Wet Wet Wet

For the first time in my life, I'm spending every day in the pool. While I'm discovering muscles I didn't know I had, and I should say muscle groups because there certainly aren't any muscles, it's far from an unpleasant setting.

Not that I'm yet to spend any time in that spa because I saw the hairiest man on the planet using it the other day and there's no way I'm going in there till I'm sure he's out of the hotel and filters have been changed.

These photos don't really do it justice because the sunlight streaming in the windows just blows out to white, what you can see in real life is warm sunlight streaming in from all sides as the sun rises above the desert and the city, piercing the surrounding buildings and shimmering off the water and paua pool tiles. Not too bad at all. It certainly eases my pain.

Multiplication

Since I've gotten over here, I've had a few inquiries about Scabies. Well she's good.

In fact she's multiplying.

But I did see this posted up, who would have thought the land of kittehs would be in the desert.

Outed

Ugh, saw these quotes from New Zealand Prime Minister John Key today as he responded in the wake of the spying revelations rocking the world. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to read between the lines and see that this is completely dodgy.

Ironic at all then this also happened?!

America is running out of friends and it makes zero sense for us to be cuddling up to them.

There's a much bigger story here and I hope the media take John Key to task. New Zealand's involvement with these spying allegations simply must not be swept under the rug and forgotten tomorrow. If we're involved, we need to be outed and we need to stop.

http://www.3news.co.nz/Coleman-brushes-off-spying-revelations/tabid/1607/articleID/319288/Default.aspx

Drive

You may have heard about the recent protest by women in Saudi Arabia seeking the legal ability to drive, what you may not have heard is this amazing song.

Lates

After finishing these 4 late shifts in a row

100

I am not, nor have I ever been a noted swimmer.

As a child I watched as other kids jumped in with relative ease, wriggling their little limbs and propelling themselves through the water like little fish children. It seemed so simple.

My efforts were anything but. Entry into the pool introduced me to the bottom, not with my feet, but with my face. I seemed to lack any of the natural buoyancy attributed to the other children and the propulsion expected by kicking my legs was set firmly in reverse.

Asthma, an allergy to chlorine and bones made of lead did not make me a natural. So to help me fit in they added water wings, a flutter board, goggles and a nose plug. Boy those other kids must've been jealous of me. There they were, little naked fish children and here I was, inflatable foam robocop.

Swimming lessons were a must, so I took them, every year. For ten straight years.

Intermediate was the last straw, one of three comparatively tall kids in the wading pool still struggling to breathe and being forced to stand up in knee high water when it all went wrong, I felt no need to continue with this debacle into high school.

I talked my mother into supporting my decision and spent every swimming lesson and school swim day alone in the stands copying text from a phys-ed book in a hollow attempt by the teachers to both keep me occupied and punish me for my non-participation. It sucked, but not as much as drowning.

Over the years I have attempted to get back in the water, but never much enjoyed the humiliation. I know I suck, I tell people I suck, but to hear "I didn't know you sucked that much", can have a discouraging effect.

It is then with a mixed sense of expectant dread that I once again dive in. I've been wanting to for a while and the magnificent pool at my hotel provides the best chance I've had to whet my whistle. The additional added bonus is the total lack of *other swimmers. Also I've gotten fat and need the exercise

I purchased the hottest togs in the shop, goggles and a new nose plug. Mr Cool rides again. At least this time I will be spared the taunts of little fish children or peers who point out my ineptitude below the water line. Project jezsexification is go.

*falsely insinuating I can swim

Routine

I've been back to work now in the middle east for 4 days, or more accurately, 4 nights.

Upon my arrival I had a day to settle in then it was straight into the night shift. In the weeks leading up to coming over I had been trying to alter my body clock to ease the transition, so I guess I'm now suffering from reverse jet-lag, if that's even possible.

The shifts here are 12 hours long and given that I'm set up in a small windowless room it can be hard to tell day from night at the best of times. The length of the shifts can make it difficult to differentiate one day from another, you sleep, eat and work, one day merging into the next and creating relative time dilation.

It's easy to see someone around the office and question why they've changed their clothes, hoping they haven't had an accident, but then wondering if it's something more serious because who would carry around a full change of clothes. Then you start to think about their upbringing, how their parents dealt with this disorder or whether it's something that came with the onset of adulthood which they've had to learn to deal with as it's gotten progressively worse. You give them a supportive if knowing look and they flash one back that says "weirdo".

My routine has made breakfast an issue. My previous accommodation on my last visit provided free food and I took full advantage. When I was moved elsewhere and the food was no longer free, it was still within my budget. Eating at the hotel wasn't a problem as even the most expensive meal was around $10 New Zealand dollars. My new hotel for all it's fabulous fabulousness has one tiny flaw, the food is 10 times as much.

It can be fun to spoil yourself, on occasion, every morning is a bit OTT. The food itself isn't even gold plated which more than negates it's apparent value, though if it were one could assume it circumvent its main role as sustenance.

I have therefore spent more time balking than eating and have had to scratch around at mealtime to find other small morsels to whet my appetite. I've already had KFC for breakfast once this week. I did manage to get to a supermarket where I purchased an 8-pack of little Arabian cereals to try, not wanting to be too committal by diving straight into a big box. I also purchased a litre of what I thought was milk and a few other snacktacular options to get me through in moments of hunger and desperation.

The milk turned out to be yogurt, yogurt does not go well with Arabian coco-pops.

Delectables

So slightly before I started training for the winter games, I did go a little nuts, but only because delicious things are delicious.

I rocked the Fonzies purely because I had nothing else available and they are called Fonzies. It's hard to resist a flavour like BBQ curry. I hope Henry Winkler knows he's part of America's imperial reach into the hearts and minds of the middle east.

Citrus mirinda is the best thing to ever come in a can and if the Pepsi company had their heads screwed on right they'd release it in NZ. Not their strawberry and apple versions however, they are rubbish.

And finally, the one thing I crave every day I'm not here, god's gift to my gob, the mighty shwarma.

Who wants to go into business with me and start selling these delicious bastards in NZ?

Oh and I started work today.

Ringadingding

Two weeks of immobility staring out to sea, then a cry rang out from the distance. I leapt elegantly down from my tower like a jelly falling off a plate. I steadied myself, pulled up my pants and began packing like it was Christmas eve at the fudge factory.

Mere hours later I was on a flight back to the middle east and back to work in the sand pit.

I've never been the most confident traveller, cautious of airports and paperwork, gate numbers, obtuse signage and own ability to get myself into trouble over the smallest of trivial details. I am my own worst enemy in any airport, a veritable bull in a china shop, if that bull was six inches tall, made of rubber, full of helium, wearing a blind fold and strapped to a rocket.

This trip and its 28 hour duration went surprisingly well by my own standards, my only real stoush coming in Australia where I was unceremoniously pulled out of the line up for a full body scan and pat down. At the time I exclaimed that someone up there must like me, only to register that 'up there' must refer to the guy in the little booth looking at my genitals and winking and waving at the pat down guy.

Body scanners are a step too far in my opinion, but that's a gripe for another day. This time I only got two phone numbers.

Sydney airport was a vacuum of humanity and 5 hours I will never get back. The only real excitement centred around me trying to print my visa to show to border security once I arrived in the middle east, something rather important when the biggest barrier is language.

You'd think I'd do this before I left, but it hadn't arrived before I left, so this was my chance to get a gold star while signage was still predominantly in english.

I found a printer and fought with three cash machines until I materialized $20 Australian dollars. I was then rejected by twelve consecutive vending machines which refused to take my note before being extorted by the bar for a $6 ginger beer. Look at the look on his face, even the note was surprised and unable to offer any answers.

I now had the coins I needed to work the printer and miraculously printed my visa without further incident. I then spent my remaining $10 on a trip down memory lane as Pizza Hutt apparently failed in their genocide and rather simply drove New Zealand's best pizza company out of the country.

I am happy to report that they've since gotten shit and we're not missing out on anything.

I then flew from Sydney to Abu Dhabi, managing to sleep half of the 15 hours while waking briefly occasionally to puzzle myself with contortions which thankfully didn't lead to anything permanent. I don't think any of them counted as art. Unlike this gif.

A few hours in Abu Dhabi airport and then on to Doha where there were some gusset ruining moments at the border in regards to my freshly printed visa, but in the end I even walked past security without having to declare my smuggled goods for homesick Kiwi's. I tried to, they just wouldn't let me, waving me through with some assertion whenever I tried to speak.

Maybe after 28 hours in transit it just wasn't worth the oxygen to have to be around me.

5kg

The body is an amazing thing, mine however, is not.

In the 2 weeks I spent sitting on my bum at home in New Zealand I managed to put on 5kg. Not of muscle, not of extra brain mass, but pure fatty fatty fat fat.

I once heard a comedian describe his fat deposits as energy in waiting, proof that he was ready to explode into action at any given moment. I've tried to convince myself that I am in the same boat, except I'm too heavy and am causing that boat to dip below the water line.

5kg's may not sound like much, some people lose as much after breakfast, but I am wee. I probably look my best around the 65kg mark, blessed though I am with a classic I shape, bereft of shoulders which would otherwise disguise my waistline. I'm currently 75kg and look like a freshly fed constrictor.

Now don't get me wrong, I like to run around and will happily chase a ball like a puppy high on life. It's just that opportunities to do so become rarer as my friends settle down, break down or just give up. Choosing to allow their bosoms to expand exponentially into full cup sizes rather than exert themselves in any way, acknowledging that life is too hard and gravity too great.

I don't want that to be me and when I grew my own bosoms in 2008, I vowed to get rid of them. Gone were the daily curries, banished to a Tuesday only affair. KFC Sunday's moved to a purely monthly indulgence. Beer was no longer my drink of choice at meal time. Not even for breakfast.

I also recognised how my habits effected my weight. Shift work had a truly detrimental effect and I found not even changing my diet could overcome the fluctuations in daily metabolism my body couldn't deal with.

I did beat my tittays, but only once I took over my timetable by becoming a freelancer. This time last year I was back down around 65 and fending the ladies off with a broom handle. It was eventually confiscated by police.

This last month though, stuck in limbo, not knowing when I would have to head to the airport at a moments notice.. has not been good for my figure. There may now be a permanent Jez shaped divit in the couch, an encrusted sweat laden crater surrounded by crumbs.

I still did push ups during this time and while a sure fire jelly knocker prevention technique, it only served to further accentuate my front hump. Though it is of great relief that I did not give up entirely and dress my hump with two folded tea cosies full of titty meat.

That's right, take a moment to recoil from your device in disgust as you let that description sink in, even I was sick in my mouth a little bit.

However news travels fast and so do I, I got the call 2 days ago and am now in the middle east, dead set on losing 5 kilos and not allowing my navel a window to the world between strained buttons.

How you ask? Yo.

Limbo

Rarely do I feel the long dangley tendrils of boredom gripping my face tightly and smothering my will to live. I typically have more on my plate than I ever need, a metaphoric fat person dining out on long hours, multitaskification and a whole spoon full of 'what day is it?'

Right now though, I'm playing the waiting game.

It is the worst game ever invented. The rules are crappy and my official review is a comprehensive 'sucks out of 10'.

I am supposed to start work in the middle east on Oct 6. Today. So while I'm handing out reviews, that's a 'not going to fucking happen out of 10'.

The last couple of weeks have been a hectic mess since I agreed to this contract, cancelled other jobs and desperately ran around like a chook full of roman candles trying to get everything organised.

But with my contract starting today and my person located exactly half a planet away from that obligation, it seems unlikely that I will be able to fulfil my first day on the job.

I know this taste, bureaucracy, all nutty and full of red rope liquorice. Somewhere there's a to-do list with my name on it, right behind doing the laundry and picking up cat biscuits.

I'm sitting here in New Zealand having freed up my calender to travel at the drop of a hat.. watching the clock tick. This is day 3 of watching the clock tick and as entertainment goes, I give it a 'jackhammer out of 10'. Each tick another scratch on the blackboard, each tock another sharp tap on the head with a rubber mallet.

I know this will end, I know I will be on a plane sooner rather than later.. but not knowing exactly when, agony.

Dessert

I am going back to the desert and the camel spiders I left behind.

No longer will the lush sub tropical bush of New Zealand be a hindrance to my locomotion as I freely turn at will, unencumbered by foliage of any description.

My dance with the dust is not a decision I've taken lightly, but as it's only for a couple of months, it's hard to turn down.

It has meant cancelling a couple of other projects, a music video for the Murderchord and an ad campaign for the White Ribbon Foundation, but hopefully I can make it up them in the future. I've also had to take my bum off and put it aside in order to get through the remaining projects I'm part way through.

Negotiations went something like this - "Can you start in 3 weeks?".. *consideration* "Ok, send me the dates" followed by reading and this exclamation "*expletive removed* That's more like ten days".

Life has been hectic.

Still, once the kinks are ironed out this foray back into sand will fit snuggley into the calender and give me the impetus I need to return to my *great works. 

It also provides a chance to spend more time in Finland, a place I'm becoming increasingly fond of. My plan is to spend Christmas as I usually do, with a BBQ and a spot of cricket. The fact it may be -40C is of no concern to me.

I also plan to build a new website and slot this blog pragmatically into it somewhere, so if you return to jezbrown.com at any time to find it filled with whizz bangery, you will know that I did that.

*may not be so great