Morning Visits

This Little fellow has taken to tapping on my window most mornings.

I dont know what he is, maybe one of the many weaver species here.

SHAPES

SHAPES is the name of the new "Ladies" only gym in Kak. It boasts many new fangled pieces of equipment and the ladies of Kak are queuing to gain membership. Apparently one sets out at speed at instrument of torture No 1, and works ones way through to instrument of torture no 6, all in the space of half an hour!
Since I qualify hugely on account of my fulsome shape, I am quite sure they would greet me with open arms, but I have historically struggled with the very idea of Gyms, and the thought of an all ladies gym fills me with great trepidation.
I was introduced to the lady who had opened it last Thursday night at Willams birthday "Sun downer celebration", she said "You will love it." [Of course she would say that!]
But I am rather aware of how much I am lacking exercise, my increasingly adventurous dog walks seem to be having great effect of Bongo, rather less on Bee and even less on me.
So I am in two minds whether to go and have a trail session. Even the thought of it makes me groan. It's not really the machines, it's the interaction with other members, so if I go, I shall put on my black cat suit, scrape my hair back and to all intents and purposes go as a senior "Lara Croft", Daring doo but incredibly unsociable.
Incidentally Jessie they have municipal shower facilities. Which I most definitely will not be availing myself of, and shall return in a disgusting condition to the privacy of the farm for my shower. If I go at all!

Treasure in the desert

Will keep you posted on my decision making process . In the meantime some shapes from around the farm:

Story stone

Winter blues

Footprints found in a dried river bed in the middle of the wilderness....look at the direction of the prints...headless chickens come to mind!

Coarse and dry

RAMBLING POETS AT CYBER CAFE

RAMBLING POETS AT CYBER CAFE.
Some of you may remember me becoming involved with a poetry writing thread that appeared on the Authonomy website that I has used to raise the profile of ARK [The book].  Memories of Dung beetles?

The "conversation" took place over a period of eight months and was started by one verse of poetry, the idea was to be inspired by this verse and create an add another verse or entirely new poem. This worked and many people became involved.
I have for many weeks now, not even looked on the site, since Gerry started to help me edit ARK I have been working on its completion and getting it out to publishers and agents. One rejection so far..but I`m quite chilled and still putting it about [but not on the Autho site, the book has now been made private so you won't be able to see it.] Trying to keep its profile high was taking up inordinate amounts of my time, and I have other stuff to do.
I was recently contacted by the originator of the poetry thread, Zan, [who lives in Bermuda], she asked if I, along with five other regular contributors,[ also living in the far flung corners of the world] would consider self publishing the "conversation" that we have had on the poetry thread.
This is not what the experts would call "Vanity publishing". it's a new idea where work is uploaded [in this case to a site in America called Creatspace https://www.createspace.com/ ], the writer, does his or her own editing and mastering of text, adds their own artwork and cover. The book is then proofed, this is where the $ 140 start up cost comes, and is then listed on the Creatspace site. Leaving the author/authors to raise awareness and market as they see fit, and for readers to order a copy from Creatspace for the costly amount of around $11 per copy plus P&P which will not be cheap from the States.
Well this is as new a territory for me, as writing my first book. But I understand that Self publishing is becoming the new way to showcase work, the publishing industry is metamorphosising into an altogether different creature these days, with such wide access to the internet and many schemes around to publish "on demand".
Not one to miss and opportunity, I have agreed, and along with the six other members, we are currently sifting, sorting, and arranging our collection. I have to admit to being "hands off" on the technical side. One amongst this group of scarily gifted people, has self published before and all of the other members are published authors or poets in their own right. YIKES!
I shall keep you updated on the progress , and yes the collection is called : Rambling Poets at Cyber Cafe.

Some landscapes from my dog walks

Tangled remains of last years vines & succulents growing mid winter

Seismic Meanderings a little more focused

Carlos was still smiling

On Monday we had the largest of the recent quakes, around 4.30 on the Richter scale.
I was sitting at my computer when I heard a huge bang, followed by a deep underground thump, this was followed by the windows and doors rattling, organic material falling from our ceilings [through the light fixtures] and a general feeling of being mis footed when I tried to walk into the kitchen. The dogs both froze.
My first concern was for Carlos, who is making a new stoop outside of the kitchen and dining room, and when last I saw him he was on top of the roof.
So I went racing outside, only to bump into him running from the garage looking as concerned as I. After a couple of minutes of mixed language conversation, we decided both of us were perfectly fine.
This quake was followed by three more aftershocks.

I am told that only when they reach 6.5 do they start bringing buildings down, so we have about 18 points to go before the tin hats are shelled out.

The farm remains intact

Desert Unmoved

Arrival of Moses first kid

Thank you to Finn, who suggested that Moses call his fourth goat "Cosby", no sooner had I named her, than Cosby was shipped out to a friend in Augrabies, she will return, but not for a few weeks.
I have been giving the remaining three goats scraps from the kitchen , all shared between the goats and the geese and I have to say Bongo and Bee who have both decided that they are partial to the odd piece of drowsy lettuce, and dry cucumber. Yesterday I noticed Billy was very lethargic and not as keen as the others to race up to the fence for scraps.
Overnight she had her baby. Cute at only a few hours old. I don't know what sex it is yet, as I was very aware of Billy crying for her baby and didn't want either Bossy or I to disturb them any more than we had already done.
So More suggested names, as I have not been constrained by gender thus far..no suggestions need this restriction.

Hurrah for Picasa, I have discovered a much less painfull way of uploading photos.

burnt palm 1

Burnt Palm 1

Burnt Palm

Burnt Palm 2

Against the grain

Against the grain

JULY 14th 2010 . The Kakamanian back by popular demand.

Social Weavers nest in sharp focus

I had imagined that any blog readers I had left, would be seriously bored by my posts and so saddled with the joint demands of finishing ARK and completing my commission, I stopped writing it in January this year.My apologies.

I was very shocked by how much wrist "slappage"  I received during our month in Europe [ and very touched] and so as promised , here is the  re launch The Kakamanian .
I would be thrilled if anyone who still reads, would make the odd comment...good or bad!, it does make me feel as though someone is reading.

I realise that in returning to blogging, by far the most torturous part of doing it, is uploading the photos.They still take an age to upload, but they are the most effective way to illustrate our life here, so I shall forge on by whetting your appetite with a few favorite images I took shortly before we left for England.

Eland at sunset: Lake Grappa

Social weavers nest in Camel thorn tree. Road from Springbok

Return to the desert

The desert hasn't altered a great deal in our months absence, save that it has become much colder.By day, ranging from 8-16 degrees and at night around minus 2. I am very happy with these temperatures and have de-moth balled, our woollies and socks, much to Bongos delight..he seems to think socks are for removing and even in the few days we have been home, has perfected the art of approaching a resting socked foot,nipping the toe [ever so delicately] and unceremoniously whipping it off of its foot and disappearing at some speed to demolish said item of clothing.

....Is it surprising

The vines in Winter

In memory of Binky Myers

We are missing one tortoise. to my great sadness, dear little Binky Myers passed away while we were gone, Moses doesn't know why or how, he just found him in a somewhat inert condition. He was at great pains to point out that Bongo, had nothing to do with Bink's demise.

The remaining four tortoises are fine..I may have missed sending details of these, so the roll call is now as follows:

Rosy and Guilden .Big Boy and Delilah. The later two are rather large [ I would say the size of a large square plumped up cushion on legs] and so feisty that they hiss at me when I go to feed them. I am in deep admiration of their natures..one always thinks of Tortoises as being rather docile and gentle....Big Boy and Delilah are the exception to this rule.

Four geese,who are large and white and very noisy: Pate, Fois, Gras, Truffle..all four of them well and I hope they will soon be old enough to produce babies.

Four goats: Kid, Clinton, Gates and another one who has arrived in our absence and is yet to be christened..any suggestions?



Seismic movement in the desert.

We have missed the huge excitement of EARTH TREMORS...most unusual for the Northern Cape, there have been a minimum of three..I say this because the variations in the locals experience varies upwards of 10 tremors, ranging from Richter scale 8 to 1.6 depending on who one talks with.

The reality of the situation lies at the lower end of both scales I think,as all mountains and buildings are upstanding,and the contents of our farm are intact...apart from a photo of Tom..which supposedly decided to jump of a shelf , thus shattering his glass.[ Don't worry Tommy, you are due to be taken into Kak for more protective glass].

As we had the decorators in during our absence to repair some of the water storm damage..I think that it is more likely that Tommy was knocked off the shelf by one of them and that the seismic meanderings are being used as a euphamism for any breakages of ever sort [large and small]that have occurred in the past month.

Alterations and improvements.

Much has changed at the farm on the improvement front, there are outside patios now laid to the rear of the property, and our braai room has a tiled floor.

By far the most impressive alteration, is the change in the krall that lies to the rear of the farm and used to house Moses "seas" of chickens, the goats and the geese. It has been leveled and covered in much of the orange sand that the locals insist of referring to as "Soil" and has been planted with grass "stukkies", these are tufts of the local grass, that send out runners and eventually form a hard wearing green matt that resembles a lawn..by October/Nov we should be able to play rather lopsided croquet on it [Ha!] This is bound to upset the locals who are already wondering why we have cultivated such a large patch of ground for GRASS!!!, as many locals have mentioned, "it seems such a waste of good planting ground."

One of our two guest rooms is completely finished with hot and cold running water, the other has been taken over by me as a studio for the moment. On the art front, I have been very inspired by all of the hard work my friends from Winchester have done since they graduated, I was so thrilled to attend an exhibition of their work when I was back in UK and it has really fired me up. Having managed to complete Archie AKA "Enfent Terrible" the local vets "pet" African water buffalo in a 1.5X1.00 meter canvas in oils..I am now yearning to crack on with altogether more abstract work again. The one great thing about the commission for Tokka, was that he insisted he wanted it painted in oils..and so it was! I rather like working in oils now. So my suitcase was filled with a selection of different oil colours and much oil solvent...seriously "not allowed" on flights, so dug in with my new knickers and bras.

Knickers and Bras

Nothing has changed on this front, and Bongo has trawled his way through very many of my favorite undies and braziers since I last wrote. I am sure I spend more on these than cigarettes each year now. So while in England Taz whisked me off to her wonderful "bosom shop" in Abingdon..what a delight,I returned to the desert, fully stocked , and with a clever device for preventing Bongo from accessing my stuff...its a linen laundry bag, with a hook and a strong drawer string top, it now hangs on the inside of my dressing room door..which can be locked. Yesterday I had to go into Kak, and when I returned, Big was looking rather sad. He said " Well, clever clogs, nothing of yours has been destroyed...but my favorite pair of boxers have been ripped to smithereens by Bongo." And sure enough, there was a very soulful looking Bongo, with a few tell tale scraps of a Ralph Lauren logo, hanging from his jowls. Now as much as I understand the pain of losing my favorite undies, I couldn't resist punching the air in joy.

A belated birthday celebration for Tommy at Kazbar.Oxford

One Month away from the World Cup...NOT!

All I can say is thank you to everyone for making our trip so fantastic, it was even busier than any of my/our two week/three week stints. Much partying, much eating and drinking,many many lunches and suppers and gatherings.

Much precious time spent with all four of my delightful children, which even when we were all living in England was unusual..and so many treats.Including Goodwood for Little, which I have to say, he loved very much indeed..so much so, that he is now a confirmed "petrol head" in my opinion..naming every single one of the huge array of cars that we saw, and when he didn't know, he raced onto the stand or accosted the owner to find out.

I have to mention that Big was a star during our trip to Goodwood, as his beloved Holland were playing at 3.00 that afternoon, and I knew he was itching to find a screen to watch..no such luck..Goodwood is only for petrol heads..not football fans. We did manage to get some of it on the car radio heading back to our hotel..and in a long cue out of the Goodwood grounds. Big astounded the very English motorists, by beeping and cheering and standing up in the car..when Holland scored and then again when someone on the opposing side was sent off..So we returned from that event with two smiley boys.

Many thanks to Ellen for providing the "dutch cap"..much fun had by all!

Gradiation celebrations held in Newcastle for Finn, attended by Big ,Little and I.

Finn and his "Little" brother. [Look at the feet!]
Jessie and Little in Chichester.

To everyone, a huge thankyou,and for the many people that we missed, our apologies .There was just too much to do. I particuarly wanted to spend as much time as possible with my babies who are facing a challenging time ahead. I am so incredibly proud of them and how mutually supportive they are for each other and their loved ones. I consider myself one of the most fortunate of Mums around.

Kisses on the lips for all.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Dawn