Another Day in the Haze

Oy. Just think of all the money I'm saving.

Were I in Queenstown under normal mindspace, I'd have dropped a few hundred and gone out for a day trip today, and yesterday I probably would have thrown myself off of something high, and there are all sorts of other trips that the next day would be offering me. But nope, I need not worry about them. Not here, and not now. Now I just need to worry about drinking god awful bottles of water, and just bringing back the fog in the form of tiny little white pills.

Tiny little white pills which are nearly out. At first I thought this might mean I should go back to see a Doc in order to get more. But no – in this country codeine is available over the counter, no prescription needed – so every drug I need is ripe for the buying. And then I thought that perhaps if the drugs were running out it was because I should be better – but no, an internet search led me to discover that kidney stones can pass in hours, or pass in months. Let me tell you how excited that made me feel.

I found internet today, by the way. That was my big mission and I used it for the hour an a bit until my batteries died. Sure I could have paid 4.00 a hour to use it in the hostel and keep charged while I was typing, but McDonald's offered me a better solution – free with purchase. Sure it only worked in the McCafe, so no burgers for me, but the – I don't remember what it was? Some sort of frosted spiced – ahh, citrus slice, that's what it was. Yes. That's what I had. Only 2.60 and it let me surf for over an hour, so better value – and it came with the food, yeah? So forget you pay internet. God this city is blanketed with pay internet. The whole city. It's like pay toilets. Nothing good people, nothing good.

Once more – in the middle of Africa if internet is free for people on their crank wind up laptops, it should be free here too. Come on Billy G, divert your money to free slow speed connections around the world – pay for upgrades if you want. Farmville proves this system works. You only need a fraction of users to pay. Here's looking at you music distribution system.

So yes, that was my mission for the day, and by two o'clock it was completed. Leaving me with – with lots of day left, but not much to do. I hear there's a bookstore around here? I might seek it out, though it probably closes early as. Is that the right way to use the term? Or can it only follow sweet?

I'm going to level with you all, much as I've tried not to make them a focal point, I will right now. I want off of these bloody pain killers. I do. They're god awful. You can feel the haze in your mind, and you can feel how they make you feel differently. I don't know if it's obvious for all, or just because I'm looking for it – but when I thought jumping out of an airplane strapped to another person was a good idea, yesterday? That was not me thinking. Actually I probably would have done it today, did I not wake up without any drugs in my system.

I had a huge pain last night, and chomped down on far too many – waiting thirty minutes between batches hoping the god awful would just go away. When it finally did, and I slipped off to sleep, I slept and slept. By noon I still did not feel anything. Never had I woken up without anything.

All it took was two minutes out of the blankets for it to come back though. But – from my internet searching, I'm not sure what that meant. Because the pain – I read – is not from the stones. It's from the muscles trying to force the stones out. So if this is true, then waking up super bloody effin' cold, and shivering would be enough to agitate those muscles even if they weren't forcing anything. But no – with my luck – they're probably still there.

I thought I might not take any drugs today, see how it felt. About thrity minutes with the feelings back at about 20% and I realized what stupid idea that was. Chomp chomp chomp. Though I'm trying to stick to the no-name Tylenol, and keep far away from the codeine. The Ibupren does weird things too – and while it works the best, it slightly terrifies me too. I do not like painkillers. I do not like drugs. And that I'm now dependent on them to get through the day really really bothers me.

The internet also told me (I don't know how true it is) is that the more I drink, the more likely I will be to pass the stones. Think of every liter of water as a new chance. With that thought I will drink and drink. What could possibly go wrong? It's not like anyone has died from drinking too much water. Wait – what?

I can not read my novel – I'm at a part where the main character is using scissors to cut off part of his flesh that is bringing him pain, and I'm not willing to deal with that – with the flesh being too slick with his blood to hold on properly – this is not the comedy I was promised. And I've watched most of the movies I have. BBC news in the TV room doesn't do it for me.

But I have found a lovely couch near a plug socket to jack in and type, and listen to podcasts without shivering as I have been doing in my room up until now, and so there's that. And that's actually quite a lot at this point.

I have rolling headaches, and I'm always tired. And it's annoying because I feel like I'm wasting my chance to be in such a fantastic place. Mind you, I know I'm not. I've seen the city, gone up the mountain, hit up the luge, and driven hours outside of town and wandered forests. I've made good use of my time here, and when I look back on this time my memories will be nothing but good. It seems most of what people do here is go drinking anyway. Lots and lots of drinking. I just ran into someone, before two pee em, trashed in the bathroom. And I salute him and his efforts. But that is not for me. Not right now.

And like I said, oy. Just think of all the money I'm saving.

More people have moved into my room – and shock of all shocks, the heating system was on. I have no idea how they did this. I pushed every button on the machine. I ripped chunks off of the machine and tried to place them back as best I could, to ensure there was nothing inside that I could touch to make it work. But here it was spitting beautifully hot air.

Look – I wasn't going to complain. Gift horses, and mouths, and all that. Mind you, you really should know if your free horse is in good condition. Or, if you want to mix metaphors, you should probably fear gift horses unless you slice their bellies open like tauntauns and check for soldiers hiding out inside.

That sounds like a reasonable thing to do, yeah?

So I wasted the day. I can admit that. I did nothing today, and it wasn't a good nothing. It wasn't my choice to do nothing. If I wanted to do nothing, and I did nothing it would have been beautiful, but that wasn't the case.

I did – however – learn why I liked the taste of this McDonald's coke so much more than any other coke I'd had recently. It tasted like REAL McCoke. I don't know if you've ever noticed, but fountain soda from McDonald's is inconcievably better than Coke from any other source, bottled or otherwise. And I had forgotten this fact. It took me back to the summer of $1.00 sodas where a super large McSoda was only a buck in Toronto. What a terrible time to be a diabetic. But still, it was oh so wonderful. And here was that soda again.

I wonder why the other McStations around the world don't use this syrup mix? Never mind – I was home in my ice-filled refillable (in theory, I've never tested it here) beverage.

As the night turned I headed back to the tv room, and watched Pelhem 123, and then the movie Blow. Followed up – at last – by Time Travellers Wife (which I'd seen earlier in the year on an airplane.) I've tried to read the end of the novel in bookstores, and it seems they do not end the same way. But who has time for all those words? Ah! I know – wiki will tell me.

More drugs, a quick shower, and then off to bed. A warm, warm bed. Bless these new people.