The role of friends

Every person in our lives has an important role to play. Confidante, friend, party-animal, +1, shopping buddy, gym buddy, sex buddy, talk-on-the-phone-for-hours person, etc etc.

Some overlap, others are each played by just one person at a time, sometimes we have multiple people filling the same role at the same time or alternating if one is out of the country. But they all exist and all are there and need someone to perform it, otherwise our lives feel just a little bit empty.

There is one very, very important role that several males have played in my life, and so have a few females (on occasion):

To keep me out of on-coming traffic.

My judgement of space and distance is pretty good and I’m fine when driving, but when I’m crossing the street and with other people I’m usually distracted by how awesome it is to be social and my impulsivity kicks in, so I’ll randomly try crossing the street at my own peril. I’ve been grabbed by the hand or scuff of the neck a few times to keep me from walking right out in front of a car, just because my brain wasn’t noticing that there’s one coming toward me at 70km/h. Now, these wonderful people just grab me as soon as we get to the place where we want to cross, and hold on until we get to the other side.

I’ve actually nearly been hit by one because I not only didn’t notice it was there in the first place, but also didn’t hear it tooting its horn at me. By the time I noticed, I was half-way across the high-way and decided that I should, clearly, turn back the way I came... I wasn’t entirely with it at the time.

So, I’d like to extend my thanks to those of you who have kept me alive and out of the hospital for just that little bit longer. You guys are awesome!

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

We all have books which we love and which we hate. We all have reasons for that love or hate, be they related to the quality of the writing, the nature of the characters, or the progression of the plot. Here is a post on a specific book and why it is wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG, because it incorrectly portrays a world-view.



As part of English for my final year of secondary school, I had to study The Outsider (or The Stranger, depending on the translation) by Albert Camus. I hate that book. More than the book, I hate the standard interpretation of it, which is that this book is about Existentialism. It is not.

The lead character in this book (Meursault) is one who shows and feels little emotion and forms no attachments. He has no great ambition. Really, he just is. His emotional spectrum seems to range from neutral to this is nice.

The people who claim that this book is “Existentialist” only remember the first half of the definition of existentialism: That life has no intrinsic meaning. They forget the second, and most important part: Therefore, we must give it that meaning ourselves. Another cause for concern is that I have met English teachers who were unaware of this distinction, and they danm well should be if they are teaching this book! So, if you're an English teacher reading this and were not aware, go inform yourself! This is important. Camus himself rejected the "existentialist" label, because he considered this books to be on absurdism.

"Oh, the burden of human choice!"

That “life has no meaning” is a philosophy known as Nihilism, and at its deepest this book is about a nihilist character. I get extremely angry and peeved when people use this book in an attempt to illustrate existentialism, because I just happen to be an existentialist. Believe it or not, it was studying this book which made me realise that. But only because my English teacher was smart and informed enough to remember that second part of the definition for existentialism.

I would say that a much more accurate description of the character is that he is a psychopath (that is, has Antisocial Personality Disorder). Key characteristics include:

• Lack of remorse, shame or guilt
• Shallow emotions
• Lack of capacity to form attachments
• Callousness/Lack of empathy
• Poor behavioural controls/Impulsive nature
• Lack of realistic life plan
• Substance abuse

There are others, of course, but I would say that Meursault displays all of the above. I, on the other hand do not display any of these. Of the characteristics which are not on that list, the only one I have is "impulsivity", and I already have a diagnosis for that.

I am an existentialist. My life has meaning. The people in my life and the things I do hold meaning for me. I do not believe that this meaning is innate or predetermined by some more powerful being, but by me as they are mine. It is a liberating, empowering, wonderful thing because I have those choices, subject only to my biology (which is inescapable to a great degree, so I accept it where necessary).

I am not a nihilist. I am not a psychopath. Stop using this book to describe a worldview which it does not actually represent.

Common Sense: Knowing when to hold yourself back, even when there's nothing else to do the job.

Fitness. No.

Exercise is a bizarre thing. There you are, stretching, straining, pushing,  pumping, in pain, sweating, tears rolling down your face, tears in your muscles, more pain, more straining, joints spraining... And this is supposed to be healthy.

The machines at the gym are evil. Seriously, they are out to kill you. This is the dream we all have of being full of grace and not breaking a sweat while moving through various exercises:


OK Go - Here It Goes Again from OK Go on Vimeo.


My reality is the image you have of yourself, covered in sweat, face-first on the tread-mill as the conveyor belt tries to rip your face off as you lie there. It hates me, and I know it.

The weight machines are even worse: Those things warp and then utterly smash the laws of physics. “Equal and opposite reaction” my arse. As soon as you’re done trying to move the counterweight, it comes to life, gains an extra 20kg and becomes double-jointed so that it tries to break your knees as you congratulate yourself on doing one whole ham-string curl.

And the personal trainers are evil. They are torture masters in disguise, with their shorts and their fancy tops and heart rate monitors. You know what that monitor is really for? Measuring just how much PAIN you’re in so that they can feel that sadistic satisfaction of having caused lots of it, and then causing even more by working some muscles which you didn’t even realise existed. I have this theory that the torturers in the Tower of London were actually a secret cult who passed on their skills to the next generation and the next, and that they gradually figured out how to cause the maximum pain without any implements AND use hypnosis on you to make you think that it’s what you want. Interrogators should hire these guys. I’ll be there’s even a secret hand shake - watch out for it next time you’re at one of these places. It’s all about finding out which government you work for. Just you wait and see, it’s a conspiracy.

The other people at the gym are all in on it. You ever see one of them wipe up after using the equipment? I haven’t, either. No wonder I got sick every time I went last year - I’d manage about a week of regular exercise before another virus hit. I reckon they were all in on it, not cleaning the machines so that I would use them and get infected thanks to the germs getting in through the paper cut I got while signing for the transaction because I had a late fee. And they smell. It’s all a secret government experiment into biological warfare, you mark my words.

Even recently, this happened. It must be air-borne biological warfare. I went to a Zumba class which was arranged as a free activity for the staff with an instructor whom I'd never met, and got sick THE VERY NEXT DAY. They are ALL in on it!!!!!

Then there are the video clips which some gyms show with the half-naked women who weight about 10kg (including what they’re wearing) and probably haven’t eaten more than a carrot and a cup of coffee per day since they were 15. It’s deliberate. To make you hate yourself so you keep going. It’s like I joined bloody Globo Gym.

But I do miss the regular exercise.

Fruit flies like a banana.

Having no sense of how long things take has led to my always adding half an hour to how long I think anything will take. I figured out a long time ago that going shopping doesn’t just involve walking around shops - it involves:

• Getting ready to go to the shops (day clothes rather than pyjamas, shoes, brushed teeth etc) 
• Finding everything I need for leaving the house (phone, wallet, keys, etc)
• Getting to the shops
• Finding a parking space
• Getting from parking space to shops
• Allowing time for having to “shop around” if you’re not happy with the price, or can’t find what you’re after in the first shop
• Waiting in line at the checkout
• Getting your things to the car
• Going back to the shops to get the thing you forgot to buy
• Waiting in the checkout line again
• Getting to the car again
• Driving home
• Unpacking your shopping
• Collapsing from the exhaustion of it all

For me, every trip I take is a multi-step process. Every possibility needs to be accounted for. I can be prepared as I like with lists and reminders, but the fact is that each of these "steps" takes time and each one needs to happen at least once.

Ever heard the phrase “You’d never get across the room if you had to think about how to walk”? I do get places, but it can be quite stressful, and the alternative is locking myself out of the house, or having to take two trips because I forgot my wallet, or something else which makes it even worse. It's all more or less part of a routine now so it doesn’t bother me quite as much as it could, but that’s the trick: It’s routine. It’s regimented. If I deviate from the routine, my world falls apart.

Welcome to my world.

Sincere apologies

I'm sorry for the lack of drawings in my posts lately. I haven't been entirely well, and the tired has been sapping my visually creative reserves.

I will try to add more in to my posts very soon, I promise!