22/09/03

*** 16th ***

after tkd and a much-needed shower, i received a phone call from hi-fi corp, informing me that the regional manager okayed our getting a cash refund for the radio we bought.
this was really cool, but i had to hang around there for AGES getting it all sorted.

i finally left around the time that i should have been making my way to fetch my mom from work.
silly me, i got lost.
ignoring the waste of petrol, it also caused me to make it just in the nick of time - for rush hour. great.

my mother and i stopped in town on the way home, to visit some family friends. and have a drink (johnny walker, black label). anyone who knows me, knows that my alcohol tolerance is rather low.

i drove home. my mom made supper, which i had practically no time to eat. as soon as i finished, i rushed off to cavendish. the movie was starting at 19.45. i left home around 19.30. i arrived at the theatre, i think, at 19.55. either way, we (eighteen of us) made it in time for the last couple of ads.

equilibrium was #@!$ing BRILLIANT. there were many holes in the plot, and some continuity errors, but all in all it was very cool to watch, and the fight scenes were absolutely STUNNING.

after the movie, a few of us decided that lizards was a good idea. two of the guys came with me to get my car, and taught me a rather big lesson.
most of the time, in israel, i'll make a joke, and everyone gives me funny looks, like my sense of humour is not acceptable. with these guys, i barely got to finish my sentences - they were quick on the draw and we were all in sync. it's a culture difference. i MUST remember this when i return. i'll admit, israel's given me a mean streak a mile and a half wide, but there's elements of myself i don't wanna squash.

lizards was cool. towards the end, however, shadowslight and i truly began to shine. we played some SERIOUS pool - we were both in the zone, and were just hammering away at funny angles. that felt gooood.

*** 17th ***

my day started off with fighting drills. this is very, very, very, very tiring. and repetitive. and tiring.
not to mention the fact that i hadn't got much sleep the previous night...

i spent the majority of the day sleeping.

at some point in the afternoon i remembered to take my prayer shawl to the dry cleaners. it took about half a minute of argueing before i realized that what the women behind the counter was telling me was that there is no charge for religious items. interesting.

i then went to milnerton to pick up my mom. we stopped by a computer game store in the building, which is owned and run by to ex-israelis. we had a very interesting, yet pointless, political debate, but i discovered something really, really cool while there. two collections: king's quest with the laura bow games, and quest for glory. i really want those. it does mean installing windows 98 on my machine in israel, and so i would need a bigger harddrive, but i think i need that anyway.

after we went shopping at pick 'n pay, we returned home, and my second mom organized supper. while watching friends and eating, my sister rocked up, and we went downstairs to visit the apartment she's moving into: it's very, very nice.

*** 18th ***

tkd this morning was a severe lesson in patience. i know the first form so completely and utterly, that my brain switches off when i do it. this is the form that we spent the entire hour studying. the worst part was, i had to match timing with this girl who was learning it for the first time...

after a shower, i drove to claremont to pick up some (what turned out later to be) useless documents, and then drove back to mowbray, to shadowslight's workplace.
i realized, almost immediately after arriving, that i was starving, so i made a mission to champs for an R8 burger. and i have to admit that, while walking back eating this thing, all i could think of was sylvester stallone in demolition man, discussing the really good rat-burger.

we managed to set up the DDK on shadowslight's pc, and i began figuring out what goes where, and how, in terms of writing printer drivers.
i was there for quite a while, and managed to achieve, for all intents and purposes, nothing.

back to milnerton to get my mom. while there, some guy had the audacity to comment on my gloves! i #$@%ing LOVE my gloves, but mocking him back without him realizing it wasn't quite satisfying.

subjecting one's mum to system of a down for about twenty minutes is a form of evil. but i had to try.
she still doesn't like it.

i'm trying to chill with cheesy substances (lactose intolerance), so instead of ordering pizza, we stopped by texie's for hake & chips (i wanted a gatsby, but they were out of bread), before my mom dropped me off at shadowslight's for thursday night movies.

first up: aliens ii. very cool, but we did some very nasty things to it. f'rinstance, firstfallen's suggestion that the hands coming out of the floor were actually being held by an ingenious alien :).
afterwards, we played a really entertaining game of munchkin fu, before arad dropped me off home.

*** 19th ***

i knew we were having fight training, and was expecting a broken rib or two. fortunately, that didn't happen. however, i came out of it with a completely screwed up knee, and a pretty sore chest. we spent at least half an hour kicking each other in the sternum, pretty hard.

i dropped one of the guys off at the waterfront. while leaving the parking lot, some cute girl walking past the car gave me a really sweet smile.
don't get it.

on the way home, i stopped at a set of traffic lights, headbanging to one of the crazier songs. suddenly, i noticed an elderly couple in the car next to me, and this old man was holding a tiny dog on his lap, and the dog was staring at me.
he picked up the dog's paw and began waving at me, so i waved back. he then started telling me how his dog loves music. wonderful.
just then the music got a little harder. i was still headbanging, and this crazy old coot was STILL talking! i have no clue what he said, all i could do was smile and nod...

i went to the traffic department, to renew my license. some guy got hold of me as i walked in, and explained everything. nice.
the bitch was the eye test - my left eye is a hell of a lot weaker than my right, and everything appears just a little further away. crap.

on my way home, i stopped by the waterfront to have my watch adjusted. i discovered that if you're by yourself, there really is nothing to do there.

i fetched my mum from work, and we sat through some pretty heavy traffic. she'd been having an annoying day, so i convinced her to come with me for coffee. we went back to the waterfront, and found this really nice little place (don't remember the name).
we were joined by my aunt, who happened to be walking past.
while we were there i saw the primi piatti uniform for the first time - it is WAY cool! my niece works there, so i'm going to try to organize a couple: they're bright orange overalls! just my style.

i went to the synagogue for the first time in almost seven years. it was really weird - i had a couple of warm, fuzzy moments, but most of it was just as i'd remembered. dull and meaningless.

my mom pieced together a quick meal for us, and then it was off to play tekken at shadowslight's. i got my nephew to come along, as he's been trash-talking me for a couple of years. and he's good at it. turned out to be a good idea: firstfallen's playstation isn't chipped, so we wouldn't have been able to play. getting to the car in order to drive all the way back to sea point to pick up his, we were pissed upon heavily by god and his cronies. it felt like a scene from a really bad sailing movie.
we played tekken until shadowslight chucked us out at around 4am. it turned out to be more or less fair, and i think everyone else enjoyed it too. aeroplane and some friends of his rocked up at one stage, completely trashed, after trying to find the place for over half an hour. they then disappeared to find munchies, and came back for just long enough to say goodbye and return to the northern suburbs. so that one of them could meet up with some chick. not impressed.

*** 20th ***

i woke up really late, around 1pm i think, and spent the first few hours of my day eating. there wasn't much transition between breakfast and lunch - all i remember was being quite hungry.
i caught the south african version of the weakest link. this woman on the british version is mean, but she's really clever and quick. our one is as stupid as she is nasty - she couldn't even pronounce descartes, and her insults were pathetic. i heard worse when i was in primary school. hell, i said worse when i was in primary school.
talk about being hired based on looks.

i wasn't feeling too well, but my mom convinced me to go shopping with her. checkers sucks. and my head spinning didn't help, either.

we went over to my sister's place for coffee. my nephew set up a really nice nargila, with banana and melon tabacco, and my niece told us one of the funniest stories i've ever heard.
this happened sometime last week: some guy made a booking for a table at primi piatti, and he didn't show up. she didn't think he would, as he'd been completely $#@%ed when he'd made it (her description of how screwed up this guy was was hilarious, i'm guessing lsd though). she got drunk with her manager a couple of nights later, and she saw the same guy. so she went up to him and started screaming at him.
she then dragged this guy (who was trashed again, as well) to her manager, and made him apologize to her. apparently (she doesn't remember this, but i think her manager told her later) she slapped the poor oke!
well, i know one thing. this guy's never going to primi piatti ever again! :)

the four of us (not my mom) went to the waterfront to watch bruce almighty. unfortunately, i ran into krybabie and his girlfriend. i haven't spoken to this guy in ages (we used to be best friends) because, to put it simply, i don't like him. i think he's a complete asshole. anyway, he comes up to me, and ask me if everything's cool, but he does it in such a way that it was like staring at a sweet innocent puppy before you pull the trigger.
and after i told him everything was okay, he wanted a hug. i feel so dirty.
* SHUDDER *
we then went in to see the movie. it wasn't bad, and seeing the girl from jag dressed up so sexy, made the movie well worth seeing. as far as comedy goes, there were a couple of good scenes, but on the whole it wasn't my idea of a five-star film.

more coffee - we went to love, revenge and cappucino for, you guessed it, cappucino. well, i did anyway. my sister and her daughter ordered something chocolatey. aside from the girl talk, i had to get a lecture from both of them, on how i have to have a "talk" with her father when i get back. just the thought of which makes my toes curl, and my vision blurry.

i discovered that i wasn't the only person not let in on babyacid's birthday party plans. firstfallen and i arranged to go hunting for it together. i gave my nephew a ride to bantry bay, picked up firstfallen, and off to obs we went.
first stop, gandalf's. the music downstairs was okay, but the music in mordor was just freakin' WEIRD. really bad house music. in mordor.
we couldn't find anyone, so we decided to try cool runnings. yes, everyone was there. most of them slightly, err... tipsy.
serendipity was the name of the game - we walked in just in time to st-, uhh, remove the mints from the bill. we sat around for a few minutes before moving to gandalf's. where a fairly quick conversation concerning deja vu took place.

gandalf's was fun. at some point, the music turned from okay to good. at another point, it apparently went from good to excellent, but i'd left by then.
typical.
all sorts of interesting people joined us, and a good time was had by most. i only had two brandy-'n-cokes, and one shooter (of something sour, i think), and i did bounce around a little bit (i remember them playing some rage against the machine).
was having a little trouble following conversations (my ears are definitely damaged), and my mind was wondering a little. i was attempting to stick my tongue, tip first, down the back of my throat, when moonflake asked me if i was okay. so i explained myself. i'm SO glad that things that intrigue me can cause such amusement... :)

*** 21st ***

leaving was a bit difficult, as the people i wanted to say goodbye to were all over the place, and it took me two or three attempts.
the drive home was fine. really. i have trouble thinking, seeing, and generally just being when i've had something to drink, but i can always drive. i wonder if everyone thinks that?

i tried to update my logs. unsuccessfully.

i had yet another early wakeup. which was why i'd left gandalf's so early.
it's approximately a two hour drive to sandbaai. i was planning on sleeping in the car, but everything was just SO pretty! it also gave me and my mom time to talk about completely arbitrary things.
when we got to my uncle/aunt's place, we had some coffee, and then took a walk down to the beach. they all sat on a bench, while i took a kiddies' hike to some hidden rockpool, to sit and contemplate my navel. and wonder where all those weird insect-type creatures come from. it was incredible, but all i could think of was having her with me. in fact, i spent the rest of the day just wishing that she could see all of this, and understand why i can't leave this place for too long.

my uncle braaied for lunch. and ohmigod, it was fantastic! we had chops, and wors, and chicken, and it was all done to absolute perfection. i even went for thirds and fourths, in spite of my stomache.
* SHUDDER *
damn, that was gooood.

we all spent the next couple of hours chilling, sleeping, reading, and laying in the grass (they have their own private mini-kirstenbosch).
we went for a short drive to hermanus, where we watched the whales, which was very cool. i didn't get a close view of them, but what i did see was awesome. they're much more impressive when they're in the wild, doing what they do.
also, it was nice to be there before the festival starts - there weren't many tourists and everyone was relaxed.

after some coffee, and chocolate mousse, we drove home. hitting traffic on the way. it wasn't so bad though, as it was even prettier on the return journey. coming over the mountain, into elgin valley, is really amazing. screw new zealand, we have enough here! (lame lord of the rings reference)

i was fully intending to pass out when i got home, but duncs really wanted to play pool, so shadowslight and i obliged and we all met at stones in obs. duncs was a bit loud, but we were there for him (in essence), so we dealt with it. one really should learn to play before trash-talking people who are good in a game, 'cause it looks silly when you lose. at least he wasn't being too serious about it. we had fun.

*** 22nd ***

i had some difficulty in tkd - we were doing forms, and my body just wasn't in the mood to co-operate with me.

i got home, suddenly remembered (thank you nokia) a dentist appointment. an hour long dentist appointment.
let's just say i didn't really feel like it. it wasn't THAT bad, and it didn't hurt, but it really bothers me when someone puts a drill in your mouth and it sounds like it's going to come out the top of your skull, and in the end it has no visible effect.
the whole thing only took 25 minutes. not to sound ungrateful, or anything, it's just that i was expecting worse, and wouldn't have been so unimpressed to begin with.

i went to town, to pick up some documents for my mom. while working out how the parking metre cards work, i activated a full hour (when i only needed ten minutes). i only remembered that i had something else to do once i'd already left, so it cost me a further half hour to park by greenmarket square.
where some guy in a wheelchair told me that he'd look after my car. now, not to say that i don't think he's a capable man, or that i don't approve of him making an effort. it's just that i think that being handicapped might affect his ability to protect my car against, well, pretty much anyone. except, maybe, offenders who are also in wheelchairs.

after much running around the flea market, and even going upstairs to wildfire, i discovered that there aren't people in this city who sell unobsequious ear studs.
go figure.

i got home, passed out for a bit, and woke up just in time to go to milnerton to fetch my mum.

i went to kauai for supper, and then to shadowslight's for monday night tv madness.
shadowslight compiled a really sweet cd for the car - rage against the machine - rage against the machine with nin - closer and some other stuff. very cool.