I think she misheard him

Him: What would you like to drink?

Me: Hmmm, do we have Savannahs?

Him: Sure. Would you like one?

AirBear (very, very eager):  Oooooh! Me too please!

A moment of shocked silence passes where I scrutinize my four year old.

Me: You want a Savannah?

AirBear: Yes, I love them! I really, really love them!

Me: Savannahs? You don't even know what a Savannah is.

AirBear (indignant): Oh yes, I do. It's a sausage.

Big-boned Ballet

I recently attended a dance school recital whose students ranged in age from 3 to 30. There were about thirty different performances on the program and the show covered various aspects of dance, from ballet to hip-hop, tap and modern.

Now, while it was entertaining and all, some disturbing thought kept nagging me. The thought was: Why are there so many fat ballerinas on stage? When I first became aware of what I was actually thinking in my subconscious, I started counting the obese dancers. In each group that performed. Shockingly, there was always a minimum of two overweight dancers in each group. I realise that the skimpy outfits that dancers wear for ease of movement also add to the ease of identifying  the portly kids in the group, but really!?! What in the world is going on?

When I was at school, if there was ONE fat kid in your school, let alone in your own class, it was a lot, and generally the poor child had some glandular problem. But after watching that ballet show, I was totally horrified at the number of fat dancers I saw. Surely glandular disorders are not so plentiful nowadays?

I presume they dance (or are encouraged to dance) to try and deal with the extra weight, and most of these podgy girls are actually quite agile and graceful when performing, but surely this is a sign of the times? And I can't help but wonder if MickeyD and the likes are in some (large) way responsible. Is the convenience of er, convenience foods the direct cause of these growing numbers of portly dancers?

The Question Not To Ask

"I'm pregnant," I giggle over the phone.

"What?" says my husband, knowing how impossible this statement just is. He thinks a little and says, "With whose baby?"

"The hairdresser's." I'm bent over double. I start to relate the following story.

I'm not a fancy girl. I'm low maintenance. No frills. Plain Jane. I haven't had my hair cut in, like, forever. I needed a little spruce up before the holidays - just so those Christmas photos aren't totally disturbing. Not being a regular at any salon, I flit freely from place to place. No commitment. Just drop in, trim the edges, fly off. I like it that way. Don't start making me appointments six weeks in advance, thank you. I'm good to come and go as I please.

I drifted by a seemingly quiet salon - they looked like they might be able to mow the lawn before school came out, so I asked for a quick cut. They could do it - great!

All washed and waiting at the mirror, the hairdresser approaches. She has a tender, almost motherly look in her eyes. "Would you like a cupcake, dear?" she croons.

"Er, no thanks, just a trim, that's all."

She smiles.

"So how far is it?" she is dripping honey.

"Excuse me?" I ask, thinking that she may be talking about the length of my hair.

"Your pregnancy," she insists, "how far along are you?"

I just crack up on the inside, but then I'm faced with a bit of a dilemma - do I lie to make her feel better ie "4 months, thanks for asking, and I'm feeling fabulous!", or just come out with the truth. I can't lie like that.

"Er," I break eye contact with her reflection in the mirror, "I'm not pregnant."

Of course this ruins the rest of my visit with outrageously awkward silences to follow.

At one point she tried to make up for it by saying that she just thought, you know, because of the shirt I was wearing, well, it's such a lovely shirt (liar! it's a crap shirt!) and where did I get it from? I lie back. I can't remember where I got the shirt, I say (Pick 'n Pay on the half price sale rack). I lie because the truth would just make her feel more stupid about saying it's such a nice shirt. And anyway, are you completely dof? What kind of 'very lovely shirt' makes a slightly podgey woman look pregnant? Only bad shirts. That's it! NOTE TO SELF: burn shirt with immediate effect!

Of course, I got a pretty decent haircut out of the deal - I think if she'd screwed up it would have been a really tough pill to swallow.

But that question: How far are you? or When's your due date? These questions should be banned in ALL unfamiliar company. Even if the overdue woman is puffing and panting through her contractions and she's standing in a puddle of amniotic fluid in the queue at the bank, any strangers in the immediate vicinity should make light conversation only. Talk about the weather, for Pete's sake. Look the other way. You really can't be sure she's pregnant, can you? Whatever you do, don't ask the question until she drops the baby on the floor. Because the day will come, dearhearts, when that puffing panting woman is actually having an athsma attack, or that puddle of amniotic fluid is the result of an incontinent bladder, and wouldn't that be embarrassing for all concerned?

When I got home I changed my shirt. I stood in front of the mirror for a bit. I turned to the left. I turned to the right. I even turned my back to the mirror and wondered if the new shirt made my bum look pregnant. After all that self-examination, all I can say is: I have a tummy. Sure. My pelvic bones which used to proudly poke my waist band pre-kids have long ago been buried. But appearing pregnant? No! My tummy is way too weird shaped to be housing a bonny baby. Unless that baby was shaped like a Toblerone and half a BigMac, and the Toblerone had melted a bit.

Sigh.

Unfinished project number 2

Anyone for blueberry muffins and tea?

What I learnt today...

Today I learned, the hard way, that spray painting in blistery-blustery winds is not recommended, and also does not mean the same thing as Use in a well-ventilated area like it says on the back of the can. Wish I'd thought a bit about it before I hopped on the ol' spray-painting band wagon. If you see me soon, No, I do not have some weird tropical disease.

I'm just saying.

Then the other thing I discovered, and this is also a fairly useful little tidbit, is an easy peasy time-saving trick.

Last night I made a whopper pasta bake meal for dinner. You know the kind, right? The sort where pasta, mince, veggies, a variety of dairy products, a nail for added iron and a dash of cod-liver oil because it's good for you get thrown into a huge casserole dish and stuck in the oven till it smells nice? Yes, that kind! Well, for the first time in a long time, there was so much food left over, that I figured I would do Leftovers for supper tonight. Which means.... I'm free to fanny about all afternoon. I keep finding myself stressing about what's for dinner, only to pat myself on the back and say, "There, there dear. It's all sorted. Remember?" Phew!

Note to self: Make more mega-meals to manufacture more much-needed me-time.

Now why haven't I thought about this earlier? Duh!

Frenetic Genetics

I just ate a slice of chocolate-peppermint cake off the same plate I had my anchovy toast off, and inevitably got the flavours mixed up. And while that was a pretty traumatic experience in itself, it got me to thinking about the differences between men and women.

(Ok, so no, it didn't, but it was a good story, right?)

Men and Women. The battle of the sexes. The toilet seat up or down? Beauty versus Braun. Mars and Venus, bras and penis. No matter how you call it, we're Just. Plain. Different. My suggestion is: Don't waste your time trying to understand it, just accept it and go forth and multiply. Or something like that, anyway.

So God made Man and Woman. And when he made Man, he used frogs and snails and puppy dogs' tails. And muscles. And fish gut. And screwdrivers with magnetised ends. And string. A very useful commodity in any home. And the string was a bit longer than he had planned it to be, so he left a little bit. Dangling. And Man was useful.

And when he made Woman, he used sugar and spice and all things nice. Like Chanel No 5. And cashmere. And rose petals. And lace. Not useful stuff like fish gut and potato peelers. Just pretty things that ought to look nice when you dust them off and hold them up to the sunshine. And while God was busy putting her together, he discovered that the lace was just a little bit too little. So he left a space. And Woman was pretty.

"Go forth!" God commanded. And the man and the woman got a little sheepish look on their faces. And man said, "Is there a bog around here? You know? When you gotta go you gotta go!" And the woman nodded and said, "Please could you show me where the little girls' room is." At this point she was doing an uncomfortable little shuffle, and the man was grabbing wildly at his crotch.

And God, in his infinite wisdom, seeing Man's obvious discomfort, handed him a pill to swallow. It was the gift of being able to pee standing up. And the man immediately took to peeing on tree trunks and fire hydrants and off of bridges, straight into the wind.

The woman, still pinching, eyes watering ever so slightly, but looking fabulous, quietly found a discreet bush and awkwardly squatted behind it to take a leak, anguishing over not getting anything on her stilettos. Once she was done, the woman pulled herself together and, noting the man writing his name in the snow with his own urine, went to talk to Management.

"It's not fair!" she insisted (whining ever so slightly) pointing at her partner who by now was having a pissing contest with a chimpanzee. "He gets to wee standing up. What do I get?"

God looked a little uncomfortable and fumbled around in his pockets. "Er, I do have this.." he said holding up a flaming pill.

The woman said, "I'll take it!", snatched it out of his hands and swallowed it. At that point Multiple Orgasms entered the woman's intrinsic make-up, and never again did she complain about the standing to wee thing again.

This isn't home sweet home. Adjust.

She smirks at me from the glossy pages of the woman's magazine. Her smug countenance proving that she is, indeed, a domestic goddess. In fact, THE Domestic Goddess of the Year. All toffed up in a glammy outfit, perfect hair, perfect make-up, all perfectly posed in front of a perfectly set dining table where a perfectly glamourous meal is to be consumed.

Blergh.

Woman like that make me want to pull out their perfectly crimped eyelashes and accidentally spill Jik (household bleach) on their silly satin saris. All hoity-toity posing next to their (apparently) well-fed husbands. The only thing missing from the photo is the Royal Rosette of Utter Perfection that women like her, no doubt, have pinned to their outfits at all times - just in case you were wondering. Hm, they must have photoshopped it out - probably didn't bring out the bling that she had painstakingly embroidered on the hems of her sleeves.

She obviously doesn't have kids, for a start. She never had acne as a teenager. She was born with a radiant complexion which never needs a touch of sunshine to spruce up. She is naturally tanned. And she obviously has nothing better to do with her time than crochet napkin rings and tissue decoupage dessert bowls.

Her perfectly interior decorated lounge is enough to make me want to spill my drink on her soft white rug. All this feng shui nonsense of minimising clutter to allow energy to flow freely through a room! Blah, blah, blah. Messy houses are happy homes. In which case, mine is delirious. 

My home could never grace the pages of a glossy magazine. (Mainly because the dust would make the pictures blurry). The dust-bunnies under the couches multiply uninterruptedly. Better a life lived to the full and a messy home, than a spotless carpet and no stories to tell, right? And hey! If you feel like leaving messages in the dust, you go right ahead - just please don't leave the date...

Where her door mat says WELCOME, mine says HELP WANTED: EVERYONE QUALIFIES.

Where she wakes up spontaneously in the morning all made up and beautiful, ready to wow the world with her wondrous flair, I succumb to a sense of guilt triggered by setting the SNOOZE button off so many times that it woke the kids. I peel myself out of bed and slog over to the bathroom. Looking in the mirror I read the sign I stuck up last night just to be on the safe side. It says, For Instant Human Just Add Coffee. A moment of vague excitement leads me to the kitchen where I search for a spoon (in the sink) and a cup (also) and the coffee (instant) to mix up the magic starter fluid. (Damn! I forgot to boil the kettle. Oh well. Caffeine is caffeine, no matter the temperature, right? *downs cold coffee* Wrong!)

Unimpressed, I flip through the article about this domestic goddess who hosts dinner parties twice a week and bakes health bread for the local old-age home, when it strikes me. Yip. I sure could have a claim to fame too. I could spread my wisdom all over magazines like this. Ok, so maybe not this one in particular, but there's bound to be a magazine that would like to do a story based on the other side of the coin, right?

Just imagine... moms like me competing for the coveted title of Domestic Antichrist! We could compare depth of ice build-up in our freezers, number of weeds per square meter in our lawns, number of mornings per week our kids are late for school and the likes. Anyone up for the challenge?

Observations of mild to middling Relevance

I attended a very formal, very larney function last night. It was an award ceremony for something-or-other (the wine was free, ok?) But what struck me as weird was that the whole evening was about giving someone an award for something, and the guy didn't even show up - in absentia! I mean really! There were the top brass of Stellies all kitted up, made-up, bejewelled and tied, and the oke sends a buddy to pick up the prezzie. So maybe he is a bigwig with more important commitments, but then couldn't they have just arranged the prize-giving for a time when he would be more, say, available?

Anyway, the food was good. The wine, not so much, but it seemed to improve as the evening progressed. The company at our table, sadly, did not. In fact, quite the opposite. It became rather embarrassing being seated at the table of what had started out to seem like some classy older folks, who turned into a pack of disrespectful, remarkably vulgar troglodytes as the wine and the speeches flowed. It raises the question for me as to why perfect strangers feel it is important to impress others with discussions over the size of their bank accounts? I really don't care about that. And for someone approaching the autumn years of their life, surely you would know better than to brag about your most recent investment. Is it just me, or does it come across as pathetic?

Before we had left home that evening, T-Bird had begged to come with us. "I'll be on my best behaviour," she had promised. Truth is, she would have been far better company and far more civilised than the gaggle we shared the evening with.

But, on the up-side, we had the pleasure of listening to a speech delivered by the Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court, Mr Pius Langa. Getting a chance to learn a little more about the blokes who make headlines and lead lives that feel very distant from our own is always an enlightening experience. They're only human too. Which is a refreshing revelation. And somewhat comforting for the individual on the road to self-discovery.

Mindnumbing Ramblings

I sit drowning my sorrows in a BIG bag of salt and vinegar chips - yip! That ol' MSG craving has struck again!

Not that I have many sorrows today - mostly just thoughts and ideas and questions.

Things like:

* Will my frozen toosh ever have feeling again?

* How the heck did I emerge from yesterday's therapy session with a multiple personality?

* Will the drip in the braai room somehow magically dry up?

* Surely Simba chips should have their own level on the food pyramid? Especially those fresh Salt and Vinegar ones.

* How can I take a long-weekend trip when I have to care for two very soft and fluffy bunnies?

* Is that the Maldives I hear calling my name?  Yip. It must be. The sound of gentle lapping waves on the shore, a coconut falling off a branch, a gentle warm breeze rustling the leaves. Sounds Maldivesy to me!

* Is Wall-E really the best animated film ever, or is Barry Ronge, film critique extraordinaire, just exaggerating?

* If I had to choose between my daughter and my camera, I would have a really perplexing decision on my hands. Does that make me a bad mother? (I could have killed her for dropping it on Saturday - Aaargh!)

* Isn't it time to be more eco-conscious? I mean, I really feel strongly that green is the new black, and all, but I should be far more active in modelling healthy, eco-friendly behaviour for my children.

* How awkward I feel for defending the emotional side, and not the logical side, of last week's tragic suicide. Sure it was wrong, but she really believed that there was not another option for herself. She honestly thought that she would be making things better for her children and her husband. Logic did not play a role in her decision.

* It sort of messes things up in my head a bit when I feel like a good 'ol cuss will do the trick to capture the moment in one four-letter word, when, at the same I just can't bring myself to do it. Why is it so hard to overcome vulgarity for the satisfaction of spitting out those descriptive and colourful phrases? Surely a healthy bit of *&#$@ couldn't hurt?

* Has my honesty frightened off a couple of role players in the bigger picture? Drat!

* Are parabens really that harmful to my hormones? 

* Since when did the STUFF move back into the study? Sure, we had two birthdays, one hospital stay, and three weeks of holidays, but is this STUFF for real?

* Did breastfeeding my children for as long as I did leave an indelible stamp of confidence and security on their wee foundations? Please say yes, please say yes!

* Will I ever again be able to pull in my tummy so that my hip bones stick out? Currently, I can suck it up all I like, and that pot-belly doesn't shift an inch!

Hmm! The crisps are finished and it's time to collect the kids...

Something else...

Not feeling very loquacious today.

So.

How are you?

...

...

Hmm.

Well, there is this one thing I can show you, that some of you might find interesting:

Didn't taste too bad, either.

Toodles.

Losing my Sense of Taste

I am losing my sense of taste.

No, really.

(Comments from the peanut gallery are unnecessary, thank you very much! Especially the murmurings of siblings.)

I really can't taste much anymore.

My tongue is all sore and burny. And, no, it isn't another MSG binge - I swear - I haven't had ANY Salt and Vinegar flavoured anything for ages. In fact, last night at the movies, the S&V flavouring was completely MIA. On all the flavour counters - absent. I checked. We ended up with a dash of cream cheese and chives which the mother of the year insisted would be a nice change. I can't tell you what an unfulfilling experience that was. It was like putting a spoonful of orange sorbet in your mouth, only to discover that someone froze cooking fat in the orange sorbet container. Blergh!

But back to my loss-of-taste-dilemma.

Since my baby was hospitalised, I, the mother, seem to have been afflicted with a mild case of, er, how shall I say? Stress, maybe? Unbeknownst to me the bloody stress gremlins set up fort on my tongue and have invaded individual taste-buds with serious consequences to the rest of the organ. The strongest muscle in my body has decided that the vermin in her tastebuds will bring all functioning to an abrupt and rather inconvenient standstill. This means that eating, swallowing, talking and kissing will from now on be left to the skeleton staff. And since my tongue has no skeleton, I'm in a bit of a pickle. (Not that I'd be able to know I was in a pickle for sure, being unable to actually distinguish a pickle's flavour from, say, the mouldy finger biscuit that's been carried around in the bottom of my handbag for the last millenium or so.)

The burning, swollen, blister-bedecked tongue I am punished with after a MSG binge is bearable. Because I deserve it. But this out of the blue affliction just seems so unfair.

In true nurse-style, I proceed to self-diagnose. Maybe it's gingivitis, on my tongue. I could try an anti-bacterial mouthwash. Or perhaps it's thrush. I'll need to doctor it with some anti-fungals. But there are these strange pock-marks erupting on the tip - like the tastebuds are dying. They are dying. I've got tongue-leprosy. I'm never going to be able to talk again. My tongue is going to fall off in my sleep. I'm going to choke on it. Is my will prepared? Have I got any outstanding "issues" to deal with? Unspoken regrets, unrequited loves, outstanding apologies, longstanding appointments to cancel. My personal matters seem to be in order. Well, enough that I can go to bed, anyway. Maybe we'll speak again. Maybe we won't...

The danger of putting it off

One of the principle differences between  adults and children is the ability to delay the gratification of their needs. Er, the adults, that is. Well, mostly anyway. Children become frustrated when what they want is not presented to them momentarily; while adults generally go on seeing to the children's needs for, well, for ever and don't actually get around to addressing their own wants, desires, cravings.

But sometimes, the adults among us neglect, or ignore, our inner cravings, children or no. Take the dedicated dieter, for instance. The Dieter is a perfect example of an adult denying the longings and desires of their inner skinny person. The more the internal hungry entity screams for chocolate, the more the outer adult shuts them up with loud music, gym classes and celery. Until, one day, the two of them happen to trip up on a KitKat and land head first in a big bowl of Gino Ginelli's Chocolate Milano. And this, I believe, is the danger of postponing the gratification of the adult's needs - the longer you do it for, the harder you fall.

This is my story about my monosodium glutamate dependency:

For sometime now I have been craving the MSG fix I get only from Ster-Kinekor's movie popcorn. Sure, I have several bottles of salt and vinegar flavouring in my larder, but they just don't seem to have the same effect as cinema purchased popcorn. On researching my addiction, I came across a very interesting theory that the only "natural" foodstuff that has the same effect on the taste receptors which respond (in my case) so exuberantly to MSG, is caviar.

Seeing as I had been quietening my inner monster for some time, and not having any caviar lying about, I was desperately seeking my fix. Unable to contain the beast any longer, I arrived at the Tygervalley Mall first thing this morning to get my hit. Like a zombie I handed over the exorbitant amount of money required to purchase the staple food of most poverty-stricken African countries, and headed over to the flavouring counter, unaware of the extortion I had just become victim to.

The jar of Salt and Vinegar flavouring glowed in the reflection of the flourescent mall lights. It called to me. I could not resist it. Generously, I sprinkled the miracle powder on my popcorn. I could not bear waiting another moment, so I shoved a couple of morsels into my mouth. I was disappointed. Being the first customer of the day, I had been given an overflowing box of last night's popcorn. Too anxious for the MSG buzz to take hold, I saved the time it would have gone to complain to management, get them to make up a fresh batch and get me tripping, that I took the matter into my own hands: I assaulted the popcorn with another bountiful sprinkling of magic powder. Again, I sampled my drug. The popcorn I put in my mouth was now yellow with flavouring, and tasted super! I shook the jar a couple of times more, just for luck. I was ready to feed the beast that had been crying out for so long. 

Seating myself in the cinema (oh, by the way, I went to watch a movie by myself which I just haven't done in years and that was sort of nice), I was ready. I had my box of Salt and Vinegar flavouring with popcorn on it, and thus armed, I started to polish off my poison. The first (real) mouthful should have been the "head's up" for me, but I was too intoxicated to take note. As I brought the popcorn to my mouth, I breathed in. A cloud of flavourant settled in my lungs and I started to cough. Violently. 

The lady behind me leaned forward. "You ok?" she asked.

"I'll be fine!" I gasped. I gulped down a swig of water from the bottle I had thankfully brought with me.

I was cautious with the next handful. "Don't breathe in! Whatever you do, don't breathe in!" I told myself. It worked. For a while. After a while, however, I became so engrossed in the film, that my conversation with myself was put on hold. I breathed in. The next episode of uncontrollable coughing ensued.

The lady behind me informed me she was a paramedic and knew CPR. Just in case I needed it.

I smiled as convincingly as I could and, once again, reassured her that I would be fine. My water was finished. There was no saliva left in my mouth. It had dried up about 10 minutes into the movie. With every fiber in my being I summoned up the strength needed to bring the pulmonary spasm under control - only because it's really hard to eat when you're coughing like that.

The rest of the popcorn was consumed without incident. A cupful of flavouring had escaped the folds at the bottom of the carton and collected in my lap. It took me a good 40 seconds to dust off the evidence of my binge.

I was high by the time the movie ended (can't remember much of it, by the way, so please don't ask), and it was in this euphoric state that I headed off to collect the kids from school. As usual, I brought them home for lunch before the afternoon activities got underway.

Now most days, I join my girls for lunch, but this afternoon was different. Firstly, and understandably, I was full of starch, so not really hungry. But even taking a bite out of the sandwich that T-Bird insisted I test because she thought it was "Yucky", felt weird. I had begun to loose sensation in my tongue.

Since then it's just gotten worse. My tongue, whilst having lost all sense of taste, feels on fire. It honestly feels like hedgehogs have wrestled on it, pinning each other down in violent, scraping maneuvers. On inspection (thanks to the nurse in me), my tongue is visibly redder than usual. It looks like it might be peeling a bit at the back. And it's swollen. I think it's starting to affect my speech too. It actually hurts to speak.

So, what did I learn from quelling my inner cravings for so long? Next time that MSG ache hits, I'm opening me a tin of caviar. Dependencies do tend to become expensive habits, don't they?

Piece of Cake!

With regards to the kids' parties (yes, I'm still going on about that!), something I take great pride in is the birthday cake. I usually commission my cake-decorating-adept sister-in-law (who has a flawless icing technique which I just can't master) to provide the flawless finish to the ceremonial pudding. 

The cake is important.

The first three themed cakes I made for my offspring, however, were as far from a magnum opus as the crayon scrawl under the dining room table (yes kids, I actually am aware that one, or both, of you has been terribly creative under there!) is from hanging in the Tate Museum. 

The first of these monumental failures was a 5 layer jelly something or other. The second cake was supposed to be bubbles. And maybe, on an abstract kind of level, they did look like bubbles. But do you even know how hard it is too make a cake look like bubbles? Try it. I dare you! By the third cake, I was starting to get into the gear of great self-caking. (That's somewhere before Home Industry Acquisition, but well after Kitchen's Wrecked; Let's Move House). The third creation was a fairy mushroom. With fairies on it. The fairies were Home Industry Acquisitions. I could see it was a mushroom, of course, but after I had received the few quizzical glances from the gathered guests, and had to explain that, actually, under this enormous dome of a cake, there is a rather thin and spindly mushroom stalk holding it all up in the air, I realized that my caking abilities were desperately lacking. That's when the sister-in-law became remarkably employable. And since then the cakes have been a pleasure (not always to make, but to serve - always!)

Which brings me to the point of my story - how hard it was for me, yesterday, to let go and let my children "do" the cake. The children competed in a cake-decorating competition which I found highly stressful (shut it, Control Freak!), but they enjoyed immensely. And they even won a prize for... oh boy... the most Cavity Causing Cake... ouch... talk about putting me in my place! 

So much for always getting it right, right?

50 Things about Me

1. For the first 17 years of my life, I was the youngest of 4 children. And the only girl. I always wanted a sister.

2. I have three adopted siblings. Two of them are girls. Both are young enough to be my own daughters. I don't really see them as sisters.

3. My middle name is Charis. Which is lovely. But I hated it while I was growing up, because my brothers often called me "Carrots".

4. I am married to my best friend.

5. Despite being a trained midwife, I birthed both my children by Caesarean Section. The first delivery was really complicated and I lost a lot of blood during the procedure. Which may explain why, on chatting with my husband later that evening, I said, "That was great! I want to do it again!"

6. I skipped a grade.

7. I can say the alphabet backwards.

8. I have spider-radar, and I am usually pretty accurate with pin-pointing the nearest spider in any given area.

9. When Nelson Mandela was president, I went for a joy-ride in his car. In my pyjamas.

10. I have swum with elephants.

11. I have a weakness for sugar. Often.

12. I am on the pill.

13. I hate being on the pill.

14. I have slip-'n-slid on the pitch cover of the University of Pretoria's cricket pitch shortly after a Highveld thunderstorm. Naked.

15. Try as I might, I just cannot eat snails. They always turn around in my throat and crawl back up.

16. I lived in Saudi Arabia for two years.

17.  I love going fast!

18. I was approached by a man and a woman at the Pretoria Zoo shortly before the Gert van Rooyen case became nation-wide knowledge. I recognised his picture when I saw the news reports on TV.

19. I suck at interior decorating and garden landscaping.

20. I have a bad habit of not completing the projects I start.

21. I worked in a frozen yoghurt shop for a year after school before I started studying. I have had my fill of Natural and English Toffee.

22. I only bath or shower in HOT, HOT, HOT water.

23. I studied nursing as a last resort. It was the only thing I could afford at the time. I paid for my studies myself.

24. I Hate (note: capital H) gyming. It hurts. It make me sweat. I would rather spend my time scrapbooking.

25. I cannot see 3D pictures - at all. I have been trying to see them since 13 February 1995, and I have had no luck. I think I must be special.

26. I have no idea how I remember the date in #25 above.

27. I once held a 7 year-old HIV patient as he drowned in his own saliva. When he took his last breath and his body relinquished his soul, I was actually aware of a little extra air in the room.

28. I can play the flute and the piano. Neither very well.

29. I have spent a glorious week on the island of Mauritius.

30. I have polycystic ovaries.

31. If it weren't for Gayle, Oprah and I would be the best of friends. I love, love, love Oprah.

32. I will kiss my own children's feet no matter how sweaty or stinky they may be. If there's a boo-boo there, I will kiss it better.

33. I still climb trees for fun.

34. I love MSG-enriched Salt 'n Vinegar flavouring. The stronger, the better.

35. I try to avoid MSG-enriched anything wherever my kids are concerned. Also: sodium benzoate and potassium sorbate. Just out of principle.

36. I have used laser hair removal. It really does work. If you can afford it.

37. I can't afford it.

38. I inadvertently killed my goldfish when I was 6 years old by lifting them out of their bowl each morning to greet them.

39. I am a stay-at-home-mom.

40. I have a money and meat inadequacy paranoia. This means that I always have to have some money and some meat stashed away for a rainy day. Currently I have more meat than money.

41. I was once drugged with apple tea in a Turkish carpet souk. It ended with me purchasing a 1m kelim for $75, which, at that time was equal to R562.50 - which was a ludicrous amount of ront for rug. So much for getting bargains in middle eastern bazarres!

42. I want to see Andrea Boccelli perform live. And even though he can't see to appreciate it, I would throw underwear.

43. I fear loss above all else.

44. I love photography and beautiful photographs. Few of the beautiful photographs that I love were taken by me. Ok, so none of them were, but I plan to take beautiful photographs in the future...

45. Bovril is the bomb. Marmite is mediocre.

46. I have breastfed somebody else's child. With the mom's permission, of course. It was a matter of life and death. Kind of.

47. I have always loved trampolines. After a good bounce, I especially love that still-bouncing feeling you get when your feet are on solid ground.

48. I saved a woman's life, who would otherwise have bled to death.

49. I am shy.

50. I have thrown myself (alright, I had to ask them to push me) off the Bloukrans bridge and in so doing, have experienced the world's highest commercial bunjee jump of 216m. I never have to do that again.

Kid Quote

AirBear and The Chef were embroiled in a conversation about vegetables.

Chef: Do you like vegetables?

AirBear: Some vegetables I do like.

Chef: Like butternut?

AirBear: Yes.

Chef: And carrots?

AirBear: Also carrots.

Chef: And baby marrows?

AirBear: No, I don't like baby marrows. I don't even like the grown-up ones.

(AirBear: 3 years, 10 months)

Rude food

As far as eating is concerned, have you ever put something in your mouth expecting it to be one thing, and it turned out to be something else? What's that called anyway, when your expectation of something is shot down in a hale of gunfire? And what about that disappointment you feel just after the moment you close your mouth and realise that this thing lodged between your teeth, is not the morsel you were hoping it to be?

I have a bad habit of cleaning up my workspace in the kitchen by placing my finger on the spilled foodstuff, and popping whatever it is into my mouth. So sue me, alright? It might be gross, but I figure that if the countertops are clean to begin with and the food that spills on the countertop is the same stuff that's being served in the fancy china, what's wrong with tasting the food on the countertop?

This unflattering little quirk of mine has it's drawbacks of course. Every now and then I am subjected to that great regret when the thing in my mouth turns out to be something I would usually not be nibbling on.

Like last night, for instance: I was roasting slivers of sweet potato and carrot in a terracotta baking dish. As I placed the dish back in the oven after a quick check on the roasting procedure, I noticed a crispy looking orange sliver resting on the chrome of the stove top. Without hesitating I picked up the toasted fragment and popped it into my mouth. Expecting crispy carrot. What I got was a shard of terracotta baking dish wedged well and truly behind my top incisor. It's disappointing, really. And embarrassing.

And talking of embarrassing moments of incorrect tasting, let me share another delightful little story with you. 

The story happened about two years ago when my dear little cherubs were barely toddling. We were all sitting around in the lounge partaking of a wonderful fettucini alfredo. The children were testing the meal out of their parents' bowls (as little children do). It was quite a busy scene with little people scrambling up onto the adults' laps and hopping off again the moment they had had enough of what was on offer. The meal was tasty. The sauce particularly so. At one point during the meal I looked down and happened to notice a gloop of alfredo sauce dripped on my blouse. Brain has no say in the matter as Jessica gathers up her blouse and licks the spill off.

Sensitive readers would do well to look away now.

Turns out that in all the clambering up and down, one of my precious darlings had wiped their nose on my blouse. And I leave that sad story there.

Other deceptive mouthfuls I've come across are the following: a cube of apple flesh hiding in a salad appearing to all intents and purposes to be a block of feta cheese; wasabi camouflaged as guacamole; the top of a red chilli pretending to be half a baby tomato; cold porridge posing as mashed potato; a plastic bead in my blueberry compote.

So be careful little teeth what you eat...

The STUFF saga continues

BLOGDATE 30stuDydusTecHocabLes and counting:

Small party sent into the STUDY today. Of the 5 men sent in, only one returned (gratefully, and I mean this with all the sympathy to the families who have suffered terrible losses in this expedition,  it was my husband). Have informed the families of our fallen comerades of their losses. We are now alone in our mission to combat the STUFF.

The STUFF in the STUDY (debris from a recent office clean-out) has been left undisturbed for some time, and the original research party decided it was time to take a closer look at what was going on in there.

From a distance (like, say, from the lounge, or better still, from outside next to the swimming pool, with an ice-cold drink in your hand and someone rubbing suntan cream on your back) the STUFF seems fairly docile and even inconspicuous. On closer inspection, however, the STUFF  is a heaving, breathing, pile-upon-pile of matter with a very definite and diabolical mind of it's own. It has expanded somewhat since it's original relocation to the confines of the STUDY, and has pretty much made any navigation into that area impossible. This is particularly problematic as other crucial equipment located in that room (like the telephone, modem and accounts file) is now completely inaccessible.

The main aim of the scouting troop was to identify if the STUFF has a weakness, what that weakness may be, and while they're there, could they please look for my iPod?

The mission lasted half the morning. Base station 1 (located in the safety of the kitchen, near the kettle and toaster) almost commissioned sniffer dogs to locate the party when one pitiful figure appeared at the door, holding an iPod connector cable, a Barbie doll (sans clothing, hair matted), and looking, for want of a better word, pained.

"Water!" he gasped. I threw my cup of tea over him. It revived him a little.

T-Bird and Air Bear appeared from under the coffee table to argue over the Barbie. She crumbled into a pile of dust on the kitchen counter. A breeze through the open window swept the dust away in a little swirl of caramel coloured glitter.

"It's bewitched," he stammered, "there's something very strange about the STUFF.

"For one, it ate the PC."

The PC has lain, somewhat forlorn and forgotten in the STUDY since long before the STUFF arrived, but not much after the Mac did. Seems like the STUFF cursed the PC, and now the PC has given up its ghost and moved on to the happy motherboard in the sky.

"Also, I found this," he reached into his pocket and withdrew one golden stick about the size and shape of a McDonald's chip.

"What is it?" I asked, holding my breath.

"It's a McDonald's chip," he looked unamused.

"How long has it been there?" No-one has had any form of fast-food in the STUDY since well before the Mac arrived, which would place the arrival of the McD potato sliver at about October 2007.

We glared at the chip. It didn't move. It didn't melt. It didn't turn to dust. Instead it glistened a little in the sunlight streaming through the kitchen window and emitted a pleasantly intoxicating deep-fried odour. 

It made me hungry. And then it made me worry. If, and I seriously doubt this, the STUFF has managed to use the telephone and order fast food delivery straight to the STUDY, and then proceeded to devour the ordered meal, leaving one crispy chip as the only clue to its insidious behaviour, then we have a real problem on our hands. But, and this is the more likely explanation, if that chip was a dropped crumb from a grabbed-on-the-go-meal that someone had in (at least) October last year, we have an even bigger problem. The problem is that a 5 month old (at the very least) chip, looks, feels and smells like it just came out from under the golden arches. Has Ronald MacDonald not heard of mould? I mean come on! Shouldn't food that old be slightly discoloured (I'm thinking green-grey), a little mushy maybe, preferrably smelling a bit rancid? I'm not kidding when I say that that one little sliver of vegetable could have easily been on any one of your plates this afternoon (assuming, of course, that you had take-outs for lunch).

Am quite off fast-food for a bit.

And still the STUFF remains, bar a couple of papers that slid out under the door this afternoon which I threw in the trash - can't be tolerating any of that inconspicuous creeping into the main house now, can we?

Fixing the Food Fiasco

After yesterday's dismal discovery of how completely banal my children's lunch boxes are, I headed straight for my nearby Pick 'n Pay and loaded my trolley with an arsenal of lunch box fillers.

When I arrived at the check out point with a trolley overflowing with snacks, and two little girls thinking it was Christmas, the cashier raised her eyebrows and asked, "Party?"

"Eh, no," I mumbled and then did my best not to make eye contact with her throughout the rest of the transaction.

I could have sworn she was tutting under her breath.

This morning I packed the girls lunches for them while they were eating their (extremely humdrum) breakfast of cornflakes. Air-Bear managed to eat her bowl one boring flake at a time.

Their eyes lit up when they saw what I was putting into their boxes... guava roll, rice cakes with Bovril, dried mango strips, peanuts and raisins and a finger biscuit each (can't be that unhealthy if we give them to babies to teeth on, right?). I slipped in a puffy flower sticker each while they weren't watching. 

Ok, ok, so maybe I went overboard a little, but my guilty conscience feels much better with its Band Aid of overcompensation plastered neatly over my prosaic lunch box potential. 

As I was packing up, the next obstacle crossed the path. The clasp on T-bird's lunch box is malfunctioning. The lid just wouldn't stay down!

"I think Air should have this box," she suggested as I wrestled with the plastic repository.

"It's a perfectly fine lunch box," I grunted, giving up and heading off to find some Scotch tape to tape the receptacle shut.

And so the kids have been safely deposited at their respective schools, both with lunch boxes brimming with enticing goodies, one taped up like a birthday present.

I am left to pack away the collected stash of treats (and possibly sample the fruit dainites - DAMMIT!! - this is why I don't want to have these yummy things in the house!!!) and to draw up next week's shopping list: Item 1: Lunch Box.

Lousy Lunch Lady

I am a mean mom. I deprive my kids. Daily. And they are more than happy to elaborate the awful, torturous details to anybody who may feign the slightest interest in their torture and neglect.

Let me explain.

I pack my kids each a lunch to take to school everyday. Which is already a whole lot more than what my mother did for me. 

When I was at school, I had to make my own sandwich if I wanted anything to eat at school. It was such a pain in the bum getting up a few minutes earlier everyday to smear the peanut butter and jam across whatever wheat-based product happened to be in the bread bin at the time. If I was feeling energetic over a weekend, I would butter up a loaf of sarmies - mostly Marmite flavoured, wrap them in wax wrap (which I just never got the hang of, so my sandwiches tended to unwrap themselves between the time they were "wrapped" to the time I opened my lunchbox at break-time),  and chuck them into the back of the freezer (which generally meant that my badly wrapped sarmies lost their covers and got freezer burn by the time they were needed). Leaving for school in the morning, I would grab a ready-made (rock hard) sarmie, throw it into my bag only to retrieve it a couple of hours later, neatly thawed between my Maths homework and a Geography textbook. This sort of worked for a while, until someone (and I do suspect my siblings to be the guilty party in this regard), started helping themselves to my ready-made meals. So it was back to the early morning frenzied sandwich assembly. By the time I was in secondary school, I stopped eating at school in a desperate attempt to be skinny. While this did save me the morning sandwich making stress, it did nothing for my weight. (As a side note: I never had enough will power to be anorexic - I could not resist food for long enough. This has been my greatest obstacle in sticking to any kind of diet, actually. If it tastes nice, I'm going to eat it. And not just enough to get a taste, I'd rather finish it, thanks.)

Back to present-day child abuse: I pack a fruit (apple - skinned and sliced, banana or grapes - destalked) and a low GI whole-wheat Bovril (can't stand Marmite anymore - also can't imagine why not..)) sandwich (cut in soldiers, triangles, or, sometimes, hearts and stars - thank you Tupperware cookie cutters!) for my kids' lunches. Everyday. Sometimes I'll add some raisins or a couple of nuts. Not often. Just sometimes.

Today my curiosity got the better of me and I snuck a peak at what other kids are getting in their lunchboxes. 

Should have done it when Air-Bear was inside. She stood beside me with big, woeful eyes as I gazed upon the feast of biscuits, pretzels, fruit rolls, marshmallows, flings, ham and baby tomato skewers, squeezy cheezies, yoghurts, fruit dainties,  corn chips, cocktail viennas and pineapple and guava fruit salads.

"Mom," she whispered so as not to disturb the holy aura of this wonderful smorgasbord. "I don't like my sandwich."

I swear there were tears in her eyes.

I felt awful. My poor deprived little darlings! The torture of munching on a seedy, dry sarmie when all your table-fellows are gorging on MSG and sugar laden treats. (OK, so maybe they weren't all unhealthy meals - but I am trying to make myself feel a little better for trying to be healthy, albeit boring.)

Here I was thinking that I was being so much better than my mother had been to me, when there were all these children who's mothers (? I think there may be a handful of au pairs and grannies in the bunch) were going to all the effort of making fancy little meals for their darling offspring.

Not wanting to go the fast food route, and aiming to keep my kids' lunch-boxes healthy, I hereby dedicate myself to the inclusion of at least one non-boring "treat" in their lunch-boxes each day.

Suggestions welcome. And needed. Please.