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WT? Anyone who knows their tea knows that matcha is tea. The highest grade of Japanese green tea to be precise.  And anyone who knows me knows that I’m not a tea drinker. Coffee is my vice. Lots of it. So when Natureline Solutions, a Canadian company I’m involved with, introduced their latest product offering FIX energy match green tea I thought to myself:

“OK, I’ll play your game and try the stuff. Just don’t expect me to like it”.

I should explain my automatic hesitation concerning anything containing “green tea” in its name or description. When I was in high school (yes, it’s that deep-rooted) I was a student of Japanese language and culture. The language part I was fine with. Very good at in fact. In very little time I was entered into every Japanese speaking contest in South East Queensland, winning many with my ability to recite some largely meaningless pieces of babble using words and structure I hadn’t yet been taught. The skill of feigning a Tokyo accent didn’t go astray, this I had learned from a senior in school who’d actually been there.

The reality is it was all acting. Something I’m quite comfortable with. There’s nothing like the liberation of taking on another character, fleshing out its strengths and foibles, and giving it your own spice and interpretation. Pretending to be Japanese was a cool extension of something I already enjoyed. There was however something I couldn’t fake. We had as part of our studies a culture section. This involved experiencing the food and drink of the people whose language we were learning. I’m not mad about fish, so half the menu was, well, off the menu. Then came the drink.

I’m talking about high school, so sake is out of the question. We had to endure a liquid referred to as “green tea”. In fact we participated in “Tea Ceremonies”. To me there couldn’t have been a better term, because ceremonies were usually about dead people and Japanese Green Tea pretty much tasted like what I imagined cremains in hot water would. Pretending to like that stuff was beyond me. My best Tokyo accent couldn’t mask the grimace.

So back to Natureline Solutions’ FIX energy matcha. It doesn’t taste like green tea. Sorry to disappoint the afficianados, but I’m pretty sure they’ve hit the back button about two paragraphs ago. I’ve tried it as a traditional green tea with hot (but not boiling) water, and actually liked it. The sneaky devil tea recipe makers laced FIX with yummy fruits such as blueberries and pomegranates, things that most of us don’t normally buy but could do with in our diet. FIX tea is in fact, gram for gram, the world’s richest source of antioxidants. The real bottom line is that I’m drinking it, liking it. Loving it. And I don’t like green tea.

To see for yourself what all the fuss is about, ask Natureline for a sample by clicking here

Greg

This is an open letter, because I can no longer afford a stamp.

Dear Mr Vigus,

I refer to your letter dated February 7 regarding my overdrawn account. You ask whether I was aware that my account was overdrawn by $10.54 at the time of writing. I must answer truthfully that I was not.

You state that “Believing this was merely an oversight and as we were unsuccessful in contacting you, we have transferred $10.54 to your overdrawn account from the available funds in your account number xxxxxxxx”. Thanks dude! You were right. It was an oversight. Last time I looked at the account it had a few cents in it. I forgot to allow for your banks’ bullshit fees for 1) being a customer and having an account in the first place; and 2) actually using the account approximately three times last month. Thank you for pointing out the obvious oversight, because I now have cause to actually look into your fee structure.

I’m most pleased that the other account had sufficient funds to cover this. Actually it had roughly 1,000 times the amount needed, a sickenly obscene amount of money given the pathetic and minuscule interest rate your bank pays me for leaving it there.

You state that you completed the transfer on my behalf “to avoid the possibility of you (me) incurring a $27.50 overdrawn account fee”. No, you did it because you can. To charge me an overdrawn fee when the overdraw is simply your fees, would be illegal. To swipe money from another account, without a standing arrangement to do so, is also illegal. But a theft I’m much less likely (or any other customer for that matter) to complain about as you then write to explain how magnanimous your institution has been towards me, the poor customer.

You ask that I ensure my account is conducted on a credit basis and has sufficient funds for all future debits. I promise I will. On the off chance that I don’t, please help yourself to any of my accounts that I hold with Bendigo Bank that have thousands upon thousands of dollars in them. Be quick, I’m closing them all.

Regards,

Greg Anderson
10 year account holder

On my last visit to my home city Melbourne, I had arranged a rental car with Hertz or Avis.    I was only visiting for one night for a birthday party so just needed something basic (read: cheap) to get from the airport to the Eastern suburbs where I was staying with family, into Southbank for dinner, back to the ‘burbs afterwards and to the airport the next day.  The flight from Coolangatta to Melbourne was uneventful, well, as uneventful as 800km/hr at 30,000 feet can be.  I booked a Corolla hatchback – or equivalent – and made my way to the carpark at Tullamarine airport to collect it.

This is where things took a turn for what I at first thought was the worse.  An irate young guy, maybe in his early twenties, had become all worked up and begun a rant about the car he was allocated.  It was clear from what he was saying that he didn’t feel a Hyundai Excel was remotely equivalent to a Corolla, which is what he had expected when he booked and paid. It was equally clear this kid hadn’t travelled much, and likely never hired a car before in his life.  He expressed an unpleasant sense of entitlement for his $59/day and started to act like an upset Donald Trump or CEO of a major corporation. Raising his voice and arguing the point was making things worse and the car hire operation fell into a bit of disarray.

I waited for a break in this conversation of sorts and handed my receipt to the lady attendant.  She excused herself momentarily and returned with a set of Hyundai keys – I admit I was a little disappointed myself because the Corolla I hired the previous trip was a great little car and perfect for my needs, but I understand the meaning of “or equivalent” and made my way to the nominated parking space.

Arriving at A17 though I found no Hyundai, but a very nice Camry Altise.

I know the Camry to be a reasonably good car, they even have those headlights that turn on automatically – for people who apparently qualify for a drivers license but are still too stupid to realise when it’s dark.

Sighing, I returned to the booth and said there had been some sort of error, no hatch to be found.  By this time our young friend was demanding a free upgrade as he was not going to accept his allocated car and the scene was becoming increasingly heated.  I smiled and politely said that there was no hurry and I was happy to wait until they worked out which cars were where.

The lady apologised for the mistake and said there was no need to wait, she swapped my keys for those of the fancy Camry and wished me a nice visit to Melbourne.  The other guy finally shut the fuck up and got in his Hyundai.

-Greg