Latest Happenings

Well I was rather optimistic is saying at least we have passed the halfway mark for winter - 21st June – as we have had really cold and miserable weather for the last few weeks. Our temperature here on the plot only reached a maximum of seven at the worst of the last cold spell. Sooo Cold!! Not the weather for us sissies who don’t like the cold. The wind has also been howling around the house on most days which makes a lot of dust and pollen in the air as some of the trees are full of yellow blossoms. Bad sinus infections are the order of the day at the moment. We have also had a veld fire sweep through the area and across the top of the plot. The thick choking smoke started our sinus problems and the windy days have aggravated things. I REALLY mean it when I say ‘ Roll on Summer”.
Diane and I have still been keeping busy with her new venture but the bad situation with the strikes for the last few weeks have really affected the way things are going. The Steel and Engineering strike affected the workshop and Hubby and his workers had to be careful not to attract attention while still working. On the Friday of the first week of the strike I phoned Hubby and was horrified when he told me he couldn’t speak as the strikers were outside in the street and he needed to keep an eye on things. The stories from friends in the industry we had heard were shocking to hear as the violence and intimidation was out of hand in some areas. I spent the next hour absolutely terrified as I didn’t hear from Hubby and didn’t know what was happening there and of course imagined the worst as Hubby can be rather short-tempered sometimes. I was too scared to phone in case the strikers and Hubby were talking and a phone call caused tempers to flare. After imagining the worst case scenario I couldn’t wait any longer and phoned Hubby. Imagine my relief to hear that the strikers had moved on as the hammer had been switched off and the workers had hidden, in terror, at the bottom of the workshop so they had obviously thought the workers had joined the strike. The workers stayed hidden for the rest of the morning as the strikers patrolled the area to make sure no one was working. Hubby couldn’t even lock the gate as places that had locked the workers and office staff inside were targeted with violence and intimidation. It was a very scary time and we were all relieved when the strike was over – this was the first time ever that a strike in the industry has affected us. The petroleum industry strike was also a bad time as so many garages ran out of petrol – even the local one in our area had none for a couple of days – but luckily we had filled up before hand and kept topping up while petrol was available. The effect of all this on the economy remains to be seen!
All has not been doom and gloom though as we did have a sister’s get-together for Val’s birthday and had a great time relaxing and catching up over breakfast out at a local restaurant near where Val lives.
The boys are doing well and have settled well into their new school. Josh is now thirteen months old and running around everywhere getting into mischief and Travis is a real chatter-box who comments on everything. His favourite word at the moment is “WHY”. I love them to bits but must say I really do find them exhausting and am really pleased when Ali gets home to take over with them. At least even though it has been so cold they have not needed to go to the DR and are keeping fairly healthy with just runny noses – I cannot go without stocking up on tissues. Travis is forever telling me “
My nose is running”. Lovely time of the year this! As I said “Roll on Summer”.
Well that’s all for now. Hopefully with the onset of warmer weather Diane and I can start hiking again as I really miss walking especially after all the walking we did while on holiday.