All abreast! I mean, all aboard!

As you may well know by now, I ride the train to work. It’s about 12 hours a week of boredom, pain, hilarity, politics, carriage hierarchy, subtle nose picking and incessant, claimless farting. One commute in particular found me seated next to my mate, Matt, (fart free thank goodness). After traditionally archaic tales of old and tails of old, conversation turned to what we thought would make the ultimate train.

The predicted folly of pool tables, roulette tables, bars and bowling lanes were strewn about our conversation like popped balloons on the colourfully littered floor of a combat clown massacre. It’s now apparent to me that those plain white bread ideas were the necessary blouse and bra we had to tear off to get to the potentially noble prize winning idea. Boobs.

You see, the train I take has a seating plan very similar to that of a bus or plane. Rows and rows of seats, where you’re staring at the back of the seat in front of you, carefully watching the dust mites make a break for it from the person’s scalp sitting in said seat.

But back to the boobs, (always back to the boobs). The idea was a little out of this world but I think it would teach us valuable skills to helps us, as individuals, work together. It was decided that every single seat of the train would have a set of luscious breasts hanging from the seat in front. Yes. That’s right. It’s proposed that the train is not powered by the engine, but actually by all the passengers leaning forward and motor-boating the swinging breasts in front of them in unison. The more vigorous the motor-boating, the faster the train goes. The details pertaining to sanitisation, excess slobber, the decrease in women wanting to ride the train and the dramatic increase of men with no destination in particular wanting to ride the train all day, have yet to be worked out.

But just picture it would you. You’re in your car, parked behind the boom gate at the railway crossing… and 4 carriages of people all motor-boating a set of fun bags idle past you in eerie awesomeness.

motor-boating explained:

(there was an idea for a train tailored towards women, but it got messy and was swiftly abandoned)

Dirty Old Man.

My word, I am indeed a dirty dirty old man. Walking along the train platform this morning, my attention was lured away from the ground in front of me and up towards the inescapably captive motion of a woman walking ahead of me. Grace. Confidence. Innocent abandon. Legs.

I was so very hopeful she was on her way to a fancy dress party. Or maybe she was playing the role of a character much younger than her on the set of movie. But alas no. The hordes of other uniforms and the fact it was 7:30am made all deductions assimilate the fact that she was indeed a school girl.

I forced myself to look away. The school uniforms aren’t exactly conservative in Ballarat. This lass must’ve been close to 5’10” and it seems they only made dresses for students up to 5’6”. Whether she intended to advertise this or not, she had legs, and she knew how to use them. A movie star harlot when compared to the gaggle that was now busy establishing a pecking order on the platform.

When I looked away, I passively observed almost everyone around glancing or flat out staring at her. So sultry was her walk, I half expected the sun to go down, a spotlight to shine on her, a microphone to drop from the rafters and witness her cascade into a piano bar jazz number.

The fantasies continued as she flicked her long blonde hair over her shoulder and turned to enter the coffee shop. At that point, the shampoo advertisement director in me yelled, “Cut! Perfect, you got it, that’s a wrap!”.

Judging by the height of the students and the broken voices of the males, I estimate they were in their final year of school, putting them at 17 or 18 years of age. If I was the same age, my thoughts could be interpreted as an adorable crush. But I am not the same age and that makes me a dirty dirty old man. Like every single other bloke there.

I’m on the train… and I hate John Mayer.

Fact: you say I’m on a train if you’re heading somewhere social however you say I’m on the train if you’re heading to work.

Like a child unwrapping a toy remote control car on Christmas Day, I opened my laptop this morning with wide eyed ambition and youthful exuberance. Unfortunately, all this positivity was hacked mercilessly to death by the scerated broadsword of reality. It’s another Monday morning, absolutely identical to every other Monday morning in every way. And as the train pulls away from Ballarat station at precisely 7:46am en route for the hive, Melbourne, the revelation insists itself upon me that the toy remote control car was a lovely gesture, but the batteries weren’t included. Last year, I was doing backstroke in woman shaped pools of beer and scotch and fun. Now I’m barely treading water in suits and budgets and targets and I’m pretty sure I’ll soon be dead from drowning in all these ridiculously misguided metaphors.

“stay positive”. That’s what you need to do big Shane-o. Stay positive. That’s the key. Wise advice but as I sit here amongst the biological droids on their way to their respective nine to fives, I’m starting to wonder, (in fact, now I am in full wonderment), if the “stay positive” approach is the long term solution or just a disease soaked bandaid of inevitable demise. If it is indeed the key, then it’s the key to a door I don’t want to fucking open. A door that leads to a room of suppression and misapprehension. My dear friends will know I perform at my optimum when I’m fired up and angry. From doing the dishes to driving my car, from competitive games to competitive sports, from the boardroom to the bedroom, I do it best when I’m angry, (that’s right babe, you’re beaten battered and bruised and you’re welcome). I’m a big fan of anger. I find it provides the necessary and easily accessible framework for powerful focus. You know what doesn’t help me focus. Yeah that’s right.

So the alternative to staying positive is to remain outright fucking livid, irate and/or any other ill-tempered mood that gives you the sort of drive and focus that could help you punt a fluffy penguin 100 yards. You’re flying now you fat, lazy, overdressed beak donning bird imposter! No amount of staying positive would’ve made fluffy fly. Chalk another one up for anger.

It’s by no means the best way to go about things. But right now, I need to use whatever methods I have at my disposal. If anger can power the Shangatrain (lame) to the last stop, then I shall embrace it. After all, we can’t all be perfect… like John Mayer, sleeping on a bed made out of thousand dollar notes made of satin and being woken up each morning by a bevy of supermodels gently gnawing at the genitals. God I hate John Mayer.