Well today I feel slightly better than yesterday, I wonder if men get PMS like women, I am pretty sure that I was suffering from this yesterday. One of those days where you are upset with the world but don’t really have a good reason why. Maybe I climbed out of the wrong side of the bed, however I always climb out of the same side so that cant be it. Yes I believe it was male PMS, lasts only one day unlike the female version that can vary from one week to the whole month. It’s a bit like man flu, but in reverse.
This morning I got a very disturbing call from a client that had been held up in their home last night, her husband was murdered for one thousand rand that he had in his wallet. The poor woman is absolutely traumatised and no amount of counselling will ever return her husband to her. Another reason to leave soon.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Reasons to sail around the world
We got a loan on our house, which means that we are going to go and look at catamarans to buy to set sail. I have seen two that fit into the price range and the size that we would like. One is in Gordons Bay and the other in Richards bay. Spoke to the owner of the one in Richards bay yesterday and I asked him to e mail me some photos. This one is a Fairweather 39’ and the other one is a ‘Woods fair-weather 40’. I have some pictures of the Woods Fair-weather already and she looks good enough on the pictures. The plan was to go and look properly when we go down to Langebaan to do our Coastal Skipper, but for the Fairweather in Richards bay we will go sooner as it is closer. We went onto Woods designs website and asked him about these boats if he knows anything about them, but he is yet to respond. I am not sure if the boat is a woods design or not and would be interested in finding out some of the history of the boats.
Still no pictures, starting to wonder if the boat is real. The problem is that things are starting to fall into place which makes for impatience. I need the pictures now. I want to go and look at the boat, today not next week or next year, now, now, now. Sorry about that but the excitement is starting to build and it is becoming harder to contain.
Finally got some pictures on Saturday morning but was a bit disappointed. In the pictures it looks as if the boat has only just been started with a refit and lots and lots still has to be done. I spoke to the owner again and he said that the project is about ninety percent complete, however his ninety and my ninety may be slightly different. We have looked at some boats before were the advert said only ten percent to go to completion and when we looked there was about fifty percent not done yet. I believe that people don’t realize exactly what they are getting into when they start with this kind of project and then slowly discover that they may have bitten of more than they can chew. The owner said that his computer crashed and that he sent it in for repairs and should have it back today, then he would send more pictures and an inventory list. We will just have to wait and see.
As things get more wrapped up and the time to leave is coming closer, one starts to question if you are making the correct decisions or not. I mean this is a huge decision to decide that you are going to leave everything that you know and are familiar with behind and head off into the unknown and uncertain future, with no choice of return to the things that you are used to. But then I decided to make a list of the events that took place in the last few weeks at work. Last week Tuesday one of my cars was involved in an accident and was sent to the panel shop for repairs. On Friday the car came back to the office but the starter motor was not working and thus went of to the car electrical shop. The car came back from the car electrical shop on Tuesday and was involved in another accident on Thursday. In the meantime we have been issued with two notices to appear at the CCMA for two different X employees. We are also busy with an investigation into another employee that is supplying lifts to some strangers that work at a local club at night. The reason we became aware of this is because one of the strangers contacted our one manager and told him that he could not pay for the lift one night so our employee beat him up. So it appears that we are running a small mafia taxi service on the side line were you will get cement shoes if you don’t pay. Sadly it appears to be a non profit organisation as I am not benefiting from this taxi service. This morning when I arrived at the office another two of the cars have broken alternators, strange how both cars suddenly have broken alternators. A few weeks ago one of these cars strangely and all by its self replaced its own battery with a none working battery. Some months ago the same car decided to replace its own gearbox, but the car is not very bright as it replaced its five speed gearbox with a four speed broken one, obviously I would never notice this. So then I received the following phone call ‘ Eish boss the car she is broken with the gearbox, she is not able to change a the gears.’ Welcome to Africa. Anyway after perusing the past couple of weeks I decided that even without a boat I should head off into the ocean, even if I have to swim or row, or perhaps I should just drown myself in the bath ha ha. Have to laugh else I would probably go completely insane.
Still no pictures, starting to wonder if the boat is real. The problem is that things are starting to fall into place which makes for impatience. I need the pictures now. I want to go and look at the boat, today not next week or next year, now, now, now. Sorry about that but the excitement is starting to build and it is becoming harder to contain.
Finally got some pictures on Saturday morning but was a bit disappointed. In the pictures it looks as if the boat has only just been started with a refit and lots and lots still has to be done. I spoke to the owner again and he said that the project is about ninety percent complete, however his ninety and my ninety may be slightly different. We have looked at some boats before were the advert said only ten percent to go to completion and when we looked there was about fifty percent not done yet. I believe that people don’t realize exactly what they are getting into when they start with this kind of project and then slowly discover that they may have bitten of more than they can chew. The owner said that his computer crashed and that he sent it in for repairs and should have it back today, then he would send more pictures and an inventory list. We will just have to wait and see.
As things get more wrapped up and the time to leave is coming closer, one starts to question if you are making the correct decisions or not. I mean this is a huge decision to decide that you are going to leave everything that you know and are familiar with behind and head off into the unknown and uncertain future, with no choice of return to the things that you are used to. But then I decided to make a list of the events that took place in the last few weeks at work. Last week Tuesday one of my cars was involved in an accident and was sent to the panel shop for repairs. On Friday the car came back to the office but the starter motor was not working and thus went of to the car electrical shop. The car came back from the car electrical shop on Tuesday and was involved in another accident on Thursday. In the meantime we have been issued with two notices to appear at the CCMA for two different X employees. We are also busy with an investigation into another employee that is supplying lifts to some strangers that work at a local club at night. The reason we became aware of this is because one of the strangers contacted our one manager and told him that he could not pay for the lift one night so our employee beat him up. So it appears that we are running a small mafia taxi service on the side line were you will get cement shoes if you don’t pay. Sadly it appears to be a non profit organisation as I am not benefiting from this taxi service. This morning when I arrived at the office another two of the cars have broken alternators, strange how both cars suddenly have broken alternators. A few weeks ago one of these cars strangely and all by its self replaced its own battery with a none working battery. Some months ago the same car decided to replace its own gearbox, but the car is not very bright as it replaced its five speed gearbox with a four speed broken one, obviously I would never notice this. So then I received the following phone call ‘ Eish boss the car she is broken with the gearbox, she is not able to change a the gears.’ Welcome to Africa. Anyway after perusing the past couple of weeks I decided that even without a boat I should head off into the ocean, even if I have to swim or row, or perhaps I should just drown myself in the bath ha ha. Have to laugh else I would probably go completely insane.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Friday everyday?
Haven’t been down to the boat for a while now, starting to wonder if she still floats and imagining that when we get to the boat she may be missing or only the top of the mast may be sticking out of the water. I think that all sailors that own a boat must have this same fear of leaving the boat for a long period of time. The weather just has not been conducive to sailing, well not for me anyway. Rain, rain and rain again everyday for the past month now, with a glimmer of sunshine on the odd occasion.
Anyway my father in law has been staying with us for a couple of weeks now because he is in-between work and is finding it rather difficult at the moment. I believe we have managed to lift his spirit slightly by offering him our garden cottage to live in, but I think he must be getting sick of hearing about boat, boat, boat. That seems to be the only thing that Lola and I want to talk about.
Went to court yesterday regarding a shooting incident that happened in our offices a few months ago. What a waste of time, the ‘victim’ is back together with the shooter and is trying to negotiate together with him in order to drop the charges of attempted murder. People can be so stupid at times, I mean she has obviously forgiven him for shooting her and now believes that he won’t do it again. What a moron. As the saying goes, once a victim second time a volunteer, maybe she enjoyed getting shot by her husband or she has some sort of death wish. Anyway I don’t want her working for me anymore because the whole office was absolutely traumatised by the incident and now she is back together with him and he will arrive at the office to fetch her from work placing all the other people in the office under pressure thinking that he may again snap at some or other point.
Thursday today and we normally meet some friends for lunch on a Thursday at one of our client’s Portuguese restaurant. This time we decided to be adventurous and we are going to meet at a new place that we haven’t been before. I will miss these particular friends whilst we sail around the world, but fortunately they are a little more affluent and would possibly afford to fly over to meet us in some of the places that we plan on going to. This would be a good reason to then have a couple of Fridays in a row. ‘Ahh should we have a drink today, oh yes it is Friday so why not.’ And then tomorrow, ‘ahh should we have a drink today, oh yes why not it is Friday.’
Anyway my father in law has been staying with us for a couple of weeks now because he is in-between work and is finding it rather difficult at the moment. I believe we have managed to lift his spirit slightly by offering him our garden cottage to live in, but I think he must be getting sick of hearing about boat, boat, boat. That seems to be the only thing that Lola and I want to talk about.
Went to court yesterday regarding a shooting incident that happened in our offices a few months ago. What a waste of time, the ‘victim’ is back together with the shooter and is trying to negotiate together with him in order to drop the charges of attempted murder. People can be so stupid at times, I mean she has obviously forgiven him for shooting her and now believes that he won’t do it again. What a moron. As the saying goes, once a victim second time a volunteer, maybe she enjoyed getting shot by her husband or she has some sort of death wish. Anyway I don’t want her working for me anymore because the whole office was absolutely traumatised by the incident and now she is back together with him and he will arrive at the office to fetch her from work placing all the other people in the office under pressure thinking that he may again snap at some or other point.
Thursday today and we normally meet some friends for lunch on a Thursday at one of our client’s Portuguese restaurant. This time we decided to be adventurous and we are going to meet at a new place that we haven’t been before. I will miss these particular friends whilst we sail around the world, but fortunately they are a little more affluent and would possibly afford to fly over to meet us in some of the places that we plan on going to. This would be a good reason to then have a couple of Fridays in a row. ‘Ahh should we have a drink today, oh yes it is Friday so why not.’ And then tomorrow, ‘ahh should we have a drink today, oh yes why not it is Friday.’
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