Ramblings of the Wingnut

What a weekend: the best to date as of yet. Beside the fact that I finally succumbed to the power of gravity and went sprawling over BOB (Bike of Beelzebub). Before you judge me, I’ll have you know I was swerving to save a rare Mongolian, stripped,  3 foot,  golden-back Panda from getting knocked over by an open back cement carrier – I don’t know, I was just there and saved the Panda. I’m actually a hero – did you know there are less than 18 breeding pairs of the Mongolian, stripped,  3 foot,  golden-back Panda’s in the world? You may have read about me…

So hows this for a lineup? Friday: Lunch at Google, Sat-Sun: Boating on Lake Tahoe, Mon: Coldplay concert? Now, that’s the American dream. So here we go, with a fuller overview.

Google. Awesome. Larry and Sergei – legends (that’s the guys that started Google, you oaf). Why. One word – Food. Unbelievably, freshly prepared food! Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Steak, Burgers, Salad, Vegetables, Health food, Natural, Pizza, Desert, Frozen Yogurt, etc, etc. And then there was the gym and outdoor sand volleyball court so all the “large” people can be less “large” and  the dinosaur. I’m not kidding – and not Clint Eastwood, a real dinosaur. Made of metal, but there nonetheless. Larry and Sergei also give updates every Friday to all 13,000 employees on the latest developments at Google. If my plans to be supreme, almighty, intergalactic dark lord of the universe fail, I may apply for a job at Google.

Lake Tahoe: So is this gi-normous lake surrounded by mountains, and cosits at like 2,800 metres the run off from the ice ensures the water is clear, i.e. blue. Super blue. The color you get when you strangle a smurf. Anyway I stayed at a friends place and we went out on his family’s boat on Saturday. Strange thing though – first storm in Tahoe in July for like 5 years, maybe it’s me? But that was after we had cruised around for about 4 hours. Good thing we got back though, my mates brother and friend managed to capsize the dingy they were in that you use when you anchor the boat. Funny thing about those friends of my friend brother (that makes sense, just complicated) – they were like characters from a movie. The one when there’s a boys weekend and there’s that crazy one and just plain weird one – that was them.

Sunday, I lay in the sun for 1.5 hours and in an attempt to get rid of my farmers tan, I put sun lotion on the usually exposed parts of my anatomy and let the rest tan (except that part, it’s a public beach). As a result of which, those parts are no longer omo white (to American readers: that’s a washing brand in SA- their moto is: whiter than white), but rather a nice shade of pink, just the other side of “holy crap, that hurts, why did I not put on sunscreen” red. I expect I will now have reverse farmers tan when the pink goes to red to brown to dark brown.

Coldplay: Also amazing. Completely. Arguably the best concert I have ever attended, even topping the primary school play I was in, when I played the lead part of a mushroom. The concert itself was an hour, forty and the cinematography and set design was insane. They had yellow beach balloons people were throwing up when they played “yellow”, changing backdrop, a TV where they could see themselves and us watching themselves (again, makes sense if you were there), lazers (not evil, to my dismay) and just in general unbelievable. The music itself was great! Seriously talented musicians and a load of great hits! Especially when they played tribute to MJ by setting their hair on fire. No just kidding, playing Billie Jean. Awesome. They also had 2 platforms, near to the crowds that they went to and played, so they were basically, in the crowd – a complete crowd pleaser for the 22,000 that were there. And then the free CD with their new songs. Good times.

Well…that was my weekend. Back to work (actually I have been for 4 days – its Thursday tomorrow and I have a presentation – ugh), so next weekend , I’m going to Napa Valley. Kinda like Stellenbosch, but with less Afrikaans spoken. I think.