Shampoo

I found myself at Game again.  As ever, I was tempted to ask a lady wearing a pink Sari whether she worked there.  I resisted the urge.

I was looking for a hair clipper, amongst other things; shampoo, deo, light bulb.  In my quest for the elusive hair clipper, I stopped for shampoo.

Not the same bottle, but yes... egg flavour.

I usually buy the cheapest option at Spar - J&J Family... because if it can clean a whole family then I'm on a good wicket.  They didn't have it.  They did have a cone shaped bottle of 'Classic Egg' flavoured shampoo though.  It was at that moment I knew I'd be writing a blog when I got home.

I didn't get shampoo.  I'm still not sure if Organics is girl shampoo, the Head & Shoulders is twice the price and the pink 1.5l bottle of 'Salon Grade' shampoo seemed a little excessive and I question which Salon exactly...  I'll be at Spar soon enough.

Police

I made a stop at the Cambridge Police Dept this afternoon.  My mission: certification.

It was pretty simple, there's a guy at the door who certifies things, all day.  The sign above his desk says 'Document certification'.

You don't need much to be a certifier, it basically comes down to one arm, mediocre eyesight and a pen.  You don't even need a desk, you could just press on the applicants back when you sign the paper off.  But can you handle it, the dude asked if he could keep the pen I brought, because he didn't have one.

All you government employees are at this point shaking your heads at my naievity... and yes, I realise that there are far more important things than ball point pens missing, but the fact that all this guy needed to do his job was a pen, and yet there was no pen, just blew me away.

It seems the arm of the law isn't long enough to reach the stationary drawer.

Multiple choice

Our semester test took place on Tuesday afternoon.  The original venue was double booked for an ANCYL rally.  Our class stood outside for a while, soaking up the spectacle.  Politics trumping education.  And running with the analogy, we soon found somewhere else to go and work.

Multiple choice questions are devious instruments.  At once rewarding the lazy and punishing the partially informed.  For the loafer they offer a wildcard entry into certified intelligence, while everyone who took some time to study is faced with having your partial understanding of a topic reduced to a stark '...i do, or don't..." understand this.

And then there's the mysterious MCQ paper marking machine; have you ever actually seen it?  And can you use a pen or not?  And why is the paper red?  It's like a warning "Beware, this will not be a true reflection of your intelligence... but it will be easy to mark, see you next year!"

Edit: Just this this article in the Dispatch http://www.dispatch.co.za/news/article/2183

Creche

Sunday morning found me knee deep in two year olds.  At times I was only ankle deep, largely due to the love/hate relationship toddlers have with gravity.

It was one of those moments you realise your trove of life experience counts for nothing.  Despite having actually been a toddler, I was at a loss.  When the first tears erupted I quickly passed the buck to Riaan, a helpful father who had stayed to assist with our 15 inmates.  There were only three guards.

One of the kids was advanced enoughh to put sentences together.  Rather than be impressed, it made me wonder if he ever gets bored with the gaping responses of his peers.  Will he become a psychopath?... misunderstood.  Who knows.

What I do know is that that is a beaver.  And that is a Walrus.  And that is a cricket.  And that kids choose books with cardboard pages over cheesy American sing-along DVDs.  Hardcopy for the win.  Once the animals books made an appearance I was set.

CMH

I finally made it out to visit Cath's office this weekend.  Not sure why its taken me so long, possibly because its  unlikely I'd be able to say "I was in the neighbourhood and thought I'd drop in...".

Cecelia Makiwane Hospital.  Better known as CMH.  It feels like you're in a boarding school, thats in the middle of some sort of out-break.  The yellow brick walls don't exactly say hygiene either.  Infact, you could well mistake the hospital for anything other than a hospital, until you don your clean boots and skate through the flourescant theatre.

I wondered whether theres a special ward for staff injured in 'clean boot related' accidents.

On a sobering note, it was an eye opener to see family members wheeling people around on stretcher beds because there aren't enough nurses to help.  A stark reminder that we are still 3rd world.  On a lighter note... the grin on the mothers face after crashing her son into the casualty door.

Tree

I was standing on the deck this week.  We only have three rooms in our flat, excluding bathrooms... which oddly, would make it six.  Sometimes I just like to stand and stare out over my kingdom, coffee in hand.

This tree got me wondering.  What is the story behind this ode to pruning?

Perhaps the previous resident was a minimalist.  Unsatisfied with the frills and lavishness of leaves, pursuing simplicity?

Or is this the calling card of the Sandringham Road (not Epsom Road) peacock?  - I will pillage your possessions as I have robbed this tree of all it held dear!

Is it some sort of navigation beacon, or a asherah pole of the lesser known lower-Vincent-Illuminati?

A domestic dispute? "Im cutting the tree down!", "No you're not!", "Fine, Ill just prune it then..."

The result of a GroupOn 'Tree felling voucher"?