Thrills for Free

NUMBER ONE

Hearing your band play on the radio at like 3 am in the morning. Never before in my life has a poor quality mono recording has made me giggle with glee.

The Only Turn Game

Dearest Friends, today (being a Monday and everything) I thought it would be nice of me to share with you a game which I made up (with the help of Oli. But of course Oli helped. When isn't he there? Answer; never). I hope to make this game thing a regular occurance. I guess il post them as often as I can remember them. Its called The Only Turn Game.






PREAMBLE

This game is perfect for playing when extremely bored in town when your waiting for a bus, or waiting for Edwin to show up so you can give him his birthday cake which you made.



REQUIREMENTS


Two people (may be played with more... see Wiked Spins);

A large Activity Space (central city Christchurch works perfectly);

A very very bored state of mind. This is key. If you are even in the slightest sense entertained (maybe theres a 12 year old busker doing mime outside the bus exchange... what an idiot), then this game will seem more boring in comparison. However, if you are extremely bored, then this game could possibly be the most fun you've ever had.



HOW TO PLAY

In its simplest form, The Only Turn Game is merely a way to make boring walks around town intersting.

Firstly, choose a destination. Secondly, walk there. However;


Player A may only turn left.
Player B may only turn right.


And thats all there is to it.



PUNISHMENTS


If a player breaks the One Rule of the game (which is idiotic seeing as there IS only ONE RULE) a punishment is issued. The punishment is agreed on by players beforehand and can be anything you like. Here are some examples;


- Must walk in barefeet for the next 5 minutes. This is lethal in the summer with such burning hot concrete in town. Plus the threat of standing on glass is pretty scary.
- Must drink puddle water
- A slap with a jandal (Summer)
- A whip with a scarf (Winter)
- A dare is issued


(nb. dares shouldn't be stupidly impossible/terribly imbarrassing. Remember, you may have to recieve a dare in the near future, and we want to keep a good natured vibe to the game. The Only Turn Game has the potential to break friendships)



WIKED SPINS


- For a wiked spin on the game, follow the above rules, but play TAG (the hands-down greatest and most simplest game in all of the world).

This is a dangerous addition to The Only Turn Game, but really makes the most out of it, and tests the tactical skill of the players. Also, it allows for Multiple Players (To play, the person who is IN can only turn the opposite direction to everyone else).

Simply play TAG with the addition this simple rule, and you will find happiness in the dizzy mess that The Only Turn Game can bring.

HINT ...If only turning RIGHT, you can turn LEFT by making three RIGHT TURNS. If used well, this technique can result in the "dizzy mess" as hinted at above.

Good luck. As with all games, don't be afraid to experiment and come up with new rules and variations. If you come up with a really wiked one, email me. Id love to hear it.

secluded in dust hell

This afternoon I continued my fight at trying (very hard) to clean my bedroom. I actually mostly really enjoy it. Im a compulsive nostalgic. When I clean my room I get to sort through all the old tickets and letters and drawings and songs all over my desk and floor. I spend far more time re-reading old letters then I do vacuuming.


SPEAKING of vacuuming; It's awesome. Mum bought a new vacuum cleaner. We used to have one that looks like this...

Now it looks like this...

Swish huh?

Its so awesome. I had so much dust in my room, I filled it beyond its full limit level. SPEAKING of dust...

I hate dust. Alot. This is the only reason that I dont clean my room much, because all the dust become unsettled and fills the air and chokes me to death. Its the worst torture. I end up sneezing my face completely off and rubbing my eyes until they are bleeding. I gave up yesterday because of dust overload when I finished vacuuming, and gave up today after less than and hour for the same reason.

The irony is I that even though I'm rediculously sensitive to dust (possibly allergic), I live secluded in dust hell (as I never clean my room). Hmmm... Maybe this time I'll keep my room ventilated.

Not That Scary Much...

Van Helsing... also not that scary.

So, as it turns out... Historical Model United Nations = AWESOME!!

As i mentioned here,I was freaking petrified of the entire ordeal. And yes, waking up very early was painful. But I had that coming (screw you Thom!! learn to sleep). But it was probably on of the most stimulating experiences of my "life" (read "this year").

Luckily, I was a pretty insignificant country (sorry Ethiopia, but you guys didn't really have much to say in 1949.. well, I didn't), so all the big players eg. UK, USA, USSR (all acronyms... hmm...maybe that's saying something...) were prepared, so they did all the big talking. And me and Oli and Ellen (Ellen was there!! And Megan!!) asked difficult questions and made funny remarks (Oli wont that comp with "The best defence is a good offence. But a good offence can lead to Nuclear Winter.") I tried to speak and failed several times. But I had fun passing notes and raising my placard (which I got to keep!! Anyone who wants a big sign saying Ethiopia just drop me a line... I'll do a good deal). And plus we all got lots of subway for lunch and a talk from the fantastic American-accented Dr Scott Walker.

Another highlight of the day was a presentation about the Global Poverty Project. This is a super exciting movement to end extreme poverty throughout the world by 2015 thats just sort of kicking off in New Zealand. I don't want to get preachy and explain it all to you right now (especially as no one actually reads this). However, if you keen on doing something awesome for the world, check out the website by clicking here. And be cool by being into it before everyone else then in 6 months when everyones heard of it you'll be like "Oh, I've been in on that for like... ages".

Brainfuckfuckfuck....

Wheres Ethiopia.... ?

The clock is about to tip over to one o'clock in the morning.... and I'm starting to get rather worried.

Tommorow im taking part in the Historical Model United Nations for my first ever time. I was sorta-half dragged into it by Oli (well, he signed my up) and only looked into how much work i had to prepare for it this evening. Its fucking petrifying. I'm the Honorable Delegate of Ethiopia (ETHIOPIA!!! IN AFRICA!!! WHAT THE HELL????!!).
For those of you who dont know anything about the Model United Nations (for example, me, one hour ago!!!) a whole bunch of future politicians gather in a room for a day to debate important social and political issues, from the perspective of a representative country. This conference is on the Essentials of Peace. What makes this conference even more horrific from my standpoint, is that we're debating these issues from a 1946 perspective. We were supposed to do research, and read up on our countries and the UN... Its alot of work to cram into one evening.

So, right now, at 1:01 am on Saturday, I'm going to sleep, knowing next to nothing on Ethiopia. And even if I did form some sort of opinion on the matter from a 1946 Ethiopian perspective, I would have absolutely no idea how to present these ideas to the group (oh yeah, theres like a freaking whole language for this shit)!! Oh well. Im sure those of you who have done this before are laughing their arses off reading this ("Oh that poor kid...what an idiot") with me getting all worked up and all. Well... FUCK YOU!! Im 16. Im aloud to get freaked out about pointless things.

And plus, if im not wound up enough, I went to the bathroom before in the complete darkness and STOOD ON THE FUCKING CAT!! God I hate my cat. It screeched off down the hallway, whilst I shat a brick.

Its okay... It will probably die soon.

Today, overwhelmed by the Weather.

Here is an over detailed account of my day. Just for fun...

Thom and Callum enjoying their breakfast.

I woke up and Thom was still here, so we played Los Campesinos! very loudly and made waffles with yoghurt and bananas and chocolate chips. It was awesome. Today was the hottest day its been so far this spring (I actually had to put sunscreen on). I wore shorts AGAIN. For a boy who lives in jeans this is incredibly liberating.

After jamming for a bit we decided we had to get out of the house and so planned a huge barefoot mish down to Riccarton mall to purchase flight of the conchords season two. However, needing sustenance, we made epic tuna sandwiches with french mustard and pickles (but not for Thom! ...Because, well, he doesn't like pickles). Then we were off... and didn't even need jerseys!

Oli found a staff for walking. Many gandalf references were made and we all laughed a lot... Hahaha etc. Oli ditched it on top of a fence as we drew nearer to the mall as he got embarassed. We laughed at him again. What an idiot.

The mall smelt weird and unnatural so we spent a very short amount of time in there, fleeing to Borders. Ahhh Borders... how comforting you are. Nice and cool and calming... no ones rushing around in Borders! And with such a wide range of products for us to sample! And such quaint displays of dvds! Oh Borders.... how we love you. Never change.

We got the dvd and walked home. Oli got his stick back from on top of the fence. He was relieved it was still there, and we laughed at him again. When we got back we were tired so we drank water and watched Conchords season two.

And then I made pasta for tea.

GREATEST DAY EVER!!!!

The End.

"I must be fine cause my heart's still beating"

Thom and I have both now officially created blogs. I sort of convinced him to make one as well, with mine going ever so successfully and all. He always tells me about these wicked adventures he has. Hes here at the moment, so I ask him for an example for you now...

"Thom, whats an example of an adventure you've had?"
...*pause*... "I 'borrowed' my dads van once and went to Akaroa."

Wow. Thom = my inspiration.

Its only now i figure that its probably not the best idea for him to be making a blog... with his life being so much more interesting then mine. And of course life is a competition and everything.

So i did a brainstorm of ways to make my blog better. Here's what I thought of;
-Put in lots of my drawings and music in it.
-Talk about my dreams and figure out what they mean
-Do some sort of long term, goal achieving, striving-for-something blog
-Wank on for ages about how crap my life is (bad idea... as its not that crap really)
-Wank on for ages about my opinions of everything
- Make enormous lies about my life to make it seem more interesting.
-A combination of the above.

I think I'll probably end up doing the last one.

Anyways, today was a good day. Oli and I did some music recording this morning in the lounge with all the doors open (as it was a lovely warm day YAY!). We are taking our time with the recording this time, multi tracking etc... making it sound nasty. However, so far its sounding remarkably similar to the live recording we did with Ben that only took one (very long) day. Hmmm....

Then Thom came round and we stole all his music and we made nachos and played lots of loud guitar. I was then prompted to tidy my room (which was a tip!). It was fun because i got to play with the Dyson vacuum. We made nachos. We ate nachos. I then had to stop tidying my room because the dust started to kill me (man I hate dust... the bastards). And now were watching the Michel Gondry dvd again, but this time with Thom. Michel Gondry is one of my all time favourite artists in the whole world. He somehow makes film which is so crazy similar to my dream life. Watching extended periods of Gondry films really messes with my head... I start to worry about how awake I am, and how much of real life is actually dreams... and how much dreaming I mistake for real life (which happens a lot more). Sleep and dream life, as well as the diluting quality of memory is something which really fascinates me (and I always love finding art that agrees with my head). Thats actually kind of one of the reasons I have this blog.

Something to look forward to.