Monday Blues...

I'm a bit grumpy at the moment because there are contractors in our tiny staff kitchen, all over the kitchen, they've been there all morning, apparently to install the plumbing for a new Dishwasher, and I can't get in there to make coffee. Why the hell they have to deconstruct and re-arrange the entire kitchen just to put in a pipe is beyond me. But I won't be arguing, this is the latest gadget commissioned by our monotone dictator, our resident Bulgarian architect, who I'm sure is a direct relation of Frankenstein, with amplification. She can be quite opinionated and hardcore, not one to do battle with because you will never be right, no matter how wrong she/it is!

Bark bark...

So yesterday evening after a whole day of studying I took a break and made a delicious braai with a steak and a pork Texan that was in the freezer. Massive pieces of meat, so we'll be having toasted steak sandwiches for dinner tonight, the thought of which has me licking my chops already! With the braai I did a large sweet potato wrapped in foil cooked on the coals, and a half a cabbage done the way my dad does it - in foil, sliced into inch-thick chunks with cheese, butter, salt & pepper and a sprinkling of brown onion soup powder between each slice, cooked on the coals. Damn it was so delicious, even Tammy had some! Also did a few braai-broodtjies. The whole meal cooked on the fire, simple and delicious! If my wife and my finances allowed I would only cook on an open fire, no matter the weather. Even back in London my mate and I used to braai, middle of winter, in the snow, standing around the fire in shorts and big bomber jackets with a cold beer in hand. The neighbours thought we were insane, peering at us nosily through their misted up windows overlooking our back yard. We were just normal South Africans!

I have to admit I broke the drought with a couple of beers last night. Sorry but I don't yet have the balls to do a braai without a beer. But it wasn't a piss-up, it was just a few well deserved beers after a determined weekend of studying. I've made good progress with the photography studies. I'm still only about a quarter of the way through the camera user manual, though I'm working through it in conjunction with a book I downloaded off Torrents last week, the "Nikon D7000 - From Snapshots to Great Shots", by John Batdorf. It's an awesome book. I didn't get much done on the Photoshop stuff yet, but I did make a bit more progress on the course material. My target is to complete module one and submit the first assignment by the end of the week.

Though at the moment I'm going through the "professional" shooting modes on the camera (Program, Aperture priority, Shutter priority and Manual), which is very interesting. I reckon pretty soon I will never use the automatic modes again, I'm going full manual! It's amazing what you can do with a camera like this when you know how to use it!

Anyway, tomorrow is a public holiday here in SA, I think I'll head out somewhere picturesque and have a good play with the camera. I need to give it a name, like boys often do with their toys, and other appendages. How about "Mike"? Named after the boxer. "Meet Mike, now smile dammit!"