The Meat-tox

Hey guys, really quick post today... I only have 6 minutes before the Royal Rumble starts, and I don't want to miss it.

So, here it is. I've put on some weight again recently, and that's not a good thing for me, for a lot of reasons. SO, I'm starting what I'm going to call a "meat-tox" tomorrow. Think of it the same way as a detox, but with meat.

The reason it's a Meat-tox, is because if I did a detox, my body would literally stop working and start eating itself. Scary huh?

The basic idea is that I'm going to completely stop eating all the stuff that I know is really bad for me that I've been eating too much of recently, and also to really cut back in general on the amount of carbs I eat, because carbs are not my friend.

To help keep myself accountable I'm going to be doing video diaries and blogs about how I'm going. Firstly I'm trying for a month, to see how well it works, and if there's any little tweaks I need to do to keep things going well.

                                                So here's the first video diary entry thing.



Wish me luck!

It's time, it's time for a punk rock party

Hello folks,

I feel like this year is getting off to a much better start than last year. Without going into too much detail (and so I don't jinx myself) let's just say that I had a lot of stuff to deal with in a short amount of time last year, and it took a while to wrap my head around it all.

But this year, I have a band, I have a new(er) car, and I have the drive and determination to make things happen.

I also have the option to start a Bachelor of Arts course mid year this year.

I'm not sure if I'm going to accept the place in the course though, as my main focus is my band, The Savages.

That's what this blog is going to be about. My band.

The Savages really started about 12 years ago, when my best friend and I met, and had a music class together in high school.
We basically spent that entire year playing music together, and all of the years since.

We didn't actually form any official band until 2005, when we started our hard rock band, Abandoned Dream, which eventually morphed into our heavy metal band, Anihilism, which we stayed with until 2009 when we basically just stopped.

With these first two bands though, there always felt like a bit of a lack of drive, a lack of intent to get anywhere. We'd rehearse only occasionally, even when we had the few shows that we did play. Everything just felt like, well at least to me, that I was just waiting for stuff to happen, without putting much effort in on my end.

So, I took a break from music between 2009, and the first half of 2010. Oh, I should mention through all of this time with the other bands, I'd also been playing solo music. I've never been stuck inside only one genre of music. I feel like that would be far too limiting..I've written Metal songs, pop songs, punk songs, acoustic songs, even jazz and blues, and I have aspirations to try my hand at progressive rock, but I don't know that I have the skill at the moment.

So 2011 rolled around, and Curt and I started talking seriously about starting a band. We'd had a few conversations about it already, even written a couple of songs, but it wasn't until 2011 that we really got excited by the idea of starting a new band. Around that time we also went to see a band called Teenage Bottlerocket. I became immediately enthralled with the style of punk that they play. It's not as hardcore as a lot of punk that I'd been exposed to, and also not as poppy as what I'd traditonally called "pop punk". My definition for this term "pop punk" had been changed forever...and for the better too I might add.

So after that I started listening to more real Pop punk. Bands like Teenage Bottlerocket of course, but also The Lillingtons, The Queers, Screeching Weasel, The Huntingtons, and of course, The Ramones. I started writing what would become some of the first Savages songs, although the band didn't have a name at that point. I think at one point we were talking about calling ourselves "The Snowballs".. You see, we wanted a reference to the movie Clerks, because it is both myself, and Curt's favourite movie. And anyone who's seen Clerks, will know exactly where the Snowball reference would have come from. Incidentally, that's also why we use the number 37 for some of our band stuff, and The Savages is also a Clerks reference. (Bunch of Savages in this town...)

So we'd started writing, and even started rehearsing a little. And then, we saw Batfoot!, this awesome pop punk band from the Central Coast of NSW. In fact, I went to all three of their shows, in three nights. Which, for me, was a really massive effort. But I enjoyed myself so much the first night in Melbourne, that I decided I had to go to the Geelong show, and the final show was in Ballarat, which was easy for me to go to. It was awesome.

The Savages first T-shirt

Seeing Batfoot! gave us the final kick in the pants we needed. We came up with a name, we got a set of songs together, and we played our first gig in June 2012.

Since then, we've played nearly a dozen "plugged" shows with some amazing bands, and played four or five acoustic punk shows. However, the best show we've played was the last "plugged" show we did, where we were lucky enough to play with Batfoot!, which was amazing. We got to hang out with the guys, and just generally have an awesome time. We talked about us going up to NSW to play shows with them as well, which is one of our goals for this year.

Unfortunately we also lost our drummer just after that gig (we had a different drummer for the batfoot! show too because of double booking on our old drummer's part), and since then (the start of december) we haven't been able to find a replacement.

The plus side though, is that even though we have no drummer, we can still play these acoustic shows. I really love that the music that we've written translates to acoustic gigs, as well as a full band setup. I really feel like this band can go somewhere, and that is what motivates me to keep it going.

This past week we also recieved our first batch of "The Savages" T-shirts. There's a picture of them up there ^.

I feel so good about this band. It feels like the right style of music, the right time, and it all just fits together really well. Curt and I are on the same page when it comes to writing music, and when we come together with a song one of us has written, the other always adds something more to it to make it even better. We've got something like 25-30 songs that are fully written, maybe not gig-ready, but fully written. We've set ourselves some goals, and we intend to do our very best to achieve them.

We also plan to at least try to start a podcast, and also a video diary of sorts, the latter of which, we've actually already started.
Here's the link to the first ever Savages video diary. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZXlucZFnYQ

We also have a show coming up at Dogs Bar in St Kilda on the 12th of February. Hopefully just one in a large number of shows we have planned for this year.

To finish up, I'm really happy with how this band has come about, doing so much in such a short amount of time, and with such a clear vision of where we want to go.

I'll keep all you blog readers up to date with how the band progresses, but for now, I'm outta here.

Faking it, and Throwing the Bat at it!

I have a funny, strange, weird and slightly creepy story to share with you all, dear readers.

A little background first.

I'm a single guy as most of you know, and because of my condition, I find it harder to go out to places to meet people. Because of that I use online dating sites. I'm not embarrassed by this. The way life is today, with online being such a huge part of all of our lives, it's no different to meeting someone in any other way, except that you're not physically in the same room when you start talking. Which, I think can actually be a good thing. People sometimes make snap judgements based on someone's physical appearance, so if you take that away, and just have the actual conversation part of getting to know someone, it can be a very good thing.


However, occasionally that can also be a bad thing.

And that leads me to my story. It's a short story, but worth telling nonetheless.

I recently (last night in fact) started talking to a girl, who, from her profile, sounded great. Into the same kind of music as me, liked the same kind of movies, a bit alternative.. and overall just like a nice person. So we started chatting last night and got along really well. Even more similar tastes in music, and movies, and just in general I found her easy to chat to, and really nice and interesting.

There was one little red flag which I didn't notice too much at the time.. but in hindsight, was a bit iffy.

She has a lot of tattoos in her pictures, so naturally I asked how many she had in total. Her response was "well I have my arms done, my upper legs and my whole back".. If you have tattoos.. you know exactly how many you have, unless they are sleeves.. which these aren't.

So after today, I realised that should have been a warning sign.

Today, she put some new pictures up on her profile. Something didn't feel 100% right.. and for me, I trust my instincts totally.. or at least I'm trying to. So, I used google to search one of her images, to see if it appeared anywhere else.

It did.

Apparently this "girl".. has taken pictures from the blog of a hairdresser who lives  in London, and passed them off as her own. Which is really puzzling to me. And it reminds me of a movie/documentary that I saw a couple of years ago called Catfish.

I have in fact, in the last 5 minutes just talked to "her" some more, and I asked her which one of her tattoos is her favourite.. her response.. "my arms". Again.. her arms aren't covered in tattoos.

So it's a strange feeling I have at the moment. Part of me wants to have a go "her" and report her.... part of me wants to just say "I know you aren't the person in those pictures".. and part of me wants to mess with "her".. because "she" has messed with me.

The creepy part is not knowing the reasons behind the fake pictures.. It could be as simple as her not being comfortable showing herself online, but it could also be that .. "she" is a he, or a hacker, or some kind of criminal.

I think what I'm going to do is just block and report the profile. I don't want anything to do with someone who isn't who they say they are.

I also just don't understand (other than for nefarious means) what the point of not putting a photo of yourself is.. I mean, what happens if it's just that they aren't comfortable showing themselves online, but then you meet and they look nothing like their photo? If that happened to me, I'd leave straight away. That would be absolutely it. Lying is one thing I won't put up with.. and trust to me is the biggest and most important thing for a relationship to work.

So that's my little story. I hope you all enjoyed it.

Online dating.. usually good, sometimes creepy.


Also as a little addition, I just wanted to talk about the big moment in the Twenty20 Cricket last night.. For those that didn't see it .. here's what happened:

Marlon Samuels (who plays for the Renegades), while bowling, grabbed one of the Stars players (David Hussey)'s shirt while he was running between wickets, essentially preventing him from taking an extra run.

So, in the 2nd Innings, Shane Warne (the captain of the Stars) was bowling to Marlon Samuels, and at the end of his over, walked up the pitch towards him and said "Come on Marlon.. why don't you grab some more people".. and then this little nugget.. "Fuck you Marl..." and his mic was cut off. Yes, he was wearing a microphone AND they had a close up of him as he said it as well.

So that in itself was amazing. You never see or hear things like that in cricket.

But that wasn't the end of it. The next over, Warne fielded a ball and, as he put it, tried to throw it to the Wicketkeeper, but in fact hit Marlon Samuels in the arm. Now I think that he did it on purpose out of anger and frustration, so I'm not condoning it. But I'm really not condoning Marlon Samuel's reaction either. Oh.. what was his reaction you ask? He threw his bat sort of at Warne, but sort of not. The point is he threw his bat up in the air, and down the pitch, which was really uncalled for.

It certainly added a lot of extra drama to the match. Unfortunately Marlon Samuels got hit in the eye while facing another bowler (purely accidental, the ball came up off the edge of his bat and went in between the peak of his helmet and the grill), and it looks like he's hurt pretty badly. So hopefully he is ok, and can at least play in the ODI's for the West Indies in a few weeks.

So that's what happened. I think it was a situation that got out of control, but the umpires and other players handled it really well, and defused the situation very quickly. It's funny to me that a verbal altercation and an "accidental" ball hitting someone is described as "the worst fight in world cricket"... If you compare that to a typical fight in the NRL or in AFL.. there's almost nothing to even talk about. No-one punched anyone, and Warne's throw that hit Samuels was under-arm and not thrown hard at all. I think it's because we never see that amount of aggression that people have been so shocked by this incident.

Personally I don't think it was ever going to go any further.. Marlon Samuels is a massive tall West Indian, and Shane Warne, while feisty, is a lot shorter and smaller than him. And he's also not stupid enough to fight in the middle of a cricket match. Just to speed in his car while being part of an anti-speeding campaign.

Here's a short video of the first part of the altercation (warning: there is swearing in it.. so don't watch it with a kid around!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2a1Tv9rNHM

That's it for this one folks, hope you liked it... comment, like, chat, let me know.. and I'll be back soon. Possibly on video as well!

Goals for the year and rabbits in hats.

Everyone seems to be doing it, so why not me too right?

At the start of every year, people make new year's resolutions. Well, not me. I just set some goals for myself.

So I thought I'd write a blog talking about that. And maybe what I got up to for new years eve. After all, this is a blog about my life, so why not include life event things right? Who knows what might come out onto this page.. er.. file?.. Post! That's what they're called.

So new years eve.. I'm not much of a party guy these days. I don't like big crowds (with the exception of gigs), I really don't like being around a bunch of really drunk people (again, I can make exceptions at gigs), and I don't like clubs and the music that's played at them. Basically, to me going to a club is essentially me going somewhere full of people I have nothing in common with who I don't want to be around, doing things I don't like doing and listening to crap music. Not my idea of a good time.

So for the third year in a row I think, I went to my best friend's place. He was having a small party, which suits me much better.
Really there's not a lot to tell.. we had some food, told a lot of stories and jokes, ribbed each other, played some trivia, and had a great time.

Oh, actually, one highlight for me was performing a magic trick.

Now I know what this blog is going to be about. Goals, and magic.

I got really interested in learning magic a few months ago, after seeing this video (this is my first attempt at embedding something so if it doesn't work, i'll put the link at the end of the blog)

This is a magician called Shawn Farquhar on a show Penn and Teller did called Fool Us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZ2ebs9F1ek

So after seeing that trick (and watching it probably 15 times), I found myself wanting to learn how to do card tricks. I've always liked magic...my mum tells me I used to do bad card tricks when I was a kid, and I vaguely remember getting a magic set at some point too. I love the performance side of it, and the technical skill involved especially interests me. And, if you watch that trick, it is just about flawless. Even a few months later, learning all that I've learned about sleight of hand, I have no idea how he does what he does. (Neither do Penn and Teller though, so I don't feel too bad)

So I decided to buy a couple of decks of cards. A couple quickly became a couple of dozen. It's become something of an addiction to me. I didn't realise at first that there were collectors of playing card decks, but I've quickly become one. I have around 40 decks at this point. The great thing about them is that even though they're not that readily available in Australia, the decks aren't too expensive. Sure, some can get up to $20 and above, but in general they range from about $5 to $15, so I've spent a little bit of money on them, but there are much worse things to spend money on.

My favourites in my collection at this point are the few black decks that I have. They're incredible looking. I also have a deck where the hearts and diamonds are coloured blue instead of red, which I love.

What I've found though, and this may sound like a strange comparison, is that learning sleight of hand and card magic, and cardistry, is a lot like learning how to play the guitar.

I know what you're thinking.. No it's not! Guitars have strings!

You're absolutely right. But, learning card sleights is all about muscle memory, exactly the same way that learning to play the guitar is. For example, I can remember when I first started learning guitar, changing chords was almost impossible to do fluently. In the same way, learning to riffle shuffle cards is all about muscle memory. When I first started trying to shuffle the cards like this (the way magicians do), I was fumbling all over the place and found it almost impossible.. and even thought about giving it up. But, I persevered, and mastered it. I've focused more on learning techniques to start with rather than just jumping into learning tricks, though I have a few simple tricks under my belt, including the one I performed for my friends at new year's... where I turned a red card blue.

This leads me into the other subject I wanted to talk about in this post, being my goals for the year.

1. Get better at card magic, and grow my collection of cards.

This one is pretty simple.. I'd like to be able to do more than one trick convincingly, and get much better at the sleight of hand stuff. And obviously buy more cards.

2. Confidence.

I have this weird lack of self confidence. I want to change that. It's mainly with people I don't know, my friends and family, and people that I'm comfortable with, I have no problem being confident and outgoing. But, as my single friends and readers will know, it's a very different story when it's someone you're meeting as a possible romantic prospect. I need to figure out a way for my confidence I have with my friends to come through when meeting new people.

3. Maintain my exercise and diet and lose more weight.

Another simple one. I want to lose at least another 10 kilos this year, and hopefully more like 20. If I stick fairly closely to my diet and keep walking every day, it's going to happen.

4. Get at least one tattoo.

I tweeted at Kevin Smith telling him I was going to get one of his quotes tattooed on me and he favourited the tweet, so I have to do that at some point. Oh.. and just so you don't think i'm getting a ton of words put on me, the quote is "Why not?" The full quote is in this picture:

5. Find a new drummer for my band.

This one is a "has to happen soon" goal, as we've got some gigs tentatively booked in the coming months. Pretty simple really.

6. Get my band to greater heights

We have some goals in our band, some of which we've already achieved, but we still have a lot left to do. This year we'll release our first cd, have our first merchandise available to buy, and play some shows interstate.

Some other goals I want us to achieve are to get played on the radio (if we can find a radio station that plays punk), get into some magazines or so some kind of interviews, and there are some bands we want to play with, and have hear our music somehow as well.


That's about it really, I mean there are things that are a little out of my control like start a new relationship, or make some money.. but those 6 are my main goals for the year.



Oh, one last thing, I'm thinking as I said in a previous post, of starting a video blog. Let me know if you like this idea, and I'll see what I can come up with.

That's it for this installment. Thanks for reading.

It's been quite a year

Well.. It's the last day of 2012, and I find myself reflecting back on the year I've had, as I'm sure many of you are doing. Or you're already drunk. Either way, fun times!

So, I thought I'd write a post talking about my year, and my goals for next year. Not resolutions as such.. just things I would like to achieve.

A lot happened for me this yeas, as I'm sure it did for you. It started with my ex-step-dad Dave (it's complicated I know) telling me he was planning to move to Queensland, which I took... not so well. He had, for a long time, been the main father figure in my life, and had always been 5 minutes away, if not in the same house, for the past 16 years. So needless to say, it wasn't an easy goodbye. We've stayed in touch.. but not as much as I'd like.

Skipping ahead while I'm on the Dad bit, in the middle of the year I got back in touch with my "real" Dad as it were, Kevin, who lives in New South Wales. I haven't seen him since my wedding back in 2009, and I hadn't talked to him for about a year and a half at the time I decided to get in touch with him again. I'm glad I did, because we've managed to re-kindle a friendship that we hadn't really had for a long time. I think he sees me as an adult now, which is good, and we have some health issues in common (he wears a caliper on one leg and has trouble walking and what not), so we have a common ground we can always talk about. Which is great. I had a lot of fun going to stay with my Dad when I was young, and I'm glad we've got past the issues we had.


So back to the beginning of the year. Only a few weeks after Dave left, my cat Sabbath got sick, and unfortuntately he had to be put down. That was just as hard, if not a little harder than Dave leaving, because.. well Dave is still alive!
As hard as it was, I know it was the right thing to do, rather than have him live in pain. Saying goodbye to him, and being in that room while the vet did what they had to do, was one of the hardest things I've ever done. But he got so many pats, and he was told he was a good boy, and the last thing he heard and saw was me. It's a hard thing when a pet dies. It makes me think of a Kevin Smith quote, when he was talking about losing one of his dogs early this year... "They spend basically their whole lives with you, but you can't spend your whole life with them".

I still miss him, but I have so many fond memories, that I usually am happy thinking about him. He would rear up on his back legs and rub his cheek on my leg, and he would get scared of his own tail and make himself jump... he was awesome.

It affected my other cat Rupert as well, he's become more attached to me, but he's also calmer these days. I think he was stressed out when Sabbath was sick, and it took a while for him to get past it. But he's much better now, and I think quietly loves being the only cat again.

In April, my mum and her husband Joe moved from Melbourne, up here to Ballarat. That was a big thing for me, especially after Dave leaving. My condition makes it such that having someone close by all the time who I can rely on in case I need help, or can't move, or pass out is a big stress reliever. Plus, it's nice to be able to have lunch at mum's once a week. Free food is the best food right?

May, was my birthday. Nothing much happened there.. just my birthday.

Oh, I know what happened in may. I began a relationship with someone. It only lasted two months unfortunately, but when things aren't right, they aren't right. She and I are still great friends, and even though things didn't work out, I wouldn't change anything. She's happy with her boyfriend, and I'm really happy to have her as a friend.

June.. well that's an easy one. The band got a name, and played it's first show. We ran through a bunch of names before coming up with The Savages... The Snowballs, The SavageRs, Bunch of Savages, and a few more.
Our first show wasn't the most amazing beginning. We supported a band that sounded nothing like us, and the crowd that was there weren't exactly there to see us. I distinctly remember saying the following: "So.. has anyone heard of Elvis Presley?" ... and there were crickets. Crickets! Oh, until one hipster idiot said in a stupid voice "Is he on australian idol?" ... ugh.. hipsters. We were also a four-piece for that show interestingly.

Since then however, we've become a three piece (and at the moment, a two-piece) and played some amazing shows, mostly in Melbourne. We played once in Ballarat, and once in Geelong at The Nash, just before it closed down. We played one of the final gigs at the Barleycorn in Melbourne as well, which was a lot of fun.

But the biggest show that we played, was in fact our last show we've played as a full band at this point. It was also the hardest show to make happen.

Last year we saw a band called Batfoot!. This was the band that inspired Curt and I to start a pop/punk band. So when we saw that they were coming back to Victoria (they are from New South Wales) we wanted to play a show with them. So we got in touch with Craig, the Bass player/singer, and tried to get ourselves a slot on one of the shows.

Craig managed to get us a spot on their geelong show, but a few weeks later, we found out that The Nash, where the gig was meant to be, was closing down, and would be closed about 3 weeks before our show was scheduled.

So with very short notice, I emailed every single venue I'd played gigs at just about, and had no luck. The closest we got was an afternoon gig on the same day our original show was scheduled for. So it looked like we were going to have to cancel the show, which sucked. Then, this great little venue called IDGAFF had a cancellation for the night our show was meant to be, and they gave the night to us with about 8 days to spare!

So all went well, we played the show, and had the best time. We've got plans to go up to NSW next year some time and play some shows up there with Batfoot!, and just generally hang out and have a great time. I personally can't wait to do that, it'll be great to play shows up there, being that I lived up there until I was 10.


We also have plans to record our first EP/Album (depending on how many songs we get recorded) early next year, possibly even next month. Also, we'll be getting our first batch of Savages T-Shirts early next year so that's awesome too!

Also this year I applied for a Bachelor of Arts degree at University, and I got in. Unfortunately, after having a look at the campus, and how the classes worked, I basically figured out I physically couldn't handle that and the band. And being that the band was just getting on it's feet when the course was going to start, I decided to defer for now. I have until the end of january to decide if I want to start this semester, or defer it again, or just pass on the course altogether.


Some smaller things that happened... I bought/got 3 new guitars due to the Allans music store in ballarat closing. They had 3 Left-handed electric guitars left, and I got all three of them! Two squier strats, one being an affinity series, and the other a standard series, and one Schecter Omen. I absolutely love the Schecter, I only paid $315, reduced from $550. It plays like a much more expensive guitar, and is near perfect. I do wish I'd had the money to buy the next model up, which has coil-tapping (turning the humbucker pickups into single-coil pickups.. technical I know), but I'm so happy with the one I got.

I reached (and passed) walking every single day on my treadmill for a year. In fact now, I'm up to around 520 days. The next goal is 600, and obviously then 700, and finally 2 years. I'm thinking I may take a day off when I get to 1000... but I doubt it.

I finally got a gigging amp as well. Without it, playing in my band would almost not be possible. It's the loudest thing I've ever played through. Most of the time I have it on about 3 (out of 10) and get told it's too loud.

I got a laptop that lets me play minecraft without it overheating. As well as a lot of other things that it does well.

I also gave up alcohol completely, and stopped drinking caffeine.


Oh, and of course, I got a new car. My mum held a raffle through her social club, and they raised about $6000.. and I finally got a car that works, with air conditioning, a cd player, power windows... all standard things these days, but to me, having never had those things before, I finally feel like I have a modern car.

So that's my year basically.. ups and downs yes, but more ups than downs definitely, and especially in the second half of the year.

So thanks to all my friends and family for being awesome, especially my best mate Curt. And my Mum.

Also thanks to all the new friends I've met, you guys are all awesome and I'm so glad to have met you.

That's it really, I hope everyone enjoys their new year celebrations, stay safe, please be careful on the roads, don't drink too much, don't drink and drive.. don't sit on a firework as it's going off.. and most importantly have fun!

See you all in 2013!!

P.S If anyone lives on a state border where there's a time difference.. tonight you have the rare opportunity for time travel! Jump back and forth over the border.. and you'll be in 2012 on one side, and 2013 on the other! Spooky!!

Hair today, blonde tomorrow

Hey folks, it's blog time again, but I have a feeling this won't be quite as long as the last few posts.

This isn't going to be any long discussion on my condition, or a rant or anything like that. Just a bit of a revelation that I've had today.. more specifically this evening.

Today, I decided to re-dye my hair. Sounds boring I know. And really.. it is. But the point of this post comes after the hair dyeing, so I figured I should tell the story, un-exciting as it may be.

For a while now, I've had my hair so that one half has been bleach blonde, and the other either a dark brown, or if I've not dyed my hair for a while, my natural hair colour. I like it because it's different, but to me it's not too out there. Also it looks a little like Two-Face from Batman, and being that I love Batman.. well, it's just another tick in the pros column.

Before the blonde, I'd had a multitude of colours in my hair, all just on one half. Blue, red, purple, green.. you name it. I'd dyed it all brown for my best friend's wedding last year, because I was in the wedding party, and needed to look "normal" for the photos.

So as I said today I decided to re-do the blonde side of my hair. Nothing interesting here.. aside from the result not being the way I wanted it to be. It turned out a little brassy. I wasn't sure about bleaching my hair for a second time, and I'd nearly run out of the powder that I use as part of the bleach. My other option was to dye it one of those colours I'd mentioned earlier as I had some of the tubes of colours left over from last year.

I chose the latter. And this is really where the point of this blog begins.

I dyed my hair a mixture of blue and purple, similar to how I'd had it a couple of years ago. Which, incidentally, was about 6 months after my then-wife had left me.

So about half an hour ago I was sitting here, and until that time I was happy with how it looked, I was showing my friends, and putting pictures online. Then suddenly a wave of anxiety hit me.. Initially I thought I was worried about going out in public with the "strange" hair, and more specifically going to the cricket next month with probably 50,000 people and me being the only weird one with strange hair.

I then thought maybe it was because it wasn't what I initially wanted to do with my hair, and I thought it might be quite hard to get my hair back to the way I really want it.

But, as is usually the case, it took talking about it to someone to figure out exactly what was making me feel anxious. After all, I've had my hair like this before, so it shouldn't bother me to have the same colour in my hair. I've also walked around in public with green, purple and blue hair (all at once) and not cared.

Then, I figured it out.

As I said earlier, when I initially decided to put some blue into my hair, it was just after I'd gotten my hair cut short for the first time in about 5 years, which was around about August 2010. My wife had left me in May 2010. I figured out that the cutting my hair, and to an even larger degree dyeing it a "strange" colour was, at least the way I see it now, an "I'm moving on" statement, and a time in my life where I was dealing with a lot of things changing and having to basically re-start my life.

Fast forward two and a half years later almost, to tonight, and I have moved on, and my life has become a lot more stable, and I'm very happy with how everything is going. So, dyeing my hair blue, as trivial a thing as it is,  has felt like a step backwards.

It's a strange thing, the way our minds work. Aesthetically, I think it looks really nice. It's a nice deep blue, with some purple patches as well. I like this combination of colours, and yet, it makes me uncomfortable to have my hair like this. So I've decided to dye my hair back to one colour for now.


I know this isn't the most interesting blog, after all, it's just about dyeing hair. But, the psychological side of my day interests me.. not just that my hair being a certain colour brings back feelings from a couple of years ago, but just in general.. how certain songs, smells, images, anything really, can instantly take you back to a point in your life where things were very different. Sometimes good, sometimes bad. I guess it's all part of life.. and for now, I can't have blue hair.

The weird thing is, I didn't really want to dye it this way again in the first place.. I really should listen to my instincts more.



Ok so I'm sorry if that was a bit boring. Hopefully there will be something interesting happen soon and I'll be able to write about that. This one, honestly, was more for me.

I'm not like you: Part 3 (re-post)

Well, I said there'd be a part three to this.. so now no-one can call me a liar. Are you calling me a liar? Yeah.. you.. in front of your computer... well no more!



Ok...that was a weird intro.

So this is going to be the third post in this series (it's a series now) of posts I've done about my condition, and how it affects me. Now, this isn't a "oh.. everybody needs to feel sorry for me because I'm different" thing, I don't feel sorry for myself, so why should anyone else? Nor am I saying that my problems are any worse or harder than anyone else's who has to deal with disabilities or impairments. This is simply my way of getting information about my condition out there, and also maybe give my friends a little more understanding about all this stuff.


The other thing that I distinctly remember from writing the last two posts, is that I actually cement things in my head by writing them down, and in a way, I learn things about myself by writing about them.



So it's been about a year and a half since I wrote part two. I've learned quite a few new things about my condition, and made a few new changes in my life to help better deal with it as well. And for the most part, it's all been a success.


One thing that I'm not sure I mentioned in the first two posts, is about headaches. I used to suffer regular migraines, and do still occasionally get them. I get really bad pains in my neck which radiates up to my head mainly. But, the reason that I used to get them so much was because of my hair, and how long it was. Tying it back 90% of the time put extra pressure on my neck (as I'm sure it does for everyone else), and adding that to the muscle aches and pains, made getting a headache quite an easy thing.



So I guess that's an explanation for people who didn't know as to why I cut my hair off a couple of years ago. That and well.. your wife leaving you makes you want to make some changes after a little while.


As I said, I made some changes in my life to help with my condition. The first was that I made a pact, or a commitment, to get on my treadmill every single day without fail. And since I decided that, I have walked on that treadmill no matter what, every day for 518 days. Some days I've only managed two minutes, or five minutes, but for the better part, I've been doing my 30 minutes every day.


I can't tell you how much this has helped. Actually, I have a blog, so I can. I can boil it down to this. If I hadn't started that, and walked every day for as long as I have, I wouldn't have a band. I physically would not be able to handle playing gigs. I'd be in so much pain. I've talked before about things like cleaning my teeth can wear me out. Yeah, it can, when I don't stick to my exercise.



Let me just clarify though, the walking doesn't build fitness. Things that people without my condition wouldn't think twice about, like a shower, or doing the grocery shopping, they still wear me out. The walking builds conditioning and stamina to allow my body to function better. So I may get tired out, but I recover quicker, and I've also noticed that I can do things for longer, like playing gigs or rehearsing, and even the grocery shopping doesn't tire me out quite as much.


That was the biggest change definitely, but I've made some smaller ones. Diet is another big one. This one is really recent actually. I was talking to a vegetarian actually (don't get me started.. ) and they were trying to tell me I should find vegetarian alternatives for my protein.. after I'd explained that it HAD to be animal protein, not things like nuts, or tofu or any other vegetarian crap. (seriously, don't get me started.) But she asked me why it had to be animal protein, and I had no answer other than "That's what my specialist told me". I had theories though... I thought maybe it had to be animal protein because it's made of the same stuff my muscles are made of essentially.



But I wanted to find out more, so I was researching diets associated with my condition. What I came across was really interesting. It turns out that a high protein but also high FAT (yup.. high fat) diet tends to work well for people with my condition. And, I can totally attest to that.


Let me give you an example, because I'm sure you're sitting there going "if you eat a high fat diet, you're going to get fat".. or "but there's good fats and bad fats"... or "you're just using it as an excuse to get an extra quarter pounder, fatty". Well, let me tell you something, my normal bodied friends...

When I got back from New York in 2006, I weighed about 115 kilograms. I made massive changes to my diet based on the information from my specialist, but because I was (and am) on a limited budget, I couldn't get lean meats in big enough quantities. Remember, I have to eat 500 grams of "animal protein" a day.. at least. That is the equivalent weight of 4 quarter pounder patties plus the cheese.


So my diet consisted of those Twiggy Sticks (salami sticks essentially), very little bread, as much protein as I could get for dinner (I think there were things like homemade pizza.. but it was 6 years ago..), but my main point is, every 3 days or so I'd have McDonalds. I would have a Big Mac, a Quarter Pounder, and a McChicken.


You're all sitting there saying "that's too much take away". FOR YOU IT IS. But I'll get to that.


For me, it worked. I ate a high protein, and, without really meaning to, a high fat diet. I walked on my treadmill 2 out of every 3 days for only 10 minutes each day (not as much as I'm doing now), and in 6 months, I went down to 100 kilograms. So all your "too much fat" arguments are invalid.


Now this is where I get a pet peeve of mine off of my chest. Yes, eating take away is bad. Yes, a high fat diet is bad. But the problem is, every single person I've discussed this with is looking at it from a "normal" person's perspective. Your bodies work properly. Mine does not. It (in my opinion) has compensated for that by being able to process fats and protein better. I look at it in the same way as a blind person's other senses are heightened. My body's ability to process, and use up fats is "heightened".


But even if that's not true, studies have shown that a high fat diet works for people with my condition, and I have shown myself that I can lose weight, even if I eat higher fat foods. So, please, anyone who reads this, don't come to me with your ideas about what I should eat. I've tried everything you can think of.


I will also point out that I had a cholesterol test done during this year. The result was a cholesterol level of 3.5 which is at the lower end of normal. Again, your too much fat argument is invalid.


That's another thing. People say to me "you don't have to eat take away though.. you should cook more". Ok yes. You are correct. But how many of you get tired from preparing something to put it in the oven, let alone bend down to put it in the oven?


I've had a lot of suggestions. And, I know they're coming from a helpful place, but again, it's coming from a place where people don't have to think about energy conservation within their own body. Someone I was talking to a couple of weeks ago suggested I cook all my meals at the start of the week, and that way I'd have enough food and wouldn't need McDonalds. This is absolutely true. But I don't have the energy to cook 14 meals, or 7 meals at once. Take away is easier than cooking. I know it involves driving and that seems counter-intuitive, but I know how my body feels, and when I'm feeling tired, driving is easier than cooking and preparing, because I drive more often than I cook. It's all about conditioning.


Incidentally, I've lost about 3 kilograms in a month, trying out this high fat, high protein diet. So it works.


The other change that I made in my diet is to allow for a certain amount of carbs every day. Originally I tried to cut out all the carbs, but I'd found that I was hungry a lot, and also I felt better once I began to eat between 100g and 200g of carbs a day. Really the only thing I worry about with my food these days is the quantity of carbs that I've eaten for the day.

The best example I can give you for this working happened a couple of days ago. Christmas day. I spent it with my Mum and her husband Joe. We had roast pork and turkey, vegetables, and some christmas desserts. There was some leftover pork, and Mum gave me some of it to take home for dinner. So, that night, my evening meal consisted of pork, and turkey. That's all. No carbs, just protein.


I managed to walk 15 minutes on my treadmill before the pain got to be too much. And that whole night, I ached more than I do normally, and everything just felt worse.


The problem is with protein, is that you absorb and use it all very quickly. There's no storing it for later. This is basically the crux of what makes my condition hard to manage, and also in some cases, so debilitating. Carbs are broken down into glycogen, which is stored as energy for muscles. My body doesn't do that, so I have to get energy from protein mainly, which does not store. Fat obviously does store, and I'm learning a bit about how my body uses that. My theory at the moment is that the reason I can lose weight with my diet, is because there's no carbs stored to be used as energy, and once the protein is gone, my body starts using the fats. For a normal person, the carbs would be basically the only thing used, and maybe some protein if they'd had it just before exercise.


So I feel like I've found a diet that works for me, and as long as I stick to my exercise, I will lose weight and reach my goal, which is that 100 kilogram mark.


The other main change that I've made is that I've totally cut out alcohol and caffeine. The caffeine is more to do with stress and anxiety issues, but the alcohol was for my condition. One drink and my arms and legs, and shoulders and neck all burn and ache, and I get really hot and red, and basically it makes me feel awful. But, aside from it being a lot better for my body, I also got inspired by a new(ish) hero of mine, a wrestler by the name of CM Punk. He lives a straight-edge life, which basically means no alcohol, drugs, or cigarettes. There's a bit more to it than that, but that's the basic idea. (for example, vegetarianism sometimes goes hand in hand with straight-edge.. but I can't do that, nor would I if I could). I'm not one of those preachy people who would tell you that you shouldn't drink because I don't, but I just choose not to put those things into my body any more. Everyone else's body is their own business.

The other thing that I wanted to write about in this post is pain tolerance. For a long time I've found it hard to understand, sympathise, even empathise with others when they are in physical pain. I'm sure this was just because of my condition, and being in a constant state of pain. Even as I'm sitting here, I have pains in my back, my jaw, my hands, and my eyes are a little sore. (Eyes have skeletal muscles, therefore are affected by my condition). I'm actually thinking about getting my eyes checked, just to make sure I'm not just fooling myself thinking that tired eyes are because of my condition. I can see everything fine, just not as clear as I should be I don't think.


But back to the pain tolerance thing. I can remember a lot of times my ex was in pain, be it a headache or a toothache, or some kind of pains in her leg or anything really, and I would make sure she was ok, but in my mind I would be thinking something along the lines of "Oh, you can't be in that much pain".. I had a real "suck it up" kind of attitude.


I'm not proud of that of course, but all I can say is that I was dealing with a lot of pain on a daily basis. I feel like that has pushed my pain tolerance way up, and what may be a 6 or 7 out of ten for someone else, would be a one or two for me. I handle pain pretty well, I mean, a kidney stone for me was about an 8, and it should be a 20 out of 10 from what I've been told.


I had a conversation with my Mum about this a couple of months ago. We talked about everything I just mentioned, about not being able to understand people's pain, feeling disconnected from it, feeling like they couldn't possibly be in that much pain, because to me it wouldn't be that bad. But, from talking about it with her, we figured out that the pain scale is a relative thing. Your four out of ten may be different from your best friend's four out of ten, but you still understand relatively how they'd feel. And to me, that was a bit of a revelation. Maybe I've just finally grown up properly though.


Wow, this is a long post isn't it? Ok I'm nearly done I promise. I mean, it has been 18 months, so you knew going in this wasn't going to be short.


The last thing I want to talk about is playing gigs. I'm actually hoping some of my new punk rock friends will read this, because it's quite hard to explain why I can't move in the back rooms of pubs and clubs with music blaring and people's ears already ringing from being on stage, and I want them to know why I leave early, and why I'm so exhausted after I finish playing. I swear, sometimes I must look like Meat Loaf after I finish.. I've heard he passes out sometimes.


I love playing shows. This last six months, playing shows with my best friend next to me, playing our songs we've spent multiple hours working on, refining, surprising each other with little ideas... it's simply amazing. And the reaction to our music has been 99.99% positive... ok there was one guy who called us lame.. but screw that guy.


But gigs are also the hardest thing I do. Again it's the little things that people don't have to think about normally, like how close the parking is, what time we're on vs what time we leave, how high off the ground the stage is (it's hard for me to get up onto high stages without steps, and even harder to get down), how long our set is, and, as I said in part two, crowds and things like that put me on edge a lot too.


I have the same issues with acoustic gigs as well, but to a lesser extent. We tend to have some longer breaks between songs, which sometimes annoys people I'm sure, but it's purely to give me a little rest so that I can play the rest of the gig.

I do sometimes feel bad though, when I'm playing full band shows, and we leave before the last band finishes. Sometimes we've left as soon as we finish playing. In fact, I remember one gig we played, Curt (my best friend) and I turned up about 10 minutes before we were supposed to start, so we walked in and walked straight on stage, played, and we'd left within 15 minutes of finishing the set.

Now, this is partially because we play a lot on week nights as we're just starting out, and Curt has to work the next day and we have to drive back to Ballarat from Melbourne, but it's also because I'm so spent physically that I can't stay. And that's what I feel bad about. We need to support each other as musicians, but I can't always. I also am not the most animated on stage, but that is simply to conserve energy for singing, which is what I find the most tiring.

I wouldn't change any of it though. I absolutely love the music we're playing. I love that it can be played acoustically, or plugged with a full band. I love that we have fans, and I love that I've made a whole new bunch of friends. The punk scene feels really inclusive. No matter what style you play, people are into it and are friendly. Aside from that one guy who thought we were lame.

The plus side is we have an awesome title for a new song. "Sorry for being so lame".



So that's it for this instalment. I'm considering starting a video blog, maybe once a week or something to talk about general issues and also give updates on my weight and band and what not.. but I don't know how much interest people would have in it. Let me know if that's something you'd like to see.


Thanks for reading, and as with last time, I'm sure there will be another part to this eventually.