10 hours without power today. If only something could be done about it.
But… wait…
JUST IN: The Minister of Public Enterprises, Pravin Gordhan, has directed the
management and board to work hard to get the country out of stage 6
loadshedding with immediate effect.
Oh. Well then.
I never realised it was that straightforward.
Why didn’t he just ask a bit earlier?
Loadshedding slots all over the place today, so let’s get in a post while we can.
And it’s a feel good one too! Bonus points!
Just really simple stuff, done well. And filmed in Cape Town.
You’ll absolutely recognise a lot of this if you have ever had a dog.
And maybe that’s why it works so well.
…with its Stage 6 loadshedding and consequent 10 (TEN) hours without power – then you’d be absolutely right. Let’s not allow ourselves to normalise this sort of crap.
But then, if you’re in my zone, you probably don’t want to look at tomorrow, where there’s another ten hours, including the top two worst loadshedding slots.
Argh.
I saw someone the other day wondering when we would all start “posing the awkward question” (their words, not mine) as to why with so little electricity flowing on a daily basis, our bills haven’t dropped at all. Oooh! Tasty stuff, invoking all sorts of conspiracy theories.
Except…
Our bill has dropped loads. I buy the same amount of electricity every month and I usually/often (not sure which is the better word here) have to top it up by the end of the month. November’s lot is still going and we’re on the 7th December! And what’s more, we’ll make it to the 10th with what we’ve still got left (and well beyond, if we stick at Stage 6 for the next few days).
Some disclaimery:
But still, even with those provisos in place, I’m getting at least 33% more than I usually do.
And you have to take the small wins, because the big defeats are regular, they’re heavy and they’re depressing.
Anyway, suddenly I have loads to fit in – including some depression – before the next outage at 2pm, so please excuse me.
I’ve sat in my car park many, many times this year. In all sorts of weather (but mainly wet):
And I was there again last night for the team’s final practice session before the World Cup.
Last week when I was up North, I wished that I had brought my drone along. The sunset was incredible, but I was surrounded by ugly buildings and tall trees, which didn’t make for any decent photography.
So this week, rather than miss out again, I did take my drone along. And predictably, the sunset was completely rubbish.
Initially…
I’d actually packed the drone away and was settling down in the back of the car to watch an episode of Only Connect when I spotted the first tinge of pink in the sky. And while I didn’t think it was going anywhere, I knew I’d be pissed off if it did and I missed it, so I unpacked and set up again and by the time I got flying… well…
First things first: this is a stacked image of 5 bracketed shots, given that the sky was BRIGHT and the mountain was DARK. I’ve already been accused of RBOSSery by someone on the family Whatsapp group (wow – et tu, Brute?), but in fact, it’s actually UN-RBOSSed:
Look at that! And that’s just because there was far too much going on in the sky for the teeny, tiny sensor on my aging drone to handle. So no, definitely no RBOSS or hypocrisy here*.
I think this image would have been better with a bit more Table Bay in the mid-ground, but I was just down the road from Blouberg (aka “Blow”berg), and the South Easter was pumping. I was getting wind warnings even just up at 30m, so I decided not to risk much above 50. A bit irritating, but there are some things that you just can’t control, and hey, I still have a drone this morning, so that’s nice.
Always look for the positives.
Because the World Cup is coming up, I’m not going to be in my car park for a while now, and when practices do start again, they will likely not be 4 or 5 times a week, so I think this was a really good way to sign off for a while.
* Add a bit of Whatsapp compression and I can maybe kind of see where he was coming from, but I’m still rather hurt.
Damage confirmed: ligaments and a tendon torn, plus a [swearword] broken rib from that completely unnecessary nastiness last weekend. Out of action (and sore) for the rest of the year and beyond. And also, at the age of [really quite old], my first official broken bone. I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re wondering.
Quite annoyed. Quite depressed. Quite frustrated.
Next time, we should probably tell the opposition that there is a rule about sliding tackles not being allowed.
Oh… wait.