How to get the most out of your drugs
It is important to remember that drugs are like electrical appliances. A grey product, whether it is heroin or a waffle iron, can kill you.
A popular misconception is that all drugs make you high. They do not. Some make you so low that you cannot even look your dog in the eye. This is why so many teenagers become disillusioned and cynical. The dealer on the corner says, “Hey pssst wanna get high?” and then sells them something that dumps them on level four of Dante’s Inferno.
Lysergic acid diethylamide is a bit like a child with Down Syndrome in that it is difficult to handle and can go off quite quickly. It is important to remember that not all types of LSD react in the same way. Superman, for example, becomes more powerful if left in direct sunlight for eight hours, while Goofy is at its best after two days in the fridge. It all comes down to acid management, really.
Cocaine, sprinkled lightly on a well-browned lasagna, is absolutely divine. But remember to use imported Italian tagliatelle and not that dreadful fake penne stuff churned out in the southern industrial area.
Marijuana, South Africa’s primary export crop, is one of the most versatile ingredients that you could hope to find at the back of your underwear drawer. It can be snorted like snuff, used to garnish a roast chicken or even brought out as a substitute for catnip to keep your new kittens amused for hours on end.
Ketamine is much like truffles in that it is very hard to find out of season. You may want to try your local vet, or even the stables if you have any nearby. Horse tranquilizers are among the most effective in their group and have been known to quieten down even the most neurotic of Joburg kugels. Racehorses rarely misbehave and there is no reason why you should, either.
Psilocybin is absolutely delicious when fried up with a few rashers of back bacon, a handful of wild tomatoes and three or four free-range eggs. Wake up early on a Sunday morning and surprise your loved one with a tray of these earthy delights. He or she will thank you in many new and interesting ways. Put the fun back in fungus!
Heroin should be avoided because it is just plain immoral to buy anything from Afghanistan now that America has taken over the drug trade.
Methylenedioxymethamphetamine, street slang for Ecstasy, is hard to beat when it comes to chasing away those Monday morning blues. Washed down with a glass of fresh orange juice, you’ll find the day simply flying by in a warm, fuzzy blur of contentment.
Beer, like a dead body, should be kept on ice at all times. At breakfast time, it makes a refreshing change from mango juice and always goes well with a fish lunch. Some say that beer itself makes the ideal lunch, but I believe that you should always snack on something while drinking beer. That way, when you develop an enormous gut, you can always blame the peanuts.
What to do if your girlfriend is a barmaid
Unless you are a rabid teetotaler with right-wing fundamentalist tendencies, the chances are that you have fantasized about having a relationship with the woman who works behind the bar in your local pub. Or any pub, for that matter. This is quite normal and you have nothing to worry about. Unless, of course, she is one of those chain-smoking bartenders with stringy hair, elephantine thighs and a furtive addiction to cheap brandy. Then you should be worried.
The advantages of having a bartender girlfriend far outweigh the disadvantages. To make full use of this rare opportunity, it is advisable that you spend as much time in the bar as possible. You will never again have such a watertight case for going to the bar night after night.
Order as many drinks from her as possible. It is her job to bring them to you and, unlike when she is at home with you, she is not allowed to refuse. Stockpile if you have to, but whenever she gets a breather between serving other people, shout at the top of your voice, “Bartender! Another pint of your finest!” Then, when she brings it to you, lean quickly over the bar counter and kiss her full on the lips. This will drive the other patrons into a frenzy of envy. The danger, here, is that they will all start trying it and the next thing you know you are up on the bar with your stool in one hand and a broken bottle in the other, threatening to disembowel the next man who touches your girl.
It might be wiser not to kiss her at all. Anyway, there is a very good chance that kissing her will affect her tips in a big way.
Something happens to men’s brains when they walk into a bar. I have seen it happen countless times. Their tips grow progressively larger as the evening drags on, as if somehow a magical number will be reached whereby the bartender will drop her tray and say, “Oh, baby, you’re such a great tipper. Please come home with me!” I have only seen this happen once in my life and I can tell you that the circumstances on that occasion were far from normal.
So if a customer catches you with your tongue in the bartender’s mouth, he is going to correctly assume that something is not quite kosher. And if he suspects that he has a less than zero chance of getting jiggy with her, he will see little point in tipping her after every drink. She needs her tips. So do you. In fact, you may want to set a precedent by giving her ridiculously large tips after every drink in the hope that everyone else will feel guilty enough to do the same. You can always get your money back later while she is asleep.
How to win the Argus/Pick n Pay Cycle Tour
The first thing you should know about this race is that the route is a very difficult one. However, there are certain parts that will make it a lot easier for you to finish, and even win, this race.
My favourite is a cul-de-sac at the bottom of Queens Road in Sea Point. From here to the finish line is a mere 3.5kms. There is a large bush growing on a traffic island at the entrance to the cul-de-sac. If you are careful and get there early enough, none of the organisers will spot you. Then it’s just a matter of waiting for the race leaders to swing out of Victoria Road, into Queens and then it’s a sharp right at the traffic circle and into Beach Road, the home stretch. Because of the hairpin bend, riders are preoccupied with making the turn and spectators are busy silently willing someone to crash. Nobody will notice as you slip out from behind the bush and join the frontrunners. A word of advice. Come in at the back. This is very important. If you suddenly appear in front of someone who has risked his heart and genitals to keep the lead for the last 100kms, he will not be as accommodating as you might think.
It is just as important to decide well beforehand what drugs you are going to take. Narco-loading is vital for racers such as us. Essentially, we are sprinters. And jumping into the race two hours after the official start is not as easy as it sounds. For a start, the drugs will make you thirsty. I have always found that two plastic bottles, one holding white wine and the other red, can clip neatly onto the frame of any of the more expensive models.
If wine is too pretentious for you, I suggest you make use of one of those cunning backpacks that are designed to hold a litre of pre-mixed Jose Cuervo and orange juice. It is easy enough to run a plastic tube from the bottle to the mouth.
Ideal race drugs include Dexedrine to get the heart rate up, Ketamine to verbally abuse your fellow competitors and LSD to brighten up the colours. Just remember that while narco-loading is great for short sprints, one of the side effects is that you see and hear things that might not altogether exist.
If you finish the race and claim victory, there may be a lot of angry people in yellow vests who will try to convince you otherwise. Whether or not you listen to them is up to you.
If you are a man, you might also want to think about rolling up a pair of socks and putting them down your Lycra shorts. Sportsmen are always held in higher esteem when people see that they are hauling serious freight. If you are arrested at any time during or after the race, be sure to remove the socks before entering the police cell.
How to behave when impersonating a doctor
I am not sure why, but it is apparently illegal to masquerade as a doctor. On the other hand, it is quite legal to impersonate a journalist. It makes no sense to me. If you visit a doctor or speak to a journalist, you are quite literally putting your life in their hands. But while a journalist might destroy your reputation, a doctor can do little more than cause you physical harm.
Besides, untrained and unqualified doctors would be a whole lot cheaper than some of those heartless greedheads out there who think the world owes them a living just because they are legally entitled to render you unconscious and then slice you up like you were some kind of prime beef.
Bastards.
When deciding to impersonate someone in the medical profession, it will be quite tempting to pretend to be a surgeon. There is something about all that scrubbing up and snapping on of rubber gloves that appeals to a surprising number of men (17.2%) and women (0.1%). However, I strongly suggest that you choose to impersonate someone else.
Surgeons are regularly called upon to perform surgery. This is why they are called surgeons. And unless you know your spleen from your pancreas, it is best to stay away from the operating theatre. Besides, most men (87.5%) know so little about the workings of the female body that they could not be trusted with a naked, drugged woman lying on a table in front of them. Especially not with a razor-sharp scalpel in their hands. Women impersonators, too, should avoid a similar situation involving male patients, especially if they suffer from penis envy.
It is, however, easy enough to impersonate a general practitioner and move through the wards in a white coat and stethoscope feeling patients’ foreheads and making them laugh with your comically exaggerated invoices. But keep it professional. You do not want to be mistaken for Patch Adams.
If you are a man, you might want to be among the 0.3% of men who impersonate gynaecologists. This is the dream job of most adolescent boys. It is only when they grow up that they realise this is not at all what they want from life. There is no rational explanation for this, particularly when you consider that a mechanic will work on a Porsche Spyder all day long and when it comes time to knock off he will drive home quite happily in his Nissan Sentra. Perhaps there are fundamental differences between cars and women that should be taken into account here.
Research undertaken by nobody who wants to come forward and take credit for it has shown that it is far more fulfilling to impersonate a doctor of the mind. The good thing about pretending to be a head doctor is that you can operate from your home and you do not need much in the way of specialised equipment. A couch, a box of tissues and a notebook and pen should cover it. If you have one, a video camera can liven things up a bit.
If you do this properly, it won’t be long before you develop a healthy list of unhealthy patients. There is really only one thing to remember when treating mentally ill people. Do not laugh at them. Ever. Do not even try to laugh with them. If they start laughing, excuse yourself and leave the room until they have stopped. The sounds you are looking for are mewling and sobbing. Only then can you do your job properly.
Diagnosing people with psychiatric problems is a lot easier than you think. For a start, they hardly ever argue with you because they genuinely believe they are sick and you aren’t. This gives you an edge right away.
If you are ever at a loss for words, all you have to do is rub your chin, look out of the window, nod slowly and mumble. It doesn’t really matter what you mumble because most of the time the patient will be too afraid to ask you to repeat it. If they do ask, however, you could say something like, “It’s the Aubert-Fleischl paradox. Hmm. Very interesting. Very interesting indeed …” The patient will not press you for details because they already fear for their sanity and would rather not know about the Aubert-Fleischl paradox.
Developing your own Rorschach Test can also be a lot of fun. If you have small children, you might get them to play around with a bottle of ink and a few pages of blotting paper. See what they come up with and then pass them on to your patients. At the very least, the family will have a good laugh around the dinner table that night.
If you are trying to get rid of a problem patient (i.e. one who never pays on time), you might suggest that, at your next session, you will explain the Whorfian hypothesis as it relates to his condition. He won’t be back.
If a patient’s symptoms make no sense whatsoever (e.g. biting the edge of your desk while urinating into your wastepaper bin), do not be alarmed. Have a little sport. The best way of passing the time in extreme situations is to tell the patient that he is suffering from a range of phobias. Ask him to subtract 1 from 14. If he runs into the wall screaming, tell him he has triskaidekaphobia. When he has calmed down, tell him you have detected signs of dysmorphophobia. Don’t tell him what it means. He will find out on his own and will never again be able to look into a mirror. There are many more. Keep going until he signs up for another 20 sessions. If you have done your job properly, he will have developed phobophobia, the fear of acquiring a phobia, by the time he leaves.
If a patient confronts you with suspicions that you are an impersonator, laugh and tell him that this is understandable because you subscribe to the Gestalt psychology movement and patients often say that. Once he discovers that there is no English equivalent for the word Gestalt, he will have no option but to give you the benefit of the doubt. He already suspects he is going mad and will not want to appear stupid on top of it.
How to be a sex tourist while training for the Kololi pool challenge in the Gambia
Some people think that sex tourism is all there is to the Gambia. This is not true. There is also the Kololi Pool Challenge that takes place once a year. Or once a week, depending on the number of entries. And the rainy season. And the groundnut harvest.
The best way to prepare for the tournament is to become a sex tourist. I have always found that if you choose a short, heavy cue and a tall, light-skinned woman, you stand a damn good chance of winning. Most of your opponents will be Rastafarians. They play with heads full of powerful Gambian weed. But do not be lulled into a false sense of security just because they have to be reminded whether they are stripes or solids after every shot. Your opponents will also be attached to some of the biggest, scariest women you will ever come across in your life. Try not to be intimidated. They are sex tourists just like you, except they are from Dusseldorf and Wapping.
It is important that you learn some basic Wolof so that you can order beers and women throughout the challenge. You do not want to run dry of either. This will give your opponents the edge. Here is a helpful phrase I picked up while defending my title a few years ago. “Danka Danka mojapa golo sinjai.” It means, “Slowly, slowly catchee monkey”. Either that or, “Slowly, slowly catchee syphilis”.
How to deal with a woman who wears fur coats
Try to get her into bed as quickly as possible. Women who wear fur are animalistic and violent, but better than that, they are usually very rich.
If she refuses to sleep with you, there are several ways in which to respond. You may want to buy a gram or so of PCP (Angel Dust) and follow her home. Sneak into the garden when she is in her bedroom biting the legs off baby mice or whatever it is that women who wear fur and won’t sleep with us do when they are alone. Wrap the PCP in a pork sausage and feed it to her dog when it comes out to bark at you. Two hours later, when she bends down to kiss her beloved pooch good night, its little brain will be about ready to snap its moorings. Try not to laugh as she runs from the house with a Maltese poodle latched to her throat like some kind of avante garde accessory from the House of Pain.
What to do if your partner has an aversion to bathing
This is essentially a male trait, but I have encountered women who suffer from what I consider a deviant version of hydrophobia.
There was one woman in particular who resolutely refused to shower or bath, regardless of how much money I offered her. I tried to find out the reason once or twice but never really made an issue out of it because some women are sensitive to interrogation.
In the end I gave up trying to convince her that soap and water are not the twin pillars of evil and instead began licking her clean. It was fun while it lasted, but it is not something I would recommend on any long-term basis.
However, should you find yourself married to such a person, there are a number of tongue exercises that you can do. Tie a piece of string to the top of a full beer bottle and wrap the other end tightly around the base of your tongue. Now hang your head down as if you are about to throw up. Retract your tongue slowly and then let it out again. Do this 50 times while taking short, shallow breaths like a dog panting on a hot day. This will develop your diaphragm and give you the necessary stamina to lick your woman from head to toe at least three times a week.
BEN TROVATO – Durban Poison 