Once again at dinner

Sunday night feedings have become rather a hit with us and our mates that it now moves from house to house. It’s almost like a proper grown up dinner club.

So once again the setting for today’s story: at a dinner party. This time it is hosted by the lovely and soon-to-be-successful- model Tina B. Like a proper Porra she understands the importance of a good feeding and did her heritage proud that night with a tasty bacon, pesto pasta with cooked broccoli. She gets a very definite 7, especially because of the malva pudding and ice cream dessert as well as the non-shortage of wine.

I’m surrounded by such a civilized bunch of people, it really impresses my juvenile self and hopefully my parents.

 At this dinner, stories of ‘your most terrible moment’ just HAD to make an appearance. There must have been something in the light fruity red Van Loveren wine we were all nursing that brought on this delightful topic.

This particular night, my Robyn made it her absolute mission to tell everyone’s stories for them, even if she wasn’t there or merely just heard about it from someone else. This can occasionally be a very broken telephone like situation.

She happily retold the story of TP’s magical attempt at pulling up her pants and instead she managed to give herself a major wedgie. No one would have known what just happened had she not drawn their attention s she yelped out in pain and supplemented it with the perfect picture of discomfort painted on her face.

Then it was on to me. My Robyn happily retold the story of a rather inebriated Dana, wearing the couch dweller Cait’s tiny dress and tripping into a club only to realise that her dress had ripped from the bum to the bra strap. Even worse is that it took 20 minutes for someone to buck up the courage to tell her before wrapping her into a table cloth.

As you can imagine, I was as pleased as punch to have everyone know that story.

So when it came round to my Robyn’s worst moment, the lovely Tina B intercepted and decided sternly and playfully that this was one story that she would tell. It was time to take her down. The tale was an enthusiastic and well told one, peppered with gruelling detail about my Robyn’s run in with the effects of punch on a party bus. The bus window wouldn’t open enough to let her stick her head out, and instead everything that came out, returned with gusto. It swished back in her face until she left the party bus as “that girl that vomited on herself”. PRICELESS!

Ultimately there were no cool points gained at this little gathering.

Moral of the story: let people decide on their own stories and no one gets their ego’s hurt.

Let your troll bridge down

Ever had the line “a mate of mine is coming over later” sprung on you?

Well today I did. We had a visitor, after a lovely girl’s day complete with mince and veggie dolmades’, hummus, guacamole and corn chips, ALL MADE from scratch by the lovely Leb immigrant TP and the couch dweller Cait.

Troll's are so cliquey.

TP is a rather friendly lass that is always keen to invite new people into our little Diggs circle so when her old bud she hasn’t seen for yonks asks to come over she didn’t hesitate. I on the other hand, being a troll guarding the bridge to my homey flat with protective zest, was rather sceptical.

I conceded, and her one mate (singular) brought 6 of his mates (plural)  to “chill” and smoke hubbly. As I walked in, I hear that this group of friendly strangers has already heard how odd I can be before I had even met them. I arrive to find out that these people chuckling on my couch know that my day began by brushing my teeth with soap because my ridiculous lover left for P.E with his toothpaste. Apparently the need for fresh minty breath isn’t as great a one as I had initially thought. My life is rather ridiculous when I think about it or rather when strangers point it out.

At first I was a touch apprehensive but it was actually a lovely few hours of getting to know a whole bunch of new people. We laughed, we smoked, we swopped stories, we laughed some more and then: a guitar was found.

This is obviously a cue for a bit of an HD home concert.

What was special about this private showing was that my Robyn joined in on backing vocals and one of the ex-strangers also supplemented the already pretty entertaining concert with some beat boxing. It was excellent to watch, it was even more excellent to watch through the eye of my Blackberry, and even most excellent to have my blackberry’s eye caught by two other Black Berries also recording this random group ‘jam-session’.

Moral of the day : Some times its okay to let down your Troll bridge.

White woman driver

There are always those few things that apparently should not be spoken about during polite conversation. This obviously includes politics and religion, but if you are a girl then it might also include weight gain, ex boyfriends and boyfriends’ ex-girlfriends.

At yet another Sunday night feeding, I discovered another thing that should be tackled rather lightly: Driving abilities. Or rather lack thereof.

My Robyn is a renowned bad driver but somehow manages to make it home alive in her daily run around’s so my mates and I tend not to take the piss too much. But this was the one dinner party that all our inside jokes about the deathly driver would come out.

Story 1: She hit a curb today and didn’t notice.

Story 2: She ran a red light and looked at the law abiding drivers like they were the arseholes.

Story 3: She did a U turn across two lanes of traffic without looking. Yes she crashed.

Story 4: At a braai in Stellenbosch, she fell asleep after having too much wine (also known as passing out). When she wakes up announces to her 5 passengers how pleased she is that she isn’t drunk anymore. The best part of this is that on our 30K journey back, while the rain trickled down on the windscreen, and the car fogged up (because she didn’t know how to turn the defogger on) while the hearts silently pumped with anxiety in the backseat, and sweaty hands wiped the quivering thighs of its owner, my dear unknowing, unsuspecting Robyn asks why everyone is so quiet. The response received from everyone via BBM was “because we are all praying”.

Apparently this is only funny to everyone else, because apparently my Robyn had absolutely no idea that she was what we academically and thoughtfully classified as unaware yet happily spatially damaged driver.

There’s always a stereotype attached to driving. My Robyn fills the dangerous woman driver generalisation but all I can say is it could be worse. She could have the generalised driving ability of a black woman driver. This is one rather non-PC generalisation I shamelessly (and humorously) agree with, especially since all of my most hilarious driving moments have involved a black woman driver in a giant BMW or Bentley.

Hey it could be the same woman for all I know but in every case, there has been nothing but hooters, angry people that are late for something and at least one graceful bumper bash.

So when this one woman, decided that she was lost mid intersection, she just stopped.

Yes STOPPED.

 She then proceeded to turn her car off.

Yes she turned the mammoth car OFF in an intersection.

The best part was the no hazard lights decision or the use of anything minutely helpful to the fellow drivers sharing the road. Then she got on her phone and had a conversation for directions while blatantly ignoring the hooting and shouting before starting her car again and moving on.

If I look at it this non-PC-yet-extremely-correct situation, then I can happily be grateful for My Robyn and her non-driving skills which seem almost minor by comparison.

Those 'creatives'

I studied theatre and performance for a whole tertiary year of my life and I absolutely loved it. I am now an avid play goer. It helps that my Robyn studies theatre and performance at UCT so I always know when all these cheap plays are and what they’re about. My Robyn tells me about the third years’ movement exhibition on Friday night.

This is how my brain works: R20 + potential entertainment= Good idea!

 IM IN!

I invite my long time high school friend Kelso to come along. She’s one of those very logical, yet creatively comedic know-it-all characters that enjoy the small things in life. She’s ‘that friend’ that occasionally blurts out some really great and unforgettable bloopers like “I think I’d be an excellent mathamatologist”. I heard her say this 6 years ago, and it’s definitely one of her best.

As everyone knows with theatre: it’s in terpretive and not everyone enjoys it. These performances were no different. The first performance was ridiculous. I didn’t mind the gas masks or the tormented and staggered breathing, or even the surplus of mirrors. It was just pointless and it felt like it went on for a few hours. Hours of strange twitches and swinging arms, instead of the 7 minutes it really was.

After that performance I was curious to find out what the logical Kelso’s feelings on the performance was. She merely looked at me and smacked me with her classic humorous charm: “Dude, we’re in that episode of Friends where Joey performs in the worst 3 hour play ever and everyone has to pretend they enjoyed it. Well I won’t do it! I refuse to be a part of that episode!” Ah Kelso, so clear, so concise, so obviously a film buff.

Thankfully we were happily entertained by the next 6 performances. They had everything a semi grown up could want: exotic chorus’s to supplement the movement of a man acting as a bull, jumping castles, elevation equipment, shadow fights, love stories and best of all nudity.

We managed to discuss the pieces like real grown-up’s. Kelso even managed to drop her filmic jargon and replace it with some proper thespian phrases and interpretive words like “juxtapose”and “narrative”. I’m so proud!

"The pattern"

The house of the triple D’s is much like a family: large, intimidating and noisy. Even the extra’s are like distant relatives with all their weird quirks and knowledgeable advice on everything. We definitely take turns on being the parents. Often the parent of the day organises a family day trip. I’ve identified a pattern: we begin the outing by doing something we deem ‘productive’ then we get distracted and will most likely end up somewhere with a bottle of wine to discuss our day’s accomplishments.

Last Saturday was not our normal hangover ritual of mopping up left over stomach curdling booze with a delicious and cheap cafe Sophia breakfast. Instead the day began at the hope street market. Apparently we were there to see the clothes and jewellery stalls (the “productive” part). The double date gang arrived with couch dweller Cait and met up with a few great friends and ultimately ended up trying the samples of all the food at least twice before settling on something to eat (the “distraction” part).

This was a different kind of trip because we seemed to have messed with the pattern by leaving out the breakfast. Somehow this meant that we wouldn’t find wine, nor would it find us, instead we would find another “productive” activity to ultimately continue with setting the day off its destined wine course.

We went to the company gardens where in true grown up style we played on the art work, fed carnivorous ducks and eventually resolved to go eat again somewhere else.

No “distraction” part still.

Even worse: no wine.

I would not allow this strange change in the pattern to defeat me! Some good was going to come out of this day! Some wine SHALL be drunk (by me) at some stage!

We were heading that night to a party I would never ever forget. It wasn’t unforgettable for the right reasons. Rather it was a night that could easily have been a nightmare—that one horror dream situation where you buck up the courage to fully commit to dressing up to a theme and NO ONE else does...

My Robyn, the couch dweller and myself all dressed up to the nines in the playboy bunny themed attire only to arrive at the party as the minority. Thankfully we were in such a scarce group that people thought we worked there and demanded photo’s. We should have charged, then the party would have been worth it.

Instead of following the simple pattern for pre-destined happiness, we went off the course and in my eyes nothing was achieved!

Next time, I will bring my own wine, that way I WIN! (And oh boy, do I like winning)

Sunday feedings

To you this is just a picture of young people being civilized around a table where cutlery and placemats are being used instead of fingers and laps. But to me this the most competitive day of the week: Sunday night feeding.

The triple D’s house hold is not just a three man digs. It’s at least a five man digs but every Sunday our house is more of an 8 person situation. You see, on a Sunday we have a dinner where a few of our friends come through and we feed them. Ooh my spidey senses tingle even when I write it.

I’ve been called what is termed a ‘feeder’. It’s not my fault though; it’s in my genes from both sides! Porra-Jew genes are particularly lethal. After a friendly ‘please stop feeding us’ intervention the extra flatmates or house dwellers have placed me on standby and instead have decided to take turns to be the feeders every Sunday.

So they cook, and the original three flatmates invite. It’s an excellent compromise!

So Sunday’s are a lively experience that have ultimately become one of the most enticing days of the week. Last week the resident ladies man began and topped the weeks before him by a) buying his groceries from Woolies (a student treat) and b) cooking from scratch (no just add meat). So the 6 of us there that night took it upon ourselves to be the master chef judges. We picked our characters and judged his meal on presentation, texture and flavour. So we ate a “delicious, although slightly overcooked, chicken stir-fry with crunchy fresh veggies. Its coconut twang was explosive especially added with the balsamic toasted sunflower seeds that were sprinkled on top for presentation and added texture.”

The best part of this meal is that my Robyn is a vegetarian and in true gentlemanly style the ladies man tried to keep the poultry and veg separate; he even cooked them in different pans. Brilliantly though when it came time to judge the meal he got so excited and cocky, as men do, that he mixed all of it together anyway. So My Robyn spent her night picking chicken bits out her dish.

A solid 6 but a +1 for effort. Cue the polite golf clap please

This past Sunday my flatmate that lives on my couch decided to top Dixie’s dish by feeding an extra two people (+1 point) and she made desert (+1).

Hmmm, I can’t wait for this Sunday.

Monica's House

I live in a three woman digs, but no one would know that just by judging by the constant amount of people that we always have over! It’s like Monica’s house in Friends but instead of a cast of thirty something’s ; we have a bunch of energized, confused friends that have either finished their degrees and are beginning “real-life” or friends that (like me) are attempting to further their studies.

Our house has been dubbed the triple D’s.  The name started out as a Cocky comment initially made by some smart arsed boy-man, but its stuck and we all chose to embrace it. Eventually.

My blog will, as of now, be an in depth exploration of some of the interesting happenings of the Triple D house hold.

But first it is imperative to understand the strange yet perfectly working dynamic we have. So there’s a Porra-Jew (me), a Pole (my Robyn) and a the Leb (TP). All social, distinctively different yet equally dramatic philanthropists that enjoy playing with life, and don’t share the same tastes in series or movies and food (due to vegetarianism and wheat intolerance). Our favourite group activity in the house is organising activities and especially the good old tea-hubbly-popcorn combo.

I’ll explain our dynamic in a simple way:

My Robyn hears about a play coming out.

 Myself and TP want to come.

 TP wants to invite everyone. So My Robyn invites everyone.

Dana wants to drink before.

 TP and My Robyn want to eat before

And so what we eventually had was 16 very different people at Primi’s for a cocktail special and dinner before all marching off to go watch Defending the Caveman.

 What followed the play was only the most historical gender show down that Cape Town has ever seen. The game: 30 seconds, the teams: Girls vs Boys, the prize: respect.

Who would win?

The girls (DUH)

The girls managed to dominate using our creativity  and “our ability to not allow logic to hinder us” as the play so happily pointed out. We had some real beauts in this game! Lexi, the master of riddles says “He’s an actor and his name kinda sounds like what a dog wears around his neck”.

Wtf right?!

And yet somehow I managed to get out of the Lexi riddle: Colin Farrel

Years of practice.

  

That was just on Thursday.

Detox shmetox

I just completed a 13 day detox and I’ve got to say... it’s really not great. Its especially tough because my lovely flatmates organise on weekend one to have one long binge weekend that starts out with baking delicious pastries and drinking the frothiest hot chocolate and ends with wine and free hors d’oeurve’s and pizza.

Torture.

I managed to suffer through the temptation by relying on millions of flavoured herbal tea (no sugar or honey or sweetners) and hubbly bubbly! Not really much of a compromise!

I’ve quickly begun to realise that being an anorexic must suck immensely! Everything we do as human being surrounds the topic of food or alcohol.

 Like: movies (popcorn is part of the experience)

 Lunch with friends

Dinner with friend or with a boyfriend

 Catching up over a cup of coffee

Having a glass of wine with dinner, or after a long day, or while you’re out, wine tasting, or when you need to relax... Okay so the amount of things a person can do that includes wine is ENDLESS!

(needless to say I quite enjoy wine)

Basically, all the social and generally entertaining things that we engage in as humans surround food. It must be crazily boring to be anorexic, I mean yes you can (sometimes) fit well into your clothes but where will you wear the clothes?  To your kitchen where you won’t be eating? What fun.

Apologies if you think I’m being crass, I just feel a sort of connection with other self deniers. Perhaps I’ll start chewing ice and sniffing chocolate bars to attempt to keep my hunger at bay.

To Cruize or not to cruize

After being on a contiki tour for 4 days around Greece with some of the most interesting natives of Australia and New York, my contiki group boarded the Aqua Marine cruise ship where we would “party” our way around Turkey and Crete back to Athens.  At least I am pretty sure it said that on the brochure. “Awesome” I thought; there’s a whole bunch of fun things to play with and do! There’s a pool, a gym, two bars, a casino, a basketball court plus breakfast lunch, dinner AND snacks! At this stage my mind is short circuiting at all the awesomeness that I will endure at the hands of the mighty Aqua marine!

Alas, all this proved to mean close to nothing. The boat was made in the late 70’s and unfortunately that was also the era of all the passengers’ heyday. We’re talking about the two step, an over abundance of speedo’s and mom jeans galore!

 Even worse is that somehow there were groups of even older people on board who were (a) always lost (b) non-English speakers and (c) taking up the whole narrow corridor. What this ultimately means is that you can’t pass them in the corridor and when you do happen to politely ask them to move their only response is an attempt at asking for directions. Directions?! The Aqua Marine is a maze of random paths going in all sorts of directions; no wonder so many people were trapped inside when the titanic sank.

Myself and the other young’uns huddled  together in the casino for safety and cocktail specials. We were the life (support) of the ship together, shouting and laughing and sticking cards to our faces, as one does. If we weren’t being shushed or glared at we were being joined by these twilight-zone characters. They would come out of the wood work sporting their  ‘night rider’ gear usually complete with moustache and leather jacket. It’s not that I’m judging, they obviously liked this era quite significantly. But it is now over, and has been for a few decades.

Thanks to the hot Mediterranean atmosphere, I was struggling to keep my dress from sticking to me, so I can only imagine how Starsky and Hutch in the corner were feeling!

I keep questioning why there was so many old people travelling on this mammoth ship all alone and where the heck have all the young people gone?!

And then I felt it: the tingle of a conspiracy theory coming along!

Maybe these twilight zone characters have persuaded other youthful members to follow them into their cabin for a drink, a spliff or for some lemonade ( I don’t know why, but maybe). Then this twilight-zone moustached man would pounce and drain the youthfulness out of his victims, then leave the  now old and decrepit victim to wonder the ship’s narrow corridors, so weak they appear not to speak English?!

YES! It makes so much sense!  It seems to be  the only explanation why the old would be attracted to the vast amounts of sport and entertainment facilities that the cruise ship offers. I didn’t have time to investigate my youth eater theory, I had a game of black jack to win and a party to make.

So somehow I dodged the two steppers and remained incognito doing the mash potato and the twist as my young friends and I relived an ancient era.

 It was the next day I realised why there was a particular scarcity in the youth market. Sadly it isn’t as interesting as the youth-eater theory. Its plain and simple - a hangover on a swaying ship which has a maze-like interior isn’t a grand idea especially when you spend your mourning trying to find the breakfast buffet.

The Roommate...

I’m just not one of those people who enjoy scary movies. I react similarly to a toddler: I cover my eyes and simultaneously watch the film through my parted fingers. I don’t blink. I scream out loud. And like a toddler I go to sleep and dream about the horrors. They affect me to the point that the horrific memory  follows me into dark rooms, behind doors and even some sound effects make a frequent appearance in my overly stimulated mind.

Fully realising my complete inability to handle any form of scary movie, my lovely Flatmate selected “the roommate” for us to watch on a movie night at home. It was about an obsessive university student clings on to her res roommate and essentially starts interfering in her life to the point that she starts trying to control who she speaks to and results in aggression and even murder. This characters glances and stares were nothing short of shrilling. I’ll admit it wasn’t the greatest film of all time but it was enough to freak me out!

My flatmate began with the torture by simulating those glances and stares; she even interrupted me when I was talking to another friend to announce that I was not allowed to talk to anyone but her. Her glares, although hilarious, began to creep me out to the point that I couldn’t even look at her. My laughter quickly turned to nervous squeaks.

Her determination to become the character was impressive! When I returned home I found a lovely drawn picture waiting for me on my pillow. It said Dana and Tara 4ever with a picture of me in the centre and a drawn picture of my boyfriend with a knife in his chest.

It was hilarious! I laughed until I fell to my knees, tears where in my eyes and my cheeks ached. Tara had fully transformed into my fears, strangely she did this in the most unbelievable abdominal workout kind of way.

I’m far less reluctant (although still pretty reluctant) to watch scary movies and I think my lovely, and character driven flatmate helped me overcome some kind of fear.

Weird way to help your friend, but hey, it works!

FACT: Aging is not an option

I was going through some photos in a big unorganised box in my big unorganised garage at home. I came across some photos of my mother when she was about thirty. She had one leg over a bicycle, tiny high wasted shorts at the top of her toned legs and a white vest covering her miniature waist. I look at this photo as her 22 year old daughter and wished that I looked that, now!

Hear ye hear ye!

The quest for eternal youth has begun!

Taketh as many youth aids as possible to ensure your life long youthful appearance.

you will be graded upon death in terms of how young you looked throughout your life span.

 Compliment + “for your age” = compliment/2

Eg: You are absolutely gorgeous, for your age.

When I was watching Oprah, as one does at three in the afternoon during the week, I was lucky enough to watch an episode on aging super models.

There sat four women ranging up from 40 to 63, spilling the beans on the challenges of being seen as the most beautiful in all of the land and then barely being noticed.

As they sat and shared their stories I would never have called any of them average. Beautiful is the word I would have used.

Why do we choose to place such terror over the aging process?

It’s going to happen!

 I have come to realise that there are different levels of beautiful. Beautiful when you’re young means classic appeal and lifelong attractiveness but when you’re an older lady ‘beautiful’ means that you’re still attractive but not as attractive as you were when you were young.

The solution- try look as close to the way that you used to when you where 20. Impossible right? But now due to cosmetic surgery everything is possible.

So now we see toned legs, bums up to backs, six packs, and melon size breasts holding onto tiny frames and faces that have seen a few too many hours in the fake sun.

So essentially, from behind we have gorgeous, yet slightly muscular, teenagers. At the front we have a menopausal woman that looks as if she is trying to sneak back into high school.

I can’t preach to anyone about how we should accept aging, but I do hope that when I grow up I will be happy with the stories the lines on my face tell.

Bummed out

I don’t really know what to think of this. I thought we were in a world that sold sex in advertising not a world that made you think pulling pieces of toilet paper out a simulated bum is acceptable. Because its not. Ever.

Somehow I feel that an advert with naked skeletal models slash humans (that have great hair and fake breasts,) covered in bees advertising a perfume, seems a bit more socially acceptable.

This advert offends me. They may as well have been handing out pooh stained toilet paper. That might better communicate the 100% recycled factor.

Imagine showing this to your parents and explaining that this is what you do for a living. Would they laugh? Or would they think “excellent, I’m so glad how smart my child is”

There are a lot of unnecessary advertisements that use shock factors that rely on gross bodily functions to do it. This is one of them.

I feel like I was there when they were coming up with this ambient. The idea probably started out like this:

Fv1: Ok let’s brainstorm how we can communicate how soft this toilet paper is

Mv1: Soft toilet paper doesn’t rub your skin off when you have the shits.

Fv1: Errrr... nice insight but I don’t think we should communicate that too explicitly.

Mv2: No way! Let’s shock the shit out of them!

Fv1:  As long as we don’t stick bums onto the toilet paper dispensers.

Mv1: Brilliant!

Mv2: Let’s do it!

In terms of being environmentally friendly and low budget I give it 10 out of ten. In terms of creating desire to use the toilet paper I give it -2.

Old people smell funny

At some unspecific age the human begins to “get old”. Getting old isn’t always about wrinkles and hip replacements (to my knowledge). It’s also about certain traits that only come to you once you’ve hit this unspecific age. It’s the growing need to put moth balls in your closet, as if all of a sudden you’re trying to fend off some massive moth attack; It’s the need to have a unisex haircut, mom jeans, 7 pairs of prescription glasses and “walking shoes”.

Old people were (presumably) young people at some stage of their lives, and chances are that moth balls were not that large of a requirement then. Another old people phenomenon is the “ I must wear tighter-higher-unshapley jeans” phase. This interests me because I can never quite understand where they even buy these from.

Imagine that in a shop window “Sale on tight at the top, unshapely at the bottom blue jeans”. I see the mannequin as having a bit of a boep.

My personal favourite is that old people love to read road signs and billboard out loud. For some reason this is one of the things my mother enjoys doing. Only God knows why... She’s definitely NOT old.

But for your enjoyment a typical example sounds a bit like this: “Do you require a plumber? Call Albert.” Then comes the commentary: “ You know we need a plumber but your father won’t call one, he says he’ll do it himself and I’ve waited and waited and now it’s been a year and our toilet in the guest room wont flush...”

But what do I know right. My time will come when I’ll find the appeal in shapleless jeans  and unisex haircuts and decoupage. Oh and moth balls. Obviously.

Rather go suck on a mango (It leaves a better taste in your mouth)

South Africa’s newest addition to the budget domestic airlines Velvet sky has made quite a splash if by splash I meant a leaf falling into a puddle..

At least it’s cheap! How bad can it really be?

My flight from Cape Town to Johannesburg was quite an experience, not only because I had the whole cabin to choose for my “free seating” but also because everyone that works at Velvet Sky definitely has some sort of zombie relative. No one smiles, no one is helpful and the service is terrible.

It all starts right at the check in counter. There were three check in lady(troll’s) each directed me to the next check in lady(troll) with a half hearted wave of a hand. I was all smiles and rainbows until I eventually spoke to the only “available” check in lady. The world went dark and cold as soon as her straight face allowed words to exit (through her lips I’m guessing). My heart beat became irregular and I lost the ability to feel joy.

 I might be exaggerating a little bit, but in all honesty it was a highly unpleasant experience. 

I was glad to see I wasn’t the only person whose day was ruined by these check in troll’s (misery loves company). Two other sets of passengers were shouting at the check in lady about how rude she was, while the casually dressed manager just stood at a distance.  What a lovely way to start your journey.

On the plus side: The cabin is very clean.

Unfortunately this wouldn’t mean any progression for Velvet Sky. The airhostesses make you feel like the “service” they are providing is done under duress. Once again, the happiness is drained from the area with the no smiles rule and the ‘listen to the flight instructions or die’ attitude.

These Velvet Sky troll’s were mean, I mean really mean. They were loaded with backhanded comments (eg: “excuse me, can you buckle your seat belt. We’d like to take off at some stage”) and they were incapable of smiling, and the weirdest thing is they didn’t blink (okay I made that part up). But in all seriousness, I’ve never been that well behaved in my life. My airhostess troll made me feel like I should be sitting up tall with my finger on my lips, in silence. I felt like a bad person when she woke me up to tell me to put my seat upright for landing. I even apologised.

 The baby that cried for the whole flight wasn’t even a problem for me as much as the crap service. The airline has nothing to offer passengers as a cheap alternative. It’s not even ‘that’ cheap. To be quite honest I’d much rather pay a bit more to ensure that I land in a good mood, rather than save some cash and have to deal with the Velvet Sky Troll’s.

Ultimately, Velvet sky feels the way velvet does when you go against the grain: Not so smooth, not so enjoyable.

This sucks!

What sucks Big Time?

A vacuum cleaner!

What sucks even more than a vacuum cleaner?

A broken window in a plane AND a Hoover vacuum cleaner!

GENIUS!

I really enjoyed this advert. It’s smart and single minded. I especially like how the product isn’t seen in the ad. I think that anyone will agree that the dots are placed at the perfect distance apart so that anyone can actually connect them.

Hoover ads have come a long way! From the days of gender slavery were women got cleaning equipment for gifts, to now, where women don’t have to pretend that they know any secret family-hand-me-down recipes and the like. It’s a swift move toward an insight on the product rather than focussing on what women really want (yup you guessed it: a hoover).

I can hear it now: (Sweet middle class American woman in the 50's) Golly Gosh Stuart, is this for me?”

Yes it is sweety, I hope you like it.

Like it? I love it! Thanks hun for knowing me so well! Its the perfect birthday gift! Now I’ll be the envy of all the other bored and intellectually stifled house wives who have to sweep their homes with broomes!

So thanks for moving forward Hoover. Not only am I pleased that the product isn’t in the advert but nor is the (un)happy housewife.

highschool

My big sister is a real big sister. She’s the type of big sister that bosses you around when you’re little and even though you try fight it, a part of you actually likes it. My friends (even now) think she’s scary. She’s the perfect teacher-type. And now, she IS a teacher at our old high school.

At first it was just fun to call her ma’am around the house and especially in public. She pretends to hate it but actually she loves it. I went back to school for a day to visit her and she turned on one of the poor, innocent, shy kids that was looking a bit scruffy. “Brush your hair! You look like a womble, and please stand up straight before you turn into Gollum”. What a lovely, kind, big sister I have, right? Then I looked around properly and  saw exactly what I looked like 5 years ago!

I’m a generic! They are generics! Nothing has changed since I left high school. Now, I see it from the other perspective: The annoying chit-chat at the back, the silly giggles when the word “reproductive” comes up, the long haired boys and the silly girls wearing make-up. It was kind of creepy.

It was particularly creepy when I picked out myself in the crowd. My high school doppelganger appeared. The flat-chested chick wearing a bra for no reason, sitting in the middle, asking all the questions (even if they where blatantly obvious) all the while still chatting away every time the teacher's back is turned. MAN, SHE WAS ANNOYING! She especially peeved me off when she came back after class to see if she could do extra work to 'up her mark'.

Now, to add to the whole doppelganger thing, I’m seeing my old teachers as people. Actual people. Not the tyrants that loved to pile on the homework and shout at you when you came a minute late into class. 

Sigh...I think I’m growing up

I had the pleasure of enjoying a crit of what boys like to do when they choose female products to work on. The product in particular was a sports bra. So being a boy I guess they get excited at the prospect of being allowed to draw breasts openly.

The scamps that were drawn were indeed hilarious and outrageous and actually extremely entertaining. Ultimately its aim was to insult its target market into buying the product. This was done by emphasising the unfortunate yet natural progression of firm perky breasts into sad long droopy breasts that are so droopy they end up in your food.

 Hilarious.

 But something tells me that this insight might, just not be the best option to sell sports bra’s.

Then I found this gem of an advert that does in fact insult its target market into buying the product.

This advert basically says “in case your kids are mildly retarded you should either a) get them some help or b) pick the cheaper option and give them john west tuna since it’s so super duperly PACKED with omega3”.

I think this advert is really amusing and somehow truthful because we know kids can be stupid and willingly engage in dangerous activities. Yet this ‘insult technique’ is less offensive than a woman with boobs so droopy they land in her food.

On the bright side of things, I find quite a lot of adverts mildly offensive as many focus on strange human truths but because no one is really saying it we find it funny.

Advertising is the “no one” , advertising is the Jew with the Jew jokes, the black guy that can call other black guys ____________, and just about any group that humanity enjoy poking a wee bit of fun at.

I think this sums it up:

Being injured is merely a way of life for me. I don’t know why but I think it’s meant as a joke for the man upstairs. He’s like “now let the window fall on her face. It’ll be funny because she’s on matric vac and she’s wearing boys’ clothes”.

Fiction?

I think not!

 This rather unfortunate event is only funny now because of the strange nun’s who, assuming the clothes were my own, tried to literally get me on the ‘straight path’ .

Everyone has that weird, coincidental “I was petrified of bunji jumping and then when I finally decided to do it, the rope broke” story.

Some more unfortunate than others.

I have been injured (often). Last year I tore a ligament in my ankle, and literally 5 minutes later in the same soft core netball match, my twin sister tore the same ligament in the same foot. It would have been funnier if we didn’t have to lean on each other on the longest most treacherous 100 metre journey home.

Soon enough we were scuffling around university together. The injury changed the world for me. It was like all the fluffy happy parts of life were removed and replaced with horrors.  All of a sudden the threat of stairs lingered around every (and I mean EVERY) corner.

 I sat waiting on the Jammie stairs (as one does), staring at people (as one does) and I noticed something Bizarre (as one does while staring and sitting): Lots of people are injured. I was blown away by the catastrophic number of people hobbling around on crutches, wrapped up in bandages and literally riddled in injury memorabilia (ie.scars, scabs, swelling).

It was breathtaking. It could be likened to the graceful movements of a Zombie Ballet.

Shuffle, skip, moan.

Trundle, click, Groan.

 It was beautiful.

Now I understand the Big Man’s humour.

Errrr... I don't get it

Sometimes you get it and sometimes you don’t.

This I did not get. At all. The image is so graphically appealing that it lulls you into a false sense of excitement. The thought going through my head was “this is so exciting! It’s a water house! What does it mean” then I read the headline “no more hairfall problems”.

Huh? It flew over my head and it wasn’t for lack of trying that I didn’t manage to connect the dots. It just feels like the dots are a bit far apart. Maybe with a smarter headline the dots would be closer.

I realised later on that if your drain clogs full of hair that the water won’t drain! Amazing insight (not really)! But in my mind I guess if this was the case I would stop running the water.  So there it is, the girl who didn’t ‘get’ the ad knows how to solve the problem! HALLALUYAH. At least I hadn’t completely wasted my time.

I think that a good headline can be a concept’s saving grace but it’s like a lot of things in life: if you’re too close you can’t see it for what it really is.

Take the good old “I hate my best friends’ boyfriend” cliché. Okay so your mate is in love with a super arsehole that refers to her as cupcake and pinches her friends’ bums at any given chance. She can’t see it. She is too close. Anyone on the outside can see this phallic representative for the shmuck he is but she never will.

 It’s just like a good headline. Although unlike your mates crap relationship, you won’t be too upset if someone, out of the goodness of their heart, crits your headline by saying: “I know you love it but its crap”.

I’m not normally pessimistic about things. In fact I’m a glass half full kind of gal, but there’s one thing I really hate. I mean REALLY hate: Cape Town drivers.

Just a few rules please in case you fall in to this disability category:

1.       Indicators are not optional

2.       It’s not illegal to say thank you (which is just a friendly wave or an erect finger if you’re rather lazy)

3.       The white lines in parking areas are there to outline where your four tyres should stay between and not a suggestion.

4.       The right lane on the high way is in fact the fast lane.

My main gripe as of late is that if you bump into a stationary car, or scratch the side, at least leave a note. The note doesn’t even have to be your contact details, it can just be a polite “Geez I didn’t see your parked car before I drove into it” kind of a letter.

Maybe  if someone bothered to write a note I’d feel less inclined to show my anger via erect middle finger, and maybe I wouldn’t be so intentional as to turn the inside light on at night while flipping someone off  to show my anger, and maybe I would be more forgiving of the general Capetonians unfortunate shortcomings as drivers.

There is nothing worse than happily walking up to your car (that’s parked between the lines) and finding the colour scratched off it anywhere. It’s horrible. It makes me feel bad for the poor car that didn’t deserve that kind of punishment at all. It’s like getting your clothes back from the (overly) expensive Laundromat and finding that your favourite pants are now stained a different colour.

Now that my once clean and unscathed car is sprinkled and seasoned in anonymous injuries I’m considering buying a bike instead. The problem is that then I’d have to worry about being mowed over by many a non-side-mirror-looking-flippin-drivers.

So much for the glass half full view of life.

queer travel

I suppose this is a touchy subject for some. Luckily the some that would get touchy about this aren’t the kind of people the advert is targeting and aren’t the kind of people that read this blog.

Ambiguity is an awesome thing. I wish people where more (cleverly) ambiguous then it might be more entertaining to speak to strangers. “I love eating dogs” That one was my favourites, said by my little cousin at the ripe old age of 17. Genius. She meant she loved dogs that were eating, like they were cute or something (its not cute).

Butt (see what I did there)
But I like this advert because we all (and especially the gay community) like to think that the butt is completely indicative of the gay community. I’d like to think that we all know why. If you don’t, don’t worry about it or alternatively ask a priest or someone with a high religious standing. They should be able to fill you in.

The other side of America. Brilliant. Mount Roushmore is being alluded to here as being the straight, solid, predictable side whereas the other side is the different side. The “gay” side.
I realise its a pun but I also realise that sometimes puns can be pretty awesome too.

Things always TURN.

It was a bright and sunny (non windy) day in Cape Town.  So one could easily imagine why this day was spent with a number of people cheering on a small rugby league at the rugby club on a fine Saturday. The sweet smell of cut grass and braaing meat filled the air. Cheers and chattering filled my ears like a dull hum. But unlike the skinny (but lovely) bitch next to me, I hated being there. Hated it. I paid my dues as I was there, as promised, in supporters gear complete with lumo headband and super short shorts. The grass was too fresh or the meat smelled too deliciious for me to enjoy it or something so like a dedicated mate that I was, once the game was over I left.

Like many people I convinced myself that all I wanted to do was “chill” , “relax” and for those in matric in 2006, “chillax”. What started out as an innocent (enough) game of 30 seconds turned into a bit of a death match complete with dignified ‘loser hats’ (my idea) which were skilfully made out of pick n pay bags and sticky tape. You see once there are a number of different bottles of wine and a number of different yet extremely similar girls stuff happens.

Soon there were whip cream moustaches and silly dares before the slightly intoxicated clan of girls decided that it would be a genius night to head out. Where did we go? Gay bar, because that’s what girls do when they want to go out and not talk to boys.

Problem1: The bartenders at said gay club are ripped and toned and are dancing in their briefs on the bar.

Problem 2: The bar tenders at said club cannot dance.

Problem 3: The bar tenders at said club cannot dance because they are straight.

(Note to self: not many straight men have a rhythmic bone in their body)

So you see… what started as a night of femaleness and independence soon ended up as a perverted yet funny account of girls imitating the pants less dancers on the bar. So we moved on to club two.. a straight one.

The party mood had taken over so completely that after we had a mini photo shoot and a few straw duels on the bar and after we crashed a batchelors and after we drank them dry and after we all had the  time of our lives that something would go wrong.

“Something”

Luckily (said extremely sarcastically) I would be the owner of that ‘something situation’.

So after the funness and the joy of being a young woman in all the ridiculousness that follows adolescence I had a three part stagger-trip-fall into the club.

It was quite an interesting trip, the kind of trip that could be rather entertaining in slow motion. My knees weren’t the only things torn open, nor was the beautiful dress that I was wearing. It was my dignity. My poor dignity was also torn and bleeding as I entered the club having my entire bum up to my middle back exposed. The worst part is I had no idea. None. So I continued as usual: dancing, running, chatting.

How long was I like this? I don’t know… that’s the worst part.  So after an unknown amount of time I was  noticed by a friends boyfriend and swiftly wrapped up in a table cloth. I wish he had told me what he was doing then I  wouldn't have fought him so hard. My bruised ego was easily mended by a juicy pity boerie roll that I ate like a sad child eats an ice cream.

Dignity? Hello? Where are you?

Sigh... I should have stayed at the rugby.

dum drunk

Drinking and driving is not a joking matter and everybody knows it but somehow there are still those little brained folk that shout at you for not drinking and make it their personal mission to piss you off enough so that you do end up feeling the need to have one or two. The kind of tiny brained people that force a shot of ‘oh so delicious’ warm tequila down your throat and expect you to thank them. Unfortunately these are the types of people that the drive alive campaign should be targeting and unfortunately these aren’t the types of people who don’t really look at responsibility as being a particularly good thing.

I like this advert, its hard hitting straight to the point. It says “if you drink and drive you will crash and potentially die”. It’s true. It’s well executed. Its simple.

But the people who need to see this are the people that won’t take this as a message that occurs to them.

Being one of them lamo dorks I can’t just point out a problem without suggesting a solution.  I propose quite simply that to get hold of the remaining percentage of reckless, brainless, typically enjoyable but inconsiderate drivers the agency should... MAKE BEING THE DESIGNATED DRIVER COOL.

 Its brilliant right?!

 Somehow that cowboy slash kung foo do gooder Chuck Norris is a legend and he, well, does good.

And somehow that boerie eating Jan van die span (player 23 campaign) is cool too.

So why cant we make that sober fun goer a person that more and more people would be pleased to be?

Scare tactics don’t work as well as we’d like to think I mean, how many smokers continue to smoke knowing full well that it could kill them,people still don't put sunscreen on knowing how the sun is delightful and evil, and how many  how many people still swim knowing  that jaws is waiting to attack?!

The short of the long: Scare tactics only work in video games. 

New age and new experiences

I have a spectacular friend who is confident, hilarious and quite a catch, she’s the easiest person to introduce to other people but when she drinks she’s a train, she’ll run you over.  She is a force that is travelling at a constant pace to somewhere that she only knows. She has been following the 12 step program for a few months now and I have not been run over by the train since.

I have always thought that AA meetings were for people with severe problems. The kind of problems that Tim Burtin probably has to be able to come up with his horror type movie style. To me the people who attended these meetings were all like the characters in fight club, intense and parasitic like Helena Bonham carter’s character.  It was only when I went to the meeting that I learned that I am terribly ignorant and quite ashamed for expecting that the meeting would take place in a smoked filled, ill-lit basement. Instead it was uplifting and enlightening. 

I went to an AA meeting in a Church in Kloof, it was filled with ordinary people, young and old and many people from different countries. At the end of the meeting the chairperson said to us that we should remember that the people we see and the things they say should remain anonymous. I almost feel bad for reporting back on this, like I’m a rat. The rat that used to get beaten up in school for snitching to the teacher about who was copying other kids homework.  That damn rat!

At the start of the meeting the twelve steps are spoken about:

AA Steps

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Then a speaker will share his story for the floor to respond to. This particular speaker is a good looking well built Englishman that was super trendy and spoke like he was talking to two of his best friends and not to the 40 people who were crammed inside this room. He took us all on his journey through alcoholism from the beginning of binge drinking in his early 20’s  right to the point where he locked himself up in his flat to drink bottles of shampoo or anything that had any alcoholic value. It was a journey that people drew a lot of similarities from. He was truly amazing and exceptionally strong as are many of the other members there.

I quickly learned that their addiction was not only their common link but also their strength. One of the members said that he had more in common with the people in that room than with people he had known for years because their addictions were a binding link in a shared struggle that they each battle every day.

 I say it was an uplifting experience because many of them would make jokes and allude to things that only they as alcoholics would appreciate. One of the members had commented on another for swearing so much while he shared his story and his response was “well I didn’t want to water any of it down”. Laughter exploded and echoed down the corridor.

A running theme that night was the exploration of dreams, many of the members explained that they were having dreams about using and waking up feeling so pissed off with themselves for relapsing. An older woman with deep sunkissed skin and the reddest of all red hair voiced her  thoughts that  well now that she has control over what she does in her dreams she could be capable of just about anything. I cannot even fathom being in control of all of me, never mind my dreams, my hair is a big enough of a struggle.

One young chap a at the ripe old age of 21 had only recently recognised his addiction a few months back and was quite shocked especially since he had initially gone to rehab for an eating disorder. “bummer” he said, “one addiction couldn’t be enough for me”.

It was a lovely place filled with lovely people. I almost wish that everyone was a recovering alcoholic or addict just so they could be as warm and grateful as this bunch of sharers. It was like going to Church but the people there actually respected each other and genuinely cared about each others progressions, they drew from others strengths and their struggles and use it to grow.

At the end of the meeting we held hands and recited a fun loud chant of togetherness (well they did, I just smiled foolishly like a typical ‘newbie).