Chris was my everything. That sounds almost silly, but it’s true. I met him on a skateboard and we became best friends. I was 14 he was 15. He died at 22.

I hope I can prove he was my everything because 19 years after he died I still take a pilgrimage every Christmas day to Timaru, the place where a youthful vow became set in stone. Back in 1993, we decided, as angst-ridden teens, that we would spend every Christmas together fishing, because that’s what we were doing at the time.

I went on a trip to Christchurch – to write a great novel, yet to materialise – and he dutifully came down to maintain the pact. We hit the road in all of the spirit of the great Kerouac novel that inspired me. We got as far as Timaru for Christmas and fished unsuccessfully on the wharf. We drank and dreamed of ways, thankfully unfulfilled, to free the elephant at the circus ready to perform at Caroline Bay. He died six months later.

We hitch-hiked around the South Island, chasing fun and girls. The former with success. It was not the greatest time of my life; it was normal. Just him and I.

For the years he was alive we were two. Invite one to a party, and the other was always there. We were inseparable. I couldn’t have loved the man more. I knew it but never had to say it. Not until I said it to the corpse in that coffin. A bad time to say it. We were bullet proof. At least we thought we were.

For a young man, he was generous. Always generous. On the trip to the Bay of Islands, he as an apprentice plumber and me as a student, he paid for whatever I couldn’t afford. But we were broke. As always, though, we had enough. We carved our names into the sandstone around the road to Russell. Sandstone fades but he will last longer, I hope. I carved him into the dedication of the book I finally wrote. I always knew I would. Even when dusty and forgotten he will live. Unfitting, perhaps, but in years his name will live on. Chris Hallam. It’s the best I could do.

For months after he died I could not drink without crying. My heart was always heavy but when I drank it flooded. I found the pain in so many ways honest. I hated and loved it. Time dulls that, thank god, but each year I go to Timaru to fulfill a promise. Sometimes I wallow in old feelings and I can’t help but cry. Other times I just sit in the car and then drive straight home. A quick thought, then off.

So much has changed, mate, yet I still come to that little town. And now I have started to cry. To this day I couldn’t miss you more. I hope you would be proud of me. I was always proud of you.

It’s our Christmas.

 Pope Francis has been behind the wheel of the Catholic Church for less than nine months and altered direction so significantly that one can only conclude that God has had a very serious rethink.

Francis turned down the traditional papal apartment in the Apostolic Palace – which was lavishly redecorated for Pope Benedict – and chose instead to live in a two-room apartment in the Vatican guesthouse. Where his predecessor wore ostentatious robes and jewelry, Francis wears only plain. He has criticised the church’s previously narrow focus on issues like abortion and contraception, instead turning his focus to the evils of the “cult of money” and economic inequality around the world.

He is taking the Catholic Church in an entirely different direction, and for this he has been named by Time magazine’s Person of the Year.

The Dogmatic Constitution of the Church makes clear that Pope speaks with the assistance of the Holy Spirit. In short, the Pope has a hot line with God and undertakes his bidding. What interests me, then, is how quickly God changes tack.

One minute God wants it done like this, nek minute he wants it done like that. Obviously this isn’t without precedent, the God in the Old Testament is scarcely recognisable from that in the New Testament. Testament to the fact that we can all have a change of heart, I suppose. But why does it require a new Pope for the church to change, why didn’t God just wire the old Pope and say, ‘I’ve changed my mind on a few matters’?

It’s enough to lead me to believe that the Pope is not in a privileged position when it comes to God. Not just because the notion is patently absurd, but also because of some interesting quirks of history I found here.

While God may have been concerned with people coveting their neighbour's ox (Commandment 10) he seemed less concerned with other sins of his representatives on earth.

Sergius III (897-911), for example, murdered another pope and with further less than advisable discretion fathered an illegitimate son (who later became pope). But he was certainly usurped in the fun department by Alexander VI (1492 to 1503) who had a greater sense of occasion, throwing enormous sex parties at the end of which small naked boys would emerge from large cakes.

While Alexander also had a incestuous relationship, he was more concerned with sexual consent than John XII (955 to 964) was, who had his forceful way with female pilgrims in St. Peter's, stole church offerings, made toasts to the devil and invoked pagan gods all the while playing dice. Everyone loves a gamble.

Pope Steven VI (896-897), however, was less forgiving of sin. He put his predecessor Pope Formosus on trial, which isn’t so bad but for the fact his predecessor was dead. Steven exhumed Formosus’s rotting corpse and put him on trial for a number of crimes. Unable to mount even a skerrick of a credible defence, Formosus was found guilty leaving the new pope presumably little choice but to remove three of the dead man’s fingers, dress him as a layman, bury him, exhume him and throw him in the Tiber river.

God works in mysterious ways.

The new Pope (and apparently God’s thinking) clearly compares well to some of his predecessors (or thoughts), and he seems to be a pretty damn good man with priorities that we should admire. So while he is trying to make the lives of the poor better then we should all embrace him. But only, and I mean only, in the same way we embrace Santa Claus.

My life is divided into two revolving states.  During one, I eat healthily, run almost every day and don’t drink. I call this ‘Zen’. The other state is a debauched hedonism, barely human. I call this ‘normal’.

During one particularly large session of normal, I was gripped by a sudden and terrible madness. A mate named Gobbo bet me $100 that I couldn’t run a marathon in less than 3 hours 30 minutes. Not knowing exactly what that meant, I immediately said yes.

Given it cost me $120 to enter the Christchurch Marathon, I accept this challenge lacked a certain level of economic rationality. And as I hit the streets day after day, a negative 20 percent return was not what one would consider a motivating factor.

Like any bet, however, the winning and not the reward was important. Although, if it was about pride, things took a pretty serious dip for the worse on the day I was caught short of a toilet and had to drop my pants huddling on the side of the Sumner causeway. It may well be the most exposed piece of geography on earth.

Anybody who has been idiotic enough to enter a marathon will know the training is pretty much a part time job, and it was a job I did like any other: rather half arsed. When the big day came, I was a vague approximation of ready.

Before the race I knew it would be painful toward the end. Everybody me told me that. Therefore I expected pain and repeated a mantra to just power through it. Half an hour’s pain for an almost imperceptible amount of glory seemed, at that point, worth it. This health-kick had dropped me into the middle of a cruel and despicable insanity.

The first 20-odd kilometers were fine. No real worries barring a tightness in my calves. I had promised myself that whatever happened I wasn’t allowed to feel any discomfort until at least the 30km mark. So for most of that time I dutifully ignored the fact that my legs were really beginning to hurt. Now here’s an obvious fact of evolution. Pain is impossible to ignore. By the time I hit 35kms I was suffering. At 38km I was making involuntary yelps. I thought about the good old days when my only concern was having to shit on the Sumner causeway. One of the greatest humiliations of my life suddenly manifest itself as a good time. The madness was complete.

But here’s where it gets interesting. Just as I truly thought I would have to stop, an angel in a Nike singlet came along. An angel dripping with sweat, made of little more than sinew. An angel who, if I’m honest, looked close to death.

Recognising my obvious state, the angel urged me on. Between breaths that appeared to be part of a long slow cardiac arrest, the angel told me he’d run five marathons and that I could do it. Despite this idiot angel having put himself through hell on four other occasions, I followed him into the battle that was the finish line.

As I began to make utterances that appeared to be new forms of swear words, the angel urged me on. I did not know if the angel was my Sherpa Tenzing or my Captain Oates but I knew one thing, I was having a terrible fucking time.

At the start of the race I was ticking off milestones in 10km blocks, then 1km, and now – I kid you not – every lamp post was a goal. Each felt like a long, painful journey between concrete edifices to Edison. Every step was an agony as I crossed the finish line.

I looked at the time. 3 hours 28 minutes. I had done it! It is difficult to describe just how little satisfaction that brought me. I veered off the road, found some grass, lay down and hoped I’d never get up.  I paused only to have a quick look around for my angel, I wanted to thank him but I never saw him again. I lay back down and waited for death.

A funny thing happened in the days following the marathon. The full bruises that completely covered the calf muscles on both legs began to die down and the hobble of my walk found a way to return to normality, a sense of achievement began to kick in.  An inner satisfaction overtook all else. One must marvel at the unique element of the human condition that constantly suppresses bad memories and focuses on the good ones. The whole experience took on a virtuous glow: something maintained to this day.

Yesterday, I got asked if I’d like to do another marathon. As quick as a flash, without even thinking, I reached a heartwarming answer. No fuckin’ way.

I read a brilliant article in the Guardian on the rules of writing the other day, and it got me thinking about rules generally.

I’m a big fan of rejecting rules. Mostly because the majority of them are nonsense, of course, like ‘don’t put your elbows on the table’ or ‘don’t play bullrush’, but also because there are so damn many of them. On average most people break 163 rules before breakfast. Obviously I blame the Helen Clark government for that.

Some rules, however, are fundamental. And here are five:

Rule 1. Never get out of bed before 9am on a Monday. Ever. Nobody likes Mondays. Don’t make them any longer than they need to be. Also, when you go to bed on Sunday night with Monday dread you can console yourself with the idea of a sleep-in. Obviously, this doesn’t work if you have a proper job or kids.

Rule 2. Never have kids. Ever. They are expensive, they steal all of your free time and they are irrational little shits right up until they’re old enough to disobey you. And don’t hand me that bollocks that they’ll look after you when you’re old. Do you think your parents are mostly a pain in the arse? Exactly.

Rule 3. Try to be nice to your parents. They regret having you enough. Don’t make it worse.

Rule 4. Cricket is the greatest game ever invented. Never work when it is on. This seems like a straightforward rule, but test cricket goes for five days. That requires significant planning.  Clients don’t ordinarily accept the line, ‘Sorry the report’s not finished because I’ve been watching cricket.’ The fact that the Black Caps often struggle to survive past day four has been a significant factor in my ongoing employment. That and scheduling matches in Dunedin in spring with the wonderful optimism that Dunedin will have a dry spring anytime sooner than in the last week of summer.

Rule 5. Never pray to anything. Unless of course that thing is David Mitchell. David Mitchell is brilliant and Peep Show is the greatest thing on TV. Actually, you are allowed to pray to TV generally. TV is essentially what binds families together by giving parents a reprieve from their children – if not for television, families in a few short years would be consigned to history, along side dinosaurs, World War II, and the polar ice caps.

It’s about now I anticipate that a less careful reader may be asking: ‘But how do these simple rules lead to our ultimate destruction’? Rule number 2: no procreation. Simple. But given we are doing our very best to stuff the planet good and proper, we are really just saving our grandkids the trouble of instantly going from raw to cooked under an ozone hole acting like a malevolent magnifying glass.

And that, with my elbows firmly on the table, is all I have to say about rules. Anybody up for a game of bullrush?