The first time Grace Jones screamed about her alleged rape wasn’t while it was allegedly happening. It was when Jakes Ngcobo, the nurse, walked into her room one morning.

   She shouted inarticulate words. Jakes couldn’t decipher them but he could tell they were directed at him and that she wanted him out of the room. When Marius van der Velde, the manager of the retirement home, finally managed to calm her down to a level at which she was vaguely comprehensible, she told him she had been ...

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Dear Martha

 
I thought about writing to you once before. Well, my therapist suggested it. I didn’t really see the point. She said letters don’t always need to be sent, sometimes they’re more for the writer than the recipient, and it might help me to process what happened. Might help me get over it, she said.

I didn’t want to get over it. Still don’t know if I do. It would be easier. I could get on with my life. I could feel light again. But, I don’t know if I want to let it go. Mayb...

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It was the worst of times, it was the best of times. It was a time for grieving, it was a time for rebirth. A time we’d never want repeated, a time we’d later yearn for. 

People were dying. But, people were living. Not in an affirming or exhilarating sense; rather, in a slow, mindful, present sense. Between the fear and anxiety and stress, there was generosity and creativity and hope. A feeling that things could be different; a belief that they must be different; and that this was the oppo...

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On Monday, April 20^th, Johnny B. Goode, armed with a handful of co-conspirators, crowbars and a small arsenal of rocks and stones, drove to a now quiet arterial road, barricaded it, and waited. They didn’t have to wait long, and when the truck came, they pelted it with stones. The windscreen cracked in several places and one rock penetrated the driver’s door window, injuring and terrifying the driver. They cranked the back doors of the truck open and found exactly what they were expecting...

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Eleanor Rigby waits at the window. No one has passed yet today, and it’s already after 11. Perhaps she missed someone when she was in the kitchen or the bathroom. But the block of flats is in a quiet road; even in normal times it can be hours between pedestrians. Cars don’t count because she’s on the fourth floor; too high to be able to see the drivers. So she has to content herself watching branches in the breeze and bees and butterflies and birds, which, she’s sure, there are more o...

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Major Benjamin Balthazar Heraldo Ignatius Tom checked into hospital on March 28th. For a week he’d had a dry cough, slight fever, lack of energy and, over the last few days, some difficulty breathing. For a while longer than that – a few years, perhaps, by his observation – he’d also suffered from a somewhat scattered mind; not confused, exactly, but lacking in clarity; and that had made it hard for him to know what to do, especially with so much information – so much uncertain info...

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Maybe it was motivated by my white guilt and the kind of social awareness and desire for justice that a university student has, but I felt it narrowed the...

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South African news has just been too depressing for too long, so I don’t read that much of it anymore. What I have been lapping up to a possibly unhealthy degree is American politics. You’d think that with everything that’s gone on since Donald Trump’s inauguration, and the considerable amount of time I’ve spent following it, that I’d be shitting myself for the future of the world. But the fact that it is all happening over there, and not here, allows me to absorb...

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So, like, the other day, there were these allegations about Donald Trump allegedly doing something alleged with allegedly Russian prostitutes, allegedly. The allegations could be fake, could be fact; that is not the concern of this post.

The concern is that Vladimir Putin felt it necessary to come to Donald's aid by saying that whoever put those allegations together is/are "worse than prostitutes".

Let's just take a moment to take in this putdown. To call them "girls of loose morals", as he did...
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So I’ve been trying to teach my daughters to ride a bicycle.

Because (1) they are now 6 and 8, which is way old enough to ride a bike, (2) it’s kind of a life skill (maybe not as much as swimming, but close), (3) riding is cool, and it feels lovely, and is good for you, and for the planet, and mainly (4) I have these fantasies about us going out as a family on Sundays and riding on the promenade or in the country and having great times and making memories that we will re...

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“Daddy?” Stella asks. “How did everyone in the world come from Adam and Eve? How could everyone be born from them?”

   She has just turned seven, and has been asking where babies come from a lot. I don’t know if this is what she is getting at, but if it is, I evade it, as I have been doing for a few weeks.

   “Well,” I say, “not all stories actually happened. Some are made up to teach us lessons. So some people believe that Adam and Eve were the first people on earth, and some p...

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So I live two blocks away from this club called Decodance. Decodance only plays 80s music. I grew up in the 80s. And yet, despite how you'd think those three facts would combine to make me a regular, I had, until a few nights ago, never been to Decodance.

Shocking, I know. I mean what kind of 80s disciple am I? My excuse was always that I have young kids who wake me at 6am. But deep down, I know that is not the real reason. The real reason is I am a slacker. No, wait, that was the 90s. Anyway,...
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Last week I saw two shocking sights in exercising.

The first was my own man boobs while I was skipping.

I don’t mean the dainty, what-a-beautiful-field-of-daisies kind of skipping. I mean the working-muscles-you-never-knew-you-had-in-front-of-a-mirror kind. It was an ambivalent experience. I haven’t really skipped much before. I also haven’t really noticed my moobs much before.

They’re not terrible. I mean I don’t need a bro (boy bra) or anything. Not yet. But I...

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I first knew of Hostess Twinkies decades before I actually tasted one. They were advertised in all the Archie comics I ever read.
   But I saw recently in Time magazine that the company that makes (or, rather, made) Twinkies is closed for business. Apparently Twinkies are only two steps away from being shoes, and they really shouldn't be thought of as "food". I don't know if it's true, but the writer reckoned that in this nutritionally enlightened age, that was Twinkies' downfall. They just co...
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Because everyone loves a good (shocking pink) vienna.
And a good grammatical error.

 

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1.

 


2. We'd like to wish a warm welcome to all our passengers.

3. Especially our Club members.

4. Wearing your seatbelt throughout the flight is for your own safety.


 

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Scenario 1:
Daughter: I want something to eat.
Mom: I beg your pardon?
Daughter: Can I have something to eat?
Mom: Pardon?
Daughter: Please may I have something to eat?

Scenario 2:
Mom: Please will you tidy your room up?
5 minutes pass.
Mom: I asked you to tidy your room up.
5 more minutes pass.
Mom: Tidy. Your. Room. The. Fuck. Up. NOW.


Kids work their way up to politeness. Parents work their way down from it. 

 

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"Not uncomplicated" tends to make for not uncomplicated sentences.

 

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Verb is a noun.
 

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I love shopping at Game. In fact, I don't even need to shop. I love just going to Game. Just being there. When I'm there it feels like a grown man's Disneyland. And you rarely have to stand in queues. I walk through the aisles marveling at all the stuff they have and how cheap it often is. Objects seem to obtain golden glows as they catch my eye. Like the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. "Come to me..." they whisper seductively. Even the 16 page supplement that comes in the local newspaper every Th...
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Remember when they brought out 2 blade razors? That was a stroke of genius. Every man in the world must have tried it, and most stuck with it. Then they brought out 3 blade razors, and some men tried it, but most of us just thought, "come now, that is a bit ridiculous". Recently I was given - wait for it - a 5 blade razor. 5 blades? Really? REALLY? That is like putting 5 sugars into your coffee. Honestly, after the 3rd sugar it doesn't get any sweeter. The only shave that is closer with 5 bla...
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...but then who's to say that Danica Camacho wasn't also late? Or early? The chances she was right on time are, well, I don't know what they were mathematically, but it's unlikely she was.
   Danica was born in the Phillipines on October 31st last year, and apparently she was the 7 billionth person on earth. Which, you have to admit, is kind of arbitrary. There are a few hundred babies born every minute on our planet. There are also quite a few people who die every minute. And there are people...
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Pardon the cheesy title. I can't resist a good rhyme. Anyway, I'm sure I'm not the first person (or even the tenth) to use the line. But it's true - I do like Newt.
   It's not him, or his policies. I've never seen him speaking and I don't have much of a clue about what his policies are. No, I like him for other reasons.
   Reason 1: he has a great name. I mean, that name could belong to so many things. Newt Gingrich could be the name of a dog, like Just Nuisance, or a cartoon character, like P...
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I was at the licensing department the other day. The one on the Foreshore, that people hate going to, because the queues are always very long and they always move very slowly. For that reason, I got there early. And it was a good thing, because the queue wasn't too long. There was another reason it was a good thing I got there early, but I'm coming to that.
   So there I was with my yellow form, which I had to hand in because I had sold my car and needed to de-register it. (For more back-story...
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This is not a post about dogs. It's not about what it was going to be about, either, which was another acronym. An acronym about acronyms. Specifically, Acronyms I Hate Or Love: AIHOLs. 

Okay, I know, it's a cheap shot. It's like putting a girl on the cover of a guys' magazine. Serious editors hate doing it, but the the truth is, it sells magazines. I know, because I know a guy who used to edit a guys' magazine, and he told me that the one month they put a guy on their cover, their sales dropp...
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I have never been a smoker. In all my 39.75 years, I have probably smoked a total of between 1 and 2 cigarettes, all in single puffs. I do not enjoy the experience. But that is neither here nor there. What is is that I have long been aware of and curious about a certain code or culture that exists between smokers, and only between smokers. If you're not a smoker, you don't know what smokers know. It's not deliberate exclusion. It's just the way it is.

What I mean is that there are all kinds of...
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If you are an avid reader of this blog, then, apart form having my eternal gratitude, you may recall a post about an acronym. (If not, see the entry titled "WAB" from May 12). Today's post is about another acronym. 

You may have guessed by the title of this post, and also by the pictures, that the acronym to which I refer is "WOW". Actually, "WOW" is not a very good acronym, because when you see "WOW" you tend to think it refers to something amazing or cool or at least positive. But "WOW" stan...
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Dallas is back. 

Strues bob.

I am so excited.

I probably won't get to see it, because I don't have DSTV. But I am still excited. Check this out, and you may be excited, too:

http://www.ultimatedallas.com/

What's more, they even have three of the original cast members: Patrick Duffy (Bobby) - now in his early 60s; Larry Hagman (JR) - now in his late 70s; and Linda Gray (Sue Ellen) - I don't know how old she is but check out the trailer. I don't think she's aged one bit since the last show 20 odd ye...
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I see it has been nearly 4 weeks since my last post.

Oddly, I checked my site traffic and it is not as down as I might have expected. I thought momentum was a big part of blogging. Some of my best friends blog every day. Sometimes several times a day.

I don't know where they find the time. Or the inspiration. Both of which have been in short supply on my side of late. But I know that if one is inspired, one finds the time. Alas, it doesn't work so much the other way round.

Apart from not bloggin...
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I have decided to stop counting my rejection letters. Partly because after 20 it's too depressing, and partly because it's now easier to keep track of the number of publishers I haven't (yet) been rejected by, which are now in the single figures.

To make myself feel better, and to remind myself that I can indeed write, I hereby present for your perusal a previously published short story. It ran in a now-defunct magazine called "Itch", a rather long time ago.

When I was a boy, I used to go into ...
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The other night, my youngest daughter, aged 2 years 11 months, woke up in the middle of the night and called me. "Dad! Daaaaaaaaaaad!"

Her waking up in the middle of the night and calling me is not an unusual occurrence. But on this occasion the reason was. In fact, it was a never-before-used reason. She wanted to make a wee in the toilet.

Younger daughter was out of daytime nappies much earlier than older daughter. In fact, dare I say, she was positively precocious about it. But she still wear...
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What is WAB, you ask?

WAB is an acronym.

What is an acronym, you ask?

An acronym, according to my big, beloved Penguin dictionary, which my beloved sisters gave me for my birthday one year, at my request, which is only something a writer geek would do, is: "a word formed from the initial letters of other words". You know, like AIDS. Or MILF. Or NARFY (although I've always wondered about the spelling of that one, because it's not strictly accurate. I mean where does the "R" come from? And where's...
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It's been recommended to me by two people not to accept the contribution-based offers I've received and am tempted by. Two people who know more about the publishing industry than me. I know this about them because they are both published writers.

The rationale contradicts and nullifies my motivation for paying someone some money to publish my book, which is: I get one book published, and then I can say I'm a published writer, and then publishers are more open to my writing. Not so, apparently....
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Not much to report, really. Just keeping count. Although those are two quite nice "NO" pics I found, don't you think?

 

 

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So April brought me four rejection letters. Not good. I mean I guess it's better than no response at all. At least I know where I stand. But i think I now have more rejections than chances left. I am still waiting to hear from about a dozen British publishers. They generally do promise to respond, even if it takes a while. Not like American publishers, who generally say they can take 6 months or longer to respond, and they will only get back to you if they are interested. So you kind of send ...
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I thought that, while sitting around, waiting for rejection letters from publishers, I'd tell you about some other rejections I've had, which pre-date the ones mentioned in this blog by some twenty five years. There would be the same number, though, I'm sure. Yes, at least a dozen. They have nothing to do with books, and everything to do with girls.

You see, high school was not a good time for me as far as girls were concerned. I kissed a few girls between the ages of about 13 and 14, and then...
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A month of mixed reviews, March was. I got 3 more form letters to say thanks but no thanks. I also got 2 more "partnership publishing" offers. i.e. I "contribute" to the costs.

You may have read a previous post about my first offer. The cost was £5700. The 2nd offer was a little higher - £8600. Gulp. Okay, they want to do it in hardcover. But a hundred thousand ronts is a hundred thousand ronts. The amount did include illustrations, which I don't need, but I can't imagine taking that cost aw...
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About ten or eleven years ago, I wrote a story and entered it into SL magazine's short story competition. To my surprise, it came third. The judge was none other than Mr. JM Coetzee. A tough critic, conservative with his praise and a man of few but well-chosen words, his only comment about this story was that it was "told with some poignancy".

Anyway, an old pal, a great support and the author of far more famous blog than mine suggested I put the story in my own blog. Actually, it's hidden in ...
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Then again, you do get those rejections that make you feel like maybe your work really isn't that bad.

This publisher said they "publish a lot of educational material and picture books are rarely to be found on our lists. However, we strongly recommend that you take this to a more tradey children’s publisher that focuses on picture books as it has heaps of potential and could be snapped up by them!"

Onward ho, then.

 

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February 14th to February 17th were not such good days. I got four rejections in those four days. 

I also discovered what the "form" letter is. And I am by now becoming quite familiar with it.

They all start and end a little differently, but somewhere in the middle of one or two or three short paragraphs, you inevitably see the words "not suitable for our list". They usually thank you for submitting your work and sometimes even use the word "decline", as if they somewhat sheepishly have turned ...
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It's good news. But, probably, not good enough news.

The offer is essentially a self-publishing offer. Or what publishers might like to call a "co-publishing" offer. They offer to publish your book, but you have to make a "contribution". What you get in exchange is much better distribution and marketing than you could do alone, plus you get a higher percentage of royalties.

It's not quite what one dreams of. The fantasy is that publishers fight over your work because it is so devastatingly good...
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11 Jan 2011:
We're sorry but your story is a little too old and sophisticated for our readers.

13 Jan 2011:
We're sorry but your story is a little too young and patronising for our readers.  

Huh?

 
 
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I have to say, sometimes even rejection can be encouraging. The next three "NO"s, between September and November 2010, all seemed legitimately, sincerely sorry not to say yes. They were all South African publishers, and they were all extremely complimentary, and they went to great pains to say how it pained them to have to say no but with the children's picture book market being what it is in SA (teeny tiny weeny winy) they tend to publish books of local interest, which The Illustrious Mr. B...
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And so it began. On 22 January 2010 (was it really that long ago?), I got my first rejection letter. It was from a local (South African) publisher, whose name is not important. Okay, it was Tafelberg.

I should mention that this first rejection is probably still the least positive one of all the rejections received thus far. I should also mention they were extremely complimentary, as has every publisher been, about the illustrations. They were less complimentary about the story, and about the ...
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I have a friend, Paige Nick, who wrote a novel (her first), called A Million Miles From Normal. (She also has a hilarious blog by the same name.) She gave it to two publishers. Both offered to publish it. In fact, she got a two-book deal. So that sort of thing does happen.

More common is a long litany of rejections, such as I am starting to compile.

I wrote a children's story, called The Illustrious Mr. Blimp. I think it's rather sweet, and has a clever little idea around which the story is wri...
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A virgin blogger writes his first post and sends it out into the big, wide, virtual world, wondering if anyone will read it. 

No one does. 
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