For want of something better to write just now...

we had a nice peaceful weekend. In case you're remotely interested...which I doubt, so why am I even going to go into this? Ah fuckit, you're here so you may as well read on... On Friday afternoon I dropped Max off at the Renault dealership to pick up his old wagon with the new gearbox and played my new old-school rock CD all the way back to Makro to buy a bottle of Single Malt scotch. Bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd, Allman Brothers and the like rang loud in my ears all the way down the highway (yes, Bachman Turner Overdrive are on the CD as well) and I pulled up to a strange look from the car guard, something to the effect of "Eish, get some new toons, honkey". I ignored him, then ignored his request to look after my car (I've ignored every one of them since some bastard car guard who wasn't at his post - or had been bought off - caused my car to be stolen a couple of years ago. I only had one payment left on it and it would have been mine, all mine, I tell ya!!) Anyway, into Makro and I found what's turned out to be a pleasant 10yr old Islay Single Malt from the distillery called Finlaggan. It sounds Irish to me, but I'm guaranteed by the splurb on the box that it's 100% Scotch. Tastes good too, not too peaty, and after the first sip, becomes quite smooth. Hell, if it wasn't 10h20am, I might be forced to have a wee dram right now, but then you'd all think I had a drinking problem too, which, without sounding defensive, I haven't...so there. I also picked up my free, inscribed, Johnnie Walker ice bucket compliments of a promotion they had last Christmas. Yes, that's right, it's taken eight months to deliver it, despite my occasional email query to the organisers regarding the whereabouts of said bucket. Now I have it in my possession, the only disappointment to it being the chip in the glass I noticed when I took it out of the box at home. No doubt caused by the inscriber... I tuned into the TV sports channels to see what was happening, in anticipation of the upcoming Sharks game at 19h00. Steph called to say we'd been invited round to friends for a braai to tan some chops on the grid and, no doubt, have a coupla drinks too. So, with Chris being a rugby supporter too, I agreed to the invitation. And a bloody good game it was too. The weather reminded me of the 1995 World Cup game, at the same stadium, between SA and France, where it pissed down for the entire 80mins. This was no different and made for some great running rugby, players passing the soapy ball between them like dirty kids in the mud. In the end, the Sharks ran out 16-6 winners, and the captain of the opposing Western Province applauded the victors on their handling skills in the wet. The braai was good too, there's nothing like a piece of meat off the grid to get the salivary glands drooling. On Saturday morning, the gardener arrived just short of 08h30, about a half hour earlier than usual and I think he thinks that, because I asked him to come a half hour earlier the week before, that he has to come earlier every week. I'm not going to correct him, as it's coming into summer and there's going to be plenty for him to do. This weekend, however, I had him slapping a layer of anti-rust over the front palisade fencing as I ground the old paint off ahead of him. Judging by the progress we made, it's gonna take us a while to do the entire fence as we only managed one side of the driveway. Next week, he's going to start painting over the anti-rust stuff to make the fence look all new again, and I'll carry on scraping the rest of the fence. At 14h30, I sat down to watch the Springboks get another rugby lesson from the All Blacks. I think it's time that the Springbok team was fired. Not the management, as Jake White is perfectly capable of putting together a winning side, but the skills and attitude of some of the players leaves a lot to be desired. After ten minutes, the Boks were ahead on the scoreboard and that's when it became very clear that they were going to lose. South African teams have a bad habit of sitting on their laurels when they go ahead early, thinking that they can now keep the "psychologically demoralised" opponents at bay for the remaining 70 minutes and retain their two point lead. As for attitude, there are a couple of players that should not even be playing club rugby, never mind international. How dumb do you have to be when, at just over five feet in height, you throw a punch at the biggest opposing bloke on the field? And it's every fuckin' game he plays, that he tries it on with the biggest no-necked fucker on the field. I'm speaking of Bolla Conradie, Western Province scrumhalf, luckily not playing this time, but it happens time and time again. Another one, Enrico January, the scrumhalf for the Lions does exactly the same thing. Maybe it's a scrumhalf thing, I don't know, but they shouldn't be on the field. Anyway, another lesson learned for the Boks (how many lessons does it take to learn something, for fuck sakes?). That evening, we went out to dinner and a show, as an early birthday present to me (before you ask, it's the 31st) from Steph. I was a little sceptic about what the show would be like, but it turned out to be a great evening. Two "camp" blokes on two baby grand pianos, tickling the ivories and amusing the audience with their humour, "A Handful of Keys" was well worth the evening out. They had a solid two hours on stage, with only a brief 15min interval in the middle, and played every genre of music you can think of. Their "piece du resistance" was a 15min-long medley of tunes spanning more than 100 years of music, consisting of 117 snippets, all perfectly in time sequence (from what they told us)...absolutely brilliant, with humour thrown into the mix as well. Unfortunately, yesterday was their last show so I can't even recommend it to anyone. I'm not sure if the show is just moving theatres or if it's being closed down, but I hope it's the former. My Sunday was spent sloshing anti-rust onto the main gate across the driveway. It took me a whole six and a half hours!! The gate is perhaps only 4m wide, but it has intricate circle patterns and nooks and crannies that are very difficult to get into with a paintbrush. I decided to do it myself for two main reasons, the first being that I'd ground the old paint off the day before and any more rain would have just brought back the rust. The second reason is the aforementioned gardener. He has a side job painting apartments and houses, but the rate at which he painted the palisade on Saturday made me feel that he was just fucking around and the quality of his work isn't that good. I decided that, as the gate is the centrepiece of the fence and, if needed, the fence can be repaired cheaper than the gate, I would do the gate myself. I might even paint it next weekend too, just to make sure it gets done properly. Anyway, gate done and a couple of small odd jobs done around the house before dark, I showered and had a scotch to celebrate my hard work, followed by another sumptuous dinner by Steph and a TV movie, "Flight of the Phoenix" on satellite. Not a bad movie, but one which can be left to the bottom of the rainy day pile. Basically, it's about a group of American oil-riggers in Mongolia (I didn't know they had oil either) whose well gets shut down by the company, who then pile on board an airplane which crashes into the Gobi desert after flying into a sandstorm, who then build another plane out of the remains of the crashed one, who then manage to fly off into the sunset just as smugglers' bullets fly around their ears. In my book, the only good scene was when the designer of the new plane, who turns out to be a 'plane designer by trade albeit of model airplanes, blows out the brains of one of the smugglers the good guys had captured while the rest of them were squabbling about how he was going to be a drain on their already low water supplies and what were they going to do with him. No emotion, the guy walks over, picks up the army issue revolver off the table and pulls the trigger. Problem solved... After the movie, I watched a bit more telly while Steph toddled off and had a bath then retired to bed, having an early rise. I wandered off to the land of nod at around midnight, arms and head slightly sunburned from the last couple of days out in the sunshine, contented. Hope you guys also had a good weekend...