Shop stewarding...

Well, I've had three meetings now in my official capacity as union rep, or "shop steward." Two were related to the same thing, a person at work who has caused some concern about the patterns of time off they have established. I found this interesting on several levels. The initial meeting was a complete mess. Our production leader was feeling a little unsure about things, so he invited the teamleader from Mains to sit in. The teamleader from Mains is an overbearing, bullyboy type. So the meeting was dominated by this bloke. The guy from Mains asked some stupid questions, and gave some great examples of shit from his own experience. The best of these was explaining why sickleave is so important. He fucking biollopcks ,...., I's ytired... g'noght/// i mean g'night...
Right, I've just had a nap, so where was I? Let's see...

Yeah, sick leave. The guy from aMains's example was one of his team who's wife had cancer. ass... Oh, bnloody hell... At any rate , the boosss type from Maind was ana sshooellwe, qho made trhe wmeetiong shit, and I didn't like him cos he was cock.

addendum

Erm, not much to say, except that the reason I put Yarp in as the last posts title was that I have just watched Hot Fuzz again on DVD, and absolutely loved it. It probably isn't quite as good as Shaun of the Dead (at least to my tastes) but it is still brilliant. Oh yeah, and my sister introduced me to vanilla flavoured Crazy Faces biscuits yesterday while I was helping look after my nephew, and they are delicious. They taste just like Girl Guide biscuits, which I have always really liked. Buttocks...

Okay, I put buttocks in as a finish to this post, but there was one more thing I wanted to mention. Flight of the Conchords. They are one of the funniest things I hav ever listened to. In the last week I have listened to the BBC radio series of theirs like four or five times. It is really cool to wander around work with a huge grin on my face...

Yarp...

Blurgh, that son of a bitch John Keys was just on the news. I really can't stand him. There are two things that just get on my nerves about him and the National Party these days.

Basically the main thing about Mr Keys that pisses me off is his everyman, came form humble beginnings thing. I don't care if his family were poor when he was growing up, I think that the fact that he is now a multi-millionaire living in a mansion and holidaying in Hawaii kind of shows that he isn't necessarily in touch with the lives of poor New Zealanders any more. He is basically a rich bastard, who likes to be all "I came from nothing and made a go of it, so anyone should be ale to do the same." Sanctimonious son of a bitch... Not all people can find that path to riches. Some of the world have to work hard just to get by.

But my biggest gripe is with the National Party in general. It has become a poofy, full of shit "Yes" party, with no apparent stance of its own. I am not in the least bit surprised that National is ahead in the polls these days - they simply change their opinion and policies to suit whatever any group has to say. Like with the media rights in Parliament. National supported the amendments to the rules for media coverage of parliament at first, but when it turned out that the public didn't like it, they did an immediate about face. And that's all they ever do. I haven't seen a clear policy statement from National in a long time. Any position they take now is invariably altered within days to suit whatever will win them votes. Frankly, I'd rather have a party in power that actually has an agenda than just some sacks of shit that'll change the running of the nation to suit whatever group makes the biggest fuss...

And on a personal front - things are much the same. Wokrk is still work-like. Being elected as Shop Steward for night shift hasn't had any impact whatsoever. Although I have had the opportunity to just sit around and talk bollocks with the day shift union rep and call it a union meeting... But basically the night shift staff all just kind of get on with their jobs and don't cause a fuss, so there isn't a great deal to do as union rep. Which is probably cool, as I don't really know what I'm supposed to be doing anyway.

Back to the political thing, when John Keys took over form Don Brash as head of the National Party, he immediately reversed Naitonals position on race relations. He basically went agianst the Orewa speech made by Dr Brash. Now, that's fine, and basically good, as the Orewa speech was an infalmmatory, racist crock of shit. But the thing is, while the head of the snake has changed, National is still the same animal. So what Don brash said several years ago shouldn't be forgotten just because a smiley, friendly son of a bitch has replaced him. John Keys makes my flesh crawl...

Dreams

I never really seem to remember my dreams. I think this is at least partly because I tend to sleep only when I'm really exhausted, so I crash into a very deep sleep fairly quickly. I don't know if that exactly makes sense, as dreams come in REM sleep, I think, so my deep sleep should be quite good for dreaming. Although that's the thing that annoys me - I often wake up with a sense that I was dreaming something quite wonderful, but unable to recall what it was. There's a weird sense of loss in not being able to remember my dreams...

There is one dream, from my childhood, that when I think back on it is as fresh as it was when I was five or six. It's from when my family were living in Wellington, in Whitby. There's me, and my cousin, and some other kids around. And for whatever reason, we're talking about flying. Now, I know that flying dreams are quite common, but this one seemed weird to me. Perhaps that's why it's stuck with me. Anyway, as we are talking about flying, I tell my cousin that it's really easy, that you just have to walk into the air. Then I demonstrate - I walk up into the air like climbing a staircase. As I ascend, I feel a lightness of body and freedom of mind, a state of almost euphoria... And then I get to the top of the invisible staircase. This is where it always seems a little more weird than I'm comfortable with. I think I had this dream quite a few times when I was young, and there were two ends to it. In one, I get to the top of my climb, and can just feel that there are no more stairs, and nowhere to go. So I stand in frozen panic, not wanting to step out onto empty air and fall back to earth. And it isn't concern about being hurt - it's an acute sense of embarassment, That the other people below me will laugh. This tended to be where I'd wake up, feeling... I don't know. Funny, but whatever emotion was left with me on waking hasn't stuck.

The other end of this was reaching the top of the stairs and simply stepping out into space, then swooping away into the air, feeling the world drop away and just being free and happy. I much preferred this ending, but it was less common.

I dion't know if this says much of anything about what sort of child I was, or what sort of person I am. But from 33 years of sleep, it is the only dream that has stuck with me.