Training Dragons and Imperial Duck.

Good evening, everybody! All things considered, I have had quite a chilled week. Although, I think 'chilled' is a relative term. It's also been a week of reflection with it being a year since we made history when we reached the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro.

What's been happening?

MY BORNDAY! I don't know about you, but I'm feeling 22...
Birthday celebrations are always great, and as I've mentioned before, I like to extend these celebrations beyond the usual 24-hour vibe. So, to keep up this tradition, I had a celebratory/reunion dinner with a few of the cast members from The Chaeli Campaign's productions and we went to Chef Pon's Asian Kitchen - go there, try the Imperial Duck. That's all.

When my birthday actually arrived, I woke up pretty early - as one does - and went with my mom to co-present at BNI (as one doesn't generally do on a birthday). Thereafter, my sister took me out for breakfast at Open Door. There were so many little people there, I actually couldn't contain myself. Toddlers are just the best version of a person - so much curiosity, with no inhibition. To end off my official birthday, we had the traditional Banana Jam dinner and it was wonderful. It's probably one of my favourite places in the world. The problem I've had with my birthday though, since getting to university, is that it generally falls in the midterm vacation, which means many of my friendles have gone home and can subsequently not celebrate with me on my actual birthday. This also gives us another reason to get together and have a good time. So, that works for me. I love that I'm able to surround myself with phenomenal human beings, who make me question things, appreciate things, and just have a great time on this life journey.

For my birthday, my sister got me a book called 'Thoughts & Reflections', it asks a question a day, and has space for 3 years worth of answers. I think this is awesome, because it is easy enough that it's totally doable and not time-consuming. I'm committed to this book - just like my blog - and keeping on with filling it in every day. We're seven days in and still on-track, so things are looking promising.

The most exciting thing (don't judge me) for the week before my birthday was that my Dragon arrived :)

I guess that needs some explanation, right. I ordered 'Dragon Naturally Speaking' which is voice recognition software, two weeks ago, and it has arrived! This may seem silly, but I can't explain how rad it is to be able to speak to your computer, with a speech issue, and have it not only understand what you're saying but also listen to you and do what you say. So legit. But in order for this to happen, it has to be trained. So, I've been training my Dragon for the last while and it's seemingly working quite well, and saving so much time.

Now, there's time for a quick university update. Last week, I once again, vastly underestimated the amount of time it takes to finish an Honours assignment. I'm having some serious procrastination struggles, you guys, but I'm working on it, at some point. I realised at 7pm, when I wasn't even halfway through it, that Friday night was going to be a long one, had a minor meltdown, and then continued walking the line between denial and hopeful success. I then contemplated at 4:43am whether it was worth my while to even make the mission to go to sleep or to just bite the bullet and simply stay awake. I got hysterical with laughter at basically nothing, and with that I realised that maybe the former would be a better life decision. Eventually, I only got like 35 minutes sleep (at the most) before waking up to do some last-minute edits. Please can we now acknowledge that me pulling an all-nighter on a FRIDAY means that this assignment was made due on a Saturday. Yeah, welcome to Postgrad studies, where work weeks are not a thing and other normal social understandings don't apply.

When I got to campus to submit my assignment and do my presentation (I was determined to be awake for my presentation), I got into the lift to go to Level 4, the doors closed, and the lift went nowhere. So, at that point, I was ready to admit that it wasn't going to be my day. I messaged my friend Lara that I was in the lift, but stuck. After a bit of a miscommunication it was determined that I actually required assistance to get out. After that everything was relatively chilled. But due to extreme exhaustion and not remembering what day it was, I (along with my mom) went - after my university commitments were sorted - off to Stellenbosch University to present leadership workshops that were actually scheduled for yesterday, that being Sunday (not Saturday). My mom was less than impressed, to say the least. There is a silver lining to this story however, because after realising that we were functioning on the wrong day we found a really cute cafe, and bought a lot of cheesecake because it looked amazing. And it was!

So, my advice for the week is that when you find yourself in a trying situation, go in search of CHEESECAKE and all will work out. Because you know, life is just better with cheesecake.

That's it for now.

Kbye.

x

Am I Crazy? I think so.

I am doing the Argus in 2013. I know what you're probably thinking....

Are you crazy?

I'm pretty sure that I am. But, I have a crazy buddy, Grant, doing it with me. I love not being the only semi-deranged person in the room. Love you, Grant! Now, you have to understand what a good person he is if he is willing to put up with me for seven to eight hours on the road where we can either be dying from heat, drowning from rain, being blown away by the Cape Town wind OR...

....it could be really chilled and I'm overthinking this.

Let's explain a little more about how the whole situation is going to work because I can imagine the eyes that you are pulling at me right now.

So, Grant is going to be on his bike (still having the mountain bike or road bike debate) and I will be behind the bike in a "buggy". This is not the official name we are going to use but it's under development. We WILL be doing training so that we don't end up falling off the bike and using our faces as landing pads. But Grant is a pro-cyclist so that's definately half the battle won. Then we just have to work on my balance and my core muscles...quite the job but we're up for it!

The things we are working on right now are finding some sponsors as well as sorting out the buggy. The buggy is kind of an integral part of our plan. We will make it work and it will be EPIC!!

You will get updates as soon as things happen so that you can be completely involved in the entire amazing journey that Grant and I are about to embark on.

:)