What are you trying to say?

I play Wordle every day, do you?

We have a little group and we share our results. It’s my dad’s group actually. We are a motley crew of various age groups, backgrounds and not everyone has English as their first language.

I started to do a little ranking graph and then my dad took over and he does a brilliant job of a daily commentary. Great fun.

I am, alarmingly, totally rubbish. Often last.

Fortunately, I am not particularly competitive or this would bother me.

But, it does interest me that I like to read and write, but I’m dismal at Wordle.

I used to get my lovely man to give me a start word every day, but I’ve abandoned that because I do even worse.

I was pondering on my incompetence when I noticed my lovely man reading one of my blogs. My lovely man lies right next to me, reads all my blogs, closes them and carries on with his life with nary a word. Always.

If I’m looking for affirmation, this is not the place to get it.

So, to my regret as it turns out, I asked him his opinion on what he was reading.

I sometimes struggle to get what you are saying, he advised me, you write strangely.

Not a fan then.

Yes, there’s a parallel here

I’m reading a book at the moment called ‘The Running Grave’ . Actually I’m listening to it on Audible. What a blessing audible books are.

Anyway, it’s very gripping. It’s about the goings on in a cult.

I’ve not had a lot of experience with cults. I don’t think a cult would tolerate me for too long. I’d either be expelled or locked up in a box until I realised the error of my ways.

It occurred to me, as I gazed across the lawn at the tortoise antics and listened to their bellows, that we are, in fact, housing a cult.

There’s a great deal of free love going on.

Even battered old Tamara is getting her fair share. And honestly, I’ve considered getting her adult diapers.

Incontinence, it appears, is of no consequence. Tamara, the hottie, is rocking it.

I’m considering playing something from Woodstock for them, it seems fitting.

My lovely man, watching this lot, commented ‘inspiring’. And then he gave a little roar.

Steady on….

When we saved grumpy, ungrateful Tommy the tortoise from a likely end of being a snack over a fire, he patrolled the garden perimeter relentlessly, presumably trying to find a way out.

I worried that he had a family to get back to. He was not saying.

My research indicated that they are generally solitary creatures and that he would be fine.

Still I fretted.

Turns out my friend has an excess of tortoises. This, in fact, is a thing.

So… Timmy and Tammy arrived. I laid out the snacks and did the introductions.

With not so much as a how’s your father, Tommy mounted Tammy.

Oi, she cried, I’m just having a bit of nibble on this cucumber.

I’m not sure there is hashtag me too in the world of tortoises, but if so, Tommy is bloody Harvey Weinstein.

However, it’s cheered him up no end, and he gave me a little wink and nod of approval I swear.

Sadly, as soon as he had finished with dear little Tammy, he set his sights on Timmy and nudged him over onto his back.

This too is a thing. Turn the competition over and be done with them.

So, now we spend our days finding Timmy and rightening the poor little soul.

Timmy has assured me he’s in the friend zone with Tammy, he just needs to persuade Tommy.

Then Tamara arrived. An old, somewhat battered duck is our sweet Tamara. She’s even bigger than Tommy and has old injuries. Looks like she’s been run over by a truck at some point.

We have welcomed her into the bossom of the household and she seems quite happy.

I even had a house built for them. They hate it.

As it turns out, previously suspected asexual Timmy, has fully embraced Tamara.

Mandova called me from my desk to witness the antics.

Rumble in the jungle indeed. Pint size Timmy is vocal in his passion for much larger, Cougar Tamara.

I can tell you for nothing there’s a lot of action in this household.

Love me do…

It has been six months since we took in Tommy the tortoise. 

He is not grateful.

Amazingly, he has not died in my care and has made it through winter. There was not a lot of hibernating allowed as I forced love and food on him daily. 

I wish I could say we are soul mates and tripping through the tulips happily, but this is far from the case.

We are still finding our feet with our relationship and he is not as adoring as I might like, truth be told. I am convinced he prefers Mandova over me. Hurtful really. 

But, I like to think we are progressing as I purchase delicacies to nourish him on and try and figure out his likes and dislikes. Loves green lettuce, not purple lettuce, loves watermelon, not as fond of tomatoes and strawberries. 

I have had to point out to my lovely man that giving him my wine soaked strawberries may not be clever. But, what do I know really? He might prefer them like that. 

He leaves his little house to wander the garden quite a bit. Speedier than you would think and very well camouflaged. So, I call for him of course. To no avail sadly. Doesn’t come when I call or answer me. 

We will get there. 

Apparently tortoises make a racket when they are copulating. We are unlikely to copulate, but if he can make a sound, perhaps he can answer my calls. 

I’m not sure how bright tortoises are, but Tommy may be special needs. Wedges himself regularly into places he has to be saved from. So, there is a fair amount of saving of his life. Up until recently, he rewarded me by piddling on me. This may be his kink of course. 

He no longer piddles on me when I pick him up. Does he no longer find me attractive, or is he no longer scared of me? 

So many questions. 

I have convinced myself he gives me a little smile when I scratch his shell. 

I have been advised that he is most likely a Bell’s Hinge Back tortoise. They are apparently more inclined to keep to themselves than, for example Leopard Tortoises. But it was Tommy we saved and Tommy I love!

What I have learnt about Tommy is that he is very consistent. Resting face pissed off really. What he has learnt about me is that I am needy and clingy and like it if you come when I call.

A sanctuary has offered to take him in. Does he need friends / a mate?

I suspect I am not enough for Tommy.

Change is a coming…

Mozambique recently enjoyed Municipal elections. 

The run up to this day is quite festive. A reason to play loud music and drive around waving flags really. 

The party that leads in our province has a chicken as their emblem. The other parties seem to have more ‘call to arms’ emblems, but we have a quite noble looking chook. 

The guy who started the party must have had a particularly memorable KFC dinner maybe. An historian, I ain’t. 

If you are planning to resurrect as a chicken, my advice would be not to do it in Mozambique. Not a fun place for chickens. Most of their time is spent hanging upside down and being offered for sale. And then slowly roasted over a long suffering truck driver’s fire while he spends the better part of a week trying to cross some border or the other. Not really sure who should get the most sympathy really. Not an easy life for either I suspect.

We foreigners, of course, do not get a vote. So our vote, on the imposed holiday, goes to a boozy lunch. It’s a win for sure, and worth waving a flag for.

Of course there is unhappiness with the vote outcome in some provinces. I’m not quite sure why they bother with elections in Africa. Aaah yes, it’s a democracy. 

But, I can report there is positive change… I slipped a guy a ‘spot fine’ for the speeding he insisted I was doing and he said it was too much and gave me change. 

We can all retire now

My lovely man realised he hadn’t received his Zimbabwe pension for a time, so said that he wanted to look into it.

A Zimbabwe pension is not really worth too much fuss. It and another $2 can buy you a cup of coffee really.

But still, something to sort out.

My lovely man’s way of sorting things out is to get in his car and find someone to speak to.

Ridiculous hey?

We’ll write to them I said, try and find a whatsapp number or an email address.

He came back victorious with an email address and so we compiled an enquiry and sent it off.

The pension fund is called the NSSA.

We received a very prompt reply. Amazing.

We are a little confused, they replied, and wondered if you could supply a little bit more information on your lovely man because we don’t have him in our database. Was he an astronaut, an astro physicist or a systems engineer?

I’m sure if we keep the pressure on by name dropping Buzz Lightyear, Neil Armstrong and perhaps ‘one giant step.. ‘ shit we can persuade NASA to fork out a pension for my lovely man.

He deserves it!

I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

Buzz off already

My lovely man and I are both bee appreciators. He is a big fan of Bee Vectoring actually. Very interesting stuff. Bees and bats. He loves them. And birds. The birds and the bees with the old bat (did you see what I did there?).

Anyway, we got some fellow (The Bee Man, most originally), to make us a hive. Immediately we realised we were out of our depth, because he kept on telling us the extra things we needed and when we received it, it all looked quite complicated.

Slightly daunted, but nevertheless optimistic that we were single handedly going to save the planet and really, how difficult could it be, we persevered. We put it in the bottom of the garden and started going with a little pot to collect our honey every morning. The Bee Man (lying bastard), had told us they would just ‘come’.

They did not. We paid another fellow to relocate a swarm to our hive. They left.

Location, location… we were not it.

We need a Queen my lovely man lamented, do we know if our swarm had a queen? We knew nothing and also, is there really room for another queen in this household?

Then… a couple of things happened. I read that Jodi Picoult book and realised just how ignorant we were on bee-keeping (and transgenders for that matter). And then, there were at least two horrific incidents that I heard of where dogs were attacked by bees.

I looked at my dear little Alfie pup and with a sinking heart acknowledged that he could irritate anything into a killing frenzy.

Give the hive away I ordered my lovely man… we can’t have bees.

We’ll sell it he said. We are not sellers of anything really. We are givers away or hoarders. He is the latter.

So, the hive has sat in the garage, on top of the bat box (we never attracted bats either). Once again, is there really room for another bat in this household?

And then, a year later, the bees arrived and made their home in the hive, in the garage.

I am not sure how we are suddenly the location of choice, but there you go.

So, we have moved the hive to a safe location nearby, out of the reach of my little Alfie and we are tending, in an ignorant way really, to bees.

The bees have chosen us. What a blessing.

Listen properly now

My lovely man and I recently made arrangements to meet my parents at Tshipise, Forever Resorts for a few days. You know, the hot springs place in SA. Worth a visit.

My father phoned to let us know they had arrived and checked in. We were still on our way, enduring a shit show of a journey. I won’t bore you… Or I may in another blog, but I’m beginning to suspect our GPS lady is a day time drinker.

Rosie, my dad warned me on the phone, this place is full of Mother Fu…. s.

What did your father just say, my lovely man asked.

I was surprised once by a monkey in Umdloti I informed him. This may be what I called it… It’s become a family joke.

(Just as an aside, we’d only been in Tshipise five minutes and the MF’s stole all our padkos as we were unpacking).

Sadly, I am never able to leave my work behind, so I diligently found a little corner to set up my mobile office (and my Starlink, bless that Elon fellow).

A few days into our break I asked my lovely man to please go down to the resort shop and buy me some surgical spirits to clean my mouse.

My father opted to take a stroll with my lovely man.

What does she need my father asked him. She needs to clean her mouth he replied. What’s wrong with her mouth? Is it because she’s got a potty mouth? Probably, I don’t really ask my lovely man replied, but I think she’s got blisters.

(I am not making this up).

They arrived back with a small bottle of savlon. We couldn’t find mouth wash they advised, we thought about soap, but the lady said if you dilute this, it will help.

So, I cleaned my mouse… and my mouth with savlon. Because… if life hands you lemons…

Yes, there’s someone in here

I needed to use the restroom at a restaurant the other day.

The only free stall had, of course, a faulty lock.

So, not only did I have to do my business hovering three inches above the seat… Because you know, public toilets… I had to do it with one leg stretched out straight to keep the door shut.

I must mention this acrobatic accomplishment whenever anyone accuses me of being sedentary.

It was at the Spur if you must know, so there was 💯 chance a toddler was going to barge in otherwise and leave the door wide open in their wake.

Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, my buttock developed a cramp.

I may have wailed loudly. I may also have missed the bowl.

Not my best experience.

Stick to the script

Generally, I consider myself quite compliant. I’m not much of a rebel or rule breaker.

Occasionally I go off the rails. With some spectacular results.

An example…

Some years ago I decided that I could leave one country on one passport and enter the next on a different passport. Who knew this is not allowed? Actually everyone… Including me.

My actions in this regard may or may not have had something to do with not wanting to pay visa costs.

Perfectly legal of course.

I got away with this three times and then I was hauled into the back office for interrogation.

The fellow was delighted to lecture me at length. Despite my sincere apologies and explanation. I had to, of course, produce my second passport because he asked me if I had been loitering on the bridge between the two countries for some months. I had not.

He felt it necessary to go through every page of each passport and examine each stamp. It became tiresome.

What do we need to do, I asked, to be able to move on from this and get on with life?

This irked him surprisingly.

Are you travelling alone he asked?

No, I said my husband and dogs are in the car wondering where the hell I am.

You, he informed me, are too British, let me talk to your husband.

Darling, I said, I lied and told that man you are my husband, also he said he’ll sort this matter that I’ve now been caught out on, with you, because I’m too British.

What does that mean even he asked? I think it means get this cheeky bitch out of my face.

My lovely man has never really let me forget this and now considers himself the better negotiator.

Whenever we have a situation to negotiate however, we discuss the plan. This is Africa. One has to be prepared.

We go in, I always think, on the same page, with the plan clearly laid out.

Inevitably, he goes off script half way through and says something gobsmacking.

We scramble through somehow. A fair amount of sweat rolling down my face considering the unexpected overshare of information.

And then he looks at me smugly… Just as well I was with you to help, he reminds me, they probably thought you were too British.

Love him.