Ouch, this “Suggested for you” recommendation was a bit hurtful:
Thanks a lot, Facebook algorithm.
Honestly though, considering how well Facebook is supposed to “know” me, the amount of misplaced ads and posts that it sends my way is quite laughable. Rap stuff, Trucking videos, Ads for Prime (the drink and the TV channel), the latest news from PJ Powers. No.
I think I’ll put this one down to being the same thing. Misplaced. Inaccurate.
Not me.
Definitely not me.
The weather has turned in Cape Town, and after a long, wet, cold winter, it would seem that spring is on its way. This oak tree in Constantia certainly thought so yesterday:
The trouble is – and hear me out on this one – we don’t really want it to be spring just yet.
[Capetonian people arrive en masse Chez 6000 with pitchforks and flaming torches]
No. Actually, we want spring to come at the normal time, which is probably about a month from now. Because while the dams might be nice and full (99.6% this week, down from 100.4% last week, to be exact), we need them to be like that in the middle of September too, when spring should start.
And if there’s going to be no more decent rain, that isn’t going to happen.
Also, it’s no secret that when it doesn’t rain, Capetonians use more water, so there will be a compound reduction of the amount of stored water we have going into what we’re told will be a long, hot dry summer.
Of course, this is just what climatologists and meteorologists are telling us, using their years and years of collective training and education, their cutting-edge computing models, and their interactions and collaboration with experts around the world.
You might well hear something different from your mate Keith, who has read something on Facebook. And we must thank Keith for taking some time out to share his thoughts on this, busy as he is also being an expert on Eurasian geopolitics, the New World Order paedophile network, cryptocurrency, and the reasons why Elon Musk is a “great guy”.
But I digress… often.
All I’m saying is that while it’d lovely to have a bit of nice weather right now, starting spring this early will have unpleasant knock-on effects in March and April. And I know that might seem a long way off at the moment, but we’ll look back on this post once we get there’re in the midst of heatwaves and water restrictions, just so I can say I told you so*.
* I won’t do that**
** OK, I might do that
Sunday morning thoughts.
Next door’s noisy washing machine has been going at it for several days now. All day, every day. Or so it seems. Two hypotheses here. Either they’re cleaning up a murder scene or they’ve opened a commercial laundry. I’m not actually sure which is worse (from a noisy back garden point of view, I mean).
On the other side, they’re chopping down trees. Big, healthy trees.
“Leafy” and “green” are adjectives often applied to living in a nice area: people pay premium prices for mature trees. And yet…
Next door 50 years of slow, hard work, gone in a couple of hours of noise (only just louder than the laundry).
On the Afrikaans side of my social media there’s a fierce* debate as to whether Neil Young or Steve Hofmeyr would provide the better soundtrack for the drive on the R319 between Bredasdorp and Swellendam. It’s getting quite heated.
I think I’d probably cancel the trip. Not least because whatever you have to listen to on the journey, you end up in Swellendam.
Oh, and obviously, since reading this, I can’t really get it out of my mind…
If I’d done a “Saturday thoughts” or “Friday thoughts” or whatever, this would also be in there. And in all likelihood, when I do my next ” ___day thoughts”, it will still be there.
Of course it will.
Freak Moose Antler Incident are in session for Marc Riley this Wednesday.
* Initially, I mistyped this word and WordPress tried to correct it to “faeces”. Did it perhaps read the musical options which followed? AI is amazing.
You should always try any experience that you can. Who knows? You might find something that you really like.
I wouldn’t include smashing the little toe of your flop-clad foot into the back wheel of a Pick n Pay trolley, though.
I tried that so you don’t have to.
Talking of… If Woolies’ shelves are empty because they were unable to maintain their cold chain due to the delays from the taxi strike, then either Pick n Pay have somehow been using different roads (?!?) or they don’t care that their cold chain was compromised.
Hmm.
“I wonder which one it is?”, he thought, as the milk went off 2 hours after he bought it.
I might start on the prophylactic antibiotics with their chicken this evening before I end up trying another new experience.
Indeed. The Premier League starts tonight. Manchester City at Burnley, no less. Eww.
And so the rules (which, I will remind you, I didn’t write) say that I must put this on the blog.
I even brought this out earlier.
Further to that, the rule which I did write, says that I must remind everyone that this video was shot in Piketberg. Piketberg is also known for… er… being on the N7 between Malmesbury and Citrusdal.
That’s about it.
But onto more important matters:
Of course, this season, the Mighty Red And White Wizards from Beautiful Downtown Bramall Lane are also in the Premier League.
So, some sort of prediction seems appropriate.
Well, given that we’ve known for almost 4 months that we were going to be starting in the Premier League this weekend, it’s been a pretty disastrous pre-season, and an especially chaotic last fortnight. We’ve sold several of our best players (yes, including Sander, who I foolishly referenced in that last post):
We don’t have many players, we do have a lot of injuries, and we also have at least one visa issue, thus it looks like some of our team, and even more of our much-depleted bench will be made up of academy players. Compare and contrast with the big boys spending literally hundreds of millions of pounds throughout the summer, and it feels like we’re scratching around in the dirt for whatever we can find.
It’s going to be a very long, very hard season. So I’ll absolutely bite your hand off for 17th position or above – and therefore survival – and the chance to go again next season.
On our side, we have the best fans in the country, we have a formidable stadium to visit, we have some incredible team spirit, and we have a local, down-to-earth manager who understands the club, the limitations facing him, and the importance of the team’s success to the fanbase. I can’t wait for our first win (it took a horribly long while last time), but I’ll fully understand when we struggle, and I’ll continue to support wholeheartedly as long as there is 100% effort from the players.
You can’t ask for more.
We’re a very small fish in a very big pond, but it’s quite literally the best pond in the world to be in.
We worked damn hard to get promotion last season and we had some great times getting it.
This is what we wanted*. We shouldn’t forget that at any point this time around.
Never stop supporting. Never stop believing.
* although perhaps not quite as we wanted it.
