Aug 31, 2011

This is going to be a "toight" month

We got paid last night! Hurray! Unfortuantely, what comes in must go out... I worked out a budget last night for my bills this month and I'm around R622 short, which makes me a very sad panda. Normally I would be fine, but this month I have to get my car serviced. The service is the 90000KM one... the biggie where they change your CAM belt, which means that it's going to cost anywhere between R3300 and R4200. This means that I'm simply not going to be able to get my car serviced this month and will have to save as much as I can in order to get the job done next month. I also have to pay dancing fees and the chiropractor; together those make up another R800. It's just going to be a horribly tight month, which means no driving around, no outings and no new clothes for the summer. Sad pandas. From next month I also need to start saving for Christmas presents. Having a mother and a boyfriend tends to be expensive business.

Mom I know wants a special drying rack for clothes and a mixer, as her one popped. I have no idea what Wayne wants, will have to ask him.

Ok, enough doom and gloom... Must plunder on.

Aug 30, 2011

Photies from the poi workshop :)

Im the chop all dressed in black :P

Standing: (Left to Right) Rayson, Wayne, Me, Robyn, Donna, Steve, Tamlin, not sure, not sure, not sure.
Sitting: Bruno, Jaco, Tertius



Aug 29, 2011

Nice weekend. Strange weekend, but a nice one nonetheless :)
Another weekend has come and gone. I am of the belief that we should have 3 day weekends and 4 day weeks. That would make my heart very happy.

Not too much to report. Robyn managed to run over herself with her car. Poor thing. She’s a bit of a disaster child. Fortunately nothing’s broken, just a few nasty scratches and bruises. I met Wayne’s dad. Sweet old man. Lots of energy for someone in their 70’s. Cooked breakfast for his family on Wayne’s very stubborn stove. Damn thing just doesn’t get piping hot and as a result everything ends up steaming, which isn’t the end of the world, but when you’re feeding 5 hungry people it can be. Anyways… we eventually ended up with “brunch”. Wayne’s brother bought him a puffer fish for his fish tank.
I would imagine that he looks like this when he’s all puffed up (sans the spikes, obviously):



Wayne and I went to tea at Illovo Nursery on Sunday, in the afternoon. The cake we had was so rich, but so lovely.

And that’s it really. Not much to report.

I’ve decided that I’m going to try take up cake decorating. We shall see how the cupcake decorating course goes on the 24th of September. If it goes well, I may get a book or two, a couple of tools and dabble. We shall see.


Aug 26, 2011

Of relationships and things...

Relationships are hard work aren't they? They're exceptionally difficult when you have two people in a relationship that are both stubborn and over emotional. I'm not good with relationships... I never have been, and as a result am always worrying that they're going to come crashing down around me and so when conflict occurs I run for the hills. I just wish relationships were simpler. I wish that there was a manual that came with them and that I knew exactly what my role is and exactly what his role is and how the two work together. But there isn't and so I'm left with this constant feeling of utter uselessness on my part. Am I even capable of getting a relationship right, or have my years of getting it completely and utterly wrong just screwed me up forever?

So now I'm sitting in my flat, with a boyfriend who is sitting in his flat and we're both unsure of where to go next. *looks up* Can I PLEASE have a manual?

Hopes and Dreams...

... that just seem unreachable. Maybe in my next lifetime I'll get them right... Who knows?

How cool is this apartment in Manhattan?

Check out the rest of it on the Fresh Pics blog :)


Jealousy does not become you...

Today is one of those days when you know you just shouldn’t be posting, but you do instead. Kind of like drinking and dialing, but I’m in a bit of a mood, so I’m going to plunder on anyways.

I’m annoyed with Wayne. I had a very grumpy boyfriend in my flat last night and after further investigation discovered that he was pissed off at my taking Robyn’s new website to Darren to develop. Yes, Darren is my ex-boyfriend, but really he’s barely a blip in my life these days. If it weren’t for work he probably wouldn’t be in my life at all. How many times do you have to tell someone that you love them before they believe you? This is the second disagreement of this type that we’ve had in 3 weeks. The first one was over Martin, now Darren… both of whom barely feature in my life. Oh for goodness sake. So anyways, I’m sorry, but I’m fed up.

Summer...

... Can you feel it coming? It's on its way :D

Aug 25, 2011

Home of Poi are AWESOME! Shop in their store!!!

It's not often that we see great service delivery here in SA... and in fact, very often we have to travel abroad to actually find it. Home of Poi have absolutely blown me away today.

Here's the background...
Robyn and I ordered flowlights together. All of mine work fine, but her one Spirit flowlight has been fautly from the start and on the weekend she replaced the battery and it just wouldn't switch on.

Anyways...
I contacted HoP, gave them the long version of the problem. They contacted me back, saying that they've had a couple of flowlights with faulty switches and are sending me a replacement flowlight for Robyn. And, to top it all off, I don't have to send the faulty one back to them.

How incredibly awesome is that?
Well done Home of Poi and thank you for the excellent service!

The braai was great fun!

Oh hey, I never got around to posting about the braai that Wayne and I had with Daniel, Robyn and Rayson. It was a really lovely evening. The only thing that wasn’t lovely was the wind, but other than that, we all enjoyed ourselves. We will definitely host another one again, but with a few minor changes… paper plates and cups being one of them. Unfortunately Wayne doesn’t own any paper plates, and neither he nor I thought to buy. Oh well, these things happen.

Anyways, here’s a few of the photographs I took of Rayson, Robyn and Wayne spinning fire on the beach.

Rayson spinning the awesomeness :)
Wayne styling with the fire staff :)
Rayson (Right) and Robyn (Left)
Robyn spinning her worlds :)

Starbright Girl

Megan has some beautiful new jewellery up on Etsy. Check it out!

Aug 24, 2011

Pretty, Pretty... again

From http://www.theprettyblog.com/ - Milk & Honey: Decor Inspiration
From http://www.greenweddingshoes.com/ - DIY Book Planter with Succulents

Either Murphy or the Universe has got it in for me today...

Photo received via email
Today was one of those exceedingly long days. It started off with a 4 hour drive to work. Ya, I kid you not. I left home this morning at 7am, expecting to arrive at my destination (work) by the very latest, 8am. Little did I know that evil gnomes (I’m convinced it was the gnomes… them or the lizard people) were conspiring against me and as a result I ended up getting caught in the backlog of traffic, which was a direct result of human stupidity.

Apparently, what had happened was that two cars collided. The driver of the first vehicle (this is where the stupidity kicked in) got out to get the license and insurance details from the driver of the second vehicle… and promptly got flattened by a passing truck. He clearly did not look both ways before getting out his car. The truck then collided with another truck and, as they say, all hell broke loose after that. This was around 6am, so by the time 7am rolled around the traffic was well and truly (excuse my language) fucked.

Photo received via email
At the end of it, I arrived at my office (glass half empty) very, very late… like 10:45am late… (glass half full) very early for tomorrow. Either way, I didn’t reach my destination at the presumed 8am.






Moving on…

As my day progressed I got well into the swing of things until 1:20pm-ish, at which point the electricity died. Yes, it did indeed die… right at the point that I was going to send out an urgent bulk-emailer to our clients. Isn’t that just super? After a fair bit of calling our utterly useless municipal electricity department, Pam discovered that the power cables had been stolen from Currie or Cowey Road (not sure which one) and as a result the entire Morningside area had a power outage. Again, so super… (for those not in the know, this is sarcasm)

At about 3:30pm the lights came back on, thankfully.

Moving on…

Tonight is Fire in the Park, but if the weather does what I think it’s going to do, I don’t think there is going to be one. It’s starting to blow gales and looks like it just may rain.

So… that’s three. That’s it right? Don’t these things usually happen in three’s? Surely there can’t be any more (again, please s’cuse the language) fuck-ups today? Surely?

Enjoy the evening all

Aug 17, 2011

Pretty, Pretty

LOTS...

...buzzing around my head... Must start making lists :)

Aug 15, 2011

The weekend round-up

This weekend Wayne and I managed to do very little. We had officially made it a “nothing” weekend due to us needing a proper rest after the last few very busy weekends. “Nothing” in our world (or mine at least) generally involves doing “something”. On Saturday, after a very late start we popped to Galleria and Pavilion, so that I could look for a dress for the engagement party that he and I are attending on the 2nd of September. One of Wayne’s friends is getting married. After a trip to Galleria and then a trip to the Pav, I managed to find a very pretty, quite simple, but still elegant dress in Foschini. The black and white dress (white on the top, black on the bottom) can be dressed up or down for either a smart daytime function or a nice evening function, so I think I’ll get my money’s worth of wear out of it. I just hope that the weather warms up a bit before the 2nd, or I am going to freeze.

On Sunday, after another late start, I pulled my room apart in a bit of a spring cleaning frenzy. I have yet to put it back together properly… getting there slowly. In the afternoon Wayne and popped to Catalina Theatre at Wilson’s Warf to watch the Familia Flamenco show. I enjoyed the show more than I thought I would. Linda has changed it from the last two years, which is a very good thing. It needed a bit of sprucing up.

Sunday evening saw me, in my bed, playing Sacred 2. I couldn’t be bothered to work on anything anymore, hence the reason my room still looks like my cupboards vomited their contents all over my bedroom floor. Tonight I will sort the crap from the stuff that I’m keeping and chuck out what I don’t want. Heaven help me.

Have a great evening all!

My Patient Bean...

You know your boyfriend loves you when he is willing to walk two shopping malls flat with you looking for a dress to wear to a party, and then the next day go to a Flamenco show with you :) Thank God, and I mean that, for my boyfriend... He literally is the best bean ever <3

Aug 12, 2011

Crush Online - Issue 11

Is out now! Click here to view the ezine!

Fire in the Park – 10 August 2011

This post falls under the “better late than never” category.
Ok, so FiP this week was absolutely… for lack of a better word… EPIC! It was the last day that the Fire Desire guys were spending with us before continuing on their travels down the coast, and so just about all of the regulars and a few newbies pitched.

Martin, Wayne and Baz had the most fun (I think). Martin got to spin with some advanced spinners, which made his heart happy. He could finally talk to and spin with people who are on his skill level with poi. Unfortunately, although it isn’t so nice to say, he is a little bit ahead of the rest of us fire bunnies at FiP, with the exception of Jace and Cass.

Wayne got to spin his fire staff (with fire), and to my amazement he was absolutely brilliant! Don’t get me wrong, I have all the confidence in the world that some day he will be one of the best spinners I’ve ever seen, but I was surprised at how awesome he was after just two lessons and one day of practice. So all in all, three days and he was killing the moves! Nice :D That’s my bean!

Baz got to spin double staff, which he hasn’t done in a while… A while being two years I think he said? He really is very good. I forget sometimes how good at fire staff he actually is, and am reminded again when I see him spinning. Wayne says it’s like he’s going to war :P

Bruno spun everything from my flowlights to some form of fire wand. The man has serious skills when it comes to fire staff, so much so that even Baz said that he wish he had come to the staff workshop. Jaco and Martin spun partner poi and Tertius managed to catch some superb video footage of them. There is one piece of the video where it looks like Martin has 4 balls of flames flying around him. Incredible. Tertius did his fire breathing, poi and closer to the end of the evening had a few willing guinea-pigs eating fire. I passed…

I’m going to miss those guys, although they will be back in April for another tour. They really added a different element to FiP and as a result everyone upped their game and it was one incredible evening.

Oh! Even Faith came to Bulwer park! She finally got her fire hug from Robyn :D
And that as they say, is that :D

Have a superb weekend everyone!

Barry spinning staff... he is just amazing :)
Bruno showing Martin an advanced poi move... I think it's called Orbitals :)
Faith getting her fire hug from Robyn... Her first one ever!
Bruno... absolutely incredible
Meeeeee!
Me doing ... what ... fountains? I dunno, it's basically poitruvian man.
Me doing corkscrew :)
My babes, Wayne spinning the awesomeness :D
Wayne spinning fire staff... His first time!
He did so well! :D

Aug 11, 2011

Most amazing evening!

Fire in the Park was incredible last night :D I will post piccies later this evening :)

Aug 8, 2011

Shorter...

... is sometimes better!

I've shortened my flowlights... Now to shorten my fire poi... somehow.

Fire Desire Workshop Weekend... Wow...

Another weekend has come and gone, and what a weekend it was!

The guys from the Fire Desire community in JHB are currently touring South Africa. They’re basically meeting and connecting with performance artists (fire / poi / staff spinners / fire breathers / jugglers and all the other people who have “fire” and “juggle” associated with their art forms and hobbies), from all over the country; with the ultimate goal being that of making connections for a tour next year with one of the guys (Richard) from PlayPoi.

Ok, so this is the general round up of the weekend:

Saturday (Cold – Rain, miserable weather…)
Wayne and I made our way to the DUT for the poi and staff workshop that was being held by the Fire Desire guys. I wanted to participate in three workshops, but wasn’t sure if there would be enough time. I ended up paying for the three, but only ended up doing the staff workshop the next day. Fortunately, that was possible as the guys held another workshop down in Umkomaas.

So anyways, back to Saturday… rain and poi. Rayson had managed to get us a class or space of some sort at the DUT, which was perfect as it rained the entire day and we really needed to be indoors. The workshop itself was outstanding. Jaco taught the class and was assisted by Tertius (whom I later discovered is quite an incredible fire breather). On a side note, fire breathing is terrifying… It is never something that I will ever attempt.

Jaco started the workshop off with an explanation of the various kinds of poi, from fire, to baton to sock, and so on. We then started with the basics of the basics with regard to spinning. His approach is very different to Robyn’s for various reasons; time being the biggest of those reasons. He explained side and wall planes and how to get in to and out of them. He also explained arm movement and moving your body with your arms. It was a really good, informative workshop. My only criticism is that they should have worked out 100% the framework of the class. I also think that Jaco needs to make a clear distinction between intermediate and advanced poi. In his head there is a very clear distinction, and I think that it would make it easier for the “advanced” people to determine whether or not they are actually advanced… or not.

So I had fun at the workshop! I managed the beginners workshop fine, and learned a fair bit in the intermediate one, so I think I did ok :)

The evening, cold as it was, saw us heading to Galleria to watch Captain America! Fun movie :D Thoroughly enjoyed it!

Sunday (Cold – but sunny at least!)

Wayne and I arrived at Mi Casa in Umkomaas about an hour earlier than we should have. We ended up having a coffee and relaxing before the workshops got underway. Wayne and I were the only people starting out with the staff workshop, so we ended up having a semi-private lesson with Bruno. Staff, although trickier than poi, is still a relatively difficult art form. I have a whole new appreciation for Baz spinning fire staff the way that he does.

Anyways after the workshop, Wayne and I headed to the Drum Shack at the Stables market. We ended up not staying very long at all… just long enough for Wayne to have one really serious jam.
And that was the weekend in a nutshell!

Aug 3, 2011

Cannot believe...

... how utterly useless some people can be when it comes to computers. Like driving, I am of the firm belief that you should have to have a licence to operate a computer and or laptop.

Aug 2, 2011

Another busy month...

It seems like it's going to be another busy month. On top of work we have the following:

Wednesday's - dancing after work
Every second Wednesday - Dancing and then Fire in the Park, after work
Thursday - Night market
Friday - Baking muffins for Saturday's workshops
Saturday - Poi workshops
14th - Flamenco show at Catalina theatre
20th - Working on Fire and Lights with Robyn and braai in the evening with Robyn & Rayson

Next month (the 24th) I've booked mom and I to go on a cupcake decorating course at The Makery. It's just something fun for us to do. I will post pics of our creations :) In the meantime, here are some of my favourite cupcakes from Zolita at The Makery:

Teddy bears - too cute :)

Pretty wedding cupcakes - gorgeous alternative to the traditional wedding cake

Cake pops!

Note to self...

Vanilla seeds... don't reeeeeeeally go all that well in coffee.