Monday, July 31, 2006

And now - a maths joke


Why did the chicken cross the mobius strip ?

To get to the same side !

Wah ha ha ha ha !!!

Okay - kinda geeky, but really - "the same side" ! Comedy gold.

Did you know that the international symbol for recycling is a mobius loop ?

Don't say that you never learn anything with your ole' pal Seraph !

Friday, July 28, 2006

What was the damage then ?

Turns out I had lost a kilogram ( down to 92.5kg ).

Freaking weird. Last week - I was really good, I exercised a bunch and I didn't lose a GRAM. This week - I'm a little piggie - BAM ! I shed a K.

I don't get it.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you.

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Revenge of the Scales

Viva and I have been attending a "Health and Fitness" thing on Thursday evenings for the last month or so, in a bid to ... well ... be more healthy and fit really. Duh ! The evenings are always just a bit weird though. I'm the ONLY guy there. The trainer ( who I'm beginning to suspect is actually an android. No human should be able to withstand the kind of punishment she does without breaking a sweat ... ) is always saying things like "Okay - make sure you're really stretching your chest out in this exercise - really get your boobs stuck out ... except YOU Seraph!". Thanks for making me really feel like part of the team, coach !

Anyway - I have been doing reasonably well. I think I've dropped a few k's, I've been losing centimeters off all the right places in my body, and I think I've been getting fitter ( my tri-weekly morning runs are averaging out at about 25-26 minutes ( they used to take me 35+ minutes - and I couldn't keep up the pace for the whole thing. AND I can consistently jog up the 210 steps from the train station "short-cut" to Fox Street ! Whoop ! ) and generally eating less crap.

But this week. THIS week. I've been BAD.

I've eaten so much crap. Pizza on Friday, curry on Saturday, ... I forget what I ate on Sunday - but there was much too much bread ... I know that, pizza AGAIN on Monday ( had to stay at school late and get food for the student actors in my play - I blame them ), a Subway sandwich on Tuesday and burritos last night. The burritos weren't TOO bad I guess ( there was lettuce and carrots in 'em ) ... but still ! And I've done little exercise other than my morning runs and StepMania games. Eeep.

I fear the weigh in tonight.

Seraph's Raro Holiday Top Ten !

1. Managing to lie down and watch “Desperate Housewives” ( and half of “The IT Crowd” before I was made to go to sleep ) after many hours of queing in Wellington and Auckland airport. Our 6am connecting flight ( that we got up at quarter to five for ) was delayed because of stupid fog in Auckland. We got a flight at 11am, only to be sent back to Wellington when we got there because the fog had come back. Yay.
After standing in various lines to get ready for our new flight to Raro from Auckland, we were told that that flight was also delayed. Instead of departing at quarter to ten, it was now departing at quarter to one in the morning !
Viva and I decided to go to some crummily cheap airport hotel just so we could relax for a moment. Sure – it looked like a few people had been murdered, and the driver who picked us up smelt like he had been eating a bushel of raw garlic with a chaser of teargas … but at least we got out of the freaking departure lounge for a few hours !

2. Actually arriving in the Cook Islands ! When we got to the place we were staying we crashed and slept for a good five hours or so. Woken by the cleaner who thought we had gone out.

3. About five paces out of our villa was the beach. Very nice. You could borrow kayaks and paddle around in the lagoon. I had lofty plans of kayaking out to one of the small islands nearby, jogging around it and zapping back across the water as an exercise routine. It never eventuated, funnily enough. Though I did wade across to closer of the two mini-islands ( a lot faster than I kayaked too ).

4. Sitting our Cook Island drivers licence so we could legally drive scooters while there. It consisted of driving about two hundred meters up the man road, turning around in a supermarket car-park, and driving back. I’ve had more difficulty getting drunk ( and I’m one CHEAP drunk ! ).
I was listening to some American guy in line who had failed it once by driving on the wrong side of the road. He mentioned that he knew some guy who had failed it three times in a row. The mind boggles.

5. Driving scooters. The crazy bastards don’t wear helmets there ! It was awesome ! I had a great time hooning around at 40-60km’s. I saw some pretty mental balancing acts by some of the locals. I finally started to understand why the police station had a sign saying “DOGS AND BIKES DON’T MIX !”. Truer words have not been spoken.

6. Going on a cross island hike. Some parts were pretty insanely steep – but I managed okay. Our guide was pretty cool – though I began to question some of the stories he was telling us… I believe that he met the Dali Lama and all, but there is NO WAY that guy was sixty. NO way !
Got to try some of the native chestnut which our guide has prepared ( or, in other words, boiled ) earlier. It was sort of like a waxy potato which had been boiled in a pot along with a pile of lamb chops. If offered – decline politely.

7. Umbrella drinks ! I had an umbrella drink a day. Best one – a Venetian Lemonade ( hand-squeezed lemonade, Bacardi, lemoncello and mint leaves ) at the Portifino restaurant. Nice place – they did a good pizza too.

8. Snorkelling ! That was the most amazing thing. So many bright coloured fishes ! Giant freaking clams ! Clouds of tiny fish hiding in coral ! Managing NOT to choke to death when I inhaled sea-water !

9. Being vaguely near the filming of “Survivor” ! We went on a day trip to another one of the islands (Aitutaki). We couldn’t go to where the snorkelling trip usually went because the new series of Survivor was being filmed on that side of the island – and NO-ONE was allowed to go near the freaking place.

10. While hanging around in the sun, wearing t-shirts and shorts while everyone was freezing back in Wellington was nice – I was glad to get home again, see Shadow ( who had been pretty unfriendly to Hix during his third tour of house sitting at La Casa Seraph, weirdly enough. ) and have my lost luggage returned to me after only a few hours.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

The word is 'love', people!

Yeah yeah yeah. So I haven't written anything. So what ? You gonna make me ? Huh ? You think you're all that ?

Oh. You really ARE all that ?

Crap.

I'd better write something then. ( Don't hit me )

Okay - I guess mostly the reason I've been quiet is that I ( somewhat foolishly ) reinstalled "Heroes of Might and Magic 3" on my computer. If you've never played this game, you are both cursed and blessed. Cursed - because it's one hell of a good game. Blessed - because you're probably using your time in persuit of art, or truth, or a REALLY good grilled chesse sandwhich, or something OTHER than sitting in front of a computer screen going "I REALLY have to upgrade my army's archers ! Where can I find another lumber mill ? Where the hell did those dragons come from ? OOooh - My hero learned the 'chain lighting' spell - yay !".

I've got it more under control than my "Diablo 2" addiction ( that was bad - I can really never play that game again, as much as I loved it ... ), so that's gotta be worth something.

Viva and I also were in the Cook Islands for a week ( more on that later ), so that made updating difficult.

Anyway - I want to talk about langauge, funnily enough. In fact - the heart symbol. Having fuitlessly searched through all THREE freaking sets of 'win-dings" in Word ( does anyone ACTUALLY ever use these goddamn things ??? ) and not found ONE heart symbol, I am forced ot resort to this - *heart*. So - whenever you see that - imagine the heart symbol. Okay ? Okay.

You DO know that that wee heart symbol actually stands for the word 'love' - right ? It really does. So - when you see the title of a film like "I ♥ Huckabees" ( yeah - I know, I found one on the net just now. I shoulda looked there first ... ) - It actually MEANS "I love Huckabees". "We LOVE Katamari!" "I LOVE New York". No one EVER says "I heart New York!". Y'know why ? It makes no freaking sense ! That's why !
It's BAD English ! I mean - you don't ever say "That shirt costs dollar sign three hundred ! There's no way I'm shelling out that much asterix hash-symbol ampersand at-symbol pi leo-sign money for that !", do you ?

Well - not when you're sober anyway.

That might sound like a pretty harmless think to get annoyed about - but I am still nominally an English teacher, and I still want to jam a working chainsaw in the ribcage of any student to uses the word 'alot' in an essay.

I think I knew I was in trouble when my pal Hix, when we were talking about some actress ( it might have been Uma Thurman ), said "I heart her!". You never want to think about impaling your good friends with rusty gardening tools. It's a bad place.

So - just make sure you English speak good !