THANK GOD IT'S MONDAY!

Jeeeesh! The weekend was just too bloody brilliant. I'm knackered. It started on Thursday with a night out as part of Tarty's continued assault on Cape Town's every available source of entertainment, and never let up. I still have to do my vacuuming...

Friday night, after a few quiet post work-week beers and a discreet glass of wine or two with dinner, The Hot Girlfriend and I swanned on down to ROAR for the second leg of the Wacken Battle Of The Bands. Well, the second of the Cape Town legs anyway. On offer were Bulletscript, The Warinsane, Zombies Ate My Girlfriend, Wargrave and Sindulgence, who we missed because fashionably late never goes out of fashion. Unfortunately we missed Wargrave too, mainly because I once again had too much of a good time and left before they went on, but I'm sure they, like all the other bands all weekend, kicked serious arse. It was wonderful standing there sweating in my spanking new VOD JMSP hoodie, shouting at the top of my lungs at old and new friends, and not hearing a fucking word they were shouting either. And then there were the bands, oh the bands!
Zombies, whilst not entirely my cup of tea, were as always, phenomenal. Their stage presence is always energetic and engaging, and whilst the bassist may rue his decision to make that outfit his trademark, they rocked the crowd right off its feet. The dancefloor was packed with all manner of metalhead going bonkers and having a great time narrowly escaping grievous bodily harm, and it remained that way throughout the night. A rare enough site...
Next up, Warinsane tore ROAR a new one. Their massive (and massively impressive) front man, Wallace, exhorting the crowd into even more manic a frenzy, they bliksemed the gathered acolytes into as near a religious fever as you can reasonably expect.
Next up was Bulletscript. Wow! The addition of Matt on second guitars a while back certainly did wonders for them, and now that they have welcomed Ian into the fold as their new vocalist, things have gone from fucking awesome to fucking awesomer! Not quite as vehemently bullish as his predecessor, George "Teethgrinder" Schoombee, Ian seems nonetheless to be an even better fit. His natural exuberance and charismatic and infectious energy fuel a rather more rounded beast, coaxing the already euphoric crowd into a swirling mass of pure explosive ecstasy! The man looked as if he were having the time of his life! The crowd did too!

I'm glad I didn't pull jury duty. I take my hat off to those 4 pilgrims for accepting such a difficult task. And echoing the sentiment already expressed so often, to Louis Du Pisani of MK Ondergrond, bravo indeed mate! Well done, sir! You have our gratitude and our admiration.

Which left me rather less in the mood for Saturday...

Luckily our engagement was a little later in the day - a birthday party dinner thingy at a franchise eatery far beyond the Boerewors Curtain and 5 minutes from where I grew up. Other than dealing with illegal immigrants barely capable of expressing themselves in English, let alone understand yours truly, a great time was had by all. Especially The Greek's 3 year old daughter, who totally stole the show.

Sunday was full-on family day. Mother dearest, the matriarch of the clan, celebrated her 68,000th birthday and I was in charge of providing dessert. I bought a bunch of cheese. There's nothing quite like getting merrily pissed with your folks. It's a special kind of enjoyment, not often savoured. Last night both the Hot Girlfriend and I were klaar, finished, over-ska-dovers.

Which brings me to today. I need the rest. I'm eternally grateful to be back in my office seat, with a chance of catching my damn breath. Until the eternal struggle against middle-age boepness kicks in as I go all self-perambulatory on my own arse after work.

And then it's beer and band practice. Jeesh, my life is a never ending parade of doing cool shit with cool people. You're all just jealous!

And in the most wonderful news of the day, Neal's back! We've missed you, oh wise one...

NGDG: Just gave my old Blackberry to my security guard. Now you know why you get phone calls at 3am from complete strangers.

Spread The Love. Sixth Hand From The Left...