Pastel Morning

There must have been a huge veldfire somewhere in our vicinity last night. The smoky, but not unpleasant, smell of burning grass was everywhere.

This morning, the smoke had settled down into a hazy blanket, covering the Moreletapark valley. As the sun rose* it became more and more rosy in hue until it became a giant piece of surreal candyfloss**. On the other side of the road, the hill that houses a big part of Constantiapark was slowly turning into a powder blue fortress.
It truly felt like I was stuck in a Pierneef painting.



* I think it is wonderful that I can finally drive to work in the morning and see where I'm going again. It just makes the day feel so much shorter, and it even gives the illusion that I'm actually getting more sleep.

** I love candyfloss. My biggest achievement this weekend was in discovering that Safari Garden Centre actually sells freshly made candyfloss over the weekends. There is nothing like it. The smell. The delicious stickyness. Yum.
Those stale balls of flavoured fluff in little plastic bags just can't compare. And there is always the uncomfortable question as to who actually blew up those bags.

Aaaaarg!

Deep breath. Relax. Focus...

After happily leaving work at 3, it took me 2 and a half hours to get home today.
2 and a half hot, frustrating, wasted hours of driving an average of 10km/h on the highway.
At one point we were moving so slowly that one of the pamphlet hawkers from the traffic light at the off ramp wandered onto the middle of the highway to entice us with notices of happy hours and half price ladies' nights.

The reason for all this inertia? A "Crime Prevention Operation" spread across all three lanes, in both directions, in Friday afternoon rush hour traffic! At least, that is what the traffic reports on the radio called it. I guess they reasoned that there would be a drop in crime if everybody was stuck in traffic.

By the time I had managed to crawl to the point of origin, they weren't even there anymore! All that was left of the operation was a single police car and 4 bright red port-a-potty's, so I couldn't even yell at them for making me miss my Hiphop class.

Disconcerting

Driving home from work yesterday, I got stuck behind a big blue truck, that regardless of it's snail-like pace, insisted on driving in the middle lane.

As I got closer to it's backside, I noticed that there were stickers with the radioactive icon on it pasted all over the truck.

The scary part was the fact that little spongelike things kept on blowing off the truck and onto the surrounding cars.

Needless to say, I got out of there as quickly as I could.

Intense Aggravation

Unmoving strings of red lights on the highway,
Eating away at my patience, my sanity and my weekend!

Haunted Highway

By now I am used to driving on the highway so early in the morning that it is still dark. But this morning was different. The buildings that make up Midrand were barely visible in the early morning light, when suddenly everything disappeared into a grey curtain of mist. It felt like my car was the only one on the road, except for the dim red glow of backlights in the distance.

Now I understand where all those stories and myths about crosing over into other worlds originated, it really felt like I got a glimpse of another reality where anything might be possible.

Then just as suddenly the mist is gone.Coming out of it was like waking up from a special dream - they never do last long enough, do they?