c'est la vie

Yesterday one of my closest friends rode in the 94.7 cycle challenge.  In the searing heat.  On a bike naturally.  On hot tar.  In lycra sort of material.  I applaud him.  Now there are a number of reasons why I did not ride in the cycle race. Firstly I do not own a bike.  My hubby had one that I rode on now and then.  Actually it was quite a bit more then and hardly ever now.   When I park my car at work and get out in the searing heat, I find it challenging to walk from my car to my office.  I don't know if I could even cycle from my car to my office.  You have to get up really really early to train in the weeks and months prior to the race.  I find it really really difficult to drag myself out of bed to brush my teeth, let alone get on a bike.  I am always looking for my cellphone, glasses, car keys, office keys and parking mall tickets.  Having a bike means there would just be one more thing that I could ...

So what do you do when you feel like you are giving a lot of yourself to someone or someones (is there such a word) but what you get back is not a lot, or maybe it is a lot, but superficial, just on the surface kind of sharing, without depth which does not mean it is sharing. Do you a) walk away, hard as it is  b) hire a hitman  c) grin and bear it  d) you have no advice to give me I realised today, without warning, like a thunderbolt hitting me, that sometimes we get so swept up in giving of ourselves and so swept up in someone's accepting this and joy in this, that when you suddenly stand still you realise ... wait a minute .... what am I getting back?  And I am not speaking about financial rewards, or favours or gifts or anything material, I am talking about giving of yourself, your thought processes, your ideas, true sharing of who you are. Some of us do that.  It is who we are.  If you are close to me.  You get me.  Heart and soul. ...

Zumba.  The word conjures up images of hip swaying dancing, bongo drums, feathers, beaded tops and smouldering Latin men. Now come down to earth ........ Zumba ..... Is actually aerobics done to gyrating Latin American music .... Think lunges to Latino music .... Jumping to Jennifer Lopez.  It is for all ages, all sexes .... But it is intense ... We sweat, we sway ..... We love the song Look at My Body ..... I workooooooout. Zumba is also fun, social, toning, heart racing, invigorating ..... Along with other words like panting, dying, crawling, drinking litres of water, falling into your vehicle afterwards etc.  But smiling. There are weeks when I carry a copy of my Last Will and Testament in my car cubbyhole so that my daughter, dancing next to me, has easy access to it when I go into cardiac arrest.  Luckily our priest lives next to the hall in case of emergency and I have him on speed dial. And then there is Simone aka our Ringmaster, Instructor, Chief Wh...

My dear Samsung S3 is now hanging on by a thread.  A tiny one.  After my blog a couple of weeks ago that I had managed to set the corner of my 11 month old phone alight, by putting it down on my novel, on a table full of burning candles and then dozing off, much to the amusement of the local Vodacom store, I now managed to accidentally drop it 2 days ago and naturally it will not fall with the cover facing down ... oh no .... it has to land screen down ... and shatter the screen .... only for Samsung to tell me the screen is not covered by the warranty and costs ..... wait for it ..... R2 100 to replace.  That is on top of the R2 000 I paid when the phone was 6 months old and their wonderful S3 screen stopped working ... also that was not covered .... in case it was dropped .... and that time it wasn't ... so now 11 months after I bought it, I have spent almost the same value on repairs.  Go Samsung!! So now I may be forced to seek "alternate sources" of phone repa...

And boom ..... the silly season is blossoming in the stores already.  As early as the second week in October the shopping malls, retailers and anyone else who owns a piece of tinsel jumped onto the bandwagon.  And I still don't get it.  I would if the packing out of the trees and baubles and the playing of the Boney M rendition of Drummer Boy started on the 1st of December .... but October?  I arrived at a popular mall in the Eastern suburbs on 11 October and lo and behold at the entrance, an obscenely high fir Christmas tree adorned in splendour, glittering in the blazing South African sun whilst the faux snow looked sad.  Probably embarrassed .... don't get a lot of snow in Lynnwood Road methinks. Especially in October.  And then the chocolates.  Lindt really has gone all out ..... Reindeer, Father Christmas, Baubles ... you name it ..... available in the entrance of every more fancy supermarket ... displayed proudly, at a premium price ..... in Oc...