Whether you want to believe it or not I’m not really bothered, but I, Loretta West, have started a blog. I didn’t want to – given how lame blogs are – but I have to. It’s a school thing to do with finding some way of channeling my anti-social behaviour – I don’t want to go into details. Just another nail in the coffin of me and the education system, as far as I’m concerned.

Anyway, ‘they’ said I should write about myself and ‘my relationship with my family’. I’m related to them; I didn’t have a choice in the matter – how much more does anyone need to know?

But to get this over with as painlessly as possible, here goes….

Starting with me; Loretta West. Some members of the extended West family (the police call them our ‘associates’) make the mistake of calling me Loretta Lynn on account of my Mum’s inexplicable love of country music. They generally don’t make the mistake twice. I’m 30 years ago but trapped in the body of a 15 year old which means I am trapped at school – but not for long.

Last year my Dad, Wolfgang – or Wolf as everyone calls him – has a fine pedigree in thievery but managed to get himself incarcerated for 4 years, which sent Mum kind of mental and she delivered this fascist decree that from now on we keep on the straight side of the law. As if. For those of you that aren’t familiar with my infamous family (i.e. you haven’t been robbed by us), get a clue: we’re infamous.

So since her brain explosion, Mum, or Cheryl if you like, has been trying her best to go straight. She’s ended up with a lingerie business, Hoochie Mama. (Crotchless undies for fat West Auckland chicks – it makes me ill just typing those words.) In return, Wolf spent most of his time doing his best to get out of jail so he can spare us this straight act of mum’s, which I’m pretty sure rips at his undies even more than ours.

But Dad’s out now – on home detention – because this dodgy cop (with an even dodgier moustache) called Judd apparently framed him (even though Dad did actually do the crime – go figure.) Anyway Judd’s been hanging round, giving Mum a hard time and being a pain in the arse. But Dad’s home now and he’ll sort Judd out – let the fireworks commence! I so can’t wait.

As for the rest of my nearest and dearest, I may as well begin with my suck-up brother Jethro – the family success story. He’s this up and coming lawyer – upstanding and 100% up himself – even the 50% of him that pretends to be Maori so he can reap the benefits at his firm – all those tangata whenua dollars. Kia Ora, Jed. Cher, bro’. (He’d totally flip a shit if he read this—so naturally I’ll leave this post open for all readers. It wouldn’t be right to deny them the pleasure of knowing his little secret, would it?)

Jethro happens to have an identical twin, Van – identical in all but brains and not being an asshole. He, through his brilliant smashing of a treasured Chinese family heirloom, managed to get himself so far in debt with this dodgy Chinese family called the Hongs that he’s still working for them managing their Lucky Dollar Store. He’s like a slave – only he’s not bright enough to realise that he is. If ignorance is bliss then Van drifts through life (with his best mate, Munter) happily stoned – which he does anyway.

Not that this stops him being a dork of the first order. Like when he nearly married this complete slag called Draska Doslic. I don’t really want to talk about her because we have unfinished business involving a fairly large sum of money that she ripped off from my brother and, therefore, deserved to suffer. She suffered; the wedding never went ahead – that’s as close to the fairytale happy ending as my family ever gets.

Moving right along, I have a sister called Pascalle. I call her Westward Ho’, because she is one. She fancies herself as a model. I thought she was closer to her true calling when she worked as a stripper for a while (before Mum stopped her – back to that ‘going straight’ thing). In-between throwing herself at washed up TV celebs and other knob-heads, she spends her life on the couch, whining.

Theodore West – also known as Ted; also known as Grandpa – is about the only member of the West family I have much time for. He’s this cool guy who was the greatest safecracker in New Zealand in his time. Now he’s living with us because he burnt down his unit at the retirement village. Apparently he has Alzheimer’s, but I reckon Grandpa still has heaps left up his sleeve.

As for yours truly, when I’m not trapped against my will in an educational asylum called Shadbolt High, I run a successful business empire called The Video Hut. How I came to take over the management of this at age 15 is a long story – let’s just say that for appearances sake a little hobbit of man Pete “runs� and “owns� the place, but as he was no match for my managerial genius he decided to retire back to the lifestyle block and leave me to it.

The Video Hut specializes in pre-release DVD’s on a cash-only-no-questions-asked basis. But we haven’t got Sione’s Wedding because we believe in protecting local filmmakers (and we sold out).

So that’s me and my life. For now. We’re a pretty full-on family and we swear too much and we’re not good at following what other people call ‘rules’ or ‘the law’ (despite what Mum believes in her deluded state). Welcome to my world.

I’ll post again soon – when I’ve got over the trauma of this one. After all, it’s a big Internet and there’s plenty of subversion to go around.

Ka kite!