Tony the drunkard

I've been 18 for a week now. Really, very little has changed in this short span of time. I go around bragging about it occasionally, I feel an aura of superiority around me (though I believe I always had that) and my passport photo looks very out of date, but other than that, not much new.

So of course, the best way to remedy this is with a night in Melbourne. A night where I essentially made an ass of myself, but t'was all in good fun.
I suppose it couldn't have been that bad; I didn't drink too much, and I woke up at 10 AM this morning devoid of any kind of hangover, but perhaps I'm almighty and immune to such things. Starting now, I'll claim that I am.

Anyway, we got to the city at about 8 PM, and already I showed my unique nature by being the only one out of my crew not to jaywalk at every crossing. The little red man told me not to walk, so wait there I did.
So we didn't get to our first bar until about 8:30. As per usual, I refused to play pool (I don't play pool in public, people might suspect me of being very bad, which is true), and instead just sat quietly waiting for my chums to buy me drinks. Hey, it was my birthday, I wanted to be a freeloader.

It started with bourbon. In my (now) expert opinion, bourbon tastes worse the more you drink it. Regardless, I downed two of those one after the other, but made sure to keep track of how much I was drinking through reminders on my phone. I have no idea why I had the foresight that night to keep track of things, but Phil declared me the most organised drunk he's ever met.

After bourbon #2 (immediately after, of course), it was onto the beers. Halfway through the first beer I was starting to sway, and I'm mighty disappointed. I wanted to have the reputation that I could drink anyone under the table. I couldn't get drunk yet!!
My motor functions were inhibited, but I was still thinking clear, rational thoughts. I decided that as long as I remembered the Japanese phrase I was currently learning; 'ego ga hanasemasu ka', I was still sober. Funnily enough, I never did forget that phrase all throughout the night.

It was after my second beer (a pitiful tally of four drinks) that I made a reminder in my phone that I was drunk. The most obvious indication that I was drunk was that I had been playing pool for several minutes without even knowing it. Needless to say, I was not winning.
9:43 PM, I wasn't quite sure what the difference was between pool and volleyball, but I triumphantly downed one ball, which meant I didn't have to drop my pants and run around the table. See? I was a winner already.
And for my winning efforts, I would be rewarded with bourbon #3 and a vodka. Tragically, that was the last that I would be drinking that night.

After downing both drinks, I couldn't quite figure out where my posse had gone off to, so I just waited out the front of the bar in the pouring rain for a little while, because it seemed like a good idea. A fight broke out nearby, and I just chuckled and pointed in a drunken stupor. They didn't seem to like that much, but fortunately at 10:23 Dom appeared out of nowhere and lead me to where everyone else had gone. Just next door to the strip joint, of course.

Yeah, I went to a strip joint. I'm just as classless as anyone else. Honestly though, I could hardly tell I was there. I had to get Dom to fork out the $10 entrance fee from my wallet to get me in, and I stumbled up the stairs and sat down in front of the stage where ladies were undressing themselves for purposes of local arousal and entertainment.

I can't believe how much it didn't interest me at the time. I mean, I was at a strip joint, I was supposed to be having a ball! I wasn't bored or anything, but I could hardly tell what the young lasses were doing. I just clapped like a stooge and occasionally shouted 'yaaaaaaaay!!'
By this point, one of the strippers who wasn't working the stage at the time walked up with a jug in her hand filled with cash and, in a kind voice, she asked me for money.

I don't have much experience in the field of dealing with strippers, particularly while inebriated, so I legitimately thought I had to give her money because she asked me.
'I've only got twenties and fifties,' I told her, in what may have been the least wise statement to make to a stripper.
'Give me a twenty and I'll give you ten change,' she offered.
At this point, I thought, what a bargain!! I whipped out a twenty and got two fives in exchange. She kissed me on the cheek and walked away. Alas, only now do I realise that the bargain price of $10 was paying for... well, nothing, really. I guess it made me seem more polite?

Regardless, I had to take a whiz. My bladder was filled to the brim and I needed to make room for more alcohol, so I walked up to another stripper to ask for directions to the toilet.
Now, let me stop right there. It was a very small strip joint, it only would've taken two minutes to find the toilet. Additionally, I could've asked any random dude standing around, but no. I had to ask one of the strippers for directions.

'Excuse me miss,' I said, trying my best to appear slightly intellectual, 'Can you tell me where the toilet is?'
'Yes,' she replied with a sly smile on her face, 'But first, won't you give me a tip?'
I thought hard on this one. Hadn't I already done this before? I wasn't going to fall for this again...
'I've only got fifty cents,' I claimed, 'I reckon it'd be kind of cheap if I only gave you fifty cents.'
'Yeah it would,' she said, pouting, 'Are you sure you've only got fifty cents?'
'Naaaah,' I admitted. I couldn't lie to this wonderful stripper anymore. She was my friend now, right?
She looked at me for a couple seconds, before stating, 'You're a really nice guy, you're so innocent. You've got childish eyes...'
'Well I only turned 18 recently!' I blurted, and to that she smiled and I was rewarded with another kiss on the cheek. That sold me. I had to give her money.
'I tell you what,' I said, reaching into my wallet, 'I won't remember this in the morning, so I'll just give you $20.'
She accepted my generous offer, and in retrospect, it might've been a $50 bill. I only assumed it was a twenty because I said it was, and it felt suspiciously similar to $20. The fact that all dollar bills feel the same was irrelevant.
In any event, she pointed me in the direction of the toilets. I grabbed her by the shoulders, smiled a big smile and said,
'I wish you the best luck and hope everything works out for you. You have a wonderful night.'

I stumbled to the toilet, looked in the mirror, then at my friend Luke who was nearby. Sadness in my voice, I stated the fear that was surfacing in me;
'Luke... I think that stripper just robbed me.'

After this, Luke took my wallet away from me, I headbutted an SUV and we went to Crown casino. I shouted to various passers-by how I had just spent $20 on directions, proceeded to lick Luke's cheek while he was playing roulette, and was kindly asked if I could leave the casino. I did without question, and we went to KFC where I threw chicken bones around and ate a tub of potatoes and gravy that somebody else had left on their table.
On the negative side, I have no idea who had left the potatoes in question and what they might've been doing to it beforehand, but on the plus side, those were some damn good potatoes.

By 3 AM we found our way back to Melton, where I spent the night in Dom's mother's bed. No, she wasn't home at the time, but I had quite an interesting dream where I got killed and was reborn as some bizarre, Matrix-ripoff dude who could jump long distances and would have to save Disneyland. And yes, in my dream... I did pick up. So at least I had picked up in some random capacity in my little adventure.

The moral of today's tale? It's better to be a poor drunk than a rich drunk. Even people I didn't know on the bus home were laughing about how I got ripped off by a stripper, man.
And no, I'm not usually such a sleazy fellow, bouncing from bar to strip joint, but if you'd like to think I am, I'll accept your claims. After all, I've got my first day at university tomorrow and I don't think that'll go too well, so it's obvious I'm none too bright.

I did learn that everything is a lot more amusing when you're drunk, though. It was the first time I had gotten drunk since 2002 (when I put a four-year ban on for getting suspended for drinking on school grounds), and apparently, I'm a lot of fun to be around when I'm blind.

...Next week, I hope that the stripper will give me a refund.

Slight detour problem

DISCLAIMER: Today's topic will contain complaints, mathematical equations and lines stolen shamelessly from Blackadder. Thank you for your time.

So, who here likes walking? ...Aww come on, you know you love it.
Personally, I enjoy a good walk every now and then. It keeps the mind sharp, the lungs healthy and the buttocks firm. Gotta watch those buttocks.

I'll often sacrifice the chance to drive because I'd prefer to walk somewhere (the fact that I can't drive is irrelevant), so I can nod a friendly hello to the passers-by and pick up each and every lucky penny I come across. They're particularly lucky in Australia, seeing how pennies went out of circulation a long time ago, y'know.

Anyway, the point of today's lovely little BLOG is to express my enthusiasm for walking long distances. Though many who read this will no doubt scoff at my plight, I feel that it was a most interesting journey indeed.

In order to be prepared for the start of university on Monday, I thought I might as well spend today (this sunny lovely Friday) going to the uni from the station in Footscray, seeing how much time it takes and making sure I don't get there late. It's better I find out now before classes start, eh?

So I awoke at 7 AM. Anyone who knows me well knows that Tony waking up at such an hour is like a dog who speaks. Very rare.
I quickly went through my morning routine, knicked off to the local train station and, along with Rob, Mick and Steve, caught the 8 AM train to Footscray. I was enthusiastic at the time, and Tony being enthusiastic at such an hour is like a dog who talks Norwegian - even rarer.

I'm miserable with directions, you know. I can hardly remember where I am right now let alone where my university is, so when I peered over at the sign that stated that a bus would be going to Ballarat Road, in all my wisdom I concluded that Ballarat Road leads to uni. Onward, to BUS!!
I got on the bus through the side entrance and got scolded by the unfriendly bus-driver for doing such. I suppose he thought I'd had intentions to hide in the completely empty vehicle without paying. That'd be that camoflague of mine that everyone's always talking about, eh?

The delightful bus-driver took me along Ballarat Road, and I looked down at my watch. It was around 8:35; classes would start at 9 if I had any.
Each stop we went past was another place I was unfamiliar with. I watched on as a trio of goths boarded, an old woman muscled her way through the throng specifically to get off first, and I think the bus-driver tried to kill me with his thoughts.

Regardless, it was around ten minutes later when I thought to myself, 'Ballarat Road is very long.' I got off the bus at some random station and walked into the florist, where I was informed that Victoria University was indeed on Ballarat Road... in the other direction.
Huh. Interesting.

So bravely, I treaded in the direction specified by the florist, and later a Holden dealership when I had forgotten. It took... longer than I had expected. 7.78 KM longer.
I got to the University, then decided I should see how long the tram would take to get there. Seeing how the tram was being a bit of a bastard and wasn't coming anytime soon, I followed the tram line into the heart of Footscray. Quite the interesting place. All sorts of delightful hobos wandering about, motorists who were out to kill me, and 86% of a population that spoke Chinese.
And of course, I know absolutely nothing about the Chinese language whatsoever. I think there's a Mandarin in there somewhere. Regardless, it meant that directions were not very helpful.

I finally got to the end of the tram line, and to my astonishment and horror, where was that located? Why, just outside the Footscray station. A couple feet away was the bus stop where I had caught the bus that had lead me the wrong way in the first place.

My commentary was colourful, and people around no doubt thought I was insane as I stood there in the street, laughing at the irony. In my defence, it was 35 degrees celsius, man.
I took the tram back to the uni and checked my watch. 11 AM. I had been walking about for two and a half hours... best not to do that on an actual school day, then.

The interesting thing here was that by this point my brain was playing funny little tricks on me. Off in the distance, I could see Melbourne. And I thought, that's not that far to walk, right? Footscray Park to Spencer Street? Twenty minutes, tops. Suuuuuure...

The following journey was quite excellent. In the direct sunlight, I walked through several townships, ended up in Moonee Ponds for no particular reason, and started talking to pigeons along the way. They did not talk back.
Walking from Footscray to Moonee Ponds is about 3.62 km in a car. On foot, I'm just going to go right out and times that number by three. Yessiree, I don't care how factually wrong that is, it was 10.86 km by my count. I had to take several random turns through completely unrelated places to get there, various dank alleys and drug districts, I should've died twice along the way, no doubt.

After walking... a lot, I realised that there were a whole lot of 'Melbourne' signs about, but not any of the Melbourne that I'm familiar with. Where were the stores? Where were the tourists? Where was my overpriced coffee, dammit?!
...I was in North Melbourne, apparently. What's in North Melbourne that isn't in the central business district? A lot of nothing, it seems. I had been duped. I was in 'pretend' Melbourne with very little sanity left intact. I now blamed Rob for this; he's the one who told me to catch the 410 bus several hours ago. I'm sure that's related somehow.

By the time I got to Spencer Street (by tram, mostly) I was drained of all life. I just wanted to go home, and as I made a final walk from Spencer Street to the Southern Cross Station, I recalled something interesting. I had a train ticket in my pocket that would've taken me from Footscray to the city in about eight minutes.
Excellent! Excellent indeed that it was now 2 PM, I had a sunburn with the size and perhaps population of North Dakota, and I was too dead from heat stroke to reach out and strangle the person next to me.

So what was the point of this story? That it took me five and a half hours to do something that should've taken ten minutes. I like to take my time, I suppose.
Allow me to convert all of these funny little figures here...
1. Several hours in the direct heat of 35 degrees Celsius equates to 95 degrees Farenheit. I think. I suppose.
2. A brisk walk of 24.4 km with little to no resting time is equivalent to 15.2 miles. Not quite 500 miles, then.
3. Australia has no pennies. We used to have a two-cent coin, too. It had a lizard on it. I like lizards.

So yeah. I'm pretty much dead. It's... not that great.

McValentine's Day

Valentine's Day. What is Valentine's Day, exactly?
To the best of my trusty old recollection, Valentine's Day is a time where we confess our love for someone whom we feel affectionate toward. A time when all inhibitions are thrown to the wayside, and we take that fleeting opportunity to look our object of desire in the eye, take a deep breath and say, 'Will you be my sweetie pie?'
Alternatively, it's just one of those days when you give a shoutout to everyone in the hizzy so that they feel spiffy, fo'nizzy.

'k. Couple things. First off, no, nobody actually does say sweetie pie anymore. It's like against the law. Second, one of these days I will stop saying hizzy. Today is not that day. And yeah, I know it's not quite Valentine's Day for everyone yet, but it is in Australia, so all you crazy northern hemisphere-type people can just assume I live in the future. 'cause I do. Kinda.

For years, Valentine's Day has been for me what most other days are. An opportunity to watch couples give each other dandy little gifts representing their love, while I scoff and nonchalantly dismiss the notion that people actually need an official day to care about others. Personally, I prefer St. Patrick's Day, because you get pissed and tell everyone you love them anyway.

It's not to say February 14th means nothing to me, however. No, that couldn't be further from the truth. Today is a very special day, a momentous day when I too may express my gratitude toward someone important.

TODAY IS STEVE McNAIR'S BIRTHDAY.

Yaaaayyyy Steeeeeeeve! It seems that, in some unique way, every Valentine's Day is a chance for me to celebrate in my own special way. So I'd like for everyone to take just a moment of their time on February 14th to remember... Steve cares.

And as he does, I hope that everyone has a safe and happy McValentine's Day. Especially Sarah, who kicks ass for sending me a message. I read it when I was like halfway through this blog so I had to make things cheerier midway in. lol

So be sure this day of love, respect and McNair, to let somebody know you're thinking of 'em. Be that a mysterious love interest, a good old pal, or that monster RIGHT BEHIND YOU (aah!!), it's always nice to show you care.