High jinks in high winds

In between some serious work, I spent quite a time today looking at all the hilarious videos and photos that people have been posting of Capetonians coping with the galeforce wind we are having here. The funny thing about the wind is, when it is just blowing hard day after day, everyone moans and is bad tempered, but when it blows galeforce for days, and you have to hang on the poles just to stay upright, it seems that our sense of humour prevails and everybody laughs together as they blow this way and that like a bunch of inebriates.

It brings to mind the time a double-decker bus was blown over on the Foreshore, the most notorious wind tunnel in Cape Town, together with several light trucks such as those that deliver potato chips and have no substance to hold them down.

I once crossed Adderley Street in some rather high platform heels and was toppled like a tree. I just lay there in the middle of the road, laughing until somebody picked me up. I never wore those shoes again, needless to say.

A wind speed of 164km/hr was recorded on top of Table Mountain in the last 24 hours - that is quite impressive and surely another good reason for it to be one of the new Wonders of the World!

Daybreak ditherings

Woke up this morning at 4 o'clock with the wind bashing the branches of a tree against the house. It's a wooden house on stilts, so being hit by the soft upper branches creates quite a racket as they scrape and whip against the gutters and window. Leaves have blown in through the open windows, even though it's just a couple of inches and in the light of day I will find the garden littered with twigs and leaves for raking up. I think it's time to get the men of the household up a ladder and cut back the trees that are growing too close to the house.

Can't get back to sleep, as the sky is getting light already and believe it or not, a hadedah is squawking outside, so even the birds are up and about.

Two days ago, a pair of rock pigeon fledglings lost their nest to the wind and have taken up residence on the lintel above my front door - you can only imagine what a mess that is making. They are not at all frightened of our comings and goings and just sit there all day. The mother flies in from time to time and feeds them, although they can fly and are fully feathered. It seems a bit odd, but maybe they are traumatised by the loss of their home. If they don't go soon I will have to put down a litter tray for them. If it's not the cats (RIP), it's birds. It seems that the animal kingdom rules at this house.

A third day of galeforce winds is now here - this weekend is the inauguration of Table Mountain as one of the new Wonders of the World. It seems unlikely that the cable car will be running so that could put a damper on things and as it will be covered with its famous tablecloth, we may not even be able to see it on its special day! Never mind, we've always regarded it as a wonder of the world anyway. What's in a name?

If it weren't for the clouds, the sun would be nearly up. After all this brain exercise, I think I might take 40 winks after all.

Gale tale

Who would have believed the wind would get stronger today? It has adjusted itself by a critical degree or so which means that our house is now in the path of the gusts that swoosh down from the mountain. You can hear the roar as it approaches and then all the doors slam and the curtains billow out of the windows as the wind tries to turn the house inside out! Being on stilts means that we rock and roll quite considerably and the pictures all have to be straightened once the wind has settled down.

We've survived for 30 years so I don't anticipate tipping over any time soon, but a few years ago, we were woken up in the night of a fearsome gale by the sound of metallic banging. As we don't have any metal in our construction, we thought it must be a sheet on the roof of the wendyhouse, but when we went outside onto the balcony to look, horrors! it was our neighbour two doors away! They have a flat roof and the entire structure had lifted at the edge and was folding itself up with each new blast. Corrugated iron sheeting must be one of the most dangerous things in a high wind and I could imagine being sliced in half if hit by one. The noise was horrendous and the poor neighbour, who was obviously beside herself, could be seen running up and down inside with a torch as the electricity had failed as well.

Although it was a terrible thing, it had an element of comedy about it, for us as spectators anyway, especially since the wind was blowing away from us and we weren't the ones in any danger. I suppose there is something about prospective disasters and extreme elements that attract people, a sense of being near danger and getting the adrenalin rush without suffering injury - probably why crowds gather at accidents, to gawk and agree with other bystanders that it was lucky it wasn't them.

Fortunately the neighbours suffered no injury themselves except for nearly having heart attacks and it was a story to dine out on for a long time!

Small mumblings...

A true November southeaster is howling across the Peninsula, sandblasting the legs of beachgoers and cars travelling along Baden Powell Drive on the northern shore of False Bay. I am always amazed that the little strip of tar which runs along the beach from Muizenberg to almost Somerset West has survived all these years. In places it is barely 50 metres to the sea with just a gentle sloping down from the road. After a good blow, the road is completely covered in sand and closed to traffic, and then the wind changes and shifts it all back onto the beach. It is the scene of many car adverts, as those who are familiar with the area will testify - the Peninsula seems to be a favourite destination for car adverts and film shoots, both local and international, and it never fails to give me a thrill to recognise 'home' on the TV.

Off Kommetjie, the waves are blowing out to sea, struggling to make it ashore even though the full moon has brought a high tide this afternoon, and a tiny yacht is motoring by, not even attempting to put up a sail. The moon is at apogee at present (meaning furthest distance away from the earth - use the word afar to remember the a in apogee) and so is having a slightly lesser effect on the tide than normal. It is also the smallest full moon we will see, but don't worry, you won't notice - it is meaningless in the greater scale of the universe.

Tonight (or rather at 3.30 tomorrow morning 29 November), there will be an occultation of Jupiter by the moon, whereby the moon will pass in front of Jupiter in a form of eclipse. If you are up at that time, go outside and have a look. Hold a pencil over the moon otherwise you won't see it!

The wind is set to blow like this for about 4 days - the Cape Doctor is going to cure us of all the germs and smog that are hanging about after a long winter. The sea on the Atlantic side will become crystal clear and turn the colour of a quiet Mediterranean bay.

Isn't nature wonderful - so much to observe and all for free.

Another gallivant with Granny!

In a previous post about my late Granny, I mentioned that a number of family members had inherited her traits, and my sister immediately assumed that I meant her and her tendency to be unwavering in her opinions. However, what I really meant was that I seem to have inherited her tendency to turn things on and then forget about them.

Another memorable memory lapse (she would today call it multi-tasking) was the time she was ironing. In those days, a blanket would cover the kitchen table and an old sheet would provide the smooth surface to iron on. She put the iron down and went to hang up the dress and never returned to the kitchen. She went down the road to the shop.

On her return, she found the blanket smouldering, and took it outside and propped it against the windowsill. It continued to smoulder and eventually the window frame caught alight, which was only noticed when my mother and her sisters, who were playing a game, came into the kitchen and found it was filled with smoke! Great excitement ensued and the neighbour was duly called to come and put the fire out! Imagine if she had burned the house down.

I'm sure she would have been forgiven - Grandpa must have been a very understanding man.

Appreciation

I went outside to hang out the washing and as I put peg to clothing, I stared up at the sky and saw it was blue and white puffy clouds drifted idly by. Birds twittered in the trees and a butterfly fluttered by, looking for a place to lay its eggs for the next caterpillar onslaught on my garden. In the vegetable patch, trusses of ripening cherry tomatoes are waiting for my next salad and the lemon tree, which I thought had seen its last season, is a mass of green again.

The wellpoint is delivering unlimited water from a basin in the rocks underneath the lawn, and a small fountain tinkles behind me, where the birds bath every evening. Fifty metres away, the waves are tumbling into the bay, the only sound that is carrying on the breeze.

A tenacious bokbaai vygie is clinging to life, having flowered since August, determined to outdo itself this year. The cactus is in bloom with two flowers at once and a third opening as I watch.

Inside the house, I have gas for the stove, electricity for the lights and food in the fridge. On my computer, I have work which allows me to earn a living from home. A blank canvas waits in my studio for the time when inspiration strikes, and two books are well on the way. And I really appreciate that so many people around the world seem to enjoy my writing, which is its whole purpose.

How lucky I am!

The champ

He Who Can Fix Anything was officially crowned Fine Cars Champion for 2012 last night, the second year in a row. Not bad for someone who has just turned 60 and is racing against much younger men and more powerful cars. He does all his own mechanical work and surprisingly enough, acknowledged that I was his number one gearbox lifter, to the amusement of the crowd, who all employ mechanics to do their dirty work. We now have about 50 trophies and it's getting hard to find a place to put them - not in the house, thank goodness, in his bar area downstairs. The best part of all these trophies is they aren't silver any more and so there is no polishing involved!

Although he intends to defend his title for a third year, I did suggest that he should retire while he is on top, rather than make an embarrassing comeback like Schumacher, but he didn't bite. I just hope the gearboxes last better next year.

The suffering of others

Isn't it just Murphy's Law! Tomorrow there is an all-day outdoor festival in Kommetjie with stalls and demonstrations on the lawns at the Kom, bands playing at various pubs and restaurants, an expected crowd of thousands, and it's going to rain. Not today or Sunday - tomorrow. Let's hope all those who have put so much time and effort into making the festival a success won't be disappointed and find that the public are made of strong stuff. We're not very used to going out in rainy weather here. We have the luxury of not having to do it if we don't want to, because it seldom lasts for more than a day, or even half a day.

Unlike the United Kingdom, famously known as that soggy little island. After the wettest summer in 100 years, the winter rains have nowhere to go - the land is sodden and can't absorb any more water, which has to run off to each side of the water courses, making for severe flooding over vast tracts of land. Residents near rivers have been told to move all valuables upstairs if they have one. What a dreadful situation, particularly with the low winter temperatures, and widespread electricity failure. How miserable it must be.

It seems churlish to worry about having our festival spoiled with a little rain when so many around the world are subject to the vagaries of the weather and we live in one of the most equitable climates in the world. Every day when I wake up I say thank you for my warm bed and hot running water in my shower. I've had plenty of times when the electricity has failed and it's been a cold shower before work, and I am eternally grateful that that is the greatest hardship I have been subjected to in my life. It is no small mercy.

Things got better as the day went on...

I didn't get off to a very good start this morning. With a list of to-dos involving five different places (and I really hate getting in and out of the car five times - I haven't figured out what kind of phobia that is - perhaps 'thiscaristoolowonthegroundphobia'), I set out early on my mission. The first stop was the post office to see if an important document had arrived from London for my son - after a bit of searching, they found it - and then he wanted me to go back home and fetch a file and take it to him at work. I was on my way to the mall anyway, but this was an extra in-and-out-of-the-car. Always being eager to please my offspring, I duly delivered the goods and set off again on my mission.

As I browsed through summer tops at the cut-price clothing store, wondering why there was nothing in between S and XXL, my phone rang. No, it wasn't someone inviting me to lunch under a shady tree. It was my daughter, laughing hysterically because she was locked in the little space between the front door and the security gate, and her key was inside. She was trapped in the blazing sun at my mercy, because she could only get out if I drove all the way back home (10km round trip) to let her out. If it hadn't been for the sun and the fact that she needed to be at work, I would have left her there as a lesson not to be neurotic and lock every gate and door! So I abandoned my search for the right size and did some more in-and-out-of-the-carring. As soon as the monkey was out of the cage, I set off again on my mission.

I crossed the Peninsula and duly queued for the car licence then went further afield and did my hunter-gatherer thing so that the offspring would get dinner, cunningly passing by a delightful coffee shop and detouring for a cappuccino and salad. Things were looking up!

And when I got home, it was as though the city council had read yesterday's blog. The workers were out in full force, armed with weedeaters and wearing full health and safety armour, converting my front garden into a veritable paradise of neatly trimmed lawn and edges, no more thorns. A heartwarming sight indeed. As soon as they had departed, bearing black bags full of my unwanted cuttings, I set out the sprinklers, turned on the wellpoint pump and settled myself on the balcony with a nice cup of tea and a sea view.

A better end than the beginning!

Keeping me on my toes

It's such a long time since the council cut the grass verges that the wild grasses are shoulder high and waving in my face as I cut a swathe through Africa (Rolux Magnummmm!). Most of you are probably too young to remember that advert for lawnmowers. This grass needs to be cut with a scythe now - I have started at the edge, pulling out handfuls, and have surprisingly made good inroads. The worst part is that hidden under all the grass are thousands of thorn plants which grew unchecked throughout winter and have already dropped their seeds, the infamous 'dubbeltjies' which cling tenaciously to the dogs' coats and have to be cut out. This leaves the dogs looking moth-eaten unless they also have a lawnmower cut and are shaved completely.

When I was much younger, I used to pull the thorns out as soon as I saw the new ones shooting and this kept them under control for years; the main reason for my hard labour was because they were the 'duiweldoring' - devil thorns - which have three unbelievably vicious spikes. Anyone who used to wear those soft rubber flipflops in the 60s can attest to how easily they go right through the soles - it was the worst thing ever to get one in your heel - it felt as though a bone had been penetrated. And every time anyone went out on a bicycle, it was instant punctures all round.

So the 'duiweldoring' is gone, but my mission for the next few seasons will be to eradicate the 'dubbeltjie'. The porcupine is digging up the pesky onion weed, so between the two of us, there should be a vast stretch of park-like area in front of the house in a year or so! Of course, that might encourage picnic parties, as happens further along the road, so a few well-placed bougainvilleas might need to be introduced, or a bank of aloes.

Now there's an idea - a 90ft stretch of aloes and proteas sounds like a much better option than a lawn, and it won't need watering. Better get my spade out now!

Summer rain

It rained in Kommetjie today. Not the sharp needles of biting cold that slash us in winter, when you dash from doorway to car and car to doorway if you really have to go out in it. No, this is the gentle rain of a summer's day that has forgotten that the wind blows hard over the Peninsula and just drifts in from the west, bringing moisture from the ocean to give you a break from watering the garden. It's the gentle rain that you can lift your face up to and receive as a blessing from the heavens, bathing you in pure water that hasn't had chlorine added to it. I bet the pH balance is just right too.

I recall summer school holidays when it rained like this and we would splash along barefoot in the puddles, the road warm from the sun and the water the same temperature as the air. There is a certain smell that accompanies warm rain and if I could, I would describe it. But words haven't been invented for the taste of warm rain or the way it feels as it touches your bare skin. It's purely sensory, and if you haven't experienced it, go outside and receive a free hydration therapy from nature. Don't worry about your hair curling or going straight. It will also enjoy the bath.

Comprehension, or the lack of it.

Have you ever noticed how everybody has a different way of interpreting things? A number of people at a morning class I attend received the same email from the teacher regarding the state of her health and describing the treatment she was undergoing.

I understood that she had to take some powerful antibiotics for a lung infection that she would have preferred not to take, and was to stay in bed for a week.

Another person told me in great distress that our poor teacher had emailed her to say she was seriously ill and was having something similar to chemotherapy and didn't know when we would see her again. I said she must have got a different email to me and went off to ask another member what he had heard. His take was entirely different, as he understood she would be back soon and was well on the way to recovery.

This shows how easily rumours spread and stories become distorted by each telling. The danger is that, if you repeat it, you could be party to passing on a falsehood which will be damaging to someone's reputation and yours. Once you become known for always getting it wrong, not only will your audience diminish, but you will find conversations tailing off in your presence. By all means, listen to what people want to tell you if you have the time and inclination, but digest it, form your own opinion and then keep it to yourself. That way they will have got the gossip off their chest, and you will have stopped it in its tracks.

Here endeth the lesson...

More porcupine tales

The porcupine continues his nightly ramble down our road, foraging for bulbs under the lawn and leaving craters for the unwary to twist an ankle in. For those who have no fences around their properties, the compost heap is the best place to detract him from your bulbs, and as long as you are not actually wanting to use the compost, is the ideal way to dispose of most kitchen scraps.

Porcupines eat a wide variety of foods, even bread, and you will soon learn what they don't like - carrot tops, onions, pineapple leaves. I've taken to throwing our scraps under the hedge, far from our boundary, as I have had enough bad porcupine experiences to last a lifetime, as regular readers of this blog will know.  I reckon as long as he is in the area, I may as well occupy him at a safe distance.

He recently dug up a little patch of wild freesias that I had planted 30 years ago and only flowered this spring for the first and now last time.

My parents live up on the mountainside in Clovelly and have had tremendous problems with porcupines over the years. A raiding pair developed a taste for bark and systematically stripped the lower trunk of an enormous syringa tree in the middle of the garden, progressing to the root system and chewing off the tender root bark, scattering soil far and wide. Eventually the tree just gave up and died. Undeterred, the porcupines simply moved on to the fig tree, which succumbed shortly thereafter.

Despite resorting to feeding them with crates of leaves from the local supermarkets, they still make a detour to the bougainvillea from time to time and all bulbs have to be kept in containers on tables. Doubtless they will soon learn to climb.

Although they cause widespread destruction in our gardens, I'm sure we would miss them if they disappeared - they are, after all, part of the ecosystem and have as much right to be here as we do.

Leaving a message

I phoned a friend for her birthday and got a voice asking me to leave a message. That caught me on the back foot - I hadn't prepared for such an eventuality. Should I be a coward and just end the call? But then she might wonder who had called and it's always annoying to go through the palaver of retrieving your messages, only to find the coward hadn't left one!

The beep sounded and I wracked my brains for an appropriate, meaningful and heartwarming birthday message, but all I could come up with was a few ums, ahs and a totally insincere-sounding platitude. I felt so embarrassed to have it associated with me that I almost called back to apologise.

I'm not usually stuck for something to say, but there's something about a robotic voice that throws me off balance. Maybe it's because I don't like interacting with machines. I think I should prepare myself in future and keep a list of suitable messages and greetings stuck on the wall of my workspace so that I can snap one off at a moment's notice and appear cool and calm at all times.

Then again, that just wouldn't be me.

The Beemer #3

Thinking about the fun I had with this car! One of the things I loved about it was the size of the engine. It was massive and completely filled the engine compartment. You could barely fit your hand between the bits and pieces (you can tell I don't know what to call them!). One day a friend brought his car around so that He Who Can Fix Anything could fix something in it. I look at his engine, flung open the bonnet of the Beemer and said, "That's not an engine! This is an engine!" It really was very impressive. Of course, this remark emanated from my favourite movie at the time, Crocodile Dundee, where Mick is being mugged in New York and he says to the mugger, "That's not a knife! This is a knife!" as he pulls out his crocodile-killing knife  from the back of his pants. Never failed to laugh at that and was thrilled to be able to use the line.

Another favourite trick was to drive into the parking lot at work, where the staff would be relaxing between shifts, and swing into my parking space without slowing down, stopping one inch from the wall to get everyone's heart beating for the day ahead. Somehow, luck was always on my side and I never made a fool of myself by misjudging the distance.

Ah, those reckless days of youth!

Food from the sea and other musings

There's a massive shorebreak along the coastline at Kommetjie today. It's the first day of the crayfish season and this is the sea's defence against its plunder, ensuring that no boats can put to sea. Even the divers are scratching around in the shallows.

The most successful fishermen today are the birds. A cormorant just popped up in the bay with a fat fish in its beak - in the struggle to position it to swallow, the fish escaped and the cormorant was instantly in hot pursuit; I could see its wake as it darted hither and thither, eventually emerging triumphant with its prey and allowing no margin for error this time as it tossed the meal down its gullet.

It's very low tide right now, yet the breakers are sweeping in at 10ft and more. At high tide the Outer Kom will be bespeckled with brave waveriders. Just saw one catching a superb ride - I'll raise that height to 15ft as the surfer is dwarfed against the surging grey-green wall of raw power heading relentlessly towards the rocky ledges.

If you're in the area, swing by. It'll be worth it.

Meeting place through the years

As I went through my Tai Chi breathing exercises this morning, it occurred to me that the little community hall where the class was taking place, aptly named the Minor Hall, had played a large part in my life over the years, right from the age of about 5. This means I have been using that hall for some 50 years, along with much of the Fish Hoek community.

I remember church fetes, such happy events with willing and enthusiastic helpers, with so many stalls that they spilled out into the sunny courtyard where you might even find a pony ride if you were very lucky. The local Dramatic Company staged excellent and very professional plays in the main hall of the Civic Centre, and I participated in piano eisteddfods there in my primary school days.

And how could I ever forget the first wedding I was allowed to attend? I still remember Bernard and Rose dancing the first dance - I was probably 6 at the time and I thought her dress was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

The years passed and our teenage years were a time of Friday night discos in the Minor Hall. As I practiced the steps of the Short Form, I could picture DJ Pygmy in the corner with his strobe lights and mirror ball and Radar Love by Golden Earring vibrating through my bones, even though this morning's meditational music was a far cry from that exciting rhythm.

More years passed, and now I sometimes make speeches in that room, at the Astronomy Club meetings where we discuss the wonders of the universe and share our experiences of practical astronomy. On a different evening the venue is transformed into a formal setting with clothed tables for the Toastmasters club which is yet another activity I will soon be participating in.

As I thought back over all the different times I have been in that place, perhaps standing on that very spot, it was as though my life passed before me. It is said that the only time is Now, and it certainly seemed as though a substantial portion of my existence had passed through that very room in the twinkling of an eye.

The Beemer #2

I was thinking about my old BMW I used to drive - mechanics are wont to call them BM trouble yous - and mine certainly had its idiosyncrasies. A favourite one was to cut out while I was driving. There I would be, cruising along on the school run, five kids in the car (it was a 7-series and very spacious), and suddenly the engine would die. The first time this happened, I waited at the side of the road until I could eventually get it to start again. But here is the value of idle chit chat with girlfriends. I mentioned to a general group that this had happened and one girl said, "Oh that happens all the time to me. I hit the air filter with the heel of my shoe and then it goes again for ages!"

Well, imagine telling that to a mechanic - he would mentally tell himself that you were mental and then dismantle the entire engine and look for faulty wiring or spark plugs. After all, what do women know about cars? So the very next time this happened, I pulled over from the line of slow moving traffic, raised the bonnet and hit the air filter sharply with a spanner which was handy in the toolkit that comes with the car in a neat compartment under the boot lid. Closed everything up, back in the car and off we went again. So obviously that theory was correct.

I did this many times over the years, frequently endeavouring to impart my knowledge to various mechanics who just wouldn't take me seriously. One even had the gall to suggest I might have run out of petrol (that was the one time that the spanner didn't work!) and we never did get to the root of the problem. Too many other things eventually went wrong and I traded it in for a Toyota Tazz which still goes without any trouble 10 years later.

Style, comfort and class are no substitute for reliability!

Thunderstorm

We're having a spot of thunder and lightning over Cape Town at the moment. Those who live in Johannesburg or Durban will scoff at those words. Our storms bear little resemblance to the massive electrical displays over the Highveld and the Drakensberg, but nevertheless they can still be impressive when directly overhead.

The day started with scattered clouds and a gentle south east mist climbing over the mountains of the Peninsula. By mid-afternoon, purple-black sheets covered the sky from north to south and stretched out over the Atlantic Ocean. A distant rumbling gave the first lightning bolt away, and my little dog began to tremble. I rushed for the rescue remedy and dribbled a drop or two onto her inner ear to calm her nerves and she scuttled away to weather the storm under a cupboard.

The lightning is quite infrequent but definitely coming closer. At first I counted 50 seconds between the flash and the thunder, but as I write, a flash appeared in my peripheral vision and the count was only 10 seconds. Weird and wonderful shapes and colours are developing in the sky above us and as I take these pictures, a flash bursts across the sky, too quick to capture, and a strong wind blows my way as if the air has been pushed away by the lightning. The sun has dipped below the edge of the cloud, casting a surreal golden light across the landscape, and a flash suddenly seems to be outside the window! Should I be typing on my notebook? Another flash, they are coming closer and more frequently. I'll be mad as a snake if I get zapped!

Definitely getting closer, the last one shook the house. I'll switch off now and go outside and enjoy it!

Birthday celebration

Today I attended the 1st birthday celebration of my great-nephew, Alexander. He was born on 11 November 2011, believed to be a most auspicious day in the cosmic evolution. I like to think that he is going to turn out to be a remarkable person who will leave a worthy legacy for generations to come.

In the meantime, he is a very sturdy child, contented and easygoing and a very good traveller. He has already been to Spain and been the youngest guest at his uncle's wedding in Marbella, and I can tell you from personal experience that he took it all in his stride, or rather the length of his pram. His mother handled all the details with aplomb, and there was nowhere that Alexander wasn't to be seen; even the pram is in the beach pictures. How marvellous to have the conveniences of today that enable you to travel with small children - imagine how difficult it must have been before the age of disposable nappies - dragging a sterinappi bucket with you?!

He has the darkest eyelashes I have ever seen (looks like mascara) and the deepest blue eyes any boy could wish for, and I believe there is an awful lot of wisdom in that young head - he is one of the new generation of children who are going to change the world for the better. This is something I just know. Look at this photo and see what you think.

Gallivanting with Granny

My grandmother was a remarkable woman. Devoted to her four daughters to the exclusion of all others, she was not an easy granny, and it is unfortunate that, although she died when she was 86, it was only afterwards that we began to become more tolerant of her personality and understand that everyone must be allowed to be themselves without having to conform to what you expect they should be - especially when the family traits began to show in other members of the family! If I had known she had so many stories to tell, I would have taken the time to ask her about them, but fortunately my mother has imparted many of them, which should surely be recorded for posterity.

She was a talented artist, pianist and card-player, and doubtless her artistic bent can be used to explain away   her apparent forgetfulness in the course of daily life. The following story I found particularly delightful:

Living in Kalk Bay at the time, Granny decided to visit her sister-in-law, who lived in Clifton. She got into her little car (we are talking about 72 years ago), taking her youngest daughter with her (the others were at school) and set off along the primitive road that crossed the Fish Hoek valley and wound over Chapman's Peak, through Hout Bay, up over to Llandudno, along the coast to Camps Bay and at last Clifton. This was no small journey.

No sooner had she arrived than she remembered she had left a pot of soup on the stove, and immediately got back in the car and drove straight back home! What a marvellous way to live!

Sandy story

Well, as I predicted in my blog the other day, nature was inhaling during the brief respite we had from the wind, and now she is exhaling like a student at a Qi Gong breathing class. Sand is blowing from the beaches of the Peninsula to form new beaches in places no one ever thought the beach would reach.

Before the advent of settlements in the Fish Hoek valley, where the natural to and fro movement of the dunes according to the prevailing seasons was unhindered, a strandloper gathering shellfish might have been irritated by the stinging sand on his legs, but would have accepted it for what it was. Now that we have built railway lines and roads across the broad expanse of shifting sand, we have altered the free flow forever. It is not unknown for sand to reach as far as the Main Road through Fish Hoek or for the railway line to be completely covered after a good blow.

In Hout Bay, the dunes are reclaiming buildings which have been erected too close to the beach and even the round around the harbour would be reclaimed in only a few years if the sand wasn't regularly taken back to the beach in a truck. This beach supplied the sand for the dunes which stretched up the mountainside and over to Sandy Bay, returning with the north west gales of winter. All of this has been covered in townhouses and high density housing. Those unfortunate enough to live in this natural path of dune formation must spit grit most of the time and wonder why they are living there!

A visit to the local museum of the history of the valley will show cars being pushed through deep drift sands in the early 20th century before roads were built or 4x4s invented. How ironic that we needed the 4x4s before the roads existed, and now that we have smooth tarred roads, we should be driving the little thin-tyred cars of those early days, but 4x4s predominate, most of which have never seen a dirt track, let alone been bogged down in drift sand. We seem to have got it all the wrong way round.

Weird weather for November

An eerie stillness has settled over the Peninsula. After days of howling wind from the south east, as is expected in November, the past four days have been windless, a gentle drift from the south west. It is almost as though nature is pausing between breaths, having let it all out, and is preparing to inhale again before lashing us with another gale. The clouds have formed and vapourised, formed and vapourised, sometimes as ice clouds high up and at other times almost fog. And intermittently, there is blue sky and the sun, which is currently the most dangerous thing around, scorches down on us with an intensity not experienced in the northern hemisphere, where the ozone layer still protects more efficiently. In between, the drift from the sea is icy, necessitating warmer clothing. In November!

The Atlantic is glassy and pale grey, with no swell, allowing the tuna skiboats to skim across the water at maximum speed, not something they can do very often. On the False Bay side, the sea is crystal clear and the colour of a pale green bottle. You would be able to spot a great white shark coming from Seal Island!

People are starting to wonder what has happened to the weather. It's probably a demonstration of what to expect in the future - the unexpected. In the meantime, we Capetonians can enjoy a respite from the wind and keep our doors and windows open without fear of having the contents of our houses blown out through the back door!

More quick and easy recipes

Tonight we are having baked chicken. Every day my son phones to ask what's for supper. I always say baked chicken and then he can be surprised, because it's always different, depending on what I decide at the last minute. Even now I haven't quite settled on the recipe.  Here are the alternatives:

1. Mix 1 cup tomato sauce, 1 cup chutney, 1/2 cup syrup, 2 Tblsp worcestershire sauce, brown sugar, salt and pepper. Add chilli to taste if liked. Place chicken pieces in a casserole, cover with sauce and tin foil, bake for 30 minutes at 180 deg C, take off foil and cook another 15 minutes until brown and crisp. Serve with rice and salad or peas, carrots and squash. This is my personal preference. You may eat what you like!

2. Mix 1 cup orange juice, 1 cup mayonnaise, 1 cup chutney. Chop an onion and place in the bottom of a casserole, top with chicken pieces and pour sauce over. Follow instructions as above.

3. Put chicken pieces in casserole. Cut some large potatoes into wedges and place among the chicken. Mix a tablespoon of hot Durban chilli paste with some oil and brush over the chicken and potatoes. Bake without tinfoil.

4. If you don't want something so rich, do the chicken and onion and potato wedges bit, then sprinkle lavishly with salt and Herbs de Provence (a delectable mix of rosemary, thyme, oreganum, parsley and winter savory that I get from a friend in France or if I am there myself). Bake without tinfoil.

Hmmm. I think No. 2 tonight. Better get going...

The simple life

With the world in the state of disarray and impending chaos that it is in, and which you and I don't seem to be able to make our voices heard over the ka-ching of cash registers in the back office of big business, a return to the simple life seems more and more attractive.

We are constantly bombarded with adverts exhorting us to aspire to greater and greater degrees of material possession, but with that comes the albatross of increased subservience to the financial system, which owns everything you think you own, and can take it away from you in the blink of an eye if you fail to make two payments. More people than you think are two paydays away from the street. So next time you see a homeless person sleeping under a bridge or a scruffy individual with a cardboard sign at a traffic light, imagine yourself in that position and you may realise how tenuous your link to the good life is.

Now for the good news. It is possible to rid yourself of the 'trap'pings of commercialism without actually physically suffering. Your mental attitude is your own problem, but that too can be fixed by you. Take the time to sit under a tree and look at the sky through the leaves - no thoughts are required and you may not even know that you have benefited in any way, but whether you like it or not, your soul has been restored and your body rejuvenated. It matters not what you believe in, but communing with nature, and this doesn't mean talking to it, is a natural restorative that costs nothing but your time. Only you can know how valuable that is.

Working barefoot in the garden is another great way to release stress, as long as you don't stress over dirty toenails! Although a manicured (funny how that came up) lawn is the socially accepted norm, and a neglected garden is seen as uncared for, if you look closely, you may notice that even weeds have beautiful flowers and something down among their leaves is finding it useful in some way. Imagine a meadow of wild flowers in place of a lawn that needs to be cut and fed and watered continually. The financial implications of maintaining a showpiece garden are not inconsiderable either. Who needs the stress? Indigenous is the way to go, failing which, whatever seems happy with the least possible attention is fine by me.

You may think that this train of thought is inspired by experience, and you may well be right there, but life only turns up events designed to allow you to learn from them - you can choose how you react to such events.

I choose the simple life!