Back

We have had electricity since last week Thursday, but blogger has not been working for me. It has been allowing me to comment and visit, but not post. Suddenly, today it is working. So, a summary of the last nearly 2 weeks.

• I have studied a lot, much more than I normally do, hopefully that will translate into good marks
• I have also read a lot, and now am up to 51 books this year!!!!
• We had a municipal election. While I do not come from a very political family, it was always instilled that voting is my duty, so I was amazed as to how many people just can't be bothered to vote. What also annoys me intensely is the political parties and how they carry on. Not sure if it is just a SA thing, but I really can't see why I should vote for you if you threaten, scream, insult, promise to burn the newspapers down, call me a criminal, belittle me and even claim that Jesus supports your party. Anyway, I have now decided to stop reading the news and watching TV for a while in an effort to bring my blood pressure down.
• Went to my friends 42nd birthday lunch. It was really nice to get to see her and a couple of the people that were there I hadn't seen for years, so it was nice to catch up. What was not so nice was being reminded that I have a big birthday coming up at the end of the year. I am trying desperately to forget again
• spent time playing cards, pictionary and 30 seconds
• I also became quite a pro at positioning 4 candles, 2 torches and myself in such a way that I could get enough light to study. I only thought afterwards that I should have got someone to take a photo. Hopefully I won't have a repeat just so I can get a photo lol.
• Brenda was invited to her first real party, with strobe lights, mirror ball and everything. Up to now she has only been to the yearly school disco. She had a lovely time, I fetched her at 11pm, she fell asleep and slept until 10 the next day. They apparently played spin the bottle, oh how I remember those days , to which I obviously responded in horror, because of course I never did things like that. She will kill me if she reads this, lol

Otherwise, I have an exam coming up tomorrow that I need to get back to studying for. I have a couple of cards and a present to post on here in the next few days. Roll on the 2nd June when the studying will be over for a bit

Camping out

I really do enjoy camping, although I haven't done it for a while. As a young adult I hitched/camped/bussed/trained around Zimbabwe and Zambia with friends, I backpacked around Ireland and a little bit in the UK. I also have done my share of camping in the Drakensberg mountains and the Natal South Coast, and loved it all. However, for the last few years I have not camped out at all, and in some ways I miss it. However, the last few days I find myself in an different position. I returned home on Friday to find that the electricity was off. Thinking nothing of it we had a barbecue for supper and went to bed. Only to find that the electricity was still off Saturday morning. Apparently there was a problem with one of the substations and the electricity will be off until Thursday at the earliest! So, here I am camping at my own home, and needless to say I have decided I prefer the real version. Ok, I have my own bed to sleep in, but that is about the only advantage. At least at a camp site I have hot running water for a bath and to wash dishes. Ok, I have camped without but that was not by choice. A tent in the dark also is a lot lighter than a house in the dark, well our house anyway. All our cooking implements are electric and so we have been BBQing which is fine for lunch, but not so good for a cup of coffee! Tomorrow I will go and get some gas cylinders so we can at least heat water, and tonight I eventually resorted to showering at the gym, which I will do for the rest of the week. The other thing is unfortunately none of my computers are powered by gas (lol) and so I am cut off from the world, I am tring to conserve my cell-phone battery until I can charge it tomorrow at work. Thank goodness for work lol. (Words I never thought would come out of my mouth/fingers!) I cannot believe how dependent on electricity we have become, and how dependent on the internet I am. What am I doing without the internet, you ask? Well, actually studying, doing some reading, made a card and a half, played some cards and really just relaxed. Sounds idyllic, well it is until about 6pm! So, I will only be around on and off for a few days but hope to be back full time by the end of the week.
PS Power failures are a relatively common occurence around here, but not normally for this long.