How To Punish A Child Who Squeezes Your Cat So Hard It Farts

Mamamia recently published an article entitled “Things your family does that you didn’t realise were weird” cataloguing the things that the author, Lucy Gransbury, thought were normal but upon leaving home discovered they were actually super weird. I’m calling bullshit a bit on this article because it lists things like Dad Tax and Wish Chips, which also existed in my household, and undoubtedly thousands of others. Compare this to, say, when I was little and every morning without fail my dad would tell me that while I was asleep he and my mum put me on the road, put yoghurt on my face and a truck ran over me and then I think we can discuss what constitutes weird family shit. Yogurt Truck would stress me out to no end. My parents loved my adverse reaction to their story and no explanation for the yogurt part was ever given. So, sorry Lucy, but you can take your frozen cheese and shove it, because I have a list of things that my family did that were actually weird.

• At 5 years of age I squeezed my cat George so hard that he did a terrible fart. As punishment my parents made me ring the vet and apologise, the vet sounded confused and just told me not to do it again.
• My dad used to take out his two false teeth and chase me around the house yelling “I am Gunkafore, you are Labrador” it used to horrify me and I still don’t know what it means.
• On long road trips my parents would buy us cheap little items to keep us entertained. To prolong the excitement and to keep us quiet for as long as possible they would give us these items piece by piece. For example, one year on a road trip to Uluru we were bought walkmans. At 5am we were given the Walkman. At 7am we were given the batteries. At 9am we were given the tape. And at 11am we were finally given the headphones – the puzzle was complete and we were over the moon! I’m still amazed that these little bits and pieces, which did fuck all until all put together, sustained our excitement for six or seven hours. Ah, times before the internet…
• My mum used to make crosswords for us to do at our birthday parties as they offer some “quiet time”.
• My dad wore a night gown instead of pyjamas.
• Until I was 20 I thought yellow was pronounced “yallow”.
• My dad used to pretend to be the ten year old version of himself and tell us all about his life in his hometown of Guilford. This was done at night, in a high pitched voice while walking around on his knees (in his nightie).
• My dad also used to do this character called “Marty Mosquito” (basically his hand scrunched into the shape of a “mosquito”) who would wake us up in the morning. Marty was friendly, but if his friend Boris showed up instead of Marty, you were liable to get pinched incessantly. Like, really pinched HARD.
• My dad thought it was HILARIOUS to make incest jokes. Nothing too rough, but still pretty blue. Eg. When I was asked by a girl in the grade below me why I had been performing, alone, alongside a teacher (my dad, who taught at my school) at the end of year concert, my dad felt strongly that I should have responded “because he’s my boyfriend” and walked off. Just to freak them out.
• I think this may be something that lots of peoples’ families did, but my family used to speak the internal monologue for our cat Jeffrey. If he was hungry or in a mood, we would voice his opinions or disdain or even just his general thoughts on the weather (he hated the wind). For a really stupid cat, I was always amazed at how articulate he was.
• Speaking of Jeffrey, we used to have a theme song we’d sing for him when he came into the room, along the lines of “Jeffrey the cat, the wonderful, wonderful cat”. Not lyrically superior, but effective enough.
• My brother and I used to have a song that we sang AT each other when it was the other person’s turn to wash up, a sort of musical bullying. It went “Guess who’s turn it is to wash up? You-rs. Yeah yeah. Woo.” It drove my mum insane and was eventually banned in our house under threat of being made to do the washing up when it wasn’t your turn.

Who knows what repercussions these oddities have had on my life, but I’d be intrigued to meet the Maz who had never experienced any of them. I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t be writing this blog though. Or gently feeling Nick’s eyeball through his eyelid whenever she got a chance.

Maz Tries To Escape From The Dwell Well

I’ve never even seen Frozen, but the song “Let it go” has been stuck in my head for days. In a strange way though, it’s kind of become my 2015 mantra. Every time I find myself dwelling on something, I hear that little blonde wizard in my head telling me to let it go. It’s actually been quite cathartic. I’m not sure what issues and niggling memories other people hold onto, but mine are all super trivial and incredibly old. I feel it necessary to get these down onto virtual paper in order to leave them there and move on with my life once and for all. So here it goes, my most painful memories.

My First Rejection

When I was eight my parents enrolled me in netball, because I was an Australian girl who was eight. And that’s what eight-year-old Australian girls do. They go to a really cold dewy field early in the morning in winter, in skirts, and throw balls at each other, then buy killer pythons. But before I had even made it to the dewy field I went to my first ever netball training. I knew no one, but as a precocious and tiny human I had no fear. Until we were paired up to do drills, that is. As the coach designated each of us a partner and the group started to dwindle I felt, for the first time, that fear of possibly being the odd one out. Sure enough, I was the last to be picked and was paired up with a girl named Rebecca (name not changed for shaming reasons.)

“Marion,” Netball Coach had said “you’ll be practicing chest passes with Rebecca”

Rebecca’s response to having me as a partner came so quickly and emphatically it made my head spin.

“Oh, poo!”

What. A. Bitch. What a little 8 year old bitch. How could the sight of tiny little 8-year-old, scruffily charming me, conjure up thoughts of defecation? What was so good about her anyway? She was freckly, plain and wore glasses. I was scabbed from adventure and endowed with knowledge of monotremes. She eventually went cross-eyed. And you better believe I don’t feel even the tiniest bit sorry for her. Because while all that happened to her in the subsequent years was the onset of severely impaired vision, I’ve had to harbour the sting of that cruelly delivered “poo” ever since.

My First Public Shaming

When I was 13 my dad bought me a bike. Being my dad he didn’t buy it in the way that dads usually buy bikes. I assume generally, that this would involve a trip to the bike shop, followed by the brand new bicycle being secreted away in a cupboard or shed until birthday morn when said shiny bike is wheeled out with a curly ribbon tied to it. My dad is not an ordinary dad, so he didn’t buy me a bike in an ordinary way. Dad chose me the best bike Kmart had on their racks (despite my protestations that I really did not want a bike), paid a deposit and then made me go into Kmart for MONTHS to pay it off in installments – literally $8 and $14 installments. I hated the bike before I even got it, so you can imagine how depressing it was to have this as my sole birthday present for my 13th birthday. But, lucky me, my dad had made sure I had one surprise waiting for me. He’d secretly bought me a helmet. A bananas in pajamas helmet. For my 13th birthday.

And of course, no bike-receiving birthday is complete without a bike ride to top it off, so my dad made me ride with him into Hornsby to test out my new wheels. I donned my B in Ps helmet and hit the road. I was actually starting to like it as we cruised along, the wind in my handlebars, until we hit George Street, one of the main roads that lead into Hornsby proper. And by “we hit George Street”; I mean I hit the gutter and face-planted onto the footpath in front of about a million motorists stopped at the lights. In my children’s character helmet. On my birthday.

The First Time Photoshop Made Me Feel Bad About Myself – And Not In The Way You’d Expect

I went to a Photoshop course for work to upskill my skills and have some time out of the office to dick around. It was a pretty basic course full of mums who, well into day two, were asking, “Wait, what’s the shortcut for copy again?” It was great, until the instructor got around to teaching us airbrushing. In order to demonstrate what sort of things need airbrushing in an image, instead of having an un-retouched image prepared in advance like a good, professional non-psychopathic instructor would, he singled me out and proceeded to let the class know all the things he would airbrush ON ME. Including, but not limited to:

• My flyways
• The little wrinkles around my eyes (or “crow’s feet” as he called them)
• A few small pimples on my face
• This weird hard little lump I have in my hairline
• Some dark bags under my eyes
• My skin tone

It was really a fabulous moment in my life, and I left there able to mask an image, with a thorough knowledge of copy and paste short cuts and some severely damaged self-esteem. 

I know I started this post preaching about letting shit go, but having written all these memories down it’s just served to reinvigorate my fury at all these people and events. So let’s just revise 2015’s new anthem to CeeLo Green’s Fuck You and call it even.

Deunited And It Feels So Good

I got unfriended recently. I was facebook unfriended, instagram unfriended, unfriended by friends of the original unfriender. I’m sure I would have been untumbled, detweeted, pinned-off and exmyspaced if I had any of those things. I was seriously, hardcore unfriended. I bet she even removed me from her phone. Or at the very least changed my name in her contacts to DO NOT ANSWER THIS CALL like she was in the film Confessions of a Shopaholic and was trying to avoid her creditors.

“But what would warrant such callous removal from all social media channels?” I hear you gasping in horror.  I know, I was shocked too. I mean, the first rule of not liking someone is that you keep as many windows into their life open as you possibly can. How else can you judge everything they do from a distance and truly know that you’re better than them?

This particular friend was one of those flaky friends. Never able to come to anything, always crying poor, too busy, too tired, too far, not enough advance noticed, scared of sushi, cats etc. But strangely enough, she was constantly posting photos online of her ‘making it rain’ with her other friends; buying herself treats, hanging out nearby, spending up big and posting her haul on instagram moments after she’d told me payday wasn’t for another two days and she couldn’t afford dinner – basically countering all her excuses in a public forum where I could screengrab her lies.  Now, I fully acknowledge that I’m not everyone’s cup of tea. I understand that people may get to know me that little bit better and realize that they don’t actually like me that much after all. But when I tried to tell her it was ok if she was a little over my constant Mazness she’d only come back with renewed fervor that we must set a date to have dinner, to see each other, to have a girlz night. And then would, of course, bail on these plans.

[Insert confrontation, presentation of evidence of aforementioned poor friend behavior and a few uncomfortable questions here]

After said confrontation, I received what can only be described as a Dear John letter stating she would no longer be my friend and that “i [sic] can honestly say with 100% conviction that I tried [to be my friend]”. Obviously not a major loss as she wasn’t a particularly good friend, but the thing that has stuck with me is that she chose to end our friendship with an untruth. Upon much reflection, a look in the dictionary and after consulting my own personal annals of friendship I’ve decided that she had not, in fact, “tried”. I did find numerous definitions of this little three letter word and unfortunately, she satisfied none of them. I was however, delighted to discover a myriad of examples of other friends and I trying hard in our respective friendships.

Try /trʌɪ/

Verb. make an attempt or effort to do something, exert oneself.

Example: One sunny Saturday my buddy Nicole and I thought we would be adventurous and go kayaking. This particular day we decided to head up and around a little island, near where we had procured our kayaks in Brooklyn. Paddling with the tide around the little land mass was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. We stopped to pee swim amongst a grove of mangroves, basked in the sun and sparkly water, swished past bridges and boats and rounded a corner – only to find that the island was not actually an island at all, but was connected to the mainland by a very thin strip of land covered in railway tracks. While we could see our start point, tantalizingly close, it was physically impossible for us to kayak to it. The thing is, I love the outdoors, I love the water and I love some exercise. But I get tired super quick and don’t want it to go on forever. The notion of kayaking back kilometres around the island, working against the tide, did not appeal. I don’t know who saw the “simple solution” first, Nicole or myself, but minutes later we were dragging our kayaks (full of water and weighing probably about 60kg each) past a large family of bemused Chinese tourists, across a road, onto the station platform, up a massive flight of stairs, over a bridge, down a massive flight of stairs, onto an abandoned and dilapidated wharf, casting them into the water six feet below and then sliding down a bank covered in rusted metal and broken bottles to leap across slimy and rubbish strewn water back into our vessels. While we achieved our original goal of circumnavigating the island, the incredibly lazy slob within me is still haunted by the question of whether or not it would have been less effort just to kayak back.

Try /trʌɪ/

Verb. subject someone to trial

Example: When I was in year six we went on an overnight excursion to… the snow? Bathurst? I don’t know, some place. Anyway, like any excursion we were buddied up on the bus with our best friends. Lucy, always ahead of her time, had bought a Dolly magazine to keep us occupied on the hours long journey. Amid the usual features on How To Kiss With Tongue (practice in the mirror first!), How To Tell If A Boy Likes You (his feet point in your direction when he talks to you – this sage piece of advice kept my self esteem pretty high for a large chunk of teenage life - turns out it’s actually a lie) and late nineties fashion tips, were some free postcards. I am still unsure as to who you would send these postcards to as they featured hunky guys, muscles shining and bulges, uh, bulging in their tightie whities. Lucy and I gazed at them prepubescent and horrified, only to have our terrifying, red-headed, banshee of a teacher come across us at this exact moment and snatch the cards out of our hands. We were reprimanded and told that, upon returning to school, we would most likely be suspended for having pornography. Nothing ever came of it, but I spent two sleepless nights at the Goldpanner Inn wondering what I would say to my parents.

Try /trʌɪ/

Verb. an effort to accomplish something; an attempt.

Example: Once, as a surly teenager, I skipped class with my friend to go and hang out in Hornsby. Now, I’m not saying we smoked some weed, but I’m not saying we didn’t smoke weed either. After coming out the other end of a particularly long bout of laughter over Video Ezy’s latest promotional campaign (they were giving away Video Ezy temporary tattoos when you rented Indiana Jones, so basically your incentive to borrow a really old video was to have “Video Ezy” temporarily branded on your arm. Read: I’m a bigger idiot than anyone you’ve ever met) I realized that the next class on my timetable, which I had fully intended upon skipping, was the class that MY DAD TAUGHT. AND IT BEGAN IN TWO MINUTES. Horrified, we legged it back to school and the biology lab, traveling faster than any stoned teenager has ever moved in the history of time. You’ll be glad to know we made it.

So I guess what I’m trying to say, in a roundabout way, is that while I definitely acknowledged earlier that not everyone has to like me, it sucks for you if you don’t want to try to be my friend. Because being my friend is sick dogs, especially if you love boats, porn and temporary tattoos.

Truth From Strangers Is Fiction

The other day I drove through Yamba and they had this sign that said “Yamba – Australia’s Number One Town”¹. One of my biggest peeves with today’s society is that people often say things that aren’t true and no one pulls them up on it. It seems to be that if you’ve said something loudly and authoritatively enough (or in this case – written it on a billboard) it is then indisputably true. Other examples of this include Lindsay Lohan talking about her sobriety, anyone who ever tells you that daddy long legs are the most poisonous spiders and people who constantly refer to each other as “husband” and “wife” when they are not married then are offended if you tell them they are not married². Unfortunately these people are rarely pulled up on this crime against humanity (by humanity, I mean me).

The weirdest example of this happened to me about a year ago. I had been invited to my friends’ house for dinner. One of my friends, for the sake of this story her name will be Cindy, had also invited her boyfriend whom I had never met. Polite small talk was made, drinks were drunk, food was eaten bla bla bla, dinner. And then something odd happened that I have been stewing over ever since. My friend’s boyfriend, let’s call him Trevor, who had not spoken to me all night approached me with a question.

“Marion” he enquired, “did you tell Cindy that moths fly towards light, because lights are warm?”

Firstly, let it be known that I have grown to hate the word random. Not as much as “epic” or “fail” but almost. However, in this circumstance it is the most correct word to describe this question, so I will have to use it. Trevor’s question was entirely RANDOM. You have as much back-story on this incident as I do, I literally have no recollection whatsoever of telling Cindy this, but sure, it sounded like something I would say. I relayed this to Trevor.

“I guess that sounds about right” I told him “moths are ectotherms, so they need an external heat source to warm their bodies, plus they’re nocturnal and don’t see the sun often, so I assume that’s why they love the light.”

There. That sounded good, finally my science degree was being put to use!

“Actually” Trevor sneered, “that’s wrong. Moths think the light is the moon, so they fly to it.”

He sat there with a triumphant look on his face and I shut up, Trevor was obviously not one to be messed with. Not because he was right, but because at some weird point in time he came across a little bit of hearsay that I may or may not have actually said, waited until he met me and then brought it up, hoping to entrap and then slam me. Like the proverbial moth to the flame. Touché, strange dinner guest.

I went home and googled it. According to live science, this moon theory holds no water. Alternate ideas as to why moths fly to lights include that males confuse lights with female moths and that the wavelengths of light assist in moth navigation. Wikipedia on the other hand does suggest that moths use radiation from light to warm themselves.

In the end though, I’m pretty sure that no one really knows why moths like lights because no one really gives that much of a shit about moths. And to be honest, my interest in moths only really extends to those of the Bogong variety (it sounds like bogan hehe). But I just wanted the world to know that Trevor was wrong. And is a dick.

¹Yamba actually did win best town in Australia. In 2009. Stop living in the past Yamba!

²Those who, due to the ridiculous laws of this country, are not allowed to enter into said holy matrimony are not included in this pet peeve. But if you are legally allowed to get married and want to use these titles, then just get married and then use them because you are confusing me.

When People Say Foxes Are Cunning, It's Not Just A Figurative Thing.

Oh lord, I am thoroughly Gen Y! Apart from my all-encompassing LOVE of all things Real Housewives and Dr Phil and the fact that I always have at least three devices running, I’d have to say my worst generation Y trait is my constant need to find the quickest way to do something.

It started out innocently, probably about three or four years ago, when I began saying ‘LOL’. I swear I meant it in an ironic way (I know, that’s what they all say), it was mocking – witty even. But you know how these things are, it all starts as a joke and before you know it you’re watching Everybody Loves Raymond, he calls Deborah “smelly tramp” and you look at the person you’re with and exclaim “OMG LOL!” And actually mean it. Oh, dear.

So now, logically, I am going to discuss my love of audio books.

I thought I was a genius when I downloaded Tina Fey’s book ‘Bossy Pants’ and put it onto my iPhone. I listened to it every day on the way to work, had a good chuckle and then told everyone that I had read it. I’m still unsure whether or not this is a lie, although given my history (see here and here) I’m going to go ahead and say that it is probably some sort of untruth. Anyway, on the back of my one-whole-book-read-in-a-single-week-while-driving, I thought “let’s branch out and try some serious literature”. So I went ahead and downloaded all thirty of the little six minute chapters of Cormac McCarthy’s ‘No Country For Old Men’. I love violence and I love good prose, so this book had been on my list for ages. And so began the most confusing few days of driving to work I have ever experienced.

I need to preface this anecdote with the fact that at this point in my life I was leaving home at 5.09am to drive 25 kilometres from my house in the inner city to Sydney’s north shore. This was a dark and quiet drive to work which could sometimes be a little strange. Once I got literally every one of the red lights between my house and Hunters Hill (probably about thirty sets in all) and was punching my steering wheel in fury when I arrived at one of those sets of lights which can only be triggered by someone pressing the cross walk button. Of course the lights went red, and as I looked around for a culprit whom I could silently hate for the rest of my drive to work, a fox walked across the road. How he pressed the button I never found out, but it was a weird moment in my life none the less. Anyway, I digress.

It was on this long and quiet drive to work that I began to listen to McCarthy’s tale of Llewelyn and his accidental involvement in an illicit drug deal gone wrong. The setting and people were painted beautifully in my mind, but I couldn’t get past how little regard McCarthy had for an even remotely linear story line. Just when I would start to understand what was happening, the whole story would be shaken up and I would be utterly lost again. One moment a character would be dead, the next he was walking and talking, he’d be crossing a plane and suddenly he was in a motel. After five days of listening to this almost nonsensical story as I drove through the silent streets of Sydney (which were thankfully sans-fox) I started to wonder if I was going mad. Why couldn’t I understand this acclaimed novel? Had I lost my smarts? Had I sustained some sort of head injury? NONE of the reviews spoke of difficulty simply understanding the transition between scenes and situations. Finally the novel came to an end. I picked up my phone (slightly relieved at the silence) and went to play a song. It was then that I realised my iPhone had been set to SHUFFLE the whole time.  

So now I’m back to reading books like a normal person – with my eyes. Yep, totes a Gen Y epic fail. LOL.

The Biggest Lie I Ever Told

I used to have this cat called Jeffrey. I know this is an abnormal cat name but I feel it is important to give cats names that have dignity; they are elegant creatures and should be labelled as such. Jeffrey was however, neither elegant nor dignified. He was actually, for lack of a better word, a total retard of a cat. He would sit nose to nose with the fridge for hours hoping it would feed him, was completely afraid of the wind and he once went missing for a few days only to be found sitting at the bottom of the garden, completely unharmed, with some type of moss growing on his back. He was also thoroughly unpleasant, so of course I loved the shit out of him.

You know when you have a pet, you often feel like it has certain things it wants to say to you? Jeffrey had a permanently angry look on his face, like he was dying to yell abuse at us, and so my family would voice his inner monologue; giving words to his misgivings about his food, his surroundings and his dislike of the world in general. The dialogue we had on his behalf revealed him to be a well-spoken but cranky old man of a cat. I still worry about the times when people would walk in on us talking from the cat’s perspective, but that’s ok because my family wasn’t particularly normal and I guess no one expected any better from us.

For a few years when I was quite young I had this concern that I may be possessed, like the main character from The Exorcism of Emily Rose, as I would often get up of a morning covered in scratches with no idea where they had come from. One night I woke up to discover that it had been Jeffrey all along; he had been sneaking into my room after I was asleep and settling on my bed; whenever I moved he would attack my legs leaving them bloody and battered. Another time he pooed on my history text book and I had to explain it to my teacher. Yes, Jeffrey was not a pleasant cat at all, but he had character and to me that is the most important thing any animal or object can have.

The following story is about the day that Jeffrey died. I am aware that this anecdote paints me as a liar and I guess I was a bit of a liar in this situation, but you will come to see that I only told one lie. Except it was a massive lie. Probably the biggest lie I have ever told actually. So if you have a problem with fibbing it is best that you stop reading now.

One hot January day I was on a train on the way home from the city. My phone rang and when I answered it, I heard my very concerned mother on the other end – I immediately knew someone had died. Upon realising I was on the train my mum told me she would call me later, but as they say – curiosity killed the cat (har har har) – and I pushed her to tell me what was wrong. She informed me that Jeffrey had been found in the neighbour’s yard where he had died after his kidneys gave out. To say I was inconsolable was an understatement. I hung up the phone and burst into tears. Now, I am by no means a pretty crier. I am frowny, blotchy, and above all, a snotty crier. I cry hard and loud until big slimy ropes of snot pour from my nose. So I sat there, in the most crowded carriage of the train, forty minutes away from home and sobbed. And so OF COURSE this was one of those rare train journeys when the State Rail guards boarded and checked that everyone had paid for their journeys. I handed over my ticket, still whimpering and covered in snot, which they checked and walked away. Relieved, I returned my face to the nook between the window and the seat and recommenced my howling.

BUT OF COURSE THEY CAME BACK. Because nothing is ever that simple in my life.

When they returned they silently escorted me to that small portion of the train which you initially step onto, the part which is neither up nor down. They had cleared this section specifically for me. Oh, the shame. So, they sat me down and asked me what had happened. I didn’t feel quite like I was able to say that my cat had died (how embarrassing to be wailing at that decibel level about a cat) and so I told them that I had lost a family member. I silently congratulated myself on something which wasn’t really a lie and continued to hiccup. Oh, how I wish they were your run-of-the-mill uncaring, bastards and left it at that. But they didn’t.

“Who was it, darling?” the extremely concerned, fatherly, train guard asked me.

This was really the moment that it all fell apart. Flanked by two burly men in uniform, devastated and embarrassed that I had been removed from the main population of the train I looked him in the eye and said “it was my brother.”

Just like that. Earnestly and honestly (except for the fact that it was an utter fabrication), and then shocked by this whopper of a lie I had just told, I burst into fresh tears.

He gently patted me on the back and continued to ask me questions, like any kind stranger would. Ugh.

“What was his name?”

“Jeffrey” I stuttered, my voice thick with tears. Thank god we hadn’t called him Mittens.

“How old was he, love?”

“He was fourteen.” He was. But he was a cat.

“How did he die?”

“Kidney failure.” It was kidney failure, but he was a fourteen year old cat.

“Where was he?”

“In the neighbour’s yard.” WHICH IS NOT THAT STRANGE WHEN YOU CONSIDER HE WAS A CAT.

The guard looked absolutely stricken and I swear to god, he wiped a tear from his eye. At this point, I was so shocked by the enormity of my lie that I stopped crying altogether and just sat silently, praying for time to speed up and my stop to arrive.

“I’m sorry to take up your time” I ventured. “I’m sure you come across things like this all the time.”

“It’s never anything this bad.” He told me, his voice shaking ever so slightly.

I am the worst person alive.

When we got to Hornsby (where I lived at the time) they escorted me off the train, into the lift and waited with me until someone came to collect me. I had to quickly call a friend to come get me, telling them through gritted teeth that “Jeffrey has died, please meet me at the station.” You’d better believe I high-tailed it right out of there – before any conversation between the guards-who-were-comforting-me-about-the-death-of-my-brother and my friend-who-was-there-to-comfort-me-about-the-death-of-my-cat could transpire.

Oh boy. If I wasn’t sure about it before this, I was after – I am definitely going to hell.

Hopefully I’ll see Jeffrey there.

10 Ways To Catch A Cheating Boyfriend

Most of you will have had a bad relationship in your day. Some of you will have had a terrible relationship. And the smallest portion of you will have had what my friends and I call, a vortex relationship, in your time.  A Vortex Relationship is the WORST KIND OF RELATIONSHIP. It is that relationship that makes you feel bad, oh, 90% of the time and dizzyingly, amazingly brilliant the other 10% of the time. It is like a drug and sees you lose half your friends, betray the other half, and destroy all your self-esteem and good clothes with waterproof mascara. I am one of the super lucky people to have experienced this rare breed of relationship.

Of course each of these Vortex Relationships has its own unique characteristics, like the different Real Housewives series, they are all terrible – they are just each terrible in their own individual way. My VR had a bit of a cheaty boyfriend who would belittle me in varying and creative ways. For instance, I once collected him from work on a Friday (he was already drunk) and drove him to his friend’s housewarming/pot luck dinner. He hung his head out of the window for the whole trip, yelling at passers-by pretending that he had an intellectual disability. We stopped to buy a dish to take – he opted for a pre-cooked roast chicken. Upon arrival at the party he barely introduced me to the room of people I did not know, sat at the table and ate the skin off the chicken WITH HIS BARE HANDS. Then he told the host that I had my period and we had to leave (I didn’t have my period by I was certainly ready to leave). Ah, the good old days.

As the years passed I realised that this was not the relationship of my dreams; with each subsequent lie and suspicious, drunken return home, and so I compiled this list. It is born straight from the mind of a very delusional, half mad, young Maz – so it does kind of reek of someone who needs to be committed (to an asylum, not a relationship haha). In the end it was my ticket out of that crap-box I called a love affair. So read it and use it, read it and thank god for your wonderful partner (or lack of a terrible one) or stop reading now and go about your life of denial, you poor sucker.

1.       Cast aside any pride and/or sanity you have left. Dispense with that shit like Pez. If you are not willing to do this, do not read any further and do not use any of these (brilliant) tips, you are simply not prepared to do so.

2.       Have an amazing memory and be the research king. If your memory is not amazing, keep a journal. It is hard for liars to keep track of their lies, so chances are if you keep track of everything you find dubious you will eventually come across mistakes and incongruences. Take note of things which seem odd and research them later; people, places and things are so easily checked in this day and age of social networking. Remember – a Facebook profile with loose security settings is your best friend. Back in the day I used to ring bowling alleys and bars and ask them to page my unfaithful other half; you kids these days have it so easy! Also, skills gained during this research will look great on your resume, the investigating and cataloguing I did probably add up to the equivalent of a journalism degree with honours.

3.       Do away with the illusion of trust. In order to really get all Private Eye on someone’s ass, you have to admit that you don’t trust them anymore, for you own sanity and also for the sake of your investigation. Once they know that you don’t believe anything that comes out of their mouth your Q & A sessions become a heck of a lot more fun and you can often corner them into telling you the truth. For example: I once called Mr Pot Luck and asked him where he was, I was told that he was at the newsagency, on his way home. I knew he was lying. I also knew that the devil was in the detail. I innocently asked what he was buying and was told he was purchasing the ever engaging and thought-provoking ZOO Magazine. “What’s on page 64?” I enquired further; I could hear his dry mouth through the phone along with some very long “ummmm”s and “ahhhh”s. It was so easy to catch him in that lie – he wasn’t at the newsagency, he was not buying a magazine and with three simple questions I caught him in the lie.

4.       Check their phone. People who have nothing to hide, hide nothing. But those who have something to hide will keep their phone away from you. This may sound like an obvious start, but here’s the twist – check it IN FRONT OF THEM. Wait until they are playing sport and you are watching, pretend it’s your phone in the car (if you have the same make of phone) and check it while they’re driving or sneak it out of their hand if they fall asleep on the couch. Maybe even connect your OWN iPhone to their computer and download all their information onto it – get creative! This way there is no element of surprise, and no possibility of being caught red handed, because when you are looking at someone while checking their phone you can see them coming. Also, be sensible with what you check – look in their notes or in their Words With Friends chat. The key is thinking outside the box if your partner’s looking to get inside someone else’s.

5.       Check their GPS. If they have a GPS in their car check their history, see where they have been and compare this with where they have told you they have been. Once I came across a discrepancy between the two and drove to the address listed in the history. It was someone’s house, so I waited outside (if you have read my previous posts you will know that my propensity to stalk is not a recent advent). A little old lady came out eventually and I found I had driven from Hornsby to Forestville for no reason. I hoped.

6.       Use sleepiness to your advantage. I think this actually a legit torture technique, but whatever, desperate times… If you feel that your partner is holding something back from you and will not share, wait until they are sleepy. Choose the one question you want to ask, and as they fall asleep consistently wake them up, asking repeatedly what you want to know. Works like a charm once they are desperate enough to sleep and they will pretty much tell you anything.

7.       Bluff. Make shit up. Once I found a foreign pair of shoes in the boot of the car. After my boyfriend tried to convince me they were mine (hahaha, seriously) he then told me they belonged to a friend of ours. I immediately fired back that she wore the same size shoe as me and these were huge (and hideous). Another time when he was out of the room I grabbed his phone and started mumbling, as he came back in I put the phone down and pretended a girl had just called. The terrified look on his face said it all, I nearly felt sorry for him.

8.       Be a master of minute details. I called Mr Pot Luck one morning to see where he was; supposedly he was at the beach. In the background I could hear the distinct call of an Indian myna bird. I told him that I had never seen a myna at the beach as they were generally urban creatures and didn’t really have feet that were accustomed to walking on sand. He tried to make some paedophilic, racist joke about an Indian minor. Retrospectively, I was much too intelligent for this dude. But then again, I stayed with him for years like a schmuck, so we were probably about even.

9.       Check the car seat position. I have ridiculously short legs, so anyone who is taller than Willow will likely have to change the passenger seat position. The driver will never be in the passenger seat, so this is a clever little trick if you’ve been told no one has been in the car. If you are more of a normal sized person simply move the seat forward before you get out. I’m a genius, I know.

10.   Break into their house. Keep in mind this fictional (ahem). Out at a friend’s party one night I was all pepped up on vodka red bull and had a fight with good ol’ Pot Luck on the phone. He was in the city and told me he was on the way home, but I wasn’t to see him because he was mad at me. So I did what any sensible 19 year old would do. I ran to his house and crawled in through his window, waiting for him in his bedroom. He did not show up that night. I really advise against this technique of catching someone out in a lie though. While I did trap him in an untruth, the sneaking OUT of his house the next morning was the most awkward manoeuvre I think I have ever pulled off.

This is all the wisdom I have to impart on this topic however; I honestly hope none of you are ever in the position to need it. Special thanks to my old boyfriend for the inspiration, you know who you are, I honestly couldn’t have written it without you – feel free to tag yourself in this post J

 

First World Resolutions

New Year, new resolutions. But has anyone ever, in the history of time ever kept a resolution? I’m pretty sure the safest bet is to just never tell anyone your resolutions, make as many as you want, but if no one knows about them there is very little chance anyone can hold you to them. I learnt this the hard way back in 2003 and have endeavoured to never make another resolution.

As a fourteen year old I was a liar and I was competitive, I am neither any more, but back then these had to be the two central pillars of my little, adolescent personality. Anyway, I had one of those friends who you always end up in little passive aggressive competitions with – who could finish their maths set the quickest, who could get a razor scooter first, who knew more words to Destiny’s Child songs, you know the one. So 2003 rolled around and the clicking over of the New Year led to that inevitable discussion about what resolutions we would be making. I had decided that I was going to sponsor a child. Of course, because the best resolution for a child who DOES NOT HAVE A JOB is to make a financial commitment to another child (who is also sans job. And house. And clean water.) So that was my resolution and it was (rightly) met with a cynical snort from my friend. She didn’t believe I would sponsor a child, she thought I didn’t have the money; “I’ll show her!” I thought.

Jump forward a month and I had all but forgotten my promise to pull a poor, starving African child from the depths of poverty. I had been happily spending my five-dollar-a-week pocket money on candy ears and dolly magazines when my friend enquired about how my sponsor child was doing. What was his name? Where was he from? How old was he? So I took a deep breath, looked her right in the eye… and lied my ass off. Of course.

 “Umm… he’s from Africa, he’s eight years old and his name is Mumble Mumblington. He’s just gorgeous, you’d just adore him!” Very proud of how sincere I had sounded and completely chuffed that I had put my friend in her place I turned to leave and was confronted with every liar’s worst nightmare – a request for confirmation of your entirely baseless lie.

 “Bring in pictures, I’d love to see them!”

“Sure thing.” I responded faux-enthusiastically, and scuttled away.

Unfortunately, the same little mind that came up with this ridiculous lie in the first place forgot this whole exchange almost as soon as it happened. And so another week passed and again I was quizzed on my fictional adopted child – not only did I still not have a photo, but I had entirely forgotten the first name I had made up. To distract from the second quickly and quietly mumbled, pathetic African sounding child’s name I made up (which I am sure sounded nothing like the name I gave a week before), I told her that tomorrow was the day I would remember to bring photos.

As soon as she had gone on her way, surely not believing a word I had said, I broke into a cold sweat. My exposure was imminent. And to have lied about an act of charity? Surely, that was the worst kind of sin! I just never wanted to be proven wrong, and now my pride had got me in all sorts of hot water. I decided there was only one thing left to do. Not confess that I was a liar (HA! we’d come too far for that) no, I would have to legitimately sponsor a child. I went straight to my mum and bargaining away my future birthday present – which was eleven months away, surely this deal would be forgotten by then, I mean heaven forbid I actually sacrifice anything for this person who was essentially a prop in a lie – and was given the money to sponsor a child.

I immediately rang world vision and began making myriad odd requests. Could I sponsor a boy? About eight years old? In Africa? (He was from Swaziland. I’m still not sure this is actually a place, but it sounded like something fourteen year old Maz would tell someone, so that would do perfectly.) Then came the final hurdle; I had asked the World Vision lady to list the names of viable candidates, and much to my growing concern they were all too normal. Tom Smith, Michael Jones, Mark Peters, nothing like the names I had hastily invented, and then… Vusie Magagula. Rejoice! The gods of perjury had smiled down upon me. And that is how I came to sponsor little Vusie Magagula for six years. He did send me letters and photos, and I took them to school, all self-righteous, and showed them to all of my friends. “Look at me, Marion, the selfless truth-teller-extraordinaire” my eyes screamed.

So I learnt that it is not a lie if at some point in time it will be true and that when all else fails, bluff and make up stupid names. Dazzle people with inventiveness to distract them from the bald-faced lie you’re telling them. And sponsor a child, you selfish bastard.