Live and learn

Back when I was first out of school – the year that I served as a conscript in the Rhodesian Armed Forces – things like Word Processing – were not something that could be done! You could type, but back then, type writers were the ones that rang a bell when the carriage reached the end of a line! Tippex was common to fix mistakes. At school, I had precious little to do with typing and type writers were kind of an unusual occurrence. Digital watches were not common, and it stuns me now when school kids are now unable to tell the time unless there is a digital readout!

Maybe I’m crazy – or old fashioned – but for me a watch HAS to have hands to be of any worth. When I was running marathons, I used to use a digital watch that acted as a stopwatch.
I had to replace my watch recently since the one that I was wearing, broke and – wonder of wonders – the agents could not fix it! When I was run over in 1992, I had a Seiko watch that I was given as a birthday gift whilst I was still at school. When I was run down, my Seiko was smashed beyond recognition. To replace it with a new Seiko was far too expensive, so I had a variety of watches that were not so great – or as expensive. Turns out that I probably spent 4 or 5 times as much as I would have on an expensive quality watch!

When my watch broke irreparably, I found a watch that I was assured is made by the same factory as Seiko watches – a Fossil watch – that is guaranteed to have spares availability for at least the next decade! How many digital watches have anywhere near that sort of backup. Chances are, it will outlast even me – and that is saying something!

I am constantly amazed at Heavenly Fathers artwork. Where I live is always green and if it has not rained this week, it is classed as a drought. To see yellow grass to the horizon is something different. I have to question why some (most?) people believe that this world is a divine an accident, instead of crediting the art work to our creator! Not very far from this area, is the Drakensberge (Dragon Mountains) that in winter are white with snow. In Zululand we are not used to seeing natural snow. True locally we get “Zululand Snow” the fallout from cane fires, when cane smuts fall to the ground from out of the air!

When I was stung by thousands of bees, I was hospitalized and the General Practitioner attending to me diagnosed me as diabetic. My blood sugar levels were through the roof and the GP felt that I was diabetic. He would not even let me eat my jelly and ice cream – the only thing that made hospital food anywhere near palatable!

I am convinced that people in hospital only recover so that they can get to order meals out! Sure pizza is not healthy for you, but they are worth looking forward to when you are faced with some disgusting scrambled eggs!

I have found out that a “normal” blood sugar level reading is 6.9 – although 6.9 what is a complete mystery? I have an impression that the shock of bee stings pushed my reading up. I have a home testing kit, with which I monitor my blood sugar readings, but they are usually around 5.3 – or kind of low. I can feel if my blood sugar is getting low, so I can eat “luxuries” like the occasional (very occasional) box of Smarties. I kind of remember these from before we had economic sanctions in Rhodesia. Back then (40 years ago) you could by quality sweets in the local Greek corner café! Then they could not be imported, and we used to stock up with them when we came to the coast for holidays. Local chocolate was terrible quality. We only used to eat it because there were no alternatives! One thing that has not changed is the taste of Coca Cola – that has remained the same ever since I can remember. I not missed fizzy drinks since I gave up sugar, just like I have not missed alcohol since I joined the LDS Church. I have certainly not missed the weight that I have lost!