Gosh, its been almost a year since I last wrote! This is obviously not close to a priority for me. Oh well...

What a year this has been for us.... 2009 was an awful year, everything that could go wrong did. 2010 has been hectic, and not all smooth sailing, but its been an exciting year if nothing else.

Its the time of year now when everyone keeps commenting on how happy they are that the year is almost over, how they're looking forward to the holidays. Me on the other hand...the end of this year arrived way too soon. There is just too much unfinished business. I just want to pull the breaks and get stuff done without the world spinning so fast. I feel dizzy...

Day of Reconciliation

We took a nice walk up Tygerberg Hills today. Its quite dry here this time of year, so not my favourite time to go up the hill. It was rather hot, but there was a very nice breeze, so it was quite pleasant. There was another reason we walked up today though. In honor of the Day of Reconciliation the cannon at the top of the hill was fired at noon. Twice.

They did a demonstration of how it was loaded and fired during old times, everything except for the cannon ball. My husband was disappointed and said it would be fine if they just aim it at our neighbours' house......and then DON'T MISS!! They didn't budge...

The first blast was quite strong and hit me in the chest. My left ear was half deaf for a little while after the blast, and there was a 'zing' in my ears for quite a while afterwards! During the second blast I decided to put my finger in my left ear. Right hand had to hold the camera :D

Let me introduce you.....

..to the noisiest member of the family. This is Emily.

My middle child (lets call her Miss Stubborn) has always wanted a Basset Hound - and I mean always. Basically since she could talk. Circumstances did not allow for it though. But since she turned 13 this year, we decided its now or never. So earlier this year we got a Basset pup.

From a batch of mostly black and brown pups, we chose her since she was different - mostly white with some brown only on the face and ears. And brown freckles. The older she becomes though, the more freckles she gets!



She has the most amazing personality, and is probably the most lovable dog we've ever had. And so cuddly! Unfortunately she's also the stinkiest dog we've ever had, and just loves getting dirty! Love her to bits though :)

Out of the blue, today, I suddenly remembered: oh yeah....I have a blog!

So decided to visit. My first thought was 'how boring', and then changed the title, theme template, boring old picture.....and deleted half the boring old posts too (almost deleted the whole damn lot!). They say change is as good as a holiday.... well, I am in desperate need of a holiday!! :-D Now maybe I'll come back more often....

Priceless

One of many amusing conversations in our car:

Child #1 (14): " 'Beat It' is my favourite Michael Jackson song."
Child #2 (13): "I hate Michael Jackson."
Child #3 (9): "Who's Michael Jackson?"


UPDATE: This happened a few months before MJ passed away. Now they're all fans :-)

Quite happy to be oldschool....

My daughter recently went on an outdoor school camp for a few days. Its something I remember fondly from my own school days. Night marches were the best!

They still go on hikes like we did, but there is one big difference.... We used the stars for navigation, the sun's shadow on your wrist watch, once in a while a compass. Nowadays they use GPS!!

How things change.... Its quite amusing actually.

Hmm..

Got a letter in my mailbox yesterday addressed to someone I don't know. The address is mine though. Seeing that there was no indication where it came from, I opened it.

Turns out it was a notification that it is time for this person to renew his driver's license. And he should apply in person, because they might require an eye test and fingerprints. OK, so we'll send it back to where it came from, adding a little note that the address is wrong.

Then I notice the date of birth: 11/04/21. I doubt this person needs this notification....mmm?

I didn't know....

Came across this interesting fact today:

Thomas Edison designed a helicopter that would work with gunpowder. It ended up blowing up and also blew up his factory.

Losing faith in our teachers

Lately I find myself too often shocked by our education system, and sadly our teachers too.

My son (8) had to prepare a speech for class on Friday. After school I asked him how it went (knowing that this is not his favourite school activity). So he said it went fine, and the teacher said it was good. I thought: 'Yay!'.

Then he told me that it wasn't bad, because the teacher was talking on her cellphone while he was doing his speech, and the other kids were chatting!! He finished his speech before she was even done chatting on her phone, and then she told him: 'very good'......

I thought: WHAT?!! And how did she grade his speech?

Its bad enough that our teenagers are glued to their cellphones ALL THE DAMN TIME! And that they can't spell properly anymore, because they use sms language all the time. But teachers......in class?!

I find it completely unacceptable.

Behind bars...

I recently heard this story on the radio, and found it quite amusing. I don't remember where, but somewhere in Eastern Europe I think, a pigeon was captured and put behind bars for smuggling drugs....! Apparently he visited some inmates on a regular basis, with little packets of drugs tied to his feet. Apparently his fate is still uncertain, but he will remain behind bars for now.....

It gives new meaning to the word jailbird! :-D


UPDATE:
It seems this is not a new thing, it is actually quite a problem in some countries, like Brazil.

wtf ?

Heard this little titbit on the radio on my way to the office this morning. Apparently a police officer was fired after using the F word in the presence of his superior. Now....I wonder what the unemployment rate would be in this country if that became the norm?

Ridiculous...

...niks gewoond nie...

Early last week a friend of mine sent me a funny email about being "Proudly South African". One of the points were: "you'll drive 100's of kilometers to see snow". That made me smile, because its so true :)

Snow is not a common phenomenon in this country, in fact: most people never experience it. When we were little we thought of snow as a kind of fairytale land :) And we can't imagine how it must be in other countries where people experience it daily during their winter time (though I've heard many regard it as an annoyance).

And then late last week....it snowed! Not everywhere, just in the higher mountainous regions. Yesterday we decided to take a drive, and go have a look. We thought it would be a quick trip, but didn't realize that hundreds of people had the same idea! Boy, what a surprize!


I've seen snow in New Zealand and Europe, so it was rather disappointing for me - only patches of white, no white carpet. But it didn't seem like people minded. Snowmen were being built everywhere...mostly on people's cars, or in pickup trucks! It was quite amusing to watch them all :) Some would stop often, to fix it up again.


Needless to say, on the way home we hit traffic! At some points we went 10kmh max. Got home wayyyyy after dark, but it was fun nevertheless:)

I love winter. And I love knitting. We lived in the Philippines for 4 years, and there its never winter! So I really missed knitting every winter...... Now its winter here, and I'm sooo enjoying knitting again :)

The little man is so proud :-)

There's a first for everything

I bought brussel sprouts for the first time in my life yesterday!! Hated them as a child...eww! And I lived in a house where you had to eat whatever was dished up, no matter what. That made me hate them even more......

So, of course, I've been avoiding these cute little veggies as far as I could since then. But then the other day I had some (don't remember when and where). And it wasn't as bad as I remember!

So I bought some yesterday...and cooked them last night :)

I'm quite fascinated by them now..... Never even knew what the plant looks like!! Cute eh?

knit volvo cover

knit volvo cover
Originally uploaded by secretagentmartens

I found this pic on flickr....and my first thought was: how weird is this? And more importantly: WHY???

Couldn't quite get my head around the idea, but then noticed that it was actually meant for an art festival.

Its pretty awesome... I love knitting, but can't even imagine doing something like this!

Now count with me: 1 2 3 4 1 2 ....

I don't have huge gripes with the whole Eskom issue. Yes its somewhat inconvenient not to have electricity at times, but hey...we've had some cool picnics because of it :) And I love candlelight!

But, the one thing I don't get, is why traffic lights are switched off too. Can't they bypass that? Especially at peak hours. There seems to be confusion at the intersections, especially the big ones.

Usually people treat it as a 4-stop when the lights aren't working, and that's the right way I think (though its really slow). But people get impatient I guess....and sometimes cross in huge clumps. That makes it even more confusing and slow, because you never know which will be the last car to join a specific group. And they don't take proper turns either (I guess some people struggle to count 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4......)

And we're gonna have How many more years of this??

*sigh*

3/4 cake

It's my brother-in-law's birthday today, and since he loves my chocolate cake (he says its the best ever....and he's very fussy *grin*), I thought I'd bake him a cake. Problem is, trying to bake a cake with so many little fingers around, only about 3/4 of the batter actually make it to the oven!! *sigh* Oh well....

The birthday boy (hmm...man) loved the surprize. That's all that matters....

What? I'm a spammer?

Ok, so I'm the person that NEVER responds to or forwards any junkmail...even from close friends. Be it the 'return this to me if you're my friend' or the cute little bear 'have a nice day' variety. Even the 'you will never have good sex again in your life' type. I just don't.

But then today, Facebook decided to call me a spammer!!?? Huh? I wrote a message to two different people (people that I know btw, not strangers), and the next thing a big red block pops up informing me that my account is suspended because I was spamming! So what's the deal, only allowed one message a day? *shakes head*

And then they don't even have any address on the site to contact with little issues like this.

Okay, so the refund for the Josh Groban tickets (show that didn't happen) might not be paid out after all? How do people get away with this stuff? *shakes head* And we had 5 tickets....not small change... :-(

Dilemma...

A friend of my son (8) came to play and slept over last night. He's been over before, and though he is quite a 'busy' chap, he's never really been too out of hand. But this time he was just wayyy too much for me....and even for my son (who told me last night already that he thinks we should take the friend home). And by noon today he was almost begging that we take the guy home. I was completely shocked at how a child can become a scary terrorist! I was soooo relieved to drop him off at home around 2pm today.

The problem is, I like his parents. Get along great with the mom, they seem like really nice people. But I will not have their son over ever again! Don't know if I should tell her, or just make excuses.... My gut says just tell her...in a nice way. But how do you tell someone that their child is a tyrant, and you can't stand the little bugger? *sigh*