Show us a sign

Yesterday evening I sat on the stoep listening to far away thunder and watched Theo skin his kill; a guinea fowl. Yip, he’d actually managed to shoot one with a pellet gun. He stunned it with the first shot, a couple more pots and finally killed it with a coup de grace head shot. Now he was a real man. All he needed to do was to eat the things heart while it still pumped and bury something under a tree or something to that effect but we settled for a whiskey.

Later that night the thunderstorm rolled nearer, drowning out the bloody rats scuttling around in the thatch roof. We’d been feeding them ratex, but I must admit I would have preferred leaving them a note saying “please vacate outside, we’ve moved in here now”. Instead, they chose a slow death and ignored the rat trap the size of a shoe box. I would have felt bad if they were cute little field mice with cute little whiskers but their droppings were not cute, they were as big as a duikers, and I didn’t fancy them gnawing at my toes after snacking in the kitchen cupboards.

I thought about the Cumulonimbus clouds hovering above. Yawn. I thought about the iced particles grinding against each other with such force that static electricity was formed. Too technical. It was just plain awesome watching the whole bloody show from my bed. The room and everywhere outside lit up as lightening streaked across the whole sky, followed by the loudest, rolling, crashing thunder I’ve ever heard in my whole life. Spectacular!

My knee is improving. Today I hobbled for the first time. I’ve been scooting around on a typist chair but it’s very limiting and I can’t go outside. I’m trying to make friends with the 2 forlorn looking horses visiting me on the stoep but Jethro just walked by and said “those things they must not come here because they kak hierso”.

I’m about finished my book. Really makes you think about our land and its Folk. Charlie, if you’re reading my blog you simply have to get a copy of James Mitchener’s, The Covenant. It puts many things in perspective about our parents who learnt from their forefathers. It seems that the Old Testament was written just for them, well and those Jews who crossed the desert in earlier times. The Bible (not the New Testament which was not relevant to them) guided them in every decision from handling their slaves to claiming the land. Thought provoking book.

Talking about weird beliefs, how’s this for bullshit. Kavin, (who recons we wasted our money doing the course cos he could teach us everything we need to know) told us that leopards have 365 spots and on a leap year they get an extra one. Whahaha don’t fall off your chair. Imagine leopards waking up on the morning of 29 February, males stretch, lick their balls and go WTF?! when they see an extra spot which appeared overnight on their goonies. Or, after a night of passion, the female goes oh my god you’ve left a fat hicky in my neck WTF it looks like a new spot. Or perhaps a cub goes up to his mother and says “mom am I still me, what’s this funny new spot under my armpit?” mother replies “no dear, that’s just a birthmark” but when her teenage daughter saunters up, shaking her arse, mother freaks out “what’s going on with your arse? I told you no tattoo’s while you’re under my care. Now bugger off out of here you slut. And so a generation of confused youngsters took their place in Africa. All leopards know the law which has been passed down from their fathers. And from their fathers fathers. And from their fathers fathers fathers. And it was passed on that all leopards need fear nothing, except Lions having a bad day and those two legged white animals who carry a fire shooting stick and can be identified by their strange hat. Let it be known that only when faced by these animals may any leopard run and hide in a cave. And let no leopard be struck down by lighting unless he or she breaks the golden rule, known to all, a leopard cannot change its spots! And so it came to pass.

Oh well. I’m off to supper. That guinea fowl’s been cooking for 4 hours and Theo says it’s ready.