Machu Picchu About Nothing

Front page news here today is the mudslides in Peru which have trapped several Kiwis near Machu Picchu. It's probably all my fault for cursing the pan pipes, which I really hate.
A few weeks ago when we headed down to Mission Bay, there was a Peruvian bloke playing the pan pipes to an enthralled crowd of locals. Since he was the only other person there besides myself wearing trousers and not shorts, I decided to stop for a moment and listen out of courtesy.
Effortlessly blowing away in the mid afternoon sun, it dawned on me that the Peruvian was butchering "Bridge Over Troubled Water". I remember seeing one of these pan pipe bands back in Birkenhell in the early 1990s, and I think they were covering it too.
I remarked (more to myself than the long suffering spouse) that I didn't understand what it was about these guys that they have to travel the world hoping to ruin the lives of unsuspecting passers by murdering middle of the road tunes. Anyway, he might have heard me with his magical Incan ears and has retaliated by trapping some Kiwis in a village selling only beads and chullos.

I had to pass the Baptist Church on the way to the shops this morning and spotted 6 Asian (that’s Oriental in new money) people of various ages waving their arms around outside. Thinking they were limbering up for an early morning Soul Baptist session by the Reverend Cleophus James, I gave them no further concern and moved on. On the way back they had doubled in number and were doing facial stretching exercises. I heard tell some years ago that the bosses of some Japanese firms make the staff conduct warm up exercise before each shift. Maybe the Baptists legally insist on it before a dunking.

We've also had a bit of a spider uprising here with two incidents of White Tails penetrating the defences of three cats and the weta-murdering ant gang. I have been called upon both times to repel the invaders but feel that it is only a matter of time before one of us gets bitten. The White Tail is apparently venomous but the bite is not fatal, it just causes pain, nausea, vomiting, headaches and severe arachnophobia. The only thing worse in this neck of the woods is apparently zombie spiders, but as I just made them up, they need to be discounted as a realistic threat.
Assuming I can still see/type, I'll update you if and when I get bitten.

Blackout To The Future

Before I came to Auckland, those in the know informed me that the New Zealand of today was like Britain in the 1960s. Bracing myself for arrival on the set of Heartbeat, I stepped off the plane expecting to see antique motors, posters announcing the imminent arrival of the Monkees and possibly even Nick Berry administering some brutal back alley justice to Bill Maynard over the theft of some motor oil from Scripps garage.
Thankfully, Auckland is a very modern city with seemingly few antique vehicles outside of a horse drawn cart, a 1971 Buick Riviera and a rebuilt Uruk-hai siege tower with twin cam, bucket seats and spoilers.
What I have noticed however is that there is an old style feel to the place with regard to health and safety. Some of the pavements resemble elaborate death traps that both Indiana Jones and Lara Croft would fall victim to within seconds, and yet if someone trips over they just learn not to do it again.
I haven't seen a single advert for those "where there's blame, there's a claim" ads that have steadily infiltrated the UK way of life.
Yesterday I saw a junction box in someone's garden that had some yellow warning tape wrapped around it and a small fern growing from its shattered casing. My guess is that it has been like that for months if not years. And yet, despite the lack of perimeter fencing around it, nobody has set it alight or jammed a metal spike into it and been incinerated. In the UK, such a thing would be a source of public consternation because a child/inbred estate rat had licked the thing after confusing it with a cornetto.

In other news, the Haiti situation has understandably been getting a lot of headlines, but I was also recently alerted to the Samoan Tsunami of Sept 2009. I don't know whether it was because we were preparing to get our arses out here or if it wasn't newsworthy enough for the BBC due to a conflicting report about X Factor or something, but I knew nothing about it until I saw an end of year round up showing the devastation.
As a lot of Pacific Islanders are resident in NZ, it was a big thing over here and the Kiwis were quick to send aid and offer lots of support to the Samoan Govt. However, since hearing about it I am stuck with an image of the grateful Samoan officials gathered around (or rather clinging to) a boardroom table that is floating 30 miles offshore and wondering what to do about the sharks crashing the meeting.

Finally, we have had a power cut in Auckland today and the company at the centre of the blame game is called Transpower. No word of a lie, but the head of the company is called Dr Strange.
My guess as to the cause of the outage is that he's testing out some home made Tesla weapons in his Volcano Fortress. Actually, come to think of it he could be responsible for that dodgy junction box up the road...

Big Freak Out

Last Friday I attended Auckland's premier popular music festival "Big Day Out". I had been pre-warned by she-who-knows that the freak contingent at this event is high so to make sure I brought the camera.
Sadly I was disappointed at the low number of mentalists attending and though no pictures were taken I did see the following...

A nun in plain clothes handing out toffees as a segue to a charity mugging for a trip to visit the poor. I didn't hear where, but it may have been Bradford she was off to.
A bloke wearing a mankini with one testicle dangling coquettishly outside it.
Women queuing in the men's bogs within easy eyesight of my genitals. They looked unimpressed, sadly.
Dizzee Rascal.
A mullet on a toilet attendant that was down to the middle of his back and in stark contrast to his number 2 haircut.
A man in a jetpack flying from one corner of the stadium to the adjacent corner.
5 transvestites.
One lonely Goth walking away from Lily Allen's set saying "She needs to die".
Two people without tattoos.
A bloke who had fallen through time (more of him later).

The event itself was well handled, even though the security measures were a bit draconian. It is easier to get into the US wearing any sort of headdress proclaiming your love of Allah belts than it is to get into the arena carrying grog. There were designated drinking areas where you could buy some of the locally siphoned piss water cunningly labelled as Speight's Summit, but these were heavily policed and you were searched again going through Checkpoint Carling.
Because of this, drunken nastiness seemed to be low, and I viewed only one kick off when two Pacific Islanders barged through the crowd with a third on their shoulders as a cunning method of getting forward in the crowd and a bloke in front of me took offence at this upstartery. Him standing there waving his fists at the one being elevated had a vague panto-esque quality about it all, but I was ready to step in to help him. Not cos the human pyramid gang were being rowdy tits, but simply because it was 3 versus 1 and I can't abide that.
Anyway, the situation fizzled out though I did manage to trip one of gang over as they shuffled past me to the exit, which was a terrible act of clumsiness on my part.

Which brings me to the time traveller. During Lily Allen's "performance" a bloke to our right was dancing in a crazy, tai chi flowing hippy way to her music. Lacking shoes and having a wild Woodstock beard and round shades he looked like he had stepped straight out of Cheech and Chong’s Up In Smoke.
People were quite rightly dumfounded at this, mainly as no self respecting individual would dance to Lily Allen unless Jack Bauer put a gun to your child's head and told you to do it, dammit. The mystery was solved when he continued dancing in the same manner while Ms Allen was talking to the crowd and then he shouted "Whoooooooo! Yeahhhhhh!" for no reason. My suspicions were confirmed when he began swigging out of a water bottle that contained a liquid that was either Jack Daniels or industrial floor polish.
I don't know what festival he was at (I doubt even he knows) but I wish I was there too, as it sounded friggin' awesome.

PS About three people seemed to know who Kasabian were but everyone sang along to Dizzee Rascal. What‘s that about?

Is It Cos I Is British?

Being a conscientious sort I decided to donate blood over here as I have done in the UK since I was a mere slip of a lad. The following is my actual conversation with the NZ Blood Service.

Jimbo- Hi there, I have recently moved over from the UK where I was a regular blood donor and would like to check my eligibility to donate here in NZ.

Operator- Ok, that’s great. I’ll just check. (Goes away) Yep, that seems fine. I just need to ask you are you between 16 and 60.

Jimbo- Yep.

Operator- Do you weigh over 50kg.

Jimbo- Yes.

Operator- Do you currently have any sore throat, stomach bug, colds or infection or have you had tattoos or or piercings in the last 6 months?

Jimbo- Let me just check. Nope.

Operator- Have you lived in the UK for more than six months between 1980 and 1996?

Jimbo- Yes. I’m from the UK as I said earlier.

Operator- Ah. Er, I’m afraid that rules you out of giving blood in NZ.

Jimbo- Right, wouldn't that have been your first question when I said I was from the UK?

Operator- Er, well...the screen says...

Jimbo- Never mind, mate. Ok. Do you know why that is?

Operator- Why it wasn't my first question?

Jimbo- No. Why I can't donate blood if I have lived in the UK? I mean, were we at war with NZ or something?

Operator- I’m afraid I don’t. Hold on. (Disappears to discover why). No, sorry, I've asked around and we’ve no idea.

Jimbo- Ok, guess that just about wraps it up for me.

Operator- Thanks for calling. Is there anything else I can help you with?

Jimbo- What like, exactly?

Operator- Er...

Jimbo- No, that’s great…thank you.

(click)

Beer Window

Our neighbours are weird. On New Year's Eve, they completely upstaged the end of decade firework display (that "awed and thrilled the good folk of Auckland" / "was a national disgrace"- depends on who you talk to) with their own home made back garden conflagration that looked like the scene from Platoon where Willem Dafoe cops it. Only with R’n’B music instead of Samuel Barber’s Adagio For Strings.

Last night, they got up at midnight to do some gardening. Yeah...midnight.
At the sound of spadework, the wife and I peered from our bedroom window as the male neighbour (by lantern light) dug around in his front garden. He was either burying the three tons of weapons grade explosive that he didn't use on December 31st, interring a family pet out of sight of the kids or is Auckland's answer to Dexter. I might venture over one night and see what is unearthed, but if I end up missing, dial 111 and report my suspicions to Columbo Baggins.

I saw my first Kiwi transvestites the other day. Though I have never been one for cross dressing myself (apart from one or two isolated incidents that had perfectly good explanations), I do understand that some men can carry it off with taste, dignity and poise.

These two, however, looked like gorillas which had rampaged through the bargain bin of a TK Maxx carrying a random selection of clothes with them as they fled tranq gun wielding zoo keepers.

The looker (and I use that in the broadest possible sense) of the two, a 6'2" behemoth, had the most tasteless dress sense since Prince Harry decided on the Swastika look for that infamous party. The behemoth might have carried it off had he not possessed a face that looked like it had been set on fire and then enthusiastically put out with a golf shoe.
His partner in drag was an elderly gentleman that bore an uncanny resemblance to Wilfred Bramble decked out in a blonde wig and a very feminine pink mini dress with silver shoes. He completed the look by carrying a 12 pack of Speights beer under one arm.
As I stood, jaw agape, they turned briefly in my general direction to look down their noses at a jabbering mental patient who was making a nuisance of himself near the cut price calendars, possibly in his search for the missing LUFC specimen that I buried a while back. Then, they turned on their heels and tottered away into the Auckland sun.
Unbefrakinglievable.

Goliath drives a Beamer

We have a bit of a moth issue here in Mordor. The stillness of the warm summer nights is often punctuated by the thumping sound of a cat landing on the hard wood floors after doing backflips in order to get one of these clothes eating bastards. So, bereft of restful sleep I set about installing mothballs to kill off winged rag munchers and came across this grisly sight in the corner of the wardrobe.
No, I have no idea what planet it came from either but the evil ants won the fight by strength of numbers. I learned three very important things from this battle.

One- Something with that many spikes and spines shouldn't exist outside of a 1950s B-movie.
Two-Lynx Fever bodyspray makes for an effective impromptu chemical weapon when deployed against battle frenzied ants that seem to take offence when you spirit their prize away for a photographic session.
Three- The insect world rules of Fight Club are very very different.

In other news, I saw a BMW with the plate "POTENT" this week. I'm guessing by the choice of car and plate that Mr Floppy is having us on.