It's not really a basement, there's no bodies.

It's Monday afternoon, and I am out the back at work having a sly cigarette, when my phone rings with a number I don't recognise.

"Hello"? I answer inquisitively, hence the question mark.

"Yeah, hi.  I'm phoning about the basement you have to rent".

I have no idea what basement this is.  I certainly don't have a basement to rent, I am sure I would remember if I did.  So I obviously reply:

"Sorry dude, I think you have the wrong number".

End of conversation.

But then my mind starts working a bit.  It's Monday afternoon.  This is when the local free ads paper is available online.  Has he read an ad and dialed the wrong number?  Is there a similar number to mine attached to an ad in the paper?  I should probably check this out.  So I log in, and search for my phone number, and find the following advert:

Excuse the poor quality, and the lack of phone number,  but there it is, with my phone number attached to it.  And it is immediately obvious that this is not a mistake.  This is someone that knows I live on the ground floor when the rest of the house is upstairs.  Someone that knows I have my own private access if required through the garage door, which is next door to my bedroom.  Someone that has intimate knowledge of the fact that I use that private entrance as a toilet when I am too drunk to go upstairs.  Someone that knows that I once rigged up a complicated deodorant can/lighter device to toast a mouse in my room (in flames - not with a wine glass).  Someone that went to the effort of shortening certain words so they could still add an 's' to the word 'private'.  And with 'alt payment methods considered'?

There were calls.  I ignored them, they're not quite as fun.  There were texts.  I replied to them, because they were fun.  And they all follow.  I am still no closer to finding out who it was, and if no one puts a hand up to it soon, I will be indiscriminately advertising every single number in my phone book.

The first, Liz.  Just a bit of a warm up:

The second, the only slightly saucy one:

The third, with slightly racist overtones:

The fourth, I still hate vegetarians:

The fifth, Dan, it was late and I couldn't be bothered:

The sixth, a wife as well, for the same bargain price.  Piss taker.

The seventh, a few home truths about 'The Basement':

The eight, and my favourite purely because after the first reply he didn't come back with 'What the fuck? Do you have a basement to rent or not'?

The ninth, my second favourite.  The first tip was meant to say 'nits' but went through as 'nuts'.  I think it still works. I stopped when I felt they may have contacted the authorities:

The tenth, where I lost interest and gave up a bit.  No more since however:

Edit: The eleventh, a bit late for this shit:

I don't have a short attention span. But it certainly isn't that long either.

I've taken up a lot of activities in my life that I haven't pursued to brilliance, just mediocrity.  Which is why as much as it appears I have a short attention span, it is actually longer than you would believe.  But only just.

I may not remember a conversation I had with you yesterday.  Sure I was listening, and taking it in, but bear in mind there was at least seven other conversations that day that demanded my attention, which I took in, and tried to organise in my head in order of importance, but the ordering of it got too much so I just ended up thinking about snow, or lesbians, or lesbians in snow, and that conversation just dropped out of my head.  Which puts me in mind of Christmas one year, a time for giving, and receiving,  and being with family.  Bear with me, this is probably going somewhere.  

As was the tradition at the time, a few of us had been to the local pub on Christmas Eve just drinking and having a good time, as you do.  I ended up staying at a friends house and needed to get back to my parents house on the Christmas day, so they kindly offered to pick me up, drive me to my flat so I could spend a bit of time in the shower scrubbing out the smell of Stella Artois, and then drive me back to theirs for a day of presents, food, presents, beer, and presents.

Due to my mediocre attention span I am not entirely sure how this came about, but as my parents sat in the living room of my flat while I made my way off to the shower, my Mother began to look at part of my DVD collection and asked if it was okay if they could borrow some films.  Of course I said that was fine, thinking I was safe in the knowledge that any filthy films I had were secured in the bottom of my wardrobe (which a few years later, when I was moving out, she would end up packing up for me without batting an eyelid), and walked off to grab a towel and shower.  And that is how, when I walked out of the bathroom with a towel around my waist, on Christmas Day of all days, I found my Mother - the wonderful woman that spent hours in immense pain delivering me some years ago (who I still feel a massive amount of empathy for every time I get measured for a helmet and they tell me I am an extra-large), with my Dad standing next to her - holding up a copy of a DVD called Snow Sluts and asking me, with a slight under-lying tone of sarcasm, "What's this one about then?".

Back to the attention span once more.  It's fucking terrible.  Really really bad.  I could live with it if it was short.  I could live with it if it was long.  But it's fair to middling.  Which basically means I start doing something, and when I think I am okay at it, I give up.  Playing the drums in school - I took a couple of exams, got quite good, but then realised how much hard work was involved in being in a band so quit pretty sharpish.  You want more examples?  Sure, I've got loads.  Magic. Loved it as a child.  And got okay at it too when I was younger.  But this one is surely understandable as magic is not cool.  David Copperfield may have scored Claudia Schiffer, but then Paul Daniels scored Debbie McGee - and I can think of thousands of people on this planet that the words "The Lovely" should be used before, and all of them aren't her by any stretch of the imagination.  The Great Soprendo was married to Victoria Wood for ages, and she still has a bowl haircut, appears on countdown every now and again, and is only Britain's favourite "comedienne" because she has jokes that don't primarily involve periods or useless husbands.  But then where she is concerned, my attention span shortens even further, so she may actually have that, but I have never bothered to pay attention through her act.

Martial Arts. I spent quite a lot of time with this one.  I got up to blue belt, which to be brutally honest is less than halfway, but I did well.  I came second in one tournament (beaten by a girl, one of the more erotic moments of my childhood), had a good few results in group tournaments, then gave it up because I felt I had learnt all I needed to to counter the bullies at school who tormented me every day for being a lardass.  Which was wrong to be honest. To counteract most of that, I just needed to keep my fat gob shut, but who knew at the time?

So getting back to the original point, which I can't remember due to my short attention span, but am going to assume it was something to do with skiing.  Once again, during the course of the season, I have been lame.  Really lame.  Most previous seasons you would find me out there every day, working on something, whether it be on skis or a board, but this year, not a jot.  There's a website where you can check your mountain stats online for the two local hills.  While I thought I was doing really well, I checked the other day only to find I had done 12 days.  Granted, I have been out to Cardrona a few times, which it doesn't track, but still.  12 days.  That's barely a 2 week holiday.  I have done that thing where I have accepted I have the whole season, so taken it easy for a while, and am now coming to terms with the fact that there is only 1 month of the season left, and I haven't hit anywhere near the heights I have done before.  But you know what?  I'm okay with that.  Because I still have that one month to go.  And as much as I don't generally like summer - I like Queenstown.  And I intend to try and do another summer here to see if there is anything I can get into this time.  And if I do another summer, I won't be able to leave before another winter.  

This place just drags you in.

---

Dedicated - in a very strange way I guess given the subject matter - to Gramps, who passed away peacefully last Thursday.  Rest in peace.

The difficult 8th blog entry. Full of smut, filth, and fat chicks.

A phenomenon not really known in the blogging world, or any world at all for that matter. However I am providing an update because if I don't, I'll just keep on forgetting. And people will spit at me for not doing so.

So what have I done since the last update?? Naff all. I have finally reached the point where this life is normal once more. I get up, I go to work, if I get the chance I ski or board during the afternoon before going back to work once again in the evening. I ski or board on days off. I go out after work drinking.
I have not yet taken full advantage of the fact that drinking AT work is not frowned upon, as long as it is from a receptacle that doesn't make it obvious that you are getting smashed while dealing with the general public. Which in most cases is the only way to make them bearable. I am sure I have probably been the same in the past, but it seems most of these people must sit in the taxi on the way to the airport going through what they may have forgotten.
"Passport - got it. Tickets - yup, in my pocket. Luggage - definitely, it's in the boot. Did I cancel the papers? Yes, I did that yesterday. Leave a light on?? No, I left the house while it was dark, I would have noticed. Why do I get the feeling I've forgotten something? Oh, that'll be it. I've left my common bastard sense at home".
Rentals are pretty generic. You can spend all day trying them on and asking me stupid questions about boots that cater for a more narrow foot. All I am going to do is take that one from you, go back to the rack and bring you back exactly the same boot in a different colour and ask you if that feels better. And when you reply that it does, I will openly mock you for being a mong. Then you can try on all the clothes that you want, if you can't get a medium sized pair of pants over your cankles, the next size up might just stretch up to your knees but no further. Stop trying to convince yourself that you have been good this year and accept that you are looking at at least 2 X's before the L, lardy.

In other, slightly more interesting news, I survived an earthquake. A pretty big one by all accounts. I have heard it was 7.8 on the Richter scale, or 6.8, or something impressive with a decimal place somewhere. I have no idea if this is a cool sized earthquake to survive, but considering the only tremors I normally experience are caused by me farting in bed, it was a smidgen bigger.
To be honest, I was out drinking at the time. I was in a first floor bar, talking to a very hot young lady. At first I had no idea what was happening and paid no attention to it. I grew up and drank in Redhill when I was younger, these kind of quakes were a common occurrence when six drunk fat chicks all got on the dance floor at the same time.
Anyhow, the floor began to shake, the speakers and screens on the walls starting vibrating and threatening to fall off, it all became a bit surreal. People started flocking to the near-floor to ceiling windows to look out at the street below.
As I just said, I grew up in Redhill, these things don't EVER happen there. I do still know however, that in an earthquake it is wise to stay away from massive planes of glass. Something to do with shaking, shattering, shards and arteries I think. A fact that passed a lot of idiots in the bar by. I came so close that night to witnessing natural selection in action.
It also afforded me the opportunity to pull out a line cheesier than any Swayze came out with in the atrocity that is Dirty Dancing. Something about the earth moving just from talking to me. Despite this, the night still went well.

Ending on a shit-splinteringly boring note, I am finally warm at night. Previously I have mentioned how cold my room has been, and that it has been hard sleeping (stop it).
I also mentioned the pointless heater I bought which warmed up about a square inch just above it. I bit the bullet just after and bought an electric blanket.
I fucking love electricity. Sorry mum, but I do. It's amazing, one of the best discoveries ever. Without it, so many things in life would be that much more difficult. I use my mobile phone to wake me up. I use lights in the morning darkness to find out which of the clothes on my floor are the cleanest (again, sorry mum). I shower in hot water thanks to the leccy. I don't have an electric toothbrush, but I should because I have taken laziness to previously unheard of levels. The bus on the way into work, my iPod on the bus, the heaters keeping me warm at work, the coaches taking me up the hill, the chair lifts I ride, hell - I wouldn't be sharing this pony with you if it wasn't for electricity. I could go on all night but I won't as I think you get the message.
Which is that electricity is the nuts.
As much as I love it though, sleeping on it? No thanks. It has so much potential to go wrong. The name itself - electric blanket - sounds like something you would get for first degree murder in the States.
Electric blankets to me are very much like fat chicks. They are great for keeping the bed warm, but you know having one turned on in your bed all night is a bad idea. I am happy to use it to warm the bed up (blanket - not fat chick), but I go to great lengths to unplug it because the last thing I need in the morning is to wake up fused to the bed springs, you know the day can only go downhill from there.
So what is the amazing invention that has enabled me to sleep naked as the day I was born in complete comfort once again?? Two duvets.
All that love for electricity, and it just took a second synthetic stuffed blanket to solve the problem.
Sometimes my slowness surprises even myself.

A little bit at the bottom: I am fully aware that I have mentioned fat chicks a multitude of times during this passage (and also that I just sniggered out loud for using "fat chicks" and "passage" in the same sentence). This will not need pointing out, but I will make it clear that this is in no way an indication that I am thinking about fat chicks a lot, or that I need, or want a fat chick. Despite how grateful they always are.

London to Auckland . As summarised by a close friend.

I had pretty much an entire diary of the first 10 days of this, my most recent excursion to a place where there is snow. New Zealand actually. Where I intend on staying until late October if I can find gainful employment. It was sent out in an e-mail. Some of you may have deleted it immediately, some may have skimmed through to get the general gist after realising there is not much there to read, and that any debauchery or illicit activity was omitted to spare me shame. There are a few that may have read it. And then strained so hard at the tediousness of it that you gave yourself an anal fissure. To those of you, I say well done. I got a helpful e-mail in reply from a very close friend summarising my activity in 3 short sentences, which I have repeated below, as I can't even be bothered to cut and paste that entire dross into this, my first blog entry. So here we go:

• Flew in (could have caused the plane to crash) - expl. my mobile turned on in my pocket as I slept. I began panicking as it vibrated with "welcome to New Zealand" texts on the landing approach.
• Bummed around not getting drunk nearly enough
• Saw some sights but didn't know, or particularly care, what they were

Beautifully put as it goes, and more concise than the original mail. So thanks buddy!

My time wasn't completed wasted. I was shown around by the sister and husband of a friend from home, and a cousin (of which I was very grateful, as I would never have ventured out of the city otherwise), and took in some amazing views, a lot of which can be found in this facebook album.