Where is Yoda when you need him?

Since time began, it's been a battle of the sexes… There are two sides. In the blue corner, weighing in at 529 pounds (including ego): The Man, stalking prey in the jungles of history, competing to be the ultimate Hunter/Gatherers. What the hell are they hunting for? Quite simply, a larder full of provisions to trade for the precious currency of affection and heirs. It's the business of pursuit.

In the opposite pretty pink corner, weight undisclosed for obvious reasons: The Woman. In the economy of love, the reserve bank; the centre of currency production, financial policy summit meetings and committee decision-making on procedures and strategy. So really, the battle of the sexes is no battle at all, but an open economy of trade and negotiation. How can it go wrong?

At least in battle, there are rules of engagement. Both sides follow the Art of War, attacking, defending, counter-attacking and turning tail, running like mad in the other direction. It was a carefully choreographed dance of courting. In primitive times, the dance was simple yet aggressive. Man brings food, Woman accepts food, Man bonks woman on the noggin with big stick, Woman produces child, if you know what I mean. The semi-conscious disco could be danced as many times as required, with many partners, until the dinosaurs ate you for breakfast.

In medieval times, it was a decadent ball set in a soap opera. There was drama, jousting, to-ing and fro-ing. With the dawn of the stock market, the jiving ceased. The Providers of safety and stability laid down their swords and sequins, moving into an arena of buying and selling. A State of Mating where black market trading is totally unacceptable.

This shift in tactics has left a Yoda-less void. Rising to the top of the pile of applicants are the garishly front-covered, fast-paced media of fashion and lifestyle magazines. Bikini clad bodies giving the best advice on packaging, primping and people-screening. This is alright, any assistance in the navigating the stockmarket of relationships is appreciated. My "quibble" is with the quality of the advice. Men get good practical advice, for instance: 'How to stop dry eyes while working at the computer….. Blink.'. Women are given by their bibles: 101 ways to pleasure him, 50 ways to deceive him and 21 ways to knock him out and bury the body.

How useful is this information to finding your one true life partner? You definitely will be able to entice him, deceive him and surprise him by following the latest advice in Cosmo by pressing his 'perineum'. First you have to find it, by navigating some serious potholes, and then apply pressure. This will cause your man to jump up, hurdle over the bed and run screaming down the road. It would be far more constructive just to blink.

Terrible advice columns, however entertaining, undermine the very partnering that is required to ensure the continuation of the battle, dance or trade of the sexes. I am therefore, dedicating my blog to the Art of Trade. I have no idea what sage advice I can dice into the pork pot roast, but it's got to be better than: Find his G-spot, and he will love you FOREVER.

Jazz Hands and Garter Belts

Whenever life gives you lemons and you're reaching for the tequila (I know I always do), there is a plethora of peanuts from the peanut gallery that would like to add to your fruit basket. This phenomenon truly floors me. We will call it Fool's Law. Fool's Law states that should you see someone going through something, it is your sworn duty as care-giver to take the situation, substitute yourself in and bore the person to death with the long and twirly tale of what you would do and how it would affect you… Almost as effective as the cure for the common cold (oh, wait).

It is as absurd, as it sounds. It's like going to a doctor and saying "Doc, I have a sore throat and can't stop sneezing?". To which the distinguished doctor would reply: "I had that once, kind of, but not the same, I found that by rubbing my throat and holding my nose whilst meditating on the benefits of Zen transcendental transformation, I was able to reach a higher state of consciousness.". Gee thanks, Doc, but can't I have a lozenge and a tissue?

So has been the story of my life in the last few months. Searching for the lozenges of life and ducking the ever more laborious twirly tales of Self and the Cabinet of My Life Factfile (I blame Facebook and other self-indulgent online scribe facilitators), I stumbled upon a Strepsil of truth that has gone a long way to fixing the things I have broken. "Shake your hands and let it go".

Sheer genius, really. We are all carrying more than our two hands can handle. Keen juggling, becomes a symptom of this ridiculous occurrence. A management tool for all life's responsibilities. It causes us to hand off balls to inappropriate people. Inadvertently, the source of Fool's Law. How has no one ever thought to just shake their hands and let it go? Somehow our balls have become more important than our happiness.

Well, balls to that. I am grabbing my top hat, feather boa and pulling up my fishnets, over my Big Girl panties. And in full cabaret-regalia I'm going to shake my hands, with spirit fingers and let it go. Because this is who I am, and what I want… The theatre of life and jazz hands. For now, anyway.

Breakfast in Bed - The Ultimate Escape

Sunday mornings may just be the worst thing the Romans invented, besides killing Catholics. Lets face it, waking up on a Sunday morning is hitting the ground after the glowing, free-falling freedom that is a Saturday night. You lie there with the sun taunting you through the curtain crack. Laughing at your semi-conscious body dealing with the reality of the situation you find yourself in by coiling bedding every-which-way any appendage can. Not even the comforting the bandages of a duvet can stop the internal bleeding that Sunday has caused.

We are all prisoners of time. Saturday is our walk in the yard, our taste of freedom. Sunday is the guard that stands by the cell door reminding you Monday will slam the bars shut and the four walls of your chosen life sentence will bind you again. We all despair as the weekend slips through our fingers faster than the proverbial sands of time. But deserts are infinite, bound only by horizons. Weekend sand is not even enough to sufficiently fill the leaky sand box we are all hell bent on playing in. As quickly as Friday fills it up, the box drains of all joy.

Makes you want to give up mud pies and sand castles forever. But life is full of Get Out of Jail Free cards, you just have to land on the right square (right after Lexington before Bond St). In last weekends game of Monopoly, I rolled a 6!

Sunday morning came, there was no sun, thanks to some handy clouds and the Enya soundtrack of rain falling kept all the morning time sounds hushed. I'm not ashamed to say that instead of the usual Sunday's vice grip of terror, I was only teetering on the verge of sheer panic and chaos. Then I got distracted by the smell of coffee being busily brewed by Russell (of the Hobbs family, a cunning bunch who are great in the kitchen). Next thing there was banging, sizzling, crashing, flipping, frying, toasting, popping and a cacophony of other -ing words that would make your hair stand on end.

Still, having not moved from my spot on the bed, nearest the window furthest from the door leading to the cave echoing with -ing words, my body was confused. Checking that it was, in fact, Sunday and life as we knew was, in fact, over, I sat waiting like a girl on the other end of a phone call with nothing but breathing sounds coming out of the receiver. Run up the stairs! Run out the door! Do something, you silly bitch! Frozen, I sat tangled in bedding.

Then, the unthinkable happened. I was presented with a plate of British Best: eggs, bacon, toast, juice, coffee, the works. Although, I take issue with eating in bed, petitions and motions were passed to amend said act with a temporary interdict. And what should have been an invalid spilling food on sleepwear, was one of the most entertaining meals of my jail sentence. Chicken and pigs are to be congratulated on their tireless endeavours and commitment to the breakfast table. Champions of escapism, and the key to feeling the beams of freedom one more time before the week starts.

The Throne-less Town

There are times in your life when nature taps you on the shoulder and says, "You evolved from an ape, never forget that". We are all subject to the laws of nature. Don't believe me? Have a swim in shark-infested waters and see how high up on the food chain you really are. My natural beating over the head, occurred on a December road-trip with Snobby {PhD - Pompous Gittery} to visit our loved ones. We were coming down the East Coast of South Africa, and passing the Drakensberg.

Long trips are a schlep for me, as I can't sit still on a sugar-less day, but in this case I was actually behaving myself... when nature called. One of the laws of physics (I forget which, and the never-ending debate has made me too stubborn to check) states that a body in motion will remain in motion and a body at rest will blah blah blah etc. The laws of nature, however, state: A rolling stone gathers no moss. This particular stone was just sitting, minding her own business, regarding the majesty of the mountains. 

Luckily, nestled into the mountain-side was an idyllic little town, right in my path to relief. The petrol pumps are powered by natives. Any road off the main drag is paved, not in yellow bricks, but in dust and stones. The hotel smells like ghosts. I know this for a fact, because we had stopped there on the way up to Grappa Mountain. I had made a dash down the The Shining-like corridor to use the bathroom. I can't recall if there was any electricity, but for argument's sake, the landlady lit up a candle and showed me the way. There were voices down that corridor.... But I get carried away.

I should have known the town was cursed. But was Dorothy suspicious of short people who were happy with their station in life? No, but she should've been. Idol worship is indicative of serious and deep-seated inadequacies as well as mommy-issues. Snobby executed a perfect hand-brake turn into the parking lot. I Dukes of Hazzarded it out the window and was halfway down the corridor when the landlady (retired from lighting candles and serving pink champagne on ice) peeped from behind her smug desk. "We're closed", she said. I stood in the open door, looking skeptical and NOT thinking about the Victoria Falls, for all I was worth. 

The hiccup was that new plumbing was being dug and the whole town was decommissioned. The whole town?!? Is that even hygienic?

I will never again visit Underberg (the town that shares a single toilet). The 67km to Kokstad were a sheer test of will power and I am eternally grateful that I am distracted by colours and shiny things. Stones rolling at a gajillion kilometres an hour in passenger seats, going to their happy place in desperation, gather no moss. But Newton's Law holds true.