Writers Blog

So many things keep happening and I keep on saying to myself - must update my blog ... but seem to have writers block! So instead of feeling overwhelmed by all the stuff I haven't written - I'll start with the small stuff and try to get back into the swing of things!

Most pressing problem at the moment is THE CAR - yes, the steering rack has collapsed for the third time in 5 weeks and yet again I am driving a courtesy car (thank goodness I have one!) but still. Of course this has never happened before in the history of Subaru - only ever to my car! I have obviously missed my niche in life - should have become a car tester - nothing can withstand my tender care!

Then there are the animals.

Dogs & Cats - Jenny had an op at the beginning of the month to remove some tumours on her neck and thigh and then Quidditch had a blocked bowel and had to have an emergency operation. He came home after a week with a bucket on his head and a bare shaved bottom. Notwithstanding the awkwardness of the bucket he managed to disappear for the whole of Friday and we announced his disappearnace on our 8 o'clock radio phone in - only to have him stroll into the kitchen immediately afterwards! Phew. But somehow he managed to pop his stitches so had to go back for repairs to his nether end. The vet we had used for the op had gone away to Cape Town so we had to take him to other vets - yes, the ones I had yelled and screamed at and accused of being incompetent when Shakespeare died - talk about humble pie!

Our collection has also been increased by 3 baby bunnies (Bubble & Squeak + Scrabble) - some surburban rabbits have escaped and are breeding all over the place so Hilarys sister grabs the babies whenever she can so that they don't get run over and they need a home...... so they come to us - so cute! Sam asked why did I name one Scrabble - was it because he was so knowledgeable!

Our trunks arrived form the UK with much drama on my part. The original invoice had said 140 GBP ALL INCLUSIVE but when they got here we had to pay the SA side of the operation another R1300 plus pay a shipping agent. It all boiled up because until that point everything had gone marvellously but when it got to Durban then the wheels fell off. The shipping world have a vocabulary and code of conduct known only to them and woe betide the outsider who doesn't know what to do. Apparently once I received the arrival notice that the ship had docked I was meant to spring into action and organise a clearing agent - as nobody told me this I didn't and when I finally phoned to find out what had happened to my trunks they were already accumulating storage fees. So, the moral fo the story is - don't ever beleieve "all inclusive" and read the small print in your b/l (bill of lading) (if they give you one which in my case they didn't!)

Then we are still waiting for the Insurance to settle the car amount. Our insurance has been great - they paid the amount for which they were liable but then there was the balance ("top up") which was meant to be covered by Hollard in conjunction with Wesbank - to date (5 weeks after the accident) they are still faffing around with paperwork and seem an extremely useless lot! What really irritatetd me was that the account number required by Wesbank in order to tell me how things were going in nowhere to be found on any of the documentation so when one of the call centre people drawled "yes, your wesbank account number...!" I just let rip and told her not to speak to me like that - if they didn't put the correct inofmration in their policy documents it was their own fault.

So between the shipping agents and Wesbank/Hollard I have been having a very traumatic time - not good for my blood pressure!