Another Early Christmas Present

We decided to give Em her Christmas present early seeing as we had heavy snowfall on Saturday night, and who knows if we get any more this year.  She had great fun being pulled around on her new red sled. 

SNOW, SNOW, SNOW and MORE SNOW

Last night I had to leave my car at the bottom of the hill as it just would not make it up, I phoned Derrick and I think he tried for about 2 hours to move it but eventually decided to just park it at the bottom of the hill.

Tonight after being stuck on the motorway for ages I eventually arrived into our estate and once again could not make it up the hill, but there were about 8 or 9 guys shoveling snow in the road making the road more accessible for the neighbors, Emily was helping too and doing a sterling job - she was also helping push cars up the road.  But this whole snow ordeal has reminded me about that email that went around a few years ago, and luckily someone sent it to me tonight, so I thought I would share it with you all.

The following is a diary of a South African who emigrated to the United Kingdom to escape the crime, corruption, inefficiency and Bee.

December 31st

Started snowing the first of the season and the first real snow we have ever seen. The wife and I took our buttered buns and sat by the window watching the snow flakes drift down, clinging to the trees and covering the ground, it was beautiful.

January 1^st

Happy New Year what a wonderful start to the year

We woke to a lovely blanket of crystal white snow covering the landscape and what a fantastic sight every tree and shrub covered with a beautiful white mantle. I shovelled snow for the first time and loved it. I did both our driveway and pavement. Later the snow plough came along and accidentally covered up our driveway and compacted snow from the street but the driver smiled and I waved back and continued shovelling.

January 2nd

It snowed an additional 5inches last night and the temperature has dropped to around eleven degrees, several branches on the trees and shrubs have snapped due to the weight of the snow. I shovelled our driveway again. Shortly afterwards the snowplough came and did the trick again. The snow is turning brownish grey.

January 3rd

Warmed up enough to create some slush, which soon became ice again when the temperature dropped. I bought snow tyres for the car. Slipped and fell on my arse on the driveway. £145 for the chiropractor but nothing broken. More snow expected tonight. 

January 4^th

Still bitter cold, sold wife’s car and bought a 4X4 in order to get to work. Slid into the guard rail and some considerable damage to the rear bumper and right rear panel. Had another 6 inches of white shit last night. Car covered in salt and sh*t, more shovelling in store for today. The f*cking snow plough came past twice today.

January 5^th

7 degrees outside more f*cking snow. Not a tree or shrub on our property that has nor been damaged. Power was off most of the night, tried to stop from freezing to death with candles and paraffin heater which tipped over and nearly burnt the f*cking house down. I managed to put out the flames but suffered second degree burns on my hands and lost all of my eyebrows and eyelashes. The car skidded on the ice on the way to the hospital and it looks like it is a write-off.

January 6^th

Fucking white sh*t keeps falling day and night. I have to put on all my clothes just to go outside. If I ever catch that f*cking bastard that drives the snow plough I will pull his f*cking arms and legs off. I think he hides around the corner and waits for me to finish shovelling, and then he comes down the road at a 100 mph and buries the driveway and pavement again. Power still off, toilet froze and the roof has started to cave in with the weight of the snow.

January 7^th

Oh God, 6 more inches of snow and f*cking ice and who knows what other kind of sh*t fell last night. I wounded the f*cking snowplough driver with an ice pick but he got away. The wife has left me to join her mother in Spain. The car won’t start and I think I am going snow blind. I cannot move my toes anymore and haven’t seen the sun in weeks. More snow predicted, wind chill is 22 f*cking degrees below.

F*ck this I am moving back to South Africa.

The Best Present Ever

This winter I have been feeling a lot colder than normal, and for the last 10 years I have been threatening to get an electric blanket.  So last Thursday I emailed hubby at work and asked him please to go and purchase one, sent him the link and everything, but of course he had already taken his lunch and couldn't go out again, but Friday I reminded him again and lone behold he brought home my New "Monogram Tranquility fitted blanket", he even put it on the bed before going out in the elements.  So of course Em and I climbed into the nice warm bed, I was still going to go down after she fell asleep and do some stuff on the computer, but after being in that nice warm bed, nothing was going to get me out.

Then of course it started snowing on Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and the temperatures have been sub zero for a while, but having my new blanket has made all the difference and even hubby is enjoying climbing into a nice warm bed.  Guess we will have to re-evaluate how often it comes on once the electricity bill comes.

When I tell everyone here about my blanket, they just can't believe it is the first time we have purchased one and we have been here now for our 10th Winter.

Now do they make electric pillow warmers and electric toilet seat warmers?

SNOWVEMBER

Thought for today!

I cannot change the way I am, I never really try, God made me different and unique, I never ask him why. If I appear peculiar, There's nothing I can do, You must accept me as I am, As I've accepted you. God made a casting of each life, Then threw the Mold away, Each child is different from the rest, Unlike as night from day. So often we will criticize, The things that others do, But, do you know, they do not think, The same as me and you. So God in all his wisdom, Who knows us all by name, He didn't want us to be bored, That's why we're not the same ~Author Unknown~

One Month to Christmas ....

Where does the time go???  I can't believe that it is only one month to Christmas, I have not bought a single Christmas present and I haven't finished making the special one for hubby from Em, so I had better get my A into G and do it.  I also don't have too much time, because week-ends are taken up from now until Christmas, so it will probably be late night shopping nights to get everything done.  And then of course the big question is what to buy, good thing I don't have too many to buy for.

Faryl Smith - Britains Got Talent first audition - 2008

Preparation for Snow ...

So the forecast is for snow tomorrow,  it is very early this year and it is very cold this early ... anyway to make sure I am well prepared for any eventuality I am going to prepare a travel kid for my car just in case.  But firstly need to ensure the car is filled with petrol in case of tailbacks in the traffic, water, fruit, energy bar and a blanket (car heater is contemplating going on the blink at the moment).  And hopefully if I am prepared for a blizzard we will just get a light dusting of the white stuff and nothing else, and the real snow will wait for the Christmas week-end like it is supposed to and not arrive on the 24th of November ... I ask you!

It get's Worse ... 

Santa Visit & Skating Sunday

Just a Family Sunday!

A Prayer for Dad

"Dear God, 

This year please send clothes for all those poor ladies on
Daddy's computer. 

Amen."

Will & Kate

I was thrilled to see the Prince William had become engaged to Kate Middleton, but quite taken aback when I saw that he had given Kate, Princess Diana’s engagement ring – I actually thought it was a bit tacky and also a bit expectant, I know that William did it for the memory and love of his mother, however he should have stopped to think.

As it is all the world’s eyes will be on Kate expecting her to live up to Princess Dianna, and by giving her that ring it would have more expectations of her to be more like Princess Dianna.  I felt so sorry for the poor girl last night when they interviewed her, she was obviously very much unprepared for the questions that they threw at her, she stumbled and fumbled and did not really answer the question and William had to step in and help.  I think she just wanted to crawl under the carpet.

Even William at one stage said he can’t wait for the interview to be over!  Surely someone in Buckingham palace should have coached Kate before going on Live Television in front of the world, and especially because of the fact that William had given her Diana’s ring, they should have known that she would have been bombarded with questions about comparisons with her and Dianne – the poor girl!  I blame the people in charge of the royal family – heads should roll! J

To be honest I was hoping he would have given her a beautiful 6 carat pear shaped Diamond knuckle duster that would have created frenzy with people wanting a knock off, just like when Dianne got engaged.  

I feel sorry for Kate as I think the more and more she is in the public eye and doing public engagements she is going to be compared to Princess Dianna, and however much she tries to create her own identity she will more than likely be criticised.   So as much as being the king’s wife and a princess sound so appealing, I would not like to walk in her shoes for a day.

I do however look forward to watching the wedding on TV as I did 30 years ago watching Dianne & Charles get married, I think it is probably high time there was a wedding.  We all know that Harry will be best man and I don’t think it will be long before Harry and Chelsea take the same step.

Blogs

One of my favourite blogs at the moment is the Jo'burg photo Blog, the old saying "A picture paints a thousand words" is so true in this case, the author of the blog hardly says anything, but he tries to put a photo of Jo'burg up every day and words are not necessary.  I often reminisce of the place if I have been there, or try and picture it in my minds eye when something has changed so much that it is unrecognisable - I spent 37 years living in my birth country and being brought up on the South side of Johannesburg, we spent a lot of time in Jo'burg city going to movies, discos, ice skating, Hillbrow - I knew Jo'burg by night, I worked there in the day ... but so much has changed and I am glad to see that things are starting to improve.

There is an ad on TV in Ireland that is shot in the middle of Jo'burg but for the life of me I can't think what ad it is now, but I always feel proud - that is where I worked I say to Emily when they show a shot of commissioner street.  Miss the old country.

Another interesting Jo'burg site is: http://www.gautengfilm.co.za/live/content.php?Item_ID=409

Wednesday Joke

THE JEWS SANK THE TITANIC ????

The plane leaves Heathrow Airport under the control of a Jewish captain. His co-pilot is Chinese. It's the first time they've flown together and an awkward silence between the two seems to indicate a
mutual dislike.

Once they reach cruising altitude, the Jewish captain activates the auto-pilot, leans back in his seat, and mutters, 'I don't like Chinese..'

'No rike Chinese?' asks the co-pilot, ... 'why not?'

'You people bombed Pearl Harbor , that's why!'

'No, no', the co-pilot protests, 'Chinese not bomb Peahl Hahbah! That Japanese, not Chinese.'

'Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese... .doesn't matter, you're all alike!'

There's a few minutes of silence..

'I no rike Jews!' the co-pilot suddenly announces.

'Oh yeah, why not?' asks the captain.

'Jews sink Titanic!' says the co-pilot.

'What? You're insane! Jews didn't sink the Titanic!' exclaims the captain, 'It was an iceberg!'

Iceberg, Goldberg, Greenberg, Rosenberg , ....nomattah...all same ! ! !

Update

My blog seriously needs an update, but it is 23:38 and the wind is howling outside, so will have to wait for another time, but just to let you know, I am still alive. x

Dancing at the Movies - Music Video

A compilation of 40 movies - Brilliant!

Skinny Mamma: Vajazzle - would you/have you??

Skinny Mamma: Vajazzle - would you/have you??: "I came accross the funniest thing today - ok I am sure that most of you already know about this 'latest' trend, but it was a shock to me!! ..."

"Every little thing's gonna be alright"

Why Worry?

I received an email last night which was a Power Point slide which really touched me and made me think.

Is it just human nature that makes us worry?  And the more worldly possessions we have, does that make us worry more?

I have been in the situation where I have lost my favourite worldly possessions on more than one occasion, and it taught me a serious lesson, never to have a favourite possession because as soon as you favour something you end up losing it or it breaks or something happens to it.

With Ireland being in the throes of a recession / depression, with taxes going up, you wonder how you are able to cope and most of us will worry about how we are going to pay the bills, but I guess we do manage. 

Lately I have been thinking about my childhood and growing up, I remember my parents constantly worrying about the bills, it was the 70’s in South Africa and we lived in a middle class suburb on the “poorer” side of town.  I don’t ever remember getting shop bought clothes, they were always made by the dress maker out of crimplene – but how times have changed.  Dress makers are sort after skills and these days it would cost more to have a dress custom made than to buy it in a shop.

We never had luxury holidays, I remember in Standard 2 one of the guys in my class his father was a doctor and when we got back from our summer holidays we all had a turn to tell the class what we had done over the summer holidays, and he had been on a family holiday to Mauritius and gone on a glass bottom boat, wow that was back in 1973 – I only managed to do the Mauritius trip in 1994, but I still got to do it.

Times were hard but my mother and father had both been through the war, so not having was not unusual for them, however they would have been in the situation where they would have been wealthy and then lost it all and had to cope with that, in that case you would think what could you have done differently to prevent it happening.   Had my father not made the decisions he did regarding his construction company and had he not been swindled out of thousands of pounds in the 60’s where would I be today?

But as the saying from the 1800’s goes “if ifs and ands were pots and pans, there'd be no work for tinkers' hands”, so we deal with our situation as it is – worrying creates Stress, which can lead to heart attacks and stroke and of course medical costs.  So how does one stop stressing about the costs and the bills and everything else in life? 

It’s easy to say “why are you worried at least you have a roof over your head and food and clothes” etc.  Yes there are people worse off than me, why look at all those property investors who are now millions in debt, but the tax payer is bailing them out and the banks who loaned them the money.  If I can’t pay my bills, who is going to bail me out?  

I have decided though for my health I am going to stop worrying because it isn’t doing my health any good and I can’t control the future so I just have to live each day at a time and come what may!  "!Que sera sera"

I went totally off the subject of the power point slide, but it basically has pictures of people from 3^rd world countries and us comparing what we don’t have and looking at their strife, for instance showing how children in modern countries won’t eat their vegetables’ and then showing a starving child somewhere in Africa, and so it goes on showing the sad plight of others and how lucky we are to have what we have. 

Water the Essence of Life ...

“Your Body’s Many Cries for Water” by F. Batmanghelidj, M.D. The theory that Dr. Batmanghelidj proposes is that almost all bodily ailments, no matter where and how they manifest in the body, are usually caused by our body cells being chronically dehydrated, and that the cure for almost all illness is simply to get our cells properly hydrated again.

Dr. Batmanghelidj had been a medical doctor living in Iran when he was arrested and thrown into jail on trumped up political charges. He was scheduled to be executed.

One night a prisoner in the same jail was brought to him for treatment. This prisoner was suffering terribly from an acute ulcer, and Dr. Batmanghelidj had nothing to give the man for his pain except water. To his great surprise, after a few glasses of water, the pain went away.

Over the course of treating other prisoners with nothing but glasses of water, Dr. Batmanghelidj found that he was able to help many serious conditions using water as therapy. When he was eventually released from prison, he conducted many experiments and found many conditions improved with this treatment.

He came to the conclusion that many physical ailments are simply a result of dehydration.

Among the many ailments that Dr. Batmanghelidj believes are really a result of the body being dehydrated are such varied conditions as allergies, asthma, lupus, arthritis, back pain, ulcers, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

The book is somewhat hard to read because Dr. Batmanghelidj is not very skilled in writing in English, and he uses a lot of medical terminology, so it can be difficult for a lay person to understand some of it.

According to Dr. Batmanghelidj, only water counts as a hydrating beverage. Other drinks such as juices, milk, coffee, and soft drinks do not have this miraculous ability to reverse disease.

Dr. Batmanghelidj has developed a formula to figure out how much water a person should be drinking each day. According to him, a person should drink one fluid ounce of water for every two pounds of body weight.

Here is a quick summary of his proposed schedule:

About two glasses of water taken upon waking.

Then, one to two glasses of water taken half an hour before meals.

A glass of water two and a half hours after a meal.

Other glasses of water as needed.

Dr. Batmanghelidj also recommends adding a pinch of unrefined sea salt to each glass of water to help the body cells absorb the liquid.

Of course, not all people agree with Dr. Batmanghelidj’s recommendations, especially not all other medical doctors. Some people think he is a medical quack, while others think his theory about dehydration being the cause of many ailments is not only simple, but correct.

It is very fascinating to read the letters to Dr. Batmanghelidj from people who say that following his regimen helped cure them of all sorts of longstanding medical problems.

The book “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water” is available at various on-line sellers, as well as in some bookstores.

If you wish to try Dr. Batmanghelidj’s recommendations, please keep in mind that he says that it takes months for the body’s cells to become dehydrated to the point of illness, and it can take months for the cells to become properly hydrated again.

Extracted from http://deepfitness.com/3637/Could-Drinking-Water-Cure-Your-Ailments.aspx