30 ... Bring it on

What does being 30 mean to me?

For the past few weeks, everyone from my family have been telling me stories about where they were when they heard I was born.  They were all either at or on their way to New Years Eve parties, so I guess it makes an interesting story.  They all can't believe that I am turning 30.  I guess it makes them feel old, kind of like how I feel when I hear my baby cousin is turning 16 next year.

Jennifer, Age 6 (I'm the one with the red hair). The day we all ate grapefruit

Everyone asks me how it feels to be turning 30, as though there is a huge anvil above my head ready to drop when the clock strikes midnight tonight.  I've checked a few times though, and there isn't.  Unless it is an invisible anvil.  Perhaps at midnight tonight I will turn into a pumpkin ...eek.

My cousins and I ... awh man, look how cute we all were.

So what does turning 30 mean to me?

Well, my ability to deal with a hangover is pretty much non-existent at this point.  To the point where I don't even bother getting drunk because I know what tomorrow will bring me. And drinking too much means having 2 glasses of wine on an empty stomach. Oh, who am I kidding? One glass on an empty stomach and I am done.

What drinking used to be

I've started rolling my eye's every time I accidentally overhear a conversation that high school kids are having.  Or college-ages kids. I'm rolling my eyes right now just thinking about it. Young people. Ugh.

Wine tastings - my favourite kind of drinking now. If you drink 5 glasses of wine at a tasting, it's classy.  If you drink 5 glasses of wine at home, you might have a drinking problem. Unless you pair it with cheese.

The questions from friends and relatives about when I am going to get married and have kids has increased dramatically this year.   Not least because my two older cousins decided to get married and have kids recently.  Thanks guys.

This pretty much sums up 2014

My social life has changed from meeting friends after 11pm to go out to clubs, to after-work drinks at bars, to meeting up for dinner.  Lately, it is all about brunch and coffee dates with friends.  Seems the older you get, the earlier in the day your plans with friends are made.  Being 30 means that I have a socially acceptable excuse to be at home in my pj's by 9pm.  In fact, "staying out late" no longer means 4am, but more like 10pm.  If I'm still out at 11pm, that is so way past my bed time.

I get to start saying "When I was your age" or "When I was younger" and not mean it ironically anymore.  I get to start handing out life advice.  And people will have to listen to me, because now that I am 30, I am so much older and wiser.

Oh ... the good old days when I was a kid

Yeah, I'm actually looking forward to being 30 and bringing on the new decade.

And because I always like a fun fact, here are some other things that turned 30 this year:
1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
2. Tetris
3. The Cosby Show
4. The Mac
5. Transformers
6. Sooo many awesome movies, like Karate Kid, Footloose and Ghostbusters

Watch what you say!

Captain Jack is learning to talk. Mostly this involves him alternating between mumbling and screaming unrecognisable noises, along with some occasional recognisable words like "hello" and "wow" and "what". Sometimes it takes a while for the unrecognisable noises to be recognisable words - so if we hear what he is saying, or if he says a word, we usually try and repeat it back to him immediately.

But the latest phrase which we are starting to identify sounds a lot like "F*** you". Now I'm not going to pretend that Anton and I don't swear, but we don't ever swear at each other.  It's possible that he could have overheard it from a movie or TV show, but I doubt it.  No, we suspect that the real culprits are our upstairs neighbour.











I am sure everyone has that one annoying loud neighbour. If you don't, then watch out ... it might be you, and you should probably check that out.  Our one annoying loud neighbour lives upstairs, and every weekend or second weekend, they start screaming at each other. Most of it we can't really hear, except for the one repeated phrase, which now seems to have been picked up by Jack.




So now our conundrum .... we like to repeat the words he says right.  We could ignore it completely, but with the frequency he hears it, it is doubtful that he will forget it.  So we have decided to respond to him with something that sounds similar enough, so that hopefully he will learn what we are saying instead ... "Thank you"....


 My only hope: That he doesn't think "Thank you" is an appropriate response to being sworn at!

A moo point

This is probably one of my top 5 Friends moments. Because not only is Joey saying something wrong, but he is so convinced of his wrongness that he even has an explanation for it. 

I had a recent moment like that. My whole life I thought the phrase was “splitting image”.  You know, when someone looks like somebody else, they are the splitting image. Because they look so alike, the image could have been split in two.  Only, the phrase is actually “spitting image”. I only just found this out recently. Like last week.  So for 29 years, I have not only been saying it wrong, but I was so convinced by my wrongness, that I even knew why my wrong way of saying it was right and made sense.

In case you were wondering, the correct version, “spitting image” comes from the bible, where God made Adam out of spit and mud. In order to make him from his own image.

Which, as it turns out, is one of life's funny little coincidences, because for a very long time I thought the phrase "up and at 'em" was actually "up and Adam".

Does the month of May turn you into a Zombie?

I was recently watching Shaun of the Dead* . The one scene that always stands out for me is actually the opening scene, which is basically just shots of people doing their jobs in a zombie-like state**

Today I walked halfway to the station before I even realised that I had left my house. Granted, I didn't sleep well the night before and had only had a few sips of my coffee, but still ... there I was, standing at the traffic light thinking to myself "How exactly did I get here".

It really makes me wonder: how would you know that you are turning into a zombie? I mean, unless you get bitten by a zombie, which would definitely be a huge warning sign.

Well ... now you don't need to worry about it. The people at Zombiepedia have put together this handy symptom timeline for you:

• Hour 1: Pain and discoloration (brown-purple) of the infected area. Immediate clotting of the wound (provided the infection came from a wound).
• Hour 5: Fever (99-103 degrees F), chills, slight dementia, vomiting, acute pain in the joints.
• Hour 8: Numbing of extremties and the infected area, increased fever (103-106 degrees F), increased dementia, loss of muscular coordination.
• Hour 11: Paralysis in the lower body , overall numbness, slowed heart rate.
• Hour 16: Coma.
• Hour 20: Heart stoppage. Zero brain activity.
• Hour 23: Reanimation. 

 Please note that this website does come with a disclaimer.

To be perfectly honest, this was supposed to be a post about the month of May. I know, it's hard to believe, because this is the first time that I am even mentioning May.  But if you follow my train of thought, you will see how I got here:

1. The month of May has pretty slow-paced at work, sometimes I feel a bit like a zombie
2. The start of May generally means that winter is coming and it makes me move a little slower, makes my wits a little duller - like a zombie
3. I was chatting to my friend Toni earlier and she said that she was turning into a zombie. I don't think that she meant it literally, but that is completely how I took it.

So, before this turns into a full-blown rant about the impending zombie apocalypse, here are 2 interesting facts about May for you:

• In any given year, no month ever begins or ends on the same day of the week as May does. So this year, May started on a Thursday. Which means that no other 1st of the month will fall on a Thursday. Which is good for people who could never get the hang of Thursdays.

• According to the roman poet Ovid: “Bad girls wed in May.” So ... if your anneversary falls in the month of May, please note that I am now silently judging you.***

As a bonus round: I have made 2 literary references. 20 bucks to anyone who can name them. ****


* Which, in case you don't know, is a movie about zombies. It's a comedy actually. It's pretty funny. You should definitely watch it
** the one scene that always stands out for my boyfriend is the one where they pull out a cricket bat to defend themselves instead of a baseball bat.  It is, after all, a British movie, but it still amuses him. Ironically, in my house, we don't even have a cricket bat, even though it is the only sport that I watch and has rules that I can actually understand. We do, however, have a baseball bat.

*** Mom, I am talking to you
**** Well, 2 intentional literary references. Besides Shaun of the Dead. Is it still a literary reference if it is a movie? Or is is something else. Another 10 bucks to whoever can tell me what the movie equivalent of literary reference is. Because clearly I have already reached hour 20 of turning into a zombie which is zero brain activity!

Captain Jack Sparrow - an update

All pets have personalities, and watching Jack’s develop over the last few months has been interesting.   Sometimes when he does something or cocks his head a certain way, I can’t help but wonder what he is thinking.

I have no idea what you are doing.

What are you doing?

What ARE you doing?!?

What are you doing?

Watcha doing?

He has this game he likes to play, where he throws all his toys out the bowl onto the floor. One by one. And then he throws the bowl. And then he waits for me to pick them all up so that he can do it all again.

Jack's stand minus the bowl of toys which I haven't picked up since the last time he threw them all over the lounge

The African Grey motto is "What's mine is mine. What's yours is mine." Anything you have in your hands, he will try and grab. While you are using it. Be it a pen, a book or a cellphone. Don't leave anything unattended. It will get destroyed. 

He likes to sneak up and chew on my internet dongle when I am not looking.  He also likes to bite on my keyboard and pull the keys off. Yes, they come off. Luckily they snap back on.

If he climbs onto my lap while I am busy on my laptop I have to hastily distract him with something before he pulls of my keys. Sometimes it is a pencap.

Sometimes it is pen. Sometimes he takes the pen from me while I am writing.

He also likes chewing on the cord of my camera while I am trying to take pictures

He has decided that pot plants make good landing posts. Except I don't have pot plants - I have an orchid and a bonzai tree. Neither of which is large enough to support a bird's weight.  The orchid leaves are not currently in the best state. I have tried to curb this by putting leaves in his cage - lettuce, spinach and celery leaves for now, and he seems to enjoy shredding them to bits. 

It's sometimes hard to get a photograph of him cos he moves suddenly all the time. He does NOT understand the terms "Smile for the camera" or "Hold that pose". I was just sorting through my photographs, and there are so many blurs ... kind of makes him looked possessed.

He is very interested with my camera. He likes to put his tongue against the lens and sometimes he tries to bite it. Luckily my camera has so far survived.

But sometimes I actually get a really nice picture.

I have over 300 pictures of him, and over 50 videos. Obsessive? Maybe ... but he is so cute, I really can't help myself sometimes.

Its my Blogiversary!!

Yay! It's my one year anniversary of starting my blog

A year of beginning each day wondering if something blog-worthy will happen, a year of pondering what is blog-worthy, a year of wondering if an event should be shared or not. A year of blog drafts that have never seen the light of day. Oh ... the despair!


So, what has happened to me in the last year?
Well, obviously I started a blog
I went on an awesome roadtrip
I had some strange visitors in my home including a crab
I survived the coldest winter ever
I got a parrot
I had a stress induced breakdown
I quit my job and started a new one
I lost some friends, I gained some friends and I reconnected with some friends I thought I had lost
I started a second blog
I got robbed
I fainted on the train
I had a birthday


If it sounds extremely mundane, don't worry ... it is.

Yes, blogging is filled with despair. But it has been fun. So thanks for reading and commenting and keeping me going for the last year. Hopefully I can keep it up for another year to come.

Another sad and angry post

11 days ago I was walking home from work, when I was robbed at gunpoint.

12 days ago, I was happily planning my weekend, thinking of what my next organisation project was going to be (May was supposed to be organisation month), I was proud of myself for finishing the 31 day fitness challenge (although I didn't do super well) and I felt brave and fearless.

The next day my world crumbled.

I am scared now when walking. I am armed with pepper spray, which helps, but I am still scared.

I have sleepless nights. Not as many, sometimes I will just lie awake for a while thinking about it before I force my mind elsewhere.

I am angry. Angry at the men who robbed me, angry at the police for their attitude, angry because getting my things replaced is so draining. Angry that most of the items in my bag ended up in someone's bin. Angry that they took my feeling of security and my happiness. Angry about the sleepless nights, angry because I know that they don't spare me a second thought.

I am adjusting to life without a smartphone. I miss my useful apps on my iPad very much. I miss candy crush. I miss checking the weather every morning before I get out of bed and catching up on the news while I wait for the train.

But most importantly, I hate that I don't feel like myself anymore.

I feel like the old me was a lifetime ago. 11 days ago ... and yet I can't remember how to plan my week or get my chores done or get ready for work.

I hate that I get angry and upset over little things these days. Bank forgot to order me a new credit card? Well that sounds like an excellent reason to shout at the teller and then burst into tears.

I am doing okay most of the time. Until I hit a disappointment or something triggers a fear response. Then the emotional rollercoaster starts again.

Yesterday as I was walking home, a car drove slowly past me. I got so scared that I almost ran the whole way home. A few days ago, I almost sprayed a homeless man in the face with pepper spray for asking me the time.


Today was another disappointment. Last week the constable investigating my case called me to say that they had caught some people and wanted me to look at photo's. I got my hopes up that I was going to get some justice. I know I shouldn't have. After 3 phonecalls (from me to him following up on when he was going to bring them), he finally brought the pictures today. I didn't recognise them. Which means that they are still out there, getting away with it.

So yes ... I am still sad and angry. But I promise, despite the sound of it, I am doing better. So this is my last sad and angry post (hopefully). I am picking up the pieces of me and putting them back together.

A sad and angry post

Sometimes a bad event will hit you out of nowhere - you will be having a great weekend, enjoying the sunshine, excited for the day ... and suddenly your car will break down and the rest of the day goes downhill.   This is essentially what happened to me and my boyfriend last weekend. The cost for this little mechanical failure? About R10000 plus the expense of hiring a car for a few days. So all in all, not a great start to the month of May.

Sometimes, though, the universe tries to warn you that something bad is going to happen by giving you little knocks right from the moment you wake up. Perhaps having a bad morning is a sign that you should just stay in bed and give up on the day.  That is what happened to me on Friday.

Right from the minute I woke up, I kind of knew it was going to be a bad day. It was raining heavily when I woke up - which is not bad in itself, unless you have a 10 minute walk to the train station to make. Jack, my African Grey, refused to get back into his cage, which delayed my morning and caused me to leave a few minutes later than normal. As I started walking, I realised I had left my watch at home - which is just one of those annoying things cos I am one of those people who likes to know the time all the time. Since I was already running late, I didn't bother to turn back. When I got to the train station, I found out the trains were delayed and when I tried to get hold of the office to let them know, my phone wouldn't work. As I was sitting at the train station in the cold and miserable weather, I was half tempted to walk home and climb back into bed. The day had started off on the wrong foot. But just then a train came and I made it to work, only a few minutes late. The rest of the day was uneventful, but when 4pm came I was grateful to just get out of there.

Usually, when I walk to the train station, I have my cellphone in my hand or my headphones in. This time I had neither. Since I had been running late that morning, I wasn't even wearing earrings or any jewellery for that matter. I hadn't walked far when a car pulled up beside me and asked me for directions to Plantation Road. It sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place it so I apologised and carried on walking. The car drove away.

Let me just interject by saying that this was a relatively common occurrence - cars often stop in that area to ask for directions. I am quite vigilant, and I do not go closer to the car. In this case, the men in the car did not seem threatening at all.

I crossed the road after they drove away, and I noticed that when the car reached the end of the road they did a u-turn and were driving back. I didn't think anything of it - they were lost, right? They again stopped next to me, but this time the atmosphere was different. The driver asked again for Plantation Road, but the passenger pulled out a gun, cocked it and told me not to scream. The driver was still talking about Plantation Road the whole time. I was confused. What did they want from me? To get directions from me at gun point?

For a moment I thought they were going to tell me to get into the car. I just stood there, not sure what was going on at all.

The driver asked me for my bag. I started to give it, but the first thought I had was: how am I going to get home with no train ticket, no money and no cellphone.

What I wanted to say: Are you for real? This can't be happening to me. Or maybe even just no.
What I wanted to do: run away. Disappear.
What I was doing: wishing that they would just change their minds and drive away
What I actually said: "Can I at least have my train ticket, so that I can get home"
And yes, I said it with as much attitude as I could manage considering the passenger was still pointing the gun at me. When I have told people this story, they laugh at the fact that I did this. One friend even said I have guts. I suppose I did, trying to appeal to the compassionate side of someone who was pointing a gun at me. Looking back, I can't believe that I did that.

Luckily my train ticket was clipped to the side of my bag. I don't remember what they said, but I suppose they said that it was okay because I drew the bag closer again to unclip my train ticket.

The driver kept going on about gosh damn Plantation Road.

At this point I became aware that there was a third person in the car - in the backseat. The back windows were tinted black.  I hadn't noticed that before. He was saying something to the man with the gun.  The gun-man asked me what valuables there were in the bag. I asked them if I should just give the valuables - for a moment I thought maybe all I would lose was my purse and my cellphone and my ipad maybe. I still had my bag in my hands. It felt like I had been standing there with a gun pointed at me for about 5 minutes, but I guess it had only been about a minute.

The gun-man started to get agitated and he told me to give the whole bag. I thought about saying no, I thought about trying to run away, I thought about my brand new ipad and all my personal belongings and my shoes and my diary. All those thoughts in a split second. I gave my bag. The driver told me to stay away from Plantation Road. They drove away.

I took a step towards the train station. Let me just get home, I thought. But then I realised that I had no housekey to get in and no remote. I turned around and watched the car drive away. Too late I realised that maybe I should get a registration number. I got the last 3 digits and the make of the car. I thought about running after the car. I don't know what I thought that would accomplish.

And suddenly the whole thing was over and I was standing in the road by myself again.

There is more to my story - the kindness of strangers who helped me call my boyfriend to fetch me, the police and the feeling of futility sitting there waiting to give my statement because it "shift change", the inconvenience of having to change locks and replace things, and the emotions: fear, anger, anxiety.  The replaying of the incident in my head over again, wondering what I could have done differently, whether I should have run away, whether I should have shouted.

And thinking of all the things I lost. I know it is just things. I am always the one who says that. But I am angry that someone could take the things that I worked hard to buy so easily and with no conscience.

Asked by my brother if this makes me scared to live in South Africa or want to leave, the short answer is no. Maybe it would have been different if they had hurt me, or if the gun had been pressed against my head. But I don't think I am feeling like this is a South African thing. More like, this is the world that we live in. And that makes me angry, and for the first time in a long time, I hate this world so much.