My words in the Wind

Miscellany Mondays - Welcome to November

2011-11-07T12:33:00.001+02:00

Miscellany Mondays - Welcome to November

Although as I type this November has been here a whole week now. Before we know it it’s December then the New Year, and so time just floats (swiftly) out of our lives........

Not sure who still celebrates Guy Fawks....Luckily in our small town it’s not celebrated at all so my cats and dogs had a peaceful weekend free of those terrifying noisy crackers and fireworks...

We’re starting summer, (yes I know many of you are ensconced indoors) - well we’ve had hot sunny weather most of October and November now, but the mornings and the evenings are still very fresh and crispy. One still has to sleep with a blanket on the beds in the evenings, which is most unlike our summer weather. I have now gone and caught the summer flu – my immune system is a tad weak, and I guess with me spending a lot of time working during the day and then studying till late in the evenings, despite all good intents with vitamins and stuff, I still caught the flu. So I spent Friday off from the office, sniffling and sneezing around the house, got a flu jab from the doctor and spent most of the rest of Friday just sleeping it all off.

Saturday and Sunday was spent studying inbetween the rest and sneezing periods...not much rest for the wicked I’m afraid. My exam timetable is a tad harsh – 2 exams 14 and 15 November, and then 2 on the same day 21st Nov. Guess those guys didn’t see my name when they were planning the exam timetable, although I must also say I chose my subjects specifically based on the preliminary exam timetable. In the prelim exam timetable I wrote exams 19 and 31 Oct and then 14 and 15 Nov. How and why these were changed to such an extent that I sit ith the final exam timetable now, is beyond me, but being I am studying distance educationa and there’s 100 000 students, the chances of me even getting hold of the right person to speak to re the matter is majorly slim,so yes, just get the rear end into action and study. This too shall pass so they say...

Anyone a sailing fan?

The Volvo Ocean Race set off from Alicante (Spain) Saturday 5 November for the first leg stopover at Cape Town South Africa. Unfortunately I don’t live near CT so will have to give their arrival a miss in person but watch every moment on TV or Facebook it seems....This is one of my favourite sporting events – only happens every 3 years and takes about 9 months to complete - sail around the world. I must admit I love such adventures. Not sure I could last 9 months of tiring sailing, but I do love sailing with the wind and sea in my hair, don’t seem to get sea sick too quickly, so I could join the adventure easily. Of course I’m also not a professional, so I’ll just have to follow the adventure from my living room TV!!! Still, if you are into sailing, go check out your TV coverage for this fabulous race.

I have a busy week at the office, what’s new, don’t we all. Further at home we have contractors putting up shatterprufe glass doors around my patio – looking forward to a neat job, and an extended room once the job is finalised. Currently the Patio sits outside, neat ceiling and all, but we moved our old but still highly working TV there with a decent cabinet or two since hubbie bought himself a bigger LED HD TV - and so have decided to seal off the patio for extra burglarproofing and also to protect the old TV and cabinets against the dust and wind. The patio can also now double as an extra room for the kids – we only have one lounge/sitting room/TV room – so when they bring friends they always have to lounge around outside or send parents to bed. Now they too will have an extra room where hopefully they can spend some time with their friends...

Here’s wishing you all a great week. I am busy studying my head off – Personality theories – all very very interesting, I feel like a Freud and Social Cognitive Learning Theorist specialist, but alas I don’t believe I am!! It's interesting how these clever guys came up with all these theories - till today we still use bits and pieces from them all in the subject, and Freud especially contributed vastly to Psychology as we understand such today...I still have to study Maslow, Carl Rogers and Victor Frakl and all by Wednesday evening as I need to move onto subject 2 for it’s exam Tuesday 15th. ...So hold thumbs...this too shall pass, let’s hope I get enough understanding and knowledge in my head to feel as if I’m on the right track.

So see you around this week I hope, and I hope you enjoyed your stay

LG

Stream of conciousness - Sunday 6 November

2011-11-06T19:35:00.000+02:00

On a sunny, calm Sunday, I spent most of the time...indoors...studying.

I feel like a Freud psycho analyst know it all.

I feel like a Bandura Social Cognitive Learning Theorist know it all

Alas I am neither

I have come down with bad (summer) flu, yes can one believe such stuff
and spent most of Friday in bed. Saturday and Sunday were spent behind the books with an hour in the afternoon trying to rest the flu away....

Exams start soon, and despite all the effort put into understanding Freud an co...sigh

I feel as if I am only half way. There's still Maslow, Carl Rogers, Victor Frankl to go.

Eastern and African Perspectives. All before Wednesday this week....mmm...hold thumbs do...

Till then my head swirls and twists...I dream about the words I've studied all weekend long...

Good news...Even though it was Guy Fawks last night, though not celebrated in our smalltown, so my cats and dogs could rest in peace last night...

I just have to finally decide: do I but the Android Galaxy Tab or the IPAD 2...mmm..the Android suits my needs better and with Honeycomb 3.00 Operating system gets a good review. Same price as the Apple IPAD 2 too. This is my birthday and Xmas present, but I'm the technological one in the house (yes sure) so I get to choose and purchase...soon...not right now, but soon..early December probably...

Exams are pressing on my mind right now, 4 exams in 7 days...thereafter it's countdown till beach sunsets and December vacation....

Have a good week all...

Hodge Podge Wednesday - Welcome to November

2011-11-02T08:29:00.001+02:00

1. Who taught you how to cook?

That’s a difficult one. I don’t remember leraning to cook but I must have at one stage I guess. My formative years from 6-14 were spent living with an aunt and uncle, but they didn’t really teach me much in way of food making. Then we moved to stay with my mom. She loved making food but with all my sport and school activities I usually only got home early evenings and she didn’t work so she made food before I got home. Plus she couldn’t work with someone else in her kitchen. She did teach me how to bake Banana Bread however, and I’d make that over and over till I got it right. After 16 she showed me some of her recipes but my mom was a perfectionist so cooking for her wasn’t always just entertaining!! I guess a good answer would be my grade 8 Home Economics teacher!!! I actually don’t remember ‘cooking’ much before then. But till today I actually enjoy cooking and baking very much. I like reading a recipe, and then closing the book and going through the recipe in my head or making it up as I go along. Can be fun....

2. Have you been told you think too much? Are too much of a perfectionist? Are too sensitive? Were they right?

I probably have been told I think too much, they would be totally correct. I believe I am a thinker. I don’t believe I am a perfectionist of any type but I do believe in doing the job right first time. It irritates and frustrates me if I have to go back or ask someone to go back and redo the job just because it was done half. Of course everyone’s version of “Doing the job right first time” varies and for some could show me as a perfectionist, but I sincerely doubt I am one in the real true deep permanent meaning of the word. I don’t redo and redo till things are perfect, I just do my absolute best first time. I am probably a sensitive person but not ‘too sensitive’ and I don’t take offence too easily...

3. As a child did you have a favorite blanket or toy? Tell about it.

I remember I had 2 dolls – a soft one from my dad (whom I couldn’t recall at that stage, my parents divorced before I was 3 years and mom didn’t have any photo of him in her house!!) and another harder walking doll from my mom, they were my favourites I guess. Next to those 2 dolls, I loved my bicycle and my tennis racquet. I didn’t have legos or Barbies or such, though I do remember playing marbles with brother, and of course bicycling and tennis. I still have both those dolls though....

4. What 'institution' do you have the most faith in?

Mmm...difficult one this. I do believe in marriage as an institution, but in the same breath I believe in marriage as being a partnership where the two partners are equal. I also believe marriage is more than sex, and I guess that’s where a lot of marriages fail nowadays. My thoughts are they marry for the sex and romantic love and then...it all goes plop!! I believe happy marriages are the basis of happy families are the basis of happy and even moral society. However, as I said I firmly believe the 2 partners are equals in all respects does not matter if one stays at home and the other works all day. I am of Christian faith, so I believe God put the marriage institution there for a reason. I respect my husband and will certainly always ask him for advice on many an occasion, but I believe in equality. But in no way do I believe in abuse of any kind, from verbal to emotional to physical abuse, I believe such marriages have immediate grounds for divorce, and people should not be convinced otherwise in this regard. To me happy and successful marriages are firmly based on love, mutual respect, trust and quite frankly, patience and forgiveness, where the latter is possible. All those nice words in Corinthians 13 hey!! I also believe in the institution of going to Church – there’s a reason we have such – stuff like community-ship, together we can do more etc etc....

5. Chrysanthemums-pansies-burning bush-ornamental cabbage...your favorite in an autumn garden?

Pansies, Chrysanthemums and any other Autumn flowers....

6. What superpower do the kids in your neighborhood seem to possess?

The power of Zero. Our street addy is 70. They always steal the zero off our wall

7. Are you a fan of the cranberry?

I quite enjoy the taste yes, but not too common here. Dried cranberries in muffins are delish, as is cranberry juice. Of course tongue in cheek if we talking the group Cranberries one of my fave song is “Dreams” by the Cranberries – the tune and emotion behind the tune speaks to me....

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Hard to believe November is here already. My brother died 1 Nov 23 years ago, at the tender age of 21 and since then my life has never been the same. In both good and bad ways. It’s been a long time, but me being lucky to have such a wonderful husband and girls, I often wonder where and how my life would have been had he not died. I don’t believe I would be in the situation I am now, it’s a result of his death that I moved far away from all that was familiar to me and what I had grown up with. 23 years later this is my new life. I believe my hubbie and girls would have loved my brother and vice versa, in fact I see my brother in my youngest in many many ways. People say youngest daughter is mom’s child, but actually, I see my mom and my brother more in her!! Eyes of the beholder hey!!

Anyway, life continues. Inbetween I have lost all who are dear to me over the years, parents, 2 best friends, one very recently – all I have left is my new family as it were. I don’t believe our lives are pre-destined as I mentioned before. I believe we make them up as we go along. I do believe we are guided and watched over, but we make life up as we move along. Life would have been different for me if I ahd stayed where I was or moved to a different town. I believe you make the best of what is on your road. That is life

LG

Miscellany Mondays - my first MM

2011-10-31T12:46:00.001+02:00

It’s Monday morning. The 31st of October. I don’t celebrate Halloween just because I’m not into such things. But I do find interesting the history behind it all before it became glamorised or Hollywood-sised. The History from really way back when....Having said that I enjoy History of most things from way back when, and the history of Sanheim (?) is no exception. My mom was a free spirit and interested in all such things (and Mother EArth?) and that has washed over to me in many ways...

We at least got some rains this weekend. For those reading my blog for the first time, especially those from Miscellany Mondays, welcome, I hope you have a lovely stay and do visit again – I share coffee, tea, biscuits (American = cookies) and friendship....

I live in South Africa so will be experiencing the opposite of most of my readers from the Northern Hemisphere. We have entered summer with a bang, in fact we have (had) minimal Spring days – we jump mostly from Winter to Summer within two weeks. I live in the dry hot North-Western parts of SA- Botswana is about 300 kilometers away (about 200 miles?) . Haven’t been there yet but trip planning will arrange it one day. We don’t get rains in the winter, in fact it was a big shock for me coming from an area with some winter rains more than 20 years ago to an area where no winter rains between April and September. Perhaps one gets used to such? After 20+ years I still miss my winter rains and usually perform a rain dance when we finally receive our first decent Spring rains. The kids and hubbie always think I’m crazy but yes...6 months is a long dry time!!! We are supposed to get Spring rains mid to end September, but the last few years we have been getting our Spring rains in this area later and later into October. We received some wonderful rains this weekend past, (not our first but certainly our 2nd decent rains for the month) for which I am most grateful – I live in a smallish (but not too small) town which is surrounded by farmers and I drive everyday out to the countryside to go work at a factory (I’m an accountant) and enjoy the quiet and peace one usually experiences on the drive to work and home again. It’s about 25 minutes, the roads are awful but I often put down the window, put off the radio and listen to the sounds and smells of the countryside roll over into me...certainly a good way to relax to work in the mornings and home again in the afternoons. Plus I don’t drive very fast, I wait for everyone to leave in the afternoons then take a leisurely drive home.

So besides some decent rains, this weekend didn’t account for much except some hard studies. I am doing BA Psychology part time (distance education) and write end of year exams in 2 weeks!!! Old brains still work but they certainly work slower than 20+ years ago. My niece was also confirmed in Church yesterday – my eldest will be confirmed this time next year, and my youngest 2 years after that...looking at a photo of my niece when she was 6 years old, wow....time certainly flies past, even though our 2 familys are very close we see each other regularly, the 4 girl cousins all within 3 years of each other so one feels one has gone through their lives with them at this stage...young teenagers (all giving me grey hairs of course!)

Tomorrow will be the anniversary of my brother’s death – a long long time ago. Sigh. He died at 21 23 years ago. Yes, life is now longer without him than with him, but he is never forgotten. I miss you Bro, my life would have been so much different if you had still been alive, but I believe these things happen, and when they do we come to a cross-road or a T junction and then we decide which way we want to continue I guess...and that makes our life up...at least that’s my version of it. But that doesn’t mean the crosses along the way get forgotten, they often live with us way longer than we realise....

So I’m glad to be here, my blogging time at the moment is very limited, working as an accountant during the day, going home to hubbie and girls in the evening and then finding some time towards the latter part of the evenings for 2-3 hours of studies a night leaves me with minimal time right now as I study for exams, but do stick around ...I will do my best to pop in and say hi, and end of November exams and studies finished till January...speaking of which after today I have officially 35 days before we go on December vacation...and that means sun and sea....the countdown certainly has begun.

See you through the window peeps, and have a great week till next time...

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 11 - Goosebumps, 31 days meme and almost HAlloween

2011-10-26T09:52:00.000+02:00

1. What gives you goosebumps?

Emotional moments of almost any kind. Like the winners in the Olympics. Or the final runners in a marathon that try get over the line just before the final gun goes off...Someone singing a poignant emotional song. My daughter did that last night. Or Susan Boyle on Britain’s got talent. And often an incredible witness of something that happened in someone’s lives and how they overcame that problem, usually with the help and Grace of God...

2. Halloween-are you a lover or a hater? Okay, that sounds harsh...Halloween-yay or nay?

Nay. But I do enjoy reading the old traditions of where Samhein (?) might have originated from

3. Can you respect someone you do not trust, and can you trust someone you do not respect?

Nope to both. Trust and respect go hand in hand.

4. Apples or oranges? Yes, you have to choose.

Hmm...apple juice, baked apples with cinnamon, apple pie...love the smell of citrus peel/orange peel and orange blossom, but if I HAD to choose...probably apples....

5. What is something you wish was in your town? (shop, restaurant, attraction, etc)

A decent movie theatre, a games park for teenagers (roller skating, putt-putt golf, volleyball court, foefie slide, paintball, video game center ) etc etc...without anyone messing it up with drugs and alcohol...

6. What non-food item is in your refrigerator or freezer?

Um.......only bicarb of soda in the fridge

7. Are you at all superstitious?

No

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Hmm...in early October over at Nester.com I think they had a whole October blog meme of 31 days. They had over 700 subscribers. I woke to this a bit late, and only arrived at such last weekend. Inbetween I’ve read many many blogs re what they are doing for 31 days. After a while I thought this certainly was a good idea but to me (like most everyone no doubt) I wanted to choose a topic that would really :

a) Have meaning to me to complete such and learn from such

b) Add value to my life ie something I could continue with after my 31 days trial period

c) Fit in with my daily life as it is now as I work all day at the office and have lots of studies – upcoming exams now in November.

So being too late for the blog meme itself, well small things like that don’t put me off. I identified 3-4 things I would like to do (on my own, and here I must admit, the idea on the Nester.com was to do this every day for 31 Calendar days, but for me to make this work in my life as it is, I might miss a day or two here and there, so I would aim to complete the 31 days within max say 45days - 2 months...). My purpose is to do it properly. (Perfectionist tendencies????)

I identified the following to choose from

1) 31 days of exercise – yip, need that right now even if it’s 20 minutes on the treadmill every day/most every day. Can’t tire myself out though I still have to study 3-4 hours every night after evening meal and I’m usually bushed by 8pm this time of the year

2) 31 days of quiet time – and finding meaning in that quiet time – excellent blog found here....

3) 31 days of better motherhood – yes well, I’m not a bad mother, probably just a demanding overly involved one with my 2 teen girls. I need to reconsider where can I step back and let them take their own responsibility without of course dropping my so-called standards and what I think/believe a mom should be. (ie leaving them to their own devices with no discipline...). It’s end of the year exams coming up for them – my girls are finishing grades 10 and 9, and I must let them make their study schedules and stick to them and let them see their results etc. And of course going forward into grades 10 and 11, it is time to step back a bit. I have already started that meme in my own personal diary, not yet sure it’s something I can blog about daily/alternate days, but I will come back and share what lessons I have learned for myself from this 31-60 days of a dedicated project that can only bring good to both myself and my kids..

Other than the above, life is busy, trying to ‘blog’ and community more with the blog people I know, but time is really limited right now, so I do the best I can and come back later. And it’s deep summer here already – temps 34-40 this week and we desperately need a week of good rains....they anticipate hot dry summer till say Mid December and then lot’s of rain for the 2 weeks after that...exactly same weather pattern we’ve had last 2 years and certainly a change from our usual summer pattern where we used to get early Sept/October rains...now we drain the water table empty before the heavens fall down on us...I trust this end of October will be a good one for you all...

“Quote:

"May today there be peace within. May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be. May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others. May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you. May you be content with yourself just the way you are. Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love. It is there for each and every one of us."

LG

Sunday Streams - no 1 - Sunny Sundays, 31 days and RWC 2011 Final

2011-10-23T21:19:00.001+02:00

5 minutes of concious writings with no corrections...This weekend was spent studying and reading many many 31 days of....found here http://www.thenester.com/2011/09/31-days-participants.html

I'm slow out of the blocks as you can see...there were several entries I truly enjoyed ...this blog being the best and most relevant to me so far.... http://www.ducksanddecisiveengagement.us/ - 31 days/letters to my daughters...I like the concept...since my daughters are in their early/mid teens I think I will start something like that in time for an Xmas gift...I must just make sure it's relevant without being too preachy...mmm...maybe I can make it a family tradition/Xmas gift the next year or three as they prepare to leave home for University in 2-3 years...sigh...yes...time does fly when you have kids....

I don't have the time right now to concentrate on anything beyond my studies..but I am looking at 31 days of various things: 31 days of Letters to my Daughters being first most in my mind; 31 days of Psalms; 31 days of exercise and 31 days of Soul-searching/Reflections. And 31 days of mosaics....If you get to know me you'll realise I don'tlet alittle thing like October get in my way...I have exams till 21 November, a really tough schedule, so I have 31 days of studies first...and thereafter I can se emyself planning a fw months of inspiration ahead....I am excited at the thought. As I said, just 'cos the meme is done in October certainly doesn'tmen I confine myself to such a time....

Today was a beautiful sunny HOT day in South Africa!! Lovely but HOT. We watched the Rugby World Cup final between New Zealand and France this morning - yes, NZ won, and I believe are deserved champions of the World Cup for the next 4 years purely because they are the best rugby team in the world for he last 2-3 years..but it was a tough match against the French, where I thought the NZ would romp home, no no, the French suddenly arrived at the RWC 2011, and gave them a good match, NZ eventually winning 8-7 in the end. So certainly hats off to France for providing an entertaining game where very easily the All Blacks could have run away with the match. And of course congrats to the Kiwis, really well done. Not many SAfricans would feel the way I feel (NZ being our all time arch enemies when it comes to rugby), but I give credit where due.

I'm looking forward to this week - just same old at work, nothing major exciting, but it's a good job and we are grateful. My youngest has a singing concert Tuesday night and beyond all that I have lots and lots of studies to do.

Till next time, thanks for the visit and keep well

LG

Saturday 9 - The Last DJ

2011-10-22T11:16:00.000+02:00

1. Who was favorite DJ and what radio station did you listen to as a kid?

I would have to say Dave Guselli of Capital 604 - this was what I listened to in my teens (early 1980'2 to around 1987) - they were affiliated with a British radio station and broadcast to our area via Transkei which was then listed as an independent country to South Africa - though no one outside the SA Government recognised them as independent to South Africa. Be as it may, I loved the radio station for their progressive politics, their up to date music and their wonderful DJ's - Dave with the golden voice. Wonder what he's doing nowadays. He was an Italian I think, not much to look at as DJ's go, but wow. What a voice. And they always had the most up to date music from UK and USA - my teens listening to this radio station was unforgettable....

2. What has been the weirdest thing you have worn in public?

I don't do weird in public. Like - never

3. What was the best part of last weekend?

The Formula 1 race - the qualifying on Saturday then the race Sunday - always always makes my weekend, I'm a HUGE F1 fan(atic).......

4. What was the most effective punishment for you as a kid?

Not allowing me to visit my friends?

5. Would you lie to your significant other to not hurt their feelings?

Possibly yes. ON certain matters.

6. We're taking you order for breakfast. What would you like?

Medium boiled egg x2 with white bread toast, lots of pure butter and honey. You can also give me fresh fruit, delish muesli and yoghurt. And on a cold winter's day oatmeal made with milk, honey ,raisins, almonds et al

7. Do you celebrate Halloween? If yes, do tell. If no, why not?

No. Firstly don't like horrors and Halloween is always filled with ghosts and horrosrs. Secondly, don't like the glorified stories that go with Halloween. I am interested in the 'real story' whatever one that might be as in Samhein night of lost souls - from the Celtic tradition, but that's the only part I find interesting. The glamorified Halloween and all that it goes with it evades me. Perhaps the same can be said for Easter and Christmas, although being of Christian faith, I believe the glorified Halloween goes along with Valentine's day - just another day at the cash bar.......

8. Do you hand out candy to the neighborhood kids?
Not celebrated where I live, but the answer would be No

9. What's the favorite age you've been, so far?
23 comes automatically to mind. Perhaps more my lucky number than my favourite age. 19 was probably the best year - I spent it as a Foreign Exchange student for a whole year in New Hampshire USA. It was awesome awesome awesome. Since then though, my life has been good to me

Hope to see you around here more

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 10 - Caramel Sundaes and Loss

2011-10-19T08:37:00.000+02:00

No 49 week 19 Oct

1. How do you typically react in a sudden, extreme, pressure-filled crisis? Would we want you nearby in an emergency?

Well I’ve never really been in such an extreme situation so no idea really. I do feel that however I wouldn’t go into a total scream, and would be able to help out as best I can....

2. Caramel apple-caramel sundae-caramel corn-caramel macchiato...of the four, which carmel treat would you choose?

Caramel apple or sundae....

3. Is there such a thing as destiny? Explain.

Hmm. I believe that God has a ‘plan’ for us when we are born and that we are His children, but we often sway the path to getting there in terms of what we choose in life. I don’t for eg believe it was “destiny” or even “God’s will” that my brother shot himself at 21 years old. I believe we travel this road of life and we actually make our life through our choices. So I guess that’s a no to “destiny”. But in other ways I do believe in God.

4. What's your favorite piece of furniture? I'm referring to something currently in your possession as opposed to something on your wish list.

Not really worried about stuff like that. I love old bookcases, probably ‘cos they’re filled with books!! I have a kist which I inherited from my mom, nothing too fancy but I would say that is my most treasured piece of furniture and would certainly HAVE to take with me if I had to move anywhere.

5. Wednesday night marks the start of the 2011 Baseball World Series. Did you know? Do you care? Will you be watching? Ever been to a professional baseball game? If you're not an American do you find the title 'World Series' annoying or amusing?

Not an American so Baseball not on my map of sports. I find the Americans using “World Series” for any sport totally amusing and ridiculous but don’t waste my energy on disliking them. I’m certainly not going to change their minds so........As an “english speaking” person of the world however I do LOVE love love cricket...and yes we’ve started with cricket in South Africa and are playing the Aussies, my all time favourite opponents this very month...

6. A sound that takes me back to my childhood is ____________.

Music...yes I know...easy choice...but I can place most of my life via music...I can almost say close to one or two years at a push when what song came out ‘cos I just link it somewhere in my memory to what I was doing...eg my first music 45” was in 1975 Alan Garrity (An SA singer) – I got 4 of them for my birthday. MY first big LP was Racey “Some girls l” – (British group) – 1976 or 1977 when I adored them at age 10/11. 1977 John Paul Young (Aussie) “I hate the music” and “Yesterday’s Hero” – I loved this guy. Long hair, loud music....1976 driving in a car with my elder cousins Neil Diamond's “Beautiful Noise”. 1978/1979 “On top of the World” Carpenters (I don’t think it came out that year, probably earlier around what 1974, but my mom sang it to me all the time around 1978 so....). And so the list goes on. There is literally no other ‘sound’ than ‘lots of sounds’.....

7. On average, once you've linked your hodgepodge post to mine how many other participant blogs do you visit? Do you ever come back to the Hodgepodge later in the day or even the day after to read posts?

At the moment I read about 4-5 blogs – mainly first the people who commented on my Hodge Podge but because time/internet is limited with studies for exams now, I don’t read too many more though I have visited a good number of bloggers from this list. The point is just to go back regularly, at the moment I’m a bit stunted there with time, but I keep at it ‘cos end Nov I will have 2 months of ‘time’....

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I have lost someone I loved dearly, 7 months now. It’s difficult to get over that loss, one goes through ups and downs – ups being “I am recovering” and downs being “ WTF??? Back to square 1”. My loss is of a very dear friend, and someone that filled my life daily with love and laughter and memories. I’ve tried to fill the gap with work and studies and attempts at ‘trying to recover’, but all this has had to be done ‘below the radar line’. I’ve been for a counselling session or two, I’ve written personally in my diary, I’ve cried buckets at the grave weekly, I’ve stamped my feet and shouted at the wind and the heavens...and I’ve had to keep this all below the public eye. Because as a dear friend, everyone expects me to move on. After all no one could have loved and lost him more than his family. And I empathise with them daily. Just....from out of sight....Knowing how bad I am taking his death, I cannot for the life of me imagine their daily struggles. I’m writing it here ‘cos I have to, I have to get it out, this mourning in private means I can’t move onto the next stage – of anger, of despair, of acceptance? - (so it feels to me) and here I’m Annonymous. You can like me or dislike me. You can read me or un-read me. But it’s something that I somehow somewhere have to rage rage and get it all out....I don’t know of any other way....

LG

My weekend reading list and some poetry

2011-10-16T19:44:00.001+02:00

I don't have much time to blog nowadays, especially since my studies for my exams have started till end November, but I do try read a lot of blog posts inbetween. I would like to post a few of my favourites here to share with you those posts/blogs that startled me, inspired me and remain with me:

An excellent excellent blogpost here: A Holy Experience: One thing that might help any relationship

Inbetween I battle daily with the loss of a wonderful friend.7 months now, and where I once thought the pain would get better and the loss less, it seems to have made a U-turn. I'm regressing - daily it seems. I need to get a handle on the sadness. I've been there before in terms of major depression about 7 years ago.Now, this huge loss seems to have started it again. In the day I work and live with my family. The mask is firmly in place. At night and alone times....my heart bleeds. I suppose I'm trying to help myself, but it seems right now I'm not going anywhere but backwards....

The Pain

my constant companion
fits snugly like a warm
jersey over my heart

what little I show
what little they see

the four walls
of my constant companion
surrounds me
daily

i don't know how to
break them down
seven months now
and where i thought
it would go away
and leave me in peace

no such luck

in the dark hours
amd moments of aloneness

i despair
i cry out

but no one is looking or listening

and when they look again
the shutters
are in place

12/10/2011

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 9 - Jury Duty and other October mentionables

2011-10-12T11:55:00.000+02:00

1. Have you ever been 'asked' to report for jury duty? Were you chosen to serve? If not, were you happy or disappointed?

We don’t have jury duty in SA. I have however found such a concept interesting.The jury is not yet out whether I believe 100% in the workings thereof, but it does have it’s considered advantages along with some potential disadvantages.

2. On a scale of 1-10 (with 10 being very), how mechanically inclined are you? Give an example to back up your answer.

Ha ha..that is a good question. I am not at all mechanically inclined. So give me a 1 or 2. In fact if my sewing machine (used on very rare occasions) had to jamb a needle I get very frustrated and after trying to unjamb the needle or whatever part is jammed, will put the machine off and wait for a mechanic to pass me by. I am pretty good with a computer however (OK so what passes as good? Probably not as competent as my teenage girls....). I can also put a plug on any appliance all by myself without electrocuting the household (pat on the back...but then that is elactrical minded as opposed to mechanical) but no, my mechanical brains ar otherwise incredibly limited. Not that I don’t find the subject interesting and informative. I do. Till today I would easily watch such programs where they explain how pumps and engines/motors work, but inclined I am not. I battle with 3D options that are not directly visible right in front of me.

3. Beets-cabbage-cauliflower-butternut squash....of the four, which is your favorite fall vegetable?

I eat and enjoy all veggies including all those above – might be one or two unknowns but I am a veggie person. I always eat my veggies before my meat and or potatoes/rice so when I am full I am full of veggies nd the meat goes home in a doggy bag (usually to be sliced up for beef sandwich). I particularly like butternut squash and spinach (not together of course) but honestly, I eat literally all veges I know of. There are a few exceptions of course but they come along as discovered. Once when on a work’s visit to Tanzania this time a year ago, they have a vege similar to a banana. In fact it’s a hard banana – it looks and almost tastes like a banana but you can’t eat it raw and it’s very hard raw. They cook it by boiling – tastes awful. Doesn’t even have a proper taste to me, so there, I don’t eat all veges. Out of the 4 above – I eat them all and even like them. Yes I know, my hubbie and girls don’t eat veges the way I do and also think a few nuts are missing

4. What do you recommend to overcome self-pity?

5 minues of self pity is good. We all need some self pity time but 5 minutes is enough. Thereafter I would take my girls or any other self pitying person to any place close by to me where people actually suffer just to live. One can start at our local old age home. There everyone is under a roof and have their own beds and food every day but the adult children (some of them certainly well off) dump their parents there and just forget about them – only visiting them once a year if the old people are lucky. That’s sad.

There are many homeless/unemployed people in the streets around us daily. In South Africa we have an unemployment rate of around 25%. The USA is currently around 10% unemployed to the best of my knowledge (BBC News, although black Americans can have as high a rate as 16%) and no doubt everyone realises that is high. Unemployment in Africa in its own is a major problem. Could be due to lower education levels, amongst other societal problems too. In Tanzania for example, it is most important to work for the government – there you are then ‘looked after’ for life as it were. However the millions that aren’t employed by the government have to find their own way of surviving and there it was apparent how many millions lived a hand-mouth existence. Everyone selling something on the street for survival – from bananas to corn or wood – just enough for the day’s subsistence too in most cases. In South Africa, there are many millions not even surviving. I will show this self-pitying person how people, previously employed, previously with a home and decent lifestyle, black and white, now live in shacks or run down accommodation due to retrenchment, unemployment, downward economic spiral. How old Black women look after their grandkids (perhaps because adult parents have died from AIDS or other illnesses – remember sub-Saharan Africa has an enormous HIV/AIDS rate of at least 25% of the population) - and how these grandparents do their best to feed and send them to school on very minimal government pensions. The pride in achieving something like this (when it is achieved) is something to admire and there are many such individuals whom I do admire. Many millions don’t of course, they all lie around waiting for the government to feed them and clothe them and give them money for free – but the ones I admire are the ones who do their best to look after their children in extremely trying circumstances. My mom was one of them – a poor white lady with no maintenance money from her ex husband, and she taught me the benefits of studying hard so one day you could find a job and move up in life and offer a different opportunity to your children. I also admire many other women especially, of all races, who bring this attitude to their children. We need more of them. Just walk the streets for one day, and I am eternally grateful for everything in my life, not the least my job, my family, my home. Every single day I appreciate and give thanks for every single thing I have. And I’m not talking possessions so much as a lifestyle and or mindset and those people that make your life

5. Do you enjoy classical music?

Yes. Not as knowledgeable as I should be, but in my mid-age am of course learning more and listening more every day. Funny how this sometimes comes with age hey? My mom loved classical and opera but as a young girl it was too noisy for me. (Yes I know compared to rock music????) Now I listen piece by piece. I enjoy the sounds of a good piano. Violins not yet my type, but I also enjoy orchestral music. That does count doesn’t it?

6. October is National Book Month...what's on your reading list this month?

Reading is my life. Unfortunately so is working and studying. So my pleasure reading is very very limited, and October will see more textbooks studied as opposed to pleasure reading. However I read for pleasure every single night 30 minutes in the bath – and am busy with a book entitled something along the lines “Don’t fool around with mountains” by Selebelo someone – a (black) South African’s memoir of his climb of Mt Everest – but first all his other climbs like Kilimanjaro, and others in S America etc on his way to Everest. I find it very interesting and fascinating. Hope to finish by this weekend. Then I have social science textbooks to read, and for pleasure I have a huge selection of books ranging from Bukowski’s poetry to travel journeys across Africa, to historical novels of Marie-Antoinette and or English history et al et al....sigh..many many choices, limited time ....

7. What is your idea of 'cute'?

Obviously applies to what. Cute immediately refers me to a soft fluffy ball of kitten or puppy. My daughter bought a ToyPom pup the other day – the poor thing is 8 weeks old, weighs 1.1 kg (about 2 pounds) and is just a ball of fluff. Cute guys tend not to be my thing, I like them not so cute like Gerard Butler or Kevin Costner or Richard Gere. Cute applies to babies or small animals.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Well my last post I mentioned rugby and the Rugby World Cup 2011 currently taking place in New Zealand. It would be amiss of me to mention that SA lost in the quarterfinals against Australia, and that the semi-finals taking place this weekend are Aus vs New Zealand and France vs Wales. For a fanatic rugby-playing nation like SA this is a big loss and many are no longer going to watch any further games – but I will. Good rugby is up for grabs. I suspect Wales and New Zealand will march on into the finals – Wales because they are playing fantastic enterprising exciting rugby right now and the French are almost the most unreliable rugby team in the world – the A team will arrive to play today and tomorrow the B or C team might pitch up – you never know what/who you’re going to get - and New Zealand, because next to SA, they are certainly the most formidable rugby playing nation in the world and probably deserve their title should they win it. For those from USA – the USA also sent a rugby team – not being a Rugby nation they certainly didn’t do too badly, but no, couldn’t compete after the first round with the rugby heavies like England, Wales, France, SA, Aussie, New Zealand to name a few. Around 1985/1986 I went to the USA as an exchange student on scholarship – up north in New Hampshire – the best year of my life no doubt – and there I coached a girl’s high rugby team for a season. It was pretty fun.

Other than that, we’re middle October, summer is moving onto us at full speed. So are my November exams. I am an accountant by day, and wife/mom by night, when I also try fit in Psychology student. I am studying part time (ie distance learning) my B Psychology degree for me to consider student guidance/counsellor in about 5 years after my Honours etc. Many will ask “why at this stage in your life”, many others will understand. To me time and age do not delimit the opportunity for you to study further what you want to. I enjoy accounting, I have an excellent job for the past 14 years, I’m good with numbers, they come naturally to me as it were. But it was never my first option, at one stage it was my only option. And so I followed such. But now, 25+ years later, I’m following my heart to do what I wanted to all those years ago. I don’t regret my life thus far as the roads taken have brought me much happiness and ‘success’ (and I define success in being happily married for the last 18 years, in being able to give my girls a stable loving home and more economically than what I had, thus they have a ‘step up’ to also continue onwards in their lives as opposed to battling through poverty). Success is not just economics however, but often the basics come from whether you can afford a good education or not, and to me education and the results of education are what are important. We are by no means rich or even wealthy, and even compared to US Dollar exchange rate we’d be maybe average in the USA, but we can afford food everyday and schoolbooks and have a good job and such and thus I consider us ‘well to do...’. So exams are a November month thing for me and then we can move onto vacation and a sunny Xmas with a big family at home.

So till next week, thanks for popping in. I apologise for not being a great networker, I read everyone who comments here, I add you to my list, and pop in again to your blogs, but time is very limited, soon end November I will have 2 months grace before following study year, and in that time will certainly spend more time visiting your blogs. Till then it’s a short hello from me (OK the above is not short winded) and hope to see you again next week

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 8 - Welocme to October

2011-10-05T10:04:00.000+02:00

1. What's your favorite meal to serve on a chilly autumn evening?

My mom always made the most delish Hungarian goulash. When feeling chilly I usually make curried chicken pot – something to warm us up....

2. Are you a creature of habit? Explain.

I guess so. I like ‘routine’ (I’m an accountant when I’m not trying to study psychology!) -I get up same time every day (even weekends I get up very early), and most routines are another word for habit. On vacation however, I usually ‘break the routine’ in all ways possible.....

3. What food product (no longer readily available) do you remember and miss from days gone by?

Mmmm...delish toffee apples...we don’t find them as easily...

4. What's something you've lost that you've never been able to find? Any theories as to what happened?

I lose things all the time, mainly because I really hide them from my kids and then can’t remember where I hid them. I lost tickets to a music concert 4 years ago – I found them the other day when springcleaning some far-out-of-the-way-drawer....guess Spring cleaning is going to strat with a bang in my house now we’ve had our first Spring rains...

5. Zoo~circus~ carnival...your favorite?

If I had to choose it would be carnival only because I enjoy the relaxed atmosphere and homemade foods and arts and crafts...– Zoos – can be interesting but I don’t like animals so locked up out of their natural environment even if for educational purposes; Circus – again don’t appreciate the way they use the animals

6. What song makes you feel instantly happy?

What a wonderful world by Louis Armstrong. Also” 99 red Balloons” by Nina

7. To what extent are you an argumentative person?

Probably a good extent, although now in my mid forties I couldn’t really be bothered arguing anymore and trying to ‘convince’ people. I used to argue a lot/mainly termed it debating - if I didn’t agree with someone I’d say so. Now unless invited to offer my opinion, if I don’t agree with someone I would probably still say so – I do not go under the radar as a yes woman – but thereafter I would just let the matter be. I won’t ‘debate’ continuously in an endeavour to change their minds, I will just state my opinion in terms of “I agree/I disagree because....” and let it be. If someone wanted further clarification I’d provide it (or if I was halfway to understanding someone and wanted further clarification myself I’d ask), but beyond that if I see this person is very vehement about something that I don’t agree with, I will now just let it be and wash over me. Excuse myself and walk away. Could be because I realise we all have opinions, and we are entitled to them even if some people stay asses they still entitled to their ass-like opinion. At the office however, I won’t do anything in accounting I don’t agree with and will therefore debate/argue the point till someone sees why I don’t do it or my boss decides to do it himself ‘cos I refuse

LOL!!

I have always enjoyed debating with really sensible open-minded people however, as this is always an endeavour on MY side to learn something, so when a sensible non-violent non-argumentative someone will ‘discuss an issue’ or ‘debate with me’ I would enjoy the conversation. I certainly don’t believe I am always right or have all the answers, but I always endeavour to keep an open mind and at least hear what the other is saying. This way you actually learn quite a bit about them and of course whatever the subject is they could be debating!!

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I love the month October. Here in the Southern Hemisphere we have moved from Spring almost directly into Summer, but October remains the most pleasant month for me (and then March).....Could be I’m biased of course, I’m an October baby so.........

However October also usually signals the lead up to the end-of-October-early-November-exams so..........lots of learning awaits me the next 6 weeks. But it’s all interesting stuff so I’m game, as one month after exams signals December vacation – usually spent at the beach for us. I’m so looking forward to 2 weeks at the beach, I must admit.Till then it’s exercise 3-4x a week, studies, kids’ end of the year exams soon, Season school concerts and prize giving stuff...usual end of the year hectic activities....Soon it’ll rush past...We have an Arts festival close by this week...Going to take my daughters to see Lochnville this Thursday and Friday hoping to see the Parlotones...inbetween lots of noisy students...We are also big rugby supporters and with the Rugby World Cup on in New Zealand, this weekend heralds the quarterfinals, the big guns have all arrived and ready to go into the semis so this weekend rugby should be good stuff too...Enjoy your first week of October and thanks for visiting..

LG

Hodge POdge Wednesday no 6

2011-09-27T21:37:00.001+02:00

1. It is officially fall here in North America...I realize not everyone who participates in the Hodgepodge lives in North America but if you do, what's your favorite memory of Summer 2011? If you're not in North America, what's your favorite memory of the season just ending on your side of the world?

We have just come through winter. Now our winters in South Africa are not the coldest a la UK/USA/Europe…we do get lowest temperatures of zero Celcius, and even some minus 5 degrees Celsius in winter. Zero Celsius is 32F in American language, so low twenties would be the coldest we get (at night time). Mostly in the days even in mid winter our temps increase to at least something like 10 degree Celsius – with some sun shining. However this winter some areas received snow at least 2x which is quite exceptional. Our winters are also not as long as those of the Northern Hemisphere. We start winters early May and they never seem to end here by end August, but luckily, all not-so-nice-things come to an end too!! In contrast our Springs are very very short – where I live we have about 2 weeks of Spring and then we jump into daytime summer only with slightly cooler evenings…but I don’t complain, Autumn(Fall) remains my favourite season – but summer still beats winter in my books!!!

2. Your favorite nut? You know I mean the edible kind, right?

I quite like nuts, the edibles and non-edibles as well sometimes…my kids and hubbie think I’m bit of a nut myself so guess that can be the reason…Anyway, edible nuts – very definitely cashews, but I also enjoy macademias and almonds….

3. What activity puts your sense of balance to the test?

Off the top of my head I would say skate-boarding – I used to be a big skateboarder as a teen, and then I fell off the board and had a big accident, never climbed back on and now if I just put my feet on the board I feel off-balance! However the other day we were doing a few yoga poses – the tree one – where you stand on one of your legs and balance – yes that showed me I need to work on this daily getting my toes to grip the ground and keep my balance ……..

4. How would you describe your sense of humor?

Quirky. Whatever that means. I always liked Bill Cosby – he would have me rolling on the floor even if I was only a teen at the time…I enjoy other humour too…the importance is to have a sense of humour and especially one to laugh at yourself!!!

5. September 28th is National Ask a Stupid Question Day...what's your stupid question?

Um….Why can't the world live mostly in peace? Stupid question. I know

6. Roller skates~hula hoop~jump rope...which activity would you most enjoy? Yes, you have to choose.

Would go for roller skates….I loved ice-skating and to me they are similar.........

7. What's your most sentimental possession?

Would be a photo/s of my mom and brother – both deceased now……..

8. Insert your own random thought here.

We’ve just spent a long weekend visiting long-last seen family and friends 1000 kilometers (about 800 miles) across the country. It was a wonderful trip and brought back some food memories of good times past. We visited my uncle, my mom’s youngest brother who was a semi-father to me all those years…he’s now 74, and a tad frail, and I hadn’t seen him in 5.5 years since my mom died…and I wanted to visit him again so we made the trip…he stays with his wife and daughter and her family, my cousin, same age, and I hadn’t seen her in almost 20 years…they are all doing very well, and it was just wonderful to see them all…

Sometimes I believe we take especially family (and old friends) for granted – and as we grow up we all grow apart distance wise, but if we don’t purposefully make a plant to go visit them, the years will pass speedily by and we’ll just sit around and “complain how time flies and how we’re all so busy and how we haven’t seen them all for a long time…” and next you know it you’re at a funeral wondering where those years went…I decided I am not going to wait for such, I am going to go visit the family and friends I have, the ones that mean a lot to me, albeit a small distance and time and effort on my side…and I am so glad I did…it was indeed wonderful to see them all again…Friends and family

Till next week, take care. One can scarecly believe it'salready end of September, 1st September was just the other day..........

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 5

2011-09-21T05:44:00.001+02:00

1. Do you like chilli? Red or white? Beans or no beans? Spice or no spice? Toppings?

I don’t eat any chilli(s) except some finely chopped red chili in homemade chicken soup when I have bad winter flu....

2. Red~Orange~Gold...your favorite fall color?
Difficult to choose...the thing about Fall colours is they all blend together to present the true Fall beauty. I like all those colours together, not necessarily one on it's own. MY fave colours are green/blue and bluey green

3. Who did you idolize when you were growing up?

Well for me it would be a sports hero and or musician
A South African rugby star called Naas Botha. Also John McEnroe to a huge extent, I was crazy over him, Stefan Edberg, a lesser extent Ivan Lendle . Till today my biggest idol is Bruce Springsteen.
Now that I’m grown up my mom would be at the top of my list and Bruce 2nd.
But Naas I still have a soft spot for, I met him on my 39th or 40th birthday, he signed his autobio book for me which I’d had since I was about 18 years old, and he was more than I had ever heard people ever say about him. (In other words he really came across as a nice guy which is great when you meet your hero almost 25 years down the line and can see he is truly worth being 'your hero' as it were and not a jackass..... )
I’m dying to meet the Boss.....I would give a lot to meet him...or even see him live...the guy's getting on now....but he still rock's in my eyes....

4. When was the last time you did something 'arts and craftsy'? Share please.

Way too long ago. 4 years ago probably. I did material painting. A few tablecloths. I will look for a few photos. We had this wonderful teacher, she was a true artist herself, she didn’t believe in ‘colouring in the lines’ on material, she painted like the true artist she was and taught us shading and light and all that stuff. I was always impressed with my creations, all assisted by her. She died of cancer 4 years ago and I’m still battling to get anything artsy and crafty done ever since. I would like to start mosaics. Now all I do is write sometimes....(some poetry)

5. What's a place that makes you really nervous?

Any high place. I can’t handle rollercoasters and high buildings.

6. Horse back riding...yay or nay (neigh?)

Yay please.....

7. What is your favorite cliche?

"Life doesn't fall from the sky. It takes hard work..."

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I enjoy Hodge Podge, at some stage I will start blogging more, it’s just been so busy with my boss off on sick leave for 6 weeks, I have a lot on my plate right now. Which then means the thoughts don’t flow......

I am a very positive type of person. Don’t get me wrong, I have been in the deepest depths of depression, but somehow, with the help of my hubbie and the Grace and love of God, I was able to recover, albeit a slow journey lasting more than 6 months. But since then, especially, I have "become" a positive person. I believe being positive and thus happy is a choice. I make that choice everyday. But I had to go through a lot of soul –searching and self analysis to get there. And my positivity often comes across as blase perhaps – it isn’t. It is deep rooted in the belief that:

- You are what you think/believe you are

- You can achieve only what you think/believe you can achieve

- I really don’t give 2 cents as to what anyone besides say my dear ones think of me

- I am what/who I am- everyone can improve on bad habits, and that I will gladly do - but as for the rest - I am who I am take it or leave it

These beliefs have assisted me in my life as opposed to negating my life. I have been like this since pretty young. I doubt I even knew what peer pressure was merely because I let it roll over me like water off a duck’s back. Yes there were times we couldn’t afford new clothes and I wore school uniforms because my home clothes weren’t so trendy. Yes I couldn’t go out with girl friends because my mom didn’t have money for movies. Yes as a teenager I probably felt like I missed out on life sometimes and probably did. But even then I stayed positive about the direction my life was taking because I knew I would get somewhere. My life experiences at that early age made me determined to work and study hard and make a decent life for myself and with the Grace of God I have done that. Thus I am contented because I am grateful for what I have achieved. And for whom I have loved. And all the other values my mom taught me. Like being positive and appreciating your life because there are people with much worse lives out there every single day. I'm not worried about what I don't have, I am content with exactly that which (and who) I do have....

Finally, you are never what people classify you as or what box they put you in. You are never the job you have (be it a fancy job or a lesser paid job). You are never the house you own or the clothes and jewellery you wear. These are all outside things that might get people to think you’re fancy or even not so well off - but truly to me, they are never nor do they define the you. The real you is the part inside you, the heart that beats with love and compassion and passion – the you your friends and family will miss one day, the you that keeps you company in the dark hours of the night. The you you want to be, can be and are every single day. If you believe and if you allow yourself to be. To me it’s that simple.

And that's who I am . Welcome here

LG

Hodge Podge Wednesday no 4

2011-09-13T21:06:00.003+02:00

1. What do you do at the first sign of a cold? Will you get a flu shot this year?

We have just come through winter. I usually dose myself up with extra vitamins which I get specifically from the doctor. I also make a big pot of home made chicken soup in which I add garlic, some chili, even some curry powder, and ginger and it’s always delish and warming when I start feeling slightly fluey. I’m not crazy about flu injections, but I will go for an injection when I get the flu as opposed to ‘preventative’ injections – I don’t believe they work preventatively....

2. What advice can you give about how to conquer fear?

Well it depends on what fear we’re talking about because certain fears I haven’t conquered myself despite any nice speeches to the effect. For example I have a fear of heights and spiders – neither of which I have succeeded in conquering. However, I do my best to assist people (who ask me) who may suffer other fears- eg speaking in public. I try motivate them rather than say ‘conquer their fears’....

3. Share two good things about your life right now.

Every single day I am grateful for two wonderful things: A wonderful job such as I have ( I value my job, but it'snot first in my life) and a wonderful family – husband and 2 teen girls....and I tell them this every day. One other good thing is I am studying (more work than pleasure of course) part time towards my BA Psychology and despite the work I can honestly say I’m loving every word.....

4. A hot fall fashion trend in 2011 is a return to sixties style...tunics with pants, shift dresses, pencil skirts, cinched waists, bold prints, high necklines and short lengths to name a few. How does this fashion trend fit with your wardrobe and personal sense of style?

I love tunics with pants and shift dresses. I wear pencil skirts now and then to the office, and some bold prints will go well with a lot of ‘plain suits’ that I have for the office. (I wear plain suits with flowery blouses and blouses with bold prints – just to lighten the plain black/navy/brown suits up a bit) . I don’t wear short lenghts anymore, shortest pencil skirt is on my knees and high necks are OK – depending on the rest of the blouse..... so when this trend gets round to us it might just fit in with my wardrobe..BTW I don’t follow fashion fads, but rather have a classic wardrobe I can wear year after year and just change some parts seasonally.....

5. Were you involved in scouting as a kid? How about as an adult?

I was a Brownie for 6 months (junior Girl Guide) and then a Girl’s Guide till I was 18 and I loved every minute...as an adult...nada....!!!

6. Apple, pear, plum, pumpkin...your favorite fall flavor?

I read this as Fall colour - Would probably be plum, along with something like sage or forest green...but fall colours of all colours just entrance me...those Maple leaves and such...beautiful.......Fall flavour? Mmm, well I like all 4 so difficult to choose...I like pear juice the most though...

7. What characteristics do you think are essential in a good teacher?

Most certainly patience, not everyone understands everything first time explained.
I also think a true desire to want to teach and help their students – not just doing teaching as a job but really as a calling.

Here in South Africa we have an appalling education system...most ‘teachers’ in the schools in the townships aren’t even qualified with a grade 12....but due to lack of teachers the Education Dept often takes anyone that ‘wants to teach’...thus besides being unqualified in the true sense of the word, they also lack the ‘teacher’ qualifications I mentioned above.

I am studying my BA Psychology part time with the aim to be a school counsellor, so at the same time I have to do “Teaching” as a subject for the next 3 years as you also need to understand how some pupils ‘learn and understand’ differently to say each other. Not everyone is bright in the direct ‘understand everything first time round’ sense – some really need another way of explaining to get past the first hurdle. My two girls are high school and they are not in a poor country high school in the townships – and I can tell you their teachers make more than their fair share of mistakes which is very frustrating for me as a parent...but I try keep in mind they (teachers) also have their ups and downs so no, everything is not as easy or as perfect as it sounds in the textbooks...I had some wonderful teachers in my high school so I guess my level of reference is pretty high too...

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I have limited time at the moment to blog, but I apprecate the visits and I enjoy the Hodge Podge because it at least makes me think of something specific to write about. However, I am doing a personal 100 days diary – 100 days of ‘growth and thoughts’ that I write offline for myself at this stage. I might share it later. 

A blog I enjoy reading every week - Among several blogs I enjoy – I’m going to paste my fave blogs here every time , just to encourage us to sometimes venture in other directions than our usual readings is Megan found here http://thescentofwater.typepad.com/thescentofwater/

Definitely worth a read.

Have a good week all, and thanks for popping in.Here we are enjoying some Spring sunshine and flowers.........

photo courtesy http://www.google.co.za/imgres?q=spring+sunshine&hl=en&rlz=1R2MOOI_enZA414&tbm=isch&tbnid=fXd58N8J0OUKaM:&imgrefurl=http://mindfulbalance.org/tag/happy/&docid=bK2hmzfpQk25kM&w=1600&h=1200&ei=padvTtnBF8iTmQXbmIT0CQ&zoom=1&biw=1024&bih=486&iact=rc&dur=90&page=1&tbnh=120&tbnw=160&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:1,s:0&tx=112&ty=33

LG

Hodge Podge wednesday no 3

2011-09-07T21:39:00.001+02:00

Found here

1. What is one piece of advice you would give a 'just turning' 21- year old adult?

Go for it. The world is your oyster. Take your opportunities, learn, play, love and live. Always with a gentle spirit towards others. Because what goes around will come around one day. This is your life. Make it up as you go along. Be true to yourself and to your God.

2. Besides cooler weather (or warmer weather, depending on your hemisphere) what is one thing you are looking forward to this fall?

I live in the Southern Hemisphere. Spring !!! Yes please…it’s already here. Actually I am counting the days (90) to my December vacation for 2 weeks at the sea…East Coast of South Africa…between East London and Port Elizabeth….this is what most of my December will look like......

3. What sound lulls you to sleep?

Rain, and the sound of the sea waves…….Richard Clayderman can do the same (compliment)

4. September is National Preparedness Month...does your family have an emergency 'kit' and/or disaster plan in place?

No, but you do have me thinking of one…………..

5. How has your blog changed since you started blogging? Or has it?

I write much less having much less time available now than perhaps 2-3 years ago…No other changes really, I write what's on my mind and I love reading good blogs by others …………..

6. What's something you've recently learned to do on the computer?

Several fancy Excel formulae like As if and nested ifs, as well as v look ups etc etc

7. Is a picture worth a thousand words? Elaborate.

Yes. Take a beautiful photo of a sea and sunrise/sunset…(see mine above)....one cannot put into words the eloquence and beauty of the sunrays, the sun glinting off the white surf, the multi-coloured sky, and yet the picture will tell it all to you just like that…

8. Insert your own random here.

Today, 6 months ago my best friend died suddenly overnight in a car crash. You can read my pain here and here and here. I still go to his grave every Friday, just because that’s where I can talk to him. Time will lessen the pain, but never the memories nor the loss. We live on. As do millions all over the world. Love your loved ones today. Enjoy them. Spend time with them. Today. Because as that famous song says “Tomorrow may never come…”

RIP friend. I love you and miss you.

Thanks for sharing my words with me............

LG

To exercise

2011-09-05T20:17:00.000+02:00

So. It's the beginning of Spring. Green leaves are blossoming and all those nice Springy things. Dawn before 6am right now and very soon before 5.30 am and then before 5am. (I love waking up in the daylight, I detest waking up in the dark cold winter mornings and dragging myself out of bed in the cold. It goes so much easier when the sun is up. I can even face 4am in the Spring/Summer for my study schedule the next 2 months. As long as some light is around the place...)

Anyway. So everyone and their aunt is getting into exercise mode, you know, bikini bodies, beach, sun and summer. Yes sure.

My friend has dragged me along to a Spring exercise program. They exercise 1 hr 5 days a week. Whoa baby. I can barely manage 5 minutes. So I will be exercising as best I can 3x a week instead of 5. Yes Yes I know. I don't do what the crowd does. Besides if anyone is likely to have an immediate heart attack from overdoing any of this it would be me. So I tread cautiously where everyone flies in.

I ran/walked 2.8 km this evening. Along with 30 other various shaped huffing and puffing ladies though no one was huffing and puffing more than I. I won't say how long it took me. Supposed to test my fitness levels. Yes sure. She could have asked me I would have told her my levels were zero.

Be as it may, I have committed to 3x a week the next 6 weeks. You understand I am not one of those that run all out full steam and pass out the 2nd day or give up the 2nd week. I don't have any steam. So I chug along for 6 weeks.

And I am positive, something, albeit walking 2.8km 3x a week at a pace to give me calf pains and faster heart rate - I am confident something will work out well after 6 weeks. I don't expect too much though. I am just expecting a sustained start. And an ending better than where I started. MY true goal is running 5km 3x a week with a 10km run on a Saturday. Not too high goals are they? Well right now they're years away, but we take it step by step day for day. I'm a practical sensible type of girl. Well at least that's what I tell my heart when it's exercising!!!

Hold thumbs for me, I am exhausted as I sit here and I have 3 hours of study to get in tonight, Urgent assignment. Tomorrow I'll roll out of bed I'm sure. Just keep holding thumbs

LG

Hodge Podge wednesday no 2

2011-08-31T19:43:00.001+02:00

1. Do you think the world became a more dangerous place on Sept 11, 2001 or are we just more aware of the danger? How has your life changed as a result of that day?

I am not an American, but that day remains in my heart as certainly the day we became aware of intense fear, hatred and desolation in this world of ours. My life outwardly did not change, I was not physically affected by the occurrences but inside, a lot changed. How mankind treats mankind. And how it escalated on that day where zealous whatevers would do the unthinkable. But indeed the world was a mad bad place even before 11 Sept 2001. Look at Hitler and his German nation ('normal everyday like you and I people') and how they annihilated millions as an everyday occurrence in gas chambers. Again, this is just a mere example. Look at all the rulers since mankind and what each one has done to his fellow man. Even in my country in the apartheid years, I read books and articles about such and ask myself in shame, “How can MANKIND even comprehend the horrors they do to their fellow brothers and sisters?” And I know the answer lies within me.

I am the one to stop the hatred and fear in my world. I am the one who must start with the attitude, “We can cure this world, one day at a time, one person at a time of such intense hatred”. I know the devil will always live somewhere, but I must not worry about him. I must do what I can to sow peace and understanding everyday in my world. In my home, at my office, in my church, my social environ – that is where peace and joy and goodfellowship and love must start. And that is how I will live my life. Everyday.. I don’t reduce what happened to everyone of Sept 10, 2001, I just try ensure going forward how can I try ensure such hatred doesn’t happen in ‘my small world’…and I believe the more we speak with each other, of all races and religions, the more we truly hear each other, the more we understand, the less we fear and hate. I know you still get the devils out there, and yes we probably can’t all be bright eyed and bushy tailed as I am, but I believe we need to look and start with ourselves first . .

2. Did you think your parents were too strict when you were growing up? How about in hindsight?

My mom certainly was very very strict. Perhaps too strict, but in the end it didn’t harm me. Her strictness merely encouraged my success today and the person I am . I grew up mostly a decent person (I believe) now trying to teach my teens to live a decent honest life – now and the rest of their lives.

3. Share one random but candid fact about yourself

I am a very friendly peace loving green loving hippie. Inside and out. I believe in ghosts (I don’t speak to them or see them, I just believe in them). I believe in good and bad spirits roaming this earth after death. They walk among us. OK my friends and family think I’m touched.

4. Would your nearest and dearest describe you as simple or complicated?

Most certainly they’d choose complicated. No idea why. I’m working on becoming totally totally simplistic…..Life is too short to be and have complications…

5. What is your favourite stadium or carnival food?

I would choose the Wanderers Cricket Stadium in Johannesburg. And secondly the Ellis Park rugby stadium in Johannesburg where South Africa won the Rugby World Cup final around 24 June 1995. 100 000 people. Awesome! Carnival food? Not big on carnivals but love candy floss?

6. Tornado, hurricane, earthquake...how many of these natural disasters have you experienced? Which do you think would be the scariest?

Luckily haven’t experienced any of those natural disasters besides watching documentaries on them and that looked scary enough. I imagine they’d all scare the sh&ts out of me. I have experienced flood waters before and that is scary enough for lil ol me……..

7. Growing up, did your parents assign you regular chores? Were you paid for doing those chores. If you're a parent do you assign chores to your own children? Why or why not?

Growing up with mom only parent, and pretty poor at that, we had to do all the work in the house unpaid, never mind call them chores. We washed clothes by hand in our bath tubs, we rinsed them, squeezed them and hung them out to dry in the sun, we took turns ironing them and packing away. We scrubbed floors every Saturday when not playing sport. Our house was sparkly clean if anything but rich. And my mom did not do any job half. We even mowed the lawn and weeded every Saturdy afternoon. She gave us as much pocket money as she could afford at the time, it wasn’t near enough but as I said, this lifestyle didn’t kill us. In fact it made me determined to study and succeed in life and that was what I did. I worked hard and studied part time distance education to an Honours in Accounting. Today I’m studying again towards degree in Psychology. I have a decent job as does hubbie. We can provide our girls with things we could only dream of . Nowadays, I expect my girls to help out with ‘chores’ in the house such as certainly keep their rooms and cupboards neat (!!!), help out with mealtimes, cleaning dishes etc. I don’t pay them for that, but I do give them a decent pocket money every month . They don’t do much as we are also lucky to afford a housemaid. A luxury in most countries, but in Africa something that comes with the geographical location (and which is vastly appreciated, don’t doubt it….)

8. Insert own random thoughts here

Death does not wait for you to say, “OK, I’ve had it now, now you can take me”. Death comes when he wants to. This exact minute you’re healthy and happy, and the very next you have cancer, heart attacks, get hit by a car, walk into the wrong restaurant etc etc. I have an incredibly healthy friend. 43 years old. He went for a doctor’s check up. Healthy 6 ft guy with the world at his feet and enjoying and appreciating life. The next minute he was told he had to go for a double heart bypass. WTF??? What shock do you go through when they tell you this and you have till tomorrow morning before they operate such a major major life changing operation on you? I can’t imagine the shock for him and his wife. And then, you realise. This is it. This is the life I must lead. Right now. Because tomorrow I might not wake up from the operation. I don’t mean misuse life – I mean enjoy it to your fullest and leave a legacy of love, peace and joy should you not wake up. So far, my friend has come out of the theatre, and has woken up. Battles to breathe, blood pressure skyrocketing, we take each hour at a time. We are grateful for the waking up portion. Now we pray, just to get through tonight, and tomorrow. One baby step at a time.

Go see where you stand should you go for a double bypass tomorrow. What legacy have you left behind?

And have a good week. Hope to see you around again

Beautiful scenery in my part of the world

My first Hodgepodge

2011-08-25T07:06:00.000+02:00

So forgive me if something is wrong somewhere.

I have hoped to join this as firstly I have been neglecting my blog over the last many months, with all my studies and work, time is few....And I liked what I saw on Joyce's blog so decided to give it a go. (BTW my mom's twin sister is called Aunty Joyce. not same one though no...)

So here's my version....

1. What is something that bothers you if not done perfectly?

Well I'm not a perfectionist in any way but my mom always told me, if something's worth doing do it right first time. In that way you don't waste your time redoing it and someone else's time waiting for you. Even though I'm not a perfectionist (I stress this please!) I do apply my mom's philosophy first time round to most if not all things I do at work and at home. I dislike any half done job unless done by a small child or done by someone and God bless them, they did try their utmost....However, one area I need to apply this more is something called home clutter........!!!!

2. Do you think a 6th sense exists? Explain

Most certainly. Call it 6th sense. Call it Guidance from Above, Within...whatever. A simple example, I was driving home late one evening from working overtime at month end, close to midnight in fact, home is about 25kms (10-15 miles?) from work on quiet country roads (not highways - good news always quiet country roads even in the mornings!!) Anyway, I was driving 'normal' speed of about 100/120 km/hr (about 70-80 miles an hr?) but it was almost midnight, quiet roads and I was tired and 'something' said to me "slow down right now". I immediately eased off the pedal and went around a corner and there right slap bang in the middle of the road was a horse just standing still. I could brake without hitting him or running off the side of the road. I chased him off the road for his and others' safety and continued home at the sedate pace of 80km/hr (about 50 miles/hr?) I have always believed in 6th senses...

3. Do you say your goodbyes slowly quickly or not at all?

First of all I believe in goodbyes, and need to greet my loved ones friends and family at funerals at the coffin. I have a big sense of loss (and in really close-to-the-heart loved ones) I don't get personal closure if I don't. As for goodbyes, depends who it is and the circumstance. If someone is going on a journey "for ever away" or for a time long enough to almost classify as such, and that someone is very close to me, yes I'll hang around until the journey has physically taken them away from me. Others not so close or dear to me, I say goodbye and move on.

4. On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being hot hot hot, what level of spice do you like in your food? What is your favorite spicy dish?

I like some spicy food, can eat for example 'Real" Indian curry - but a level 6-7 on real Indian Curry is hot enough for me!! I do add some curry regularly to my dishes - in the winter at least 1x-2x a week!! I like spicy chicken/Lamb curry....

5. What is one of your all time favorite commercial jingles?

I can't admit to liking any commercial jingles!!! Sorry!!

6. Plane, train, boat or auto...your preferred method of travel?

I have flown several times - but plane remains at the bottom of my list. In fact though I do prefer a small plane to a big one though, even if the ride is more bumpy. Once up in the air, it's glorious but all those tummy twisting moments getting there don't impress me much!! We don't do train riding in our country much (not necessarily safe), but I travelled by train in Switzerland and what a pleasure!!! I love sailing, though haven't sailed much in the last 20 years, instead I watch the Volvo Ocean Around the World trips to get my sailing morphs!!! So leaving all the above, Auto remains the regular form of transport for me, though our roads where I live are disastrous. I also have a mild case of what some can call "narcolepsy" which is almost "fall asleep at the sound of the wheels turning", so driving auto long distance becomes a real pain for me as if alone I have to regularly stop on the side of the road to wake up (regularly being every what 30km? 200 miles?)

7. What is something you take for granted?

Probably health, but seeing I am the unhealthy one of us two, (despite I actually make healthier choices than hubbie ie don't smoke drink too much eat fatty foods etc) I am starting a mild exercise routine again end August in an effort to lift my health results a bit...

8. Insert your own random thought here

I blog to write about my thoughts. I won't say I'm a must be writer, butI do like to get my thoughts down before my brains becomes overloaded. I also do enjoy writing as such. I however spend way toomuch time working and studying after hours tobe a dedicated blogger but I like the interaction with bloggers from all over the world thus my attempts at keeping a blog running.

At the current status in my life I'm in my mid forties with two teenage girls. Yes, I need all the Prayers I can get. My girls too obviously. Somehow we will get through this all, but boy it can be tiring and sometimes despairing but we start all over again, each time any one of us makes a 'mistake'.

Hope to see you around

Today

2011-08-24T22:32:00.000+02:00

I'm missing you friend.

Major, bigtime.

I feel like running away.

To Johannesburg of all places.

One cannot run away from your heart.....

Some thoughts to ponder

2011-08-24T22:15:00.000+02:00

I'm back online sharing some of my thoughts today..............

1. What are you passionate about?

I am passionate about living as green as possible and living for the environment and nature. Not because it's a Buzz word or thing to say or do, but because I truly love nature and believe this is what we simply must do. I am also passionate about caring for and helping young kids &teens and trying to help them make their way in life, as well as assisting and empowering abused women in their battle just to go forward

2. What's your biggest challenge right now?

Right now it's to try ensure I bring my girls up the best way I can. To believe in themselves, not with arrogance, but with the knowledge they can do what they set themselves to do. To love God above all. To realise hard work will get you most places deservedly. To be a decent, compassionate human being trying to make a difference in someone's life someday somewhere, just through being themselves with compassion and kindness.

3. The next big thing for you?

I'm probably busy with such right now - studying my BA Psychology part time. Would like to be involved in teenage/young adult counselling - career wise, social wise...just somehow be involved. I believe the young kids/teens/young adults need someone on their side sometimes...

4. What you can't live without

That would have to be my husband and girls. Easy answer perhaps but it is a sincere one. I have lost several people close to me the last few years, my brother, my mom 5 years ago, my best friend shortly thereafter, and very recently, another very good friend J. So life has dealt me many twists and tears and I guess I can only go forward in the hope that I'll be spared losing someone close again for another few years, and thus really take this time to thoroughly live with and enjoy my hubbie and girls. And that we can make good memories for the future we don't know anything about...

So what would your answers be to these questions?

Thanks for the visit folks

2011-06-07T07:30:00.002+02:00

I have been missing in action due to some intense studies as I have written exams from mid May till today. I am glad to be back though.

Where I live (North West province of South Africa), winters are cold, temperatures fall to below zero degrees at night but we tend to have generally crisp sunny winter days. Certinly not snow and ice winters, though snow does fall on higher ground in the Lesotho or Drakensberg mountains, and even Western Cape. Then we feel the 'cold' all the way north, but no, we don't physically have freezing snow and ice covered winters...

Winter on the highveldt - Photo courtesy of http://www.fotothing.com/Ykeep/photo/10/

The above photo is not my own, but is a good example of how winters in my area look. Dry grass, dry lands as the corn and sunflower fields usually are harvested mid May-mid June and stand brown and bare till mid September when they start ploughing and clearing the fields for summer plantings - usually early October, depends on our rains.

I don't much like winters. In fact I say it very lightly here. We are moving into one now. Fall or Autumn, is like Spring in 'sunny' South Africa. They last a week, at most a month where I stay. I love Spring and I love Autumn. Summers are usually enjoyable. Winter....Sigh....We mainly get long summers and long winters. Well not as long as some places in the Northern Hemisphere where winter is more than 6 months...So yes, our winters could be 'worse'. So with this in mind, I have decided to try and change my approach to winter this year and not moan and gripe about it all the time. Not only on the blogs but mentally and in my everyday life.

I have a decent job, a decent house to sleep warm in every evening, a nice warm bath before bedtime...and our tummies are always full. So much to be grateful for as so many in our country, and around the world cannot say even one of those things for one day a year. So yes, let me start by looking on the positive side of winter.

Spring always follows winter, sometimes speedily into summer. Without wishing my days away, that already is wonderful news.

I've already explained our winters aren't as awfully cold as other parts of the world. Also something to be grateful about, although the white winters always look postcard beautiful, I know they bring their own problems. I have experienced one such winter in the NE USA and it was wonderful and freezing. And dirty and never ending.

And so - for my approach to the bare, brown lands that lie before me - they lie in await for Summer when the farmers plough and sow them full of corn and sunflowers. Nature is cyclic, that's it. Our lives are too. We need to rest and slow down in winter in order to be able to plant again in Spring. Same in our lives.

So without me turning into a hibernating bear, let me get on with the joys of enjoying life, and in this stage of my life, Winter 2011. Albeit at a slower pace, the point for me, is to see the beauty in every single day. because it is there, right in front of me. The natural beauty, and the plant beauty (I have some cacti that will be blooming soon, I am now going to watch them with an eagle eye!) and even the people beauty around us. They are there. 'You will only see as deep as you want to see" ( http://doloresayotte.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/standing-on-your-tiptoes-may-30-2011/)

Enjoy your Springs and Summer and Winters where you are. Do also read here for some more inspiration for the day. With all her posts Dolores made me realise we have much to be grateful every day...winter or not...

http://doloresayotte.wordpress.com/2011/05/26/thoughtful-thursday-peace-in-lifes-simple-pleasures-may-26-2011/

Thank you Dolores

See you through the window

Of funerals and friends...

2011-05-12T18:22:00.000+02:00

In the last two months I have attended two funerals. The first one was of a very dear friend of mine. You might have read elsewhere in my blog some of my thoughts and my deperate feelings of loss on his death. It was a huge loss for me and I still adjust and miss him every single day. He died in a motor car accident - sudden and with no goodbyes...his last words and laugh still in my memory as if yesterday...

The second one was the death of a colleague and former boss. He committed suicide a week ago. He stayed and worked about 400 kilometers away from where I work and live, but we had had a good working relationship when he was with us, and we got on very well, and kept in touch albeit on an irregular basis. While listening to the Preacher and all the other people talk about him, he sounded exactly as we knew him 7-8 years prior. I don't know why he did what he did, I forgive him as there is nothing else for me to do but forgive him. He did what he thought best at the time and I respect him for that even if I don't agree with what he did.

I attended both funerals. The first I don't remember much of, not a word of what the Preacher said, not what songs we sang, nothing beyond my continual tears and the full church. I don't even recall what the coffin looked like - or what colour flowers were on the coffin - nothing, beyond the blue sky, my tears (sobs actually), and the very deep hole in the brown ground...I know they say as Christians we need not be grief-filled but despite the saying/expectation even, when I lose someone I love I am grief-filled. It takes me time to get over that and rejoice in the deceased's expected salvation...

The second funeral I attended this week. It was attended by about the same number of people as the first one, though I knew almost no one except his wife and two young children, who were both pleased to have seen me. We sat right behind the coffin so I had enough time to study the coffin and the flowers. Not that one does this deliberately, but I guess when you look hard enough at the coffin while trying to make sense of what the Preacher is trying to say, then maybe something filters into the thoughts...even though I was upset at his death, and did shed some tears, I didn't feel the crippling grief I felt at the loss of my former friend, thus I could see what was going on around me as opposed to being grief blind and not seeing anything as at the first funeral...

I often wonder why we go to funerals. Especially perhaps, those of former colleagues or friends, that we may not have kept in touch with, but when we find out about the funeral arrangements, it's almost as if we feel compelled to go and say our final goodbyes. I mean the person is not there, so sometimes I wonder whom are we saying goodbye to? ...Does just being there bring any closure for us perhaps? Do we go to remind ourselves we once were friends and now he/she is gone? Do we go to show our face to whomever? Will we keep in touch with his grieving wife or not? Or do we sometimes go because it might be seen as the socially right thing to do?

I know I go to funerals mainly to say my farewells, I imagine others might feel the same. But I do know of some people who go to everyone's funeral just for the sake of being seen and to say "Shame I was there, his poor wife...blah blah blah..." I know I don't go to funerals if I didn't know the person personally or even respect or like him/her. It can be my hubbie's boss, if I didn't like him I wouldn't go...

And then some funerals are seen almost as a family rejoicing/celebration. There is cake and tea and the Aunt's talk to the children and remind them how big they have grown overnight ...why can't people arrange a family reunion at another time except a funeral? I always wonder....

My mom always said "Don't put flowers on my grave, give them to me while I am alive". I say the same thing to my girls. "And please also don't put huge photos of me on the coffin or in the church. In fact leave me in the coffin somewhere and don't spend a lot of money on the coffin, a plain coffin is more than OK - after all they are just going to burn me or throw me into a huge hole, who wants to spend R 18 000 on something they are going to burn or bury...(No criticism intended at all of the funerals I have attended, just mentioning stuff that came to my mind while quietly watching the events at the last funeral...)

And then eventually we pack up and go home and carry on with our lives. The deceased and funeral become perhaps just a blip in our memory, even though that is not the intention at the time. Sometimes we may recall fondly something of the deceased, other times we can't even mention his/her name for the tears just below the surface that take forever to go away...

And we leave those left behind, those truly left behind, to continue with their lives, often without any further support from us.

Sometimes we don't realise that the ones who are left behind to continue without help and love, may not always be the obvious family members...they are the ones also walking the lonely road on their own...

Mother's Day

2011-05-08T07:51:00.003+02:00

This is the day we celebrate today.

I admire the notion that Mothers are so important to us, play such an important role in our lives that we have such a day to thank them and spoil them.

When I was younger, before my teen years, my brother and I lived with my Uncle and Aunt who were my legal "Foster parents" for a few years from around 6-13 years.... Every year when Mother's Day came around we had to make cards at school for Mother's Day and Father's Day. I remember never really enjoying such activity. I used to do it because the class did it and I didn't want to feel out. Usually I made 2 Mother's Day cards - one for my aunt, and one for my mom, and would throwm my aunt's card away when I walked out of class, and I would give my mom's card secretly to her when we were allowed to visit her a few hours once a month. My father I never knew at that stage so somehow Father's Day didn't upset me that much, but I wasn't wholly into it then either. I also threw the card away when I walked out of class.

I didn't love my Aunt and Uncle as parents. They were too strict, loveless with us even. Later years when I was older I realised I appreciated what they did in looking after us, but actually we might have been better off in a Children's Home where we were before they took us out. (My mom was in a hospital all these years and Child Welfare took us to the Home). They did introduce us to 5 of our cousins however, all at least 14-15 years older than we were, and as young kids of 7, 8, this was pretty exciting having older cousins who treated us like brothers and sisters. In fact I learnt many things from them (my cousins) and we had good years together. Even bonded till today. They taught me karate and old 60's and 70's music, and to climb trees and ride bikes and play and enjoy rugby soccer and cricket, chess and all such other things. But my aunt and uncle never allowed us to see my mom and were very strict with us even if we were like 5 minutes late after our visit once a month. I imagine they received a small social security allowance for looking after us but we never had new clothes or such. Eventually when my mom was released from hospital brother and I ran away from home on many occasions to my mom, but of course, by law, we had to be sent back. To my mom's credit she tried to dissaude us from running away as firstly it was always in the middle of the night, always unsafe for two young kids, (I ca say however a huge adventure for us - we used to plan it and smuggle some food for the 'trip') and secondly she knew we had to return until she could get the papers signed again through Child Welfare to return us to her, a process that took about 3 years or so...(we were returned to her when I was about 14 years, having left her when I was 5/6 years old). (The aunt and uncle also abused us sexually, emotionally and physically once their elder children left, mostly the reasons we ran away but the Welfare never believed us despite whatever evidence there might have been had they looked properly...)

So Mother's Day only really came into my life properly when we were truly living with my mom. Father's Day only came into my life properly when I started helping my babies prepare cards for their Father's Day presents...And my mom never allowed us to buy her store gifts. To her love came from within, and celebrations were there but they were't aligned with the commercial activities outside the home...

Till today I only like celebrating Mother's Day with a homemade card, a flower from my garden, breakfast maybe and lots of love and hugs and true appreciation. I appreciate being a Mother to two wonderful teenage girls (even if they are at the stage of driving me crazy day by day...)

My mom sadly died about 5 years ago, but last night I dreamed of her for the first time in a while.

SO happy Mother's Day to all those out there, may you be loved and spoilt a bit, you and the Fathers are truly a blessing to the family, so all I can say is Be One. A Blessing. Everyday.

Do excuse me if I am away the next 10 days, I will come visit again, don't leave me, I am busy studying every evening very hard for my exam 17th (and then 2nd June and then 7th June)...so time on the blogs is non-existent then...

Take care

Stop and smell the Flowers

2011-05-01T14:45:00.010+02:00

So today is 1st of May. Where we are here in South Africa, I don't know of any fun activities celebrated as they do celebrate 1st of May in the Northern Hemisphere countries, except Worker's Day. And that is mainly celebrated by the Unions and ANC supporters. Nothing fun about that for me. Attend speeches and marches and such. Ugh....

Luckily though, since 1st May this year is a Public Holiday on a Sunday, we luckily get off tomorrow to celebrate Workers' Day all over again. Lucky us hey? Not sure if this happens anywhere else in the world (but in South Africa, any PH on a Sunday results in Monday following being another Public Holiday...let me know if this too happens in your part of the world please...)

Anyway, today is a lovely Autumny day. The sky is overcast with coolish weather and sun teases us to come outside...now with warm rays, and then chases us back inside again as it becomes cooler...

I am supposed to be doing some studies...have my first exam in about 16 days and first week of the new month is always dedicated to month end deadlines and overtime...but I'm being lazy and procrastinating on this lovely 1st of May...who in any case studies on such a beautiful day???

Even though we are now, what, 1 month officially into Autumn (using Equinox 23 March as change of seasons) my garden is not yet showing any bad effects of the cooler weather. Although admittedly, our garden only dies when we get bad frost in the winter months....Here is a photo or three of my garden with the beautiful Bougainvillea still in full bloom...pretty striking I think...

(Yes the technical quality is pretty awful as at this time of the day there seems no angle I can take the photo without the sun glinting off the statue...but the idea was to show you how big a bush it is at this stage...I'll post again say mid July and then you'll see just dried twigs...)

Even though winter hasn't hit us yet, I think my plants get confused with the ever fascillating weather sometimes - this Iris has started blooming and to the best of my knowledge they only bloom in my garden either mid July or early Spring....it is a lone warrior though...

The lone iris on the left and in detail below...

Yesterday I went to the nursery to buy my friend a gift for her birthday. My eldest went with me. I love just browsing through the nursery, looking at the wondrous colours of the roses, stopping to smell them. I don'tlike a rose without a beautiful scent, so I smell each and every one before I buy one...my eldest said people would look sideways at me, with me sniffing the roses, I said "Not worried, that's their problem, not mine...Im here to smell the roses...."

I hope you get to smell the flowers this week, be you in Spring or Autumn countries....

Of Princes and toadstools

2011-04-30T08:18:00.002+02:00

So a blogger friend over here http://blogs.litnet.co.za/TS24/lekker

posted a few pretty photos of mushrooms and toadstools and enquired over true love and false love. And isn't false love at least better than no love?

And with the Royal wedding successfully completed and on most peoples' minds, I wondered along myself...

How does one define such? What separates the two? Can true love become false love? Or was it false from the beginning and we were just too desperate, too needy, too high on hormones to see such? And can false love ever become true love?

I believe everyone has their own defintions, even experiences of the two.

To me false love is also only recognised when our myths of 'true love' fails....and it can fail a million times due to a million different reasons...(just look at Hollywood and our own soaps....). As a young girl I was brought up in a divorced family with no love lost between the two parents. But I believed in fairy tales and happy endings...just as Walt Disney would have us believe. My favourite was always Cinderella...why I have no idea...maybe she ended up with the most handsome prince, or maybe she had the prettiest dress of them all. Till today Cinderella is my favourite princess, though Katy might have just won in th stakes yesterday...

As I look back on my relatively short life, I can say I survived one false love and carry with me two true loves. As per my definition. My false love was from the beginning false, though one does not see it as such. Perhaps our memories also change our true loves into false loves long the way (and vice versa)...

For me False love is that based on pure need, self want, sex and hormones, glorious though they may be at the time, the part that you can't help yourself but want him/her, withno thought to anything else, and finally at some stage, you'll recognise you need more than the hormones. You need the acceptance of who you are as you are, the non jealousy, that little space that just allows you to breathe, that comes along with the internal liking and love of yourself that true love propogates....

In the absence of these, false love resides. I've experienced it on a very deep level and it takes a while to see such and get out of such, because of course the hormones could be Prince Charming, the one and only one at the time...but eventually you might see the frog and not the Prince...

My two true loves I carry with me...one he died, and the other he still lives...are my true loves for what they meant to me. For what they allowed me to believe in and be true to. And perhaps the hormones might not have worked so hard here, but the part that are true in you and him, they came along for the ride(s).

In my current studies, one of my subjects is Marriage Guidance. Although it's not something at this stage I would like to major in, there are other majors I want to do, it's pretty interesting reading and background material - especially since I try see where such fits into the life of hubbie and myself, and even my mom and dad. All the cliches you read about - for example that respect and liking come along with love, knowing who you are before taking on someone else, the influences positive and negative of different languages, different religions, different cultures , backgrounds, upbringings and thus references in life - these all do truly impact on a marriage. Of course they can also be overcome.

Just depends how much who want to overcome them, and the impact of overcoming them...if it stillkeeps you intact and sane as opposed to discarding the tru you at the center of this all...of course we all change at sometimes in our life,responses to our changing environment - our work, socio and political, family environments...but love will always have a good effect on you...well that's my belief....

And if not then perhaps you should just go check...eiher you changed into a frog or the other one did...

But I believe in true love and Princes and Princesses. Even if they come along without a title and a crown...

LG

Back ome after Easter weekend...

2011-04-28T07:27:00.005+02:00

We were lucky as a family to take time off and spend the long Easter weekend in the mountains of the Eastern Cape South Africa). We stayed close to Barkly East on a farm and roamed the small mountains between Lady Grey, Barkly East, Elliot and Rhodes driving on the passes in the rainy wet weather can be pretty hazardous.

Some of the erosion cracks throughout the valley...beautiful even if they are erosion...

Here are some piccies to show how beautiful that part of the world is, the Southern Western Drakensberg combines with some part of the Maloti range (borders Lesotho) ....I could easily go live there...however no Internet signal, no plain sms /mixit signal for the girls, and no TV...the girls moaned like hell but they survived 4 days....

The Kraai and Bell river valleys on the way through to Rhodes...small town only reachable by dirt/gravel road from whatever direction you come into..pretty close to the Tiffendell Ski Resort

Pretty rock outcrop hubbie and I dubbed Fish Rock on the way to Elliot

The green hills are full of these rocky outcropsthat glint in the sun and when you get closer you see they look like Sandstone outcrops.

Wedrove the 800+ kilometers down on early Friday morning, thinking most people would have been on the road the Thursday. Wel everyone and his dog was on the road Thursday but the rest of the country also decided to travelon Friday.It was astonishing how many people were on the road then, the petrol stations were all busy with cars standing in queues in every town we drove through...be as it may enough idiots were out on the roads too...amazing how they can drive in cloudy rainy weather and not even think of putting on the car headlights...

I also had to complete this huge monstrous Marriage Counselling assignment...had to finalise my report by the MOnday morning...so worked on it during the evenings...very interesting stuff (not my chosen field, just a year's study on the BA PSychology I'm doing part time distance learning)...we may be aware of how different cultures and languages and religions and upbringings influence our dailyactions in our married (and other) life, but sometimes we forget such things...just thinking about a few instrospective questions on my own marriage where hubbie and I are both South Africans, he Afrikaans speaking and I am English speaking, and what influence that has had on our marriage in terms of communication and whom misunderstand whom (especially regarding communication with in laws and extended family) and how we have had to adapt (I speak Afrikaans fluently and only speak English to the girls as my work, my community, everything here is Afrikaans) - I cannot imagine what bigger influence varying languages, cultures and religions have on such partnership - of course you can makie it work, but that's the thing - you have to always consider these differences, respect them, learn from them even and then make the marriage work...as I said pretty interesting stuff when one gets to the instrospection past the theory....(not to mention the ways we are brought up, and how certain things our parents did affect us, even if we don't think so...)- the assignment just brought all this theory to the fore for me...

So we have a long extended week off at home and month end 3 May..I'm looking forward to the (Already) doing nothing with the girls at home and then starting the studies at some ime for my first exam 17 May

Hope you all have a wonderful and safe week and see you round again soon...

LG

Some questions to ponder

2011-04-18T17:58:00.002+02:00

1. What are you passionate about? I am passionate about living as green as possible and living for the environment and nature. Not because it's a Buzz word or thing to say or do, but because I truly love nature and believe this is what we simply must do. I am also passionate about caring for and helping young kids &teens and trying to help them make their way in life, as well as assisting and empowering abused women in their battle just to go forward 2. What's your biggest challenge right now? Right now it's to try ensure I bring my girls up the best way I can. To believe in themselves, not with arrogance, but with the knowledge they can do what they set themselves to do. To love God above all. To realise hard work will get youmost places deservedly. To be decent, compassionate human beings trying to make a difference in someone's life someday somewhere, just through being themselves with compassion and kindness. 3. The next big thing for you? I'm probably busy with such right now - studying my BA Psychology part time. Would like to be involved in teenage/young adult counselling - career wise, social wise...just somehow be involved. I believe the young kids/teens/young adults need someone on their side sometimes... 4. What you can't live without That would have to be my husband and girls. Easy answer perhaps but it is a sincere one. I have lost several people close to me the last few years, my brother, my mom 5 years ago, my best friend shortly thereafter, and very recently, another very good friend J. So life has dealt me many twists and tears and I guess I can only go forward in the hope that I'll be spared losing someone close again for another few years, and thus really take this time to thoroughlylive with and enjoy my hubbie and girls. And that we can make good memories for the future we don't know anything about... Thanks for the visit folks LG

"The Scent of Water"

2011-04-15T18:18:00.003+02:00

" An individual has not started living until he (she) can rise above the narrow confines of his (her) individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity". Dr Martin Luther King quoted in this amazing book I am reading http://www.amazon.com/Scent-Water-Grace-Every-Broken/dp/0310327377/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302884272&sr=1-1 It is said when you have pain, try reach out to or try understand someone else in pain. Not to find comfort in their pain perhaps being worse than yours, but to realise you're not alone in this world, there are many hurting people out there. And then you gain some perspective perhaps in your own pain. So with a hole in my heart that doesn't get smaller, my head full of words and sounds and memories that won't settle or go away, I finally picke dup this book. Into chapter 3 I can almost say I have found some solce. Even if just for the time being. At least it helps lessen the noise in my head and the pain in my heart for a few hours... It's a good book thus far. It has some shocking stories. It might not suit you all of course, but right now, it suits me just fine... LG

Amonth down the line....

2011-04-08T22:12:00.002+02:00

We take each day one day at a time....We try go forwards not backwards...This quote so resonates with me today...word for word What might have been is like countless raindrops in the desert sands it was just never meant to be found here http://thewordwhisperer2.blogspot.com/2011/04/dixie-cup-in-ocean-of-chance.html?showComment=1302292563087#c1610766285887919792 I too have wondered why some people get all the luck in life...minimal pain and loss...and others get more than their fair share...Alas I don't yet have all the answers to my ponderings.. This song is my song of the day, of the week, song of the month...the haunting melody plays in my soul..trying to restore peace and relieve the pain....Beautiful by The Parlotones (A great South African Band)...Just love them...hoping to go see them when they return to SA soon... Give it a listen, do.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJheWfvuofc&feature=player_embedded A good weekend to you all.... LG

The Pain

2011-03-27T18:36:00.003+02:00

i lie to myself i will be ok i tell others that i am fine but deep down i know the truth - my heart is breaking day by day this is how it feels right now - full of spikes and pain maybe one day it will be reduced to a memory of the love we shared some fluffy soft wonderful feeling but right now, you're no longer here and i'm left with this......... LG

Sometimes

2011-03-21T17:13:00.002+02:00

I have so much to say
othertimes, like now, the words
come slowly
but I know I must keep trying

the night you died
i dreamed of you
it was a good friend dream
and now, you're gone
i still recall our last conversation
memories of your smiles and laughs,
your chats, the jokes, the cups of coffee
the beers after work on Fridays
the betting on the rugby matches
i have your last e mail in my inbox
your name and number on my cellphone

and i have to go on (with my life)
day after day
without you
walk into the office and know
you won't be there for the coffee
you won't be there for the chats
or the smiles and laughs

and i haven't yet figured out how i will make it
without you my friend
but i know i don't have a choice

I love you my friend
and I miss you

Always

LG

Which side of the Fence

2011-03-19T12:53:00.002+02:00

So, someone knowledgeable in this regard, please help me out?

I have always ben under the impression nuclear energy is cheaper, cleaner and certainly greener than fossil energy. I am not a scientist but the few people I have spoken to that might seem to know something have been pro-nuclear energy. Especially with regards to the long term effects of carbon fuels...

I have however always been concerned with what we do with nuclear waste, because I don't believe we have got that part right yet.

We have Earthlife Africa and Greenpeace all protesting the future use of nuclear energy because of what happened now in Japan - which was all started by the natural disasters the earthquake and Tsunami. Not man made disasters. Read here for more http://www.thegreentimes.co.za/index.php?id=0&storyid=902&storyaction=viewstory&storytype=1

The nuclear crisis in JApan certainly sounds like a disaster to me, but I do know until now there have hardly been any negative effects/disasters from nuclear power plants except the 'big one' at Chernobyl in 1986, where counted 56 persons died, as well as say the next geberation being affected in some ways with mutilated genes. This is terrible indeed and does hold long term consequencea for mankind. There was also the 3 mile Island event in 1979 in USA but with no deaths to mankind, or damage to the environment, all was contained (apparently).

Obviously nuclear energy becomes a danger and a crisis where the cooling part can't happen, but truly the last 50 years, nuclear power plants would have seemed to have served us well????

So are we barking up the wrong tree when we say nuclear energy is safe? Or do we remember such is safe in relation to other fuels? Look at the many major oil disasters, BP last year, as well as the continued environmental disasters in the Arctic region where they continue mining for oil and degrading the environment at an incredible rate at the same time. Yet this is not seen as a disaster to mankind and the environment the same way the immediate reaction to a nuclear upset is spelled out.

So is nuclear energy safe taking into account the positives and the negatives, or is it not the way to go into the future? Should we rather rely on solar and water and wind energy (both very limited in SA) ??

Because coal and oil mining doesn't do much for me....

What do you think?

LG

A Letter to a dear friend

2011-03-08T20:21:00.002+02:00

The first stage of grief
Holds me captive
I've cried buckets and buckets
But my tears keep falling
Just the thought of your name
brings it all down again

All the memories of you
are good ones
There are no bad ones to shove
to the side
to bring to the fore
to make my pain less

The pain will pass
that I know
But it's going to be
a slow drawn out process
till then
my tears, my longing,
the big hole gaping in my heart
will be my 24/7 companion

RIP Friend
We'll meet again in another life

LG

Happiness and Good(ness)

2011-02-01T19:06:00.002+02:00

So one of the 3 essays I have to write by this weekend is somehting to do with the subject matter "What is a Good Life?"

Is Good defined as Christian Good life?What does that Christian Good life entail? Living a clean honest life determined by the Bible? Is there any other kind of good? What does a good life mean to any Moslem, Buddhist or even non-religious person? What is your opinion here? I need some input to think about all this please...

Then, is happiness and goodness connected? Are you happy because you lead a good life? Or do youlead a good life because you're happy? Can you live one without the other? Perhaps - I know some people are 'happy'and they certainly wouldn't qualify in my definition of a good person...

See, I have homework to go do...Help me out with your opinions please...always something to think about

LG

If you could turn back time

2011-01-16T14:50:00.003+02:00

Besides this being a famous song by Cher "If I could turn back time", the question came to me today.

If I could turn back time, would I?

This is no doubt not as simple as it may sound. In some cases perhaps we always wish we could turn back time to change that decision that we wish we hadn't made. Or perhaps those words that we said, or worse, left unsaid. Maybe in those cases it is understandable that we wish we could turn back time.

When I look at my teen daughters I sometimes wish I could turn back time to have them as smaller girls again that we could just re-enjoy those times again, and perhaps add some more. Instead time just flies us past.

I sometimes wish I could turn back time 21 years ago when my brother committed suicide. Even if it was just to try understand what his problems were at the time, perhaps I could convince him otherwise.

SO I guess it is totally human to want to always go back and change time. Most times such decisions no doubt would be linked to emotional times that we wish we could re-have or do better the second time around.

But I must admit, if it comes to the push, and I think about this question and detach myself emotionally, I guess the answer would be NO. I wouldn't want to turn back time.

Because I believe your life is made with those decisions at the cross roads,T junctions, yield signs and stop signs that come your way. And sometimes the events by others that you didn't even choose. Be they made under duress and sometimes not to your liking, the road you take influences you as soon as you have made the decision. The people you met who influenced you positively, and sometimes even negatively, come what may, they are part of the life that is yours. SO to go back and erase a portion of this life is perhaps not the best decision. Plus sometimes we have to live with the choices we made, the words we said or didn't say, the actions we wished we had done or wish undone.

At the end of it all, I guess our life is not a perfect oval or square, or even a perfect straight path. It has its twists and turns and that is what makes it interesting and gives us character.

As Angelor said here http://letterdash.com/angelor/a-whiter-shade-of-black-part-2-a-blacker-shade-of-white you need darkness to appreciate the light - the stars are so much better in a pitch black sky!

So, would you go and turn back time if you could???

Me? I'm moving on to Today and Tomorrow

LG

Saturday Morning musings

2011-01-15T06:39:00.004+02:00

photo courtesy of http://thoughtwrestling.com

Yes, I know it's time I wrote something. I feel it too. But somehow, everytime I sit in front of the laptop, everytime I feel as if I have a few words to type, everytime I read someone else's blog, my words just disappear...as words in the wind do!

I don't believe I am comparing myself to others, I am just experiencing some or other block right now. Personally I believe it comes from me being too busy. When I get very busy (and productive) at the office, and I come home exhausted at 5pm which has been happening the last 3 weeks with year end and such deadlines, my brain basically just freezes. So damned be whatever it was I wanted to say, my fingers are too tired to equate what my mind is thinking and my mind then goes on strike and refuses to think any words anymore. It certainly is a vicious cycle for someone who needs to write, as I need to. (It may not seem so to you, believe you me I have a need to write most days). Even if it's just a few scribbles.

I have tried and am continuing to try various remedies.

I have spent quiet time with myself every morning for the past forever. Like now, I am the only one up in the house on a lovely fresh Saturday morning. I have listened to the VERY early calling of the birds this morning - must have been early 5am - mainly Crested Barbets and maybe one or two others I don't yet recognise - abd then now, after 6.30 am the birds quieten down and all I hear is the humming of our refrigerator. The windows are open, the fresh breeze and sounds enter and it's just me myself and ....whatever......Sunday mornings my neighbours lets his big birds out of some or other cage and then we really have a noisy wake-up to a sounds-like-parroty-breakfast.

I also spend quiet time with myself in the evening, after the kids have gone to bed and hubbie is working on the computer. Time that is dedicated to writings. By then though, around 9pm I am usually dead tired and can't link two words together.....Note that I don't spend quiet time just because someone says so...I actually

a) Like it (such an insipid word to describe my need for silence)

b) and I need the time to get my thoughts out of the grey matter and into my concious matter, whatever colour that might be. Whenever I drive to work or home it's usually in silence so that the grey matter can rest from the office to home so I'm refreshed when I greet my family, or that I'm refreshed for the office after a busy morning getting ready for school with the girls.

I am quite busy I know - I have demanding studies coming up, demanding work deadlines, a busy family of 2 high school girls and a hubbie (yes, very big and busy I know) - sigh, and all I want to do is fit this all in and do some writings. Ha.

SO I limit myself to reading yours and others blogs (not too many) and I type the words on days like today when my fingers are faster than my brain closing down.

Have a wonderful weekend all. I personally am going to have coffee and breakfast with a best friend, spend some time in my garden, do one or two urgent reports for work, continue to clear some papers I mentioned before...it is progressing...slowly.... watch some good cricket on the telly if all and sundry are not washed away (SA vs India) , and make a delish dinner from Jamie's 30 Minute meals I received for Xmas. Not that it takes me 30 minutes, it takes me about 60 or 90, but the recipes are great and all the effort is good for me...

LG

My word for 2011

2011-01-09T17:44:00.003+02:00

Today is the 2nd Sunday of this New Year.

Certainly the cliched "Time flies when you're having fun" seems to apply to me.

After much thought the past 2 weeks I have decided this year, besides my studies, I will be dedicating myself to applying the word "Simplicity" to my life.

My life certainly needs the concept.

I've read a book or two on decluttering. Nice stuff. Alas, they were unable to convince me to go beyond the point of reading. Perhaps I had a busy schedule. I wouldn't think of blaming the poor authors for my lack of action.

My house isn't a mess. I can invite you in to enjoy a cup of tea anytime of the day without having to jump up and clear or clean the living room. We don't have excessive possessions that lie around the place or chock-a-block the cupboards. It is difficult to describe. I feel I am one of those souls who simply, cannot, throw anything away at the mere thought. I have a craft cupboard where I keep anything and everything from wool to broken china (to be used in mosaics). I might throw something away if you really can convince me I will not be using it again. I can throw stuff away - it's just a slow process. I read magazines and keep some of the recipes. Thus I won't be buying many magazines this year - in fact not one till the old pile has been finished and read and donated to the old age home or the local pre-school. And then only one magazine a month maximum.(You can't just drop such ahabit cold turkey. You might ignore your commands and go overboard. Thus I try one step at a time).

I am currently reading "Organized Simplicity" by TSh Oxenreider. In it she describes that we must look beyond the catch phrase in the buzzword "Simplicity" . It is so much more than pure decluttering.

A simple life entails aligning your priorities in your life with your values.

And living thus. I like this approach of hers. It seems sustainable. There is more for me to read.

That is what I hope to accomplish this year.

One day at a time.

I hope not to bore you as I keep you posted on my progress.

LG

Why do I do what I do

2011-01-07T20:26:00.002+02:00

Annelie Botes (SA Author) once said she wrote because it wasn't so much as someone reading the story it was more the case of someone writing the story. Being read and paid are just bonusses to the writing.

I'm neither author nor journalist, though I do enjoy writing in some or other form. I am an accountant. Like my father before me, but certainly aka my girls, not like mychildren after me. I ventured into the accounting world when I was 20 and through sheer luck per chance after my "ventures" into my dreamjob were forfeited in pursuit of family duty and responsibility.

However I took this opportunity as a sign from the gods, and Mother Nature herself, that this choice made at the crossraods when I was totally unprepared for such, would be the correct choice at the time and for many many years to come. It has indeed been so.

I sometimes feel I am a natural accountant. Weird to say so since I never dreamt of being an accountant nor did I ever want to be one. The plans of mice and men and young teens. But the cards I was dealt with led me in this direction and I have a natural ability with numbers (and people). I am no grey little woman, and I dare to add, in my 25 years in the business I have yet to meet the stereotypical grey accountant. ALL the accountants i know and have known, and I mean ALL, have been vibrant, entertaining and colourful both figuratively and literally. I guess it comes down to being in the eye of the beholder.

So I do what I do (right now) because life threw such a twist at me when I was enjoying my normal student life. And threw me to the winds in the opposite direction from where I was going and wanted to go. It happens. I made the best of it. And many years later I met my husband who is, btw, also an accountant. A non-grey one of course.

At the end of the day I do what I do to pay the billsf or my family. Along with it I work happily and live happily.

And being a natural at numbers does help I guess.

LG

My Life through Music - Start at the Beginning

2011-01-02T18:04:00.002+02:00

I was born in 1966.

Yes. That makes me middle-aged. I know. I'll never be 23 or 29 again. (My favourite years for some unkmown reason). And I'd love to be 35 again but I don't believe in re-incarnation so there goes that wishful thought...

Be as it may, I Googled the Top 100 songs of 1966 - found here. (Note - maybe the website is wrong, but hey, we'll believe them for today).

The Top 100 include;
Ballad of the Green Beret, Cherish, Monday Monday, You can't hurry Love, California Dreaming, Born Free (My mom's personal favourite around exactly when I was born!!), These Boots are made for Walking, What becomes of the broken hearted, Strangers in the Night, When a Man loves a woman, Paint it Black, Wild Thing, Good Vibrations, You Don't have to say you love me
et al.

I don't have to tell you I know every single one of those songs above, and many many more on the Top 100 list. Well I guess, many of us do. We were brought up 'with the old music' as it were, and anyway "Good music never dies".

My mother was a music fanatic. We're talking good music here, not the semi-noise we hear mainly today. Anyway so she supposedly brought me up to enjy and appreciate 'good music'. Well that includes some classical music but lots of 'Golden Oldies' from the 50's to at least end of the 1980's. After that I sincerely believe most good music somehow got murdered overnight.

Anyway, so I remember most of my life through music. Thus my attempt here to share both my story and my music memories with you.

I believe solidly my mom should have been born 15 years earlier than she had been so that I could have been born at least 10-15 years earlier than I was.

I would have loved to have been a teenager in the late 1950's. Till today I am a big Buddy Holly fan (why? no clue). I cried buckets of tears and tears in the movie La Bamba (story re Richie Valence who died along with the Big Bopper and Buddy Holly in 1959 I think). I have also seen the movie at least 5 times and counting...I was a big Cliff Richard and The Shadows fan when he started in the late 1950's and of Johnny Cash even though he really tried to mess his career up big time...I love the music of the Rolling Stones in the 1960's but The Beatles were OK even though I acknowledge the huge contribution they made to music (I am a Lennon fan though). I think the only big guy I wasn't a freak of a fanatic over was, strangely enough, ELVIS, though I love his late music in the 70's before his death such as Suspicious Minds. My mom adored and was devoted her whole life to Elvis, but I loved the sounds of the 50's and 60's more - all the music from Dirty Dancing is a good example, not to mention Grease and such movies. (I'm not sure I would have liked the Ducktails themselves, but their music was wonderful!!)

Sigh. Unfortunately, I was only born in 1966, only learnt about Vietnam and Flower Power in my early years, but I know, I just know, if I had been a teenager or a young adult I would have had "The Time of my Life".

What music of the 1950's, 1960's are your favourites? (If any)

I post the video here to "Born Free" because this was my mom's favourite song when I was born and because she is nol onger here to share it with me, it'll always remind me of where I started out....

LG

Thursday Thoughts - A New Beginning

2010-12-30T21:04:00.005+02:00

I have been doing some thinking the last month. As Pooh Bear said :

" People who don't think probably don't have brains; rather they have grey fluff that'sblown into their heads by mistake" (courtesy here http://www.great-inspirational-quotes.com/winnie-the-pooh-quotes.html).

(Pooh Bear is one of my favourite Bear).

Anyway, I feel my writings have become a bit stagnant perhaps. I want to write but I lack inspiration most of the time the last few month. The fact is I also have limited time, so I want to put out some blogposts in the New Year that someone might really want to read, ie look forward to reading and feel that the 5 minutes they spent reading me was worth their 5 minutes. At the same time I do not want to reduce my time spent with my family (I have a darling husband and two wonderful but quickly-growing-up-teenager-girls) nor reduce time needed for my studies (I have 4 subjects coming up in 2011 that I'll be studying long distance while I work daily with month end deadline demands as well). So I have figured out a predetermined schedule of blogposts as well as a guideline to blog them under will come in handy. And it gives me "direction" - I'm one of those that like to know where I'm going upfront....

At this stage I hope to post 2 blogposts a week -

- Monday Encounters where I will blog "My life through music" and

- Thursday Thoughts - " My writings through the Alphabet".

Maybe this is a silly idea, but ever since I started my blog I've just been writing when I have the time and need and sometimes with not much to say except what'sin my thoughts right now to lure someone back to the blog. Well that's how I feel about my writing and I'd just like to make it more, well perhaps 'streamlined' for myself. But I am a small fish in a huge sea, and I have no problem staying that way, I would just like to write with a bit more structure in mind.

Today is thus my first "Thursday Thoughts" - A New Beginning.

Thank you for joining me, and I look forward to providing some entertaining reading for you in 2011.

A wonderful 2011 to all of you. May your dreams come true, and your lives be real. And may we truly experience some good weather and share our love and ourselves to make this world a better world in 2011.

I look forward to sharing my 2011 with you.

LG

Season's Greetings

2010-12-26T21:26:00.005+02:00

So the Festive Season as some call it (or The Holidays) have come and almost gone for another year.

I was thinking of all my friends and acquaintances freezing it out in the cold winter weather currently being experienced in Europe, UK and northern parts of North America. I hope most of you were kept snug and warm inside and that the white outside was just a beautiful addition to a special time of the year. It always looks so beautiful. I have expereinced a white Xmas once and it was wonderful (till New Year!)

Be as it may, we here in sunny South Africa had a mainly wonderfully hot and sunny Christmas and Boxing Day, spent outdoors on the patio or next to the swimming pool. In my family we ate cold meats (pork, tongue, beef) and salads, and I had at least 16 adults and 8 teenagers and 8 younger children all over at my house on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Today we had Trifle for dessert (we eat dessert on Boxing Day, there's no space on Christmas Day) and had much more quiet than the previous 2 days thank Heavens....(the 8 younger babies did not arrive).

(Unfortunately) I don't live at the coast, I live about 3 hours from Johannesburg in what we call the "highveld" (meaning the area on the escarpment at least 1000m above sea level)...

We get hot summers with rainstorms in the afternoons and you can see the heat zing over the grass....awesome....

I must say with all the people I felt a bit overwhelmed and I am used to large family gatherings every year. But this was as if it was one too big. Felt as if the whole Christmas meaning was lost somewhere between the gifts, food and noise. Perhaps with all the youngsters it is to be expected, I don't know, it was the first time in years I have felt this way. I didn't like it at all, and I'm hoping not to experience it again next year!!

So here's hoping you all had a wonderful time, better than myself, and that 2011 willonly treat you all with the best it can offer.

Take care till later

To write

2010-12-16T07:53:00.002+02:00

To write. Something. Because one cannot stop the words, the only way to slow them down is to write or type them. Especially when they insist, albeit an on-off relationship, with more off than on. But when they're around I treat them as guests. Look after them. Parden to them at every call...

Today I feel so much inside me, my head is full. But if my fingers can keep up with the words is another dilemma (for the fingers...)

The sea roars in the background. It sounds as if high tide is on the loose. From where I type I can see the sea stretching in front of me, various colours of grey in the rain. The clouds are white-ish grey and meet the waves on the horizon. The wind blows the froth onto the rocks. It looks like winter. Not even the brave fishermen are here today. I imagine I could live here forever, blue skies or white or grey skies. Of course I can't. So I'll enjoy such while I can and hold them as treasures in my mind till we meet again.

My brain is overcrowded. I'm on vacation. Isn't your brain supposed to take a break when you do? Everything is on automatic nowadays..why doesn't the brain automatically decode into rest??? So I sit here, listen to the sea, type in B&W...and imagine I'm a seagull battling the wind...I love the wind...most of the time..

Believe it or not it's been raining 5 days on off. When it stops and it's not too cold hubbie and I go take a dip in the sea. We decided otherwise at this rate we'll never get to swim if we wait for the sun to shine. Our kids think we're crazy. We probably are. But then one needs to enjoy your vacation and if youlet something as small as weather get in the way...weeelllll.....!

Have a wonderful day/week all.....hope the weather is just treating you well where you are

LG

Greetings

2010-12-12T09:02:00.004+02:00

I have been away for so long a time. Excuses abound of course. I won't bother you with them, but let it be known I miss my blogs and my blogfriends - one (I) need(s) to do some daily/regular writings and I find my brain overloading if I don't do my writings. And I truly enjoy the communion found by reading other worthwhile blogs which I have on my list....I just haven't had the time to pop in the last 2 weeks...

As I write now, my family and I are on holiday. As I type I can see the sea a few hundred meters in front of me, I can hear the waves crash and I can smell the wet salty smell. Wonderful stuff indeed, no wonder one is inspired to write again. We are on the East Coast of South Africa. To be precise just north of East London, just south of the "Wild Coast". We are indeed lucky and privileged and full of appreciation to take such a holiday. Today the sea is a whitish grey colour - the same colour as the sky, so it doesn't feel like the middle of summer, rather the middle of winter, but just being here, relaxing and enjoying the oftimes soothing and oftimes demanding sounds of the sea is wonderful itself.

November rushed by in a swirl of exams, which I studied hard for and aced. I have already registered for next years (year 2) subjects (long distance studying). Involves subjects such as Ethics, Marriage counselling and Personality Theories. I'm a nerd I know! But the good news is I won't get started till mid January....

I hope to get to visit some of you again in the very near future on your blogs. Till then may the summer/winter treat you kindly, may there be peace and love in your life, and may you find your rest or adventure this Season. I wish all these good things on you, and for those that feel alone, perhaps no love in their lives, know that there is a season for all these things, and they too will pass....

PS this is a view of the beach where we are staying. It is one of the lesser visited places in the December holidays, so never a crowded moment, not even on the beach. At the moment, the last few days we have had overcast cool weather, but that is to be expected at the coast, and I feel for the locals knowing they desperately need rain. We'll get our sun, my mom always said "All things come to man if he/she will only wait!!"

Take care till next time

LG

Care(lessness)

2010-11-28T21:39:00.003+02:00

the careless thought
left (to its own)
will incubate
in the warmth of
the soft folds
it's ensconced in

the careless word
will drip
drop by drop
onto the canvas
that is the social mix
taking with it
the careless sentence

all that is left
the careless
existence

LG

"And that has made all the difference"

2010-11-18T17:30:00.003+02:00

We all know these words, the closing lines from Robert Frost's "A Road not taken". Indeed one of my favourite poems.

But I'm not going to write about the "road not taken". No I'm going to write about "All the difference"....

Everyone is different in life. No two people are the same, not even twins. Two people may share the same experiences and to some degree the same memories, but the importance and relevance attached to them will likely not be the same.

I grew up relatively poor but with a strong drive to achieve something for myself in life and later for my children. Education was always at the forefront of such drive, but not necessarily 'rich'. Money perchance, yes, you need such to support yourself and your children. I never wanted to be dependent on a man for anything. You can imagine the type of teenager I was, pretty cheeky and independent.

All along my mom encouraged me and supported me. I come from a strong Matriarchial family for the last 2-3 generations. My Gran alone brought up 8 children without monetary support from her (ex) husband and my mom had to do the same (luckily only 2 children!!!) so I guess the independence and self-drive was inherited naturally. They didn't have to push me anywhere.

My mom always wanted me to be a CA (Chartered Accountant) which is pretty much the highest qualification one can be for an accountant - I stopped studying after receiving my Honours degree mainly due to having a small baby at the time and a demanding work. And I was contented and happy, I didn't need 'more'. Today I still have the best husband and 2 wonderful girls (now both teenagers), a good enough job to keep the roof over our heads and food on the table, thanks to The Lord only.

And I believe my blessed life has all come about because of my hard work, my belief that I would achieve something, the help of The Lord in my life and the belief my mom had in me when I guess no one else had.

As they say, "That has made all the difference".

I hope one day my girls will consider me their "making the difference"....

LG

Beauty in the eye of the beholder......

2010-10-31T20:57:00.005+02:00

Part of Tanzania from the air

One of the Monkey families in the hotel grounds where we stayed...just watching them can be very entertaining, can really sometimes remind you of some humans....!!!!

One of the beautiful Baobab trees in the front of the hotel Mkonge where we stayed in Tanga

Another Baobab tree in the same grounds of the same hotel -this time at the back..the hotel bordered the 'beach' but it wasn't a swimming beach...

Does anyone else have Baobabs in their country? I think it's an indigenous tree to Africa but I could be wrong...

The view this morning on my travels home from Johannesburg after having returned to South Africa last night... the clean lines of the country fields bewitch me every time I travel this route (often, 1x a month) and I had to just take a photo early this morning........

So it's month end yet again and I have returned from my travels to Tanzania.I say travels but basically we stayed in Dar-Es-Salaam the capital for a night or two while we had a meeting or two, and then we stayed in Tanga, a coastal town north of Dar, where the factory is where we do the training. The training went pretty smoothly, no major hiccups experienced at all. I have other photos but can't place them due to the personal content thereof.

Tanzania is in the NE of Africa (Central region) , with the famous Mt Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa in the NW of the country and the Indian Ocean in the East. I know several people at work who have actually climbed Kili, and one or two that have climbed Mt kenya as well. (It's almost the in-thing to climb Kili nowadays in our country...). Serengeti and Ngorogoro are also in the NW area which we didn't get to see, after all we were on a working trip not a vacation! The people are probably the best feature of Tanzania, I have visited 3 x now since 2000 and always find the people to be very warm and welcoming.

The infrastructure leaves much to be improved, and the towns and cities aren't necessarily pretty - the houses are mainly broken down and in dire need of paint, and there are no pretty gardens anywhere except perhaps in really well off areas of which there are few, more likely the various European Embassies. The rest of Dar and the country live in houses resembling shacks or shanties...pretty much what I guess the poor in Central Or Southern America live in. So it's not a visually appealing country, at least not to myself, where I consider South Africa to be an especially pretty nice looking country....

Anyway, the trip was good, the people are very hospitable, but one must truly work according to Africa time, and there are certainly no traffic rules followed by anyone. In the cities traffic jams can take several hours to clear up, and I experienced the traffic to be a matter of 'get in there, drive fast and don't let anyone else in'... and certainly don't stop at stop signs or traffic lights. But the plus points to such a country that has less than what you are used to, are there - one always enjoys the true African sights, there's always hundreds of bicycles on the road at any given time and usually they carry everything including the kitchen sink on such a bicycle - just dangerous in the evenings when there are no lights on anywhere , and the smells and sounds and sights are always of true Africa...always something to enjoy although the smells can be a bit overpowering sometimes in the wrong direction!!!

On a final note, such trips always make you realise exactly what you have at home to be grateful for - the mostly decent tar roads, the picturesque countryside, towns and cities that we have, how easy we take things for granted in our daily lives...

For this reason I appreciate these work trips to Tanzania even though they only happen every 2-3 years...

Tomorrow starts a torrid week at the office, month end deadines and reports...after all that's my daily job!! So if I only surface at the weekend, do forgive me. I also appreciate all the comments, I may not get back to you all individually, usually I go read your blog and leave a comment as opposed to answering on my blog where people don't always read the response comments...

Have a wonderful November where ever you may be...

Tanzania

2010-10-20T20:49:00.008+02:00

Old mansion left standing over the last 30-40 years,now in a dilapidated state but still used...

Roadside scenes - roadstalls...typical business in Tanzania rural areas

Piece of Tanzania from the air...shacks and shacks...the normal residential mode...

Monument to the former slave colony in Zanzibar

Typical Tanzanian dhow (used for fishing)

So I'm off Saturday to Tanzania for a week's work. We have a factory in Tanzania that I visit once every 2-3 years, do some training for Budget and Month end accounting on the SAP (software) system. It's usually an enjoyable trip but:

1) It's not as good a trip as to Switzerland of course!!

2) Because you can only drink tea/coffee or bottled water or other bottled beverages

3) One has to have malaria injections, pills and rub yourself every evening with anti-moz spray and wear long sleeved and long pants in the evening to keep the little bugs from your blood.. (not tomention sleep under the nets)

4) There are only one or two lovely restaurants..the rest of the time you're very careful what to eat so as not to get food poisoning....this is Africa after all...

I was there last in 2008, the people we meet and work with are lovely friendly people and will go out of their way to treat you with kindness. I even learn a few words Swahili when I'm there to their utter delight!!

We are staying in Dar (es Salaam) for a few days...might get to explore the town, last time we didn't have enough time though we did explore Zanzibar, this time it's only work work...

The only thing that bothers about Tanzania is the state the people live in , albeit they seem happy...real African shacks all over...some expats and a few Tanzanians living in style, the rest live in the usual poverty associated with this area of Africa............ hey the African feeling is amazing, the true smells and sounds of the markets etc...but the lifestyle is not otherwise western...

Above a photo or two of our last trip, will let you see some photos in a week - only return weekend 30 31/October

Till I return, take care

Another week

2010-10-16T07:55:00.003+02:00

in our lives has come and gone!

Time flies when you're having fun. Or when you get older. Both certainy applies in my life!!

This weekend I'm resting. The previous 2 weeks have been a mad house, month end deadlines, birthday demands and appointments (yes believe it or not, own birthdays can be very demanding making cake for all and sundry) and so this week end I get to rest.

Well you have to understand my definition of rest. I refer to rest of the brain. Not necessarily the body. The body recovers in sleep. It's the brain that needs the recovering.

How do I do this? Try and clean my brain? I will be doing some work in the garden. I am building a succulent garden out front our home (I'm referrring to the public pavement area beyond our garden wall). I have to be careful that I don't place anything too enticing for others to steal, or if they do that's it's not a big loss for me. I have acquired several succulents just waiting for me to plant them, today is getting the ground ready. I'm still working on some of the other aspects like what plants will go where etc. I'm not a professional gardener, I sort of plan the stuff and then work around the plan. So long as I know where to start. Not necessarily the right approach I know, but hey, I did say I'm not a pro.

So watch this space, maybe I have aphoto or two in a week or so...

To all those experiencing Autumn/Fall, have fun. It's my favourite season without a doubt, just the awesome weather and colours alone inspire me. I love reading your stories in other parts of the world, I think that's what so amazes me of blogging and the internet...the ability to see what others are doing and experiencing....We are having Spring here south, though weather-wise we only had Spring for one week and went straight into summer!! Today we might be having some cooler weather as a cold front comes past...almost ideal garden work...gotto clear the brain....let's hope we have lift-off!!

Have a good one where ever you are, whatever you do...

LG

A wonderful day

2010-10-10T06:38:00.004+02:00

It's indeed a wonderful day today. Light and breezy, not too breezy, not just yet. But the fresh air so early in the morning is good for me as I sit in silence while everyone still sleeps........

This week I had month end at the office, so worked some overtime and was incredibly busy and exhausted most evenings. Luckily this weekend it's all over and the pace can get set back to normal and not frenetic.

Yesterday was my birthday. It was a wonderful day albeit much busier than I wanted. I shared a breakfast and back massage with a friend, received some wonderful gifts from friends and homemade cards from my two girls, and spent the afternoon taking my youngest to a concert performance in a town about 120km's from where we stay. Thereafter we went to watch "Eat, Pray, Love" which was pretty enjoyable, will certainly go read the book now! We got home well after 11 pm........

Today we have a big family braai (barbeque- but we use firewood to make coals and then we 'braai' the meat.) A big family braai (for yesterday). I need to go make some strawberry muffins, noodle salad, garlic bread and possibly if I have time a wonderful chocolate pie recipe I received from a friend....the family are indeed spoilt.........

And then my maid who does my weekly ironing jilted me. Look I can go without a housemaid, but not without an ironing maid. She just left us and after a week's laundry not being ironed it stands easily a good 50cm high. So before tomowith not a wordrrow morning I'll need to iron some basic clothes for school, and work! Yay. Can't wait to get started (on the search for a new one, don't misunderstand me here now!!!)

Here's hoping you had a great week and an even better weekend where you are. Thanks to the friends that visit, I am very busy in the week (start studies tomorrow night, write exams in exactly one month!!! 3 textbooks to get into this head!) so please forgive me if I only blog and comment on weekends, work and studies abd family keeps me busy. But I do appreciate the visits and comments.

One of my all time favourite musicians celebrated his birthday (and that of his son Sean) with me yesterday, the one and only missing-in-action-dearly-needed-in-this-world-today-wished-there-were-more-like-you Mr John Lennon......

Here's a clip of one of my favourite songs...just Imagine........

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Q0Eyw3l3XM

Till next time, enjoy your life.........

I'm feeling sad today

2010-10-02T07:45:00.006+02:00

Yesterday I took the day off and took my kids to watch some movies - a bigger town 150km away. We had movies and clothes shopping for summer for them, ice creams and waffles and after a long day came home. Wonderful stuff. Today I get to go work on some month end financial reports, I have a deadline of 3 days so my boss allowed me to swop yesterday for today because it suited the family yesterday. Very kind of him, but soon I will get my ass in gear and head over to do some work!

But that's not the reason I am feeling sad, though it's a glorious Spring Day - still no rains in sight. The weatherman did predict early to mid-October for our first rains so I'm still holding my breath...

I'm sad because there are parents who can kick kids out of their homes and leave them to fend for themselves. And I'm not sure what to do about such seeing as I only want to do the best for the child.

N my youngest has a very soft heart, just like me. But I have never doubted her ability to be correct with this soft heart. She has a friend at school, they are early high school and I've met the boy a few times, quite pleasant with good manners. He is 'staying over at friends' as it were as she found out he has been sleeing on the streets the last 2 nights. Now the mother of another friend of hers, has said he can stay there by them permanently. It always amazes me how poor people share what little they have 'cos they are poor bu are willing o share what they have. I have no problem with this, I am just worried will they really be able to look after him and for how long?

So I am thinking of phoning the school counsellor on MOnday - actually 2 lovely young adults, early to mid 20's who have wonderful rapport with the kids in this smallish town (40 000+ people) and see if they can just find out the true story and see if they can officially help him. I'm not too keen on social welfare and such stuff, but I do agree poor C must get help if his mother has kicked him out of the house. He is only grade 8 - he needs to have a safe home to really live in peace and concentrate on studies, not worry about his next meal or shelter.

But of course I'm not sure - is this the right thing for me to do - speak to these counsellors - as I said they have a wonderful rapport with the kids and the kids like them, or I am barking up the wrong tree, interfering where I shouldn't and just leave all alone? I wouldn't like to contact the social welfare department, maybe he and his mom just had a fight blah blah, so I would rather like to get the 2 likeable counsellors in and just chat to him and see what's giving?

What do you think? Do I do this or just leave my nose out of it?

LG

Tuesday Mumblings - Still dusty, still no rains......

2010-09-28T19:11:00.003+02:00

It's a dusty windy, almost chilly day from where I sit. Still no rains in sight though each morning I am tempted by the 'smell of rains in the air' as I walk from my back door to my garage (they are not joined). And then I remain hopeful till I reach my work 30 minutes later and only see dust and agricaultural topsoil blowing all over the place, then I know no rains in sight yet. Sigh........!

The week has started with a bang and a quick trot to the weekend is inevitable.....I'm back at the office after having a totally-relaxing-lazing about-doing nothing-just-because-I-can-week after my operation. My boss said I looked totally refreshed, I felt refreshed till I got home after 5pm and was totally dead tired (poofed). I made dinner for the family, didn't even bother to eat, in the bath by 19:30 and in bed by 20:30. I didn't even have energy to read!!! Today I am feeling better but admit to having swallowed a few vitamins this morning!

I am counting the days till our (sunny summer) December vacation. From tomorrow morning it will be 73 days (including weekends!). Yes I thought youmight be dying to know this. We might get a few days 'early discount' if the kids' schools close before 11th December as per calendar. They always close a week before the date on the calendar in December, but i was cautious this year as they had almost double their JUne/July holidays due to being closed during the whole of the Soccer World Cup. So they basically need to work till 11th December, but I'll only know for sure some time mid November when we get their end of year exam rosters. Then we will see if we have a few days discount, if so we plan on leaving a few days earlier and instead of travelling in one long trip will travel over 2 days as mom-in-laws legs and bloodclots can't handle 12 hours travel almost in one sitting. It gives us time to rest at the Gariep Dam or someplace close. I am already envisaging this December vacation!! Sun and sea!! Yippee!!

Before then though I get to take a week's working trip to Tanzania. We have a factory there and this will be my third training trip up north. (me training thm). I pretty much enjoy it, mainly because as I train them I end up re-training myself and making sure I keep on top of what I'm supposed to know. Despite the fact I wouldn't want to permanently live there or even visit for too long a while due to bad infrastructure and health situation and just general decriptness only found north of our borders, the people are always wonderful. I'll have to polish up my minimal Swahili just to impress them!! I can already see their amazed faces if I recall a sentence or three, I think I last visited 3 years ago.

Anyway, till another day when we chat again, take care and have a wonderful week.

LG

My friend ....

2010-09-26T07:49:00.008+02:00

Thanks for the new people reading my blog. I welcome you and hope you return yet again...

I am an early riser. A morning person. Most always I get up in a good mood. The rest of my house are all late risers.

In winter and summer, working days and weekends, I easily arise 1-2-3 hours (winter!) before them all. I pad through the house to my lounge, and open one or two windows to let the wind and smells and sounds of the morning in. Then I sit for a while in silence. Just appreciating the morning. On weekdays it will be at 5am, on weekends usually just after 6. Winter might be later by an hour, not much more. I listen to the wind, sometimes the birds' chatter is loud, othertimes not so loud. And I enjoy the silence. It's my 'me time'....

I love the wind. Probably not continuous gale force winds, but I love the wind. The gentle breezes blowing into my house, and sometimes the not so gentle breezes. I love riding bicycle in the wind, I love riding motorbikes with the wind all around me, I love sailing. I don't do many of these anymore, so I let the wind into my house in the mornings.

My family usually come after me and close the windows when they feel the wind is too much for them.

But till then, it's me and my friend....

I hope you all have a great week ahead as we move into the first week of October. MOst of my friends' blogs I read are in Fall, whereas where I am it is lovely Spring. Will be better once we receive our "Spring rains" - we haven't had any rains since around late April...that's apparently what my friend is supposed to be bringing us, but each morning I just see him playing around...maybe we'll get some rains in early October...

Till later, a wonderful week to you all...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7-12iJ8xTM

LG

Commonwealth Games to be

2010-09-24T09:05:00.004+02:00

I have 2 things to say about the Commonwealth Games to start soon:

I have no objection to the Games taking place in India at all. I don't know what was measured though to give India the head up above any competitiors offering such Games.

And secondly,more importantly, how could any committee even think of offering the Games in India during Monsoon season?

Don't people think anymore? It'slike offering the winter Olympic Games in the Caribbean in August and then wondering why there's no snow and lots of hurricanes?

Really, I think the committee allocating the Games to India in middle Monsoon season (or just after peak Monsoon season!) should be hauled over the coals and not necessarily the hapless Indians...

Read here for more...http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11402678

Let's hold thumbs thing start drying up that the Athletes can get some decent

Spring Equinox

2010-09-23T09:22:00.003+02:00

Today is 23 September 2010. Yes we know.

Today is Spring Equinox in the Southern Hemisphere. At last. Great news. Let's hope the rains come soon.

Today is The Boss's birthday. Thank goodness for great musicians and their wonderful music. They certainly make my life wonderful.

I lost a day somewhere yesterday. I thought yesterday was today. But I know today is not yet tomorrow. If that confuses you then you must know how I'm feeling. The good news is the girls come home at 10am. School closes for the holidays. Again. Yippee. They deserve a break.

My Internet was off for most of the weekend till Wednesday. The Vodacom 3G signal just went missing. Even the girls were irritated - they couldn't mixit most of the weekend. Bugger is you try assisting with 2 school assignments and no Internet nowadays...it's a B*T. Especially assignments on Somalia's war and Einstein and the Atom bomb...Internet is really amazing stuff. What on earth did we do before it came along???

I'm resting at home from a small operation. Must admit it's a pretty small operation and the rest is more than the pain. Guess I'm a lucky lady. Back to the office Monday though!!!

We have termites in our garden. Terrible. I'm an eco-friendly person. I like eco-friendly solutions. So if anyone knows of a trusted eco recipe that really works, please advise. Urgently.

Have a wonderful rest-of-Spring-day........

LG

People and Manners

2010-09-09T08:13:00.004+02:00

Nowadays, I wonder if most people still have manners and if it is considered an essential part of life? Do parents still teach children manners? Perhaps you can't teach what you don't have? From the behaviour I see nowadays of both children and adults, I'm inclined to think Manners are some forgotten art best relegated to the Victorian years or something similar...

Manners do vary across cultures, that is a given. We experience that here in South Africa and I believe therefore the more you understand people and cultures the less the behaviour is unmannerly and the more 'cultural' it could be. Having said that though I believe there are some 'generally accepted manner standards in life' which should cover most of us in SA and the western world? Things like "Please" and "Thank you" and just acknowledging someone when they let you into traffic, the queue, hold a door open for you etc etc. You don't even see much of that around nowadays...

One of my youngest daughter's best friends came to stay with us the weekend. She has stayed over with us for about a week when her mom and dad had a family crisis and had to leave town. (They stay a small distance out of town, we stay like 50m across from the school, very convenient now the girls are in high school...). So I said "Yes she's welcome" (which she is). I didn't ask for the details why, wherefore etc because you will tell me if you want me to know. Anyway late Sunday evening, just before we're about to go to bed, they drop her off. And the child is sicker than I am and in the first stage of flu, coughing and sneezing all over the place with some baby cough medicine and aspirin on hand.

You will understand I've had very bad flu for over a month now. Since beginning August. Just as I was about to recover, my husband and children got the flu (from me no doubt) and after a week re-infected me for 2nd time. It was so bad I've spent most of last 2 weeks at home trying to get better, usually one step forward two steps back. By now hubbie and kids are totally recovered from their bout of flu (Touch wood).I imagine my body is just totallyexhausted, July and August were tough working months for me, but they are the busiest of my life every year so work only gets better going forward till next July. I spent the whole of last weekend in bed after my husband almost took me to the hospital Saturday morning. I was just feeling as if I was about to recover Sunday when a sick child was deelivered to my door. With no medicine. Anyway, I got up 3x in the night to give her medicine, and took her Monday straight to the doctor and asked for flu injection and anti-biotics. The rest of the family had just recovered I didn't want them starting all over again. I believe I was re-infected as of yesterday I lost my voice. I can't say I'm speechless, I'm just voiceless and no signs of getting better.

Oh, I didn't say> When I asked the child Monday morning where her parents had gone to, it seems they took a week's vacation to the sea and left their very sick child with someone else.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Manners maketh a man or woman!"

Or do they???

LG

To try again

2010-07-18T11:52:00.005+02:00

I have been incredibly busy since end of June. At work that is, leaving very little time for anything much else.

I see my garden is as dead and black-frosted as my writings. So far the only three plants that have somehow survived the winter thus far (and as Koeitjie stated it has been f* cold up here) have been my lavender, my Nandinas (bamboo plants) with their lovely green and red foliage and berries, and a few daffodils which have yet again, amazed and delighted me as they sprout from the hard, dead and cold ground which is their home

At least they encourage me towards Spring and Summer, and I know the sun is on it's way back south...it's just a matter of waiting it out...

" It's choice, not chance, that determines your destiny "...Jean Nidetch

Pretty accurate statement I think. What do you think about choice or destiny?

I'd be interested to hear your opinions

Here's to a peaceful Sunday afternoon watching the (almost best show on TV) the Tour de France

LG

Mother's Day - not the usual entry

2010-05-09T21:03:00.003+02:00

Being a fighter for womens' rights as far as possible without being a bra burning feminist, I found this article interesting and disturbing. Enough to share with you all. Unfortunately, being an internatational website, there is no focus or stats for SA - I guess we're not as bad as Afghanistan but I don't really have hope we'd be much higher...found here

http://www.theroadtothehorizon.org/2010/05/state-of-world-on-mothers-day.html

Save the Children’s eleventh annual Mothers’ Index compares the well-being of mothers and children in 160 countries.

Norway, Australia, Iceland and Sweden top the rankings this year. The top 10 countries attain very high scores for mothers’ and children’s health, educational and economic status. Afghanistan ranks last among the surveyed countries. Seven from 10 bottom-ranked countries are from sub-Saharan Africa. The United States places 28th primarily because its rate for maternal mortality – 1 in 4,800 – is one of the highest in the developed world. The US also ranks behind many other wealthy nations in terms of the generosity of maternity leave policies.

The lowest ranking 10 countries are Afghanistan ranks last, preceded by Niger, Chad, Guinea-Bissau, Yemen, Democratic Republic of Congo, Mali, Sudan, Eritrea and Equatorial Guinea.)

Conditions for mothers and their children in the bottom 10 countries are grim. On average, 1 in 23 mothers will die from pregnancy-related causes. One child in 6 dies before his or her fifth birthday, and 1 child in 3 suffers from malnutrition. Nearly 50 percent of the population lack access to safe water and only 4 girls for every 5 boys are enrolled in primary school.

The gap in availability of maternal and child health services is especially dramatic when comparing Norway and Afghanistan. Skilled health personnel are present at virtually every birth in Norway, while only 14 percent of births are attended in Afghanistan.
A typical Norwegian woman has more than 18 years of formal education and will live to be 83 years old. Eighty-two percent are using some modern method of contraception, and only 1 in 132 will lose a child before his or her fifth birthday.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, in Afghanistan, a typical woman has just over 4 years of education and will live to be only 44. Sixteen percent of women are using modern contraception, and more than 1 child in 4 dies before his or her fifth birthday. At this rate, every mother in Afghanistan is likely to suffer the loss of a child.

On the children’s well-being portion of the Mothers’ Index, Sweden finishes first and Afghanistan is last out of 166 countries. While nearly every Swedish child – girl and boy alike – enjoys good health and education, children in Afghanistan face a 1 in 4 risk of dying before age 5. Thirty-nine percent of Afghan children are malnourished and 78 percent lack access to safe water. Only 2 girls for every 3 boys are enrolled in primary school.

In Afghanistan, Jordan, Lebanon, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Syria and Yemen, women earn 25 cents or less for every dollar men earn. Saudi Arabian and Palestinian women earn only 16 and 12 cents respectively to the male dollar. In Mongolia, women earn 87 cents for every dollar men earn and in Mozambique they earn 90 cents.

Some interesting reading just to re-appreciate what we have. Even if sometimes if doesn't look like much.

Hope your day was a good one ?

LG

Grease is the word...

2010-04-21T20:29:00.003+02:00

So. Family and I were lucky to go watch Grease- the Musical - this past Sunday at Monte Casino Teatro.

From here http://www.montecasino.co.za/whatson/Theatre/Pages/Grease_the_musical.aspx
we see that it's an international show with an all SA cast.

I can tell you, you are missing something if you haven't gone to or don't go see this musical. An all SA cast in no way has to stand down for any International version. Over the past few years we have taken the girls to watch "Phantom of the Opera" at the State Theatre, "Mamma Mia" at the same place a year or two ago, and now "Grease" at Monte Casino, and are all hoping to get tickets to see the "Evita" musical sometime in August,also at Monte Casino....

If the local "Grease" stars are anything to go by, SA musical theatre productions can continue with no worries. I couldn't really choose between "Mamma Mia" and "Grease" as which one was better, two different shows, both wonderful, but hubbie and youngest said "Grease" was their favourite. So if you have a few rand left, and some time on your hands, do go treat yourself.!

As I write we are busy watching the IPL semi final between Bangalore and Mumbai. I though Bangalore might do the thing albeit against the top team Mumbai Indians. The one thing I am impressed with at the IPL are the women dancers. Maybe no one else besides myself has noticed (ha ha, who am I kidding here!!!) but these dancers are nowhere near being anorexic. In fact I might even fit into the scene on the stage, being nicely rounded and all. So I am impressed that for once we don't get to look at skinny starving looking girls, but rather at those girls with a bit more on their bones. Makes me feel good that somewhere somehow our teens might get a positive message - not all have to be skinny. Of course there's nothing wrong if you are of the skinny type, as long as you are happy. The influence media has on our kids must not be undermined, and where 'fashion and beautiful and skinny' would seem to be king, I appreciate a small gesture that the 'non-perfect' out there can also be in the limelight now and then...

Finally, tomorrow I go to Johannesburg (again, sigh...). Luckily Friday we're off for a long weekend of walking and photos (and relaxing of course - hopefully seeing some decent stars??) at the Golden Gate National Park...I am so excited about going to this beautiful part of the country...hopefully I can get some nice photos for you all...watch this space....

The art of forgiveness?

2010-04-17T16:20:00.003+02:00

Another wonderful article found here http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2010/22960.html
The writings are obviously resonating with me at this time in my life, I don't know why but I feel lucky to have found such a website for my daily readings....the stuff I share with you here I really do believe (and practice in my own life).

For years I could not understand how and why people would forgive others for some incredibly bad things done to them. I realise it was 'the right thing to do' via Bible study as well as some or other 'psychological benefits' that could be obtained, but I don't think I understood the true meaning and benefits of forgiveness. Forgive (but not forget) seemed to me to be the right words, and I encountered this in other people around me, all with the same understanding. And I realised that words alone would not help me recover (or any other around me in the same situation...). I remember watching the news and hearing the family of that young Wits student, say they forgave that Indian chap and his accomplice who had done such dastardly things to their daughter. And I looked at the TV and said to them "How on earth can you forgive such?" (I know one has to do such as I explained above, but how one could truly do so, I didn't really accept or understand).

Be as it may, I recently discovered the true meanings and benefits of forgiveness (to me) , recently being about a year or two ago.

How I discovered I can't really remember. I do recall going through a stage when I was 'sorting myself out' as I like to put it. This sorting out phase was indeed a 6-9 month period of my life. I had read an article or two that had made me think, not only on my life, but where I was at the time, and where I was going .... the self-perspective stuff that finally got me back to my studies that I am now doing, (smile) and enjoying my life I am now enjoying (another smile).

However. The true art of forgiveness, as I see it, is certainly no small or easy matter. But I believe once the concept has been taken down into the depths of your conscious and sub-concious, eventually the words will come back to you to put in practice. And possibly set you free from whatever burdens, blame or feelings of hate and unforgiveness one carries around.

And I took myself through such forgiveness 'steps'. Of myself, for some circumstances, and others for other circumstances. I didn't make a big issue of such, it was all done in my own quiet corner, I doubt anyone around me even realised what I was doing, my immediate surroundings don't always believe in the things I believe in or the ways I believe in doing things. We are all different after all.

And I also saw recently, first hand, how forgiveness 'acts' can help others to heal, though to me, not knowing yet that they truly might have worked for the others, as a 'student of psychology', I would like to follow such up one day...

So I concur from first hand knowledge what this writer is saying here, and I add, if you need to, go try truly forgiving someone who has done some nasty deed to you. It's not easy, it's not quick, but if you truly do forgive them, you should be freed from those daily burdens...

" Perhaps the problem lies with the activity of blaming. Whether we blame others or blame ourselves, there is something aggressive and unkind about it. It sets up a situation in which it becomes difficult to move forward under the burdensome feelings of shame and guilt that arise. It also puts the resolution of our pain in the hands of someone other than us. Ultimately, we cannot insist that someone else take responsibility for their actions; only they can make that choice when they are ready. In the meantime, if we want to move forward with our lives instead of waiting around for something that may or may not happen, we begin to see the wisdom of taking the situation into our own hands. "

http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2010/22960.html

Here's wishing you a good weekend - the Bulls lost to an excellent Reds team - with the help of Morne Steyn, congrats to the Stormers and their fans, the Stormers had an excellent game and could be picking up the pace in the competition, we will wait see, and the F1 tomorrow can only be exciting....even though Lewis remains my guy, Vettel is slowly taking his place in my heart as no 2!! He's going to be a mini Schumi I think!!!

We're off to see Grease Musical on stage at the Monte Casino tomorrow. So it's kids doing (lots of) homework today and I'm off to get some studies in!

Have a good one

LG

Owning the Roots - Leading by example

2010-04-14T20:47:00.003+02:00

" Often the best way to create change is not to try to convince others to change, but to change ourselves. "

Short and sweet. I could not have said it better. Read the aticle here

http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2010/22957.html

Sunday morning musings

2010-04-11T10:17:00.002+02:00

Yesterday was a lovely summery autumny day. I took the girls to watch "Alice in Wonderland", they'd been waiting the whole holidays for it. Needless to say Johnny Depp enchanted and we all thoroughly enjoyed the movie.

Today I awoke to a cool wintery autumny day. I'm the only one in the house that likes windows open on such a day. I have been up since early letting all that nice fresh crispness into the house. I let the family sleep late on a Saturday and Sunday as hubbie works most evenings till very late on his year end (till mid June poor thing!) - luckily in his 'home office'. And the kids start school tomorrow for another 8 weeks before the Soccer 2010 vacation. I think it's going to be a busy 8 weeks all round. I'm having a wonderful weekend with no (office) work in sight till tomorrow morning. I should think so, the past week was awful. Friday night 18:00 was the best part of my working week!

I'm also redecorating our bedroom. After 12 years I bought a new duvet plus all the trimmings, curtains and voile curtains, a whole new look. Something light and airy but not too feminine. I like light and airy, captures all the sunlight in the winter. So it's a whitish scheme. Not all white, don't want hubbie to think he's in a hospital now...

Today I mildy attempt to sort out our study - I say our study as everyone dumps things there then expects me to clean it up. So it will be a mild sorting out, main objective is just to find everyone's study books again and lay out a study plan for moi. Exams in 5 weeks, need to get down to the grinding mill now.

Yesterday, on the way home (the movies 120km away - good news for the past 5 years is soon we will be getting a movie theatre along with a Game and Fruit and Veg. Let's hope the next 5 years will produce something, though the erf has been bought long ago...) Anyway, on the way home, I stopped at a friend's mom and dad's place in a smaller village about 30km from where we stay. These elderly people have a biggish succulent plant garden which they re now too old to look after. I mentioned to my friend at one stage I was working on replanting part of my garden and wanted to plant succulents and 'cacti', but it's quite difficult finding some decent plants. She then told me her mom and dad were wanting to do away with their succulent and rock garden and I must go have a look. So I stopped at their house on the way home.

Their garden in general and their rock and succulent garden took my breath away. They have built up a real treasure, I can't believe they would want to get rid of such, even in their old age. They don't have a gardener and have a pretty big garden, but they say they cannot maintain weeding the succulent garden and they don't want to see it deteriorate. I stood in awe, pity I didn't take my camera with me, but over the next few months as we 'transplant' the garden to mine, I will take before and after photos. They have some of the most amazing succulents and cacti around. I stood in awe at their hard work and their love and dedication. I am more than privileged to be taking over their collection. So it's to the planning board first, then I'm waiting for a contractor to come do something first, and then I will (with the help of a knowledgeable garden friend!) start transplanting the rocks and plants to my garden. But this is at least a 3 month project, so ..watch this space.

Here's wishing you all a wonderful week.

"True happiness is more than a fake smile - it can be found in living true to yourself, doing your best and having no regrets" courtesy of

http://www.serenejourney.com/2010/04/true-happiness/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SereneJourney+%28Serene+Journey%29

LG

Some news

2010-04-05T07:43:00.001+02:00

The camp was wonderful.

How I survived 150 teenagers I have no idea. How they survived me, even less of an idea.

Seems we're all a bunch of survivors.

If I ever wondered if I'm studying the right direction, I confirmed it on this camp. There are so many teens out there looking for some love from someone, some (positive) attention from someone, some praise from someone. And if the parents aren't dishing it out, they'll take it from the Nigerians and the druggies and the gangs. It is incredibly sad to see what WE are doing to OUR children.

Just 2 statistics I experienced personally from this camp

1) If I told you 80% at the minimum, had been sexually abused or even physically or verbally sometime in their life, would you believe me? And they're not yet 18....

2) If I told you out of 150 kids, when asked, who desperately wanted to commit suicide, and would do so given the opportunity, 120 kids at least stood on the stage? The hairs on my arms stood straight up. It is a shocking statistic, and a dismal testimony to us as parents, educators, friends, that so many kids would even think of such. And yes, one or two of the kids were from gangs. One or ten were from a children's home or three. Let's take them out of the picture and look at the rest of seemingly 'normal', kids. And the numbers don't change. I was ice cold and totally emotionally overwhelmed when this matter was raised and I saw how many were standing up there....

Our teens certainly need some love and understanding.

I hope to do my part, starting with my kids. (If I told you the relief that flowed through me when I saw they weren't 'on the stage' along with the other 120+, I wonder if you could understand such? At least I am doing something right, if only for today...)

The camp was everything I wanted and more.

We will be back next year. No doubt about that.

It certainly was a life changing experience, even for big ol me

LG

My reading list

2010-03-27T05:54:00.006+02:00

It was a stormy rainy night. Last night. I went to bed with the sounds of a rainstorm in my ears and a website that didn't work. I awoke early this morning to hear the same stormy sounds. I stood up in the dark to watch the 3rd practice round for the F1 in Australia, the qualifying round started before 8am. The storm continued , dark and heavy, like delicious warm treacle, surrounding me, lashing at my house's roof. How thankful I am for a house. Only me up and listening to these sounds, and only now, with the rise of the sun has it abated...slightly...

Since I seem to be incredibly busy of late, the words just don't come easily on my blog. That always happens when my mind and body is pushed where there is no more space for it to breathe into. So while I start working on giving myself that space I will share a few wonderful blogs I have read the last few days

Longwind - on Perception found here http://longwind.wordpress.com/2010/03/26/poppins-and-perception/

Zen Peacekeeping - shame free yoga found here (really excellent article) http://zenpeacekeeping.typepad.com/zen_and_the_art_of_peacek/2010/03/shame-free-yoga.html#comments

I'm off to a camp tomorrow and back on Thursday. Till then keep well

LG

Of studies, exhaustion and other languages and cultures...

2010-03-20T19:55:00.004+02:00

My studies are going slowly, albeit it very well. I got 92% for my first assignment. Obviously I'm working way too hard, though it is a first year subject. The same subject, needless to say, I've been battling with Assignment number 2 with, due tomorrow. Well, tomorrow does end at 12 midnight tomorrow, so I've got some time on hand it seems...

I am going to see a homeopath tomorrow re my exhaustion. The iron and vitamin pills don't seem to be working. Maybe he can help me, maybe he cannot. It's worth a try. I believe in natural stuff as much as possible, though I also believe in medicine/antibiotics and all the medical advances we've made over all the years...

Thursday after a halfday work meeting (once a quarter) we played Paintball. Well, in a team of 50 where only 5 are women, I watched the Paintball sessions. Call me a sissie, I'll go with that tag when it comes to PB. I played with the same guys last year. They shot the *&^%s out of me and their other opponents till I had a few good little scrapes and bruises. Today was no different, I took the photos. The guys get on the field, all adrenalised and hyped up and testosteroned and ready for war and lil 'ol me just wants peace. I even hate guns, even the so called harmless ones (water pistols). Plus in the heat you get to wear baggy overalls over your clothes for protection and a rubber mask that has seen how many faces before mine. Not to mention anyway the thing never fits me, and then I have to permanently evade all the fog and sweat inside such mask while I am trying to aim at whoever is already shooting the *&^%s out of me....I saw some of the coin sized abrasions and bruises on the guys after the games, I am glad I stuck to my guns not to play today!! Bring me any other game, I'll drive through the mud, play soccer, gladiators, most anything, just not shooting games...

So. You tell me.

What has the impact of learning another language, if any, had on your life? We tend to learn English and Afrikaans in our bilingual system, but how many of you have learnt another language, be it a black language or even a European language like French? And in learning the language, did you just learn the words or did you learn anything about the people that speak that language? Share something with me. It's for research purposes.

I am glad the weekend is here. I have 2 assignments to do after this one, by Friday next week, but I think the girls and I will go watch Alice on Saturday...

Till later

LG

"The Lovely Bones"

2010-03-09T21:30:00.003+02:00

I had to go to the gynae at the local big town about 150km away from me.

This is the first time in 13 years I've been to one, the last time was when my youngest was born just a little more than 13 year ago. I could immediately see why I might pray for another 13 years to go before I go back to the guy! Not that he is a bad guy, it's just, really, going to the gynae is just so...ugh!!! (Oh, I did get my pap smears done by my lady house doctor every year and my mammograms every two years so no I wasn't naughty, I was just withholding on a certain part of the medical fraternity...)

I also had to go by my lonesome self, husband declaring it a big no-no for him, and couldn't take girls out of the school, on second thought perhaps I could but I don't encourage slipping school, besides they're in the first quarter test series so it's not a good thing to slip school right now, mom's important gynae visit or not....

Thus, this was the day I decided to treat myself. I mean, if one travels 150km far to visit someone (in this place 150km is certainly a distance), might as well make it worth your while...

I promised the kids I wouldn't watch "Alice" without them, I wouldn't watch "Sherlock Holmes" without them, so this left pretty not much else available. It meant I could go see "The Lovely Bones"...some of which a bit of who ha has been made over recently, not exactly sure why, but it has...I own a 2nd hand copy of the book, but I enjoy watching a movie and then reading the book, not sure why, bigger picture thing first then the detail of the book, so off I marched on my lonesome with two elderly afrikaans ladie sinto the theatre.

Oh my goodness is all I can say.

Has anyone seen the movie and what did you think?

The part I knew what it was about was that it went about a teenager who gets murdered and then sort of wonders in the inbetween and needs to come back and tell her dad who the murderer is before she can continue onto the rest of her heavenly journey. That's all I knew.

I found the movie, well a bit odd. Not sure if it was good or bad to be honest. OK, the storyline was OK, the directors kept some of the gory details of what he did to her when he murdered her out of the movie to a certain extent, but you did get to see some parts reflected back via the young girl's recall of the murder which had me as a mother, just wishing that guy was nowhere near any other poor teenage girl or woman....and of course also wishing someone would do exactly the same to the monster he was...but the way the movie was portrayed was strange...it actually is not at all the type of movie I'd go watch alone, in fact at home I'd probably get up and walk away and ask my girls what happened but I sat stuck in my chair refusing to get up and walk out of the movie theater...I definitely want to read the book now to see if it differs in any way from the movie, just because the way the movie portrayed Suzy's floating inbetween worlds was really kind of weird to me...not that I'd have it any different, I'm just saying it was a bit weird...I'm not sure if it was based on a true story, I'd have to read to see if so...

I do believe I will probably dream about the stupid movie tonight, so I'm off to do some different reading that might have me surviving till tomorrow.

Oh I must just mention. I saw on BBC news early this morning - the German and Austrian roads I think are beginning to wear thinly after this freezing winter, and they are now experiencing some potholes in several towns. The pothols on TV looked just what we are used to, many though much smaller...You know what got me laughing? The fact that the mayor in one of the German towns, has decided to auction the holes off...the residents can buy a hole and sponsor the filling up thereof so the smaller towns in particular don't go 'bankrupt' in an attempt o fix their roads...really, just imagine that in SA??? I think the German soccer fans are going to feel quite at home when they visit us, who knows, maybe they'll feel up to auctioning the things off. Only bad news is someone better tell them, they'll pay their money and tomorrow the municipal officers and mayors will run off with their money and demand they pay again...with the holes still standing ...it was quite a funny thought....now who wants to sponsor this hole right here....??

LG

Jerome and Susan

2010-03-05T18:07:00.000+02:00

Moved into our house as babies sometime late December. Well, maybe they were eggs in our house, but I only saw them as babies. Till today we don’t know where they came from but we woke up and they were there. I actually remember potting some vege plants and they might have come from the big pot with the soil/compost I was using that came from outside, and I saw these two babies. Must have been all of 1 inch (2.5 cm) each. Once upon a time, many years ago I was dead scared of such….hubbie gets called to gently transfer them to the potplants outside the back door, (and heaven forbid if he does not do so gently!) but within minutes there was a torrential downpour. Needless to say it seems they survived, because since we must have had at least 4-5 of their babies and now possibly grandchildren in our house, it seems a never ending propagating family.

We found the latest child/grandchild this morning, and the girls baptized him Romeo. No idea why, I believe they must have been feeling corny or something…

I’m talking about the family of Praying Mantis’ we’ve had in our house since late December. Mainly in the kitchen near the window and on the ceiling, but this is open plan with the lounge, and adjacent to the study. So I guess they are big roamers because I have found them in all those 3 rooms the last 2 months. I usually don’t see more than 1 or 2 at a time, but just when you think the one must have left you see ‘another’ one , of course it’s neither Jerome nor Susan, we would have known that by now if they were but hey it’s family…gets almost more attention than Stuart Little our little field mouse got at one stage….…

One did die either from thirst or heat, he basically dried up the poor thing. . Was green and ended a shriveled brown….This morning I opened one of the lounge’s windows as Romeo was on the ledge ,maybe he evacuated during the day, maybe he’s still there…

You must know by now I am not a gogga fan. I don’t actually like creepies crawlies and certainly not Spiders, Parktown Prawns, locusts, and till December, Praying Mantis. Though I do like nature and will leave all at peace and quiet if they live in my garden and not my house….my house is my house, the garden is their house….but I have been most accommodating and protective of the Mantis family. Though we don’t see them all at the same time, I am really convinced there must be at least 10 roaming my house.

Could be only 1 or 2, but that’s OK, I’ll imagine they’re all having amazing sex and making babies while the sun shines, and eating all the goggas and I am host to such conservation of nature…good enough for me…!!!

LG

Manic Monday....on it's way

2010-02-28T20:50:00.007+02:00

To all concerned:

I have completed my 3 study assignments! I am very proud of myself, don't know how I did it besides sleeping little and working a lot the WHOLE weekend. Including an essay of 6 pages, (that I was instructed to write 3 times over and I have to show the re-written efforts to the lecturer!!) I am very chuffed with myself indeed!!!

Be as it may, I haven't yet lost all the marbles that keep turning upstairs. The title is due for tomorrow of course, when I start a hectic month end (again, it was just the other day!). So with my assignments due Friday (coming, just finished this weekend since I have no time for studies this week) and ALL out of the way already I have to survive month end this week and then I SWEAR I'm going to sleep at least a whole weekend long..starting this coming weekend...till then I have to vasbyt....

What can I say of the rugby? Congrats to the Bulls, you had me worried in the first 15-20 minutes, but boytjies, you can only get better! Well done. You are a great team though I missed Mr Spies, I swear you did too!!! Keep going now, no time to slow down.

This afternoon, sitting in front of the computer trying to finalise the essay, I heard a noise outside in the trees. Now as I said before we have about 4 Crested Barbets and they seem to have taken over our garden in that sometimes this is all we hear. No other bird sounds. Not that I mind, I like their sound very much. Anyway. All of a sudden there's this noise in the trees. All I can think of it sounds like a crow. I detest crows, they make one helluva noise and chase all the nice birds away. So I thought, well I haven't seen a crow here for ages, let's go see. The flat harsh squawking noise that was coming from the trees convinced me I had to look for a crow, though having found some coucals/loeries recently, I was wondering if this noise was them, I don't know what they sound like (the coucals now)

SO I go outside, spent about 10 minutes looking up towards the big pine tree in our neighbour's yard trying to find these noisy squawking things. It/they would squawk and the little barbets would chirp back, and it was like listening to my two girls, not one of these birds would give in to the other, and I thought to myself, you bully crows you, picking on such small beautiful birds, when I see you I'm going to moan at you...And there lo and behold, after 10 minutes of searching, this below is what I found...

Forgive the blur, this bird was high in the trees and my digital can only zoom so much, with of course the associated constant moving...

To say I was flabbergasted to find such a bird right next door is to say the least. It looks like a spotted eagle, but I'm not a bird expert, so I'm still looking around. I was actually telling hubbie at the lunch table that I see 'eagles' in the town every single day, one or two, and I'm talking literally in the town...mostly on my way out of town, on both main roads out of town, very close to the road as they look for food, but my sight is not that good that I can see the details of them...
Anyway here's hoping you all have a great week, I'll see you around sometime...

Sinful Friday

2010-02-26T18:16:00.002+02:00

So today, 15 years ago, my eldest was born. I'm sure I've told the story before, but I'll just repeat a part of it seeing as it is history today....

15 years ago, about 2 weeks before today, I bought tickets to go watch the Strolling Bones in Johannesburg. Hubbie refused at the onset to go with me, being far preggies and all that, but when I follow my mind, well it's like trying to stop a roller-coaster single-handedly I guess...The date on the tickets was Saturday 25 Feb 1995...

Be as it may my doctor said I would be giving birth the 19th, the 19th came and she said definitely would happen the 26th February.

We lived at that time in a lovely huge flat, just 2 bedrooms but with huge windows facing north, bit warm in the summer, we kept them closed, lovely in the winter, especially as the rest of the flat was coldish...anyway, we didn't have a telephone and if cellphones were out, well not one of us had such...(husband darling detests a phone even till today...)

Be as it may, it was near his company's financial year end so he decided seeing as the doctor said this would be the big weekend, he had to go work while he still could, and I had to go along, taking my baby quilt which I was busy sewing at the time...We didn't know boy or girl so the quilt was cream with blue and yellow and greenish....

My waters broke without me even knowing such early in the day, it was only around lunch time I realised it was the waters which had me going to the toilet every 5 minutes, so off we went home, picked up the suitcase and went to visit mom-in-law. Having had 6 children we thought she was the best one to guide us when to go to the hospital. From all I had heard the waters broke with a terrible noise and embarrassment and soon after the pains would start, well I was several hours down the line and nothing had happened besides a continuous gentle trickle....

Luckily that evening I could put myself on the sofa (no real pains, and this at least 8 hours after the waters had broken!!) and watch the Strolling Bones live, husband and mom disappeared, the noise was not for them. Around 10pm I suddenly got the pains I had been waiting for all day, and off we went to the hospital, where we spent the next 4 hours (no I should say the hospital staff spent the next 4 hours) trying to get hold of my lady doctor who was busy 'visiting' with the dominee (pastor)...

Anyway, all's well that ends well, my baby girl was born at 2am Sunday morning, without any assistance except that from the doctor and nurses, we were the only mother and baby in the hospital, had the whole maternity ward to ourselves till the following morning (oh such peaceful times they were!!) and I went home the Monday morning. I still do tell my child she only gave me 4 hours of real pain, but hell, you can believe they were real....!!!

Now that was 15 years ago and it feels like yesterday...today she got breakfast in bed AND Dad sent home a lovely cake to surprise her, that was indeed the big surprise of the day!!!

Oh. I forgot. Sinful Friday? No it's not as wonderful as you might think. I've been studying at home most of today, I have 3 assignments due Monday, and I'm stuck on number...um...1!!!

The rest of the weekend will thus be spent paying for my sins, previous and imagined...

Have a good one, I end with a wonderful quote....

"Even though you are on the right track, you will get run over if you just sit there..."

Will Rogers courtesy of this wonderful website...

http://ramblingwoods.com/

Guess I have to stop sitting hey!!! See you through the windows if I survive this weekend...!!

LG

Of movies and birds...

2010-02-20T21:26:00.006+02:00

I've been watching a few good movies lately. DVD's with my girls, we usually spend Friday nights together. We have recently watched "Revolutionary Road", I found a highly depressing and distressing movie, but an incredible reflection of "lost dreams " and what happens then to people...Also watched "Secret Lives of Bees" based on the book by Sue Monk Kidd (she of "The Mermaid's Chair), and this afternoon "The Reader", another interesting movie. I know I'm 'behind' but seeing as we don't have a movie cinema I only visit such on special occasions with the girls, the rest is done via DVDs...

Congrats to the Cheetahs, the Sharks must be feeling the pinch hey? Second game in a row lost to the Cheetahs and in Durban nogal. (Last year Sharks lost CC semifinal to Cheetahs in Durban if I remember correctly?) The Bulls game was interesting, I'll watch anything with Pierre Spies in, the guy is gorgeous and an incredible rugby player. He beats Schalkie hands down in all departments in my opinion. Stormers won again, results quite impressive but couldn't say the match was that exciting at all....perhaps the Stormer fans think otherwise?

I'm supposed to be studying, but have been working office work all day at home, so I guess it's time for R&R before the cricket tomorrow....(and the studies of course, I have 3 assignments to do by next weekend..ha ha ha..talk about procrastination!!!)

Last year I mentioned I found a strange sounding bird for the first time in my garden, turned out to be a Crested Barbet, would you believe I have seen 4 this summer (last week) in my garden, all together...it could be 2 pairs as they're all together , I'm most delighted...(the garden next door is the apartment end (ie garden flat) of the garage of our next door neighbours, and has 2-3 trees, and the place is empty, so the birds come out to play a lot, and seems they wander over into our trees much to my delight...listening to them each morning between 5.30 and 6 is amazing, albeit darker than usual now that summer sun has already started moving into Autumn....)

Recently I was lying under the tree and just playing with the camera, and zoomed on into this bird in my tree. I found it purely by accident as it didn't make any noise to draw my attention. I have looked through my one or two minor bird books but cannot find anything. It looks like a type of crow I think, but if you know, please advise me, I would appreciate it...

Not wonderful photos I know, but see if you can help out anyway.........I am very curious...Have a restful Sunday tomorrow...

LG

An interesting quote

2010-02-17T21:30:00.002+02:00

"The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it..."

So sayeth Albert Einstein. So it is said here http://ramblingwoods.com/

What do you think? Do you agree, disagree or no opinion???

I agree with the above quote. So many of us will turn a blind eye to whatever, saying "It's not our business", "I can't do anything anyway..."

But I disagree. If more of us did something about the small things in life we complain about, or helped where we could, or stood up for what we believed in, like someone standing up to a bully at school or at work, well then this world would be a better place. I can only believe such. It's more the disease of the century NOT to do anything...except complain of course...

But I'm interested in your opinion.

Have a good one. Whatever it is. I'm off to Johannesburg for a 3 hour meeting tomorrow, it takes me 3 hours to get there!!

LG

Ukraine's Got Talent

2010-02-13T07:29:00.001+02:00

This is an amazing piece on You Tube. It's about 8 minutes but worth every minute. This young lady certainly has got talent, absolutely amazing to watch...

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=vOhf3OvRXKg#t=00

This video shows the winner of "Ukraine’s Got Talent", Kseniya Simonova, 24, drawing a series of pictures on an illuminated sand table showing how ordinary people were affected by the German invasion during World War II. Her talent, which admittedly is a strange one, is mesmeric to watch.The images, pro je cted onto a large screen, moved many in the audience to tears and she won the top prize of about £75,000.

She begins by creating a scene showing a couple sitting holding hands on a bench under a starry sky, but then warplanes appear and the happy scene is obliterated. It is replaced by a woman’s face crying, but then a baby arrives and the woman smiles again. Once again war returns and Miss Simonova throws the sand into chaos from which a young woman’s face appears. She quickly becomes an old widow, her face wrinkled and sad, before the image turns into a monument to an Unknown Soldier.

This outdoor scene becomes framed by a window as if the viewer is looking out on the monument from within a house. In the final scene, a mother and child appear inside and a man standing outside, with his hands=2 0pressed against the glass, saying goodbye. The Great Patriotic War, as it is called in Ukraine , resulted in one in four of the population being killed with eight to 11 million deaths out of a population of 42 million.

Kseniya Simonova says: "I find it difficult enough to create art using paper and pencils or paintbrushes, but using sand and fingers is beyond me. The art, especially when the war is used as the sub je ct matter, even brings some audience members to tears. And there’s surely no bigger compliment."

Enjoy...

LG

Reflections of LG

2010-02-11T21:29:00.003+02:00

My hubbie says despite being married to me for 16 years, and me being an open type of person, he says he still battles to figure out my so called complexities.

I figure I'm actually quite straight forward, but as with all people, we do have twists in our tales (pun intentional).

Basically I consider myself a very honest, open, very easy going type of person. Don't we all?? If I like you we're likely to be best buddies. I am a loyal friend. I do not have everyone as my best buddie though, though I do treat my friends and acquaintances with a lot of respect and love. The mutual liking and respect will lead us to be good friends or just remain acquaintances if not mutual.

I always give most people a chance, and from young age have never adhered to what social norms might dictate as far as 'friends' went. But woe if you betray my trust. Then you're on your own, Jack. I only get taken for a ride (no pun) once. But I don't get cynical because one person let me down, that one person let me down, not the whole world. I do detest though with a passion, dishonesty of any kind, and gossip. Though I know we're not all perfect, and I am far from such!!

Anyway, the words have explained the basis of my personality, as I understand myself.

The photos might just add a dimension or two, just plain photos, I don't use photoshop or anything.

First one is daffodils in my garden (mid winter last year).......... This photo is intended to illustrate my deep seated love of gardening, which I got from my mom. She was Mrs Greenfingers without a doubt. At any one stage I have about 5 small basil plants and mushrooms growing, plus the sweet smelling geraniums, plus the Rose Vetplant, I forget it's name - plus I have now convinced hubbie we can take out some irises for some space for more brinjals and tomatoes...I also consider myself an avid greenie, and read up on this subject permanently! It's not only got to do with climate warming, it's just got to do with the way we should to me, live as naturally as possible. I am slowly, very slowly, getting my family there...

When I'm not greening my environment, I enjoy reading as much as possible. In addition to reading, wait for it, I am a big nerd. I LOVE studying. Yes it's terrible I know. I am an eternal student, and will study most things that catch my interest longer than 5 minutes. And I do mean Study as opposed to just reading, I have an incredible respect for education. I'll probably study till my last days if I can. It's just the way I am, my mom was like that, even though she never got any formal qualification, she ended up knowing all about the big philosophers in life and History and Biblical History. The only thing I could teach her was maths and accounting and she even wanted to learn that without having matric. We stopped at the driving lessons though after she drove us into a fence when I was 16 and was giving her driving lessons. (Oh btw, I don't consider computer games as part of studies, though I hear they're quite amazing for you, it's just never captured my attention!!)

Here are some books in my study..When my mom died I gave most of her clothes away to charity since she was almost 6ft and I am 5ft2, but I literally kept all her books..they too need reading...one day we'll get there...I keep those I KNOW I'll want to read again in my life, those that didn't make such an impression get donated to the 2nd hand book shop or library or whoever wants them...

And lastly, despite that others may think, being an accountant I'm quite planned and structured, (yes I am) I am also actually a very dreamy type of person...my hubbie says I'm always building castles in the air my br-in-law luckily paints them for me...My special set of angels in my house playing me music, don't get me wrong, I just like angels, no specific belief attached to them...It's the music I hear which it seems those around me don't hear...

On the downside, one of negative qualities would be when I make up my mind about something and want something done, I don't like sitting around waiting while the someone who has to do it, gets onto the same timeline as myself. Then I tend to get up and do it myself, much to the chagrin of those around me. When I want it done, tomorrow is almost too late...can be quite demanding to those around me, not that ANYONE in my household listens, so don't go feeling too sorry for them now...

LG

Last night

2010-02-04T21:41:00.001+02:00

LG
I worked late as my immediate month end deadlines came to an end.

I work 25km out of town, and on evenings such as last night, it's a real pleasure to drive home. The pitch black sky ahead of you, and after a few minutes , such sky studded with diamonds, right in your face as it were, is certainly something to appreciate on my journey home. Plus it's a quiet road, a farmer once a week, several trucks late at night, an owl, a jackal, several small buck and rabbits...

Such a drive home is always a relaxing time for me, and often I travel in silence just to get all the noise that month end deadlines and figures have made by running around for 3 days upstairs in my head, out of such head. Sometimes there's a big truck or two with it's bright light, other times, it's just me, my cranky Corolla, silence, and any ghosts driving home with me keeping me company...

Last night for some reason I put the radio on. But I wasn't in a mood for loud music so I tuned in to RSG. They were braodcasting some or other repeat program from 1981, regarding a discussion on 'retirees'.

And I quote from the program, translated, "We should not force the older employees to retire at a predetermined age. Besides the financial implications incurred by anyone retiring, especially at an early age of 55, by just indicriminately inviting and somehow co-ercing the seniors amongst the workforce to retire, we lose an incredible amount of knowledge in the workplace."

I agree, but my immediate thought was "Wow." One would think this speech was made just the other day not 30 years ago.....Not much changes hey, the wheel just turns and gets re-invented over and over...

Soon after this program, I had reason to LMAOROTF. (Laugh my ass off rolling on the floor). I couldn't physically roll in the Corolla, but damn I came close.

We've all read the e mail, and I think G or G SPot or even Fletchie, blogged same e mail once, re housewives' duties in the 50's and 60's. The one that says, "When husband comes home, ensure to have freshened yourself up, and have his coffee and slippers and food ready, he's the only one who had a rough day at the office..." blah blah blah. That in its own wa spretty amusing but I'll share one or two more with you from last night.

I'll call it "Guides to good sex in the 60's", all quoted and translated from last night's RSG program. Yes even little soutie me, or should I say, especially little soutie me, found it incredibly amusing...

" When you retire at night, do so quickly and quietly. Do not put face cream on until after husband has fallen asleep, (and this will be after sex but they say so very discreetly), after all he doesn't want to look at such a face last thing at night. " (Holy cow, what types of face cream did they have in the 60's??? )

" Even though personal hygiene is of utmost importance, it is important to bathe once your husband has fallen asleep". (Oh really? Yes Your Royal Highness I'll just lie here sweating in silence ...)

" If your husband initiates intimate relations (and even though I have translated the words, I promise you they used this weird language regarding sex...they never ever said the word it was always intimate relations or something unknown and not to be spoken of), remember it is of utmost importance to satisfy your husband...lie quietly without protesting, and once he reaches his moment of satisfaction, it is appropriate to give a soft moan so that he knows you enjoyed such too..." Appropriate! Goodness gracious....And to think the 60's considered themselves liberated...ha ha ha...

(I was giggling quite loudly by this time, just imagining what the heavens my mother and her generation had to go through...Keep hubbie satisfied darling, keep him happy....)

I cannot remember anything else from the program to beat the last paragraph, but I can assure you it was as funny if not funnier than the housewives tales....

And I always thought I wanted to be a teen in the 60's...after last night's program I have serious doubts whether I would have fit in. I mean really, a society, that encourages only concern and satisfaction of one of the partners in marriage would have me strung up and hung out to dry long before I had convinced anyone else they were talking BS...

But hey, it was a hell of a good chuckle!!!

Of mothers and daughters........

2010-01-31T21:31:00.001+02:00

The complicated relationships between mothers and daughters interests me.

I know enough daughters who have this love-conflict relationship with their mothers, going back many years, and then possibly dissolving over night as (mainly) the daughters realise the importance of their mom in their lives.

Perhaps you are one of them?

Perhaps you are an exception?

I know, that after the rebellious teenage years, when we’ll do anything that mom would not want us to do, or even dress as inappropriately as possible, just to show mom we can, we may proceed into our twenties when we’ll choose our boyfriends the opposite of what mum would approve, and finally, after settling down, either happily, or unhappily after a few years, suddenly the age of enlightenment might descend on us (daughters) when we realise all that mom told us, most was true and correct. She did seem to know something after all…

And then, suddenly, unexpectedly, once we’ve just gotten into the routine of sometimes accepting her advice, and watching her with the grandkids, and grow older before our eyes, we realise, we may just end up like her after all. Not in all the ways, we are still individuals, but in many ways.

And before we know it, because life is short, she is suddenly overnight sick. And the once strong passionate woman we knew and rebelled against, suddenly she is lying in hospital, suddenly on her deathbed, and you realise, how young she still actually is, perhaps early sixties? And you pray, this is not the time to go, you have so many years left you really want to spend with her and learn from her, and overnight, she’s taken from you.

And you wish all the years of conflict were erased, that you could enjoy her as you were meant to do.

And guilt lives with you day by day. You wished you had looked after her, perhaps, that she didn’t get the cancer, or the osteoporosis, and it must have been your fault somehow…

And regret lives strong in your heart for many years, until one day, you know, somehow you have to let go….

And you do…

And the circle starts again with the next mother daughter relationship…

I wonder if this is the same up down love hate relationship with fathers and sons?

LG

One thing

2010-01-24T22:06:00.002+02:00

that irritates me is slow internet. Oh Pleez!!! Rather give me no internet than slow internet!! I've had slow internet for most of today, rather frustrating...As I use 3 G I imagine it could be due to the wet weather we've been having this past week or two...lovely weather if I may add, but wet....no complaints my side though, I am just incredibly grateful that so far the closest river to us is about 100km away (I kid not). I hear the Vaal River sluices will be opened around Friday or so. No doubt a sight for sore eyes, but I can feel in my bones, some big bad water is going to hit some parts of SA in the next month....

So besides slow internet I have been covering school books till I look like a school book. Let's hope the end is indeed upon us. My youngest is enjoying high school, so far, but I imagine the work is about to begin seriously soon....She already had 3 minor assignments to do this past weekend....!!

I have also been working on yet some more year end reports that are due, hopefully the end of January will see the end of the outstanding reports.

The news on Haiti is very depressing. All those people waiting for water or food or even decent hospital services, what's it been now? 3 weeks? I see some major riots starting in the next week. One can't blame them, but hooliganism never got anyone anywhere. I hope the US aid starts getting to those who need it urgently this week.

My reading has been going very slowly. That's also frustrating for me. I read Zakes Mda "Madame of Excelsior" recently, but the book only got some of it's message through to me at the end of the book, so guess what, I've started reading it again from the beginning. Hoping not to miss the message from the beginning this time. An interesting book, written in a style us whiteys might not be used to. Has anyone (besides G) read the book, and if so, what did you think? I'll just mention it goes about the court case (early 1960's) in a town called Excelsior, when about 19-20 people, black women and white men, were charged for contravening the Immorality Act. Quite an interesting situation for all the whiteys who supported Verwoerd and apartheid on the one hand, and then had sex across the racial borders...mmmm...how people think and operate is really an interesting phenomena.....

I really would appreciate reading any of your comments if you did read the book.

I also watched the Dolphins beat the Titans, an unexpected result perhaps? So the final for the MTN 40 will be held in East London Friday night between the Warriors and the Dolphins. Wow. Must be all those star-studded Proteas playing for the Warriors finally got them to the final (though the Protea guys only got back to their team this a week ago, so the Warriors in particular must have played well before the return of Kallis, Ntini, Prince? and co. Still impressive for a 'smaller' provincial side to take on the big guns....(The EL stadium Buffalo Park is actually quite small of course, no doubt it will be packed!!)

Before I go, I just want to throw one stone in the bush. Does anyone believe De Kock should be released for whatever reason? I don't usually talk politics but I have an interest in this case and just wanted to see what this group of bloggers would think re that suggestion. I have read several other people's opinions on the matter, none of which agreed with mine, but people are entitled to their own opinions and I respect that. I'm just interested in what you might say on the matter.

Time for me to go. You all have a good week now, doing what keeps you happy.....

LG

Memories at my finger tips

2010-01-19T05:36:00.002+02:00

Our trip to the Wanderers was wonderful in all respects, and the cricket was great too. The Wanderers remains my all time favourite cricket ground, but must no doubt be qualified for my Cape Tonian friends in that I’ve not yet been to a match at Newlands. When are you going to invite me?

The crowds at Wanderers, though are very normal South Africans, ie they are very partisan to any visiting team and especially to the good better best players in such opposing teams. I remember sitting at Wanderers a few times when Shane Warne played and the crowd always boo-ed him. His last match they boo-ed him off the field and I thought to myself, “What a bunch of ignorant drunk asses, there goes a great(est) spin bowler the world has ever seen (not record wise, ‘cos Mury has the most wickets, but hey, Warne could spin a ball on his day! Ask most S Africans who played against him!) And I would think (and hubbie, who was NEVER a Warne fan, but luckily has a few brains in his head) would say, “They know not what they know not”.

Saturday was similar. Not many people like Kevin Pietersen, I can honestly say I like him and I think he’s a good addition to the English side, he didn’t have the best series, but then, a few of our best didn’t either. But he usually comes to the party when it’s required, which was the case in the first test at Centurion I think. The crowd boo-ed him also almost off the field at Wanderers, and I thought to myself, “Don’t worry KP, I know them to be a bunch of drunk ignorammussi!!!”. My point is, do we really have to be so rude?

Anyway, back to real life at home. I went for a back massage today, I usually treat myself to one every month, and even a hot stone massage now and then. MY back gets quite sore from all the long hours in front of the computer, and despite whatever chairs and desks the employer gives me for ergonomics, I always have a tense sore back 10 days after month end. And while I was waiting for the beautician to arrive, I sat drinking a cup of tea, and there in front of me was one of these wooden 3-leveled bathroom trolleys. All 3 levels had a neat towel on and then an accessory or two for the beauty procedures.

And instantly a memory of several years ago, my best friend and Cape Town flashed into my memory. Just looking at this trolley, all passed in front of me. My friend Grace and I were down in CT for the Argus, but a day or two before the race we always went shopping. Now the two of us drove down with a few friends, but we were alone in my little Run-X, with two bikes attached and a rather small hatchback boot. The boot didn’t deter us from shopping, don’t you believe, and on one such shopping spree, Grace came across such a bathroom trolley. Our boot small as it was was packed. Most of the back seats were packed almost to the rafters as the cliché goes. But that trolley LG, yes that trolley just somehow has to find it’s way into our car and back up north!!

Far be it from me to destroy such wonderful interior decorating dreams, and by hook or by crook we made it back up north, the boot packed, the back 2 seats packed and Grace was even sitting on some fancy cushions she had bought with 3 boxes of grapes on her lap, and a few bottles of wine stashed around somewhere!! But that wooden trolley was in!

Wonderful memories.

In the meantime, her hubby remarried within 4 months of her death, a stranger from the Internet, whom it would seem money and riches are more important than growing teenagers, I sincerely believe he had to, he could not live with two teenagers on his own without Grace, he was just that lost without her. Hard to believe now, but I saw it with my own two eyes. How he needed someone around to fill the gap.

And now, he neglects them. The son who needs love and direction is in the opposite direction of what his mom would ever have wanted him to be. By this I don’t mean career-wise, I mean lifestyle wise. And dad sits and lets it be. Her beautiful daughter who could play UNISA piano when she was 15, has been left to her own devices, and now, no longer plays any of the lovely music, but works as a cashier somewhere, over-eating each and everyday with no longer a care for herself. Father lets her walk home at midnight after a work’s stock count on her own.
WTF???

I don’t look down on them, I ache for maybe what they could have been, looking through the eyes of my friend. Knowing I can’t do much, but wishing I could.

And I imagine her aching somewhere too.

LG

"It all starts with me"

2010-01-17T13:24:00.002+02:00

I came across this blog post a day or three ago. To me it encompasses the motto I have in life. Everything in my life starts with me. Basically with my attitude and my approach to how I will tackle the things ahead (and behind) of me.
I post the blog posting for you to enjoy

It all starts with me

Don't look outward
for the answer to the dilemna.
The answer lies inside.
Don't look at others
for a place to point the blame.
There is no one to blame.
Looking outside instead of going within
is an ego thing anyway.
It all starts with me.
I am the interpreter of my experience.
I am the creator of my reality.
It all starts with me.
It's not all about me.
It just all starts with me.
Truth. Lies. Illusions. What do I see?
What am I looking for?
How will this day be described when it's done?
Whether good or bad, it's up to me.
My focus is on improving me.
I look inside to see the real me.
Because...it all starts with me.
I look inside where no mask
can disguise the real me.
No pretending. No defending. No mind game.
Inside. In the midst of me. In the deep place.
That's where the truth, my truth resides.
Deep inside I know that...
it all starts with me.
So...
Who am I?

Taken from http://jeffbakertalks.blogspot.com/2010/01/it-all-starts-with-me.html

LG

Some photos for a change

2010-01-10T08:13:00.007+02:00

There's this artist who lives and works in the Cintsa area (East Coast of S Africa, just north of East London) , close to where we holiday near East London every December.

I bought this the previous year (2008) because I found it to be something unique and special. I think the sculptures are made of some type of hardwood. His name is Steve Meiss, he signs such on the bottom of his sculptures. These are the average sized stuff he tends to sell to the tourists, and also makes smaller sculptures. Probably due to the price, they tend to buy smaller items, though of course for the work he does, I find his prices very reasonable.

I bought this the previous year (Dec 2008) - feet about 22 cm long each

Quite neatly done I think I grow some or other small grass inside each foot, they're just trimmed because they died when I was on leave (no one to give them water).

I bought another two December just passed

And a beautiful bust

And lastly a photo of our beautiful little kitty, Oreo, she'spitch black and oh so naughty...

Trust you're all having a good weekend, and those of my blog companions in Europe or England or N America, I hope the weather is not tooinclemental for you!!

Till later

Captain, My Captain

2010-01-07T22:33:00.003+02:00

What do you have to do to beat the English?? Thorns among the Proteas for sure...

I salute you, Strauss and Co. All 11 of you. Obviously you have more guts than is evident in our team. You earned my respect the last 3 games.

Well done.

SA has a long way to go, despite the singular performances of Smith and Kallis.

Sigh........

PS I won't mention too loudly the absolutely amazing, awe-inspiring team from the East - South East of us. They don't need 450 runs to get a team out on the last day of the test, 133 will do the job!

Now that's what I call ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC!!

LG

PS Since Neil ought to be in the team I got myself a piccie of him in case the selectors read my blog they will remember whom to add to the eam!!

First Few days of the new decade

2010-01-05T05:50:00.002+02:00

Have come and gone already. Time flies when you’re having fun.

I trust you all had a good one? Mine was half good and half not so good, but we survived. Had some lovely rains most of Saturday and Sunday. I’m growing some herbs as well as cherry tomatoes, eggplant (my favourite) and some oyster mushrooms, in pots near my back door. I’m hoping to expand them soon into the garden, but that will just have to wait till after year end deadlines at work and the 4th cricket test at Wanderers. The third weekend of January I might be able to start re-planting them. Will wait see. Otherwise I might wait till Autumn, just depends on the harvest I guess.

The Dakar has started, I love watching this race. At the moment I tape all the 10pm short reviews, and watch at around 5am in the morning, (I work late this week) - basically all we get to see at this stage, 30 minutes of a full day’s activities. Don’t ask me why I enjoy the race, must be the glorious scenery that allows me to travel with the guys, or even the amazing feats they actually go through. Last year I remember the thick pools of heavy dust they drove through the first week or so, this year seems they have some mud to contend with but they’ll be hitting the Atacama soon and then we’ll just see sand sand and more sand. Despite sounding boring, it’s beautiful. At least to me. And I watch astonished at how those vehicles race at speeds through terrains half the time we can’t even see in front of us. Those truck drivers are just as amazing.

I won’t mention the cricket, though after today there just might be hope for SA after all. But if they’re going to win this match, and any other result is not quite an option right now, they’ve got 20 wickets to take (7 down, 13 more to go) so they better get their backsides moving. I can’t believe they finally dropped Ntini. I mean, why didn’t they do so in Durban? I respect the guy in all that he did for SA cricket especially being the first black guy to have achieved such an outstanding cricket record, but hey, if they can drop Neil McKenzie at the drop of a hat for Prince and or Duminy and neither have shown any major backbone at any time during the last 6 months in our team, surely they should drop Ntini without so much as plodding through the Durban test with him just because he’s a guy of colour? I tell you, that Durban test will cost us this series. Friedel was on form at the time. Speaking of McKenzie, it’s amazing that Duminy came in for Prince while in Australia, and now that Prince seems half ready they drop McKenzie who had a very successful Australian tour with us last year. And they’re seeing their lack of batsmen upfront. Thank goodness for Kallis otherwise the Poms would have already won the series just by pitching up at Newlands is all I can say. He’s an amazing talent, and perhaps the only one on the field wearing the Proteas right now. I hope Kallis continues till at least 40, we really need him around and he has so much yet to achieve. The player with the highest average for the first decade, just beating Ponting on average, but about 600 runs behind Ponting in total. Well done Kallis!

I watched the movie “Perfume” based on the book (I think) by Patrick Susskind. I must admit I bought the book recently as recommended by a friend, but not yet round to reading such. The movie certainly was interesting, I must just go find out if it’s all fiction or if it’s based on some true version somewhere. Did any of you watch the movie recently? (I record more than the kids and then watch over weekends when I have time!) I still have some good movies to watch, but no one enjoys my taste though I might get my girls to finally give in and watch with me. I also watched “That Englishwoman” the other day, a short movie about Emily Hobhouse. She was a remarkable woman it seems. Talking of movies, we spent most of the Christmas weekend (after Christmas) and the week leading up to New Year watching the Pirates trilogy and the Star Wars 6 movies as is our custom. Our visitors (family) also watched with us, we have also made it their custom it seems. I must admit Star Wars (original 3) will still go down as among my top favourites, but boy, Johnny Depp can make one watch Pirates over and over again just to watch him. Both my girls and I thoroughly enjoy him in these movies, he is quite amazing. My girls are most excited about Alice coming out this year purely because he will play in it. I could never before get them to watch Alice, they said it was boring, now with Mr Depp I see it will become our next all time favourite. (Well it probably won’t beat Pirates, but anyway). Can you believe that a 40+ year old can get a few teens excited? I daresay.

Anyway, here’s wishing you all a wonderful rest of the week. I’ll see you around, and all I can say is “Protes: 13 wickets. That’s your target boys. Get your asses moving”!!

LG

L

Greetings to Auld Lang Syne

2009-12-31T17:19:00.000+02:00

As I type this I have the odd beep-beep on my cellphone as someone sends me a Happy New Year sms.

I have decided to forego that procedure this year of wishing everyone on their cellphones for the New Year. After all, I did wish those I wanted to a wonderful 2010 when I wished them a Blessed Christmas season not a week ago. To send the same message to the same people borders on overdoing it in my books.

So as we close down the last day of the last year in the first decade in the 3rd millennium (did I get that all right?), here’s thinking back to what 2009 held in store for me and mine.

I admit to being a very lucky, happy and blessed person. Maybe those who know me aren’t so lucky and happy (to know me now), but I honestly feel very blessed and content with my life, my better half, my work, my family, my friends, my house, my kids, my garden, my studies, my future? I don’t want to throw this down your throat, but in the end I surmise it could be because I am a happy person and don’t get upset much, at least certainly not with trivial stuff around me. It hasn’t always been that way, of course not, but I think my life turned out pretty well and I am grateful and appreciative of what I have today, and I am not in any way referring to material things, though having a house, job and work are foremost of my appreciation. Being happy does not mean I don’t have pain in my life, I have several loved ones whom I miss daily, but I know they want me to live my life today because I can. So I certainly do my best in this regard.

I imagine my husband also is happy with his other half, that is myself. We have a good marriage that seems to have grown more solid over the years, the vacation once again brought me to realization how many other jackasses there are out there that I managed to skip. Not that I need such justification, as I said before, I appreciate my hubbie everyday. I think he’s wonderful and he knows such too. My studies went well, my work went well, I am appreciative of the work I have, albeit one that will make me work tomorrow and the whole weekend to fit in my year end deadlines, but the fact I have one to go to every morning is not something one should take for granted. I am not 100% appreciative of that silly car of mine that has given me problems for the past 18 months, nor the service team from Toyota, but I am appreciative of the fact that soon, very soon I will dump the car on their doorsteps and go buy myself another one. From another supplier perhaps. I must please have extra patience because apparently my car is the only piece of dogfood (insert any other word so desired) in the whole country with the problem that’s why they can’t solve it. I would therefore be more appreciative if some engineer could join Toyota in an endeavour to resolve this problem in 2010 for me. I am also looking forward to a wonderful Dakar 2010 starting soon and hopefully a very more exciting F1 season than we had in 2009. Maybe a few horses sprinting for the finish from the beginning, something not so very boring….

Anyway, here’s to a 2009 thoroughly enjoyed my side, and wishing you all an even better, prosperous and very healthy and happy 2010. May the English win the soccer world cup just to cheer all the Boertjies up. I think we need such cheering up in this country and I swear the Brazilians and Italians have won enough World Cups to last a while!

Take care and have a good one.

LG

End of year run-out-of-steam-blog

2009-12-26T13:46:00.001+02:00

I admire those that can blog something everyday. I apparently, at this time in my life it seems, cannot.

It's like I have no words left. None that makes any sense and none that will not bore the dead cockroaches out of you.

So, I will jut hang around, cut loose and read the blogs and some books I have lined up. Currently busy with "The Pilgrimage" by Paulo Coelho (have picked up and put down a time or two, it's interesting ,then boring, then interesting...also busy reading "The Bourne Identity" by Robert Ludlum, and finally reading some magazines, trying to get my house spring cleaned in a certain manner, slowly does it...

I can admit to looking forward to 2010. Towards the end of 2009 my life as I organise it, came into being. By this I mean I have been struggling for a while to find one system of organising my life, work and personal loads, and ensure that I get somewhere. Usually the systems are complicated and I run out of steam. Such an example, though excellent,was too complicated for me was "Getting Things Done" aka GTD per David Allen. He even wrote a second book called "Making it work", I haven't yet tried his second recipe, his first, though ecellent was very time consuming and complicated, thus one could run of steam quickly, which is what happened to me. (Anyone know of or successfully implement GTD in their lives? )

I did however, manage somehow in the latter half of 2009, to work up a system which is relatively simple, easy to implement and maintain and is already showing me some results. So I am looking forward in 2010 to making sure that system works for me. This may sound funny, perhaps for those not interested in organising their lives, or those who have no need to do such, but I have a demanding work schedule and trying to balance my family time, own personal self time, and even study time with demanding work hours, I need such a balanced organised system.I seem to have found such, and with it working so far, comes 'peace of mind' too. So that part of my life is also getting balanced.

Suffice to say I am a Libran, we do believe in balance.

:))

Have a wonderful weekend. relaxing, entertaining, whatever you want it to be, enjoy the cricket perhaps, and also the last week of 2009. Make it a good one.

Keep safe

LG

To Dream

2009-12-20T06:55:00.001+02:00

Every great achievement was once impossible until someone set a goal to make it a reality.

Lewis Carroll’s famous masterpiece Through the Looking Glass contains a story that exemplifies the need to dream the impossible dream. There is a conversation between Alice and the queen, which goes like this:

“I can’t believe that!” said Alice.

“Can’t you?” the queen said in a pitying tone. “Try again, draw a long breath, and shut your eyes.”

Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said. “One can’t believe impossible things.”

“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

When you dare to dream, many marvels can be accomplished. The trouble is, most people never start dreaming their impossible dream.

Who remembers this song, only recently sung by Susan Boyle that made her an overnigt success? It still gives me goosebumps.

Enjoy, and keep dreaming!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIlQ_n_QdoU&feature=PlayList&p=41424DCD1015CA16&index=4&playnext=3

LG

Vacation at last

2009-12-04T22:19:00.001+02:00

What can I say?

It's that time of the year. To recharge, rest, relax and come home ready for the end of the year and New Year challenges.

May it thus be.

I could do with a good break.

We're off to the quiet spots of the E Cape beaches. En route we'll be taking 'the road less travelled', not the main highway, so hoping to see a few interesting little towns we haven't travelled through before.

And I intend to swim in the sea every day .........

Ciao ciao till later, around 21st/22nd December

Rain rain...stay please

2009-11-29T00:22:00.002+02:00

As I type this latest blog entry in my life it's raining wonderfully outside. We need the rains, despite the early plentiful summer rains only Gauteng dams (and maybe one other province) are well over 85% full, and with the potential drought in the second half of the summer, well let's get as much rain as is sent to us.....

I just finished watching a 2hour movie called "The French Lieutenant's Woman". 1981 version with very young Jeremy Irons and Meryl Streep. Some of you might enjoy, most probably wouldn't. It's set around early 1800's I would think though it doesn't say....

So the Springboks lost to the Irish did they? No doubt the Irish Eyes are smiling....What's this, 5 losses in a row? Wonder what's happening down in the locker room? Maybe they're just plain tired, N Hemisphere is just starting their season and we've had 10 rough months, and the next Super 14 practices start in less than 2 months no doubt...My guess is they're tired...come back home boys, all is forgiven...

I've been having some engine problems with my Corolla the last, what 12-18 months. And our local Toyota could not give me an answer the last 12 months. Zilch. Zippo. Nada. Niks. Nothing. No clue what's wrong. Basically the engine just cuts down from 120km/hr to about 20km/hr...that's it, no warning, just happens. It always happens though at unexpected times. I've been on the locals' case now and recently in September, just upped and phoned Toyota SA and told them I was now p'd off, could they please collect their trash and send me another one.

Needless to say I had everyone from TSA to the locals phoning me at least 5 times a day, setting appointments when they could change the transmission or whatever it was they wanted to change. No reported case of it in SA, no technical knowledge could be found.

So just when I was about to phone and congratulate them after 3 weeks of smooth driving, my car packs up again. 3x the last week. Very irritating. The last time I had to drive the last 20km home at 20km/hr, it was slower than a damn tractor....So I phoned the local guy and told him I would be bringing the car in Friday 4th Dec and since I return the 20th, he can keep it till then and fix what needs fixing otherwise they can keep the bunch of you know what and give me my money back. I just need to phone TSA Monday, I must admit they really do react quickly. I cannot explain the frustration of living with such a car.

Anyway an excellent quote to end off tonight,

"Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplacable spark. In the hopeless swamps of the not quite, the not yet, and the not at all, do not let the hero in your soul perish and leave only frustration for the life you deserved, but never have been able to reach. The world you desire can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours."

Ayn Rand, found on this lovely blog http://sheleftonthenighttrain.blogspot.com/

You have a good rest of the weekend now. Next week I'm working very hard at the office. You see only 7 sleeps left...

LG

Christmas Parties

2009-11-22T07:30:00.001+02:00

So yesterday, the rain finally stopped for several hours for us to have the Children's Christmas party, outdoors, as planned. And today as I type, we have blue skies and sunshine.

The party turned out to be quite a success, the kids had a ball playing on merry-go-rounds and swings and slippy-slides, all those fun things they should be doing outside instead of sitting in front of TV's or computers all day most days. I am pleased another party is now behind us though this brings a Catch -22 situation, if it's behind us then a New Year will soon start, and if a New Year starts it too can come to it's end...and thus time runs away from us...

Be as it may, my kids helped me finalise the decorations on the coffee cans. It sounds weird, but we collect the big 750g coffee cans during the year (my hubbie provides two such cans of coffee a month - he drinks so much coffee!!) , spray them gold and or silver and decorate them with beads and ribbons or stuff, then fill them with cookies for the local old age homes (x2). We've been busy as a family making our contribution and the Old Age Christmas parties will be held this coming week. Inbetween all the studies but that too is almost behind us.

We have been fortunate (as an organisation for the Old Age Xmas party) in getting one or two big sponsors onto our list, Pick n Pay being one of them and sponsoring 200 old people with a lined 'green bag' wherein we put the gift and they then get the small gift plus the green bag as a shopping bag. The few I have lined up in my kitchen in preparation for the party look quite cool, all filled with small gifts for the aged.

It is amazing what one person can do, and also what one person on their own cannot do. I volunteered to organise presents for 20 persons, and you would be amazed that out of all the highly paid people working with me only 4 sponsored a gift each worth R 100. I'm talking about others earning over R 20 000 a month (and much much more) not even feeling inclined to 'donate' R 100 to such a worthy cause. And then when you look at the gift 'wish-list' the old people have things like 'biltong, sugared fruit sweets, deo roll ons and perhaps even panties' on their wish-lists and the people around us cannot donate even one R 100 for such a gift.

It is enough to wonder where this world is going to.

And even though people might say the "youth is our future, forget the old people, they've had their lives", we must remember society is identified in what they do for the youth and what they do for those that gave us the youth.

Anyway, I know one day we'll all have to answer to Someone , just make sure your answer is ready today....

Have a great Sunday all.

LG

Someone else's words - add Fresh Life and Strength this Holiday

2009-11-21T08:48:00.002+02:00

It is only when we silence the blaring sounds of our daily existence that we can finally hear the whispers of truth that life reveals to us, as it stands knocking on the doorsteps of our hearts.

~K. T. Jong

The above words and title taken directly from Karen found here at Calm Space. http://thecalmspace.com/2009/11/add-fresh-life-and-strength/

Definitely worth the read especially if you're rushing towards year end as I am....

Of jam and compost making, and tired old houses

2009-11-18T18:21:00.003+02:00

People are interesting creatures aren’t they? Not always enjoyable to be with, in fact the longer I hang around on this earth the less I want to be around them. A sure sign of ageing no doubt. I think I’ll go hermit sometime soon, real hermit, Galapagos Islands or New Brunswick Canada or even the Kalahari beginning to sound like my place of hermitage…But children are good people, one can always be around them….

Be as it may. I have exams soon. First one tomorrow. Next one next week. The good news is after the exams comes the month end and then the vacation. So come along exams, beat me if you can…(You can’t).J

Inbetween being a tad queasy over the weekend, causing me to miss all the cricket and rugby on Friday night,(yippee), I got some studies done. And I made some apricot jam. We only have one tree so the version of making jam turns out to be max 2-3 bottles. However it’s something I do and enjoy doing every year. No reason why, we actually aren’t jam eaters (except I always buy a bottle of some unique or delicious jam whenever I go away on a visit or vacation…we have about 5-6 different types in my fridge…I do get around to eating them eventually, but it’s a special treat …!). But I make the jam and use it in my pork dinners as a marinade or a cook in sauce and the family loves it.

Maybe I also enjoy making the jam because it reconnects me to a small piece of nature which is still truly mine and within my personal space. It’s like making my own compost. Not many people understand why I do it, after all someone else makes the compost, surely one can just buy the stuff. And at the end of the day how much is one person/family really contributing by recycling or making their own compost, etc? I don’t have the statistics available, but I believe one person taking a stand in something does make a difference. In most anything. You know if we were all that one person, well then this earth would be a better place and I’m sure most of us would be better people too. Contributing to your own life in a way that has meaning to you makes the difference. If you understand what I’m trying to say. This to me is contributing to my own life. Other people have perhaps different or other ways.

Yesterday we were out of town on a strategic meeting. The nicest part was driving out there, it was roughly 100km further into the country than I am. You know I’m in the country within 5 minutes literally of any road in my town and I always relish getting out onto the road as long as it doesn’t head to JHB/Pretoria or any other city like place…Anyway, one always reads about clutter draining your energy. I actually believe this statement, and am in the process of the home spring cleaning project, I did tell you it was slow and has been put on hold with studies but we will be picking it up soon. Anyway yesterday I spent a whole day in a totally wonderful guesthouse, all old stone and wooden floors - except, at the end of the day it wasn’t that wonderful. The house must have dated from around 1904 but the only real thing that would have told you this would have been the stone from which the house was built and this could only be seen on the outside. The pine ceilings in every room were beautiful but I must admit I’m one for the old steel ceilings. Anyway, the reason I was so drained when I left, was purely due to the fact that the guesthouse was totally crowded with stuff. Now I am not a decorating guru of any degree. I quite like the cleanish, almost minimalistic (almost), place-is-lived-in-version of decorating. This place was literally stuffed from the corner of the front door to the corner of the back door. What could not fit on the tables were on chairs or floors and even the walls were covered with photos a whole corridor full.

That is just too much for me. All very tasteful and artful and quality furniture and décor items, but it was so overwhelming I fled most tea breaks outside just for a breath of fresh air and some birdsong. And since I was there with a company mainly of men, the poor things I imagine they might have felt that same overwhelming feeling.

So my spring cleaning is definitely going to be upped a step albeit just to make sure I don’t chase any visitors (the rare kind) or even my hubbie out into the garden. I firmly believe too much stuff is too much.

Anyway, enjoy the rest of the week….may the second team win tonight in England…(they didn't...)

LG

Serendipity

2009-11-15T08:07:00.002+02:00

A funny sounding word. Has always intrigued me. I didn't watch the movie by the same name though...

Looking in the dictionary, it is stated to mean " the faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident". The word was apparently coined by Horace Walpole (1754) after "The three Princes of Serendipity".

Courtesy of Readers Digest Illustrated Oxford Dictionary
(my mom bought this for me years ago, it is a wonderful dictionary, 30cm x 15-20cm and at least 5-7cm thick, every time the kids ask me what does a(n english) word mean I send them off to look it up in this amazing book (it even has pictures for me, illustrated you see), they avidly detest doing so and protest loudly, but hell, how else are they supposed to learn???).

Anyway, so this word has tickled me for years.

And I finally got the true meaning out of it this morning from this article link below. If the word tickled you as much and you want to understand it really easy and really properly, go read an article here.....

it even mentions Alexander Fleming and the discovery of Pennicillin as 'serendipitous'.

I disclose that meeting my husband must have been a serendipitous moment in my life (for me at any rate, I'm sure he'll describe it as another moment in his!!!)
I'm also sure there have been several more serendipitous moments, I'll have to go think about them first though.

There now, my fancy english done for the week...have a good one everyone...

LG

Slowdown. Or is it a meltdown?

2009-11-07T22:20:00.003+02:00

I must be ageing as I feel time and life just passing me by in a blur of workdays and rest-ends. Mostly I have slowed down a bit the last 3 months, perhaps hard for you to believe, but take it from me, there has been some slowdown in my life. Purposefully on my end, and even slow in achieving, but there has been some.

And I feel better for all this slowdown on my part. My mind particularly seems to have a tad more space, though it's been countered by my body. The spring-cleaning is continuing, but at an unusually slow pace for me, one cupboard a weekend sort of pace. And I don't even 'stress' about it anymore. Although I feel somewhat better, on the other end my health as such seems also to have slowed down, despite vitamins and iron tablets I continue to be dead exhausted every night since September and exercise has taken a backseat. Yesterday I was at the doctor for a vitamin B 12 injection, and numerous tests will commence this week and the week after. And then this morning, just after the dead of dawn, I got up to participate in a 5km fun run, the fun part being walk one jog one...with no exercise in 3 months I was surprised I kept up with the pace and even enjoyed such race. (I imagine all the bones and muscles will protest loudly tomorrow). The next walk one jog one for me is end January, I'm hoping to walk one jog two. But never fear, I'm sticking to 5km, just the thought of a 10km race (albeit a walking one) sounds way too much for me. I told my friends if they move off from the 5km alk/run I willmove to the 10km /20km bicycle race. I feel I can handle that with some exercise, but not 10km walk/run...

So as I sit here with all the pains in my legs reminding me I haven't exercised for a while, what I really wanted to write about was the picture below.

This is a baby plover, or perhaps as we know it a baby Kiewiet. (photo courtesy of here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/40064663@N07/3731686117/).

I have a similar photo on my cellphone but don't ask me where the cables are for upload or even the program, I don't know. Anyway, about two Fridays ago, I was leaving work a bit later than usual, trying to get the table into some semblance of decency. At around 5pm I had had enough of the decency and decided to go home (we knock off 3pm on a Friday!). That morning I had noticed 2 baby kiewiets with their parents on my drive into the work area, and so I drove slowly out looking for them. As I said, no traffic around so I could stop and look for a while. I found them, well I found the Kiewiets with one baby, not sure if the other one didn't make it to 5pm or whether it was a second family of babies. Anyway, stopped the car and just sat looking at the Kiwiets for a moment, and realised the mother and father were calling to kingdom come but baby wasn't following them. Then I figured it out, he/she was in a gutter and the parents on the grass next to the gutter, and the cement backdrop of the gutter was taller than the poor baby, so he/she couldn't climb up to the parents. So I got out and despite them all running away from me and making a noise, caught up with baby and lifted him up onto the grass out of the gutter and off the family scuttled with a lot of noise of course.
And I was most chuffed with myself, I have never seen a baby Kiewiet before. I had snapped the photo before I picked him up so was lucky to get a photo since I haven't seen them again.

And that's why I think we pass life by too quickly, we don't slow down to appreciate the newness of nature when we should.

So, you going to slow down a bit and see if you can spot something you've never seen before? I'm sure if you look you will see something new...

Good luck, and let us know

LG

Tornado and the Kalahari Horse Whisperer

2009-10-31T07:30:00.003+02:00

So Last night, seeing as I don't watch horrors and Halloween stuff, we as a family watched Asterix and Obelix (at the Olympics) and Tornado. Both entertaining movies and enjoyable for a family movie evening.

It's an SA production, directed by Regaardt van den Berg and mai role players Danny Keogh and Quentin Krog. Don't expect a fast paced movie or even any fast paced action. It's slow paced but meaningful. If you enjoy horses or animals, as well as their interactions with humans when in pain, you may enjoy this movie.

A review and a short video can be seen here
http://www.moviesite.co.za/2009/0409/tornado-and-the-kalahari-horse-whisperer.html

My favourite words from the movie (there are a few):

"Everyone runs away from pain and being broken. And when they're 'fixed' they don't believe they're fixed because they're confusing fixed with perfect". (words paraphrased and put together by myself).

I enjoyed the movie. Maybe not everyone's cup of tea, but a good family movie none the less. Unless you're into horrors, then I guess this movie is way too slow or too lame for you.

Have a good weekend all.

LG

Of sickness and health

2009-06-17T19:58:00.001+02:00

So, some or other flu just whacked me over the head Monday night...

Yesterday I was pretty sick, all sniffles and coughs that would have made me sound like I was participating in the proverbial dog-barking competition...

Today was an extension of yesterday except I spent most of the day in bed and went to the doctor at about 3pm, came back having had an injection and some whole lotta medicines...the good news, or bad news if you're my boss, is I'm booked off till Monday. Yippee....not that I do anything except laze around, even now as I type this I feel I've sprinted about 100m (And I certainly can no longer sprint...)

Yes, so I'm very fluey and faint. My family has discovered two things...first I am very grumpy when ill. I only thought others were grumpy. Yesterday I acknowledged to all and sundry I too, am miss grumpy bear when battling with coughs and sneezes and aching body parts....
And secondly, I didn't eat much yesterday or today, one just deosn't feel like it when you're barely holding your head up, so I didn't eat much. And this afternoon I woke up and decided I was a little hungry. So my eldest made me two slices of peanut buttter toast and some tea, and once that was down I went back to snooze...I'm still not hungry now, maybe will feel peckish later...

So here's hoping you all have a good Thursday. I mean a good one, better than mine see?

Till later

Miss Grumpy Bear sniffles and coughs LG