June 2005 Archives

What a crazy day. A colleague left for Greece yesterday for two weeks and asked me to help out on her magazine deadline, and what a nightmare it's been.

Blah, all that aside. No one likes a whiner.

Charles arrived on Monday, and we spent the day on Tuesday (I took off work) walking around London (much to the chagrin of my feet) and sightseeing. As it turned out the day was sunny eventually, and as we sat and drank a pint before picking up Lau, I looked at him and had to smile. He's come so far - I mean it in only the best way. He's left Knysna, this small, coddling little town, and is sitting in Covent Garden, drinking a pint of beer he's never tasted before, with a different currency in his wallet (the hexagonal looking one is 20p, Charlie!) and if he's scared, he's not showing it. This is the man who has lived 2 doors away from me for 7 years, and now we're both here and loving it.

Every time I think about the steps we're both taking in our lives I can't help but smile - when we went to the matric farewell together (lame, I know, but an amazing night to share with your best friend in the world) I never thought that five years on we'd both be in London too.

The longer I'm here, the more I love the place.

Interesting SA politics blog found while searching for pics of the new deputy prez.

Funny take on a lot of issues? Check.
Creams off the good stories so I don't have to search for them myself? Check.
Refers to Jacob Zuma as Jay-Z? Check.

Three strikes, it's worth a good read.

...that the next time the elections roll around, we could be voting for a woman to be president.

Thabo keeps upping the ante! Now if he'd only up his quiet diplomacy on Zim to a little bit of a whisper...

I agree that we should not vote in a woman for the sake of her gender. But if she's as un-corrupt as all the media reports are saying, it might become a reality. And we could really call ourselves the most progressive nation in Africa. Then it'll be sorry for you Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt - our president will have a woman's sensibility, and maybe issues like maternal mortality and HIV/AIDS will be addressed instead of ignored (and only responded to under immense pressure).

Sigh, we can dream.

Now I know it's not 'on' to blog about working and stuff, but this is harmless enough.

There's this guy who works on my floor (I'm in an open-plan office) who is foreign, somewhere Eastern European I think, and who is LOUD, so I can't help overhearing the gems he comes up with.

Today's offerings:

To a girl who's going out tonight:
FG (foreign guy) - "Tomorrow morning there will be big metal plate in your head with big metal ball rolling and causing the pain for you"

To another girl who's making plans for Saturday:
FG - "What's the party tomorrow evening?"
SHE - "My sister's engagement party.
FG - "Wa-hey. GIRLS ALOUD.

You may notice to your right (my army right) that I have added a 'Headlines' section above my 'Friends' link - I've been struggling with trying to sort links I find into some kind of logical system, and as I find a lot of interesting things via the news sites I read, I thought I'd share them with you. These will only be news items, not links to sites I read regularly, those can probably be found lower.

I aim to put at least one up every day; newer ones will be placed on top; and they will be removed every morning. I'm thinking of setting up an archive for them; we'll see.

Actual headlines will be written in the style of sploid, onion and so on. 'Cos I'm unoriginal like that - let's see what my early morning brain can come up with in the future.

It only took us three months to get around to it, but the Lau and I went shopping in central London yesterday. Of course, you need to have loads of dosh to shop properly, so we kinda looked around and I bought her a top to replace the one she's given me - a black number that requires double sided tape to control. We'll just have to see if THAT one ever makes the light of day.

Ian got through to the assessment stage. We're not really approaching the issue head-on right now, and as such, I don't really want to write about it. It's heavy on my mind at the moment, don't think I don't spend most of my time thinking about the ramifications of this; but to be fair, all that will come later, maybe.

Payday tomorrow. Hella-hella-lujah - Orange just billed me for my first two months in one whack and buying REM tickets for the 9th July has resulted in a week of un-fancy lunching.

When someone compliments you, it's always lovely - doubly so when it's your boyfriend. But with all this hot weather, I'm running out of skirts here, people! Come on cold weather (I never ever thought I'd say this) but come on back - I've got some long pants that are screaming to be worn and today I'm on my last skirt before I start the rotation schedule!

After weeks of a bit of a dinner-cooking high, last night was the biggest shocker ever - dry turkey breast, too crunchy carrot and swede, oniony-tasting baby potatoes and okay mushrooms. I honestly was so disappointed - I really thought that I'd proved to myself that I could actually cook! Turns out I've been on one long lucky streak, broken by a hideous plateful last night.

More like SHEEESH... it's hot in here.
Yes, weather blogs are not the most interesting, and considering that most of you, dear readers, are experiencing the coldness that is the Western Cape right now, I won't rub it in.

The heat of the last couple of nights coupled with the fact that only one of the windows in my room opens at the moment again coupled with the fact that we live on the high street (deep breath)... means that I have not been having the soundest of sleep.
Last night I limped to bed at 9.30, unheard-of-ly early, and went through another night of too-hot-to-sleep sleep.
During this time, I often resort to napping on the floor right next to the window, where the 'breeze' (read 'waft') flows through out our bedroom door. Ian enjoys this time, starfishing out on the bed; I then clamber over at about 2am most mornings once it's cooled down enough for me to survive lying on sheets.

Once I'd disappeared to bed (while it was still light outside) Ian obviously made good use of the free time by blogging (twice!) and doing his online leadership test for his recent job application. I'll blog about that later. Right now, ejoy the text from my colleague's t-shirt (gotta love the casual dress code of my office):

my best friend is called alan
he lives in my top pocket and
tells me to start fires

All attempts at a healthy lunch today were thwarted by the arrival of three enormous slabs of Milka chocolate from a co-worker who had been on holiday. Dude, I work for the same company as you? How can you afford to go to Barcelona and I can't? Bitch. The chocolate did redeem her, somewhat.

I don't even want to get started on Indianapolis. It's too much of an effort to even think about it after spending 2 hours yesterday watching only 6 cars race. I'm a Ferrari fan. I'm a Schumi fan. I suport Bridgestone. And even I was bleak about what happened. What made it that little bit worse was the lack of any understanding on the part of the American spectators who left (and who vented into the camera before leaving). Sure, I'd be pretty pissed off too had I saved up 2 months' salary to go to a stuffed-up race. But geez dude, don't get all screamy about it. And at least get a bit of a reward for your money by staying for the race. In a moment of unallowed Senna reminiscence I thought, what if all these fans leave and someone has a fatal crash at this race? Wouldn't they just absolutely kick themselves for leaving early?

And ooh, ooh, I just remembered, I've been wanting to blog this for aaaaages... my digsmate, Dale, has this amazing idea. This is something he and his taskgroup thought up at uni (they didn't do very well, stupid teacher I guess). I'm wondering if putting this out there means the idea will be stolen, but hey - I think it's pretty damn awesome and you guys won't go ahead and patent it now, will you?
Okay, Dale's idea is for pork sausages. Not just any pork sausages, mind you, but for SQUARE SAUSAGES.

Or, SQUASAGES™.

If you have ever tried to fry pork sausages in a frying pan, you'll know all too well why this little product would come in so handy - those little bastards roll around all ove rthe pan, and inevitably you end up with one side that's black, as the stupid normal sausages do tend to find one side to cook on roll back to it after being moved. Why has no one thought of this before? They'd be easy to turn over, would get cooked evenly on all sides, wouldn't end up burnt at all (unless you got too involved in Big Brother for the '2 minutes' you gave yourself to look at the TV while cooking) and would have innovative appeal.

Sainsbury's, if you're reading this... call me and I'll get Dale to call you back with a royalty figure. Six figures, methinks.

Sometime, December 2004. I'm at Oyster Catcher with friends, and this english girl with an afrikaans name is sitting across from me. I've met her only twice before. She asks if it's true that I'm going to the UK to be with my boyfriend. I say yes. She says, "me too".

Today, I go with Laurika to Heathrow, to see Evan off. They haven't been together very long, but she's already hurting and is about to have her heart crushed when he gets on a plane and flies away.

He's moving to Kenya, she's staying here. They're not breaking up.

I have no right to judge anyone on their relationship decisions, especially long distance decisions. But I'm worried for her. I don't know if she's doing the right thing.
But if I think about it, when I first went to Rhodes, I was full of confidence for my capacity to long-distance it. And the last thing I wanted to hear was how wrong I was. Even if I was wrong. So I'll support her. And maybe I'll have to support her when they break up, eventually. Maybe not.

"I came here for this?"

Good on you Thabs.
(via Sarah)

How amazing for our president to take this step and silence all the nay-sayers about how the ANC would not even reprimand Zuma, nevermind axe him. I think everyone was afraid that this corrupt man would ascend to the presidency and destroy the legacy of two great men who both kick-started and maintained a respectable democracy.

Just hilarious. (read from the bottom up)

1:37 pm: ... Shapiro praises MJ’s defense team, but fails to cite their fatal and obvious tactical flaw, taking a client who’s incredibly creepy and seems very guilty.

1:51 pm: CNN analysts say that if Jackson’s only convicted of misdemeanors, he may be released, giving him ample time to hire a private spacecraft for permament self-exile to Neverland II, his new colony on the moon.

On to happier things...

As H & M seems to be sucking in any expendable income I have, I may have to hold off the digicam thing for a while, and have been wondering just how effective the camera on my phone is - it's just 1.3 mp but I figure I just want images for myself and to post on flickr in the meantime, so I'll just have a look at how the quality comes up on screen and we'll see.

Opportunity knocks - there is often something interesting happening in Trafalgar Square, and today is a prime example: Boris Becker and Tim Henman are playing tennis against kids (hardly seems fair!) on a specially erected grass court in Trafalgar today. I went out to see them at lunchtime, only to forget my phone inside. Apparently it's going on until 8pm tonight, so I'm going to chance it after work, but I do sense that the major players will have moved on by then. Still, the court itself is pretty impressive in the middle of the square.
So I will take photies of this and post them tonight.

Also, my colleague who went out to see them with me was telling me about how these activites always happen in the square and it's always this random surprise for us - often if you don't take lunch you miss out on something fun.
Well, I found a site that lists all activities planned for the square, so that's that problem solved.
She also told me she saw Nelson Mandela speak in the square. May I just say that this is totally, totally unfair.

I miss it. More than I have yet, more than I did at uni in Grahamstown. But I can't say I miss it the most I'll ever miss it, that remains to be seen.

Sitting at home this weekend (and yes, that's pretty much all I actually did) I spent a lot of alone time thinking about how my life has changed since coming to the UK, and came to a few realisations:

1. I go out a lot less, by my own choice.
2. When I do go out, the experience is very, very different to how it was in SA. (and I don't mean as a student - going out in Cape Town and Knysna were similar in a lot of ways to going out in G-town)
3. I miss my girlfriends.
4. I felt a lot more free when I was single.

That last point is a bit of a no-brainer, really. I do feel tied to Ian, in some very good ways; but at other times there is the feeling that if either of us do things seperately it's a sort of abandonment of the other. At least I know that's how I feel, a little. Maybe it's the female abandonment mechanism, but when we do our own things sometimes I do get this feeling in two ways - I feel I am abandoning him by not wanting to go out and do the things he wants to do, and I feel a bit abandoned when he goes out and does his own thing.
It smacks of neediness, which leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but it's the truth. And maybe this is Tony Pierce talking, but a little truth is probably what this blog needs.

Relationship issues (more often than not) tend to blend into gender issues. More specifically, women trying to understand men and men trying to understand women. While some blogs tend to circulate this theme more than others, it is something that I find many people coming back to, time and time again. It makes for interesting debate, but honestly, sometimes, I feel sick of it. I get really REALLY annoyed with articles and blog posts and conversations where there's this theme of exasperation between genders. Like a good friend of mine once said in uni, "there are poles, and there are holes, get over it".

And yet, I find I fall into my own gendered traps. I don't know many women who don't find the feeling of being gently overpowered by a man arousing. Images of strong, muscular men intrigue me. I enjoy taking care of my man when he's sick. And dammit, I'm a girl who needs to cuddle - I'm not the immediately-post-flagrante, let's watch the GP type. I need me some reassuring cuddle time.

You can't deny your nature, and at times I feel mine lets me down a little. Especially when I feel a little jealousy when my man goes out and has a good time with some random girls - even when I know he's 100% mine.

I miss the easygoing person I used to be. But then, I'm committed right now. Maybe my investment in this relationship is what's got my nesting reflex acting up. I need to let go a bit more, I guess. Gotta inject a little bit of singleton into this coupled-up body.
So maybe I don't miss home so much; but rather the person I was when I was there.

So it's been an uncharacteristically quiet day on the blogging front, due to me being on FTP deadline today, but I've managed to sneak in a few minutes now during my lunch break (which tends not to exist on FTP day, so I'm not really being a martyr, and why oh why do I admit to these things out loud...)

I have eaten lunch early for the past 2 days, due largely to what I've termed the 'Special K effect'. Ian and I started eating Special K for breakfast yesterday. It kind of tastes like watered-down Frosties (yes I added sugar, you bad bad dieter you). The effect I've just been talking of is that even if you eat a mega-big bowl (which I did this morning in the vein of scientific experiment, not because I was actually hungry or anything) you are still feeling pretty empty and hungry a good half hour before your regular lunchtime. Yesterday (small bowl, very empty and hungry me at 12.30) I honestly did feel at one point that I might keel over onto my keyboard, and oh the embarrassment when they all find out that I was killed by a
small-ish bowl of Special K. With sugar.

I decided to go to lunch early yesterday, after determining that those funny black obscuring dots were porbably not pop-up flash ads, and that I needed to get some food in my gob.

I'm not sure if this is something I'll get used to, but dammit, I bought two boxes of that stuff and I will not succumb to the heaven that is Cinnamon Grahams.

My company does the consumer magazine for a major health and beauty store in the UK*. For their picture spreads and product reviews, they get given many products to be featured in the magazine. Four times a year, they throw all this blag on a big meeting table, and sell it to the employees at knock-down prices.

Today, my friends, was that day.

The production department girls are apparently the queens of this experience, as shown to me when I was rushed along to queue outside the boardroom door a little while ago. We were first in the queue.

It is important to note that the editorial department of this particualr title have to sift through the products before they go on sale, to pull out empty bottles and the like - and they, of course, cream off the best of the lot before even announcing the sale.

That said...

I got some great stuff. The paper controller for the company is the self-proclaimed ultimate queen of these sales, and she managed to bag a whole lot of great stuff that I didn't even see on the table - she's that quick.

I got the following:

Big purple flower-emblazoned toiletry bag
Veet Bladeless Razor kit (incl gel and 'razor')
Almay Truly Lasting Colour Lipcolour and Gloss set in Truly Brown Sugar
FCUK eye laquer in Chromalin
Store name* Fresh! Frightfully Fruity Flower Gel-ly
Britney Spears Curious Perfumed Shimmer Stick
Charles Worthington Results Shine On Blow-Dry Spray
Charles Worthington Results Stay Smooth Frizz Taming Serum

Looking at the store* website, I've pretty much worked out that the sum total of buying all this in store would come to about £50.

I spent £8.

Yes, I'm bragging.

*I don't really know the rules when it comes to this, but if you really wanted to find out which company it is (not that interesting, really) you wouldn't have to dig too deep.

Oh my gosh, Ultimate Swiss Ball, what an experience! I think that my typing muscles are even hurting!
I went in thinking, aaahh, we're just like going to bend over backwards on the ball, and stretch and stuff - boy was I wrong!

The instructor was great, the whole atmosphere in the class was amazing - you were pushed to do your best, but at the same time, not made to feel like an idiot if you fell flat on your face (yes, that's me).

I'm definitely going again, but apparently the real pain only hits you two days after the class, so speak to me tomorrow and we'll see.

To loose lose weight.

It's proving difficult. In the past I have lost weight before, most notably a bit at 'varsity. To do this, I cut out carbs entirely for two meals of the day - I only ate carbs at breakfast. The down side to this was that I was so carb-manic come breakfast time that I would go mad - croissants, corn flakes, toast, muffins, french toast, you name it. Any carb on offer was thrown down my gullet. Then, at lunch and dinner, I would pick through my food, removing every grain of rice and leaving all potatoes on the side of my plate. Heartbreaking, I'll tell you - the potatoes were often the only decent part of a res meal.

So now, after arriving in the UK, let's just say I went a little 'fast food crazy'. More like, MacDonalds and Burger King crazy. Plus the fact that Ian and I simply had to wade through flavour after flavour of Ben & Jerry's and Haagen Daz probably didn't contribute to any slimming effort.

The crap part is - when you realise that you've gained weight, you start to implement better eating, more physical activity - and the results are painfully slooow.
Oh, gaining weight is the easy part. That happens nice and fast. When you've also got a government-issue contraceptive pill, it happens really really fast.

Discussing it with Ian last night, he identified what I think might be the key to success for me.
My exercise style has always been more that of a sprinter than that of a long-distancer. I have almost NO endurance - I can do short sharp bursts of activity but can't handle the longer, more self-discipline-requiring types of exercise. My dad runs marathons, has run the Comrades 4 times, my sister can cycle far and long - I just don't have the capacity.
OR - THE SELF-DISCIPLINE.

Now this is fine - because maybe, just maybe, I might be able to cultivate it. According to Ian, this is why my gym exercise has often not produced the visible results my non-carb phase did; I have been a lazy gymmer.
Oxymoronic as it may seem, it may just be the thing that makes the difference between seeing enough of a result from this gym effort to keep me on track, and failure - being the inevitable lazy excuse-finding not to go to gym.

This song has been in my head today. I don't know why. It has narrowly beat out Metallica's Whisky in the Jar as a blog entry. I prefer the Dashboard, to be honest!

The Brilliant Dance - Dashboard Confessional

So this is odd,
the painful realization that has all gone wrong. And
nobody cares at all,
and nobody cares at all.

So you buried all your lover's clothes
and burned the letters lover wrote,
but it doesn't make it any better.
Does it make it any better?
And the plaster dented from your fist
in the hall where you had your first kiss
reminds you that the memories will fade.

So this is strange,
our sidestepping has come to be a brilliant dance where
nobody leads at all,
where nobody leads at all.

And the picture frames are facing down
and the ringing from this empty sound
is deafening and keeping you from sleep.
And breathing is a foreign task
and thinking's just too much to ask
and you're measuring your minutes by a clock that's blinking eights.

This is incredible. Starving, insatiable,
yes, this is love for the first time.
Well you'd like to think that you were invincible. Yeah, well
weren't we all once before we felt loss for the first time?
Well this is the last time.

If you do not listen to this band, I consider it my absolute duty to bring them to your attention. That way all my mortal sins are forgiven and I make it into heaven.

My sister told me on the phone yesterday that she knows when I'm not on deadline, because I blog more often.

Dammit, she's right.

I often wonder what it would be like had I stayed in my last job - I would no doubt still be working in Croydon, but in a different firm (the title I was working on was sold). I wouldn't have had to train someone else in my position. I would have stayed on doing ad production on the one title instead of the 6 I currently work on. I would have been earning less. I would have been spending less on commuting.

It's difficult to think in a what-if way. The chances of promotion are lower here at my new job. But I love the location. There's this huge bunch of pros and a similarly long list of cons, which is true of any job, I suppose.

I don't really know where I'm going with this blog post. I guess I just don't have anything near as exciting as a new tattoo to show off :)

I'm sorry, I can't hold it in any longer.

If you lose something, it's one o.
If something is loose, not fixed, it's two.

As in: I lose control and become a loose woman.
If you need another way to remember it, lose only has one, like it's "lost" the other o, in a way.

God, I feel TONS better.

Last night, my softball team won their first game in three years - I like to think my participation had a little something to do with it. Well, it bloody well better have, because I'm aching all over this morning!

I've only played in two games, but in the first I had never ever made it on to first base after hitting - I think that I tend to hit too high up and not enough far out, if that makes sense? So I got caught out a lot. Every time I would swing my little heart out on that bat and start to run, I'd hear everyone go 'awwww' and know I'd been caught AGAIN.
So yesterday, I decided to run like the wind after my first hit - and I promptly hit the ground about 2 steps away from the first base bag. Limbs flailing, I must have looked like a total fool. My colleague said she thinks I just gained too much momentum and hit a bump - she's really gracious about things sometimes!
My consolations are that everyone was probably looking at the ball or catcher at the time, and of that I got up quick and scrambled over to the bag, safe!
I made it all the way around to fourth in that innings - my first score for the team. I made fourth once more in the game, but not quite as spectacularly, and did get to first and second a couple of times before other hitters were caught out... but that hit-the-dust first round run will remain in my mind every Thursday as we prepare to play from now on.

So with a sore left shoulder, a grazed left knee and ass with aching muscles (said 'muss-kels'), I sit here feeling happy for my team and well on the way to being more active.

And the weirdest of all is that staying active seems to have suppressed my cold - I'm still very clouded up, and the mornings are still crappy, but in the daytime I don't feel as terrible as before.

I may reward myself with a Maple Pecan Danish at lunch. You know, just to undo all the good work so far.

Sevitzdotcom's second annual blogger's braai invite here.

So the Ultimate Swiss Ball class was all booked up by the time Natalie dear caught a bit of a wake up, so I couldn't do it, but I did go to the gym and sign up and spent about 40 minutes swimming (in a semi-crowded pool with average-looking lifeguards, boo).

But it's all good, the swim was good, the gym's amenities are very good and I felt good afterwards.

Tonight it's softball again, I'm hoping that this time we actually win. I have decided not to beat myself up about big lunches anymore - I am not eating junk food, and frankly, who's to tell me I should have 4 Ryvita's instead of 6? Those things are like FIBRE CENTRAL.

My boy

Charles is coming to the UK.

This is my best friend, and a more trustworthy, loyal and deserving of hot-ass guy you will never ever meet.

I've known him for almost 6 years.

He lands on Monday 27th June.

...link and the last link both come from this link, where I've been reading some interesting stuff.

Am I on some sort of self-improvement kick? So it would seem.

So after a bit of a wild trip at an enormous sports store (it was a sale!) it would seem that the digicam plan has to go on the back-burner for a little while.

This is all in preperation for this evening when I shall join the gym and take my first class there - *deep booming voice* ULTIMATE SWISS BALL ball... ball... ball...
The instructor for this class is "Brian", who I fully anticipate is a large scary Swedish man with masochistic tendancies and no neck. Should be fun!

And hey - who knows, by the time I actually do get the camera, I might be fabulously thin and worth taking photos of :)

And I will not let the fact that I woke up feeling sick deter me from my quest. I will play softball on Thursday. I am a powerhouse.