Family conversation XI

Pim: Would you like to drive my car?
Kim: Actually, I´d prefer to drive Mim´s.
Pim: Mine is an automatic, so you wouldn´t have to bother about gears.
Kim: But that would require a shift in mindset.

Family conversation X

T: Did you speak to Pim about going to see Chris Chameleon on Monday?
Mim: Ja, but he didn´t seem that keen.
T: I´m sure it´s not that he´s not keen; he´s feeling too stressed and busy at the moment.
Mim: Ja, you´ll just have to go with one of your friends.
T: None of my friends will want to go to the Barnyard Theatre. It´s so not cool. That´s why I enjoy hanging out with you. It´s like if you have kids and you can take them to see Kung Fu Panda.
Mim: Thanks very much!
T: It´s not a bad thing. I like to think of you guys as my older housemates, rather than the parental unit.
Mim: That certainly explains a lot...

Family conversation IX

Mim talking on the phone to sundry family members (I´ve heard this conversation more than once) about her trip overseas.

Mim: No, I didn´t really like Amsterdam; I wouldn´t go back there. It was so flat. It had no vibe - people were just wandering along the streets, doing nothing.

Somehow I think she might have been missing out on something - perhaps the very reason some people want to go to Amsterdam.

Family conversation VIII

Sitting in the lounge, watching The Queen; the scene where Helen Mirren is determinedly driving through the Scottish highlands or wherever, in pursuit of that elusive stag.

T: I suppose, if the queen can drive, so can I.
Mim: Yes, but she doesn´t have to drive in public.

Family conversation VI

If you have a five-litre jug and a three-litre jug, how do you get four litres? Or, if you take one set of parents and a 20-something who's returned to the nest, how do you get a book out of it?

T: "It's very fashionable to write books about one's parents these days. Everybody is doing it."
Pim: "I know, you told me the other day."
T: "I just thought I'd mention it again."
Pim: "If you wrote one about us, no one would read it; it would be boring."
T: "No, it wouldn't; it would be hilarious."
Pim: "I suppose you could put a different jug problem in italics at the beginning of each chapter."
Mim: "Don't encourage her!"

Family conversation IV

T: "So we can go and book my learner´s tomorrow?"
Mim: "No, I told you we´re going in the opposite direction."
T: "Surely it´s not that far? The longer we wait to do it the longer I´ll be at your mercy."
Mim: "No, the longer I´ll be at your mercy."
T: "I guess we´ll both be at each other´s mercy... Or throats."

Family conversation III

Mim: "Pim will have to go to the movies (to see Nuclear Comeback at Encounters) by himself then."
T: "Why don´t you go with him?"
Mim: "No, I don´t want to."
T: "I would go, if I weren´t busy."
Mim: "I know you would."
T: "Don´t you care about the environment?"
Mim: "Pim can look after the earth; I will look after the computers."

Family conversation II

Mim to me: "You can cook whatever you like for supper - it doesn't have to be pasta."
Nim: "I don't want fish in Jojoba oil wrapped in barbed wire, or whatever."

For the record, I stuck with the pasta, fearful of incurring the young master's wrath.

Family Conversation I

Mim: "No, I´m not going to watch Lord of War. You already made me sit through it once."
Nim: "Why won´t you watch it again? How many times have you read The Poisonwood Bible by Margaret Atwood, hey?"

Three things that annoy me

1. Mim and Pim's Internet is very slow and temperamental. Also, I can't use the HTML edit function when writing my blog cos of some strange setting on both their laptops that we haven't been able to fix, despite recourse to blogger help groups. I can't access the Internet on my own laptop, as no one can find the password for setting this up. If anyone knows how to solve any of these grave problems, please give me a shout!

2. Pim is constantly listening to talk radio. Talk, talk, talk. It is driving me crazy. What's wrong with a good, old-fashioned melody?

3. Even though our ground-floor apartment is north-facing, it still receives little sun, due to a wall, a tree, and the fact that Jozi is having unaccountably rainy weather for winter.

Hair today, Proust tomorrow

Sometimes people think I am shallow. You'll agree or disagree depending on where, when and how you know me. A couple of random quotes to illustrate the "shallow" hypothesis:

Kim: "When did you become so shallow?" (2004)

Early Bird: "When Theresa first started working in magazines she was an intellectual hippie from Grahamstown, but look how shallow she´s become!" (2006)

In 2005 Mim gave me a hair-straightener for my birthday. I was delighted with the present, and had painstakingly straightened locks for a month or so; then I shaved all my hair off. I also demanded (and received) the box set of In Search of Lost Time for Christmas - to pacify my pseudo-intellectual side. My hair has since grown back. And I´m only halfway through The Guermantes Way. But reading this poem, first brought to my attention by Early Bird, makes me feel better.

Anyway, while I was in London, my dear friend Caramello gave me a very generous voucher for my birthday. And it's not all about hair and lipstick, so I was glad it was for Waterstone's rather than The Bodyshop. A list of my purchases follows.

1. Complicity
Iain Banks
GX and I have a running argument as to whether Iain Banks or Iain M Banks is the better writer. Considering I have read only the former, and GX only the later, it's never gonna be settled until one of us becomes less precious about our selection of reading material.
2. Odd Girl Out
Anne Bannon
The first lesbian pulp fiction novel. Despite the wimpy main character and surprising lack of sex scenes, it's still a classic.
3. The Road to Oxiana
Robert Byron
The original Bruce. Byron is the hero of my hero, which makes him a super hero.
4. The Princess Bride
William Goldman
An epic tale of "true love and high adventure". I never tire of it.
5. Atomised
Michel Houellebecq
I revelled in discovering Houellebecq. But honestly, there´s only so much of ageing Frenchmen fucking hot young things that one can take before it begins to pall.
6. Confessions of Zeno
Italo Svevo
Actually the book I bought was called Zeno's Conscience, but I prefer the translation above. I first came across this novel through William Kentridge's opera, and have spent years searching for my own copy after UCT library rudely demanded I return the one that belonged to them, as well as issuing me with a hefty library fine. The book sits by my bed for the day or night when I am inspired to give up smoking. Until such a time, I am a devotee of the last-cigarette ritual.

'To reduce its outlandish appearance, I even tried to give a philosophical content to the last-cigarete disease. Striking a beautiful attitude, one says: "Never again." But what becomes of that attitude if the promise is then kept? It´s possible to strike the attitude only when you are obliged to renew the vow.'
pp 13 to 14

Right, it's 1:.29am on 27.03.08, hardly an auspicious date to give up smoking. So I'm off for a "last cigarette" before bed.