Category Archives: Columns

Cape Town – So, Freedom Day.

On Tuesday night I reflected quietly on the freedom of not setting an alarm for the following morning, but resisted the temptation to share the thought on social media for fear of seeming to trivialise the day [April 27].

On Wednesday we had a friend round for a braai, who said that as she was driving to our house someone on the radio was talking about how we voted all those years ago, and were part of history before it became history. I asked my 13 year old if he knew what Freedom Day commemorated and he rolled his eyes at me. Of course he knows.  Continue reading →

Cape Town – So, is there a “bitch switch” or not?

Cell C CEO Jose do Santos has had a terrible week for saying – on online radio station CliffCentral- that they do. After an outcry, he apologised. Then senior women managers at Cell C issued a statement supporting him, saying that while he had chosen some inappropriate words, these were “far outweighed [by] what he has done for every employee in this company, particularly women”.

And Adriaan Groenewald, who interviewed Dos Santos, took to Twitter to defend him. “People must listen to the interview for context,” he said.

I don’t know what Dos Santos was thinking, because that is simply not the sort of thing the head of a large business says in public.  Continue reading →

A way to work while supine.

Cape Town – It was a laundry basket that did it.

As I have done for years, I pulled the wet washing out of the machine and put it in the basket. Then I lifted the basket on to the top of the washing machine, ready for hanging out the next morning.

My back went into instant spasm – and the next morning I was being driven to the doctor for the first of many appointments. I’ve been prodded and poked, bent and banged, scanned and X-rayed. The upshot is that a disc in my lower spine has “extruded” and is impinging on a nerve, meaning that my right leg is subject to a constant dull ache and sitting down is well-nigh impossible.  Continue reading →

Cape Town – Every week, I have to come up with an idea for a column.

Sometimes the idea is right there in front of me. Sometimes there are lots of ideas I just don’t want to touch. And sometimes there is nothing at all.

This was one of those weeks.

What, I said to my husband and son, am I going to write about?

Magic the Gathering cards

Jak, 13, had an instant response: write about Magic The Gathering, he said.
Continue reading →