A mildly sniffly nose, a slight cough and the occasional headache are all that remain of my recent Covid infection. And if that doesn’t sound too bad, it’s because it’s really not.
But…
Sadly, exercise is still a bit of a bridge too far, and because of the otherwise very mild symptoms, that’s really annoying. A gentle 2km stroll along the prom in Sea Point yesterday exhausted me, which really shouldn’t be the case. I was in bed by 8:30pm. Again.
Look, I’m already far further on than back in 2021, but it’s so frustrating that I’m breathless after walking up a flight of stairs, and heavy-legged after a short walk. I should be out on the mountain today, doing an easy hike with friends, but given yesterday’s experience, it was always going to be a non-starter.
I’m mindful that each week I miss is going to take several (or more) weeks to recover, and that that ratio is only going to increase the longer I leave it, but the thought of even getting on a bike or going for a run is just beyond me at the moment. Legs don’t work.
I live in Cape Town in South Africa. I’ve lived here for almost 20 years. It has it all. I love the food, the culture and the nature.
And I don’t know how much Facebook ads cost, but I feel that this repetitive effort by Dutch airline KLM is a somewhat unnecessary expense on their part.
Book my ticket to Cape Town? On your airline, that’s going to have to be via Amsterdam.
No chance. You might be ok with wasting loads of money, but I’m not.
Spotted this on Facebook earlier, and never have I identified with anything quite so much.
Memories of Mr Dalton and Mr “Mental” Mantle came flooding back straight away.
Ankle deep in claggy mud on the top field. The slap as the ball hit your cold, wet thigh, and the peach and purple pattern it immediately left behind.
Legally assaulting an opponent by belting the ball directly at them was a completely acceptable – and oft used – tactic. And when faced with the other side weaponising the Mouldmaster, it was imperative that you didn’t back down or “nesh” the challenge. Taking the hit and then carrying on sent a very powerful message. Even if you were weeping internally.
Which you were.
30-something years on, and just the sight of that ball has got my inner thigh tingling.
I love a bit of clever advertising. And this is clever advertising. Simple stuff, taking a brand that we all know about and informing us that the range of services it offers is expanding, but keeping it all very familiar as it does so.
You can now book train tickets on Uber in the UK, and Ad Wizards Mother have given us some lovely work to tell us about it:
More on that link above, but I think it’s just very clever the way they have extended the messages we’re used to reading about drivers and cars and simply extended them into trains. It seems both completely normal and a bit alien. And because of that, it feels both comfortable and amusing.
We’re less than 6 months away from elections in South Africa. This process will unfortunately result in one (or – worse still – more) of the local political parties trying to form a government. But in the run up to those elections, we can expect populism, bribery, misinformation, disinformation, violence, scapegoating, xenophobia, and a whole raft of untruths and empty promises.
All of which will be lapped up and amplified by a fully dysfunctional, AI-assisted social media, and those dodgy anti-SA sites like Daily Investor and TheSouthAfrican.
It’s started already, with one certain divisive political figure spouting bullshit to anyone who will listen in an effort to be controversial,
Maybe he was thinking of the very similar sport of Nqanqarhu: named for the posh school in the Eastern Cape where Wandile Qwebe-Mwelis first picked up the football and began running with it.
And while this is so clearly and demonstrably incorrect, it’s actually laughable, there are plenty within his party who will believe him. And sadly for us, and the country in general, the polarisation of politics is so great at the moment, that they will then go on to believe him on more serious matters, never mind the fact that he’s merely doing it for clout and votes.
And yes, he got his name into the headlines again. Just what he wanted.
I guess that the positive side of this is that the polarisation of politics is so great at the moment, that it’s unlikely that he will sway anyone into voting for the EFF while talking this sort of nonsense. But it is rather scary that there’s a good possibility that the EFF and this clown may become Kingmakers next year, should the ANC’s demise be as bad as everyone expects.
It’s not like anyone else is doing much better. You’d think that with such a proven disastrous government in place, it would be easy pickings to win the election. But things are more complicated than that: there’s a whole lot of history to overcome for a start, and then there’s the infighting and instability amongst the opposition parties, the ridiculous pipe-dream (is there such a thing as a “pipe-nightmare”?) of “Cape Independence” and the power-crazed individuals driving it, and even the unnecessary stances on the Israel situation.
The aftermath of the elections promises to be a complete mess, but there’s not a lot we can do about that. The run-up to the elections will also be horrific, but keep your calm, don’t believe everything you hear or read, and don’t be fooled into shouting for one side or the other. It won’t get you anywhere.
