Life inside the cubicle part 6

[As with the other LITC's this was written in 2003]

I have disturbing, earth shattering news. You, devoted reader (or rather stuck on an e-mail list you cannot be released from), may remember back in LITC 1 (for those who don’t have it check the archives) I mentioned seeing an image of Jesus in the first three stories of the Beehive. I may have found the reason. Of course you may say what reason? God?

No, don’t be silly, the reason is the Beehive is not round!

This startling fact was unearthed when speaker Jonathon Hunt was asked about the length of time taken for the Beehive renovations. Turns out the contractor had to modify his operations because upon reaching the fourth floor, (Jesus’ sunglasses), it was the discovered that the ‘Hive “bulges”. After making several jokes about the location of Jenny Shipley/Parakura Horomia/Mike Moore/David Lange/Rodney Hide’s office (man, there are a lot of fat politicians), I gave this issue serious thought, and it began to make perfect sense. Many of our nation’s icons are things that are not quite round: our national bird, the Kiwi; our national fruit, the Kiwifruit; even our national ball, the Rugby. So it makes sense that the home of our nation’s leaders is not a perfect circle.

However, this investigative journalist does not give up after just sitting around doing nothing. I have viewed the plans for the Beehive available through Archives NZ and I have discovered that the PM’s suite is perfectly round. Old Helen C gets all the circular goodness she can handle while the rest of the shmo’s get bulged out crap. To be honest I don’t really care, let Helen have her circles, if that’s all she cares about, (disclaimer: I have no idea what Helen Clark really cares about). What I care about is that this building, which seems to be all regular and round, contains a stunning figure of 612 litres of beer. That is over 6 tonnes of beer (roughly 18 car lengths). The reason the Beehive is not round is that it is drunk! With that amount of alcohol lying around (chilled with 600m of cooling pipes) it is hardly surprising that politicians get nothing done. Or do they?

No.

And who do you think is leading the charge in this area? John Banks. You may know John Banks as the former Police Minister, or maybe as “the man with the fattest head”. Even though he is now only a local body politician he continues in his commitment to do nothing and yell while he does it. This weeks issue was the memorial to Sir Peter Blake, who died fighting pirates (which is how every sailor wants to go). John Banks said (yelled), “The Auckland ratepayers are not going to fork out for an island [that is] 3 hours boat-ride from central Auckland and all the seasickness and carry-on that goes with that!” By “that” one can only assume John Banks is referring to sailing, the thing that Sir Peter did quite well and, on occasion, for more than 3 hours at a time. The ratepayers referred to by the way are (assumedly) the same ones John Banks is throwing out of their pensioner flats while doubling their rates.

What the politicians should be doing is fighting a new and “deadly” trend sweeping the country. Bottom pinching bicycle riders. That’s right my fellow kiwis, from the sunny Bay of Plenty to the dark hollow of Christchurch, Bottom Pinching Bicycle Riders (BPBR) have become a menace. Evolving from the Local Undie-Snatching Teenagers (LUST) in Christchurch, a creature that makes a ‘nest’ from stolen women’s lingerie; this predator is now stalking central Tauranga preying on 20-something aged women making their way to work. Police are urging women who have had their bottom pinched to “make loud noises,” and quite rightly. While all this carnage is allowed to continue our not quite circular politicians are getting drunk on 6 (six) tonnes of chilled beer! Still it could be worse, they could actually do something, and then we would be screwed.