The next few days were spent trying not to spend any money whatsoever, as we had about one hundred dollars to our name because the money had not been transferred properly from one account to the other.
This couldn't have happened at a worse time.
The deposit we had to put down on Tropic Thunder (as we weren't members of the video club) was, count 'em, $100.
One Hundred Dollars. I did ask if the lady thought this was slightly over the top, and that for that amount I could go out and buy nine copies of the film, but the response I received was a stew of emotions, ranging from mild derision to sincere hatred, with a healthy dollop of malevolence gravy.
She was of course working in a shitty little video shop at nine o´clock on new year’s day, I shouldn't have been so forward.
After a tearful farewell with Dan, and arranging to meet him in New Zealand at some point, we eventually flew to Melbourne. Once there we checked into super mega huge hostel 'Urban Central' and did next to nothing apart from eat lots of free pasta and drink lots of free tea. That pretty much counts as nothing, I think.
Oh yeah. How could I forget. We went to see Australia. This was, to my mind, as close as I ever want to get to absolute nothingness.
We also hung around a lot to watch the pillars along the walkway blow up. That was pretty cool. If nothing else, Melbourne could definitely waste fire.
On our second day there we went down to one of the harbours and watched leather-skinned men feed swans and shout at seagulls.
Unfortunately only the birds are pictured here, but believe me when I say that these blokes’ hides were stab proof.
The next day we rented a car and drove down the Great Ocean Road. This was really good fun, and good practice for renting a minivan thing in New Zealand. I think it's probably easiest to let the pictures do the talking.
Apart from to say that I received two of five wasp stings I would endure in the next four weeks. I fucking hate wasps. Complete cunts.
Speaking of cunts (actually really harsh on the bloke but I needed a link), we also had a brief friendship with a guy from the States that played online poker for a living. He was pretty interesting - until he got a couple of beers down him.
After a tearful farewell with Dan, and arranging to meet him in New Zealand at some point, we eventually flew to Melbourne. Once there we checked into super mega huge hostel 'Urban Central' and did next to nothing apart from eat lots of free pasta and drink lots of free tea. That pretty much counts as nothing, I think.
Oh yeah. How could I forget. We went to see Australia. This was, to my mind, as close as I ever want to get to absolute nothingness.
We also hung around a lot to watch the pillars along the walkway blow up. That was pretty cool. If nothing else, Melbourne could definitely waste fire.
On our second day there we went down to one of the harbours and watched leather-skinned men feed swans and shout at seagulls.
Unfortunately only the birds are pictured here, but believe me when I say that these blokes’ hides were stab proof.
The next day we rented a car and drove down the Great Ocean Road. This was really good fun, and good practice for renting a minivan thing in New Zealand. I think it's probably easiest to let the pictures do the talking.
Apart from to say that I received two of five wasp stings I would endure in the next four weeks. I fucking hate wasps. Complete cunts.
Speaking of cunts (actually really harsh on the bloke but I needed a link), we also had a brief friendship with a guy from the States that played online poker for a living. He was pretty interesting - until he got a couple of beers down him.
He was 'studying' (read: had read a couple of books on) Taoism. Every other sentence he'd segue it into a conversation... 'But are you really... [here, alive, thinking, existing etc etc]...'.
No matter how much I tried to argue with him that it didn't matter if we were really here, drawing on all of my AS-Level Philosophy, he wouldn't budge an inch. There would be more chance of having a beer with the Pope and him admitting that condoms are handy and that Jews write good sitcoms.
Yes, I really was getting annoyed. I could not convince him that despite what he believes about whether or not he's really here, his brain would sense pain if I stabbed him up the nose with some free pasta. Action, reaction. Oh well.
There was also the fact, that I didn't bring up at the time, how ´Taoist´ is it to make a living taking other people's money? Ah, but is he really taking other people´s money...? Yes, I saw him do it.
This wasn't to be the last infuriating discussion about beliefs that we would have with some Randomer.
After getting a taste of the road down the coast, (well, Helen did, I got a taste for map reading and Cornettos - yep, back on the hard shit) we were looking forward to getting to New Zealand to clock up some serious miles.
No matter how much I tried to argue with him that it didn't matter if we were really here, drawing on all of my AS-Level Philosophy, he wouldn't budge an inch. There would be more chance of having a beer with the Pope and him admitting that condoms are handy and that Jews write good sitcoms.
Yes, I really was getting annoyed. I could not convince him that despite what he believes about whether or not he's really here, his brain would sense pain if I stabbed him up the nose with some free pasta. Action, reaction. Oh well.
There was also the fact, that I didn't bring up at the time, how ´Taoist´ is it to make a living taking other people's money? Ah, but is he really taking other people´s money...? Yes, I saw him do it.
This wasn't to be the last infuriating discussion about beliefs that we would have with some Randomer.
After getting a taste of the road down the coast, (well, Helen did, I got a taste for map reading and Cornettos - yep, back on the hard shit) we were looking forward to getting to New Zealand to clock up some serious miles.
Or rather, kilometres.
That we did, after a brief stop off to see an old friend with a new job, and Helen finally got to fucking see her favourite thing in the sea up close...
That we did, after a brief stop off to see an old friend with a new job, and Helen finally got to fucking see her favourite thing in the sea up close...
1 comment:
What's Helen's favourite thing in the sea? A new blog please, Chris! xxx
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