Just when you think you're out, you're once again forced to don the ninja mask and fight evil.

The last time I engaged my Secret Ninja Skills was when I was in Bangkok and somehow got into a dispute over the price of a "Zippo" lighter with a Koh Sahn Rd shopkeeper.

Inexplicably, incredulously, surrealistically, and a whole pile of other adverbs ending in "ly", he pulled out a samurai sword (which were also for sale in his over-priced store) and started threatening me with it.

I stood there in the Crouching Koala Bear stance going "Bring. It. On!".

My wife stood there in shock, crying.

Fellow tourists stood there watching, waiting for the rare chance to see a man get his arms hacked off.

Then about a dozen other store owners ran into the store and I thought "Fuck."

I'd seen this sort of thing in Bruce Lee movies and knew that I would now have to fight all of them as well.

But, thankfully, I was wrong. For once.

The other businessmen wrestled the sword off the other guy, slapped him around a bit and apologised to me.

I couldn't believe what had happened.
This guy didn't want to sell an imitation Zippo lighter for the cheap price I'd paid for another one at another store.
Instead of just saying "No sale", he went all nuts and pulled out a sword.

What a psycho.

So I snuck back to his shop after it got dark and burned it down with a Zippo lighter.

After that encounter I started to question why I always seemed to be finding myself in Situations.
It was like I was like some sort of psycho magnet.
I guess the fact that I kept burning people's shops down didn't help.

That day I swore an oath that I would hang up my pointy-toed ninja boots for good.

But this week, I found myself forced to once again engage those special powers to come to the rescue of a fellow blogger.

Professional drunk blogger, Jennifer, is a trainee ninja. Who is scared of snails.
Deathly scared.

Her grandmother was killed by a pack of wild garden snails.
And when Jen was 11, a snail tried suffocating her in her sleep.
So her fear is understandable. Perhaps.

This week she discovered a snail in her bathtub and she Freaked Out.

I felt the need to answer her cry for help by teaching her a couple of ancient ninja tricks for dealing with garden snails:

The first is to build a beer trap.

Snails like beer. So if you half-full (or half empty) a glass of beer and leave it lying around, a snail will climb into it, get drunk and be unable to climb out. Then it will drown.
The alcohol also nicely marinades the snail, which is useful if you are French and like doing crazy shit like eating snails.

The second ninja way of dealing with snails is to build a bear trap.

Basically, you build a bear trap and catch a bear. Then you take that bear and dig another hole in the ground, put the bear in it. Do not feed the bear. Call it names, get it real angry.
Then the snail comes along, falls into the trap and the pissed-off bear crushes it with one mighty pissed-off bear hug. No more snail. Easy-peasy.

(Best no-one mention The Great Naked Cockroach Hunting Balls-Up to her, though.
Stuff like that tends to affect ninja my street cred).

I’m off to the beach for the weekend.
I’m sneaking out early.
Although, the last time I tried sneaking off early wasn’t so successful. I bumped into my boss in the parking lot. She was also sneaking out early...

The internet will not be going with me.
Deal with it.

Maybe I'll go surfing. It’s been a while.
I’ve been kinda put off in recent years. By sharks. And killer jelly fish. And getting involved with that group of surfers who turned out to be bank robbers.

And nearly drowning while trying to surf in 50-year storms doesn’t help.

These days it’s more a spiritual thing with me, anyway.
One eye on the waves, the other on the shore. Another on the sharks. And pesky dolphins.
I’m just happy to sit out there beyond the breakers.
Probably because I seem to have trouble catching waves these days.
My surfboard appears to be too small for me.
It has NOTHING to do with the fact that I am now 35kg heavier than when I first walked on water.

(And yet I am still not overweight…)

Have a good weekend, people.