The spat106 short longform #13

Being rewarded handsomely just for doing a standard job

Presently it’s one of the two times in the year where people in New Zealand get recognition for their achievements in life, this is the NZ Honours system time. Not to be confused with hammer time, which took places in the early 90s. This week past was Queens Birthday Honours, the other period is New Year’s Honours, which seriously should just be given to anyone who wakes up on New Year’s Day without a hangover. One of the people to be knighted was Prime Minister up to 7 months ago, John Key, he got given an honour which he himself reinstated while he was in power. In a tweet I did write he did get it for services to blaming Labour. This draw a response from someone who said I should be magnanimous and am just jealous. They had written jealous as a hashtag, this is stupid because the only time jealous should be a hashtag is if you’re helping to promote that legendary song by Nick Jonas called Jealous. That could be the song of the millennium, now that is something that certainly deserves an honorary knighthood.

Back to Sir John Key as he is know wanting to remind you of what you should call him from now on, one could argue knighthoods shouldn’t be given to people who were just doing what they were paid to do. Or should it be for those who go beyond their call of duty ie volunteering for services towards their community or anything that benefits society that was outside of their job description. This also applies to professional sportspeople to, who are just given an honour just for participating in the sport.

One reason why John Key has got the knighthood was that the only people allowed in the All Blacks changing shed are All Blacks players and staff plus the current New Zealand Prime Minister. The only exception to that rule is anybody who has a knighthood, we see what you are doing John.

I am now expecting to get a knighthood for turning up to work everyday 8am to 5pm, for 5 days. Well last week I didn’t because I had a head cold so I took some sick leave as is my right to do so under New Zealand employment laws. I feel I must have an honorary knighthood anyway because people in the hospitality industry often refer to me as “Sir” anyway. Also when I walk into the All Blacks changing shed there is someone who says, “What the hell are you doing in here, sir?” Being a sir hasn’t seemed to have increase my salary though. But because being sir goes with the territory with being a knight, it means you are obligated to be on the frontlines for New Zealand whenever there’s a war you better have been trained in fighting in armour and being a carry a sword and shield while riding a horse.

So if the criteria for getting a knighthood is doing a selfless act for a sustained period of time without any payment of any sort, I ‘d like to remind everyone that I have been writing these newsletters for 12 weeks now and for no money whatsoever so that means a knighthood is coming my way this New Years. And not just for wisely drinking a copious amount of water before going to sleep in the early hours of the 1st of January too.