An amazing afternoon out at the Deep South Distillery near Kommetjie.
Genuinely interesting guided tour of the distillery area by Steve, and then an opportunity to taste their gins, rums and amazing chili vodka with his wife, Sandy. I just love meeting people who are so obviously passionate about their work.
Highly recommended.
It was all a bit weird from the start. Populist, vocal, flipflopping political party, known for its publicity stunts and – let’s be honest here – “occasional” forays into violent protest, calls for a day of National Shutdown to end loadshedding and oust the President. But given that their grievances are an ongoing thing, it was odd that they gave us all six or seven weeks notice.
Until you realise that they had chosen the Monday 20th March because it falls in between a weekend and Tuesday 21st March – a public holiday. Schools were closed, many people would have taken one day of leave from work to get an extra long weekend: it would likely be quiet anyway. This did not go unnoticed by some people:
But it did meant that the organisers could easily claim that images of quiet cities and empty streets were down to support for their cause, when actually, a control for their experiment would have yielded much the same result.
And then there were the veiled threats. Shut your business or it might get looted. Shut down your airport – or else:
Hint: Don’t mess with a national keypoint, guys. Silly move.
And many of those businesses (not the airport) won’t be open today Not because they are supporting the protest, but more that that they are terrified of the potential violence that might befall them, should they open. And while the leaders of the party are publicly calling for peaceful protest, the EFF dosen’t have a great record at doing that:
I’m not saying that today’s EFF protests will be/would have been violent. I’m just saying that their history is enough to assume that there’s a fair chance that it won’t all be peaceful. And in the lead up to the protest, over 24,000 tyres (the SA protestors weapon of choice):
were found – many of them sequestered at strategically important localities like major intersections – and removed.
So when journalists report that “street vendors stayed away”, and the EFF supporters claim that shows endorsement for the protest, I’m more willing to believe that it’s just for the vendors’ safety and that of their businesses.
And then there’s the misinformation, because there always is misinformation. Old videos, old pictures, entirely normal traffic jams: the works. Thankfully, all debunked here. But not before they have had millions of impressions on social media.
Oh, and the video of Adderley Street in Cape Town, now supposedly in Pretoria.
Also, it rained in Cape Town this morning. It rained a lot. Now I’ve never been a fan of sports which are stopped by a bit of rain (tennis, padel, cricket etc…). And the rain certainly kept the protest numbers down around here. Much to the amusement of the mayor:
Cheap shot, agreed, but I reckon that he’ll be extremely glad that the weather helped his city out today. And after all the sabre-rattling, intimidation, threats and bravado from the other side, why not push back a little?
It’s 4:30pm now, and there have only been sporadic or unverified (at the time of writing) incidents across the country, thus far. It seemed like a lot of people stayed away from the protests instead of work – there have been a lot of images of tiny groups of red-shirted individuals from various places around the country.
A couple of valid(?) points have been raised though. The sudden availability of police officers to combat any trouble that may arise, when they’re usually nowhere to be found when actual crime happens to actual individuals. That said, I do know that they are working unsustainable shift patterns in many places to have extra numbers on the ground today. Even Struisbaai SAPS has 12 hour shifts going on this weekend, and the EFF only managed 20 votes there in the recent by-election.
And the sudden availability of electricity, as well. Is it really down to hard work and good luck, or can the powers that be actually positively affect loadshedding? And if so, how? Because if so, that’s quite sinister. Why aren’t they doing it all the time? The proof of the pudding here will be what happens tomorrow and the rest of the week.
And finally – why the panic by the government? Lots of police, lots of talk, lots of unnecessary drama:
“Regime change”? “Unconstitutional means”? (Let’s talk about constitutional means after the elections next year.) And the military on standby. Overkill. Sorry – poor choice of words.
All in all, an awful lot of “all mouth, no trousers” again, as it usually is in SA politics.
OK, in worldwide politics, but especially in SA politics.
Still a few hours of the day to go, though. And then the rest of the year.
Anything could happen.
And what’s happening here? Well, I’m going to have a beer, because my fridge hasn’t been shut down.
We’re the famous Sheff United and we’re shifting attention from our currently somewhat iffy league form by going to Wembley.
We’ll probably get thumped, but it’s important to remember that to be thumped in an FA Cup semi final at Wembley, you need to be in an FA Cup semi final at Wembley.
And by “it”, I mean the first day (24 hour period, midnight to midnight) for us with no loadshedding this year?
It’s definitely a lot longer than that as well, given that we had a very loadsheddy end to 2022, but I don’t have the figures to hand.
Of course, there is actual loadshedding elsewhere, but we are unaffected – as yet. Last time they tried to do this, everything broke down halfway through the day and we ended up on Stage 4 with 10 minutes notice. So let’s not count chickens, but also, let’s hope that we have a whole 24 hours of uninterrupted electricity supply.
But why is this possible? Well, no-one seems very sure, but it’s “lower expected demand” [sic] and fewer broken generation units, apparently:
(If you’re reading from overseas, you’ll likely be looking at the above wondering WTF any of it actually means, but we’re well used to deciphering this sort of language now.)
And why fewer broken generation units? Well, no-one seems very sure. The installation of a new Minister of Electricity, the departure of the CEO of Eskom, and some minor party threatening violence on the streets of SA tomorrow are being touted as the reasons, but none of those could miraculously fix years and years of decay, corruption and lack of investment. So maybe it’s good fortune or – more likely – a lack of sabotage. But why a lack of sabotage?
Well, no-one seems very sure.
It’s all rather confusing, very welcome, and probably completely unsustainable.
I’ve never been into trendy things that are trendy because they’re trendy.
Trendy things that are trendy because they are good or useful – sure. Solar power would be a great example of that, right now.
But if you are just doing something trendy solely to be trendy – well, that’s not for me.
Step forward padel: the latest trendy thing to hit the monied white people of South Africa.
In Cape Town, you may have seen Mountain Biking fill this niche. And then there were E-Bikes.
Remember the Tim Noakes Cookbook?
How about Hot Yoga?
Fedoras.
EMS BodyTec fitness.
Crapft Beer (or Gin).
There are many, many examples.
Padel is a cross between beach bats, tennis, pickleball and squash, and it is EVER so trendy right now. And it’s almost exclusively in that demographic that I have mentioned above.
I have friends who play padel. But it’s not for me. And I feel that that decision was vindicated when I saw the (hastily built, always full) local courts being used by at least two gentlemen wearing fedoras.
Case rested. That’s not sporting gear, that’s trendy for the sake of being trendy gear.
They’d probably ridden there on their E-Bikes.
And then I was served this ball-achingly awful ad on Facebook for Padel bats padels, which just sums up the whole thing:
So many issues here.
seventy-Four different Examples of Capitalisation. Never a good Start.
Released on 23 February, but “designed to celebrate the holiday season”? Which holiday season, exactly? Shrove Tuesday?
And “a little pre-taste of the summer collection”? Mate – this is the Southern Hemisphere. On the 23rd February, summer is less than a week from being over.
How pre-taste do you want this? 9 months?
Variate is a noun, not a verb.
“wintery Smoke Pine Greens” – absolutely ideal for a little pre-taste of the summer collection.
As an aside: never smoke a pine, by the way:
“When considering total emissions, particulate matter from smoldering pine wood and needles was by far the most mutagenic of the samples assessed, and thus potentially more carcinogenic.”
Mutagenicity and Lung Toxicity of Smoldering vs. Flaming Emissions from Various Biomass Fuels: Implications for Health Effects from Wildland Fires
And then the weird elevation of “a papaya smoothie” as some sort of aspirational goal for the hue of sporting equipment.
But after that, well, they’re just taking the piss, aren’t they?
Our Collection continues to draw its inspiration from Sci-Fi movies translating the current world we’re living in, where people spend their time between the physical world and the virtual metaverse.
I don’t even know what that means.
I love a good Sci-Fi movie translating the current world (we’re living in).
But no, the people you are trying to appeal to are spending their time between the padel court and the next occasion they go to the padel court. This intermediate time is spent in the physical world, describing their last padel game and arranging their next one.
No-one is spending any time in the virtual metaverse, because:
the “metaverse” is a hypothetical iteration of the Internet as a single, universal, and immersive virtual world that is facilitated by the use of virtual reality and augmented reality headsets.
And no, I don’t know if you can play padel there.
As with many of these fads, padel will last for a while (durations of these things vary) while shrewd individuals and companies pivot and invest to make a quick (and big) buck (e.g. Osaka’s [above] domain is actually osakahockey dot co dot za, but that old curved wooden stick staple is nowhere near as trendy and money-spinning as padel) and will then die out.
But with the equipment (padel, racquet, ugh… whatever) starting at a few thousand Rands for a bit of moulded plastic:
…it’s clearly for the few, not the many.
Thankfully, it won’t be around for long.
Please remember to recycle your bat on the way out.