Back to the hum-drum

After two weeks of turmoil, things have calmed down a bit on my side – to the sad point where I worked the whole of Saturday, taking brief respite in a bout of lunatic shopping (three pairs of shoes, a fabulous top, underwear, Morgenster olive oil).

On Sunday, a friend, her adorable niece and I went to what seems to have become a dating hot spot – the zoo. Nope, I’m not referring to animals seeking partners for mating season, but to the astounding number of hand-holding pairs of humans (ranging from 12 to sixty-something) traipsing around the grounds. I spent a lot of time gazing at my favourite relatives, the chimps, who sporadically thrilled the crowd by throwing sticks, chewed pieces of fruit and faeces at the only slightly more evolved animals staring at them.

What my news lacks in excitement, is made up for by friends’ antics: three doctor mates down south became prison bitches for a few agonizing hours in the back of a police van while hitching a lift from the Cedarberg to Cape Town; a colleague had car accidents on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning (see, it’s not just me) – haven’t heard from him since then, and one never knows what happened from Friday to Sunday.

This coming week and the next should up the ante a little: a mate is over from London for the week, I attempt go-karting for the first time on Saturday, do the Heritage walk in Parktown on Sunday (I hate Herbert Baker, but after writing around 20 essays on his architecture in high school, it’s time to show off my knowledge to the victims I drag with me), and start my wine course on Monday. Oh, and my daily two-hour trek has been somewhat enlivened by beginners’ German tapes, which add to my knowledge and detract from my driving skills (it does say “Warning: do not listen to these cd’s while driving or operating machinery” on each cd. Oops. Die tante is vreundlich. Ein Coca-Cola und drei wurste, bitte shurn. )

A tip for those of you who will face a job interview in the future (all of us, I hope; I don’t want any pals stuck in the same job for the rest of their lives) – when a prospective employer asks you what your hobbies are, never answer “Nothing”, and certainly never proceed to excuse your lack of interests on your race. A young Oriental lass, to whom I posed the question, explained: “You see, Chinese people don’t really have hobbies.” Riiiiiight. I’m sure 1 billion people on this planet would object to that comment – I certainly do. Every other boring buttlicker (we were holding a recruitment evening event to suss out potential new colleagues) at least had the decency to deflect the question and say “I enjoy socialising”. Don’t we all?

Well dearies, I promise to be more inspired next time. Peas, I will respond to your ‘list of 7s’ soon, I swear!