Indulge me for a moment readers. Imagine if you will, being sat in a pub back home in good old blighty,
enjoying a beer at the bar whilst awaiting the arrival of a companion. You’re a
little early and based on every other encounter with said companion, you will
be waiting for a while as their time keeping skills are somewhat absent. You
start to observe your surroundings. The patrons of this particular
establishment provide a good cross section of our drinking public. To the left
of you are the casual after work crowd, suited up and looking self-important,
probably using a hands-free set or at very least saying random numbers and
dates into the latest blackberry, I believe it is called the ‘Blackberry
Wanker’.
“No! I said 17, yes on the Tuesday,
NO! The 3rd Thursday, yeah, 14! Now please excuse me whilst I go and
pleasure myself whilst choking on a rope created by my vanity, sense of self
importance and delusions of grandeur” (says the man writing a blog)
I can’t
imagine that you are going to want to talk with this office junior.
To your
right, a little farther along the bar you have the wino collective. They have
been there all day, every day since the dawning of time. At least these guys
can set the imagination off. Why do they drink like they do? What happened to
them? I like to romanticise that something has occurred in their life.
Something almost Shakespearian, A lost love, a defeated general, a lost power!
This is bull shit, they just like beer…. A lot. Then you think, how the hell
can they afford to drink so much, I can’t afford to drink that much and I work
hard. It is best that you avoid such negative thoughts as very often it leads
to a particularly uninspiring rant about politics, broken Britain and observing
how things were somehow different in your youth, which by the way, were not
different.
The rest of
the pub is filled with people like you. Meeting friends having fun, getting
tipsy. You however, are sat on your own for the time being and could be for
some time. Can you talk to a stranger? Can you, in the middle of the city
centre just strike up a conversation, sober with the guy sat next to you? Surly
you should be able to do this?
Think about
it the other way around. If you are sat at the bar and some bloke comes and
starts chatting to you, the very first thought that comes to your mind is going
to be something like.
“What the hell does this guy want?
What is he after? I'm not giving him a cigarette? I just had to sell my mother
in law on ebay to afford 10 cat shit smokes. I ain't buying him a beer either
the scrounging bastard. God I hope he doesn't want to talk to me. I hate
strangers they are always after something”
I don’t
blame you! I would probably be the same.
The first
thing I was told about Canada is that I would be surprised by just how friendly
Canadian people are. I was at first dubious of such comments. However, I was and continue to be surprised by how friendly Canadians are. It’s
almost worrying how friendly they are. I have been bought at least 3 beers and
shots just to welcome me to the country. This is a very good thing as a night out here costs roughly the same amount of money as it would cost to buy a premier league football team.
They are
just really friendly and they love nothing more than to draw you a map. Without
hesitation and with little encouragement they are on top of you, smothering you
with friendliness and then, out comes pen and paper and suddenly you are sat
with a master cartographer to the kings and queens of Europe. They seem to know
where everything in Canada is from a city level to a national and will happily
lend you the wealth of their knowledge. In fact they are so eager to help you
that on at least one occasion a local has bought me and Gina a beer to keep us
there until he had told us all he had to offer. This is often the result of
them overhearing a conversation regarding the whereabouts of a city location.
So I guess what I’m trying to say is that people from Canada are nosy bastards
who butt into other peoples conversations! ;)
Thank you
for than indulgence I shall leave that subject now.
One friend
turns to another and says “hey man, want to try something fun and new?”
“Why yes,
that sounds tremendous” is the reply from our intrigued explorer.
“Excellent,
in two days time were going snowboarding”
“Oh Shit”
At first
snowboarding sounds like a good idea. What could go wrong? I mean your only
throwing yourself down a slope covered in concrete hard snow strapped to what
is essentially a flatted out box of cornflakes. A box over which you have
little to no control!
At best I am
a worrier, at worst I am a nagging, neurotic scaredy pants! This I’m afraid is
just not the ideal approach for snowboarding. Whilst approaching my first corner
as a new snowboarder my imagination begins to get the better of me. That corner
now represents the end of Lee Morton! My hopeless human eyes cannot see over
the tiny dip on the edge of the corner, they cannot see the snow or even the
tree. NO! I am blind in panic, over the edge of that corner is a thousand foot
drop into a ravine. At the bottom crocodiles are awaiting their dinner. It is
at this precise moment that I remember that I don’t know how to stop this
cereal box and unless I do something drastic I am going to fall to my premature death. In
the struggle with reality I am currently experiencing I forget about the speed
at which I am travelling. In my mind I feel like I’m flying, I feel as though I'm going at least the speed of a raptor, flying towards my doom. I quickly realise
that this requires drastic and immediate action. Personally, my method on the
day was really pretty simple. Throw myself to the ground, show no shame and
launch yourself into that powder. I bounced from the ground with as much grace
as a rent boy being thrown from a rugby team tour bus. My limbs seem
to fly uncontrollably around me, a leg flies past my ear. I feel my right
elbow hit my left shoulder and I make the sort of sounds you usually only
hear approaching the end of a porno as air escapes me from every possible
bodily rout. Finally I come to a stop, motionless for a few seconds, am I
alive? Have I survived what surly must have been a life threatening fall? Snow
has gotten under all of my clothes, my ass crack is full of snow. It has
managed to infiltrate my entire undergarment collection, I’m inches away from a
frosted manly section. Thank the good lord it stopped just before. Cold and lonely on the
side of a hill, I test every part of my anatomy; arms and legs in full
working order, I can wiggle my toes, YES! I am ok. I take a deep breath raise
my face to look this cruel environment straight in the eye and flip it the
bird. I see two things: 1st I see Fraser rolling around in the snow,
laughing so hard he is in danger of slipping into coma at my expense. 2nd I glance to my right and see a sign kindly informing me that on a scale of one to ten,
one signifying a baby chimp could navigate the slope and 10 being the most
difficult, I am in fact on number one! Even the kiddies slope is steeper that
this one. I look once more to my friend in hysterics and think to myself "Mort maybe snowboarding is not for you old pal"
Ok ok ok, I
think I’ve gone on quiet enough for one instalment. I’m in danger of talking rubbish
forever here.
If you made
it to the end, thank you J
