freebornman

I’ve moved back up the country again, returned to Auckland city. I couldn’t take it any longer living in the South Island’s Nelson. I’m a city boy at heart and spent half my life in London. Don’t get me wrong …stunning part of the country, lush vineyards, dramatic panorama, wonderful place to be if you’re a grape but otherwise far too quiet. There was nothing for me to do. Nothing in the way of work… nothing zip zilch zero nix!!.. Well not unless you wanted to work forty hours a week!! ……….. filleting fish!!…………. or out at sea two weeks on two weeks off!! ….. It’d be on and off the toilet in my case…….. not my scene at all. Anyway I couldn’t pass the drug test. It seems the way to do so, is by…... not taking them….
…..I misunderstood.
It’s very strict ….. They pride themselves on random drug testing in the workplace. There’s nothing new in that!! When I was at school they didn’t even wait till you started work. They used to check us for drugs at the school gates and if we didn’t have any they wouldn’t let us in!
The social scene was very ’cliquey’ and the people were too conservative for my liking …… and far too polite ……… it was unnatural.
I’d get up in the morning and saunter along the river bank,……. same old river bank…….. same old fish. I’d sit own and pull out a book that someone ‘friendly’ had lent me….. I didn’t want to read it but you know how some people insist on lending you books wether you’d like to borrow them or not.
Every single person who passed by said hello and smiled……everyone..
They’ve got to be hiding some dark secret in that town they don’t want exposed. There’s got to be a vault some place where bank managers and headmasters get naked, wear leather hoods and pee on each other… It was like living on a movie set. What was the movie starring Jim Carey and he’s totally unaware his life is a reality show in the making? …He wants to see the world. He wants to get away from his over polite, friendly , ever tidy, nice’n’shiny little town. . In reality, all his friends and people around him, are actors who play their roles in the most popular TV-series in the world: The Truman Show.
…. I think that was all filmed in Nelson.
I’m a reader but not by the river bank…..too many distractions and I’d pocket the book more often than not ….just couldn’t concentrate….
Smiling polite people, fluffy ducks, gurgling stream, blue sky overhead, sun streaming down, not a sound to be heard…….. I’d have to move on to the High Street for some excitement. The traffic gave way so often there’d be a grid-lock. “After you”…“No after you” ….” “Please I insist”…… “ No need I’ve got plenty of time”… so polite.
I always new when some visitor from out of town had joined it ………….. I’d hear a cry from the rear “For fuck’s sake!!!!……………..
……. Music to my ears.
The main drag was like a giant shopping mall, just a line of clothes shops staffed by more friendly people….. I always headed for a branch of one of those book shops you find the world over. In fact I spent so much time browsing people thought I worked there. …
“Have you got anything by Stephen King?”
“Certainly have …. You’ll find him along on the left two shelves down”
Even the staff would come over and ask if I’d had my morning break….
One time a smell drifted along the aisles, someone had broke wind so I sidled off out before they blamed me. One thing I’m not into is public farting…… or worse…. getting caught
I had started heading home when the oddest thing happened………. I thought I saw the Queen…….No I really did …walking along the same river path that I’d been tramping every day. She even had a Corgi with her.!!! Isn’t it amazing, the whole Royal Family love getting outdoors, exploring nature. Even Princess Anne and look what nature did to her!….. It wasn’t Liz of course, but some astonishing look-alike . I realised that as soon as I saw the dog……..She doesn’t really walk her dog does she……..hardly ever sees it I would think, and on that rare occasion dog probably thinks “Who the fuck is this………….still, it’s a walk.”
I mean she’s flying here and there all the time and couldn’t take the dog with her. You wouldn’t want the Prime Minister of Pakistan slipping on his arse having stepped in some corgi leftovers. No it would stay at home and she’d have a ‘Royal Thrower Of The Ball.’
I wonder if anyone ever comments if she “breaks wind” ……. I doubt it , they
probably blame the dog.
It was the evenings that got to me….sitting in my apartment waiting for life to knock on the door. My problem was I knew what was out there.
I ventured out one night shortly after arriving. It was like a ghost town. I wandered for miles without seeing a soul. I kept expecting to bump into one of the living dead………. Then I came across the local bowls club and they were all gathered there. I legged it sharpish in case I was spotted, took a few turns down some side roads and got lost….. I couldn’t believe it.
I didn’t have a car, knew nothing about the buses and then saw a lone taxi on the rank. Getting ready for another motionless night he was no doubt just as surprised to see me… I got into the cab and the driver had just farted. I must point out……nothing, I mean ‘nothing’ prepared me for this. It must have been hanging around for a long time….buried deep in the bowels of ……. well the bowels I suppose. He’d have been thinking to himself “ Another useless night, I’ll just let this one rip” It smelt like a putrefied yak. Yet we never said a word till we got to my stop. I just sat there trying desperately not to breathe through my nose. Finally we arrived ..I said “If you want a tip, keep your windows down if you plan to stay in this job“….he said “It’s the upholstery cleaner!”……. I took the name of it down……..I‘m very selective when I go shopping… well I have to be….you go through the checkout with a trolley of food now you need a bank loan to pay for it…..
It’s another mission trying to guess which queue is going to move the fastest…….how many people with twelve items or less equals a woman with enough shopping in her trolley to feed the street. ..No difference to me which aisle I take ,I can only afford twelve items or less …. On this visit I was about eighth in line and noticed a middle aged guy two places in front of me holding a huge ,20 kilo bag of Eukanuba dog biscuits. As we waited for the queue to shift along he caught the eye of the woman in front of me …. She small talked him, as they do…..asked him “Have you got a dog?”……… he said “ No, I haven’t as it happens, …..I’m starting back on the Eukanuba diet” ……he carried on talking about it laying out it’s benefits and a few around him started to ear-wig. ……..“ It’s extremely balanced and nutritious, so what I do before I leave the house in the morning I fill my pockets up with Eukanuba Nuggets and any time I feel peckish I reach in and top myself up with some of the biscuits”
The line had halted by now and even the check-out operator was listening in……………………….. “ Trouble was” he added. “ I ended up in hospital…no idea how long I’d been there, lost 10k weight, had tubes coming out of every orifice and IV’s in my arms…… still I’m over all that now I’ve got a fresh lot of biscuits and getting myself back in shape again”……
The woman said “WHAT?!!…… you’ve just come out of hospital for being poisoned by dog food and you’re doing it again!!!”
He laughed……. “ Oh no… it wasn’t the biscuits….. No, I was sitting in the middle of the road licking my balls when a car hit me!!!”
.................we laughed!!