Belgium Campus

Matthew has his heart set on going to the Belgium Campus ITVersity in Pretoria. He has applied and has being accepted from his Grade 11 marks but has to be ratified with his final exam marks which he has to write soon.

It was one of their Open Days and Lynda and I trekked up to Pretoria to visit this IT research focused university or ITVersity as they like to call it. The Belgium Campus is something like MIT or Caltech but on a much smaller scale.

On the way across the boerewors curtain we had to go through this tunnel and I just had to shake my head. What is with this you have to hoot or roll down the windows and howl? Ah hooooooooooooo!!!! Is it like some type of primeval instinct similar to the gathering around a fire pit. To me I think it must be a hankering memory of the birthing experience that the caveman and cavewomen still clutch onto. A save place in the womb and then this must be the light at the end of the tunnel. Let’s hope that the light is not a train, Wooooot Hoot!

Pet Peeve

I have been doing grocery shopping for quite some time now and have gotten quite good at it. Yep my pet peeve is when the super market stores don’t mark products or mark products in such a way as to mislead. I found that Spar is notorious for not marking items that are expensive. Pick ‘n Pay, well they put more expensive items on gondola ends with big signage as if to say that it is a special price but you often find better priced items in the aisles. The same with their specials, most times you can find cheaper elsewhere. One thing I like about PnP is that below the price they put in smaller print the unit price as price per kg which I always use when shopping. It has become a habit, look past the branding and buy wisely. I even noticed that bulk items in stores are way more expensive than the popular sizes so it doesn’t help at all buying in bulk. Woolies you tend to trust their quality and their price is way too steep but sometimes just for the convenience of not thinking what I buy, I go into Woolies. That too is becoming a luxury I can't afford often.

In the Checkers, just up the road from me, they grind my nerves when they put the item prices of tags and then slap in the middle they put the price of an item per 100 grams not the actual price. It gets so confusing. Take this Mozzarella Cheese, I am looking for a decent mozzarella but not to break the bank, so then I see R12.99 next to R44.99, I think what is this, but only then do I see per 100G. Urrrrrghhh. Forget that I don’t want to now start working out how much is this cheese compared to the others, I will look somewhere else. And this Checkers does this a lot.

Leapfrog Weather

Yes the weather is changing from winter leapfrogging spring directly into summer. No more dry and dusty August, I can smell the rain, lovely. Our pets are not fond of the rain but love the warmer weather. Bring it on.

Dustlady

Now here’s a little story to tell it is a must about an unsung hero. Yes today is dustbin day and seeing this woman swinging out from behind the refuse truck to grab my bin, reminded me of a song that my dad used to play on these old records that goes like this "Oh, my old man's a dustman, he wears a dustman’s hat. He wears cor blimey trousers and he lives in a council flat."

Oh, so who is now singing that old diddy tune?

I say, I say, I say, I was surprised to see woman power in full display as this dustlady loaded my rubbish into the back of refuse truck without breaking a sweat. Can I say dustlady? Is there such a word? Oh well I'm such a narner, of course there is such a word, I just made it up.

No Way Jose

Back to normal after the long weekend. First things first, 2 cats Tiger and Bebe had dentist bookings first thing this morning and what a hell run it was. With meow meow there and everywhere a meow meow it drove me up the wall sitting in rush hour traffic on the way to the vet. Two hungry scared caged cats in a car don’t make for a peaceful trip, no way Jose.

Day After

With a full house the cats made themselves scarce and since Monday was too a public holiday it was recovery time. Yay!

The day after the all nighter party we crashed and so did the cats, only too happy to find peace and quiet in the home once again. Ahhhhh back to normal.

Please Don’t Kill My Vibe

WARNING EXPLICT CONTENT NSFW!!! Eish I woke this morning to find the kids still partying, please don’t kill my vibe. I don’t think I got much sleep as I put the fan on to make some white noise to drown out the doff doff doff.

Oh well thankfully most of the kids left this morning but the party continued as you can see with the following video of twerking for the setting sun. Eish some things are just not meant to be seen as once you see this video below, you simply can’t unsee. WARNING EXPLICT CONTENT NSFW

Death Note Birthday

Since Matthew’s birthday falls in his final exams we decided to move his birthday combined with his final year function with friends this weekend. By busy I mean 12 teenagers descended onto our quiet home for a sleepover party and some sleepover party it turned out to be.

Two arrived yesterday and the rest of the teenagers arrived just after noon. Soon the party was in full swing with pizza slices going round as the guest settled in and started playing Xbox and Playstation. With Matthew playing host, we had to slip out and buy the rolls and salad ingredients.

At 4pm I started the braai while the kids went for a hike down into the kloof. When they came back the food was ready, thank goodness as they were exhausted and hungry. After dinner it was pool time. Now how come I remember someone saying you should not swim on a full stomach? Well that someone forgot to tell Matthew and friends.

It looks like this party is never going to end as Matthew cuts his Death Note birthday cake and they all get their second wind. With the music doff doffing in the background Lynda and I call it a day while the party will continue till tomorrow morning.

Snakes Alive

Oh my goodness, Paddy is turning out to be quite a snake catcher as this is his 2nd snake that he has brought home in as many days. It is a fully grown Centipede Eater snake that he has brought home this evening as a gift for us. Can't he like a normal child for once.

This little chap is non lethal but what happens if he tries to bring home a Night Adder, or God forbid tries to tackle a Rinkals or Puff Adder. This is starting to worry me. Do I need to find out what anti-venom there is for cats? 

Thankfully this little snake was a catch and release.

Opposite of Vertigo

"Whoa what just happened!" screamed my mind as I put on my new glasses this morning. Looking straight ahead I was fine but when I was walking in the mall back to my car from the optometrist, it looked like I had no legs.

Looking down, the floor looked so much closer that I felt like I was just a ball with feet sticking out. Oh like those Mr Men characters. It felt like vertigo but without the height issue as I felt that I was right down low on the ground that I could just reach out and touch the floor. "What happened to my height?"

The opposite of vertigo is stability and I didn’t feel like I was stable but I was not dizzy or spinning either. The closest I could come to this feeling is from way back in my youth, after drinking too much and while lying in bed, you would put a foot on the floor to stop the room from spinning. Yeah my feet were firmly on the ground but I was way too close to the floor.

"Welcome to the little people’s world, Jerome!"

The First Cut

HELP IT BLEEDS!

Yes my trees are bleeding as the first cut goes the deepest. I am not fond of cutting down trees especially the indigenous ones but these 2 majestic trees have outlived their usefulness and have become very programmatic and no other solution could be found other than cutting.

I am not 100% sure what these large trees are but the one at the back when you crush the leaves it smells like eucalyptus, so it must be an aussie. The one in the front is our main problem child, the Sycamore Fig tree or Ficus Sycomorus. It is not indigenous to the Highveld region here were I am but can be found all over Africa and the Middle East.

It is the sycamore that is of biblical proportions that is bleeding red blood like sap as we sadly cut her down. The seeds were giving our neighbour’s swimming pool pump a hard time and you should see the state of our driveway and walls. The sycamore was in the forefront of the taking back of nature. I can imagine little Zacchaeus wanting to climb up into the branches of the sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see but the sycamore tree was no more.