Last week we finally accepted that we had to chop some branches off our 99 year old oak tree that has been attacked by shothole borer and got a lovely team of people from Donovan Dangerous Trees Felling in to do the honours. It was a lot less noisy and irritating than I expected, they were quick and efficient and most of the noisy stuff was over by 1pm. Not only did they chop the dead branches off our oak, they also trimmed the wild oak at the back to help our solar panels get more sunshine. All this for the princely sum of five and half thousand SA ronts. I highly recommend them.
We need our solar panels to get as much sunshine as possible seeing we’re having stage 3 to stage 6 loadshedding. It’s really stage 7 or 8 but they call it stage 6 to stop us all having a conniption. Like me pretending to be 45 when I’m nearly 55. Bwahahahaha! Talk about bolting the stable door after the entire herd has buggered off. Andre with the good hair’s interview about what’s really going on at Eishkom has had us all properly panicking not to mention getting rid of our personalised mugs. What I love about South Africans is that we can make a joke about anything, even being poisoned by cyanide.
This week also marked the end of dry February. Woo hoo! It’s definitely a lot easier going booze free if you both do it. I thought perhaps we had chosen a difficult month to do it seeing as we had just waved goodbye to our beloved Lastborn in CT. But as the husband pointed out, it was a good exercise in just sitting with our sad feelings and not drowning them in a vat of red wine and champers. An excellent point, I felt.
We thought we would immediately take advantage of being empty nesters and join rugby clubs and dance groups and go out to eat and try interesting new recipes and hike over weekends and have dinner parties. We have done nothing, dear reader, NOTHING except work our mielies off. We have tried one or two new recipes and we go for a walk every morning and sit and have a coffee at Croft, but that’s really it. I am also having a major lie-in every morning and am waking up at 6.30am, but apart from that not much has changed.
I did have the comforting thought when we didn’t hear from either of our offspring that really our kids think about us far less than we think about them so I need to stop worrying quite as much. I remember staying in a flat in my second year at varsity – living in the same town as my parents – and perhaps seeing them once a week. The Lastborn mentioned that the food in res is ‘interesting’ which is a word we use when we go watch a piece of theatre that was complete shite but we don’t want to offend anyone. I immediately wanted to send around half of Woolies so that she doesn’t have to eat shite food and was given a stern talking-to about my sister about not being a helicopter parent.
TOO DAMN LATE, I cried.
Film/TV recommendations:
I have subscriptions to Showmax, Netflix and Apple TV. I think we may also be signed up for a freebie with Amazon Prime, I’m not sure. But the outcome of all of this is that the Husband and I can spend a lovely evening watching trailers and googling reviews of movies and series and NEVER ACTUALLY BLOODY WATCHING ANYTHING. Arghhhhhhhh!
Please tell me we’re not alone.
I did find a series to watch this weekend: Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal. As the title baldly suggests, this is a true crime doccie about some good ole’ boys in the South with a hundred year old family law firm, a very deep sense of entitlement and absolutely no conscience between them. Horrifying and fascinating in equal measure, I highly recommend it.
Also on Netflix: We Have A Ghost. I was surprised it didn’t get better reviews as it’s a lot of fun, quite dry and with some great one liners. The basic premise is that an African American family buy a rundown old mansion which turns out to be inhabited by a white ghost who tries to scare them off to no avail. The dad in the story manages to monetize their ghost and chaos ensues. Watch out for a fun cameo from the always hilarious Jennifer Coolidge. As the husband said, it was the perfect Sunday night movie.
Book recommendations:
Don’t You Forget About Me by fave, Mhairi McFarlane. Thirty year old Georgina takes a job at a pub and finds out that her ex from school not only works there but is her boss. It’s a tried and tested formula but the thing about romcom is not what’s going to happen, it’s about how you get there and Mhairi’s writing is so funny and fresh and original, I am a huge fan of her books.
This one did however pop up on Bookbub where it was supposed to cost a dollar or something but when I went to my Kindle, it was on at 8 dollars. Bookbub is turning out to be a disappointment. Also, I had no idea you were supposed to replace your Kindle every 5-6 years. Mine is 10 years old at the end of the this year and is starting to give up the ghost.
It’s also the pub day for my memoir My Year of Not Getting Sh*tfaced #MYONGS on Tuesday. I received the gorgeous copies of my books this week and have been doing a series of interviews promoting it. I got all dickyed up to do one on eNCA, only to have connectivity issues which resulted in me rushing around the garden, trying to get the hadedahs to STFU and doing a phone interview. The problem with all these interviews is we can’t say SHIT on air. Jenny Crwys Williams came up with a good alternative – ratfaced.
The actual in-person launch will be at Exclusive Books, Rosebank on Tuesday, 14 March, 6 for 6.30pm. I will be in convo with fellow author, Sue Nyathi. Hope to see you all there and don’t worry, just cause it’s a sober curious memoir doesn’t mean you will only get juice, there will be wine! Don’t forget to RSVP to events@exclusivebooks.co.za. Happy Reading! Xxx
