Monday, August 27, 2007

heritage & marbles (loss of)

The Ant, Mr 747 and I went on a Parktown Heritage Tour on Saturday. I always love these things, ambling through Herbert Baker gardens, with cute little old ladies dressed up in flowery hats who give you a running commentary on the history of each place.

This one was particularly hysterical, because the old dame completely lost the plot mid-tour.

She lost her marbles. Maybe she'd had too many gin and tonics at the cake sale beforehand, but I think she'd finally lost that last brie wedge that made up her cheese platter, so to speak.

But what a beaut. She was one of those old grannies that had seen it all, being from “Rhodesia” and all.

All her facts were mixed up, she carried around notes done on a typewriter from 1975, except they were the wrong notes. Possibly for another tour or something, but the woman didn't exactly talk a whole lot of sense:
“The person who built this house was born in 1985...then he died in 1955. Right...is this the Westcliff tour?”
(No, we're actually in Parktown, my dear.)

“Mr Anderson was from Salisbury, Rhodesia. Had flowing long hair and now, this house belongs to a Mr Jacob Zuma. Let's move on.” (You sure?)

The highlight of the tour was Graham Hart's garden. The old weather dude on SABC? A celebrity in weather circles? No?
Anyway, seems he's a bit of a clivia fanatic. A garden filled with about 5 000 frigging clivias (and quite gorgeous really), but since his wife is possibly the only member of the South African Clivia Society, seems the weatherman himself is a bit obsessed. One of the patios has been made into a greenhouse. They were everywhere.

Mr 747 went straight for the kill – because really, we had a celebrity in our midst didn't we now - “So Mr Hart, you have a problem with lightning strikes here because of the quartz in your rock?”
“Well no, son. Lightning strikes usually happen in high places.”

Ant and I were being very mature, pretending to take photos of each other, but making sure he was standing right in the background and within my LCD screen, although I chopped his head off in the photo. Bugger.

Saturday evening I caught up with one of my old digsmates from Crested Butte. A nice little boozy braai. It's always fun, mainly because Crested Butte was one of the best times of my life. We skiied every single day and partied up a storm every single night for four months. Then there was the time I chundered into our one and only cooking pot. I'm still unsure of the details even now, but I only presume I came home blotto, saw the pot and promptly puked in it. Classy.

21 comments:

SheBee said...

I bet you your roomates felt the same way I felt on Friday night when I walked into a bathroom with chunder plastered all over the walls. Classy my ass ;)

OOh that weather man! My gran had a crush on him, I'm sure of it!

Betenoir said...

LOL@ Graham Hart. and Clivia. and Quartz.

you should have invited him out to party wit y'all. and the dotty old lady, too.

Peas on Toast said...

SheBee - ooooh, that's gross...see at leat I consolidated my tactile into a pot, and not over the walls. :)

Betenoir - that dotty old lady, I'm telling you she was a beeeyoot. I'm thinking of calling her up for some tea and scones just to hear her talk crap about history that never happened :)

Betenoir said...

she actually sounds alot like my High school history teacher... which accounts for my low, low marks in that subject after std 8... :(

Peas on Toast said...

Bete - it's funny-how do the potty people become experts on all that is historical?

Did she tell you that the Voortrekkers and the Cold War were related?

SheBee said...

Peas,

IS your friend going to redo your blog again at some stage?

Not dissing this one, its just that the other one is sooo mooi!

Peas on Toast said...

Hi Sheebs
I agree, she did a wonderful job with the banner at the top. Thing is, we may need a website guru to help as well, because there were a few problems with the stuff/logos/archives etc on the side, so its a bit of a work in progress.

SheBee said...

If you do decide on a guru, Tertia just used Mark Forrester, who has redone her blog. He's in my community listing I think, I saw him in the reader stats somewhere.

Whats nice is that you can deal with it all over email, so you can keep it simple, pimple.

Peas on Toast said...

Cool thanks babe. Will drop him a mail. Mine needs a major overhaul, and has needed one for years!
:)

Unknown said...

easy tiger....my Dad's the chairman of the South African Clivia Society...not sure if he and Graham are vas though..there's some politics between the north and south...you know, my Clivia miniata is yellower than yours... :)

Peas on Toast said...

David - seriously? As a matter of interest, because we wanted to know - how big is the Clivia Society?

Interesting - he was saying how people spend thousands on his prize clivias....bless :)

Revolving Credit said...

Ummm....I wonder if there's a South African Labia Society??

I suspect that you'd be able to pass that off as a botanical society :

'Come on luv, show us ya blossom'!!

Revolving Credit said...

Apparently, there is one!

Peas on Toast said...

I'll Google it for ya, Rev.

I'm certain the world wide web has a few rosebuds for your perusal. :)

Peas on Toast said...

Oh my, ok, you're quicker than me today Revvie.
I'm spaced on Myprodol and in bed today :(

Revolving Credit said...

At least you're home with drugs. I'm sitting at work plugging my leaking nasal cavity with serviettes!

..and I've run out of cigarrettes...grrrrr!!

Peas on Toast said...

Oh crap - grumpy and with tissue plugs up your nostrils.

Send us a picture, send us a picture! :)

SheBee said...

Am I the only insane person here amusing myself with replacing clivia with the word chlamydia?

Why you on Myprodol, Peas? What happened?

Peas on Toast said...

SheBee - I have cramps :(

And no, clivias remind me of clitorises and chlamydia too...

SheBee said...

oh shame, i had that last week. eew.

eat rolo ice cream, i hear its medicinal in some countries.

ok, i made that up, but it should be.

Unknown said...

Peas - clivia soc size - a few hundred members me thinks - they're a fanatical bunch...