| Death of the good guys
30 October 07
So the Adventures of Pirate Will and Pirate Joe are finished at last. Now they are put away for six weeks in a warm place to rise before being knocked down, kneaded some more and sent to the publisher to bake.
But while they prove in a warm damp place,... |
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| Pus Finger
29 October 07
I was trying to write an email to the Headmaster explaining why I couldn't play the National Anthem at Prize Giving. "I have a whitlow," is what I had to say. But Whitlow is such a funny old English word, that sounds genteel and mild and doesn't give full expression... |
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| Tax returns
28 October 07
I thought I would be clever this year, and save a lot of money, and fill in the new extrafriendlyeversoeasy tax return SARS sent me online.
I began by writing a snooty letter to the tax consultant saying they told us we had to cut costs and save money, so... |
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| The End is Nigh
26 October 07
So at last the day has arrived. What began as a merry jape to entertain some small boys in Pietermaritzburg over the school holidays has turned into a full length children's book, about to top 30 000 words.
THe hardest part of writing is sustaining my own interest in the... |
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| What is Beauty?
25 October 07
I was sixteen when I moved schools for the first time. St Mary's DSG was an Anglican school, and as a child from a staunch Catholic home I had never been inside an Anglican church before.
It was a revelation.
Firstly, there were clivias. I had never seen a clivia.... |
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| Dumbledore is gay?
22 October 07
Dumbledore is gay? A tiny paragraph sneaked into today's Cape Times. This should be front page news. How sinful, how dreadful, think of all the millions of children across the world who have been subjected to this pornography and filth. As if witchcraft, wizardry and all the forces of evil... |
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| Singoff
21 October 07
So if you had to have a singoff between the three wunderdivas of song, Sinead O'Connor, Sarah McClachlan and Annie Lennox, who would win, and what would be the criteria for judging?
I'd put Sinead first, for authentic, no-neurosis-barring I've-got-to-sing-or-I'll-die fanaticism.
Annie writes better songs... |
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| What shape ball do they use?
19 October 07
That used to be my first question when anyone got through to me on the subject of rugby. Until last Sunday I'd only ever watched one Rugby game, the 1995 world cup. We lived in Laaiplek a tiny village on the West Coast, and it was impossible to escape the... |
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| Wild Pirate Lads
16 October 07
I am deep in the adventures of Pirate Will and Pirate Joe, two valiant piratical lads who were forced to walk the plank, and have ended up in an undersea world dominated by the Great Spotted Pudding Fish and on the Isle of Just Desserts, run by a Mrs Thatcher... |
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| BOOK LAUNCH
06 October 07
Thursday evening my two new thrillers 'Rockslide' and 'Double-cross' ('Rotsstorting' en 'Tweegesig') were launched at Bellville North Primary school.
About 90 kids attended and half as many adults - parents, teachers and librarians. We gave away free books as prizes, and the kids as usual asked intelligent and perceptive questions... |
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