For those of you who are unaware of my plans for this year already I thought I’d announce them to the world via me-good-old-blog. You see in just on two months from now I will no longer be gracing the fair shores of England’s penal colony, Van Diemen’s Land; no, I will be relocating to the whiter pastures of the Great White North… Canada. Yes that’s right kids, this little half Indian duck is packing up his bat and ball and fleeing the country in a way completely unlike that of Christopher Skase.

Some of you may posses highly tuned comprehensive skills and remember that I was actually in Canada not too long ago, less than six months to be exact, when I spent less than a week taking in the delights of Toronto. Whilst I did enjoy myself immensely whilst there I can’t say that the city alone is reason enough to drag me half way around the world. There are many factors that have influenced my decision to take this rather unusual plunge on my behalf.

I think it would be easier to describe the decision process in reverse. You see for me I’d always wanted to go overseas and work for a while, it’s just one of things I’ve always wanted to do at least once, but it was always too easy to find reasons that I *couldn’t* go rather than why I should. Perhaps it has something to with my largely pessimistic nature and love of a relatively easy lifestyle that I currently occupy? Perhaps it’s just because I’m a lazy fuck and finding hurdles is easy than jumping then, trust me I should know I snapped a groin muscle jumping them when I was a teenager! Ouch! I’ve always had no trouble finding these excuses, my Diabetes is always a great card to play, I’ve got a good job here, I’m heart broken and an emotional wreck that thrives on the lifestyle not unlike that of a hermit’s? You see it’s all just too natural to come up with these things. So instead of writing down a list of reasons as to why I shouldn’t go I wrote a list of why I should. I didn’t get very far, in fact I only wrote one and doing that took ten minutes of time that I could’ve been using to watch The Biggest Loser or something else of lesser value (if that’s possible).

“Why not?”. Is what I wrote, I know it’s kind of cheating writing a question to answer your original question, and trust me when you’re answering yourself by asking yourself something else things can get mighty confusing, but you know what I couldn’t have written a more honest answer had I listed a million things. I’m young (well I’m under 30), I’ve got nothing really tying me down to Melbourne, I’m good at what I do and should be able to find work easily and well, you only live once, do what you’ve dreamed of!

I chose Canada over other destinations (ie. England) because I loved it there, the people were great, the city was alive and I had the best time of my trip last year when I was there. Add to that the fact that I’ve got some distant relatives, should I get really desperate, and a couple of close mates who’re already occupying the country Aussie style that will undoubtably help me out. All that and frankly London (and the rest of the UK) just didn’t do it for me and there’s nowhere else that’s so easy to get a working visa for.

Of course whilst I’m away I’ll be keeping you all abreast of my adventures and updating this blog with the usual paraphernalia that you’ve all become accustomed to and adore (come on I know you do! hehe). Keep an eye out because I’ll be selling pretty much everything I own to pay for the whole damn trip and prove to the customs dude that I’m worth having in the country (You need to show C$4000 in your account before they let you in!) and I’ll be making everything available online to you all.

In closing, it’s going to be a great adventure, I can’t wait and I’m absolutely scared shitless.

This morning’s train ride was just like any other, a fun filled ray of sunshine on Melbourne’s finest public transport system. Without a doubt the most enjoyable twenty minutes of mine and my zombie like fellow commuters day. Quite obviously I’m not the only person who has morning issues in Melbourne, who would have thunk it?!

There was nothing particularly special about today’s “journey of joy”, the scenery outside the window was the same as the day before and while my eyes could barely part to let the sunshine pierce my retina for fear of aggravating yesterday’s drunken Super-bowl celebrations they were given grace by the final legs of the ride being underground. Ah, nothing compares to the comforting warm glow of that oh so familiar artificial light my pale skin had grown all too accustom.

It’s usually about this point I have a look around at fellow passengers, see who’s decided to bask in the radiance of my own special brand of morning beauty, I wouldn’t exactly call the sweep around the carriage as anything more than a passing glance but it’s always good to “evaluate your surroundings” if you know what I mean. *wink*, *wink*

Anyway, just as I was approaching my final stop I was picking up my bag and making my way to the door when I noticed that the woman in front of me, who was wearing a lovely white business shirt and charcoal pinstriped skirt, had unfortunately neglected to notice that right down the centre of the back of her skirt’s seam was a tear about three inches long starting about an inch from the hem and going upwards to her bum. The skirt was lets say, on the shorter side of things, a few inches above the knee so you can imagine a three inch tear was getting up to slightly revealing territory.

(Note this is not the actual skirt I saw… sheesh, who do you think I am?!!)

This is where my conundrum comes into play… Obviously I wanted to tap the poor lass on the shoulder and tell her politely that “Hey, sorry to be the bearer of bad news but you’ve got a tear running right up the middle of your arse, perhaps you might want to go home and change” in perhaps slightly more delicate words but should I go and do that I run the risk of being perceived some pervert who in her mind only noticed said tear because I was staring at her arse; which, although you may not believe, I was not.

I decided it wasn’t my place to tell her but as I watched her walk away and more and more people quite obviously notice as she passed down the train station’s platform I began to regret it with each passing glance she received. The thing is no one else bothered to tell her, well none that I saw her anyway, but how embarrassed would you be?

So my question to you teh-internets is what would you want to happen to you if you were that person walking off a train at 8am in the morning with a rather significant tear in your posterior’s clothing. I think I’d want to be told, whether it was by a male or a female, old or young, but that’s me. If I did find a tear like that I’d probably call in sick and call the day a right off! hehe.

When I was a kid I always struggled with the concept of “New Years”. You see I saw the calendar of twelve months as a linear path, you travel in a straight line through time from January to December and once you hit the 31st that’s it, year over. The problem wasn’t in that logic but more so the fact that after December 31 it was once again January. Calendars weren’t round like the clock hanging on the wall of my bunk-bed adorning room. Clocks made sense, you went in a circle, years were straight. I always imagined that there was this strange Euclidean time period between the end of the year just gone and the start of the new, some sort of time spatial U-turn the universe made to allow it to travel all the way back to January 1st. What made my mind explode just that little bit more causing me to start dripping blood from my nose Butterfly Effect style was if the universe had to travel all the way back to January how on earth did it do it so freakin’ quickly when it took us 365 days to trudge through the year. Had I been alive in the days of Magellan or Columbus I dare say I would’ve been your typical ham sandwich pitchfork farmer burning witches and waiting for some poor bastard to sail of the edge of the earth because he was some crackpot that thought the world was round.

Needles to say I was quite young when I thought like that, you get a little older you learn about orbits, the year being another circle of the sun, blah, blah, yadda, yadda. Boring science, I like my idea better; you try and get a four year old to create their own time/space theories! I was a special child.

So how does all this relate to the year that is soon to be passed, 2007. Well… it probably doesn’t really, but I thought it best to share a nice story rather than swear through this entry entirely about how much of a shit year it’s been and that no matter who I’ve talked to they all say the same. I don’t know what it is (actually no that’s a lie, I do know, but I’m not sharing so there!) but boy did this year suck the cock meat sandwich (Harold & Kumar 2 reference… watch trailer here). I truly hated this year; even with my world trip I am gladly leaving this year in the past!

To mark this rather dubious celebration of crapness I wanted to do something a little different than highlighting what I believe are my favourite movies, TV shows, and similar junk that every man & his blog (I say man because 99% are done by nerds) will do and never be read. Whilst I’m most certainly not under the illusion that millions will read my blog either it will none the less be entertaining and cathartic for myself.

It is with belated breath and great pleasure that I present to you… Raj’s list of stuff for 2007 (very similar to the Raj-makes-up-categories TV Awards)

Most annoying thing of the year - People on Public Transport
I could devote a yearlong expose on how much the persons occupying space on any form of public transport truly shit me to tears but I’ll try and keep it brief today. I’ve got no beef with public transport itself, as in the actual physical thing that gets you from A to B, it would be a fantastic system if I was the only person using it at any time of the day and I didn’t have to put up with the seemingly endless sea of frigtards (see next award) that don’t cover their mouths to cough & sneeze, that stink, that are just purely nuts and that don’t make room for anyone to get on! I fucking hate public transport, and if any of you write a comment saying “buy a car then” I’ll personally send the crazy air gun guy from No Country for Old Men after you.

Word/Saying of the year - frigtard
Whilst the rest of the world can go on believing that the geek word “w00t” is somehow cool now because all the frigtards out there are now online using Facebook or MySpace and can speak like a 12 year old kid playing Halo 3 for sixteen hours straight on his Xbox I will break from the collective sheep and personally elect another completely made up word that I have already used in this paragraph. Frigtard (pronounced frig – tard)
Frigtard is a word that I believe was made up by this guy who wrote a blog pretending to be Steve Jobs (well that’s where I found it anyway). The word (if you haven’t guessed this already) is a derivative of two, frigging (used as a euphemism for ‘fuck’ according to Apple’s Dictionary app) and retard (a politically incorrect way of saying moron). Ergo all people on public transport are frigtards. See what I did there, tying it back into the previous award, clever!

Best procrastination tool of the year - Guitar Hero
I’m extremely tempted to put the Internet as the winner of this award but I spent a month without that and one of the only things that kept me from doing anything productive during the solemn period was Guitar Hero 3. That and not only did I get Guitar Hero 3 this year but I also bought number 2 earlier on and haven’t stopped playing both of them since. When you haven’t got time to spare but you really don’t want to do what you’re supposed to be doing than this is the tool for you! Sit back and watch the hours literally disappear and your impending unemployment become ever closer.

Worst moment of the year - Being overseas when I should’ve been at a funeral
Had a couple of things happened in January instead of December 2006 this little award would’ve been completely different but as it turned out they just happened a little too early and basically made this year shit. Anyway that didn’t happen in 2007 but this one did. So I was overseas, sitting around Paris enjoying myself as you do in Paris when I find out that an old friend of mine has passed away. Shit in itself but the next two weeks I spent trying to get home early to attend a funeral and unfortunately couldn’t do it. It sucked; I still feel shit about it.

Best moment of the year - Watching Ice Hockey in Toronto
Just to prove I’m not a complete pessimist I thought I’d better balance things out with the best moment of the year. Sitting in the Air Canada stadium watching the Toronto Maple Leafs and some other team (I forget) play live was just awesome! I’m not really good at talking about stuff I actually enjoy or like so I don’t really have much else to say other than it was like I was a kid again just having fun!

2008 Resolutions - None
Making a New Year Resolution is just a stupid idea. Anyone that hasn’t figured that out by now is either five years old or has the brain of a five year old. If you want to do something or make a change in your life do it right then and now, don’t wait for some special date because it will never last my dear kiddies.

A special thanks to all the people that have contributed to this year sucking so much; you know who you are. I couldn’t have been so bitter and dry without your help and without your shit I’d have nothing to write about. True I might be to blame for a lot of it myself but in true Raj fashion I’ll blame others. hehe.

In all seriousness though, I hope everyone has a great year in 2008. Thank you for reading my ramblings throughout 2007, perhaps if I find a girlfriend any time soon you wont be subjected to them anymore! Hehe. Au Revoir.