The Throne-less Town

There are times in your life when nature taps you on the shoulder and says, "You evolved from an ape, never forget that". We are all subject to the laws of nature. Don't believe me? Have a swim in shark-infested waters and see how high up on the food chain you really are. My natural beating over the head, occurred on a December road-trip with Snobby {PhD - Pompous Gittery} to visit our loved ones. We were coming down the East Coast of South Africa, and passing the Drakensberg.

Long trips are a schlep for me, as I can't sit still on a sugar-less day, but in this case I was actually behaving myself... when nature called. One of the laws of physics (I forget which, and the never-ending debate has made me too stubborn to check) states that a body in motion will remain in motion and a body at rest will blah blah blah etc. The laws of nature, however, state: A rolling stone gathers no moss. This particular stone was just sitting, minding her own business, regarding the majesty of the mountains. 

Luckily, nestled into the mountain-side was an idyllic little town, right in my path to relief. The petrol pumps are powered by natives. Any road off the main drag is paved, not in yellow bricks, but in dust and stones. The hotel smells like ghosts. I know this for a fact, because we had stopped there on the way up to Grappa Mountain. I had made a dash down the The Shining-like corridor to use the bathroom. I can't recall if there was any electricity, but for argument's sake, the landlady lit up a candle and showed me the way. There were voices down that corridor.... But I get carried away.

I should have known the town was cursed. But was Dorothy suspicious of short people who were happy with their station in life? No, but she should've been. Idol worship is indicative of serious and deep-seated inadequacies as well as mommy-issues. Snobby executed a perfect hand-brake turn into the parking lot. I Dukes of Hazzarded it out the window and was halfway down the corridor when the landlady (retired from lighting candles and serving pink champagne on ice) peeped from behind her smug desk. "We're closed", she said. I stood in the open door, looking skeptical and NOT thinking about the Victoria Falls, for all I was worth. 

The hiccup was that new plumbing was being dug and the whole town was decommissioned. The whole town?!? Is that even hygienic?

I will never again visit Underberg (the town that shares a single toilet). The 67km to Kokstad were a sheer test of will power and I am eternally grateful that I am distracted by colours and shiny things. Stones rolling at a gajillion kilometres an hour in passenger seats, going to their happy place in desperation, gather no moss. But Newton's Law holds true.

Life Hijacked the Train

In the age old tradition of responsibility shirking: "I'm not making excuses... BUT". And its true. Life as it occurs, by whatever measurement you may subscribe to (sundial, watch or simple guess-work), seems to fight against routine. Should your life settle into a routine that is as predictable as a train journey, life will rally and rise-up against the tyranny of this occurence.

Life is the railway bandit that will always stop the train!

For instance, blogging tardiness is as a result of the following:

1. Quitting my job

2. Running round in a panic wondering why I quit my job

3. Getting 6 new jobs to replace the void created by the lack of first job

4. Nervous breakdown due to overworking

5. Sitting at the computer blogging about the last 6 months

6. Lather, rinse and repeat

In that time, life has been the opposite of a train... it has been a rollercoaster. Any twist and turn that came my way, seemed like part of the ride. And, oh what a ride. When I was younger, I remember riding a corkscrew ride at the biggest amusement park I'd ever seen in Malaysia. It went round and round and it felt like my senses were on fire. If I screamed anymore, endorphins would've blown out my ears.

When life is taking you on that sort of ride, it's not time to reflect. It is time to grab the bandit by the balls, possibly steal his horse and ride off into the sunset. I will, however, be at the next station to get back on the train because you can't chase the horizon forever.

Isn’t the English Language Great?

This is a statement of fact not a query. This a love song to that all encompassing, trade-promoting code that enables communication, commerce and chagrin (when you say something really embarrassing and people just stare at you blankly, or worse, you say something stupid and people understand and think you’re as stupid as what you’ve just said).

English is a brand of the British Isle’s inadequacies and overcompensation for small parts, like the amount of land they got out of the deal when continental drift happened. Their raft kept getting smaller and smaller. And as they watched arable land drift toward America and Africa and the icy wastelands of Russia, the pale angry people with small genitals decided that they would get their own back.

Step 1, learn to share this slighted feeling (as just recently named at the time) through the spoken word. Step 2, refine previously aforementioned word into a language. Step 3, make said language one of the most difficult languages to learn. Make words have meaning depending on their position in a sentence, make up other sentences that have no relation to those meanings. Confused? So is a Czech-y when you’re trying to explain that cats and dogs are not actually precipitating. Step 4, take this farcical mess on the road. Superimpose it on the rhythmical tongue of the uneducated savage, thrust it upon the natives and reform them so that you can borrow bits of the land you formally had, or at least your homo-ancestor with knuckles dragging.

Once civilized, the world will bear the brand of the British inadequacies. We will dilute it and bring to it such words as: babbelas (hangover), howzit (hello), moegoe (George W Bush), redonkulous, bootylicious etc. These words are wonderful, a vast improvement and make our yoke easier to bear. Just ask the people of Jackson, NY, all 1700 of them have just declared English their official language. After this much time one would think that ship had sailed... AND we know the Americans don’t really speak English, but let sleeping dogs.

This feels a bit like intellectual masturbation, so I will take a coitus hiatus.

The Greeks know best... Clash of the Titans

Everyone loves a hero… everyone except Hollywood. The insecurity of movie producers is starting to clash with the art of story telling. Thanks to focus groups and too little therapy to deal with issues with their parents, they manage to ruin one of the oldest stories told.

In 1981, it wasn’t enough that poor Perseus (and I say “poor” in a yes, fine, but not really because he’s a demi-god and all) should go face the unface-able Medusa but the producers and script writers of the original had to invent two new gods, Calibos and mommy/sister-dearest to meddle in his journey. What? Is there not enough hardship and struggle to face the Gorgons, monster siblings who included the three-headed Hydra (Medusa’s sister), the Chimera, and so on? This is obviously so concerning that present day, Perseus was hunted by Hades. I know Hades, and he isn’t concerned with a silly village or feeding off fear. Hades is happily sitting at home, lording it over the souls of the dead, with wife Persephone, who takes a holiday every year to bring us Spring. Bitter and grudging, I think not.

The tale of Perseus has been remixed with the attempted coup of the Titans, for no good reason and doesn’t do them justice. Originals gods should always be given their due respect, the Atlantians found out the hard way. The so-called Clash of the Titans, doesn’t even feature a single Titan, and the Kraken is Scandanavian.

During the latest version, gifts appear ubiquitously all over the show, which eventually aid Perseus in his quest (but its not actually a quest because focus groups must think that’s lame and they all have daddy issues, so let’s make it an act of revenge), and they couldn’t even get those right. The real Perseus never rode a Pegasus because he had winged sandals from Uncle Hermes. And Hollywood-Perseus would’ve been embarrassed should he have realized that he had been jipped. The shield is supposed to be a gift from Athena, not some crackly scorpion shell. Poor guy. To be fair though, Hollywood was too busy undermining the heathen panoply of Greek Gods to get their story straight.

Perseus, who actually dug being godly (and who wouldn’t) was actually taking the Medusa head back to the guy (Mommy’s new boyfriend who challenged him to bring the head) who had asked for it. Yes, Danae is actually alive and well in Greek mythology and not aiding Sam Worthington’s daddy issues. En route, he sees Andromeda tied to a rock, ready for sacrifice to Poseidon. And as one does when one sees a damsel in distress, takes up her cause. And they all lived happily ever after. So happily, in fact, that Heracles (better known as Hercules) is Perseus and Andromeda’s great-grandson.

I like to think that the film producers set out originally to climb a mountain of epic-ness, which went horribly awry. They had a training montage, with epic close-ups. They had an epic before shot with a mentor, followed by a crescendo in epic musical tones. Epic monsters and epic actors shielding a bastardisation of culture, story and daddy angst. I like to think this because if Clash of the Titans is actually a stab at cheap Christian propaganda, I would laugh at the irony of damning faith and belief at the altar of Dionysus.

If you’d like to know how wrong it went, click here or here for the facts.

(Love is) The Tender Trap

How many times have you heard your mother say, “In my day...”. Yes, yes. In your day the world was a better place, pollen didn’t make you sneeze ‘cause the snuff was blocking your nose, one never got cold ‘cause we were drenched in fur and one never got sore ‘cause The Help did everything for you. Today, the world is a dreadful place. We suffer from black lung from fossil fuel (a modern invention of bad taste), your eyes and nose never stop running thanks to allergens such as bread, milk and other staples that keep the Third World alive, day to day. Is it true? Have we really gone backward?

You see a pair of laughing eyes, and suddenly you’re sighing sighs. Ah, the golden age of Crooners, the All American song book with black and white men illustrating every page, who weren’t exactly hot... but no lady could decline. We’d sip a Jack or a Johnnie out of a Stuart in a smoky leather lounge. Its a grayscale fairy-tale of Hollywood proportions.

Love today, its in full colour. I know what I want, when I want it. It has got so bad, that a friend of mine courting a psychedelic student was informed over their first acquaintance coffees together, the number of children, the size of the diamond and the year of the Wedding (which is not in the Chinese calendar, if you know what I mean). My mother was horrified. But this is the multi-hued romance of the 21st century. If you don’t want what I want, let’s not have a drink in a smoky bar and waste each others time. Women have lost the art of the tender trap.

We’re honest, brash and brazen. We don’t accept drinks for fear of spiking, we won’t accept rides cause we drive better than you do (my insurance quote says so) and I will not be wasting my time with you, unless you submit to my demands immediately after meeting me. We’re not dating, we’re taking hostages!

Did my grandmother have it right? I don’t think so, because even if she was right, I have the right to vote. I also have the right to earn more money than Dean, which is something Debbie Reynolds never achieved. And although Debbie got a kiss, a wink and a smooth smile, she never got her name above old blue-eyes and the boys. So no, we’ve come a long way. I for one am not going back, because although we could’ve smoked guilt-free with the Marlboro man, we would have died a painful mucus-y death alone, never knowing the joy of a Rat Pack Tribute concert with your true love by your side. We may not have romance, but we have Double Income No Kids.