The other day, we woke up to find the entire city shrouded in mist; visibility was down to a minimum. Two things were remarkable about this. The first was that, at that same time, the weather forecasters were assuring us that Bloemfontein was clear with sunny skies. This means that weather forecasters can’t forecast, or, alternatively, given that they are working for the SABC, they’re doing their utmost to inject a modicum of bizarre humour into the early-morning programmes. Heaven knows, they need it.
The second thing was that the mist and poor visibility made sweet blow-all difference to the speed at which traffic was travelling along our roads. Interestingly, not long ago, I read some serious research which indicated that, on a daily basis, Bloemfonteiners drive around town at speeds that are up to 22 kph faster than the 60-kph limit. Many of the culprits have passengers or children in their vehicles. Presumably, this means that these folks aren’t particularly good at time management, and don’t mind killing themselves and their families in their haste. Talk about killers in the mist!
Another matter of note was Eskom. Apart from the electricity cuts, which are still called load shedding in the drivel of bureaucratic euphemism, a number of street lights in our part of town have, for weeks now (and long before load shedding), also been switched off at night-time. No one seems to care – or notice. And that would be all well and good, were it not for the fact that the lights are blazing brightly throughout the day, and have been doing so for more than a week. Quite frankly, I think that’s taking the notion of darkest Africa just a little too far. But it’s difficult to explain to Eskom’s bigwigs that people are unlikely to be persuaded to switch off their geysers, etc., etc., while the street lights are on during the daytime.
And I’ve already heard some people saying that they don’t know what they’re going to do when Oscar’s trial is over. How about turning off the telly and getting a life?
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