Taking its toll

Brendan texted me yesterday to say that Robin Williams had taken his own life. Williams’ untimely death shocked the world. How can someone so talented who has given so much pleasure to so many people be so utterly depressed as to want to end it all? Poor mental health is a huge problem in our society and it shouldn’t take an A-list celebrity suicide to get people talking about it. Every year about 300 people are killed on New Zealand’s roads. Road deaths are readily reported on the news. You can find the figures all over the internet, and they’re updated almost daily. Road casualties are broken down month-by-month, by age, location, and type of road user. And wouldn’t you know it? NZ road fatalities are in steady decline. We’re all becoming better drivers and our roads are becoming less dangerous. But while the road toll is decreasing, over 500 New Zealanders are killing themselves every year, and that figure isn’t going down. Just imagine for a minute that suicide statistics were displayed so prominently and in such detail on a government website, and updated every time a suicide was confirmed. Suicides would be the second or third item on radio news bulletins. Millions of dollars of taxpayer money would be spent on suicide-prevention adverts, specifically targeting those most at risk. By tracking the stats, you’d know exactly who those at-risk people are because, guess what, they aren’t the same people they were in 1994. Knowledge is power. Yes, John Kirwan’s depression campaign has been a definite help, but so far it feels like we’ve only just scratched the surface of the problem. Depression, and suicide in particular, still seems to be largely a taboo subject.

I talked to Brendan on the phone last night. We talked about Mark, a 23-year-old guy who, for a while, attended both the Auckland autism group and the North Shore men’s depression group. He died on a sunny afternoon in August 2011 when his car crossed the centre line and collided with a truck. I don’t think it was ever determined whether or not it was suicide. Mark had a combination of mental health and other conditions: depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia and Asperger’s, although I never would have guessed he was on the spectrum. He was what I’d call a “pretty boy”, and he had a habit of getting closer to women than they might like. He came from a well-off family north of Auckland; I don’t think he had a good relationship with his parents. In September 2010 he wanted to move away from home and he asked me if I’d take him on as a flatmate. I said no, using the age gap as an excuse, but really I knew he’d be hard work with all his conditions. If I’d said yes, he might still be alive today. If a butterfly flaps its wings and all that.

 

The autism group on Monday worked rather well. Our facilitator had to leave at short notice but that wasn’t a problem – we were more than capable of facilitating ourselves. My phone app – remember that? – cropped up in conversation. If I’m ever going to create apps or games myself, perhaps my best bet is to make a Facebook game.

Here's a great article on FiveThirtyEight about Nigel Richards, the Kiwi Scrabble player who is number one in the world by some distance and gets virtually zero recognition here in New Zealand. He's almost a recluse and is Zen-like when he plays Scrabble. Both his interests are obsessions: Scrabble and cycling. If he wasn't somewhere on the spectrum, I'd be surprised.

Here's another good article from Joe Bennett, describing a moneyed suburb of Auckland. He's right - house prices have reached almost mythical levels in that city. Things were bad enough when I looked at properties in 2009. The no-price thing was a real turn-off. I'd look at a place and ask an agent for just the first figure of the price. Three or four? Four or five? Give me a clue. Of course if I'd actually bought, we'd be talking six or seven now. But that was 2009, the year when my income peaked. I'd be really surprised if I ever earn as much in real terms as I did then, and I knew that even then (and if by some miracle I do make that much, it won't be from a salary). The earning power of a graduate is "supposed" to peak around fifty; mine peaked in my late twenties. Going back to the article, Joe Bennett has a remarkable knack of making mundane things, like that road sweeper, sound interesting, almost beautiful.

I had my Chinese lesson tonight. I still think it'll be ages until I can speak vaguely comprehensible Mandarin, if I ever do. And as for reading or writing it, that will take even longer. At the moment we're using pinyin, which is the most popular Romanisation system. The design of the system was headed by Zhou Youguang, a remarkable man who is still alive at 108. The Language Log blog is interesting reading. It covers Chinese quite often. The latest post on the blog, written by Victor Mair, features a Chinese restaurant menu. The two most impressive things in that post (to me) are that: (a) the Chinese have at least seven words for cabbage, and (b) Victor Mair knows them all.

My car failed its warrant. I'm not surprised. It's got some fairly large patches of rust on both of the front pillars. I'm getting the patches repaired for now, but all this rust will probably be end of my car eventually.

It feel like rust patches are sprouting all over this blog too. I don't think my writing is up to much these days, and I don't enjoy it as much as I used to either. So we might be nearing the end.

What is this? (and some photos)

I've had enough of this, whatever this is. I suppose that's the problem - this feels like nothing.
Would it really matter if I didn't show up to work tomorrow? If anything, work has improved. I'm back in the same mode I started this role in, where I coped by pretending my job was only a temporary one.

I've been to the movies twice in the last three days, without paying a cent either time. A year ago, to celebrate the anniversary of my apartment purchase, my real estate agent gave me two free tickets at the Penthouse in Brooklyn. They didn't expire, and I only used them on Sunday when I took Kevin to see Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. For me it was an education as much as anything. Last week another movie invite landed in my letterbox - a special showing of Saving Mr Banks, after work today, with my agent and dozens of other buyers present. Many of those buyers were talking to the agent, and each other, and it all seemed a bit weird to me. I'd seen Mary Poppins a couple of times, so it was worth seeing. So two movies at no expense, other than the $354,000 I spent on my apartment.

Today at work I realised how much the coffee machine sounded like one of my colleagues. I didn't realise a lot else. I went to a job agency at lunchtime and spoke to an intimidatingly tall woman and an intimidatingly short man and handed over my CV (which was described as "almost unique") and felt a bit embarrassed and intimidated. "What, ideally, are you looking for?" Probably nothing you're likely to have available.

After work, I had 45 minutes to kill before the movie. I sat in a park, if you can call it that. There were purple flowers I hadn't noticed before. Lots of them. Were they rhododendrons? I wasn't sure. A man with striped trousers and a similar bag stuck up a poster for a band, well several bands, one of which was called Zambel or Bamzel or something. Most of the names would have been really good for word games if they were actual words. At the bottom of Cuba Street a busker in a crazy oversized woolly cardigan was singing and playing his guitar. He had a sign asking for 15.6 quintillion dollars to rebuild the Death Star. I gave him a dollar in 20-cent pieces.

The Winter Olympics in Sochi are now under way. The cost, estimated to be US$50 billion, is utterly obscene. By comparison, the Lillehammer games in 1994, which I really enjoyed at the time (partly because Britain got two medals, woohoo) cost a little over a billion, which still seems like a shedload of money. When I watch the summer games I think, if I was competing I'd embarrass myself. With the winter games I think, if I was competing I would die.

Here are some photos of my South Island trip:

A farmhouse at Stumps Corner, not too far from Temuka but it feels like you're a million miles from anywhere. There's a loose railway theme, and a sign on the right gives the latitude: 44 degrees and 11 minutes. In a long, thin country like New Zealand, perhaps longitude doesn't matter much. In Chile you could almost locate a place by latitude alone.

An old tram, with what's left of Christ Church Cathedral

The Catholic Basilica on Barbadoes Street

Some Christchurch street art -- from Wellington

A mess. And one of the many car parks.

Building frontage shored up by containers

Lyttelton - a ship being loaded with logs

Time just gets away from us

I now take one beta-blocker tablet four times a day. Or at least that's what I'm supposed to do. On Friday morning I wasn't thinking, and I took all four pills at once. My instinct was that I'd be fine but I Googled "propranolol overdose 40 mg" just in case. I brought up one of those "answers" sites: the first poster told me I needn't worry; the next said I'd die a horrible all-caps death. I then called the 0800 number given on the fact sheet that came with the pills. "You'll need to go to hospital and be monitored for the next eight hours." Shit. I rang my work colleague to say I probably wouldn't be coming in - she was on a train and couldn't really hear me, although she was as clear as a bell to me. She rang me back when I was in the hospital car park. Then I rang her again, accidentally. God I hate my phone. I have some element of control over it when it's in my hand (and texting is easier than it was on my dumb phone) but when it's in my pocket, all bets are off. These accidental calls and texts chew through my credit. I can lock it but it unlocks itself somehow, and all the settings change themselves, including minor things like whether my phone actually rings when I receive a call. Anyway I arrived at the emergency desk and was presented with several forms. Because of my accent I was given an extra form to do with NZ residency. One of the questions asked when I'd be leaving the country. At this rate, pretty damn soon. They took my pulse and blood pressure, and I got the all-clear soon afterwards. Like I thought, 40 mg isn't that much. Some people take that four times a day. I then took my car in for a WOF, which I'd planned to do anyway, and arrived at work at 9:30. My boss's absence made my late arrival much easier. She'll be back at work tomorrow. In my (short) lunch break I saw Career Services to hopefully talk to someone, but they stopped doing face-to-face chats three years ago, when they would have been inundated with people looking for work. All this technology is supposed to make life easier, but instead everything is gradually made that little bit harder.

I've been feeling crappy again this weekend. Everything I do has this sense of complete futility about it. No goals. No plans. No way out in sight. I do something either because it's an obligation (like paying a bill) and something terrible will happen if I don't do it, or because I have this notion that it might help my anxiety and depression if I do it. The weather this weekend, which you'll have seen if you've watched any of the Wellington Sevens on TV, has been perfect for driving me around the bend.

I rang my brother this morning. We had a good chat. He's usually a good person to talk to - he makes things seem that little bit less bleak. I should call him more often.

Kevin has an extensive DVD collection. On Wednesday night when he was out, I put on True Grit, mainly because it was a western, based in Arkansas in the 1870s. Not that long ago I was thinking of visiting that part of the world, but that doesn't even seem vaguely possible anymore.

Soon I'll be taking Kevin to see Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom. My brother was telling me about someone who was arrested for putting a Mandela-based joke on Facebook: "My PC takes so long to shut down I've decided to call it Nelson Mandela." I don't find that particularly offensive, and I find it hard to believe that he was actually arrested for that.

I need hope

My new flatmate just called me to say he's running late, so that's given me the chance to write something here.

Yesterday I didn't want to get back to Wellington and this never-ending cycle of impossibility. I was hoping some massive storm would brew up and we'd circle for a while before being diverted somewhere, anywhere, I wouldn't have cared.

I felt pretty terrible a lot of the time I was away. Sometimes I was visibly upset, and that made Mum upset and both my parents very worried. I was still able to do things, but most of the time I felt sick to the stomach and like I was running through treacle. Mum took me out for tennis three times - we just hit the ball; no scoring. I was hopeless the first time, much better the second time, and dreadful again the third time. Mum was rusty to begin with but steadily improved - if she played competitive age-group tennis I'm sure she'd do really well. The last time we played, a bloke perhaps a shade older than me turned up with his two small daughters on bikes with stabilisers. He was cleaning up the area around the courts. His girls were clearly giving him a lot of pleasure and this made me upset because in all likelihood it's a pleasure I'll never experience.

Mum even took me to the golf course - we did nine holes but I didn't even finish some of them. I hit trees, mounds, boundary fence posts, even the trolley once. Sometimes I hit nothing at all, not even the ball. I would have racked up scores well into double figures on a few occasions if I'd been counting. And amongst all of that I managed a par three.

On Friday we saw Captain Phillips at the cinema in Geraldine. It was a gripping, if rather scary film about Somali pirates. It starred Tom Hanks and was based on a true story. My brother has been on armed patrol ships in the Gulf of Aden - most of the time he didn't have a lot to do.
Before going to the cinema we had fish and chips. I think I could have eaten my plateful all over again.

We talked about the few months I spent down in South Canterbury before moving to Auckland. I was very organised and motivated in my job search. One afternoon I drove into Timaru and knocked on doors of banks and finance companies (both South Canterbury Finance and Mascot Finance were in existence then). I had a chat with a very pleasant woman at BNZ. She eventually offered me a job, but by that stage I'd already taken the actuarial job in Auckland. Things could have turned out very differently. (Nearly all the jobs I applied for were in Christchurch or Canterbury. Maybe a couple were Wellington-based. Only one was in Auckland.)

We met my uncle; he's done much better with his lung cancer than anyone predicted. But his cough was back and he was extremely negative about, well, pretty much everything. Regarding the situation in Christchurch, he said they should take dynamite to the cathedral with Gerry Brownlee inside it.

I started this blog five years ago. Things are a lot, lot worse than they were then, and I've now got five fewer years to remedy the situation. The good news is that my counsellor is back on the scene and I'll be seeing her on Tuesday. And the flatmate is, on balance, good news too. Having someone to talk to should make a big difference.

Tennis final, biking, post-quake Christchurch, etc.

I've been feeling seriously rubbish again the last few days. Zero concentration. Zero motivation. And zero medication - a nice idea at the time, but it doesn't seem to be working.

My soon-to-be-flatmate came over with his dad on Sunday. When I told him about the earthquake business he got a bit jittery, and I thought he might pull out completely. I was having second thoughts too. He showed me his (expired) driver's licence with a 1977 date of birth. He's older than I thought. He's clearly had problems but what I don't know. And would you believe it, his younger brother has only just moved into another flat in the same block. That's not necessarily a bad thing. On balance I'm positive about living with another person for the first time in ages, even if the landlord thing is new territory for me.

I followed the men's final on the radio, half-hoping that Nadal would make a fast start so I could fall asleep safe in the knowledge that he was well on the way to yet another grand slam (even though I really wanted Wawrinka to pull an upset). Nobody could have predicted the ultra-bizarro match that ensued. The commentators (who included the wonderful Chanda Rubin for much of the second week) were excellent as always - a web of intrigue was being spun, and they conveyed that brilliantly. I was so glad Stan the Man came good in the fourth set, even if his victory was tainted a bit by Nadal's injury. A five-set comeback win for Nadal would have sent the controversy level off the scale.

On Monday morning I met one of the underwriters as she was walking to work. I was about to hop on the airport bus. "Have a good time," she said. "You too." That shows you how my brain was working. Or not. Wellington Airport is currently decked out with a huge eagle - which came down in last week's earthquake - and a Gollum. The flight to Timaru was pain-free as usual. Being over the wing I couldn't see a lot. All I could make out were big green dartboards carved out by irrigators, with the pivot as the bull's eye. It's amazing how sophisticated these giant irrigators are - they're all computer-controlled, and some of them are clever enough to jump over fences. The plane arrived ten minutes early and when I got out, wow, sunshine. Where has that been?

Mum kindly recorded the tennis for me, and I watched all four crazy sets. Perhaps the biggest moment came as Wawrinka served at 5-3 in the first set. He went love-40 down and couldn't buy a first serve, but Nadal was unable to get any of those second balls back in play. It was a weird set, but then things got a whole lot weirder. At the end it was good to see the two players being so friendly, even if Nadal surely wanted to get the hell out of there.

Even if you're not a tennis fan you should watch Li Na's speech after she won - it's absolutely priceless.

On Tuesday I was all over the place. I looked at some government jobs online, with little focus, and found one that was closing the next day. After lunch I took Dad's bike out - it was sunny and the exercise was likely to benefit me. I hadn't ridden a bike for I don't know how long, and I must have done 25 km at least, muttering to myself most of the way, trying to remember what that job was all about. It felt strange cycling on these straight Canterbury roads that stretch out seemingly into infinity. I'd see a truck or a milk tanker in the distance and it would take forever to go by. When I got back I applied for that job, but it was a strange application somehow. Later a couple from the UK arrived - they were staying the night and flying home from Christchurch the next morning. They'd been touring around the South Island, doing the Otago Rail Trail and a spot of Morris dancing.

Yesterday Dad drove us all to Christchurch. After dropping the British couple off at the airport, we had a look at the city. It was the first time I'd seen it since the earthquakes. Holy hell. It looked even worse than I'd imagined. The heart of the city was totally gutted. The streets on the map were still there, but they'd been reduced to almost a bare grid. To think that all that destruction happened in seconds. I couldn't get over the number of containers. They were everywhere. Some were used to shore up building frontages. It was a bright sunny day but it was eerily quiet in what used to be the CBD. An exception was the new Cashel Mall, which was a vibrant array of container shops. It worked very well. A bloke was playing a flute and singing opera. He seemed to suffer from some sort of tic, but he was very good. I happily gave him some money. He was angry when a group of Maori performers turned up and stole his spot. I hear some big company wants to get rid of the Cashel Mall containers and build something imposing. That would be a shame.

We then drove to Lyttelton, where my ancestors arrived 150 years ago. It's a lovely town but was hit hard by the quakes and resulting landslides.

I'll put up some photos from yesterday if and when I get the chance.

Flat - in more ways than one

My mood improved in the middle of the week but has since taken another dive. It's physical as well as mental. I should probably see the doctor, but all this depression stuff now feels so normal. It's got to the stage where it's part of what I am.

I rang up my prospective flatmate this morning to give him the green light. There are now a few flatmate-related things I have to organise, and I don't feel like doing any of them.

Tom came over today. I still feel a bit uncomfortable with him around. He likes to get his mitts on any digital device I might have. Why haven't you added this or customised that? Jeez Tom, that's really really low priority for me at the moment. He mentioned Java programming again. Apparently arsing around with code, even if it serves no purpose, is fun fun fun all the way, and highly rewarding. I would like to learn Java, with a distinct purpose in mind, but I don't see that happening any time soon. Where will the time come from? The concentration? (I couldn't read a novel at the moment.) Of course Tom is pretty knowledgeable about the ever-changing digital world, and he was able to tell me what a "flat" iPhone design was. How can an iPhone screen not be flat? It turns out that "flat" just means no effects such as gradients or 3D or translucency (supposedly all that stuff, which was all the rage not so long ago, is now old hat).

Well done to Li Na on a fully-deserved Australian Open title. It's her second grand slam; she also won the French Open in 2011. The first set of tonight's match was a real belter - it could have gone either way. Cibulkova, the surprise finalist, certainly played her part too. Li Na almost exited the tournament over a week ago when she faced a match point, which means I need to update this page.
Let's hope Stan the Man at least puts up a good fight against Nadal tomorrow.

Release of energy

Although my work situation isn't filling me with happiness, depression-wise I haven't been too bad in the last week or two. It goes to show that unhappiness and depression are two quite different things. But yesterday there were signs that I was making a descent, and today I went into a tailspin. Right on cue, we had a significant earthquake shortly before 4pm today, which lasted about thirty seconds but of course felt longer. The epicentre was in a different location to the big shakes we had last winter; it was close to Eketahuna, 33 km deep, and measured a hefty 6.2. I sent the tennis commentators a message, to say how good their commentary was and to mention the earthquake, and they read it out.

I was at home today - it was Wellington Anniversary - and it's just as well I've only got a four-day work week before I go away (I'm going down south next Monday). My only real team-mate has taken the week off, my boss hasn't, and I'm feeling like crap and with little energy, not far off how I felt over the Christmas/New Year period.

I put an ad on NZ Flatmates and got a surprising number of inquiries, more than I did from TradeMe. And of course that's a good thing. But having to even think about flatmates or jobs or anything like that feels beyond me.

Depression - it doesn't take time off over Christmas

Maybe I'm coming out of yet another depressive spell, and soon it will be completely wiped from my memory. I hope so. In case it does get wiped, I'll mention right now that things got seriously shitty.

I've had all the physical symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome, without (yet) the chronic bit, plus a whole load of really crappy stuff going on in my head.

I was able to finish work at three on Christmas Eve, but still felt (and looked) completely shattered when I got home. I remember it being an unpleasantly weird day for me, but I've mostly forgotten the details. Dad was also struggling: his tablets to help him pee less often during the night had the side-effect of reducing his blood pressure. We went to church at St Joseph's, a modern building just around the corner. The sermon was unlike anything you'd get in Geraldine. The priest told a story, but not the nativity story, and even used a spade as a prop. At times he switched to Spanish - he must have spent some time in South America. There was also a lot of Maori being spoken, even though I could hardly see any Maori among the 400-plus-strong congregation.

On Christmas morning Mum put the turkey in the oven, then we went for a long walk (at least 10 km) around the bays. It was good to make the most of the sunny weather, but neither Dad nor I was quite in the right state for that sort of distance. Mum forged on ahead, anxious that the whole apartment block might have burnt down, though at least the seismic risk problem would have been solved. The building was still intact when we finally got home, and we had a good Christmas dinner: turkey, ham, lots of vegetables, Christmas pudding, not much alcohol. Mum even made those extremely tasty devils on horseback (prunes wrapped in bacon). It made a nice change having it in my flat with the sun streaming in, and with just the three of us. (I don't think I could have faced a big extended-family Christmas, and I'm pretty sure Dad couldn't have faced that prospect either.) It turns out my brother also had a quiet Christmas with a friend of his - they go back a long way. We then went over to my cousin's place and sat outside (and grazed, as if we needed more food) in the early evening sun.

On Boxing Day we took my old TV to the tip (that cost $5), picked up a few $2 books from there, then drove around the coast. Mum and Dad had their eyes on properties and for-sale signs - they'd like to buy an apartment here at some stage. That evening we played Scrabble. Mum had a really good game, as evidenced by the speed at which she played (the whole game only lasted an hour) and how little complaining she did. I didn't do so well. I had a bunch of letters that didn't go together (F, U, V, W) and no esses or blanks or anything remotely useful like that. I did have the J and the X - at the same time, quite late in the game. Mum must have beaten me by forty-odd, with Dad, who was unlucky to get stuck with the Q, a bit further behind.

Yesterday I was at work, and it was a shocker of a day. At one point I ended up in the store room. I couldn't find anything I needed, and I must have balanced myself on two box trolleys, rocking back and forth, knocking brochures and letterhead and envelopes off shelves, not really caring. It wasn't too bad being in the store room really, as long as I didn't attract anyone's attention, or heaven forbid, someone actually came in. They didn't. At lunchtime I ventured outside, as always, even though the weather was horrible. I sat in the food court and opened Love in the Time of Cholera at page one. I read and re-read the first few lines over and over, not getting anywhere. As far as work was concerned, I might easily have entered incorrect bank account details and a lot worse. Walking to and from work, and even just around the office, was painfully slow. Later we saw the second Hobbit movie, which I thought was very good, even if I struggled to concentrate for 2¾ hours. If I suffered from arachnophobia I probably wouldn't have lasted very long. The end, which absolutely invites you to see part three in a year's time, was a bit of a surprise to me.

Mum and Dad flew back home this morning. We'd had a pretty good Christmas together, even if both Dad and I were struggling. No arguments, apart from the one on Monday when I broached the topic of work. That's always been the number one source of arguments with my parents. After dropping them off at the airport I went to the market then attempted to put up a small ad for a flatmate in New World in Newtown. I asked one of the staff who wasn't very helpful - they don't have that facility - and in reply I dropped the F-bomb on her. When I got home, for some reason I remembered that the darts would be on so I found a live stream. I saw an extremely high-quality match where a bloke by the name of Peter Wright, sporting a mohican and a tattoo of a snake on his face, averaged a whopping 106 but still only squeaked past his younger opponent 4-3 in sets. It's changed so much since I watched it as a kid - with all the walk-on music and cheerleaders, it's become a lot like the rugby sevens. I received a website-related email that I was supposed to act on, but it was all beyond me. I got very frustrated and rolled around on the floor shouting. I walked into town and sat out on the waterfront for a while. There's nothing like Christmas to make me even more aware of the passing of time, and I just sat there with my head in my hands. Life is slipping away and Mum and Dad and me, we're all getting older and it's all happening so damn fast. My brother's getting older too and I have no idea when I'll see him next. I've now had eleven Christmases since I landed in Christchurch. Christmas in 2023 or 2024 doesn't even bear thinking about. I happened to bump into my cousin and her family. Their youngest was riding a bike; he picked it up almost instantly just a few days ago. When I got home I made myself go to the gym. That's probably the best thing I could have done. I then spoke to Richard, and I'm certainly feeling better now. I came off the Efexor a few days earlier than planned (because I was feeling terrible) and that might have made me feel even more terrible. It's anyone's guess.

The 60th anniversary of the Tangiwai disaster, which killed 151 people, received some media attention (including a very unjolly radio programme on Christmas afternoon) and with such a huge death toll I'm utterly ashamed that I didn't know anything about it before.

Sometimes I think they should bring back public flogging. Those teenagers who attacked that German couple camping in Whakatane on Boxing Day certainly deserve it.

About ten days ago Louis Theroux did a programme on American autistic kids and their incredible parents. Boy do those parents have it tough. I'm glad they touched on life for these kids after childhood. The saddest bit for me was when the mother of an autistic boy talked about praying for a miracle every time she goes to church. Her (non-autistic) daughter said, "Mom, God made him that way" to which the mother said, "Yes, God made him that way to teach me a lesson."

Here's hoping my mini-revival continues. I'll be catching up with Martin tomorrow.

The edge of madness

It's been good to have the week off. At the back end of last week I think I was going slightly mad. My mental and physical processes had slowed to a crawl. On Friday it took me half an hour just to walk home from work; I was drumming on my lunchbox and mumbling to myself (well a bit more than just mumbling) the whole way. If I hadn't already decided to take this whole week off, I'd have called in sick last Thursday and Friday. Unusually, I'm fairly sure what triggered this latest episode. In this instance it was work, which is a hair-trigger for me.

Continuing the subject of madness, perhaps, the body of Australian tennis coach Paul Arber was found in the Waikato River this morning. An exceptional tennis player in his own right, he was in Hamilton for a junior tournament. Some passers-by saw him swimming in the river in the early hours of Sunday morning. They talked him out of the water, but he went back, and that was the last anybody saw of him alive. His behaviour was described as being "distant and spiritual" shortly before he went missing. Something clearly wasn't right with him; I doubt anyone will figure out exactly what. It's all very sad.

Last Friday somebody at work saw on the Stuff website that Nelson Mandela had died, and apart from some Chinese-whispers-style confusion where a few people thought that Nigella Lawson had popped her clogs instead, nobody really paid the story much attention. I suppose it has been coming for some time, and most people at work are too young to really remember apartheid and what the great man stood for and achieved. I'd put myself in that category. I remember watching the 70th birthday concert - he was still in prison then - but at that age (eight) all I thought was, old man, in prison, that's bad, let him out. There were a lot of musical protests and tributes back then too; I still think Paul Simon's Graceland album, though controversial at the time, was amazing.
Mandela's passing has received wall-to-wall media coverage and rightly so. New Zealand has always had close ties to South Africa through rugby and the high numbers of South Africans (50,000) living here. Being in Browns Bay on the day of the World Cup final in 2007 - oh my.
I've just read that the sign-language interpreter at Mandela's memorial service, whose gestures were pure gibberish, has claimed he suffered a schizophrenic episode prior to appearing on stage.

On Saturday I attended the anxiety group Christmas party along with nearly thirty others. It was quite enjoyable, mainly because it was pretty low-key. I could tell the staff at the Speights Ale House were hoping we could all just go home and put them out of their misery. We weren't drinking very much Speights. The guy who runs the group, whom I know reasonably well, has done a remarkable job. The group has grown from fifty-odd members when I signed up to about 350 now. A real success story. (For me the increased numbers has actually made things harder; there are now so many events organised by so many people - heck, even I organised one - that it's hard to know whether I'm coming or going.)

This week I've been busy using my brain in a way I want to be using it, which is a rarity for me. I've been trying to revamp a website using WordPress. The user interface is great, but it's still really really hard. I've had to monkey around with the code (and I'm really just fumbling in the dark there) more than I expected. I struggled to find a so-called "theme" that was appropriate so I had to pick one and customise it - that's a bit of a dangerous thing to do. I've installed a couple of plugins to stop things from happening (I guess most people install plugins to make things happen, but not me.)
I toyed with the idea of going to the test cricket, what with taking the week off work and being a two-minute walk from the Basin where it's all happening, but I've really got to crack on with this website business.

On Monday Tracy, Tom and I played an extremely crazy and chaotic (but enjoyable) board game called Wiz-War. Luck played a huge part, so even though I had to ask Tracy what this or that card allowed me to do (which meant she'd know what I had and could plot a strategy accordingly) I ended up the winner. It was a very close finish - in cricketing terms I won off the last ball with only one wicket left.

Tomorrow they've got the work Christmas party. This year they're kicking off the party at lunchtime with some kind of team-building event. The dinner bit starts at 4:30. Last Friday my boss asked me whether (on my day off) I'd be going to the whole thing or just the dinner bit. Umm, are you sure there isn't another option? So I'll pop along at half-four (or quarter to five) and hope I don't have to stay too long. The first couple of hours (food, the odd drink) will be OK, but at that point I hit the wall. I mean, what are you supposed to do then? More drink, just because it's something to do, and tactical loo breaks every half-hour. That's about as good as it ever gets. I spoke to Mum on the phone tonight, and mentioned the party. She enthusiastically told me to enjoy it, asking if I had a smart shirt ready, adding in "be sociable". There are several helpful things she could have said, but she didn't pick one. It's funny - over the last few years her understanding of "what it's like" has improved no end, but she still comes out with things like this that make me think she's got no idea.

Scare

I hardly feel amazingly wonderful now, but compared to a week ago I'm much better. For over a week I wasn't good at all. Going through my old blog posts, I can see that my brain has filtered out some of my worst experiences.

Last night Dad told me about his latest big scare. He had a blood test for prostate cancer (PSA test) and the result was alarmingly high. He flies to the UK next week and they were going to put off his actual check (for lumps) until he got back but he insisted he had the check before then. Although his prostate is enlarged they didn't detect cancer,so he feels he's dodged a bullet there, but he'll have more tests in early November. Prostate cancer isn't easy to treat but you can survive with it for years - there seems to be a lot of variation in how aggressive it is. Dad isn't looking forward to the flight - it takes a lot out of him. He said he'd never go direct again.

Tuesday's second America's Cup race really was exciting - no doubt about that - and after today's race the Kiwi team have several match points up their sleeve. So as long as they don't capsize they should be OK. It'll be a real boon to Auckland if they can host it again. The races, and everything that goes on in between them, have received wall-to-wall coverage in NZ. But in San Francisco most people are aware that there's some kind of, y'know, boat race, and that's about it.

In contrast to the yachting, New Zealand's Davis Cup promotion tie in the Philippines received very little coverage at all, but it was a drama-filled contest that finished in the early hours of the morning, local time. The Kiwis somehow got over the line, with Michael Venus coming from two sets down to beat Treat Huey (great name) in the deciding match. I can't quite decide whether I should get back to playing tennis again. The exercise would be hugely beneficial to me I'm sure.

On Monday I played board games with Tracy and Tom. The first game we tried was a card game where you had to put various inventions in chronological order. It was more interesting than it sounds. I guessed reasonably well, making up for how little I actually knew. The other game was what they call a "programming" game. You roll dice which you then put in an ordered sequence to direct a robot through a rather complicated course. I got confused and kept rolling "backwards" when I needed to go forwards, or vice-versa, and didn't get very far.

I'm going to Auckland tomorrow. I still have to pack. I've got quite a few people I want to catch up with. When I get back I'll be thinking about flatmates.

The big switchover (I could do with one)

I never thought digital-only telly would come to New Zealand, but in two weeks they'll be switching off our analogue signal. I remember my grandmother grappling with digital TV on one of my visits to the UK; they really should have waited for all the old people to die before making such a confusing change. I'm not a big telly watcher (my flaky undigital reception might have had something to do with that) and the whole digital thing just wasn't a high priority for me. Plus I didn't want to spend the money. Last week, despite feeling like crap, I forced myself to at least think about it, and this morning (having browsed PriceSpy) I bought a 32-inch Samsung TV from Noel Leeming for $400. I was in and out within five minutes before all that light and noise completely engulfed me, although when I saw an 80-incher on display I felt like asking them if they had anything bigger than that. Installing and tuning my new TV was surprisingly painless. I had visions of, well, no vision, but instead I've got a really sharp picture.

This morning's first America's Cup race (the NZ boat almost capsized) was the lead news item at 9am. It's a shame I missed the race - it seems to me that, just like in Formula One, the exciting bits are when someone crashes (or nearly crashes). I turned on the (old) TV in time for the second race. Right, I still don't know whether it's a jive or a jibe but I'm going to watch this and it's going to be great. But it was abandoned half-way through due to high winds. The commentators thought that was farcical and I was inclined to agree. They then had some expert on, trying to explain things for people like me. He said, "the pre-start is the most exciting part of the race." What?! Imagine if the warm-up was the best part of a tennis match. When we stayed in NZ in the summer of 1986-87, there was some America's Cup series between the Stars & Stripes and a Kiwi boat called KZ7. They played Rod Stewart's Sailing over and over. My older cousins, who sailed all summer, were right into the yachting. I was too young to have a clue what was happening. Many years later I still don't have a clue.

It was a superb day yesterday (I was secretly hoping it would be the exact opposite) and although I had little energy I went for a walk, trying to make the most of the weather. I stopped for a coffee and ended up talking to a 72-year-old woman (what's the cut-off beyond which women happily tell you their age?) who knew a lot about Syria and other conflicts, and was pessimistic about the future of the planet and its people.

Last week was exhausting. Everything had slowed down considerably. It took me noticeably longer to walk to and from work. Normally I'm a reasonably fast walker but people were streaming past me. And as for the bit in between the two walks, well that had almost ground to a halt. I sat at my desk, shaking, unable to remember what I'd done 30 seconds or two minutes before. I was constantly having to backtrack. Work kept piling up in my queue. I was unable to prioritise: my depression had taken over everything and become Priority A and B and C and D.

It was my old boss's last week, so we had leaving lunches and drinks on Thursday and Friday. That was all I needed. At least when I'm at my desk I can sort of pretend. Friday's drinks after work were particularly horrible; we went to the Green Man - several hectares of floor space crammed with people, some of whom I was supposed to interact with. I wasn't there for long. I spent some time with two blokes from work - they both knew me from our work involvements but they didn't know each other, until they got talking about guitars and bands and karaoke, and after a while it was clear that they were getting on like a house on fire, so I left them to it, and soon left the Green Man altogether.

When I got to work on Thursday my payslip was in my inbox so I checked my bank and credit card statements. What's that $65 for? Ah yes, now that name rings a bell, didn't I look at that site (cinechest.com) when I was trying to find that 56 Up movie? But I don't remember giving out my credit card details (I don't do that willy-nilly) and I sure as hell didn't sign up for paid movies. A quick Google gave me the answer. I'd been scammed by those bastards at cinechest.com, and if I did nothing I'd get charged $65 every month. Wow. I went to the bank and got my credit card cancelled for a $10 fee. So 56 Up became 75 Down. I was given a "disputed transaction" form to fill in - I haven't done so yet and don't fancy my chances of getting that money back.

The first time I felt like this, where life went by in slow motion and took on a grey, metallic tinge, was in Lyon back in 2001. Just like then, the last thing I want to do is see or talk to anybody, and almost everything I do is a function of my depression. Dad had a call from her sister who is going through a bad depressive spell too, probably worse than mine. After talking about her, I then mentioned my latest bout. Dad said that with the possibilities my app might still give me, my mood should instead be elevated. My parents have been really supportive with anything app-related and I do appreciate that.

I'm going to Auckland this Friday night. I'll be staying till Tuesday. It's a well-timed trip for me. After last week, I desperately need to get away. Spending time with people who don't freak me out will be a welcome change. When I get back I plan to start my new diet (it won't be easy) and advertise for a flatmate.

Is this for real?

Work. Oh god. It's happening again. For a while I go along merrily (well, not exactly, but I sort of chug along in third gear) and then, bam, all of a sudden I plummet off a cliff. I took Tuesday afternoon off sick. Just before I left I drafted an email to my new boss saying that these latest changes aren't going to work for me. It seemed a better option than pretending everything was fine - I haven't had much luck with that strategy in the past. I sent the email when I got to work this morning. Despite my best efforts I didn't get much done today. I had all the usual physical symptoms. It took me an age to do anything, and I promptly forgot whatever I'd just done. We have a system where - bizarrely - you have to type gibberish at a certain point, and I must have stared at the "jsrttrsjtsr" (or whatever it was) for several minutes without even realising it. I looked at the vacant bank of desks behind me - heck, soon there are bound to be people sitting there, and then it really will be game over. I remembered ducking to avoid a flying pigeon as I was walking down the street - I know the event happened in the last few days, but I don't know if it was real or whether I dreamt it. I think it was real - I'd say I'm 70-80% sure. I improved a bit in the last hour of the day, probably because I knew it was the last hour, and have felt better since I got home.

Canterbury has been hit hard by the storms. My parents' power was out from 5pm yesterday until 6:30 this evening. They can cope with a power outage quite well. They've got gas and have a steady supply of water from the stream. Their biggest worry was all the meat in the freezer - probably half a cow at least.

It's official - a copy of the yellow sticker arrived in my letter box on Monday. Another copy will soon be attached to the building.

On Monday I heard this song emanating from Cosmic on Cuba Street. It's by Fever Ray, a Swedish artist I hadn't heard of before. I managed to catch just enough lyrics to jot them down and Google them when I got home. It's a pretty good song on YouTube but much better coming from proper speakers. I've started reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (although I haven't read any this week) - with that and Fever Ray, I'd quite like to go to Sweden.

Rafael Nadal's serious purple patch has taken a lot of people by surprise. I've heard suggestions that he might be juiced up. He's now won 13 grand slams, just one behind Sampras and four behind Federer. It's incredible that 30 of the last 42 majors have been won by just two men (Djokovic has bagged half of the remaining dozen). Serena Williams, like Federer, now has 17 slams, but unlike Federer I can see her adding another three or four to that tally.

After badminton on Sunday we went for a short walk. It was a stunning day (quite the opposite of today) and I took this photo:

Take more of these pills

Oh jeez. Things haven't been good this week at all. I saw the doctor today. He said I'm "undermedicated" and upped my Efexor to 225. Heck, you see me for ten minutes once in a blue moon and you think you know me. "We can go as high as 375." Yes I know. I've been there before. "There's no shame in taking antidepressants." Shame isn't the issue. I'd happily take a whole damn packet each day if I thought it would do me some good. "You're being quite negative. See, you're depressed. It must be your serotonin levels. I can help that. Take more of these pills."

This week life has seemed impossible. Especially work. It's my turn to handle the email inbox - I find that hard at the best of times (which these most definitely aren't). It used to be my turn every fifth week, then it was every fourth, then every third, and now it's every second. That's what happens when people leave, of their own accord or not, and they aren't replaced. Then there's the business of paying for this flat which has become a millstone around my neck.

They had a board games evening at the library last night. I went along after work but was only going through the motions. First we played Ticket to Ride; I did really badly but at least I had some clue as to what was happening. Then I got caught up in a game involving a rapidly-flooding desert island. I had no idea what I was doing and I sat there hoping we could all just bloody well drown so I could go home. It made sense that I should be playing a game where drowning was a serious possibility. Actually had I to see Julie before I could go home, and that made me even more anxious. I dropped my car at Julie's (I had to vacate the car park because we had someone clean the windows using a cherry-picker) and had a half-hour walk back.

Here are some pictures from Saturday's low-visibility walk. There was a major fire at the reserve earlier this year.

Fog lifting?

I felt stressed for most of the weekend. It seemed impossible to switch off from everything going on in my head, which meant that everything I did, or tried to do, was shrouded in dense fog. I was busy all weekend - at least it felt that way - but I never felt like I did anything of significance. I went for a longish walk, went to the market, did my chores around the house, played around with a few phone apps (which I need to do as part of my "other job") and spent a fair while on the phone, but didn't talk face-to-face with anyone unless the market stallholders count. That's not an unusual weekend for me; when I return to work on a Monday and someone asks me what I did at the weekend I often end up saying "nothing special" or words to that effect.

At lunchtime today I saw my support worker (have I mentioned her?). Her main job is to help people look for and keep jobs, but when I see her I often drift into territory that lies outside work. Today it felt we were getting somewhere, and I think my fog cleared a little as a result.

I had to phone a few customers at work today. Considering how hard I find certain people-related situations it's funny how I don't mind calling customers, and sometimes even like it, except when they ask me something I don't know the answer to and I feel silly. Today I found myself in an interesting situation when a name I knew flashed up on my screen. I checked his notes and one of my colleagues had written "I spoke to him, he said he's autistic...". Yep, definitely the guy from the group. He'd applied for an automatic acceptance policy (no underwriting) and it's easy to see why: he's very overweight and with his past history of addictions he'd struggle to get cover otherwise. He'd be about five foot five in every direction and his trademark braces make him a very recognisable figure. Some of his comments on Monday nights make me wince ("when I feel down I fire up YouTube and listen to one of Hitler's speeches"). Eww. His view of the world lacks any shades of grey, and he can get worked up over issues to the point of being scary, but he's also highly intelligent and can be very friendly too. Anyway I was really supposed to ring him but I just couldn't. How could I pretend I didn't know him? What if someone listens to my call (which is recorded)? I saw his birthday was imminent so I sent him a text wishing him a happy birthday and, er, by the way, if you provide your payment details I'll put your policy in place. I found it interesting that he told my colleague he was autistic - he seems to identify strongly with the "brand".

Julie sounds like she's in a pretty bad way and I don't think I can do much to help. Our 45-minute phone conversation on Saturday (which was really her conversation) could have been summed up in seconds: "I'm in a lot of pain, I feel hopeless, and I don't want to live any more."

So Nadal did make it eight French Open titles and twelve grand slams in total. Quite remarkable really. Some of the results in the latter stages of the tournament (Tsonga beat Federer 3-0; Ferrer beat Tsonga 3-0; Nadal beat Ferrer 3-0) show the importance of match-ups in tennis.

Bouncing back (I hope)

This week I've been feeling stressed, anxious, depressed, the lot. I can't quite put my finger on why. There might be several whys. Sometimes there doesn't have to be a why at all. It hasn't been much fun feeling hopelessly inadequate, not sleeping well (that's a problem I haven't had in ages), and being even more obsessive about the passing of time than I normally am. There's been a lot of news - the plane crash that killed the 2 Degrees boss and his wife; Jesse Ryder; North Korea; Nelson Mandela; the new Chinese leader; and the George Taiaroa murder (that was absolutely terrible), but I've been too introspective to pay much attention to it and I feel bad because of that.

My uncle - Mum's third brother who's 69 - has been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. He smoked up until a few years ago. He's lived in South Canterbury all his life and knows people from childhood. I've seen him on a fairly regular basis, most times I've gone down south, but I've never got to know him that well. I've never felt we've got much in common. He's quite a complex character I think. He's been married three times and has seemed quite bitter ever since his second wife pretty much took him to the cleaners. I guess we're all terminal, but this has happened so suddenly (the news I mean, not the cancer which has probably been around for some time) that it's a real shock to Mum's family. My uncle is a very private person and although I haven't named him and hardly anyone reads this blog anyway, he'd probably shoot me if he knew I'd written this paragraph.

On Tuesday I saw Julie at the rest home. The place is run by the Catholic church (she isn't a Catholic herself but most of the inmates are) and you get the impression they're nearly all waiting for God. I think you can become institutionalised, and subservient, very quickly in a place like that. Julie plans to move out of the home later this month, into a flat that someone has hooked up for her. I've lost track of the number of times she's moved. She had some extremely dark thoughts when I saw her. I don't expect her next move to lighten her mood but I'd like to be proven wrong.

I was on edge for the rest of the week. By Friday the constant foot traffic behind my desk (to access the nearby loos and canteen) was starting to get to me. That lunchtime I got my hair cut at the cheapest place I know of in town, a barber's with old furniture, run by an old man. I think he recognised me from my previous visits. He asked me what I wanted and I made a bad job of pretending to have some clue. Inevitably when I returned to work, some of my colleagues noticed my chop and wanted to know where I'd got it done. Oh god. Our local CEO has now moved on to bigger and better things within the company, and on Friday afternoon she had her send-off. Lots of anecdotes, lots of jokes, lots of supposedly funny pictures on Powerpoint slides, and lots of wanting to get the hell out of there.

Straight after work on Friday I went round to my cousin's place for an Indian takeaway and a couple of glasses of wine. I don't drink a lot and when I do it's nearly always either with my cousin (her husband doesn't drink) or by myself. My cousin's husband showed me their Kindle. It can store up to 3000 books, and in some ways is better than a book. For instance you can't increase or decrease the font size in a physical book. Don't know what "repudiate" means? Just click on it and it brings up a dictionary entry. It felt like science fiction somehow. (Mum has an e-reader too but I don't think it's as sophisticated. It does however come with a lot of classics already loaded.)

I've so far resisted the temptation to buy a smart phone. Actually that isn't quite true; I haven't needed or wanted one so I haven't bought one. But this puzzle stuff will soon make one a necessity. So what do I get? I know, I'll ask Tom from the autism group. He emailed me screeds of information about phones, and went into all kinds of technical detail that I didn't even try to understand. Apparently it's all about what version of Android you have (Tom says I shouldn't go down the iPhone route) and whether it has a single or dual core. You can even get quadruple cores. I wonder, can you also get Apples with multiple cores? That brings to mind this sketch from the one remaining Ronnie.

Tom came over yesterday. He brought half a roast chicken and helped me with some tech issues, but oh boy. I was feeling anxious anyway and he didn't help. He's got an inquiring mind, which is generally a good thing, but it means he asks lots of questions. Yesterday I could almost physically feel the impact of each one. I had to explain why I wanted to go to America, which was hard because I didn't really know why. At one point he wanted to know if I'd done any home improvements lately. Well not really. I mentioned the chairs that I did with Mum last weekend. I said the stair rail needed painting. He said, yes, it looks really grotty. Thanks. "I can tell you're not interested in doing renovation." Thanks. While I was sorting out lunch he looked at those chairs and picked them up and turned them over. "Why aren't the screws in fully?" They don't go in all the way. Look, you try. They did go in all the way, but there was some good reason why we hadn't fully tightened them which I could no longer remember. Out came his Swiss Army knife and he started tightening the screws. "This one is missing a screw." Yes I know, they came in packs of fifteen, I'll get another one.
I'd had more than enough of Tom by this stage. I asked him how he planned to spend the rest of the day. He got the hint.

As I was walking through Te Aro yesterday, post-Tom, I saw this game of bike polo going on. I'd heard of it, and even Segway polo, but never expected I'd see it in action.

Today I went tramping at Cannon Point. I'd done that trip before, six months ago. Only four of us went today - some people (including Danielle) were put off by the dodgy weather. It did rain a bit, but nowhere near enough to outweigh the benefits of getting out and about when you've been feeling like crap. Even driving there and back seemed to be of benefit, and I now feel like I'm bouncing back from my latest bout of depression. It wasn't a very long walk; it took in the reservoir lake which must have provided most of the Hutt's water supply in the past. On the walk somebody mentioned smart phones and I said I was looking to get one; it was suggested I get the Galaxy Rav 4 or something. Whatever, it was clearly expensive. When I said I didn't want to spend more than $300 I got comments like "but a smart phone is such a useful tool; unless you get a good one you won't appreciate how powerful it is." That's OK if you've got the money.

I heard Hello Old Friend by Eric Clapton on the radio on Friday night. It's just a lovely song, simple as that, and I've been playing it a lot this weekend. For some reason it reminds me of Richard (as it happens he was born the same year that the song came out). I miss Richard. So much is made of where we live, but if you've got friends nearby that hardly matters.

Struggling again

It was a bad week to have a bad week. We have a roster at work for handling all the email queries and last week it was my turn. It's part of my job I struggle with at the best of times, but when my head is like mush and my feet are shaking it's like you're running through treacle. I tried to keep the emails down to one scrollbar-free page. After work on Wednesday I read my book in the sun (so I couldn't have been that bad - there have been times when I couldn't even do that) before going to the depression meet-up at 6:30. There was a woman in her late thirties who I hadn't seen since before Christmas. What a Christmas she had. She lost her father and broke up with her husband of twelve years, all within a week, and ended up in a psychiatric ward. In comparison my Christmas was an absolute breeze. I had to leave the meet-up at 7:30 to go to the tramping club and sign up for a trip or two. They had a meet-and-greet session; the guy from the autism group was there which was a bugger because the place stank and was too hot and I didn't want to be there any longer than absolutely necessary. A woman gave a shortish slide-show presentation which, as it happened, was hilarious. It was her deadpan delivery. The autism guy and I chatted for ten minutes; we agreed to catch up at my flat on Sunday.

Work has just started doing health checks on its staff and on Thursday I had mine. She checked my blood pressure, cholesterol, height and weight, then asked me a few lifestyle questions to come up with a rather crude measure of my risk of heart disease. I got one black mark just for being male (!) and another for my cholesterol: my reading was 6.14. I eat less dairy products and fried food than I ever used to, but my damn cholesterol is still up there. Someone suggested porridge as a virtually guaranteed cholesterol buster. I like porridge, and have it every day in winter, so maybe I need to make that a permanent fixture in my diet. I wish they'd given me a breakdown of my cholesterol into the large fluffy (good) stuff and small dense (bad) stuff: the previous time they said I had oodles of both.

I had a long chat on the phone on Thursday night, mostly to Mum. She tried to make me feel better: "Other people have problems, you're not alone." Well yeah, I guess. Like the woman who was back at work last week after breaking her arm in early November. She now goes to the depression group. I think her arm was the least of her worries. The woman who sits right next to her turned up to work two weeks ago with a completely new face. Well that's what it looks like. I'm guessing it's Botox.
On Friday (I was feeling a bit better by then) I joined the French society, like the one on the North Shore but bigger. I don't know whether that was a good idea. The more things I do and clubs I join, the less involved I am in any of them, and the more I find myself going through the motions.

For at least the fifth weekend running it's an absolute cracker here in Wellington. This can't last.

Killer joules

I’m not really part of society. Everything I do is meaningless. Those two facts (I think they’re facts) are reflected in my current mood. Neither of today’s phone calls helped.


This morning I called Julie to ask if she wanted to see a film with me. She wasn’t in a good way at all. In the last year or two she’s alienated a lot of people (admittedly some of those people did her more harm than good); today she made a good fist of alienating me too. Then Dad called me. I couldn’t hide my low mood. When the future of their other son is giving them sleepless nights the last thing they need is to worry about me.

I don’t normally buy takeaway pizzas (as much as I like them) but on Friday I ordered a “meat lovers” from Domino’s. The energy content of each pizza was displayed on a board. My meat lovers had 7000 kilojoules. That’s seven million joules isn’t it? All I remembered about joules from my physics lessons was our teacher’s bad puns about jewels, duels, Jules and maybe even Jools. But although I wouldn’t have known a joule if it punched me on the nose, I didn’t like the sound of seven million of the little buggers crawling in my pizza. How many joules were in a calorie was anyone’s guess (do they even convert?) but a quick Google before tucking into my pizza told me it contained two-thirds of my recommended daily energy intake. Feeling guilty I ate five slices and saved the remaining three for yesterday’s lunch. Last night I had had trout which my cousin’s boys had caught at Taupo. It was tasty and far more wholesome than the pizza. Talking of fishing, tonight’s news featured this bloke who stole a 13 lb bass from a Guernsey aquarium to win $800 in a fishing competition. What on earth was he thinking? He stole the fish on 9th July last year. Someone commented that he should have waited five days – for Bass Steal Day.

Baffling

Oh no, not again. That was my immediate thought when I turned on the radio to catch the news yesterday morning. Yet another school shooting. Twenty-eight dead: twelve girls and eight boys, all aged six or seven; six female staff at the school; the shooter's mother and finally himself. But for the quick thinking of the school staff there would have been more fatalities. Unfortunately this will keep on happening again and again unless America does something about its gun laws. Fat chance of that. Americans are as horrified as the rest of us when children are killed in this way, but few of them want to do anything about it. I find that utterly baffling. (I just heard on the news that there are 89 firearms per 100 Americans.)

On a lighter note we had our office Christmas party on Friday. It took place on the waterfront and started at noon. It was OK for the first couple of hours while the food was out - I've come to realise that I max out at around the two-hour mark when it comes to socialising - but I became more uncomfortable as time wore on. A lot of the talking I did (which wasn't much) was with a woman of nearly seventy - for some reason the bigger the age gap the less social pressure I feel. At half-three I was itching to leave - I was just sitting around staring into space. I was thankful to be babysitting for my cousin in the evening - that gave me a good excuse not to drink much and to leave early. I managed to escape on the dot of four. I went over to my cousin's place just after six and stayed until she and her husband got home at 11:15.

Yesterday the anxiety and depression group had a meet-up at Mac's Brewery, again on the waterfront. Only four of us showed up including a bloke from Wales, of about my age, who had only been in the country two months. He seemed a really nice, easy-going bloke, but nowhere near anxious or depressed enough to be part of the group. He talked about a recent date he went on, and the various extreme sports (which NZ is famous for of course) that he'd already tried. I almost think any prospective member should have to fill in a questionnaire if they want to join, with eligibility restricted to people who score above a certain level based on how they answered the questions. Been on a date in the last month? Lose ten points. The last week? Lose fifty. In this guy's defence, I'm pretty sure he had suffered from mental health problems in the past, and as he's new to NZ I could hardly blame him for joining groups as a way of meeting people. We had some really interesting conversation to begin with, but at the two-hour point (again) I started to struggle. When we parted company after 3½ hours I was in a worse mental state that when I arrived. I think it was the realisation that while many people find social situations hard, for most of them it's a temporary problem and only certain situations. For me it's permanent and virtually all situations. And there's the relationship thing - no matter how depressed people are, they still somehow have meaningful relationships. But I don't.

On the radio this morning they talked about "Mad Pride", a relatively new movement of mental health patients, along the lines of Black Pride or Gay Pride. The use of the term "mad" here is interesting because it's a word with many meanings: "fanatical", "angry", "foolish" and "insane" to name just four. Then there are a few compounds like "madcap" which I think of as being a wonderfully British word like "barmy" or "bonkers". I guess it's the "insane" sense of "mad" that's being used by the Mad Pride movement, perhaps with a tinge of anger, and because "mad" in that sense is a pejorative term it's only people who are "mad" who can get away with using it, a bit like what we've seen with "queer". The radio programme continued by interviewing some members of Sendam, who are mainly a drumming band based in Wellington, made up of mental health patients. The name is almost "madness" backwards - if they'd kept the double S you'd have pretty much got a cross between a Korean car and a viral pop song from the same country. They band were accepting donations so I gave them $15.

Talking of relationships, I asked Tracy if she wanted to see The Intouchables at the Penthouse. She said yes - probably one evening this week although I don't yet know which. Do I treat this as a date? Although we have similar interests our personalities are maybe too far apart, but you never know I suppose.

A bloke who sat not too far from me got fired last Wednesday. There in the morning, gone by lunchtime. It was for serious misconduct, though I have no idea what. I don't keep up with all the office gossip. From what I could tell he was good at his job. My boss and his boss are are in the process of grading and "calibrating" us based on our performance. As we found out last week, the percentage of employees who gets each of the grades is fixed. This raised one or two eyebrows in our team: "So even if we've all done a really good job, some of us will still get the low grades?" Yes, my boss said, saying that he didn't make the rules. I then piped up, saying that at least there's a flip-side: even if we've all been rubbish, some of us will still get the top grades. One of my colleagues likened the system to a school exam; working for a large company feels a lot like school to me. When I arrived at the company to start my actuarial role, I was given an HR pamphlet outlining various grades; it mentioned a literal decimation policy of "managing out" the bottom 10% of employees. As soon as I read that I thought, oh shit, that'll be me. In my current role, despite all the talk of grades last week, I really couldn't give two hoots what grade I get.

This afternoon I went to play poker with Martin at the Realm in Hataitai. Only it wasn't on. Their regular Sunday tournaments ended last weekend. We played a few games of pool instead on their free but ramshackle pool table. They've still got a tournament on Tuesday night and we've agreed to play then, so I'll need to rearrange my other commitments (I normally see Julie on a Tuesday).

It's been quite a hot day today. A couple of times lately I've been caught out, forgetting that Wellington does get sun occasionally and that it does burn just like anywhere else. I've still done precisely zero Christmas shopping. I plan to squeeze it all into a couple of hours next Saturday. What on earth do I get my brother?

I recently discovered the Icelandic group Of Monsters and Men after hearing this song which a bank used for one of their adverts. I think they're great.

Bush walk and a sense of relief

I had quite a good weekend. On Saturday I went on a tramp: the Hemi Matenga bush walk near Waikanae. It took 3¼ hours and it was probably the most arduous trip I've been on since that infamous one in April. The wet weather certainly played its part; the trek up to the highest point was fairly gentle - unfortunately we couldn't see a thing from the lookout due to the rain - but the downward slope was steeper and I slipped a couple of times in the mud. Danielle had signed up for the trip but pulled out when she saw the weather forecast. That was a shame. She is a little unsteady on her feet when going downhill but she probably would have been OK with a pole. The bush was lush and green; the more seasoned trampers among us pointed out plants along the way, such as hen and chicken fern which develops baby ferns at the ends of its leaves.

When I got home after the tramp, I felt that pleasant feeling of accomplishment as well as that unpleasant feeling of being desperate for a pee. That evening I went round to my cousin's place to babysit while they went to see The Intouchables, but not much babysitting was necessary as the film was booked out so they came straight home.

Yesterday the depression group met up at Denny's on Willis Street. We had an interesting chat and all agreed that while public acceptance of depression has improved in recent years, people are far less accepting of social anxiety. The group also met on Wednesday for our regular catch-up on Cuba Street. Just like yesterday, six of us turned up on Wednesday including an older chap with big milky eyes who has bipolar disorder - it was good to see him for the first time in ages. They might be planning some activity along the lines of paintball, but hopefully less painful. A poker night has even been mentioned.

Royal eclipse

My stress levels are down a couple of notches from last week. I've had no work functions or quizzes to deal with. When I described the work quiz to someone, she said it sounded like Cranium on crack. I've never tried Cranium, or crack for that matter, but I know what she meant.

This morning's partial eclipse of the sun caused some excitement at work. I saw the half-obscured sun through sunglasses, and couldn't really see a lot on my computer screen for the next minute or two. In 1999 we had a total eclipse in the UK. It was at about 11am on a summer's day; people used pinhole projectors and various other contraptions to view the once-in-a-lifetime event. The most striking thing for me that day was the sudden drop in temperature.

The other major happening in Wellington today (two in one day, I know) was Charles and Camilla's visit. At lunchtime I managed to glimpse the couple from 100 metres away on the waterfront. There was some ceremony involving a haka, and two wakas were brought out: I hoped Charles might get in one.

I went to the autism group again on Monday. It went better this time, perhaps because the two new guys weren't in my group so there was less disruption.

Last night I saw Julie, as I usually do on a Tuesday. She isn't very good at the moment - she talks about ending her life - but last night she was a little perkier. I took over the film Wall-E which seemed to cheer her up a bit.

The latest government valuations in Wellington just came out. They're reviewed every three years. The GV of my flat is down $20,000 since I bought this place, presumably due to the earthquake business, though it's still $11,000 above what I paid for it. Here's an article in the Herald (that I happen to agree with) about Auckland's (unsustainably?) high house prices.