Robyn's Secret Passage

You may recall this dialogue from the start of the Charlie’s Angels movie:

LL Cool J: Another movie from an old TV show.
Mad Bomber Guy: What are ya gonna do?
LL Cool J: Walk out.

(The punchline being that they are on an aeroplane, which leads into some sky-diving action.)

That got me thinking about walking out of movies. It seems to be the ultimate sign of a bad movie if it causes someone to walk out. I thought back to all the movies I’d seen and I could only think of one where I’d actually walked out, and two where I came really close.

The Near Walkout I

I can’t even remember what the film was, but it was some costume drama that would have come out around 1993 (possibly Scorcese’s “The Age of Innocence”). I was seeing it with my friend Renee and the film was just dragging along and being very dull and boring.

So we briefly discussed it and decided to walk out if it didn’t get better soon. Then disaster struck. Renee had recently got her nose pierced and somehow she managed to knock the stud out. She tried looking for it, but the theatre was too dark to see it. We had to wait until the film finished so she could locate the stud.

From what I can remember the film actually got better and I didn’t totally hate it, but it would have been a walkout if it weren’t for that pesky grunge-era jewellery.

The Near Walkout II

Generally speaking, the films of Jean-Claude Van Damme are pretty choice, but I think it’s fair to say that the 1995 film “Sudden Death” was just shit.

Usually in most Van Damme films there’s some reasonably plausible excuse for why there’s this guy with a French accent in the midst of a bunch of Americans (”This is Jean-Pierre from the Quebec FBI.”, “I grew up on a shrimp plantation in New Orleans.”), however in “Sudden Death” his Euro origins are ignored – he plays a character called Darren McCord.

The plot of the film has been described as “”Die Hard” in a hockey stadium”, but “Die Hard” was pretty cool and “Sudden Death” was shit, so its an unfair comparison.

I was sitting there in the theatre watching it and I realised that I knew exactly how it was going to end. The mad terrorist was going to be beaten by Van Damme, and the hockey stadium full of people would be saved. There was no suspense, no action, no drama. It was just a matter of the film getting on with filling in the blanks.

I considered walking out. Sitting there watching the rest of the film seemed like such an incredible waste of my time, even worse than the time I accidentally had dinner at Renee’s grandparents’ place (fish with white sauce and vegetables, canned fruit salad and vanilla ice cream).

But something kept me there, in the theatre. Perhaps my desire to see all of the films in Van Damme’s oevre, or maybe just laziness. However, I was on the verge of seriously walking out.

The Big Walkout

My only real walkout was due to the film making me feel sick – literally. When “Breaking The Waves” came out there was a bit of publicity surrounding the fact the the hand-held camera work was causing some audience members to experience motion sickness and people were even walking out because they felt so ill during the film.

So when I came to see “Breaking The Waves,” I thought I was pretty hardcore and would be able to handle it ok. However, I was getting over a bad cold and had been feeling crappy most of the day. I sat in my usual position (centre of the third row from the front – it’s where all the energy focuses, man) and was sure I would be ok.

But about two thirds of the way through the film I began to feel really ill. I didn’t want to leave because I was really enjoying the film, but my enjoyment was soon overridden by an increasing wave of nausea. I realised that I would have to leave or risk puking. So much to my regret I got up and left.

I ended up getting “Breaking The Waves” on video and watched it to the end without feeling nauseated.

So I’m yet to actually walk out of a movie in disgust. It’s probably not likely to happen because it seems that most films that make it to the cinemas in New Zealand aren’t that bad. Maybe I could rent a really bad video and walk out on it?

So imagine there’s this movie, and a girl is in a bookstore looking through a book, and a a guy comes over to her and strikes up a conversation, they start chatting and hey, it’s a classic movie meet-cute! Real life is never that cute, as I found out today.

I was in Whitcoulls on Queen Street browsing around. I had wandered over to a section of books and picked up one that looked interesting and started flicking through it. I’d only read a few pages when a man walked over and said something that sounded like, “are you heerrthy?”

I wasn’t sure what that meant, so figuring I’d misheard him, I said “pardon?” He again said “are you heerrthy?” and again I was clueless to what he was asking so I said, “I’m sorry?”. He then said, “Well you are in the Health section, so you must be healthy.” I looked up. Indeed, I was standing under a sign proclaiming “HEALTH”. I said, “Oh, right,” put the book down, then walked away.

What the hell was that all about? That’s the kind of lame forced conversation that normally takes place between people stuck in awkward situations. Like at my old job where one morning a courier who was waiting for the lift at the same time as me said “It looks like the lift’s got Monday-itis”. The kind of situation where a little non-conversation breaks the silence.

But this was large bookstore. There was absolutely no need for him to talk about nonsensical shit with a complete stranger.

If I’d thought about it, if the whole bizarre situation hadn’t caught me off-guard, I might have responded with something vaguely choice like “Well, I’m as healthy as I can be for someone with the herpes virus.” It’s true in that the virus that causes glandular fever is part of the herpes family.

But what was going through his mind when he said it? Was it some kind of a bad pick-up line? Maybe he was planning on working in about how when he gets that feeling, baby, he needs sexual healing?

If it was meant to be a pick-up line it backfired abysmally. Not only was he a rather unattractive fellow, his inability to speak clearly, and his general creepiness put me beyond Shania mode and did not impress me at all, let alone much.

Regardless of his motives, the whole experience creeped me out and I quickly left the store. If my life were a movie that may have been a classic meet-cute, but in real life it’s just stupid.

It’s another year and I’m still only semi-employed. But using the spare time I have in such abundant supply, I managed to get some recent photos off my digital camera and am happy to present them to you as part three of the “Things To Do In Dorkland When You’re Semi-Employed” trilogy.

Adult Concepts

One of my favourite phrases is “Adult Concepts”. As previously noted, realistically adult concepts would refer to things like dealing with putting your aging parents in a rest home or choosing a good accountant. However, adult concepts is just another name for porn. I was walking home one day and saw the local adult video shop had it’s front window painted up boldly proclaiming the aforementioned concepts, and I just had to take a picture.

More Bee

I was perplexed by the “Corporate Beeburger” graffiti. Things got even more intriguing when I was walking home along a different route and saw some graffiti on the side of a block of flats proclaiming “Bee violence, bee control”. Now, after I put up the photo of the beeburger graffiti, I received an email from a concerned citizen, who said they thought that the bee in question was a reference to the Beehive, i.e. the government. This kind of fits in with the second lot of bee graffiti, yet it is still perplexing.

Buddha

I have a little plastic Buddha. I’m not a Buddhist, but I think it looks pretty cool and sometimes I rub his head for good luck. The plastic flowers accompanying Mr Buddha have a bit of significance. The purple one is a remnant of a Hawaiian shirt Friday at my old job, and the yellow flower is from the Cancer Society’s Daffodil Day. The Buddha is sitting on a sushi rolling mat I bought from the Dollar 1 2 3 shop. I have never rolled sushi in it.

Delta

There was this band called Delta and I knew their drummer. Delta broke up (and everyone cried) and had a final concert. I wasn’t on the guestlist, but I scammed my way in (”Yeah, I’m on the list. There. That name.”) and saw their very last concert at the King’s Arse tavern. I took a picture of the entry stamp on my hand for posterity.

James Bond

A slight detour from Dorkland, we shall momentarily head south to Hamiltron, to the classy suburb of Claudelands, to the corner of James and Bond street where you can see how the street signs read “James Bond”. I used to live just down the road from this sign on Argyle Street. We thought it was really cool to have James Bond so close by. Actually, that’s not true. I don’t think we gave much thought to it at all.

Kingsland

Back up to Dorkland, here is a picture of the suburb of Kingsland, featuring the Newton Road on-ramp to the North-Western motorway. Cool, huh? Well, the cool thing about this is before the motorway was put through all these streets came down the hill, then up the other side of the hill to Grey Lynn. When the motorway was put through it chopped all the streets in half.

Pure Massacre

And on the pedestrian over-bridge that goes over the motorway, more graffiti can be seen (possibly also by the author of the Bee graffiti). This time it’s the chorus from that rockin’ Silverchair song “Pure Massacre”. I’m particularly impressed by the presence of a hyphen to show that the word was so long it had to be carried on to the next line.

Well, those were a few recently highlights of my days as a semi-employed beegirl in Auckland.

Soon after uploading this page, I received this email from a concerned reader:

Your photos-of-stuff page sucked. Because Kingsland, Hamilton and Bee pictures suck.

So do Adult concepts.

You have been warned.

Jimmy Nuang

As per Mr Nuang’s comments, there will be no more Things To Do. A trilogy is quite enough.

My brother and I used to live only a few blocks away from each other, and we both walked the same route to work every morning.

Upon our morning travels we would run into a curious fellow who we named The Cars Man. We called him this because he had a complete outfit – trousers, jacket, suitcase – upon which had been written “CARS CARS CARS CARS”. Sometimes there were what looked like equations “CARS + CARS = CARS”.

The Cars Man would yell out various things to us and other pedestrians he encountered in his morning walk along Mt Eden Road.

My brother and I would email each other with tales of The Cars Man. But now my brother’s moved to Australia and I’m (theoretically) working from home, so The Cars Man hasn’t been seen lately. But here are the highlights from 2000.

RHG = Me, RBG = My brother.

15 June – RHG

I was waiting at the lights outside the funeral director at the top of Mount Eden Road. Suddenly I heard a voice from across the street.

“Wait till the light goes green! Wait till the light goes green!”

I looked up and there was the Cars Man on the other side of the road. The pedestrian signal changed to a green man and the Cars Man said, “now you can go!” So the other pedestrians and I set off across the road.

One guy said to the Cars Man, “yeah, thanks for that mate.” I also thanked him for his road safety guidance.

I do sincerely believe that the Cars Man makes our streets safer.

16 June – RBG

This morning I spotted the cars man, or more correctly the car man spotted me. He said some thing that was totally unintelligible. Usually you can make out one word at least, but this time it was just a mumble of words.

He had a helmet on with a light on top of it and the light was switched on. Maybe he was planning mining or caving. Or maybe he is just making sure that the cars can see him. Alternatively he could be turning into a car.

19 June – RHG

I passed the Cars Man at the end of Kelly Street on the way to work. He didn’t say anything to me, but he yelled something unintelligible at a cyclist. It was probably either “Good on you for riding a bike instead of driving a car!” or “You almost ran into me, you bastard!”

26 June – RHG

I saw the Cars Man go into the motorbike shop.

17 July – RHG

I saw the Cars Man walking down Mount Eden road, again by the bus stop close to the railway stop. He was wearing a thick woollen jumper (obviously the Cars Suit is not warm enough for cold winter mornings). He was also carrying a plank of wood which looked fairly new. Whether this was a gift, a purchase or a found object, we may never know.

17 July – RBG

I also saw him as well this morning, he was down by the Feltex Carpets building on Symonds Street. He was wearing the jumper, but I don’t recall him having a plank of wood. However he did greet me by saying “Hello Loverboy”, I would have preferred it if he had said something unintelligible.

18 July – RBG

I first saw the cars man on Symonds Street he appeared to be exiting a cafe. He was wearing a beanie and a woollen jumper.

I kept my distance. Unfortunately the pedestrian lights at the intersection of Symonds St and Newton Road had just gone as the cars man reached them. He started a conversation with a guy who was standing at the lights. The pedestrian lights went for the other direction. But the cars man started walking out into the traffic, although he quickly backed up and made a remark about cars. All this time he hadn’t seen me.

The pedestrian lights went for proper this time. He was striding out ahead, I thought I had lost him. However he stopped to have a ‘conversation’ with some people in the Chinese bakery. He then spotted me and asked if I was going packing, or maybe he was asking if I was packing a glock. And he said something about my suit.

Up ahead there was a couple holding hands. The cars man asked them if they were holding hands, they did not acknowledge him. He then turned off by the Feltex Carpets building.

3 August – RHG

Walking to work this morning I saw the Cars Man walking along Symonds Street, just past Bungalow Bills. There was an Oriental fellow walking along side him and the Cars Man was yelling something quite unintelligible at him. The Oriental fellow was staring straight ahead, purposely ignoring the Cars Man, trying to escape his clutches.

7 August – RBG

Today I was walking along Mt Eden Road it was quite foggy and just I passed the new bus shelter by the railway station. Through the fog I heard the cars man although I could not see him. I though it might not be the cars man, but sure enough it was him. He was like a fog horn, so when it is foggy everyone knows that he is coming.

17 August – RHG

The Cars Man was sitting outside the Feltex building rolling a smoke. As I walked past he said “Give us a kiss, love. Give us a kiss.” Instead I merely said hello.

21 August – RHG

This morning I had a conversation with the Cars Man! It was on Mount Eden Road, just along from the top of your street. It went like this:

Cars Man: “Hello love!”
Me: “Good morning.”
Cars Man: “Will you marry me?”
Me: “Ummm… not today.”
Cars Man: “What about tomorrow?”
Me: “Ask me then and see what I say.”
Cars Man: “Ok!”

I’m thinking of walking down the other side of the road tomorrow morning in case he asks me again.

28 August – RBG

I saw the cars man near the top of Mt Eden Road, as he neared me he said “Whooie, did you have sausages with your eggs?”

I’m not sure if that was some sort of sexual reference, or that he was saying that I had spilled something on my shirt, or something else.

26 September – RHG

After a long absence (in fact, I think the last time I saw the Cars Man was the time he asked me to marry him), today I saw the Cars Man. He was walking down Mount Eden Road, just a few houses before Kelly Street. He was carrying his Cars lunch box and the plank of wood. He saw me and said what may have been “How are you” but it sounded more like “hooooo rooooo yooooo!” I said hello and continued up the road. I could hear him saying “hoooo rooooo yooooo” as he continued along to his corporate headquarters.

26 October – RBG

The cars man was sitting in the bus stop by the Powerstation. I am 50% sure that he said to me, “sit on my knee lovely”.

26 October – RHG

I saw him this morning too! He was walking down Mount Eden Road, just down from the bridge that goes over the railway tracks. There was a girl walking a few steps ahead of me and he said “Hello, honey. How are you?” to her, then me.

31 October – RHG

This morning I was walking along Mount Eden Road, about outside the Quaker church when I spotted the Cars Man. The follow conversation took place:

Cars Man: Good morning lovely!
Me: Hello.
Cars Man: How are you today?
Me: Fine, thanks.
Cars Man: Oooh! I’m going to marry you!

So, good on you, Mr Cars Man, for making the walk to work in the morning a bit more interesting!