My Year of Meaningful (2011)

OK so I got out of the post-friends-departure-depression and am coasting along now here in the good old rut.


That means the gym routine, the eating routine, the work routine, the email routine, etc etc etc. Actually, with one twist, I'm going on the dry for the entire duration between when the guys left and when the next mob comes down (1 week from tomorrow). That will mean that by next week I will have been dried up like the Kalahari for exactly 2 weeks. I dont even want to know when the last time I could say that was.


Reggie went to the vet tuesday to get another lump removed off his private parts (same as 6 months ago or something) and the vet confirmed it is indeed the Big C. Well actually he confirmed that through the nurse who told us, because the vet wasn't there when we picked him up. SO we're still clueless as to how far it has spread or how severe it is, etc. But we're going in on Saturday to get the other puppies' boosters, so assume we'll find out then. All I know is I'm starting to feel sad already. He's being extra clingy these days and now that he has a bunch of stitches in his belly he's extra sore and it's hard for him to be his usual self. I just don't know what I'm gonna do when I lose that boy. I love him soooooo much.


This public consultation that we had to go to waaaaaay up in L-town on sunday/monday went fine and I'm glad to be back down here in the south. It was good to see our translator Mr. Sech though, he is always a hoot and of course I thrive on preaching to the public on a microphone. But still, I hate those things. Especially when the topic is sewerage. yeah, nice. Here's a photo of me doing it.



(I'm the white one)














My anniversary is on sunday, we have another big public meeting on tuesday (in a nearby village - whew!) then the aunt+uncle arrive friday, and then the bday is on the following saturday, then the cousin+gf arrive on the sunday. Now I find out that crazy El may be winging her way down here literally the day after that mob leaves. Thank god they leave the day before easter weekend - i might get a break from work AND people. And lo and behold, after that? There's no deadlines or public meetings or visitors or any of that other nonsense til.... what? The end of JUNE?!?! I won't believe it!

I wish all my friends would install google talk. Alan & I were playing around with it a couple weeks ago and it's way better than Skype. Less complicated and easy peasy. I realized I have friends whose voices I havent actually HEARD for 6 years. Grief.

Sometimes I think about living in Puerto Rico. Then I also think about living in South Africa. Then I also think about living in the USA.... what is wrong with me!?!? I'm going to make a list of places I would consider living in, and maybe places I would NOT consider living in. That could be a lot of fun, I think!

This weekend we are watching No Country For Old Men. Marshy was so kind as to give me like 15 DVDs when they were down here, and that's one of them. It's like he doubled my whole movie collection in one go! Bee Movie and The Assassination of Jesse James are in there too - both ones that I really wanted to see. Plus The Departed, which is the Mr's favourite movie in the world, so now we have it for posterity. What a great guy. I still miss them so much.

Oh yes, and in a bizarre twist of fate, exactly 4 days after my post about that bizarre dream I had about D., lo and behold he up and joins facebook and gets friended by our mutual friend J., so I see it on J's page. Wow. Talk about timing.

And speaking of D., and movies, one of the movies Marshy also gave us was I'm Not There, the Bob Dylan-inspired flick. I really need to watch that one again because I'm sure a bunch of references went right over my head which pisses me off b/c 10 years ago I would've caught every single last one of them. But hey, I've got new inspiration to reunite myself with my old love of Bob and all things Bob related. The Mr. hated it though. Obviously, they never had any relationship at all.

...can someone please find my ring before I die from depression?

It was last seen ON MY FINGER in the swimming pool whilst playing some freaky hybrid version of waterpolo/watervolleyball with 5 overzealous boys. That was tuesday. All pumps, floors, surrounding areas, filters, etc. have been scoured over with a fine toothed comb.

It is nearly 8 years old and beautiful and subtle and it hails from Pretoria South Africa. Notable features are 2 tiny diamonds and one small diamond in a band of white gold, but mainly the scratches and scrapes galore, typical of something that has been worn religiously, daily, 24/7, for approximately 7 years and 48 days. If found please return to me as there are 2 people in my house who are desperately saddened over the horrible void on my 4th finger.

back to the search...

:~(

I have 5 people at my house hanging out by the pool and drinking afternoon Amstels and Black Labels and Savannas and I am at THE OFFICE! BLEAHHHHHHHHH!!!!

The Mr. and I have come in on this fine Monday morning to get some work done and we will meet our dear visitors for lunch in a couple hours. We will limp along during the rest of this week doing a combination of he works/she entertains or vice versa, with a bit of dodging the office and a bit of fire fighting on the cell phone, but in general we will be trying to spend as much quality time as possible with our buddies!

The last week was phenomenal, and I will probably try to find time to recount everything in full, later, but for now it's the return of the bullets!

Last week highlights:

• Seeing my pals come through the Joburg airport doors on Friday morning
• Hanging out in Joburg for the first time in over a year, eating good food and drinking good wine
• Introducing the guys to Ma and Pa P. and having an afternoon in the garden with them
• Marshy bonding with Ma P's lovebird, Becky
• 3 fabulous days on Hartebeestpoort Dam in a great house, braaiing, swimming, relaxing, playing games, sleeping in, etc.
• 3 fabulous days in Madikwe game reserve spotting wildlife and being spoiled in the farmhouse where we stayed.
• Our safari truck being surrounded by 7 lions stalking a naive herd of waterbok... literally 3 feet away from us.
• Spotting a huge herd of buffalo - ending my 8 year buffalo drought, FINALLY.
• Brown hyena drinking right next to our truck and coming close to investigate for several minutes.
• Multiple sundowners.
• No work for a week.
• Hanging out here at home with the guys this weekend.

Now I have to go - I'm working my butt off here trying to get some jobs off my plate and free up some more non-office time for the duration of their visit. Oh the photos I have to upload... too much to do!!! and too little time as per usual.

THis is one last fast blogging extravaganza before I find myself on hiatus for awhile.


Tomorrow we leave to go to SA. Dinner with the family P, some shopping if time allows, and then bunking down with brother Al... all in preparation for FRIDAYYYYYYY when the guys arrive bright and early in the A.M.


That is assuming all those travel delays in London we've been hearing about this week don't waylay their flight! :-o


Today I asked the secretary when she was due. She replied that she was not pregnant. oops. I love being awesome like that.


So if yesterday was Super Tuesday, can I make today be Fabulous Wednesday? YES WE CAN! I'm going to go around wishing everyone a Fabulous Wednesday - it's only right after I did it all day yesterday (Super Tuesday-wishing, that is).


Just before we left the house today my home state of MO was showing prelim results of 49%/49% between Hillary and Barack. I believe they'll probably tip towards Barack... I can just see St. Louis hopping on the Obama wagon before they hop on Hillary's. No matter - I got my ballot in and am satisfied that I did my job and will be perfectly happy if my state sends Barack. Well ok, "perfectly happy" more translates to "fine with" but either way, we're all winners. And I just sent an email to my mother to find out how she voted. hahaha I can't wait for the verdict! And I know my father isn't head over heels about ANY of the 4 GOP candidates which makes me shiver with delight, after having to endure the past TWO elections feeling the same way. How ya like dem apples DAD!? Sucks dont it!


Friday night we'll be having dinner in Jozi. That means chosing between Greek, Sushi, Vietnamese, (non-sushi)Japanese, or bohemian pizza joint... My favourite kind of dilemma!!!


New Prison Break series started last night, WOO HOO! And I'm enjoying the new Glenn Close series "Damages" a wee too much for my own good these days as well... it's like "Law & Order" hooks up with "Prison Break" or "24" in a love triangle with "Lost"! All the courtroom drama of L&O combined with the adrenaline rush of PB and those mysterious flashforwards/backs of the latter. Doesnt help that it's on right after PB, which means I have a hard time going to sleep what with all that adrenaline rush going on.


Reggie is my favorite dog, hands down. I think his rapid aging process is making him even sweeter and more lovable than ever. I love him sooooooooooooo much!!






(I also love my favorite Jamieson photo of him sooooooooooooo much)








Oh yes, and yesterday I was informed by ~ahem~ SOMEONE ~ahem~ that it was "Be Nice to Your Husband Day" today. But that totally collides with Fabulous Wednesday... what gives?

And finally, this time tomorrow we'll be in the automobile flying past all the lovely SA scenery on the way down south! Woo hoo! Sushi stop along the way? I do hope so. Leaving on time in the morning? I do hope so. The likelihood of that happening? Probably little (as usual whenever we want to leave the country). But no bother, we'll still be on the way! Yee haw! Party time!!

I was singing "Dreamville" by Tom Petty all night last night, and little did I know that it was going to send me into a totally bizarre dream sequence once I went to bed.

(well I just have to assume it was due to that, as I haven't had very vivid dreams lately for some reason, and then all of a sudden I did!)

I have to write it all down because I just have this unbelievable urge to be thinking it over in my mind all day today.

OK yeah right so anyway the setting is at some church. Some church where people are sitting in chairs in front of the chancel, in 2 rows going front to back, about 6 chairs deep. Yeah that means there was only about 12 people/chairs. But anyway!

A familiar face is there, sitting in a chair farthest from me, but since there's only 2 rows of 6, we're quite close in proximity. It's my old and dear friend D. from High School. And he is totally ignoring my presence, which hurts me deeply in my dream, but without even having to analyse it, in my dream I know straight away why he's doing it - the chick he's married to. The wife is nowhere to be found in the dream (makes sense, I don't even know her and I only know maybe 3 things about her, through the grapevine). But still in my dream I'm desperate to get his attention because I REEEALLY want to talk to him. And in real life too, he's like the one old friend that I would really like to make some sort of re-connection with more than anyone else, as we haven't seen each other since... 1997 or something?

At any rate, the next segment of this dream is taken up with me like, clearing my throat, tapping my foot really loudly, or otherwise trying to get his attention without disrupting the church service, to no avail. And the idea I'm getting is that it's not that he doesn't know I'm there, it's that he's choosing to ignore me. Dammit! Anyway, that part goes on for a really long time, building up a real sense of anxiety and leaving me clearly upset.

Move on to the next segment: I'm in some sort of shop (book store?), and I get the idea it's close in proximity to the church. At this stage I think I've resigned myself to never getting a chance to talk to D. again, particularly given the fact that I know he lives in Florida now (in real life and in my dream), and if it didn't work in the church, it's because that's how he wants it - me, nonexistant, forever. So anyway I'm browsing away and in he walks, much to my surprise. He comes over and acknowledges the fact that he was purposefully ignoring me but he couldn't shake the guilt and knows it was the wrong thing to do and that he should at least explain himself.... and lo and behold it's a combination of reasons why, but yeah, one of them is because he's married now. ??? I decide now's my chance just to get it all out and apologize for a few things that happened between us that were my fault, way back when, and simultaneously let him know that he was such a great friend to me that I just didn't want to think that it would never be possible for us to at least keep in touch as friends and that I really hate feeling like there's a big fat brick universe between us now in our adulthood. Really, he was an extremely, extremely important & huge factor in my life way back when on a variety of levels, it's just a cryin' shame altogether.

It appears that my eloquent powers of emotional persuasion are breaking him down, and he's leaning towards accepting my bid at plutonic friendship, when all of a sudden I see sheer terror in his eyes as he looks out the door, into the street. I look and notice it's his wife (!) who I have never even seen, but in my dream I knew it was her, storming down the sidewalk with a murderous look in her eyes. In my dream, I know she knows he's there, and somehow I even know that she knows *I'M* there, and that we're having a conversation. Well, I can't remember the details (damn! should've written this down this morning!) but all of a sudden there was a big scramble and D. bolts, and I'm left confused and perplexed and totally clueless, yet my subconscious knows "he's scared shitless of that girl!!" And at the same time the jealous territorial chick in me sympathizes with her and I think I just accepted it, feeling better anyway that I got out SOME of what I wanted to say.

The 3rd part of the dream comes when later, somehow I had found D. again, because we're back in the same church (I'm thinking it was his dad's church, and I'm thinking I went back because I knew he would be there and I was (a) curious to see if his wife had given him a black eye, and (b) I wanted to at least finish the conversation). This time I find him there (no wife) and he's cradling something... wrapped up in a bundle. But before I find out what it is, we're back into talking about stuff and he's basically telling me that it's hard for him to have friends nowadays and that his life has changed so dramatically from when we were friends and so on and so forth... and then he's like "also, there's this...." and he unwraps the bundle and its...
A CONJOINED TWIN(s?) !! joined at the head. WOAH. I also have a pretty bad freakout threshold when it comes to conjoined babies. This is not good.

I can't remember the details then, but this stirrs up all sorts of weirdness and the dream ends with me being really upset for a range of reasons, and basically he tells me that because of our past, his wife will never go for this whole friendship thing, even though we live on different parts of the globe. That was about it. I woke up pretty devistated and hella freaked out in general.

But it was such a vivid dream! I love those!

Breaking it down:
I can see the relationship between D. and the church location... his dad was/is a minister, so even though I wouldn't classify him as being all that bible-bangy, I do sometimes associate him with churchy stuff. In fact, in the dream I have this gut feeling it actually was his dad's church, back in good ole J-town (which I'd never been to before, nor was it anywhere near downtown nor a bookstore). The whole semi-familiar bookstore thing makes me think that as well. In fact if I dig waaaay back into my dream-memory I'm thinking his big ol' dad may have even made a cameo appearance in this one, actually.

I can see the whole D-ignoring-me thing clear as day - I mean at times it was *that* kind of relationship that we had, so the fact that in my dream I was thinking about him being married now, would indeed bring up feelings of that whole "conflict of interest" nature. Whenever I think about my exes, the ones that are married now in particular, I remember this old conversation I used to have with my ex (R). He used to say "I dont mind having friends that are girls and all, but as soon as they get hitched - hell no, I'm not gettin' anywhere NEAR some other guy's wife!!" A subject I've personally wavered back and forth in my opinion on at least 3 times in the last 15 years. But anyway!

I also attribute my desperation to get his attention into feelings of guilt and discomfort that I have sometimes when I think of him. Not anything I did wrong, per se, but those teenage years are especially full of manipulation and game playing and relationship drama, and of course we had all of that a'plenty. ALSO, and here's the kicker - I harbour a LOT of guilt related to my ex (R) that I know I'll never get off my chest with him (as he is on another continent and doesn't talk to me anymore) even though in sort of a 12-step-kinda way I have this deep-rooted need to someday say "hey I'm really sorry for A-Z, I was stupid and young and... well, stupid". And sometimes I think my subconscious channels that huge burdon of guilt into my feelings toward other exes and was this time materializing in my dream-feelings towards D. No? Maybe? I think so.

D. always worked in a bookstore when we were in HS and College.

Conjoined twins freak me out, and I was just thinking about birth defects the day before for some odd reason, so that's why that was in there, I reckon.

What else? I can't think of any other interpretation but it all seems to make pretty good sense: I had been listening to Tom Petty all evening and back in the days when Tom was my no. 1 man, well, those were also the days of D, so a lot of time he's resurrected in my memory when I hear that kinda music. The end.

And just because for the last 18 hours I have had this song in my head... a complimentary singalong:

"Goin' down to Lillian's music store
To buy a black diamond string
Gonna wind it up on my guitar
Gonna make that silver sing

Like it was Dreamville
A long time ago
A million miles away
All the trees were green
In Dreamville

I keep wakin' up all by myself
With a bluejay in my brain
Flappin' his wings, makin' me sing
It was just about to rain

Like it was Dreamville
Where I was born
Light years from here
And the air smelled good
In Dreamville

Like it was Dreamville
A long time ago
Light years from here
And the trees were green
In Dreamville

Ridin' with my mamma
To Glen Springs Pool
The water was cold
My lips were blue
There was rock and roll
Across the dial
When I think of her
It makes me smile

Like it was Dreamville
A long time ago
A million miles away
All the trees were green
In Dreamville, in Dreamville

Yeah it was Dreamville
A long time ago
Light years from here
And the air smelled good
In Dreamville, in Dreamville..."