Following on from last night's admissions, there is one more secret for me to spill.
Logic and I have never been friends. We parted back in Grade Nine, when it became clear that the only answer on my maths test I could give with any confidence or certainty was my name. I dropped maths; took up home ec; learnt how to make mean scrambled eggs but lost the ability to separate fact from fancy and do even basic addition. That's right: I am the person in the restaurant whose calculator comes out as soon as the bill is presented, and the adding of the bill becomes a performance not vastly different to an ancient religious ceremony in that there is much humming and chanting and swaying back and forth, with my tongue gently poking from the corner of my mouth, as I try to work out the tip on a cappuccino.
Stop streets also present a challenge for me. Many is the time that I have paused at an empty street, waiting for a car to appear so that I can then actually stop for it. The converse is also true: there have been times when I have been so determined to take a gap between fast moving cars that I have forced my car to take off in third gear.
From this, we can deduce that spatial perception is not my forte, nor is planning. This was proved again last week, when a bout of flu left me bed ridden and my store cupboards empty. When finally I was ready to face the world again, it was clear that a touch of grocery shopping would have to be a priority. I decided to stock up on provisions in the afternoon. In the morning, though, it was time to knock some deadlines on the head. The only problem being that this goal relied upon the acquisition of some goodies. Coffee was needed, as was soup, toilet paper and tissues. Now, a person more given to the constructive use of time would have decided just to go ahead and do all the groceries at once. But not I. I elected to go to the very poorly stocked Woolworths at the top of the street. Once there, I realised that the soup flavours were all decidedly lacklustre and that I preferred to make do with a cappuccino from next door. Which left me in need only of toilet paper and tissues.
Now I have always found toilet paper an embarrassing purchase. Especially when buying in bulk. Actually, no, it's more embarrassing by far to purchase a single roll at a time. But either way, I feel more secure when my toilet paper purchases are thrown in amongst tomatoes, brown sugar and Jik.
As a result, by the time I went to check out, it was just me and my tissues. By now I felt vaguely ridiculous for having trekked out just to buy a box of snot rags and, as is my habit, my ridiculousness started manifesting as aggression. "Would you like a packet?" the cashier asked innocently enough. I immediately decided that this was a judgement disguised as a question; say yes, and she - and everyone else in the check out line - would label me a polar bear killer who doesn't even try to remember to turn off the geyser and pool pump, I thought. Thus, I turned down her offer and marched out of Woolworths, clutching my tissues.
There were two ways I could play this: I could walk around nonchalantly, as if a tissue box is the accessory du jour, in the same league as Hunter boots or a statement necklace. Or I could get all protective, looking people directly and challengingly in the eye, like those self consciously quirky individuals who put collars on their cats and take them for walks, or women in their thirties who wear pigtails.
And so it was that my tissues and I perambulated around the Parktown Design Quarter, stopping at Vida for a cuppa, pausing to catch a ray of sun and then driving back home. They thoroughly enjoyed their excursion, I think - and I'm glad, for no one can tell me a tissue's lot in life is a particularly pleasant one.
Logic and I have never been friends. We parted back in Grade Nine, when it became clear that the only answer on my maths test I could give with any confidence or certainty was my name. I dropped maths; took up home ec; learnt how to make mean scrambled eggs but lost the ability to separate fact from fancy and do even basic addition. That's right: I am the person in the restaurant whose calculator comes out as soon as the bill is presented, and the adding of the bill becomes a performance not vastly different to an ancient religious ceremony in that there is much humming and chanting and swaying back and forth, with my tongue gently poking from the corner of my mouth, as I try to work out the tip on a cappuccino.
Stop streets also present a challenge for me. Many is the time that I have paused at an empty street, waiting for a car to appear so that I can then actually stop for it. The converse is also true: there have been times when I have been so determined to take a gap between fast moving cars that I have forced my car to take off in third gear.
From this, we can deduce that spatial perception is not my forte, nor is planning. This was proved again last week, when a bout of flu left me bed ridden and my store cupboards empty. When finally I was ready to face the world again, it was clear that a touch of grocery shopping would have to be a priority. I decided to stock up on provisions in the afternoon. In the morning, though, it was time to knock some deadlines on the head. The only problem being that this goal relied upon the acquisition of some goodies. Coffee was needed, as was soup, toilet paper and tissues. Now, a person more given to the constructive use of time would have decided just to go ahead and do all the groceries at once. But not I. I elected to go to the very poorly stocked Woolworths at the top of the street. Once there, I realised that the soup flavours were all decidedly lacklustre and that I preferred to make do with a cappuccino from next door. Which left me in need only of toilet paper and tissues.
Now I have always found toilet paper an embarrassing purchase. Especially when buying in bulk. Actually, no, it's more embarrassing by far to purchase a single roll at a time. But either way, I feel more secure when my toilet paper purchases are thrown in amongst tomatoes, brown sugar and Jik.
As a result, by the time I went to check out, it was just me and my tissues. By now I felt vaguely ridiculous for having trekked out just to buy a box of snot rags and, as is my habit, my ridiculousness started manifesting as aggression. "Would you like a packet?" the cashier asked innocently enough. I immediately decided that this was a judgement disguised as a question; say yes, and she - and everyone else in the check out line - would label me a polar bear killer who doesn't even try to remember to turn off the geyser and pool pump, I thought. Thus, I turned down her offer and marched out of Woolworths, clutching my tissues.
There were two ways I could play this: I could walk around nonchalantly, as if a tissue box is the accessory du jour, in the same league as Hunter boots or a statement necklace. Or I could get all protective, looking people directly and challengingly in the eye, like those self consciously quirky individuals who put collars on their cats and take them for walks, or women in their thirties who wear pigtails.
And so it was that my tissues and I perambulated around the Parktown Design Quarter, stopping at Vida for a cuppa, pausing to catch a ray of sun and then driving back home. They thoroughly enjoyed their excursion, I think - and I'm glad, for no one can tell me a tissue's lot in life is a particularly pleasant one.
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