Posts by Felix Marwick
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Ever stopped to consider that maybe we're just not that good?
We don't have the money or the player base that Australia does. They have a huge advantage over us and so too do several other cricketing nations.
We finished about where we deserved to. Maybe one day a World Cup will be ours but I'd venture to say it'd be regarded as an upset.
Having said that - I'm a lot happier about the state of NZ cricket than I was 13 years ago.
-
Our track record at the World Cup predicates a loss in the semi-finals.
However I live and hope.
Nevertheless I'm reminded of the adage;
"the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. However that's the way to bet"
-
has anyone noticed that they always have experts walking past or towards the camera before they're interviewed.
it kind of says, "look dr. [whogivesashitreally] can walk in a straight line! s/he is therefore someone you should listen to attentively!
If I may give away a few trade secrets.
That's probably a sign the story is short on pictures. That technique is usually done to give some sort of vision over the script and is quite common in stories which, while worthy, are a bugger to find exciting pics for (eg finance, insurance etc)
Other tricks include;
the reading a document/computer screen shot
the making a cup of tea shot
the two shot (ie ws of reporter and interviewee)
the noddie (ie mcu of reporter - usually to cover an edit in a quote/grab) -
Well in the world of weird opening lines in novels Peter F Hamilton has surely made a stellar contribution.
"Suzi crapped the Frankenstein cockroach into the toilet bowl, then pushed the chrome handle halfway down for a short flush."
THE NANOFLOWER.Out of the 600+ books I own none have an opening sentence that can top that. I keep buying more in the chance that I will find one.
-
If you are into WW1 literature I'd recommend a novel called "Her Privates We". It's author was anonymous and only went by a serial number of his dog tags.
Very well written and quite chilling in places
-
I wouldn't say these books are life changing but to me they'r a bit like old friends that I visit on regular occasions.
Julian - Gore Vidal
I Claudius & Claudius The God - Robert Graves.And when I feel like something a little twisted there's always Colin Wilson's A Criminal History of Mankind. If you haven't read it get a copy immediately. You don't have to read it cover to cover just open to a random page and prepare to blow your mind (ie the Pope did what??!!)
Of course I've had (and to a certain extent retain) a fascination for absolute trashy sci-fi. Hugh Cook is quite droll in the way he manages to poke fun at the entire genre, and George R.R. Martin is possibly the best developer of depth of character in fantasy writing for decades
-
Never mind Auckland, and forget about America. When it comes to true paranoia and the full security rigmarole try flying El Al out of Tel Aviv.
Admittedly they have good reason to take especial care but I was a little taken aback at the treatment I got (and this was before 9/11).
I'd heeded the warnings about their rigorous procedures and check my bags in 2 days in advance in Jerusalm. All my gear was gone through with a fine tooth comb. Poked, prodded, xrayed, wrapped up in special security tape and then locked up in a specal conatiner which they sent to the airport.
After checking in the same procedure was repeated a further three times. The last one done just 10 metres away (in the same room) as the previous bag rummage had been carried out. In fact the person who had made me empty my bag the first time managed to come and oversee the third repeat of the experience. I can only assume he was making sure his colleagues hadn't slipped a small terrorist in my backpack when his back was turned.
To cap it off they refused to carry my nargile pipe because it was a security risk. However they were quite happy for me to airfreight it out on another airline. I guess their reasoning was "well as long as it's not our plane that goes up in smoke ...."
Oh and a travel tip; when entering Israel from Jordan do not walk across the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge. Especially if you're wearing a Palestinian kheffiyah. For some reason it makes the border guards very nervous/
-
Just to clarify.
The DPS weren't called in. They were already there as is standard practice during such ocasions. The ousting was actually done by the police, albeit likely at the behest of the DPS, and as a result of Chinese pressure.
All in all a pretty reprehensible turn of events.
-
And there's absolutely no truth to the rumour Bob was last seen boating with Freddie Flintoff.
-
This one comes from my teenage years and occurred during that phase where you've discovered beer and are trying to discover girls. It's not the best party I've ever been to but it's certainly one I remember. At the time my friends and I were very big on finding a parent free place on a Saturday night and drinking ourselves into a complete state of paralytic dysfunction.
And for you temperate types it was a case of how we were drinking AND what we were drinking! Vodka and orange in a cask and 16 year old boys go together kind of like Serbs and Croats. Explosive and messy. Still it was the done thing in those days and if I could remember more about it I'm sure I might regret some of it.
Anyway the weekend arrived when my parents were going to be away so it was my turn to provide the venue. My parents weren't complete fools, having raised teenage boys before, so my mother gave me a stern lecture before they departed. Lots of talk about how I was not to have a party, and how they'd know if I dared try such a thing. Like the devious teen I was I simply nodded agreement while trying to figure out how I could score their brandy without them noticing.
Message received, understood, and totally ignored.
Sure enough later that day my friends duly arrived well and truly stocked up courtesy of the Motueka Hotel which, in those days, was a notoriously soft touch for teens seeking alcoholic refreshment. Apart from a minor fatal incident involving a Morris Minor and a duck that was in the wrong place at the wrong time things started out reasonably calmly.
Predictably it didn't last long. With the stereo blaring and drinking games well underway the evening descended into a rosy alcoholic haze. It was somewhere between the sophistication of Whiz Boing Bounce, and the elegant simplicity of Next that things started to go horribly wrong.
For some peculiar reason in those days I had a very silly habit of trying to hide while drunk. Tree tops and roofs were my speciality. Unfortunately for me my efforts at trying to conceal myself on the top of the water tanks on the top of the house were a spectacular failure. I'd left an errant leg out in plain sight and a good friend , who went by the nickname Sickie (more on him soon), spied said leg and gave it a tug. Yours truly falls off the top of the house, landing on my back, on the river boulder paved area beneath. If I hadn't have been completely munted at the time I suspect it would have hurt like buggery. Needless to say my evening came to a premature end as my friends bundled me off to bed.
It spared me from some of the horror that was to come.
I awoke the next morning with a King of hangovers and a seriously stuffed back. It was one of those mornings when you're so bad that it takes you a good half hour just to sit up. So here I was clawing my way through my misery and I heard the worst words a teenager can ever hear when he's had an illicit party in his parents' home.
"I've leaned it up and I think it's OK".
Oh bollocks!
It turns out that after my evening came to an end that of my friends, and in particular Sickie's, continued in fine form. Single-handedly he managed to demolish a 3 litre cask of vodka and orange mix (this stuff was so vile you wouldn't even want to use it as paint stripper) and then passed out on the couch. At some stage in the wee hours of the morning his stomach decided it wasn't going to put up with this cruel and unusual punishment and voided its entire contents on the floor.
Right in the middle of the living room.
Let me make it quite clear this wasn't your everyday chunder. It was no hiccup with solids, it was the full stomach stretch. You know, the one that exercises every muscle between your thighs and your eyes. Sickie (you might understand how he came by his nickname by now) left a veritable lake of vomit on the floor.
The problems arose when another of my friends, who for decency's sake shall remain nameless, attempted to clean it up. His intentions were noble, but his abilities fell well short of the mark. He vaguely remembered something his mother had once told him about talcum powder being good at removing stains and tried to match theory to action. Dumping half a container of talcum powder on a very large, and very liquid, puke puddle produced a morass that quickly set like concrete.
This is where I came in. To a group of teenage boys, surrounded by empty beer cans, and the occasional bourbon bottle, looking intently at one of the worst examples of ecological terrorism I've ever seen. Naturally they thought it was hilarious. I was less enthused for patently obvious reasons.
So my colleagues in crime were hastily evicted while I was left with 8 hours to remove the evidence. All the windows were opened in a vain attempt to get the stench of puke out of the air. A heater was switched on high and set in place to dry the stain. A stain, which I swear expanded the more I looked at it. As portions of it dried I attacked it with a stiff broom blasting particles of puke and talcum powder into the air and across the living room. A duster and vacuum cleaner were then hastily enlisted to the cause.
After hours of labour I was left with a huge pale splodge in the middle of the living room. To my mind I was a dead man walking as there was no way I was going to get away with it. In a last fit of desperation, even as I spied my parents driving up the road, I rolled the couch over the top of the evidence then sat down and put on the best facade of cool calm and collected I could manage.
In walked my parents.
"How was the weekend?"
"Not bad, pretty quiet" said the nervous son.
"I see you've cleaned the place up a bit - oh and moved the couch"
"Yeah I thought it being winter and all it'd be nice to have it a bit closer to the fire"Silence. Nervous sweating. Apprehension. And then - nothing.
Blow me down if I didn't get away with it!
Well not completely of course. When spring came round and the weather warmed up and the couch was rolled back .... then there were some issues.
"WHAT THE HELL?!"
"Umm you know that weekend you were away and told me not to have a party and told me you'd know if I did ... well ..."