and that's great, because I gain a great deal of satisfaction from a hard days work. I don't enjoy work at all, but I do enjoy it. It's like if Escher did personalities.

But to drag this rattling out-of-control word salad into some semblance of a point, I really want to declare this:

I read back through a few posts in this blog today. And while there exists literal clouds of wanky, self-indulgent, ultimately meaningless garbage; there are also some very solid posts of which I am extremely proud of. And I don't need any form of wider recognition to validate them. I don't care if only 3 people read them, or if they become mandatory reading for High School English. I needed to say some things, I said them, and the way in which I articulated those things tickles me to revisit.

Mission accomplished, so to speak.

And it made me realise, no matter what anyone has to say about me, no matter how negatively I may experience my own self at times, and even no matter how pointless we all are with our ideas and careers and cars and brain tumours; some of the posts in this blog are of a high enough standard that I feel I achieved something worthwhile in all of the living, assessing, experiencing, learning, mistakes, revisions, and other ephemera that went into the creation thereof.

Words are an acceptable legacy in my opinion (and no, that isn't a cry for help or a threat of self harm).

Just sayin'.


This is knifey, from 'the internet'.

Fame as a birthright.

In 1968, Andy Warhol said that "In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes."

In 1970, Alvin Toffler wrote 'Future Shock', where the accelerated rate of technological and social change left people disconnected and suffering from "shattering stress and disorientation".

In 1991, Douglas Coupland released 'Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture', which depicted through the structure of a framed narrative, the stories of inhabitants of a post-Toffler existence.

On June 11, 2002, Simon Fuller, Fremantle Media North America, and 19 Entertainment presented 'American Idol: The Search for a Superstar'.

Today, I would contend that the accelerated rate of change, coupled with the publics diminishing ability to concentrate, has accelerated Warhol's 15 minutes so fast that it has reached zero point and has nowhere to go but in reverse.

Instead of 15 minutes, the public shows trends of consuming media voraciously with a constant focus on 'what comes next'.

Due to the revolving door format of reality shows, todays stars are actually manufactured with a clearly definable use-by date, to the extent that new entertainers are often criticised for attempting any kind of action toward career longevity.

And in the extreme, entertainers suffer backlash for releasing a second album, or for branching into other areas (ie: acting) in a move to cement future exposure.

The message seems to be that you don't get 15 minutes then fade away any more, you get one quick shot, and then "You are embarrassing now."

This microwave oven entertainment situation has a flow-on effect to society, and of course to younger more impressionable minds, who no doubt wonder why anyone even remembers Led Zeppelin or The Doors. Because entertainment is disposable (and more often than not, free), star power means a lot less than it used to. 

So the first single by artist 'X', charting highly this week, is not expected to remain in place. In fact, there is a general belief that artist 'X' will be back at their day job this time next year. As a result, the artists musical integrity (if it exists in the first place), is watered down to the point of irrelevance. If an artist other than the pantheon of record industry superstars (Rihanna, Beyonce, GaGa, Katy Perry, Matchbox 20, Nickelback, etc...) does live to release a follow-up album, they are often hated for it by many of the same people who jumped over each other to get at the first. 

The record industry of course is fully aware of this, and encourages (if not exacerbates) this situation, as it allows their top stars to monetise heavily on their safe position, and allows the companies themselves to churn out large volumes of content that is produced extremely cheaply and with no long term artist development expenses to consider. Very clean. This safe market position is tirelessly maintained by huge numbers of behind-the-scenes staff and media, who constantly engineer and promote leaked sex tapes (that everyone involved in is not only aware of, but has signed off on, and is getting paid for), as well as paparazzi stories/videos, and manufactured news/photo opportunities. gossip, and carefully constructed legal allegations.

Let's not forget that reality TV has injected a curious element into this mix- most kids sitting at home, even those without an atom of talent to call their own, fully believe not only that they have a chance at fame too, but that they are actually entitled to it.

And because they believe in this entitlement, their attitude is very much "Hurry up and die so I can have my turn."

We've never had that before.

The socio-musical balance has been upset, and the flipside to this commentary is that young people have become both perpetrators and victims of this cut throat mentality.

Kids have always been unpleasant, but now even more so. Being nice is considered a weakness, there is a constant pressure to retain SWAG, to live without thought for the future or consequences (YOLO), to "Trust no bitch", etc... This aggressive MEME culture values the individual over the collective, without the individual in question actually needing to have any sort of mental/cultural/ personal currency to back up their claim of importance.

It is entitlement as apex predator.

Of course culture can only maintain this direction and frenetic pace for so long before a new paradigm is forced to emerge, and I'm not ashamed to say I have absolutely no idea what it will be.

Technology and science/biology are tending towards collaboration as the standard model, which seems reasonable. And of course this generation will learn a lot of hard personal lessons over the next decade, and will settle as all other generations do/have, into a more societally acceptable/workable mindframe.

But we are a long way off a transhumanist H+ hive-mind/singularity. People are just too absorbed in irrelevance, and their own desire to lead that irrelevance right now. Unless there is a huge personal payoff (superhuman strength, unlimited information and blindingly fast access/processing abilities), there is no reason to give up on that dream of fame and pecuniary advantage.

The concept of an altruistic/benelovent culture swing seems more like science fiction than human/animal chimeras (which have existed in China since 2003) do right now.

That's really saying something about us.


This is knifey, from 'the internet'.




 

 

So, I thought about it, aaaaand...

Wash Solo, Obi Wan Kenobo, and Luke Skywater.

Rewind, selector.

Do you ever get down?

Look back on your life and wonder what you did all that wasted time?

I've definitely been feeling like that lately- another birthday menacing me from the next month of the calendar. Mortality. Ego. All the good stuff.

I moved here to Australia in 2001. I came here for bigger and better opportunities, as I reached the top of my game in New Zealand, and started to feel like I was suffocating over there. Beautiful place, but my God it's like a village full of gossip.

So- farewell NZ. I caught the airport shuttle bus to my flight in the dark, and couldn't wait to get out of that place. So much so that I left an amazing girl behind- I was so focused on moving 'forward' I never realised 'til I was long gone just what I had passed over without thinking.

She got me back though, tore my heart right out.

 So I moved to Melbourne, after never having been here before. I heard it was the rock capital of Australia, but all that started to rapidly change as soon as I got over here (I'd like to think it wasn't my fault). 

I toured pretty much non-stop when I got here, but the band that I came over with (and who were selling out massive shows every night back home) weren't getting recognised here. The record company guys kept saying "We've already got a Superjesus", as if every female fronted rock band could be pigeonholed so easily.

So the tours dried up.

My first week here I worked for Bon Jovi.

I started a band. And usually, I think of it as an abysmal failure, when I think back on it. I don't even usually talk about it. But I had a listen tonight, because I'm not in the music biz any more, I work at a friggin' strip club. And that depresses me.

So I plugged in my old 70's headphones with the unlimited bass response, and played back our old EP, rehearsals, demos, ideas... and I really loved it. I could see the holes in the songs, could hear the work that needed to be done. But I could hear exactly what I was aiming for back then too, and it was alright, though now dated.

I remembered how I got an email from the managers of one of the highest selling acts in American history, offering us a management deal. How my musical idol (and object of desire) guested on our record, how really massive bands would hear our music and get in touch to say they liked it, and how dumbfounded we were when it happened.

And that was just the first 3 years or so.

I started a commercial kitchen in the storage area of a landmark inner city pub (which is still serving hot meals as we speak), just because I saw the potential in it. They used it to stack old chairs in, but I cleaned it, fitted it out, got the stock in, drew up menus, hired the staff, and served the people. Then I moved on to the next thing.

I made guitars for a while. Sponsored everybody who's music I liked in Australia. Worked with artists to create signature models. Even made custom guitars for Ben Harper and the Queens of the Stone Age. Got back on the VIP list for festivals and after parties. Liked it.

Then I left the guitar factory, and was invited to join a band that has since gone on to sell platinum in Australia and Gold in the USA and UK. I never played a note with them, but I was invited, and that's nice.

I also went through a really dark time. I won't get into it here. I probably already have. I lost an ex girlfriend and a best friend to suicide.

When I emerged, I had opened a shop of my own in Melbourne selling custom bicycles- choppers, cruisers, sleds, lowriders, and motorcycles too. The guys from American Chopper visited Australia and put us on the list of places to see. It was called Hellbourne Choppers. I also made custom branded bikes for international companies like Slate Bourbon and El Jimador tequila. I took immense pleasure in turning down any offers from Telstra, Optus, Vodafone, or any of the major banks.

It was ridiculously successful until the Australian Government banned every type of bike that we sold. Our distributors all freaked out and stopped importing, and the only bikes I could sell where the ones I made, or found on the internet secondhand. It crippled the store, and I ran into a wall of $35,000 worth of debt. I paid the last cent owed 1 minute before I was due to appear in court for involuntary bankruptcy. I never bankrupted, I made it out alive. I also moved the business to the internet, where it still happily lives today. I do need someone to help me update the site, but regardless of being 2 years out of date, I'm still getting orders all the time. I'm planning on coming back strong this year. I am #1 in search engine rankings- I have total market dominance.

Somewhere in all of that I started working security quite seriously. I have defended everything from 20 billion dollar nuclear-enabled supersonic bombers for the USAF, 5 star Generals, VIP's, rock stars, more rock stars, the Nation of Israel, private properties, vast amounts of cash, military personnel, lounge bars, one of the biggest music venues in Australia for a summer, and of course, a strip club.

I also sat the police entrance exam for Victoria police. I passed with a 94.2% pass score. The minimum score is 156 out of 244, I got 230. I was invited to attend the police college, then had my invitation withdrawn by the new police commissioner who has a stick up his ass regarding tattoos. Thanks Ken, you douche bag.

But it's still an achievement.

Every time I requalify for my handgun license I shoot a perfect score (300 out of 300) every year I do it. I get to walk around in public fully armed, which is a nice bit of trust to have from the community. I've been doing that for a few years now, no problems to report.

I got my Black Belt (Unit 10) in Tactical Krav Maga. I've started out in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

I've toured the world (Canada, USA, Asia, Europe, The Middle East, Australia) as a session guitarist for other people (including Anastacia, who was a big deal over here for a while).

I started another band with some of the guys from a stonkingly huge Australian band that broke up, and then got back together afterward. I was kinda like the mistress I guess. We went nowhere, there's no way it could have turned out different. We got a lot of fans though! I never listen to those songs any more.

I passed a first aid course, got a forklift license.

I disappeared a couple of years back to go play music in Dubai. Had a nice apartment, lived at a level of luxury I have never managed to achieve here in Australia. I also got deported from the country, but you know, shit happens.

I worked on a couple of records for very big bands here. Showcased for an artist that got an 18 million dollar offer from a major label on the strength of our performance- acoustic guitar and voice, that's it.

Got flown around here and there, free hotels, ARIA awards, Logies, all that fun stuff.

I've had about 12 words entered into urbandictionary.com too, which is a dubious distinction at best, but I'm actually really happy about those. I like contributing to culture.

Speaking of which, some of my graffiti made the front page of newspapers all over the world, in more than 20 countries. The Government saw the tourism potential in it and commissioned me to make more, and the National Archive in Canberra did the same.

The blog you're reading right now is the first blog in Australian history to be archived by the National Library in Canberra, in a computer archive called 'Pandora'. They said I am "...an integral icon in the cultural landscape of Australia". The word "fuck" appears in the National Library's archive 879 times more, thanks to yours truly.

I've had my writing published, drafted policy for the NSW Government, and for the Environmental Defenders Office. I have a secret twitter that no one knows is me. It's very, very dirty.

I've fallen in love with too many models and strippers, and broke up spectacularly with all of them, so if any of you see me out, and I'm with either profession, just kick me in the nuts. Unless I'm at work. because obviously, there are strippers there.

So when I look back, I guess I did fill up the last 10 years pretty well. I'm not slowing down, so by the time I'm 51 (in another decade- OHMYGOD!!!), hopefully I'll have a bunch more stuff to add to the list.

But rather than accumulating external achievements, there are a couple of internal matters I need to wrap my head around. And I'm not sure how. I need to learn to stop being a kid, and live in my skin. Learn how to be 9 years away from 50 years of age, even though there isn't one person on the planet who would pick my age correctly right now.

I am what I am, I need to learn how to be honest about that. To have the courage to leave ego and childishness behind, and be proud of maturity and wisdom and experience. Even though I feel like I'm turning invisible, like one day soon I will cease to exist within the visible spectrum.

And here's a shocker for you- I have no desire whatsoever to live past 60. And if I do so naturally, I will remedy it artificially. I know it's shallow and retarded, but i can't face that, I have no idea why. It's not like I'm a super hot guy who should fear losing my looks- I have always been average at best. But I just can't face the prospect of being fully invisible, overlooked, no longer relevant, in the eyes of the rest of a world whose every other opinion I pay no heed to whatsoever.

Bad and wrong, I know, but there it is.

Let's see what happens...

This is knifey, from 'the internet'.

Lana Del Rey.

There are no pictures for this post, because this post relates to music.

Normally I don't weigh-in with opinions on popular music unless it's to occasionally remind people that Lady Gaga is Madonna, not David Bowie. And the world moves forward, deaf to my protestations, and that is the natural order of things.

But I feel compelled to point out something that all the music industry critics seem to have missed.

I keep reading critics wondering why there is such a huge backlash against Lana Del Rey. They point out that Bob Dylan worked under an assumed name, The Strokes are rich boys, and Elton John is gay. So (they claim) hating Del Rey for using an assumed name/persona and coming from money is hypocritical.

Of course they're right- but they are missing the point.

Music like 'Born to Die' doesn't traditionally make it to such rarified air as Del Rey's team have managed to launch that record into- it doesn't fit the mainstream profile.

But it sold.

Because people are so enchanted by the concept that someone like Del Rey exists out there, weaving such ghostly musical components together, almost as if the music was made of air (which of course, it is). They are enchanted that she could be real, genuine, not manufactured. That someone so ethereal and alternative could exist in a vacuous mirror ball like L.A., and not be corrupted by the trash and filler.

They don't care if her name isn't real, it's part of the art. But when they discovered her vocal style had changed since her initial EP as Lizzy Grant, the authenticity of the dream began to show its edges...and the cracks widened with each closer investigation.

And so the people felt betrayed. Because given the choice, they would choose to crown artists that produced work to a higher standard than the inhabitants of the charts, they just need guidance. But the video for 'Video Games' on You Tube went viral because the people needed to believe someone out there in the world still believed in MUSIC. Believed in bucking the trends. And even though there are beats on the record, contemporary instrumentation, high production, the result is still ethereal. It still takes you "there". At least, we thought it did, while we thought it was genuine.

In a world of ever-accelerated culture, where 15 minutes of fame has narrowed to seconds, the idea of a mainstream anti-hero, a pure, un-auto-tuned, effortlessly talented, and authentic individual who is unaffected by the disposable production line of chart music, is not only desired, it is essential.

Music consumers are strangled by a lack of soulfulness, of unvarnished honesty. This is why Adele is so universally lauded. The production on her record is irrelevant- it's her voice, her emotion, and the rawness of her experience that connects you to her. It could have been recorded at home and it would still have touched the same nerve. But the people need more...

And America needed its own incarnation, with its own twist, it's own story.

It was Del Rey's calculated betrayal of the music loving public that has led to her highly overestimated downfall, and it is that same betrayal that music critics don't seem to be able to see. They write about it, sure, but they don't equate it with relevance, as they are in the main tired and disappointed with the choices and opinions of the great unwashed.

Musical elitism precludes them from sympathy toward the people who funded the careers of Limp Bizkit or Lil Wayne.

But souls need nutrition, and given better options, people make better choices. This applies to music too. And for a moment in time, it appeared as if the people had a saviour.

And when they saw that she was a false prophet, the crucifixion commenced...

...But as they say, nothing is forever. I'm sure she'll weather this storm and continue being who she eventually became. Her fanbase is massive, and I honestly can't see her evaporating any time soon.

Her true followers hold her to be far too holy, to lose faith now.

Sex with Animals.

Flowers are so great because they're like pets you can own for 5 days, watch them grow and bloom, then just throw them in the trash. It's weird though, how they are the sex organs of plants, and how we rip them off, and smell them, and put them in vases, which are basically a whole subgenre of holding devices for the dismembered sex organs of plants. Without this sick preoccupation we have with flowers, we'd just have containers, jugs, buckets, amphorae and urns.

If we weren't so messed up, we wouldn't have vases. Or dildos, salsa music, guns, or French cuisine. By contrast, imagine ripping the cock off a dog, and putting it in a vase. Because that's what we do with flowers, only obviously with plants not animals. "Wow! What's that?" "That's an arrangement of chihuahua penis and seal point siamese vulva, counterbalanced with a lovely setting of cockatoo fallopian tubes".

The thing about cats, that make them so evil is, they completely lack a sense of humour. If a cat shredded your bedspread, then pissed on your face while you were sleeping, that's evil. But if they laughed when they had finished, that's more devilish and twisted, which I can appreciate. You'd be like "You BASTARD!! Why would you do that?!", and while you would be angry as hell, you'd know you got "got", and would have to accept you're a punk, and that the cat rules.

Can you imagine a cat laughing though? That would be one fucking nightmarish sound, wouldn't it? And the look on its little face, with all those needle teeth exposed, eyes crinkled up... Fuck that, that would be all kinds of wrong. Cats are so fucked, basically.

Dogs, on the other hand, are so wonderful to have around, because even though they do shred your bedspread, and roll around in dead animal remains, and eat other dogs crap, and not come when you try to call them away from people eating their lunch in the park, they do it all with a big stupid grin on their face, that just says "I FUCKING LOVE LIFE!" And then if you yell at them, they look really sorry, like they're suddenly not enjoying life at all, which is what you want from something you're yelling at. Cats just look at you with a look that says "Tonight- I piss on your face, puny human".

1.  "If you're having sex, and the dog walks past the door and sees you, is that wrong?"
2.  "If you're having sex, and the dog walks into the room and watches you, is that wrong?"
3.  "If you're having sex, and the dog walks right up close and looks at you, is that wrong?"
4.  "If you're having sex, and the dog climbs up onto the bed with you, is that wrong?"
5.  "If you're having sex, and a part of the dog touches you, is that wrong?"
6.  "If you're having sex, and the dog lays down against you, is that wrong?"
7.  "If you're having sex, and the dog lays down next to you and looks at  you, is that wrong?"
8.  "If you're having sex, and the dog licks your hand, is that wrong?"
9.  "If you're having sex, and the dog licks your hand and looks you in the eye, is that wrong?"
10. "If you're having sex, and the dog licks your face, is that wrong?"
11. "If you're having sex, and the dog licks your face and doesn't stop, is that wrong?"
12. "If you're having sex, and the dog is licking your face, and he gets an erection, is that wrong?"
13. "If you're having sex, and the dog is licking your face, and he gets an erection, and you pat him, is that wrong?"
14. "If you're having sex, and the dog is licking your face, and he gets an erection, and you climax, is that wrong?"
15. "If you're having sex, and the dog is licking your face, and he gets an erection, and you both climax, is that wrong?"
16. "If you're having sex, and the dog is licking your face, and he gets an erection, and all three of you climax, is that wrong?"

If you climaxed while reading that, I think it's pretty safe to say that's wrong.

This is knifey, from 'the internet'.

The Law Gets in the Way.

I like Plato. 

Of all the philosophers, he's the best. 

He was a handsome bastard, with one of those awesome ancient Greek 'short hair and long beard' combos they used to rock way back then in the B.C's. And sandals! But apart from that, he was just a regular guy, who helped to metaphorically lay the foundations of Western culture, which is the real reason you've probably heard of him. 

Being an 'ancient' Greek, as opposed to a contemporary one, he had the interesting distinction of having a death date earlier than his birthdate. You try doing that nowadays! I read on Wikipedia that when Plato was an infant, they say bees settled on his lips, an augury of the sweetness of style in which he would discourse philosophy. I had a bird shit on my eye when I was a toddler, which I see as a foretoken of the gift I have for removing painful burdens from others, through the skill and truth of my observations. But this isn't about me. It's not about Plato either, which may be shocking to you, seeing as I've just been talking about him. No, like all matters of import, it is about a chance meeting in a bar. But we're not there yet. 

My favourite work of Plato, is easily 'The Laws'. It's one of the few things I studied in my 8 years at University, that I actually paid any attention to (apart from, of course, the female student body). To cut a long discourse short, the meat and potatoes of the work concerns itself with virtue, that being the quality that all lawmakers should wish to instil, via the constitution of a city/State, into the extant citizenry. The problem with it, and the reason why Plato's fabled city of Magnesia doesn't exist today, is that philosophers tend to overlook the strenuous ethical contortions general humans have to achieve in order to fit into the framework. Think Olympics for houseplants, or 'Pimp my Ride' for your microwave...it's a bit beyond simply a stretch. 

People just don't like acting well, unless it damn well suits them, which is why the law we have in Australia is so convenient (for the most part). As much as we don't like paying taxes, or not being allowed to murder the people who kick the backs of our seats in movie theatres and in aeroplanes, we do enjoy the protection those laws extend to us, when we don't feel like getting murdered or even just mildly threatened. As much as we obey the law, because we live in fear of the law (as opposed to the Platonic style of 'obeying the law, because we are educated and edified by it'), it gets the job done, which works for (the majority of) us. 

It doesn't always work for me though, because people do kick the back of my seat at the movies or on flights. In fact, and I'm not sure why this is, but I can't remember a flight or a movie where someone didn't repeatedly kick the back of my seat! Luckily it isn't against the law to accidentally spill your drink over people, or if on a plane, to suddenly swing your chair into a reclining position, hitting them in the face with it, or spilling their own drink all over them. Drinks cost money, so this is very satisfying, like shooting an attacker with their own gun, which is clearly something else I do all the time. Just not on planes. 

So now to the point of this story, which happens under the protection of the laws governing the wonderful island nation of Australia, late at night, in a bar somewhere in Melbourne. This particular bar is called the Jawa bar, not so much for the owners love of the films of George Lucas, but more after a kind of motorcycle manufactured in the former Czechoslovakia, before it became The Czech Republic, and a place you never want to catch a train, in that order. 

I want you to imagine that you're in this place, there are people all around you, and whatever your sexual proclivity leans toward, within reasonable norms, your eyes are happy. 

He's at your side all of a sudden, and you kick yourself internally for not seeing him in time to go the other way. He talks to you, engages you in a conversation you don't want, and his topics are so mind-numbingly boring you have moments of wondering if he actually knows, and this is how he gets his kicks. Annoyingly, he also has an in-built talent for standing directly in the way of the hot (insert gender here) you were making eyes at a moment earlier. 

He's a nice guy though, and you don't want to offend him. So you try to listen, and feel terrible when you know he sees your eyes wandering, the desperation written all over your face, praying for an off-ramp. The stifled yawns, your eyes on everything but him. But he doesn't let up, and you are amazed to learn though experience that it's actually possible to be so bored you want to vomit. That's your body fighting the infection of his words. Your ear holes constrict, nasal passages revert to mono. eyes squint, trying to impede the flow of words to your cerebral cortex, to your amygdala, the part of you that's trying not to die from hopelessness. 

If he doesn't realise what he's doing, when it's so obvious, then he's a ninja master of the old school, the kind that can kill you with his brain without trying. An assassin, albeit one who throws terms like "Dual quad core xeon processors" instead of throwing stars. An assassin, who can kill out in the open, bludgeoning you repeatedly, suffocating you by filling the air with words that, while permeable enough in small groups of under six, become smothering when installed professionally into full sentences. 

Like a poisonous cloud of supermodels, like herding blobs of mercury. Absolutely aggravating, absolutely pointless. And you wonder what it is about you that makes him feel welcome? You're fully aware of your pained expression, you can't hide it, you've tried.  And then, from out of the dense cloud of verbs and antonyms, comes a gap in the conversation. 

You feel refreshed, you're in a rainforest clearing, the sky is above you, you are free! He stops to take a pull on his beer, both of you looking around the room, and not at each other. "Yep, yep..." He says to himself breathily, as if he too is bored by his conversational ninjitsu, and you finally feel like it's over. No one is saying anything, both of you just looking off into space. A respite. Mercy! Proof of the baby Jesus. 

But no, it's not that. He's just warming up. Then the vines swirl around you, and you're lost under the dense canopy of his letters and punctuations, and a part of you dies, the part that had hope and loved life. And you hate him then. You imagine your hands around his stupid throat, choking him, while he fights to rasp even more words out. His eyes like a freshly landed trout, goggly, and conveying that "what the hell is this!?" feeling. A fantasy. A fantasy of control. Escapism from the real world, you and him in a bar, surrounded by a thick cloud of irrelevance, and he's got you going ga-ga, protected by Plato and his law, the law that says you can't strangle someone to death for being boring, regardless of how good they are at it.

So I had to settle for being lawful, and, rising from my bar stool, I walked away from him mid-sentence and out the door. I might have stayed in the bar if I felt he wouldn't have simply followed me and kept talking. But clearly his ability to empathize with others regarding the high tide mark of his boring-ness was damaged, to put it nicely.

I don't remember ever being so glad to be by myself after that moment...

This is knifey, from 'the internet'.