Hi !  This week I am thinking and writing about a lot! This includes Cape Town, anniversaries, stairs, kitchens, beers and puppies, first dates, expensive shit and trust- Eve D.❣️

Week in review…

✈️ This week I took myself, and my Zac, off to Cape Town. I had been feeling mild cases of burn out for a number of days, and was demotivated and pissed off with the world. Cape Town usually fixes all this for me. Micole couldn’t come with us, which was unfortunate but also not a train smash: Zac and I enjoyed focussed time with just ourselves, and it was good for both of us. Cape Town, of course, did not disappoint. It really is the most spectacular corner of the world. If you’ve never been, I highly recommend it. (More thoughts on the trip, below). 

🍾 G and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary this week, and no one is more surprised that we made it this far than us. (My kids were convinced it has been 2 years). This was supposed to be a fun fling while we figure out what we really want, but here we are 🙂 . In G’s words, the year has been “Not bad!”. I always say that you have to go through a full year of a relationship before you know what you are really dealing with, and I still stand by that ❣️ So now I know 😂 .

🥇 Micole had a graduate actuarial day at a big financial company. Students from across the country were divided into teams, and were given a financial/actuarial challenge and two hours to solve it and prepare a presentation. Micole was on the smallest team, and all her teammates were new to her. Now, you need to know that Micole sees herself as a timid, quiet and soft spoken girl, and often lacks self confidence. But she’s also ambitious, intelligent and hugely competitive. Anyway, her team’s presentation did not win, but she won the only individual prize for…the Best Presenter. 🏆️ This is massive. She was gobsmacked when she won…but now that she knows she can, she is invincible. #Congrats Micole!!

Food for thought:

It’s always beneficial to, every once in a while, change environments and get yourself out of a bubble. This trip to Cape Town drove that home hard. I had a lot of time to do nothing, which is another way to say that I had plenty of opportunity to entertain whatever thoughts popped into my head. Here are some observations that I jotted down:

I don’t do stairs (Cape Town Thoughts #1)

You would be hard pressed to “do” Cape Town and not walk, a lot. And we did, and it wasn’t a problem. But…I have now confirmed to myself something that I have always known but was starting to (again) shove under the carpet: I really, really struggle to do steep elevation climbs. I have always had this problem, and it is directly linked to my lymphoma and blood haemoglobin levels. I was reminded of this nuisance when I had to climb the (hundreds of?) stairs to get back from the beaches to street level. It was really difficult for me. This is also the reason why I struggled so much on my hike two weeks ago (that hike was basically three hours of climbing up and down “stairs” aka rock formations). So now I know, and I need to figure out how/if I can fix this. And if I can’t then I need to stop putting myself in positions that require too much of this effort, or at least manage my expectations. Anything else isn’t helping anyone.

Related, this made me smile: “Four minutes into my run, I decided I wanted to work on my personality instead” @jb_melbs

Lots of unhealthy people in the world (Cape Town Thoughts #2)

I did a lot of people watching, as one does whenever in a cosmopolitan destination like Cape Town. And one thing that I noticed (once again) is there are a lot of unhealthy/ overweight/obese people in the world. I don’t mean slightly overweight (me! me!), I mean overweight in the sense that quality of life is affected. I saw people struggle to get off cruise boats, struggle to sit in plane seats, struggle to walk a promenade, struggle to get up from chairs. This is unfortunate, debilitating and probably avoidable. I don’t even blame the people as much as I blame our western diet full of crap. The scary thing is that unless something radical happens, these people are on a downward curve of wellbeing (we all are, actually, but at least I hope our baseline is in a better place). This is why I gym, do pilates and climb those f*cking stairs. I don’t want to lose my mobility.

Worth remembering: “Better to be the oldest person in the weight room than the youngest in assisted care”,

Photos, Photos, Photos (Cape Town Thoughts #3)

Because Micole was not with us, the deal was that we would take lots of photographs, and “vlog” our way through the trip, and send her all the footage. Zac is an avid cameraman and took literally hundreds of photographs / videos. We then sat on the couch and viewed them all on the TV when we got back (if this sounds like a nightmare, don’t stress: Micole insisted). Anyway, this meant that I sat for an hour or two and was forced to look at hundreds of photographs/videos of myself 🤯 . Before this week, I saw maybe ten photos of myself this year, total. I don’t like the camera, and of course I hated all my photos. I saw in them someone who is not me. I look older, more worn, more wrinkled, and more disheveled than I feel. But…the kids loved them. Which made me realise that (of course!) people see you the way that you are all the time. There is no “special lighting”, or “the right pose” or the “best angle” in real life. I can’t cheat my way through it.

And, co-incidentally, a couple of days prior, Facebook showed me a photo of Zac and I taken about 6 or 7 years ago. And now I think I looked pretty good. But also, I remember not liking the photo at the time. And you know what? Such is life. Those hours spent in front of the TV looking at all the Cape Town images immunised me against not liking my photos. I will now take a lot more selfies, and I will love all of them! It’s me! I’m alive! And happy! I will never be this young or this healthy again, and I am going to enjoy and commemorate every day of being me.

Which, by the way, is not the same thing as refusing to look after myself. If I think my skin is dull (yes!), if I look tired (yes!), if my eyes have no sparkle (yes!), if my hair is a mess (omg, it is!) I can fix all that through a good diet, more sleep and more frequent visits to hairdressers. So if that’s what needs to be done, then I must do it. I think 2026 will be the year of wellness (Yes, I’m making 2026 plans already).

And anyway, this quote resonates: “Hotness isn’t about wrinkle counts at all; it’s about refusal. Refusing to settle for the patterns, jobs or friendships that drain you. Refusing to accept that your best years are behind you. Refusing to make yourself smaller so someone else feels bigger. Refusing to cut your hair because of age, or to dress a certain way too. Refusing the limitations imposed on us”

Dates, and men (Cape Town Thoughts, #4)

Zac and I had breakfast in a tucked away beachfront restaurant in Kalk Bay, where shared the outside area with another patron. She was sitting alone until a man - a real Capetonian hippy - walked in. She got up with glee and they gave each other the biggest hug after which she said… ”It’s so nice to meet you!” Ah, a first date! Clearly they’d been chatting online for a while, and decided to meet in person. I do wish I could share their photo! They are most definitely mismatched, but still very sweet together. He spoke about the recent moon eclipse and guitars, she spoke about marketing and NYC. I think they both knew they weren’t going to be dating, but they also knew they’d be friends. And that’s a win!

Reminds me of two quotes I saved, to share with you:

And I think this applies to babies, but also to grown men:

Social Media (Cape Town Thoughts #5)

We all know that the news and social media is a f*cking nightmare, but it was an even bigger nightmare this week, right? Well, while I was in CT I stayed away from my phone. Not because I made some sort of pact with myself, but because it didn’t even occur to me to be on it. I had other things to do, other thoughts to stimulate my mind. I was able to entertain myself. And the world, of course, kept on turning.

And I know that this level of ambivalence is dangerous, and probably the last thing we need right now. I get that we need people to be angry, and outraged, and vocal. But I don’t have any more strength. In economics this is known as the “free-rider” problem (I will benefit from your outrage, but I won’t contribute to it) and I apologize in advance.

Two beers and a puppy

I absolutely love this framework, and I think it works. I now realise I strive to find the people that fit both roles, because life is too short to bother with anything else:

Kitchens…

I want a new kitchen. Like, desperately. At first I started thinking how I could remodel my existing kitchen, but then I realised my kitchen ambitions are grand, and my current kitchen could maybe accommodate the scullery, pantry and laundry room. I do have a massive pool room in my house (“pool room” as in “looks out onto the swimming pool” but also “has a pool table in it”) which is completely unused for a million-and-one structural reasons But, it would make an amazing kitchen/outdoor/entertainment space. Anyway, I am in my “collecting inspiration photos” stage. Also: To be real with myself, I have to say that I’m not actually going to be remodelling my house. I’m probably rather selling it next year.

Stupid, expensive shit…

At one of the touristy hubs in Cape Town I paid R40 for a bottle of 300ml of water, that I could probably buy for R10 in a shop. I was not happy. It was weird…I don’t mind paying considerably more for good food, but if you try to cheat me by selling me what is probably just “filtered” tap water at 4x the price, I will bitch about it for months.

I also followed a link to a “must buy” item from a newsletter I read, and it was literally this (below), for $128. For f*ck’s sake! If you would pay $128 for a bunch of beads on a little leather strip, then you’re mad. But also…if you are a newsletter writer, presumably writing to the masses, then perhaps recommending this level of stupid shit (especially in today’s broken world) is not the smartest thing to do.

Rather spend your money on this:

The human touch…

Saw this photograph on one of the socials, and I’ll admit it’s pretty amazing. And I’ll bet the pilot was thrilled. But then I got thinking: it’s only great because I believe the story behind it; a person set up the camera, timed it, etc and got the shot. The reason the pilot thinks it’s great is because he believes it is his plane in the photo. Lots of trust going on here! If this was a painting, it would be meh at best. If it was AI generated, it would be worthless. Point is: we value the human creativity spirit. We reward it. But it is going to be increasingly difficult to give this appreciation freely, because AI is going to infiltrate everything, and eventually we will trust nothing.

Speaking of fake stuff, this is funny:

Odds and ends…

✅ Apparently the Eiffel Tower is going to add 72 notable female scholar names to the 72 male names already etched into its base. A couple hundred years late, but better late than never.

✅ This is a Cyanometer, and it is used to describe the intensity of the sky. It was invented in 1789 and I want one. (The Cape Town sky was mostly #6 when I was there recently. Today, the sky in Pretoria was a #14)

✅ If you struggle to get going at work in the morning, here is a fun tip: do ten small(ish) tasks before 10 am. This could be things like paying a bill, writing an email, sending an invoice etc. Once you get through 10 of those, you will be warmed up to do the bigger stuff.

✅ Have you heard of Green Prescribing? It’s where doctors prescribe (ie. order (!)) you to go and spend time in nature, before they prescribe any pills. In Canada, doctors can give you an annual pass to the national parks, instead of a prescription. I love this.

✅ The Constitutional Court in South Africa has just ruled that men can take their wife’s surname. Until this was headline news, I honestly did not know that they couldn’t. Also, the BBC News ran with this story too, which makes me think that men in the rest of the world can’t do this either? Cue an eye roll. 🙄 

✅ There is a study that says that people underestimate how unhappy their lives would be if they were suddenly confined to a wheelchair, because we forget how adaptable we become to new circumstances. I was reminded of this when I read Jessica Slice’s post, where she talks about how she took herself, wheelchair and all, off to a park. She says, “…I felt a rush of absolute joy and an unbidden thought: I want my exact life”. Read it here, it’s good.

I’ve been watching…

Nik and I didn’t watch a movie this week, since I was in Cape Town, but we do have our next two movies lined up. Next week we are watching Naked Gun (the new one) and the following week it will be K-pop Demon Hunters (my choice, on a recommendation from Tim Ferris). It’s the most watched movie on Netflix, and definitely is not anything Nik and I would normally watch. But then, that’s exactly what these movie dates are for!

Also: Only Murders in the Building Season 5 (I think?) is out on Netflix.

Looking ahead…

I have done almost no work in the last two weeks, so that is what I am going to be doing this week. Like honestly, that’s it. I will be working. I have about 8 working weeks left of the year, and I really need to put them to good use.

Thanks for reading!

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