Whatever you’re doing today, have a nice day.
We’re looking forward to a big lunch with friends and family, and I have potatoes to peel. And infamous Yorkshire puddings to make.
So please, enjoy your day. I plan to enjoy mine.
Tag: christmas
It’s that day again
I’m having the day off the blog today, so this was written earlier.
We were planning a big afternoon with a lot of friends, but then something else showed up which has changed all that.
Yep. A stonkingly strong positive (I know these things are qualitative rather than quantitative, but sometimes, they can be both) which our son has imported from Egypt along with the super cool Tutankhamen bottle opener he brought back for the bar.
He’s doing ok. He could be better. A rather sad end to an amazing adventure.
We will still enjoy ourselves today. There is lamb, there are roast potatoes, there is Yorkshire pudding.
Whatever you’re up to today, have a great day.
88:88
An absolute treat for us Chez 6000 today, as we might be lucky enough to go the whole day without a power cut. But that’s more down to luck than anything else. The country is on Stage 3, which would generally mean about six hours off for most people. But in Cape Town, they’ve managed (for the moment) to reduce that to Stage 1:
The 180-megawatt Steenbras Hydro Pump Station (SHPS) consists of four turbines that are used to generate electricity. During peak electricity demand, it channels water from Upper Steenbras to Lower Steenbras, through the turbine generator, to create electricity.
When electricity usage is low, usually between 11pm and 7am, the turbines pump the water back to the Upper Steenbras Dam to be re-used the next day. In this way, SHPS operates like a battery. The amount of electricity that it can generate in one day is limited by the capacity of the lower reservoir.
Thus about two-thirds of the water used to generate power during the day is pumped back at night to the upper Steenbras reservoir to create more space for continual utilisation of the power station.
It’s more like charging the cellphone battery at night for usage during the following day. Cape Town is the only city in South Africa to own and operate a large pumped hydroelectric scheme.
And then, thanks to the way that the timetable works, we have been fortunate enough to not be scheduled for any cuts in Stage 1 today.
Woohoo.
And there are rumours that Eskom has been saving up emergency reserve capacity over the past few day in order to give us relief from loadshedding for tomorrow as well:
Eskom chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer says that Eskom will do its best to keep the lights on for Christmas but warned that things could change very quickly.
“It is our intention not to have load shedding on Christmas Day; however, we are monitoring the situation,” he said.
The current outlook, barring any challenges over the next day or so, is that emergency reserves will have to be used to keep load shedding at bay. The intention is to keep load shedding suspended for at least ‘large parts’ of Christmas, he said.
Two days without blackouts. Aren’t we fortunate?
Look, I’ve taken the outrageously bold step of resetting all the clocks in the house. There’s no point in doing that usually, because they will all need resetting 4 hours later. But with (possibly) two days off, I’m going to indulge myself and be able to glance at the oven, bedroom clock or the microwave and get an accurate assessment of the time, rather than the usual 88:88.
I’m happy that we’re loadshedding free for these couple of days. It does help. But I’m also mindful that we need to avoid normalising this situation, or even celebrating it in some kind of weird Stockholm Syndrome way. We shouldn’t have to be hoping to have electricity. It should be there.
But this situation isn’t going to change any time soon:
At least, not for the better…
Day 275 – Boxing Day QP
As ever, I’m writing a few posts in advance over the holiday period (such as it is) so that I can have a little bit of break as well. And because I don’t want to be using up all my words in one go, here’s a quota photo that I took on our recent trip to the Cederberg.
Star trails for dayz (or… er… nightz).
This was the result of 2 hours (and one second, because why not?) of exposure, then an automatic noise clean up on the camera (I won’t be using that feature again – took another 2 hours!) and a bit of tweaking in Lightroom. Bigger and darker here.
I quite like it.
It was almost worth fumbling around in the pitch darkness of the bush in the early hours.
Almost.
Day 274 – A very weird Christmas
I’m not a religious person, but I do know some people who are.
I’m very aware that today is a big day for one religion in particular, and that has implications for other people, even for those of us living in a supposedly secular nation. Our summer holiday is based around Christmas and New Year (ok, and actual summer) and we have time off work to relax and spend time with our families.
This year will be a bit different.
My Dad hasn’t been able to make the trip over here and Mother-in-law 6000 is not allowed out of her sheltered accommodation, both for her own safety and that of those around her.
For the first time that I can remember (possibly ever?) it’s just going to be us four.
It’s going to be different and it’s going to be weird.
And we have each other – not everyone will have family around them. Please make sure you check in with those who are on their own or might be struggling a bit because of their situation today.
If you’re lucky enough to be able to celebrate freely and/or to be pretty much Covid-free, please don’t underestimate just how fortunate you are. And how jealous the rest of us are.
2020 has been a complete dog show, and certainly not one where the best of each and every breed is demonstrated and displayed. More like one where a huge pack of errant beagles have run wild, eating everything in their path and peeing against the podium. But not quite as funny.
There will be no quick fix in 2021, but surely things have to improve at some point.
Right?
In the meantime, keep well and keep safe, wherever you are.