» Terrified!

Getting my wisdom teeth removed
It's worse than it sounds.

I was born three months premature, and that's a fascinating story in and of itself, but I'm only mentioning it because I think it's somehow related to why all this happened.
See, I was about 17 when that fateful visit to the dentist told me that my wisdom teeth looked like they were impacting. I shrugged and said I'd wait and see what happens, thinking nothing of it.

Two years later I was sitting in that chair in the surgery going under global anaesthetic. I was reassured that I'd be asleep for the entire procedure and wouldn't feel a thing.

Sure enough, I went to sleep, and woke up in exactly the same room.
I remember being surrounded by scientist types, some looking exactly like the anaesthetist and aide that had accompanied me into the room, but I knew that it wasn't really them. I don't remember their technobabble, but I do remember a golden robotic arm coming out of the wall with some vial in it that I knew would be used to impregnate me with some horrible monster. I screamed and screamed begging them not to, and in the end the arm retreated back into the wall.
I tried to get up from the chair, but was immediately pushed down by a strong arm.
Time seemed to freeze then. I attempted to get up multiple times only to be pushed back down by some unseen force. I couldn't summon the strength to do so. I was trapped in this chair for eternity.
It seemed like hours. I wasn't sure what was happening was real- I knew somehow that it wasn't, but it was so lucid. I eventually resigned myself to my fate, assuming I would be stuck here forever.
I kept lifting my arms and legs, wiggling them around, clicking my heels together, just to check. It felt completely real.

Some time later, I came to feeling utterly horrible. My mouth was numb.
"You had an allergic reaction to the valium. You were shaking. We were so worried about you, we couldn't complete the procedure; we could only remove one of your teeth."
I remember looking at my hand. I still wasn't sure whether this was real or still part of the nightmare.
"Is this real? Am I awake?" I slobbered in typical anaesthetic talk.
"Yes, you're awake now."
"I had a nightmare."
"A nightmare? Well, people who are allergic to valium usually have hallucinations. You're okay now."
I sat up. No force pushed me back down. I looked around the room for a little bit at all the concerned faces and the machinery which I'd spent the last eternity being forced to stare at and examining the reflections.
"You're going to be a little groggy from the anaesthetic."
Fuck that. I was walking. I got out of the chair and immediately fell to the floor.
I couldn't walk.
My granny came in, and she was very worried. I had to lean on my brother and summon the strength to walk to the car.
I felt completely helpless. I couldn't walk, I couldn't talk properly, I couldn't even open my mouth very far. And on the whole ride home I still wasn't sure whether I was still dreaming.

I had to get my other teeth out individually every week or so under local anaesthetic. The next time I went into the surgery, I was afraid it would happen all over again. And while the other procedures were trivial, I still felt worthless being unable to eat properly. I was depressed for weeks. And the pain from having your wisdom teeth out is horrifying. I spent hours curled up in my bed begging for the pain to stop.

I'll never forget how I felt in that nightmare. I don't know whether it was a hallucination, or what, but it seemed completely real to me. I was terrified at first, but in the end I gave up and figured I would just be there forever. It was the worst thing I've ever been through.

Length: I think it took a few days for me to accept I was in the real world.
(Sun 8th Apr 2012, 4:33, More)

» Racist grandparents

Me old grandad
is from India. Hang on, let me explain. We're Anglo-Indians. When the English came to India they married and had children with the Indians, raised them in rich households with servants, took them to colonial schools where they learned English, English customs, how to be polite and some such. You can imagine how religious my family is. Anyway due to this upbringing my grandad has a bit of a superiority complex over the native Indians. He associates mostly with other Anglo-Indians, and with the whites in his retirement village.
So it comes to no surprise that he's staunchly anti-immigrant, always complaining about the 'boat people' (a rather exaggerated issue here in Australia) and anti-Muslim. Also anti-Asian, especially the Japanese, for he was caught up in a few air raids as a child in the war. He's just been getting worse and worse lately. Amazingly no racial epithets (except for calling an Asian driver 'Mrs Wong' etc), but the way he speaks makes even the word 'Muslim' seem like an insult. There was a period where he'd point out every one he saw. Granny used to tell him off but has since given up.
And the racism's passed on to his son, who has now married an equally as racist Queenslander.

I'm not racist though, I like everyone.
Except for those goddamn kikes.
(Sat 29th Oct 2011, 3:53, More)

» I didn't do it

I totally
did not kill six million jews, for the lulz.
(Mon 19th Sep 2011, 5:18, More)

» Protest!

First time writer, long time reader. Also, socialism.
In my first year at university I was immediately jumped upon by the resident socialist club. For orientation day they had parked themselves right at the entrance to the oval where all of the other clubs had their stalls set up, creating a lovely chokepoint to prey on any and every student.
Luckily for me, their representative was a real talker. The sort of guy who never shuts up or lets you get a word in, asking constant rhetorical questions and sucking you in to an increasingly emotional argument.
Also luckily for me, the only exposure to socialism I had had before then was a high school mandatory reading and viewing of Orwell's Animal Farm. So this concept of a world where all people are equal really struck a chord with me, and I embarked on that activist journey we all have upon our first days as an adult.

Now for the relevant part. It turns out that some corporation or other was putting in some rather nasty new laws and the construction unions were having none of it. I was invited to a protest with said workers, to march as part of the activist group. I was understandably nervous, expecting them all to be giant gruff men who hate black people. Imagine my surprise when they were all lovely people. Some of them even bought our magazines.

We paraded down the streets chanting stereotypical socialist slogans and booing at the bourgeois office toffs watching us from their twenty-story office buildings. Apparently a number of workers were told that they would lose their jobs if they went to the protest, so we booed them too and called them cowards. It was great fun and I really felt like I was doing something worthwhile for the first time in my life.

However, it soon turned out that these guys were doing something or other every week or so. I was being asked to help on the stall a few days a week on top of the weekly discussion sessions and various events far out of the city I had no idea how to get to. Which I would have been happier with if I didn't want to spend every waking minute of free time playing TF2 in the computer club with my geeky pals.

In the end, it was all too much and I was far too lazy. I left that group at the end of the year. Bugger wouldn't stop calling me and the fees were racking up.

Length? A few hours, never kept track.
(Sat 13th Nov 2010, 5:44, More)

» Trapped!

A friend of mine recently revealed his chronic fear of realistic puppets.
When I asked why, he said that he accidentally knocked over a shelf in a locked closet when he was a child and flooded the room with hundreds of puppets, squashing and almost suffocating him. Amazingly, the puppet fear is bigger than claustrophobia, since he says that while he was in there all he could think about were those staring eyes.
(Sat 1st Mar 2014, 5:54, More)