Break free from the Gulag’s shackles you Country Bumpkins.
Welcome to my blog.
I’ve stopped counting them now, but I plan on doing them now once a week. I have been uploading them about 2 or 3 times a week, which is fine, but I’m feeling a lack of structure and with so many projects on the go, I need to give it a time slot.
I got a few good responses for the last few, especially the one about life scripts and how they dictate the way we live out our lives.
If you are a new reader, I suggest you go back to the start.
I give them fucked up names, so I can’t point you directly to that one. I apologise.
I’ve found a real example of what I meant though.
I have a 7 year old girl, but when she was 2, I was tasked with looking after her at the weekends because my gorgeous wife needed to get some free time. I still do this.
I’m a lazy parent, and I’d often just leave her without a nappy and panty and she’d just shit and piss in the garden. Like a cat I guess.
When the missus caught her doing this, she proceeded to tell her that she should stop doing that and that a snake will rise from the grass and nip her on the fanny.
Ever since then she has never been comfortable in public toilets or even worse, wizzing outside. Understably so, but yesterday she had a groundbreaking and liberating experience.
I took her down to the beach for a bit of air and so I can get out as well. We were looking at dead crabs and shit. Poking them with sticks.
She told me she had to pee. Now this was level 3, and public toilets are closed.
She was busting, and I could see it. She’d just drunk a whole juice as well.
It took me 30 minutes to convince her that she needed to go by the rocks. She was bawling crying by this point, asking about snakes.
But eventually she sat down and took the wee.
That night I asked her how she felt and told her to journal it. She said it was so scary and decided to draw a picture rather than write about it.
Pretty gas picture though. I’m not sure why she looks like a frog.
Be careful what you tell your kids, those things will stick.
So I said I was going to talk about weed.
There’s been a lot of negative press around the use of recreational cannabis these days, especially since the referendum is now looming as New Zealand are slowly beating this Covid shit.
There was a coffin dodger on TV earlier this week talking about the negative effects of participating in the consumption of the Devil’s lettuce.
Some points he brought up was that the weed is being cut with things like glass and rat poison, which is true. He also said that the high levels of THC are dangerous for people who have pre-existing mental health issues. Also true.
THC is the part of cannabis that makes you high. The counter to this is something called CBD. CBD is the chemical that is medicinal. This chemical counteracts the THC, and good ethical weed has a good balance of the two.
He also said that it is a big contributor to petty crime.
I then realised something.
This old goblin was correct about all the negative aspects of weed, and he had me sold. But then I meditated on it.
Yes, he was correct, but all of those negative effects are because it is illegal. If weed was legal and regulated, none of these negative points would exist.
It would be ethically sourced and grown and wouldn’t need any cutting. You could choose your strain, and over the top levels of THC would not exist. That’s only a result of Hydroponic growth, because of hiding the process. There’d be no need for thieving and shit, because it could be bought anywhere. Imagine now going to a dealer and asking for some good quality weed with a balanced level of THC and CBD?
He’d tell you to fuck off, and take this little baggy that smells like boiled cabbage and durian.
If it was legal, you could scrutinize the quality.
If alcohol was illegal the same thing would be happening with that.
People will be drinking shit that was brewed in toilets and garages. We’d be drinking fucking White Lightning and Moonshine and going blind. We’d be drinking homemade whiskey cut with anti-freeze and petrol made by criminals. It’s happened before.
But because alcohol is legal and regulated, none of the negative impacts that the old guy pointed out would apply. Had it been illegal, he would be saying the same shit about grog.
Here is my genius idea.
Pubs and clubs are the last businesses to open because of the Covid lockdown.
And if you’ve seen the ridiculous rules and regulations around how they will have to operate, you’d see that it is never going to work.
It will only be table service, which sounds lovely, but if you’ve ever been in a New Zealand pub, you will know that that can only ever be fantasy. The patrons are usually vomiting into each other’s mouths, forget face masks.
Social distancing will never work. Not forgetting the toilet situation after all the pints. People will be pissing in their pants if they’re not allowed to leave their tables.
Why not make weed legal and turn those pubs into marijuana cafes?
I don’t smoke weed often, but I know that it does not make you as belligerent as booze does. One could easily social distance when being high on weed.
So you can still go out and socialize, you can still get buzzed. It’s just not as mad.
Plus if it is to become legal, it will also be regulated. Thus a whole new industry can emerge from that. Growers, warehouses, retailers and everything else that come with a new industry.
It will be taxed as well, so the economy will get back to its feet quick smart. The negatives that old coffin dodger was talking about would be rendered obsolete because the industry will be taken out of the hands of criminals.
I know I said that I won’t talk politics on here, but I’m voting a resounding ‘yes’ on the referendum. I suggest you do the same.
For the sake of humanity vote ‘YES’ to legalize the use of recreational cannabis in New Zealand.
With that rant out of the way, please enjoy the following short story. It is fiction, but it’s based on a mad dream I had.
Oh wait, my weekly begging first.
I’m obligated to tell you that I get paid a small fee if anyone purchases these trinkets below via my Hoplink.
https://e83e2xqydey9ncyhqa0yocjrav.hop.clickbank.net/
This story below is a shortened version of a short story I have on my Anthology on my Patreon.
I will urge you to support my Patreon if you enjoy the content.
For the price of a cup of coffee per month, you could help me do something I love.
https://www.patreon.com/Blacksheepwriting?fan_landing=true
Enjoy the following shortened version of a short story.
Content warning:
The story has sexual and suicidal themes. It also contains drug use.
You have been warned.
One Degree of Separation
I’m not sure where to begin with this story.
I should have a coffee. No wait, I should tell the story first and then have a coffee. Maybe also a smoke, because I know that nobody will believe me. They’ll call me fucking mad and send me to the assylum.
Forgive me if this does not follow the usual chronological order of storytelling, but not even I’m sure what happened.
So I met this girl in the club, the one outside Queen Street. The one with the homeless people outside, I know there are many clubs with bums outside, but this one seems to always have the most. I guess the patrons there are more generous.
At around 1am she decided that we needed to find some quiet outside so we could have a chat. So we did.
The homeless lads didn’t really care, nor did they bother us. The intention was never to have a chat, you know the score.
She was drinking gin all night and as you know, gin is one of those drinks that really dries out the inside of your mouth like turpentine, especially if you’re having it with tonic.
Her tongue felt like when your cat licks you, that moist dryness that feels like it will smooth out your skin, like 1200 grit wet and dry. Pleasant, but uncomfortable, with a hint of concern.
She was aware of this and popped some gum from a foil wrapper into her mouth and then we continued eating the face off each other. It didn’t improve that texture and I didn’t even feel the gum in her mouth, I needed to end all this before all my tastebuds flattened. So I fingered the box off her right there in front of the bums.
They didn’t really pay attention anyway, they must see this kind of thing regularly.
Her phone buzzed and she had to leave, she was done anyway. My fingers had those wrinkles on them that you get when you do the washing up, that’s usually the indication of a job well done.
My night was played out by then and I was hungry. I usually lose my mates every weekend, so I decided to go home on my own. I would usually catch an Uber, but that night I decided to take the bus. I like the bus, I can stick in my headphones and listen to Joe Rogan talking to Alex Jones. That conversation never gets old.
Not one to forget custom, I made a beeline for the kebab shop.
Even shitfaced, I can follow the smell of the fragrant shallots that’s always hissing on one of the stovetops. I always find it.
There’s an Arab guy that works there, probably the only sober person in the city on the weekends. I never quite understood him. Not the way he speaks or anything, I’m not a racist. Just the fact that he is probably my age and is happy to work on Saturday nights while we all partied.
He looked a bit like Aladdin, very handsome, with that shaved solid stubble that only Middle Eastern handsome men get. He knew me by name and we’d often chat, mostly about football, but sometimes about his dream of studying medicine. We even shared numbers, I consider him a friend.
He wasn’t at the counter, but I know what I saw when I peered over to see if he was there.
What I saw is hard to describe in words and it’s a little bit embarrassing.
I saw a camel.
Not a real camel, but a two dimensional cartoon depiction of a camel. He was wearing a fez and was smiling at me. It was weird, it looked a bit like in that episode of the Simpsons when Homer entered the real world, but not even that felt as real as this. Homer did not cast a shadow, but this camel did.
All of a sudden the camel gets pulled through the door that leads to the back entrance of the shop and onto the pavement, so I rush around to see it properly.
There was nothing there. I did a triple take.
“Niall,” I hear Ahmed say from the counter.
I go back around to the font.
“I just saw a camel,” I said to him.
He looked tired and sweaty, not as calm as he usually was.
“A camel? Why will there be a camel here in a kebab shop?” he retorted with a laugh.
“I know what I saw Ahmed. And I’ll report this place if you don’t tell me what’s going on,” I said to him.
I could see his face change as he leaned his body over the counter.
“Ok, I will show you something. You know that song ‘A whole new World’?” he asked.
“Pebo Bryson?”
“Yes, that song is about real life, I’ll show you,” he flipped up the counter and ushered me in.
He opened up the door that leads back to Queen Street and a light beamed back up at us. I know what you’re thinking. This is like that Narnia movie right? But it’s not the same, the light was bright, but not warm.
Usually when faced with that level of brightness, the photons will generate heat on your skin. This light was ambient, and it shared the same temperature as the cold November evening.
“Are you sure you wanna go in?” he asked me.
And before I can reply, I see that camel smiling at me again.
“There he is,” I pointed.
Ahmed laughed “You know too much already,” and he walked through.
He was now wearing a blue waistcoat and a white grey pants that were flaring out like those MC Hammer pants from the early nineties.
He had a gleaming over exaggerated smile with perfect white teeth. It looked like Ahmed for sure, but it wasn’t Ahmed. He was a cartoon version of Ahmed and he looked like Aladdin. It was Aladdin, I’ve seen that movie many times as a kid.
Back in 2000 when I was six, when my Mom and Dad were arguing they would put it on to distract me. Even when my Dad walked out on us, they left me to watch it. They always argued about him doing his painting so much, he spent a lot of time in the garage. I loved that movie, and I knew Ahmed was Aladdin now.
I stepped through the door to see this Whole New World.
It was just like the movie. There was a market and people walking around. There were anthropomorphic animals wearing human clothes.
I checked if I was a cartoon, but I wasn’t. I felt like Bob Hoskins in that movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit. It’s hard to explain.
“You are not the only real human here,” Ahmed said.
“I don’t understand,” I reply.
He whistles into the air and a flying carpet turns up. He mounted the carpet with the dexterity of a parkour athlete with no regard to the laws of gravity or the universe.
He pulled me up, I felt weightless.
We fly over the land and I marvel at the flat landscape below.
“Where’s Jasmine?” I ask.
“Jasmine? She works nights in your world, she’s a bartender.”
Before I could reply, we swooped down to a little hill that overlooked a ravine.
There was a man there, he was painting on an easel.
Ahmed drops me off and says nothing.
I approached the man from behind, looking at his painting.
“All I wanted to do was paint,” the familiar voice said.
“Da? Is that you?” I asked.
“Yes, it is me son,” he said calmly as he placed down the pallet and turned.
“I thought you were dead Da? They found your body and everything? You hung yourself?”
“I’m not dead son, I’ve never been dead. I’ve always lived. I’ve lived in you. Your hopes, your dreams, the way you rub your hands together when you are nervous or confused,” he said as he placed his hands on my shoulder.
I stop rubbing my hands, I’m not nervous anymore.
He hasn’t aged at all, but I’m not bothered by this. Nothing was making sense, but it felt like everything was making sense.
“I miss you Da, every day” I said to him.
“Missing me is why I am not dead. The reason why you miss people is because they live on in you. Nothing to do with spirits, my boy. It is our memories, and memories are what make us,”
I understood, then I grabbed my phone out.
“Can I take a picture?” I ask.
He smiles that cheeky smile and I do a selfie of the two of us.
“Well you best be on your way, I need to paint. All I ever wanted to do is paint,” he said.
“That’s how I feel about write Da, but the real world doesn’t allow that,”
“Don’t set up your own regret, when I came here……”
I felt a sharp pain in my chest as I gasped for air.
“You fucking kids are gonna kill yourselves,” a voice screams into my ear.
A fat nurse flings open the curtain and I look over to the next bed.
It was that girl from last night. I grabbed my phone to text Ahmed.
Me : WTF happened last night….
Ahmed : What you mean?
Me: At the shop?
Ahmed: Dunno, I wasn’t working
I’m confused for a moment still laying there with my Samsung in hand.
“That was a mad fucking trip wasn’t it,” the girl next to me says.
I feel a deep sense of sadness, it felt so real.
I check my phone again to see what I got up to, I usually have to recap my boozy nights by looking at my social media and snaps.
And there it is, the selfie I took with my Dad, just us, a white background and his painting of the ravine still sitting on the easel.
