Texts From Last Night

Actual text messages from a female colleague that I woke up to this morning:

(411): Puking. In my mouth. Yes. It's true.

...and then, 36 minutes later...

(411): So drunk it's ridiculous.


Apart from being gross, I feel like the second text was rather redundant in the grand scheme of things. I mean, if you were vomiting in your mouth (and based on seeing you 2 hours earlier I can be pretty sure it was due to excessive amounts of alcohol and not some gastrointestinal issue), then it would be relatively safe to assume that half an hour later you'd be classified as hammered.

Just sayin'.

Oh, Maggie

Needless to say, the weekend in Margaret River (easily Australia's best wine region, for the uninitiated) was amazing. Great wine, amazing weather, fantastic food. I now have about $200 worth of wine sitting in my kitchen demanding to be consumed in a sad and lonely moment when I realize all my friends are on the other side of the country. Wait, did I say that out loud?

In any case, what I found amazing was that Junior and I were the ones on a wine tour from 10am to 5pm, and yet it was Jam and Chappy who had driven down that day who managed to be absolutely slaughtered during dinner. This included Jam looking like he was going to fall asleep in the middle of his own sentences, and Chappy dropped a full bottle of Sauvignon Blanc on the table and watching a few pours go straight down the front of her dress before one of us put a stop to the madness.

Just blogging about it makes me want to go back, really.

Hurry While Supplies Last

I'd hate to go off on my weekend of wine tasting and fine dining in Margaret River without leaving you all with some very necessary information.

Smirnoff Vodka Mojito:



Go and buy this. And drink it. Now. That is all.

Should Have Known

That is, when my Chappy and Jam said they were going to pick me up at 1pm to go for "lunch" and then texted shortly before noon to say they were coming early because they were "thirsty", I should have known what would happen. But still, I threw on my swimming shorts because I was convinced that "lunch" actually meant a bite to eat and then a trip to the beach.

Even when I went downstairs and Jam, who was driving, walked out of the car with a beer in his hand, I still asked if they had any sun block because I'd left mine back in Sydney.

I started to get the hint when we got to their house at the beach, and instead of eating or walking down to the sand, I was presented with bottles of Smirnoff Mojito Cocktail, and told about the various sorts of wine and beer that were coming afterwards.

But I'd have to say I didn't really know what the obvious outcome would be until I woke up the next morning with little recollection of how I got home (thank god for taxi receipts) and dehydrated enough to drink about 4 liters of water before I'd even left the apartment.

Thanks, guys.

Best 10 Minutes In A Convenience Store Ever

Two posts in one day, crazy, I know. But it was necessary to share this one. When I first clicked on the link and saw that it was over 10 minutes long I figured I would watch a couple of minutes of it and close the window. But it was mesmerizing.

(My favorite moment comes around 8:20, if you're feeling impatient.)

Keeping The Toaster By The Bathtub Just In Case

Well, after blogging about it some 6 weeks ago, I've finally relocated to Perth for a couple of months, hence the reason I've been quiet all week.

If nothing else, the lack of a social life or pretty much anything to do means I can at least focus on doing things I usually can't be bothered with, such as exercise or work. I'm just trying to think about how fit and tan I'm going to be by the time by 30th birthday rolls around to stop myself from committing suicide, which is the official pasttime of Western Australians. True story.

Okay, Fine, They Make Me Pick Cotton

You know, I have spent a huge amount of time debating with non-Australians and trying to argue that Australians, despite initial appearances, are not racist.

Sure they perpetuate ridiculous stereotypes well after the rest of the world has decided that it's not appropriate to say such things, but I have argued that they just say what we're all still thinking, and as a result are much more willing to discuss their beliefs and change them than your average American. Generally, I actually find that preferable.

And then...everyone gets excited about the reunion of a sketch show called Hey Hey It's Saturday (which inexplicably aired on a Wednesday night, but I suppose that's besides the point) and this is what the producers decide is appropriate to air on national television:


And to think, this might have just slipped under the radar if it weren't for the fact that Harry Connick Jr. was one of the judges, and explained why he looked so uncomfortable while a bunch of guys in black face calling themselves the "Jackson Jive" yelled at each other in ebonics and danced badly.

(Having said that, Connick's explanation did sound a little weird, as it included the line: "I just wanted to say on behalf of my country, I know it was done in humour ... but we have spent so much time trying not to make black people look like buffoons that when we see something like that we take it really to heart." I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was that difficult to not make black people look like buffoons. But I guess we all know what he meant.)

Even if we look at it from the perspective of being a cultural misunderstanding (seeing as it's really only Americans that have such issues with black face from a historical perspective) you still have to wonder how the producers could have been so ignorant of this fact that they couldn't at least have asked an American for an opinion before sending this to air.

And so, to continue my defense of Australians -- I don't believe this was racist. Just amazingly, incredibly stupid and culturally insensitive.

All I ask of my Australian friends is that they help me out a little. Please. Good lord.

Like, Totally

Don't you guys seriously hate it when you're walking down the street and people keep looking at you and you're not sure if it's because you look super hot that day or if it's because there's a stain on your new shirt or something? And then you have to go walk by a store window with a dark background and pretend that you're looking in the window when really you're just checking yourself out?

Anyways, I have bought the answer...the best iPhone case EVER:

Now you can just pretend you're using your phone, when really what you're doing is making sure that everyone is just checking you out. For reals.

Overheard In The Office

Colleague: You need electrolytes.

Zander: I had a burrito.


That actually reminds me of a conversation I had last night...


Junior: The salad had spinach in it! good for your muscles.

Zander: Um, this is real life, not an episode of Popeye.

I Have The Dumbest Dreams

Seriously, though. I just had one that involved me (and a few others) being laid off from my company, and instead of severance pay my company offered us each a *really* good deal on a 2-year lease for an Audi.

Lame.

The Best Laid Plans

On Saturday, I woke up early, came into the office to get some work done, and then headed home to relax in the afternoon before a friend's birthday drinks. I was even sitting down to watch an episode of Jeopardy.

Then, Juice called. He wanted to swing by and pick up his backpack that I had borrowed months ago for South America.

Within seconds of him and Stranger walking through the door, we were all drinking vodka on my balcony, and hours later I was incoherent and embarassing myself on Crown Street.

You know you've had an unacceptable night when a female friend texts you the next day and thanks you for grabbing her crotch in public.

Sweet jesus.

Why Yes, Mr. Bowie, There Is Life On Mars

As I've Facebooked and Tweeted about earlier today, we all woke up in Sydney this morning to wonder if we'd been relocated to Mars without prior warning. It was kinda cool, kinda freaky.

Also falling into that category is this photo from the Texts From Last Night photo pool on Flickr that I didn't realize existed until now:



I will bet $200 and a Snuggie that this guy is English.


UPDATE: I've done a little research on "The Music Room" (as it appears that sign in the background says) and not only is it in England, but it's stumbling distance from the town in West Yorkshire where my family lives. Now emailing my cousins to see if this is a friend of theirs...

Clarification

I've been under the impression that my drinking was due to the fact that I am maturing and interested in more adult things these days. For example, I wasn't drinking on Sundays because that's when I like to stay home and try a new recipe.

This past Sunday, a friend called asking to do lunch, and I said I would prefer to stay in and we'd do lunch during the week.

Then, about 9 minutes later, another friend called and asked if I wanted to meet up for a few beers at the bar across the street. Needless to say, I was there within 5 minutes.

So the truth has come out -- I'm not any less of an alcoholic. I'm just a shockingly lazy one.

Nice

Love how I trashed everyone else for not updating their blogs and then abandoned mine for almost a week. My bad.

As for my trip to Brisbane, I feel kind of bad about not being excited since it was a great weekend. And the fireworks were actually awesome, mostly because they actually fly FIGHTER JETS through the city and over the river as part of the show, after burners and everything. That makes it a winner in my book, mostly because I'm a firm believer that fighter jets should feature in EVERYTHING. I'm just starting plans to make sure they factor into my funeral somehow.

Otherwise, I've spent this entire week working my ass off on a client proposal, which means if we don't win this work I may as well quit consulting and become a basketweaver in the Mongolian forest. My other motivation is to get this done and sent to the client early tomorrow so I can join everyone else in getting hammered for free starting at 3pm. That's right folks, my alcoholism is more powerful than my work ethic. Makin' momma proud.

Crap

I thought I'd have tons of time to blog this week, but out of nowhere I was asked to do all kinds of WORK, if you can believe it. How rude.

Anyway I'm heading up to Brisbane for the weekend, which generally isn't that appealing, but at least we've booked a stupidly expensive hotel and the weather is supposed to be perfect. There's also something called "Riverfire" on tomorrow night, which is basically the 4th of July at a completely irrelevant time of year. And these things excite us because apparently we're still 8 year old. See you next week.

I Don't Suck As Much As Everyone Else

Despite the fact that my blogging has dropped drastically from 4-5 times a week a few years ago to 2-3 times a week now (pretty much precisely correlated to my drop in weekly binge drinking sessions), I think I've put in a decent effort at this whole narcissistic endeavour. I've likely been buoyed by my inability to stop talking about myself, with this blog being where I post when everyone around me has stopped listening.

My irregularity in blogging has likely left me with about 6 readers -- among them, someone in South Korea (according to my site stats) who I imagine is using my blog as one of the more unfortunate ways one could use to learn English. I also like to conjure up images of poor people in poverty-stricken countries, such as Paraguay and Mali, who randomly visited this site one day only to never be able to leave due to the poor condition of their ancient, charity-donated computer that they can't afford to replace.

In any case, I don't feel too bad because a recent check of my Netvibes account showed that none of the friends whose blogs I used to read on a regular basis seem to be posting anymore, and haven't done so in months.

Another, more insightful man, might take this as a sign that it's time to move on to bigger, better, and slightly more productive things than discussing his quasi-alcoholism and mocking strangers on the internet. I, on the other hand, think this should be interpreted as "I WIN", and have simply updated the links to the right so you have a few more options for time wasting for those days when I somehow find something better to do than blog (e.g. take naps, start drinking early, etc.)

Enjoy.

How To Become Immune To Alcohol

Really the only drinking session worth mentioning from the weekend is Friday afternoon, when I joined some colleagues from the office who had decided that it was too much trouble to come back from lunch when they could just stay at the pub.

Somehow I managed to catch up with them despite starting to drink 2 hours after they had, and the rest of my night is a blur potentially involving being accused of flirting with the daughter of our bosses boss (WTF?) and going to dinner with a friend and his mother and not remembering any of it.

Thanks to that performance, I managed to drink until 2am on Saturday night and also most of Sunday afternoon without actually feeling intoxcated, and at no time did I experience any sort of a hangover. This, of course, is one of the criteria for determining if you're an alcoholic, but I'm less bothered by that than I am by the fact that this was all much more expensive than getting hammered and passing out by 10pm.

Random Drunk

See, this is yet another reason to love Facebook. I was skimming through some friends photos from a recent vacation and came across this photo, instantly finding myself in the throes of a friend crush:


I have no idea who she is, but she looks amazing and clearly needs to be my new best friend. And you just KNOW she looks like this at least two nights a week. Probably three.

And before you say anything, YES, I do fully realize that this post is vaguely hypocritical and fully lacking in self-awareness considering the number of similar photos of myself that probably go up all over the internet every month. Does that mean one can't appreciate the small things in life?

Validation

As I start looking at ways to make my residency in Australia more permanent, a small part of me wonders if I'm turning my back on being an American, even if it means I'm only here another couple of years.

And then, I read things like this...

Who knew President Obama was not born in the United States? Nearly four in ten Americans in a Public Policy Polling survey. But he was born in Hawaii! Yes, but six percent of those in the same poll said Hawaii was not part of the United States. Another four percent were not sure of Hawaii’s status.

...and all I can think is that I should just start a fire and burn all evidence that I was born in a country of such fat, stupid people. If nothing else, I suppose we should appreciate the awesome entertainment value of watching the world's only super power self-implode before our eyes.

It's Like Watching An Entire Nation Go Extinct

In the absence of having anything original or entertaining to say, I thought I'd share this with you -- People of Walmart: a collection of all the creatures that grace us with their presence at Walmart, America's favorite store.

If you're thinking for even a second that you might not have to click on that link, I give you this teaser:


Happy Friday. Go get fat.