Outraged
Page 4
ONLY POSSIBLE REASONS NOT TO FLY WITH AIR NEW ZEALAND:
You own another airline.
You have won tickets on another airline.
Air New Zealand don’t fly to your destination.
You have vowed never to fly.
You are dysfunctional and obnoxious and may possibly want to travel at the same time to the same destination as me in business class.
You love being treated like an animal.
You are mad and desperate to experience PS on United. (For the meaning of ‘PS’, see later.)
You have a terminal aversion to clean planes.
You are desperate to arrive late, at the wrong destination.
QUESTIONS ABOUT AIR TRAVEL:
Why are people on planes so fuck’n stupid? ‘We have three selections: jet planes (lollies), a cookie or chips.’ How fuck’n hard is it to remember that? On a plane, very. If one more person next to me on a domestic flight asks, ‘What do you have again?’ you are going to need the flight marshal.
Why are people in so much of a hurry to open the overhead lockers when the plane stops? I want to be first!
Why do fuckers put their personal reading lights on and then go to sleep? You shits. Shits!
Why do you bring your children? Surely the constant crying is an indication that they don’t like it, you other-passenger abusers!
Why on internal flights in the States do the fatties sit next to me and the really fat sit on me?
Why do I have to queue at all with other people? Don’t you know who I am?
Why don’t you know who I am?
Why do some people seem not to be able to smell themselves?
Whose fault is it that I am so intolerant?
PERSONAL — MY CAREER AS A PROFESSIONAL PILOT:
I had two flying lessons in a fixed-wing aircraft many years ago when I was still quite poor. I realised that I could not afford enough lessons, and thought that the cheapest way to get my flying licence would be to qualify in a glider and then upskill to powered flight. I had one lesson in a glider and almost vomited over the instructor. I can safely say it was the worst flying experience of my life. And that from someone who has flown EgyptAir many times, been in a plane crash, and travelled Jetstar! So, no more lessons, and the flying career of perhaps the best pilot ever was nipped in the bud! Instead I built a helipad in my garden and hoped for an influx.
ANECDOTE:
When you fly LA to New York, try JetBlue. Quite a good price and quite a pleasant airline. Get a late-night flight and there can be a bit of a party mood. Let’s just say, as many purple potato chips washed down with as much Coke as you like. Do not fly American Airlines and do do do not fly United. I know you might get air points on your fuck’n Star Alliance card, but, believe me, it’s not worth it. I was flighting much as a pig is carried to market with United and was experiencing PS first hand. PS? I hear you ask. What alluring product of the sky is that? Well, I called over an aged denizen of air travel. An old, fat, poorly groomed flight attendant by the name of Judy. Let’s call her ‘Dirty Judy’. (And not in a good way.) She reluctantly and slowly approached my unclean seat, and I leant over the enormous belly of a smelly fat man to ask the meaning of ‘PS’. The letters adorned all of the soiled brochures in the ripped seat pocket lying on the floor by my feet. She scowled at me for a moment — or did she just pause, through a scowled face? ‘It’s “premium service”,’ she barked, and turned to leave. I interrupted the building momentum of her hooves with another brave and probing question. ‘And am I experiencing that now?’ I asked. She paused, much as a bull does the moment before he charges and plunges his mighty horns into your groin. Then Dirty Judy indignantly walked away, never to glance at me again.
Fuck’n shit airline. PS, my arse!
SUPPLEMENTARY ANECDOTE:
I arrived slightly late and during something of a war for a flight from an outback airstrip to Phnom Penh in Cambodia. Late, yes, but also that day’s only passenger, so perhaps a little respect would have been nice. The terminal was still smoking from mortar attack, and there were a number of dangerous uncordoned-off holes in the floor. I afforded them a little grace. They were, after all, experiencing slight unrest. As the plane nervously waited on the runway, two poorly dressed but well-armed youth rifled through my belongings and checked my ticket. (Where is Mike McRoberts with a spare flak jacket when you need him?) I was about to walk to the plane when they informed me of the airport charge of US$25. I said, ‘You have got to be fuck’n joking?’ And with that they threw my bags in a discus-like motion towards the plane and the contents scattered everywhere. ‘Move!’ they shouted at me with guns pointed. ‘You don’t want to miss your plane, bastard.’
‘Absolutely not,’ I thought, but kept quiet.
Lesson: just pay the $25.
NOT ANOTHER FUCK’N ANECDOTE:
I was flying over the parched desert of Southern Sudan. The six-seater was full. Alarmingly, I was sitting in what would be the copilot’s seat in a bigger aircraft. I could smell the Jim Beam wafting from every pore of the pilot, a rough old man in short-sleeved shirt and shorts. I think we were the only people on board who spoke English. During the flight I had been studying the instruments. ‘I may need to land this,’ I thought. ‘This guy’s not going to make it.’ He was certainly behaving oddly. About what I judged to be half an hour or so from our destination, he turned to me and spoke the words no passenger wants to hear: ‘Can you fly a plane?’
Normally my response to that question would be a somewhat arrogant ‘God, I haven’t flown for ages!’, but on this occasion I chose a little more honesty. ‘I can’t fly a plane,’ I said. ‘Fuck,’ he said.
Ten minutes passed and I plucked up the courage to enquire as to the meaning behind his question. He told me he had almost completely lost the feeling in his legs and would quite possibly require medical assistance prior to landing. I had already ascertained with a fair amount of certainty that no one else on the plane was going to be of any assistance, as, I am sure, had he. I told him I could fly the plane now, and he could do the best he could to massage the life back into his limbs for landing. He thought this was a great idea and handed me the controls with no words of wisdom. I was a pilot at last.
In the available space, he contorted his tired and alcohol-fuelled body. After some awkward twisting and rubbing, he reached the point where he thought he could land. We were in sight of the strip as he wedged himself in and I handed over the controls to my number two. We landed without incident, and I stood with some pride as my ramshackle cargo disembarked safely.
GENERALISATIONS
It is a fundamental cornerstone of communication: the ability to generalise rather than occupy huge amounts of time specifically itemising things and backing them up with concrete evidence. It is very economical and perfectly valid.
Example: Asians are bad drivers. Yes, they are. But, to many, true though that general statement is, it is offensive. Because they know an Asian — let’s call him Xinhow — who is a good driver. It is not possible to name Xinhow and all the other good Asian drivers, who you don’t know, in order to reassert that, as a proportion of bad drivers, Asians are more than holding their own. You see? Nothing wrong with generalisations at all.
So the next time you rudely interrupt someone in a pious tone, thinking you are correcting them, with a line like, ‘There are actually some quite nice homes there!’, just know this: you are a nit-picker. And your revelation has done nothing but slow down a conversation or monologue that quite correctly included the generalisation ‘Otara is a shit-hole’.
It is not necessary to flag that you are generalising. If the person or people you are talking with are too stupid or corrupted by their own prejudices to understand, you should save your breath.
SUPPLEMENTARY EXAMPLE:
Fat people just eat too much!
Really? My clinically obese Uncle Hohepa has a disease that prevents him from metabolising food the way we do. He is trapped in a body he c
an’t control …
Give me strength!
HOMOSEXUALS
Why is it that so many homosexuals allow themselves to be defined by their sexuality? It’s just bizarre. So often they campaign to be treated like everyone else, when their whole persona is captivated by homosexual affectations. I have found this to be more true of males than females. So many gay men act like they have just finished a shift on the men’s apparel floor at Grace Brothers. I know it must have been hard at school, but get over it! Move on.
I have been accused of being homophobic in the past, but I have also been accused of being homosexual. Again proving that I am a perfectly balanced human being. (On one occasion I was stopped in the street in Australia by a fan. The bloke said how much he liked me on air. I introduced him to my girlfriend, who was standing next to me, and in true Aussie style he flinched and said, ‘Shit, mate, I always thought you were a homo! Good on ya!’)
Homosexuals have to understand this: you are not special just because you are gay. The world does not need to stand aside and recognise you for your ability to have sex with your own kind. It’s not a skill. A party trick, perhaps, but not a skill. You don’t need to show off your sexuality in public, it’s not clever. And you certainly don’t need special treatment from others. Making homosexuality a circus act is entirely counter-productive.
Now it’s time for me to use the line ‘Some of my best friends are …’ Well, they are. And for the most part you wouldn’t instantly know they are, because they are getting on with their lives as human beings not sexual freaks. Having said that, I do have some close friends who are sexual freaks.
I have long been of the opinion that we all fit somewhere between 100 per cent heterosexual and 100 per cent homosexual. To explain my hypothesis I have created a diagram:
On this scale of 0–100, 0 is completely homosexual and 100 completely heterosexual. Therefore 50 is completely bisexual. In my vast life experience, it seems to me few if any are either 0 or 100. Arguably, the higher your score the more ‘normal’ you are. I concede that the closer you are to 50 the more fun life could be!
So where are you?
If this is your book, pop your name on the line and your score in the box.
As this is also my book I will fill my score in too.
You see: dangerously close to having a great deal of fun indeed.
Those who have called me homophobic in the past will be eating their words now. Those who have accused me of being homosexual will feel at least partly vindicated.
ANECDOTE:
when I was in my late teens, early twenties, I worked at the BBC, mostly in Bristol, England. As you can see from my BBC ID, I could have been viewed as something of a drawcard to predators with sexual intent. Indeed they did exist in some not insubstantial number, but my personality was such that I batted them off with gay abandon.
I was actually taken out to a gay establishment by Quentin Crisp. That is my very biggest run-in with homosexual royalty. But perhaps the loveliest gay-related story I have from that time took place in a jeweller’s shop on Park Street in Bristol.
I was walking home from work and called in to look at watches I could never have afforded. It was a big flash jeweller’s and quite intimidating. There were two old ladies prowling through a tray of rings under the watchful and stern supervision of a dark-suited sales gentleman. After some time the bell on the front door rang as a magnificently dressed man swept in with a small and sycophantic entourage. The man was actually wearing a black cape with a black velvet hat, a silk scarf, and carrying a cane. I was standing quite close to the old women and could easily hear them saying, ‘Look, look, it’s him. That one from that show!’ They were both very excited.
At the same time the sales assistant rudely folded away their ring tray and abandoned them. He called for extra help and walked over to the entourage. ‘Good afternoon, Mr Inman. Thank you so much for coming in, sir. How can we be of service?’
The old women had missed the rudeness and were overcome with excitement. John Inman was at the height of his fame, and I, too, was somewhat star-struck (67!). However, clearly Inman had not missed the rudeness, or for that matter the excitement of his female crowd. He did not answer the salesman, but paused and walked directly over to the women. He smiled at me (67!!), turned to the old ladies and said, ‘It should not be hard to find rings for such beautiful women’, and as they melted in his presence he beckoned over a different salesman. I left the shop some time later with Inman still helping his fan base find a ring. They were having the time of their lives. He was a true gentleman.
RELATED COMMENT:
Theatrical gays can be quite fun.
IMMIGRATION
Do you ever wonder how some people managed to migrate to New Zealand? I do!
I am reasonably happy with our refugee policy. Reasonably. I do have deep concerns, though, with the desire of some in our country to obey without question the directives of the United Nations. It can utter the most ridiculous statements at times. And, quite frankly, any organisation that elevates a country like Sudan to a position of global influence must be phenomenally flawed. So far as giving a voice to the dangerous fool of a leader of Iran, I can see why it does, but God give me strength! Suffice to say, the United Nations is no better than a necessary evil.
There is a simple test we must apply to everyone seeking to immigrate to our beautiful country. Are they people we need, or people who need us? If the latter, the answer to their application must be no.
It seems to me that we hunt globally for nutters, the needy, and those who are likely to cluster. How ridiculous! Part of the test should be their desire and ability to integrate into our society. If they can’t speak English, how can they integrate? If they are not prepared to learn English prior to their application, they clearly have no desire to integrate. Answer: no!
New Zealand is a very desirable country in which to live. And we should welcome those who will contribute positively. The more positively, the easier it should be for them to gain access. So far as bringing family, the same test should apply. If you choose to migrate to another country and your family can’t get in: your choice, not the country’s. Tough!
NOTE TO MIGRANTS:
This is New Zealand, not the country you are seeking to abandon. You have chosen this country for the life benefits it affords. Be part of enforcing these and improving our lifestyle for us all. Do not try and recreate a compound of the life and country you have left behind. If you have no interest in being an active, positive part of our beautiful land, bugger off. If do you have an interest, thank God for you.
IPADS
I understand the point of the iPad. Invent a new device that fits a new section of an existing market that you have created for the sole purpose of exploiting. It is the sort of concept Hitler would have come up with had he not been forced into that bunker with that awful Braun woman. (So awful was she that he was forced to kill himself after less than 40 hours of marriage.) Anyway, Hitler, Jobs. You get the point.
The key thing in being successful with this strategy is that you must not create a device that is so capable that it replaces one you are already exploiting. And so we have the most frustratingly useful bit of electronic crap on the planet. The iPad is to writing what handcuffs are to sculpture. Why is it so bloody shitty?!
I concede I have made no attempt to upskill myself on the subtle nuances of the iPad’s operating thing, but for Christ’s sake, it’s 2013. The thing should just be perfect. Shit!
ANECDOTE:
I have just realised: it’s NOT 2.30pm yesterday. My iPad is on LA time. Bloody bastard thing — trying to sabotage my whole day.
So I went into settings and typed ‘Auckland’ — just Auckland — and instantly it updated the time and date. Quite clever!
QUESTION:
Why are apostrophes on a different screen? Shit!
LOUIS VUITTON
It’s a fine balance in a luxury shop between sophisticated and classy,
and just poncey and snobby. The big chains like LV, Prada and Tiffany’s mostly get it spot-on. They know you can’t always judge a book by its cover. Sometimes the most unlikely looking and even behaving visitors to their stores can be big purchasers. But they are selling an experience as well as a product, so it needs to be a notch or two up on Kmart. And at their prices it needs to be rolled in glitter.
I am just as at home in either environment. But I think that, perhaps as a direct result of being at the very bottom of the social ladder for quite some time when I was young, I do like a nice environment and good service. However, for the same reason, I do expect quality. If I am paying a shit-load of money for something, I expect it to be perfect.
So, I went into Louis Vuitton to get a briefcase. I knew exactly the style I was after. I went into two LV stores and found the perfect one. Not the all-leather one for US$9,850 plus tax, but the half-canvas half-leather one for US$5,400 plus tax. Lucy, my eldest daughter, was with me and could see that I was about to buy it. It was so much nicer than the all-leather one, and with tax would still have been under US$6,000. You know, it was a thing of true beauty, and a pleasure, almost an honour, to hold. The male attendant could also see I was about to buy it, as he had one (and only one) so untouched that it still had the protective plastic on the silver catches. Then he said that the complimentary key case would be engraved for free with my initials, and we all knew that I was about to part with a lot of money. Even the two suited security guards. I almost frothed at the mouth at the thought of getting anything for free at Louis Vuitton. That, like, never happens. I looked in the mirror, under the salesman’s instruction, to see just how good I looked holding it, despite the appalling clothes I was wearing above my jandals.