So much for my resolution to blog once a week. (098) HA! Although, in my defense, I usually get the urge to blog during work hours and my my internet keeps bombing out as soon as I tried to sign into my blog. They’re onto me…. ;-)

So, what’s new on my side?

• My magazine addiction (047) has been successfully curbed I think. I no longer look longingly at the magazine rack each time I enter a shop and scan desperately for a title, any title, that will grab my fancy. And of course, I’ve become much pickier with the magazines I do buy, since I have a quantity limit now. Sometimes I don’t even get to 4 per month!
• I’ve tried to go see an improv show (004), even booked the tickets, but then rocked up at the wrong venue. Very disappointing! For those wondering, the Intimate Theatre is not a separate room at the Kalkbay theatre, it is actually a separate theatre and is in the middle of the CBD. So when we finally figured out we were at the wrong venue, it was too late to still catch the show at the actual venue. Oh well, you live, you learn… Next time!
• We did however attend the theatre (010) – this time for Pythonesque (a Monty Python type show, surprisingly…) at the Theatre on the Bay, part of our anniversary weekend celebrations. I’ve never seen any Monty Python (yes, yes, you can berate me later), so the show was a lovely surprise as I quite liked the style of humour.
• We’ve also tried some new restaurants out (012) (yes, coffeeshops DO count!) – Melissa’s for a delicious breakfast including a freshly pressed beetroot, orange juice & ginger drink, and Café Crème for an equally delicious breakfast which included a lip-smacklingly awesome apple compote with Bulgarian yoghurt.
• I can also tick off nr 013 – we had a picnic for Valentine’s Day. Even though it was on our livingroom floor (it was windy outside!), but we made the best of it with lots of cushions & duvets and in the end it was the best choice as we could pass out there and then when we had sated ourselves on JC Le Roux sparkling rose, homemade flatbread (025), diy marinated olives, garlicky chicken wings, roasted aubergine & redpepper and fried halloumi. Yum-o!
• Not making too much progress on nr 019 – I already eat a wide variety of foods, so this one is actually quite difficult to do… I keep threatening to try rollmops, but have not worked up the courage yet. They just look ….. icky…..
• 043 – I’ve paid off another one, so now have 2 left out of 5. Focusing now on TheHusband’s debt, so will probably take a while before the last 2 is paid off.
• 022 is ticked off – chocolate salami was a hit during the festive season (off course with extra booze & orange peel added in, why not?)
• Still too scared to get on the scale (027). But I think my clothes are feeling a tad looser (or rather, less tight…). Wishful thinking?
  
• Perhaps..Finally read Rich Dad, Poor Dad & can recommend it for anyone who does not look forward to getting trapped in the rat-race.
• Made good progress (read: about 2 days…) with nr 063, but then the whole Joost-sex video scandal popped up all over Heat, my colleague showed it to me and I was trapped like a deer in the headlights (albeit a deer that quite enjoys being trapped in the headlights…)
• Had a lovely girls night in with Michelle a few weeks ago, was just like the good old varsity days. Not sure if it counts as a proper girls’ night (069) when there are only 2 girls though…
• Working on 070, watch this space….071, 074 & 075 are miserable FAILS.
• I am a happy postcrosser! (091) Close to the 20 card-mark. Although, had a bit of a dry spell for the first few weeks of 2009, but now I’m all fired up again, since I figured out you can buy airmail postcard stamps in bulk at the post office, so I don’t have to go the postoffice every damn time I want to send a postcard (really annoying)
• Stupid computer gave me a bit of a backlog on 094, but I’ve started up a new legacy and will be backing up on a regular basis to avoid any future mishaps. (Stupid Acer!)
• The doves seem to not be such keen visitors to our balcony anymore, so I guess 099 has taken care of itself. However, we now have a new plague – cockroaches. They have managed to crawl inside of our microwave (yes! Behind the digital time display – wtf), and give me the evil side-eye everytime I step into the kitchen. However, we have now found a new poison with which we will wage our war, hopefully this time it is successful. FYI, cockroach traps trap NOTHING, Doom-type sprays just sprays them away and then they scuttle off somewhere else, and apparently the old footstomping technique isn’t really the winner either – they release a gazillion egss when they get squashed! Just what I wanted: little cockroach babies!
  
• Urgh100 – FAIL. But I’m glad about the FAIL. I think it actually did more good than harm as initially feared.

I'm aware of the fact that I'm going to open up a big ol' can of worms here, but there's something I just don't get:

Why all the fuss about the Springbok emblem? I'm of course talking about the big hoo-ha about "them" wanting to take the emblem away. And now that "they" have conceded that it can still stay on the jersey, the rugby-"manne" are still not happy, because, horror of horrors, they have moved it to the other breast! O calamity!

Now, before you go accusing me of being insensitive (okay, maybe I am just a tad...), I do understand that people attach meaning to the emblem and that's what all the fuss is about. But, come on! Surely grown people cannot be that dense. The emblem makes no difference to the game in the end. It's not going to change the fact that the average person in this country lives & breathes rugby and it sure as hell isn't going to affect the score at the end of the game. One of the more annoying arguments I've seen, is that the Bok has united us as a nation (World Cup 1995 & 2007) and that's why it should stay. Of course I cannot argue with that, rugby did unite us and it was awesome, but that's just it. It was RUGBY that united us as a nation (even I got excited and I usually battle to stay awake during a game...), not the Bok per se.

Yes, I suppose it has sentimental value, but is that enough of a reason for people to create groups on facebook, to petition the rugby bosses and to feverishly vote in Die Huilgenoot's polls regarding the matter?

Come on people, this really is quite a small "issue" compared to the bigger picture. There are so many other things to protest about in the world, hell even in our own country, why the focus on a picture on clothing?

Or is that perhaps the precise reason for it: it distracts us from the bigger thorns in our sides?

The cool thing about Postcrossing is that not only do you get to send postcards all over, but you receive postcards from all around the world too. I received the first 4 on Friday last week and it made my day! Even better was that the one from Tanzania had a message in Dutch on the back, and as we all know, I have a bit of a thing for the Dutch language - for some reason I find it VERY amusing. :-)

It's been 3 weeks since I've started with my 101in1001 and I've finished a couple of goals, and have a couple in progress.

The most difficult one is proving to be #47 (the one limiting my magazine addiction). But, so far I've complied by only buying 4 magazines since the challenge started. And I may only buy again on the 12th of November. Granted, the 4 magazines were bought in the space of a week, but that'll teach me to space it out a bit!

This past week has been interesting. Life without TheHusband usually is, as I battle my own demons. For those of you who don't know: he's in Lima, Peru for 2 weeks of training. One down, 2 to go. I think I'm okay so far. The ironic thing is that it's always been a dream of mine to go to South America. So... having TheHusband be away for so long and be THERE is sort of a double whammy. The photo's he's sent me so far looks absolutely amazing and the stories he tells me makes me want to quit my job, pack my bags and climb into the nearest suitcase bound for South America.

Get Your Cyborg Name

Kannibaal gaan lank sit

Or more commonly known: Afghanistan. The first on my list of countries to read about. To simplify matters, I've decided to focus on the internationally recognized countries. Of which Afghanistan is top of the list.


To be honest, I was very tempted to skip this one, due to over-saturation (the whole USA vs the Taliban saga), but in the end I gave it a go..

Interesting fact: The country was a monarchy until 1973, when the King's brother-in-law ousted him with a bloodless coup to become the country's first president. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "trouble with the in-laws"

Little known fact: There is a booming opium trade in Afghanistan stemming from a huge illegal poppy cultivation.

Best part: Culture plays a big part in the average Afghan's life - most households have at least one book of poetry and poetry events are very common (even though a large part of the population is illiterate).
Also, women now form 28% of the cabinet, making Afghanistan one of the leading countries in the world in terms of female representation.

Worst part: The almost constant war the country has been embroiled in since way back when. And the Taliban. Those are not guys you want to mess with. Especially if you are a woman.

Verdict: It doesn't seem as bad as I initially thought, but I'd still hesitate to go live there. Even though women are now well represented in parliament, and the laws governing what women can and cannot do have largely fallen away, I think that large parts of the population still views women as 2nd class citizens. And I'd have a very hard time coping with that.

So. I've stumbled upon an interesting meme and decided to take part in it.

The Mission:

Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days

Start date: Sunday 12 October 2008
Finish date: Saturday 9 July 2011


Magical Mystery Tour/Day Tripper

001. Spend a day at the amusement park & go on all the rides
002. Play a round of paintball
003. Go to an art exhibition
004. Go see an improv show
005. Go play putt-putt
006. See 6 live shows (2/6)
- KKNK (Apr09)
007. Go ice-skating
008. Go Geocaching
009. Attend an International Food Evening in the Neelsie
010. Go to the theatre 3 times (3/3) - Apr09
011. Go strawberry picking
012. Try 10 new restaurants out (4/10)
- Irish Pub, Durban (Dec08)
- Melissa's, Stellenbosch (Feb09)
- Manoushe, Stellenbosch (Apr09)
- Braza, Canal Walk (Jun09)
013. Have a picnic - Feb09

Honey Pie/Strawberry Fields

014. Plan weekday meals & do grocery shopping on a weekly basis - doing this on a regular basis, consider it done
015. Give Brussels sprouts one more try - Oct08
016. Make gluhwein
017. Make ginger beer
018. Roast a whole chicken
019. Try 10 new foods (3/10)
- Belgian endive (Oct08)
- Fennel (Dec08)
- Sauerkraut (Jun09)
020. Make a meal based on a colour-theme - Apr09 (YELLOW)
Starter - Stuffed Pattypans
Main - Yellowpepper & Fontina Salad with a creamy mustartd dressing
- Sweetcorn fritters
Dessert - Caramelized Pineapple with Butterscotch sauce
021. Make ice-cream/sorbet from scratch
022. Make chocolate salami - Dec08
023. Cook 5 things out of every cookbook I own (5/150)
024. Make & bottle something
025. Bake bread

Revolution/I Want You (She's So Heavy)

026. Eat two vegetarian main meals per week - doing so on a regular basis, consider it done
027. Lose 7 kgs (0/7)
028. Exercise for 30 mins, 3 times a week for 12 weeks (2/12) (re-started on 29.06.2009)
029. Touch my toes (without bending my knees!)
030. Drink 4 glasses of water each day - doing so on a regular basis, consider it done
031. Ban sweets for 1 week, 10 times (0/10)
032. Eat only raw foods for 5 days (not consecutive) (0/5)

Ticket to Ride/The Long & Winding Road

033. Go away for a weekend, 5 times (1/5)
- Goudini Spa (Jun09)
034. Go to Darling and visit Evita se Perron for a meal & a show
035. Get a passport & visit another country
036. Take a boattrip to Robben Island
037. Go to the beach
038. Go on a winetour (at least 5 winefarms)
039. Go on a roadtrip somewhere I've never been before

Can't Buy Me Love/You Never Give Me Your Money

040. Celebrate Buy Nothing Day(Nov 29) each year (0/3)
041. Attend a Treoc course - Nov08
042. Buy at least one property in our trust
043. Clear out short-term debt - May09
044. Buy all 3 Austin Powers' movies (1/3)
045. Buy/get another Sims2 expansion pack
046. Don't buy anything which doesn't fit me perfectly
047. Limit magazine buying to 4 per month - doing this regularly now, consider it done
048. Read "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" - Feb09
049. Buy a nice pair of boots - May09
050. Save up & register with SAICA
051. Buy proper ballroom shoes - Nov08

Hard Day's Night/In My Life

052. Wash the dishes every night for one month (0/30)
053. Put clothes away every night for one month (0/30)
054. Go one day without saying anything negative about anyone
055. Apologise first 20 times, even (especially!) when I think I'm right (2/20)
056. Make a point to NOT overreact (when I'm angry) 10 times (0/10)
057. Deal with an issue I'd usually try to avoid
058. Do not indulge in any gossip at work for one month (0/21)
059. Organise favourite recipes into a recipe binder
060. Declutter: get rid of 101 things (57/101)
- Shoes & clothes (Nov08)
- Clothes (Jul09)
061. Get rid of old magazines
062. Finally unpack the 'Box of Horrors' in our bedroom
063. Avoid celebrity gossip for one month (0/30)
064. Put away laundry the same day it's dried for 6 consecutive weeks (0/6)
065. Go through digital photos, print & frame (or put up for display in some other way) the best ones

Got To Get You Into My Life/With A Little Help From My Friends

066. Meet up with Michelle & Lee-Ann once every 2 months (2/16)
067. Host a dinner party once every 3 months (2/7)
- Caribbean party (Dec08)
- Bollywood Dreams (May09)
068. Go visit Nelia in Namibia
069. Have a girls' night out/in - May09
070. Make a new female friend
071. Write (& send) a letter to my brother once a month (0/33)
072. Visit my Aunt & Uncle once every 3 months (2/7)
073. Treat my mom to a spa day - Dec08
074. Talk to/email my dad once a month (5/33)
075. Call my mom more regularly

Love Me Do/Oh! Darling

076. Go on a date with TheHusband once a month (8/33)
077. Go for a Sunday/Saturday afternoon stroll with TheHusband once a month (1/33)
078. Re-read the Five Love Languages & also the Five Languages of Apology
079. Watch 10 "boy"-movies with TheHusband without complaining or falling asleep (3/10)
080. Do 101 romantic things for TheHusband (2/101)

The Fool on The Hill/I Am The Walrus

081. Learn to speak Spanish
082. Catch up on current affairs via news24 once a week - added to my RSS feed
083. Finish reading the Combrink/Combrinck genealogy books (0/3)
084. Complete Bronze ballroom dancing programme
- Preliminary - Mar09
- Secondary - Jul09
085. Take an online course
086. Read up on the history and culture of a different country once a week (3/143)
- Afghanistan
- Peru
- Finland

Happiness is a Warm Gun/I Feel Fine

087. Watch the Comrades once from start to finish
088. Re-read the Adrian Mole books (3/6)
- The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole (Oct08)
- True Confessions of Adrian Albert Mole (Nov08)
- Adrian Mole: The Cappucino Years (Nov08)
089. Have/go to a poker evening
090. Comply with the Four Agreements for one week
091. Send 20 postcards via postcrossing - Oct08 - Jan09
092. Join the bone marrow donor register - Oct08
093. Talk to 10 strangers (more than just "hi"...) (2/10)
094. Build up to 10 generations in one family on TheSims2 (3/10)
095. Host a Murder Mystery Evening
096. Learn how to & make a quilt
097. Make something for our flat (the quilt doesn't count)
098. Update my blog once a week (6/143) (exceptions will be made for periods away from home, w/o internet access
099. Find a way to get rid of the damn doves on our balcony - they left on their own!

Do You Want To Know a Secret

100. Do not **private misson ** - fail
101. Do **private mission**

Geez! I feel like I've been dumped on some alternate universe where people are expected to literally work their asses off! Not only is it month-end, not only is there all sorts of issues with payments,not only do we have our bi-annual stocktake,but my boss is going on holiday for the next 2 weeks meaning I am seriously overworked with trying to sort out everything before he leaves! Where is a person supposed to find time for browsing and daydreaming with such a hectic workload??

In the midst of all this, it is TheHusband's birthday next week (thank heavens for online shopping!), and I start a driving crash course next week in the hopes of (finally, maybe, HOPEfully) obtaining my driver's licence this time around. What with the ridiculous hourly charge for the driving school, I'm expecting an end-of-the-month-salticrax situation for most of the month...

Oh and to top it all off, our maid has been pulling a Houdini act for the past few weeks, which means our flat is a complete disaster area.

Seriously, Katrina in New Orleans has nothing on me and TheHusband.

Had the best dream last night!

Me & TheHusband in South America, dancing the night away, mixing with the locals, attending shows and exploring the culture.

Who knows, perhaps it was a glimpse into the future?

• Stupid/ignorant people. This includes people who have no common sense e.g. they do not know that the United Arab Emirates is a country. This also includes people who cannot spell even the easiest words. Honestly - get a dictionary/use the spellchecker. This also includes people who misspell your name in reply to an email with your name at the bottom/companies who enter your name from the application form you filled out. VERY annoying.
• Stupid/ignorant people who think they know it all. And who lose their temper when you point out their mistakes. The. Worst. Breed. Ever.
• Bad customer service. The annoyance I feel is inversely related to the level of remorse displayed by the person delivering the bad service.
• Computers with a will of their own. Isn’t the whole point of a computer that it does everything right, so as to eliminate human error? Or at least consistently wrong? But no… evidently I seem to be missing something.
• Queues. Specifically loooooooong queues. Even more specifically when only 2 out of a possible say 6 tillpoints are open for business. How does this make sense in notoriously busy times of the day?

Well, I don't have much news of my own to report, nor any profound thoughts, so I thought I'd just do a quick update of my life and then move on to some interesting things I've stumbled upon all over the internet (yes, I've become a slave to del.icio.us)

So, to sum up my life in a nutshell:

• The Husband is away for business this week (again) . Hopefully his business trips will now become less frequent.
• I have a horrific cold and feel like crap.
• I have come up with a plan to tackle our debt and am very excited about it.
• It's raining and miserable outside.
• Our flat is no longer in its usual state of chaos ever since we employed a maid (Thanks Yolanda!)
• I am still deeply in love with The Husband and magazines (in that order, mostly).

Moving on to more interesting things found all over the net:

• Ridiculous celebrity baby names - seriously, there's something fundamentally wrong when you name your child Jermajesty or Moon Unit
• Okay, so I've written a lot about nerds, enginerds and geeks. But have you ever wondered where you lie on the geek-scale? Well, luckily for you, there is now a handy chart to determine just how geeky you are. I notice The Husband in multiple descriptions on this chart - is that good or bad? On a related sidenote - watch the genius that is The Big Bang Theory. It's all sorts of brilliant.
• Chocolate-covered bacon. Some might think it's crazy, I think it's a breakthrough! And while this post is written tongue-in-cheek, I'm seriously considering giving it a try.
• I know I'm not an expert on the subject, but the stories on this site makes me feel a whole lot better about my computer abilities.
  

Why is it that we sometimes have dreams we really enjoy until we start to think about them the next morning when we wake up and come the the unsettling realization that the event that took place in your dreams wouldn’t really be that enjoyable in real life. In fact most of the times it would just be downright weird or even creepy.

Of course there are also those times when you find it difficult to decide whether or not the event would be enjoyable had it occurred in real life. Those times strike me as the most unsettling, because of the indecisiveness of the matter. At least in the first scenario you know how you feel, while with this it just leaves you feeling… well, that’s the point! You don’t know how it makes you feel. The thing is the event that you enjoyed so much in your dream is usually some sort of forbidden fruit that you technically shouldn’t want and at the very least shouldn’t enjoy when it happens. Yet you find yourself wondering…

This happened to me last night and I’m still wondering.

Anyone know how to contact the dreamweaver?

Hmmmmm....

With reference to my post of last week - 'Love & Marriage', I've stumbled upon the following:

"A pattern of late marriage may actually *increase* the rate of divorce. During that initial decade of physical adulthood, young people may not be getting married, but they’re still falling in love. They fall in love, and break up, and undergo terrible pain, but find that with time they get over it. They may do this many times. Gradually, they get used to it; they learn that they can give their hearts away, and take them back again; they learn to shield their hearts from access in the first place. They learn to approach a relationship with the goal of getting what they want, and keep their bags packed by the door. By the time they marry they may have had many opportunities to learn how to walk away from a promise. They’ve been training for divorce."


While I don't necessarily agree with everything in this rather lenghty post, the excerpt I posted above seems to make a lot of sense.

So happy as The Husband is flying back tonight after a weeklong business trip to Pretoria. Sadly the feeling will be shortlived as he flies back on Sunday for another week, but I’m trying to delay that thought until Sunday evening. In the meantime – utter bliss for the 48 hours that we’ll spend together.

Makes me think about these Hollywood types whose entire marriages play out like this. For us, luckily, this is only a temporary arrangement, for them, a way of life. Which begs the question of how stable such a marriage can be? Does absence really make the heart grow fonder or is out of sight, out of mind at the order of the day? For me, absence seems to make the heart grow fonder, but I do believe that this hinges on the fact that it’s only for a week at a time at most. When your spouse is away for 3 months filming on the other side of the world it’s hard to believe that your marriage can stay strong. Part of marriage surely is to grow together and be together and live together. I just can’t help but wonder what it’s like when they do spend time together. Can they see each other for who they really are or are both of them wearing rose-tinted glasses?

Seems to be a plausible explanation for the high rate of divorce in Hollywood. What I don’t understand is why so many of them get married so quickly, only to get divorced just as quickly. Surely one puts more thought into a life-changing decision such as marriage? Evidently not.

Problem is, people view marriage as just another step in their relationship “to prove my love for him/her”. They don’t seem to get that it is a life-long commitment. Of course, these days that's no longer a given with the ease of getting a divorce. Sure, there are some cases when a divorce is the best option, but I’d take a guess that’s only true in about 10% of the divorce cases around the world. The rest are just people not wanting to make an effort and not honouring a promise made to each other.

Do our promises mean so little these days?

Went to watch “Defending the Cavemen” at the Theatre on the Bay on Saturday night and let me tell you all the reviews were on the spot. The show is brilliant and it’s clear to see why it is now in it’s 10th year running. Alan Committie does a great job of exploiting the differences between the sexes for comedic relief, however manages to avoid it being offensive for either sex – quite a feat. I can highly recommend this show – it managed to clear up quite a few things for me along with the belly laughs it provided.

Back at work we’re busy developing a new product (well, when I say ‘we’, I mean my engineer-colleagues of course). However I’m expecting to play quite an important role in this as I have to perform a viability study at a certain juncture in the project. I’ve only just started to gather the information, and already this has provided for a few amusing incidents. When asked how long it would take to develop certain “keyable options” (watch me work that lingo…) the engineers responded with mild bafflement – it seems there was a bit of a communication gap between sales & development as sales is fully intent on selling these keyable options. However what I don’t understand was them asking me to explain these keyable options. Honestly, did they really think I’d be able to explain it to them? So I merely shrugged and referred each department to the other to sort it out. Aaahahhhhh the joys of being a bystander… (and simultaneously putting my colleagues to work!).

Dear Sir/Madam

I’m writing to convey my disappointment at the way a problem was handled at your Stellenbosch branch on the 12th of March 2008.

I went to your store to pick up a few items for lunch & supper. When I got to the till I presented my Woolworths card as I normally do, but was told that the transaction would not go through. Upon my enquiry as to the reason for this, the lady behind the till could not give me an answer, merely insisting that the transaction would not go through and implying there was something wrong with my card. I told her that I’ve never had a problem with the card before, but she just shrugged. She proceeded to swipe the card again, but encountered the same problem. She then enquired whether the card had been blocked or whether it was a new card, to which I answered in the negative.

The cashier had run out of ideas by now and called another store clerk to come assist her. He tried the same procedure of swiping the card, but again without success. I was asked the same questions and replied in the same way. At this point he asked me whether I had another card that I could pay with!! I was incredulous that he would offer this temporary solution to an obviously bigger problem. Whether or not I could pay with another card was irrelevant; the problem was that my card was not working for some reason and I needed this problem solved. I asked him what was wrong with my card and I was then referred to someone else to help me. He would have to look up my details on the computer.

When he had typed in my card number my details appeared on the screen, showing two surnames (my maiden name and my married name). Then I was asked if the two names were both me! As if I had somehow gotten hold of a card in a fake name! After I assured him that it was in fact me, he informed me that the card in my possession had been blocked as it was still in my maiden name. This infuriated me as I had not been sent a new card yet, so how could my old card be blocked? I voiced my opinion in no uncertain terms to the man attending to my query to which his reply was that the card was probably still in the mail. When I pointed out to him that the card had obviously either never been mailed or gotten lost in the mail (given that the change in my surname was effected on 15 January 2008 and it was now almost 2 months later), he merely shrugged and said that an independent contractor was responsible for printing & mailing the cards to their customers. As if this should’ve somehow appeased me! Surely it is Woolworths’ responsibility to check that the independent contractor does their work? And especially before they block a customer’s old card?! His only comment was that I should’ve applied for a temporary card. Now I ask you – how should I have known that if no-one had informed me of this when I originally came in to change my details? After all, I hardly expected my old card to be blocked before I received a new card. The man had no answer for me and just said that I could apply for a temporary card now, provided I had my ID with me.

Luckily I did (I do not make a habit of carrying my ID around since it was once stolen from my bag) and I could receive a temporary card with which to fund my purchases. When asked how long it would take for my new card to arrive, the answer was ‘one month’. I fail to see why it would take so long, since, theoretically, my card has already been printed (in the 2 months since 15 January 2008) and hence only needs to be mailed to me. Which should take a maximum of 4 days to reach me, assuming it gets sent from Johannesburg/Pretoria.

In the meantime I have to carry my ID around with me whenever I want to use my temporary card (until I receive my new card). The effect of this will be that I will opt not to purchase goods at Woolworths until I receive my new card, since I do not make a habit of carrying my ID around with me as mentioned previously.

What really annoys me about the whole situation is that no apology was offered to me during this whole saga. Instead blame was shifted onto the mysterious “independent contractor” who was responsible for sending the new card to me. This is completely unacceptable.

Another thing - surely I am not the first customer who’s surname has changed because of getting married? Why did it take so long to figure out what the problem was? And do all newly-married women have to go through this ordeal or was I just very unlucky?

I hope that this matter will be attended to swiftly and expect at least the following to come from this:

a) A written letter of apology from both head-office & Stellenbosch branch
b) Proper training of your cashiers to not immediately insinuate that the customer did something wrong when a card does not work
c) A card to be issued in my married name within the next week and couriered to me at no extra charge


I trust this matter will get the attention it deserves.

Kind regards
Mrs M Hendricks (néé Combrinck)

You know, I’ve had it up to here with the level of service in this country! Everyone complains about it, but nothing gets done to improve it. To be quite honest I’m not even sure what one can do to improve the situation, but to put it bluntly, I’m now GATvol!

I express my written disappointment to the parties in question and still receive the equivalent of a bored look in my direction.

Let me illustrate two recent cases:

First was a questionnaire emailed to me by my new ABSA relationship manager. This, in itself was surprising to me as I am a private bank customer, but up to now have been largely ignored by “my bank, my friend”. But okay, this was someone new who had taken over my account and I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The questionnaire’s main purpose was to confirm whether all my details were correct; if not, to update them. Right at the end was a space for extra comments. Well, giving someone the benefit of the doubt was one thing; keeping quiet in the face of an open invitation – quite another. So I filled in my comments – that, to be quite honest, I was not satisfied with my ABSA experience.

One would think that any self-respecting person/entity with the intent on keeping it’s customers happy/continuing to live off their money would not hesitate to grab the phone and enquire as to why their supposedly valued customer was unhappy and how they could rectify the situation.

Unfortunately one would be incorrect in this train of thought. The only reaction I received was an email thanking me for my honesty.

On to the next blood-boiling incident:

I finally decided to tackle the dreadfully annoying task of updating my details (for my ‘new’ surname) with all relevant parties (Truworths, Foschini etc.). It’s not that I didn’t want to make it official, but by the time I received my new ID (a big shout-out to Home Affairs – SIX MONTHS after I applied for it), the initial euphoria over being a Hendricks had passed and the updating of details was now just another thing on my to-do list. Which I wasn’t particularly looking forward to, due to the high schlep-factor.

Anywho, so I set off to town – on the first attempt I could only change my details at the bank as the “load was shed” (translation for the non-south africans – the power went off) directly after that change was made. On the second attempt I had just finished up at Truworths, when, again, the load was shed. By this time I was quite annoyed with the whole situation and definitely NOT in the mood to sacrifice another Saturday morning sleep-in for this, so we headed off to Somerset Mall (where, hopefully we would find light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak).

Arriving there I had to stand in an extra-long queue (it being Saturday at the mall after all). I was armed with any and all documentation they could possibly ask of me (old ID, new ID, marriage certificate, you name it, I had it). Explaining to the lady what I needed, she asked for my new ID. I expected her to hand me some sort of form to fill in to change my details, but no, this was obviously a revolutionary operation and so no form was deemed necessary. Instead she handed me a till-slip and instructed me to write my new details on the back of said slip. Right. Handing it back to her, I enquired whether that was all, to which she replied “Yes”.

Walking out of Foschini, I had the sinking suspicion that my details would NOT in fact be changed on their system. Needless to say, I was right. Upon receiving my statement (addressed to Miss M Combrinck) I almost lost it. A scathing email was sent off to Foshini by yours truly, explaining my severe disappointment in the fact that clearly they had not managed to update my surname on their system.

Today I received their reply, kicking off with "Dear Miss M Combrinck".

The irony was just too much...