Giving and Receiving of stick

Flying Pete is quite cute. Curly brown hair, blue eyes and a touch taller than me, but what was most impressive was his endurance. However, I fear he will never go to another South African film after last night’s spectacle. I was moved to buy a bunch of tickets after meeting the film director in a shopping mall handing out flyers and trying to get people to come and watch his film. It reminded me how hard I worked to get bums on seats for mine. So Petri, Ciggy, C, Fay, Flying Pete and I set out to make our mark.

It was possibly the worst film ever made in history. C had great fun poking me in the ribs during particularly bad moments. I’m not even going to mention the film’s name as I am spineless and would prefer not to get engaged in a vicious fight with fellow independent filmmakers. Oh and because I actually felt really sorry for him as he stood underneath the exit sign, grinning and waiting for positive feedback. I pretended to be on my phone so I didn’t have to congratulate him.  I was so stunned at how bad the film was that I wasn’t prepared to even attempt lying.

I just spoke to the British docci director – he has such an amazing voice – smooth and velvety like lindt chocolate. I was finding it hard not to drift off into a reverie in which I was sitting on top of him and giving it stick. Did I say “giving it stick?” I meant “riding his stick.” Did I say “riding his stick?” I’m sorry; this was not the kind of thing I was taught at ballet school. But maybe I can give Flying Pete a little tomorrow. “A little what? A little polishing of his shaft, a little giving and receiving of stick. 

Do shocks to the testicles cause sperm spikes?

In my quest to round up the characters on the Brits’ wish list, I have unveiled some real crackers. Today I found a company in JHB that makes an anti-hijacking shock device which you install in the seat of your car. When (not if) you are approached by a hijacker, you can calmly get out of your car and as the crook drives off into the sunset, you activate the shock via a long-range remote control, then sit back and giggle as his ball hairs fry. It is said that criminals are always one step ahead of law enforcement, so no doubt hijacking syndicates are recruiting, or more sinisterly, creating gonad-free eunuchs who can take the odd electric shock to the crotch and still do a passable job of trimming the emperor’s nasal hair. The ball hairs fry up is accompanied by an ear-piercing siren. No siren is going to match the sound the eunuch was exposed to when someone relieved him of his testicles. 

You can also install the same device in briefcases and handbags for people collecting large sums of cash from the bank. I can just picture the inventor of this shock device standing around the braai with his friends trying to drum up the most creative way to punish our bandits.  I can also imagine his lawyer friends choking on their beers as they realise how many articles of the constitution his latest device has just contravened, and therefore how many he will have to sell to allow him to mount a defense against potential litigants. He has also invented an anti-escape stun-belt to put on prisoners during transit. He was quick to add that it shuts off after 4 seconds otherwise the shock would be too much.

He was also proud to tell me that his invention has been exported all over the world and recently has been unbanned in Australia, however the product is illegal in the UK under the dangerous weapons act and he is therefore unable to be a participant in the documentary.

I’m gutted. It would have made such good material but also ruined my reputation among the liberal media and notoriously left-wing indie film community. So maybe there is a plus side to all this banning of inhumane proto-torture devices by some first world countries. He says he doesn't want to seem inhumane and assures me that the shock will not cause burns and is approved by SABS (South African Bureau of standards). He adds that in 23 years he has had no reports of an adverse effect. I’m dying to add, “Because they have all been rendered speechless.”

Petri just called and she is really bummed. Apparently W89’s genes were very popular and his sperm is no longer available. So she’s taking the safe route. W75 – the tall, blue eyed, classical music lover. She goes for her first sperm spike tomorrow. 

No screwing in the cockpit.

I’m having a very busy day indeed. Flying Pete called and I admitted to spotting him doing his thing above Camps Bay beach. He invited me to go flying in his two-seater plane on Thursday. I invited him to join a few of us tomorrow night to watch a South African film. I also received a creepy Book of Sayings from MC.

‘People say life is the thing, but I prefer reading’.

'The public library is the most dangerous place in the town’. – If he’s in it.

'When I write a book, I’m making it the best book I can' - I rest my case.

On the Speed Dating front, I have been contacted by the guy who still lives with his mom, and I can’t stop fantasizing about joining the mile high club with Pete. This has the makings of a porno title. If Pete’s plane is really only a two-seater, we will be shagging in the cockpit. I realise that you might be thinking, “If she’s joining the club with the pilot, who’s going to fly the plane? I’m pretty sure two-seaters don’t have autopilot. And what the hell are those air traffic controllers going to think? They’ll be screaming with laughter and we’ll hear a nasally voice shout, ‘Switch the radio off if you’re watching porn on your laptop, we’re getting frustrated down here.’”  

I think the testosterone is kicking in because I’m starting to understand how difficult it is for a school boy to sit still in class for 1 hour without fantasizing about the chemistry teacher sitting on his face and performing acts only one of the Vaudeville artists could accomplish.

I asked the documentary company if we could do something a little tamer than tackling the Bulgarians and suggested one of South Africa’s latest and most popular forms of robbery - bombing ATM machines to get the money out. This crime has replaced cash-in-transit heists and the police have recently broken the back of the syndicate.  I tried to convince them by saying there should also be some good camera surveillance footage they could use, but they didn’t bite so I told them about the other criminal fad at the moment - kidnapping wealthy businessmen and holding them for ransom. The way it works is a syndicate lures a businessman to SA and kidnaps him at the airport. I read on the weekend that this has just happened to a Swedish and Japanese businessman. The commercial crime unit is handling these cases and it seems as if the Nigerians are mostly linked to these crimes, although the South Africans are catching on quickly.

The Brits came back with this list:

Interviews with journalists, victims, gang members past and present, law enforcement officers (in anti-gun or high flyer unit or abalone smuggling). Actuality sequences following some action e.g. a police raid or paramedic unit on patrol during the evening. (I wonder if they realize we use real bullets in South Africa.) Raw actuality action e.g. filming in a tic/crack den, filming a gang initiation, meeting parents of gangsters etc. Archive news reports to back up our stats and stories.

Foot in mouth disease.

Petri, Ciggy, Fay and I arrived at Speed dating and were deployed by the speed dating facilitator, who resembled a drill sergeant running a boot camp, to different corners of the restaurant. The first guy seated in front of me sported a Hawaiian shirt and the first word to come out of his mouth was ‘aloha’ which kinda didn’t work for me. A first-morning-in-Vietnam whistle blast signaled to the men that it was time to move to the next table. The whistle sounded again and the din of people speed-talking commenced. I really stuffed up candidate number two. He was perfect in so many ways: good looking, studied law, but now works with an environmental NGO. I blurted out ‘so you’re doing your thing for the planet. If there is one left for our kids?’ He looked visibly shaken and I’m still trying to get my foot out of my mouth. 

Still, this is speed dating and if he is going to make an accurate assessment of me in my half of the two minutes, he might as well know that I want kids, adventure, Nancy Friday sex into my seventies, a large house in the suburbs, a smaller one in the Transkei for holidays, two Golden Retrievers, funding for two movies, private school education for my children and a few less retreating glaciers. That’s all really. Just a little list. ‘I imagine it sounds intimidating to even a man like you but it’s much more palatable when spaced over twenty years to allow for a little psychological digestion. Call me.’

Petri came over to deconstruct the evening and with her list of potential donors from the AI clinic. Apparently Fay hit it off with my NGO guy, and he has already contacted her. I didn’t mention my faux pas – Ciggy would not be able to resist the temptation of ragging me for the next 6 months.

I’m not sure how Fay does it. Without fail the men flock to her. She is an aspiring poet and barely makes ends meet working in a sex shop during the day. It must be the images of Fay demonstrating various sex toys to customers that make men weak at the knees. But moving right along from the picture I now have in my head, Petri and I studied the AI list.

W52 – 5’ 8”.

Dark hair, average build, loves rugby and all contact sports – he sounds a bit of a Neanderthal. Either that or he is a complete coward who gets all his sense of power through vicarious violence.

W75 – 6’2”

Slim, blond, blue eyes, likes classical music. - He would be good, Petri needs a bit of height in her family.

W86 – 5’9”

Brown hair and eyes, loves reading, chess and computer games - sounds nerdy but could be very intelligent which is a plus.

W89 – 6’1”

Sporty; cricket, skiing and diving, enjoys theatre and film, camping and plays guitar.

Petri and I agree, after much deliberation and casting aside of our rather silly skepticism, that W89 sounds great, an all rounder who is also intelligent and can add considerable height to the family tree. With that accomplished, we took Nikki for a walk on Camps Bay beach. C joined us and we were all sitting in a row watching the sun set when a motorized paraglider flew past and C said ‘There’s flying Pete’. Petri and I looked at each other.

‘What do you mean flying Pete?’

‘Just that. It’s Pete flying up there’.

And so Flying Pete’s identity has been revealed. C says he’s a very nice bloke; at least I haven’t given my number to a psychopath.

My second deal closed as a pick-up artist.

I just got this email from the docci Brits:

“Please could you find out about the Bulgarian prostitution traffickers – they sound really interesting and I know the Director will like it (that is if there is truth to it - I heard about it from a reporter who seems in the know with these sorts of things), but is there any chance you could just do some asking around? Will this put you in danger? Also, regarding trafficking of children, I think that we should definitely explore this. Let’s find out about how it works, who’s responsible, prices, who are the customers etc.”

Yes darling, what a fabulous idea. I’ll do a whip round the crack houses and speak to those odd chaps who run the pedophile rings and, who knows, we can meet on the porch for sundowners in a few days to discuss things while the natives bring us G’n’Ts.

Are they fucking mad! This isn’t a grocery list that you can just check off – yep got the Bulgarians, children leave in blue drums from jetty No. 5 in Durban – ETA 2.30am in Dar es Salaam. And if I’m not bloody careful I will be injected with an odd chemical and be walking the streets of Sofia the following day whispering, “South African sex, only 50 Levs” in halting Bulgarian while nursing a large bump on the side of my head and wondering whether ‘flying Pete’ would like my micro-skirt.

Another message from ‘Flying Pete’. This sounds promising. But now he wants more pictures and wants to know when the one I sent him was taken. Yes I know the one I sent him is a glamorous picture and yes I can look that good, sometimes. But give me a break, I’m not going to go paging through all my photo albums for other pictures, I’ve already done that, and there were no other photos I wanted to send.  Maybe I should tell him it was recent but that I photo shopped out the scarring I got from my house fire last year just to test his moral stature. What other pictures does he want? This is getting sexist. Maybe one of me bending over in tight jeans to pick up DIY tools, or maybe holding La Senza lingerie against my just-showered body. He is dreaming, unless he can be happy with group shots and the odd picture of the retreading job that those nice men at the garage did on my wheelchair. I reply "no, you’re just going to have to take a chance". So he sends me his mobile number and I send him mine.

Speed Engagement

My dream board is not playing ball. The only sexy men it dished up were walking down the ramp and even with their six packs rippling and their breeding-colony hotness, the glazed hostility projected off their faces was enough to put any fairly intelligent woman off. What do I mean by a fairly intelligent woman? I mean a woman who could get through a Cosmo without picking up a dictionary. The only Levi model I would even consider going out with appeared on the ramp with a grin as wide as Garfield’s. It was obviously his first time modeling, but he was only 10 and it just wouldn’t be right or legal unless we went paintballing and then for ice creams. I also bumped into my ex with a beautiful blond woman on his arm, thus brightening up the evening considerably. My ex fiancé that is. Our speed engagement lasted exactly 50 days. He has gone on to have a few more and has now been dubbed ‘the serial engager’ in Cape Town.

His choice of momentous days has to be admired. He proposed on Christmas Eve and left me crying on the bathroom floor of a Hotel in Berlin on Valentine’s Day. Yes he was a prize peach, and he knew how to pack a punch. It all began unraveling when he insisted on coming with me to the film festival in Berlin. It was my last opportunity to appoint an international distribution company for my first film 'A Stranger arrives' and seeing that it was so important to me he wanted to give me some support. So he got to the airport early and upgraded himself to business class.

I can only attribute my lapse in judgment to the fact that he got to me at a particularly vulnerable time in my life, the eve of my first film premier. I was feeling exhausted, terrified, overwhelmed and anxious, to name a few emotions, when he approached me at a restaurant. I was having dinner with the distributor of the film, he was dining a few tables down. My polite refusal to go out with him on many previous occasions didn’t seem to deter him (my instinct was obviously intact at that time and is quite a handy thing, when you use it). But predators can smell fear and helplessness and he moved in for the kill. He bought us some drinks and before I knew it he was sitting with us, my hand firmly in his grasp. It felt so good to have a strong man at my side and before I could stop the words coming out of my mouth I had invited him to the premier. The following night we walked down the red carpet together and two days later did the rounds as he introduced his prize catch to all his family and friends.

Even though I felt sorry for his beautiful date and what he had in store for her, I left the Levi’s launch feeling lonelier and older than ever and to round the evening off a blister from my dangerously high and potentially neck-breaking shoes. I hobbled through the vast parking lot trying to find my car and my dignity. When I eventually realized I was on the wrong floor I took my shoes off and walked the rest of the way barefoot. A couple walked past holding hands, I put my chin up and tried to convince myself I was fine.

Maybe I am asking the universe for too much. Petri, Ciggy, Fay and I are going to speed dating tomorrow night so I’m going to lower my expectations a bit. I’ll adjust my request for an 11” penis to a 9” one, but that is my lowest bid. Any lower I might as well throw in the white towel and lock my lips onto the closest lesbian. Even that metaphor was a lesbian one. Most women boxers are anti penis.

That’s a bit spooky. Just got a message from ‘Flying Pete’. I think I was aiming too high. He says he likes the sound of my profile, but could I send him my picture first? Here we go again; it’s all about the package. So I hit send.

Looking back, I’m sure I could’ve found something for Sid to do at Ballet school.

No word from “Slow dance“. Don’t you just hate that?  Two days ago I didn’t give a shit about slow dancing and now I check my messages every half an hour to see if he has made contact.

C gave me a copy of The Surrendered Single – I wonder what he is trying to tell me? Maybe I should just surrender and face the fact that I am way beyond my best before date.

I might have made a serious mistake leaving Sid to pursue my ballet career. To this day I have no idea how I did it. I felt like my stomach was being twisted with a wrench hammer when I got on the plane to Cape Town. Sid was going to university in JHB and the best ballet school was unfortunately in the Mother City. What if I had never boarded the plane? What if I had unfastened my seat belt and dashed down the runway saying “Sid. Sid. I can’t leave you”. I would be living in Johannesburg, married to Sid with 5 children and living happily ever after.  I think that at the age of 17 I chose my career over a traditional family – I just didn’t realize it at the time, I thought I would be able to have both.

But I did get on the plane and I did stand in a queue every night with my 50 cent pieces in my hand, whispering into the payphone receiver to Sid, so fellow students couldn’t hear my agonizing conversations with him. Our long distant relationship lasted one year. On the eve of my return to Cape Town for second year, Sid and I broke up. He sat in the rocking chair in my bedroom till 4 in the morning, looking at me. We both couldn’t actually face saying the words “break up” so finally he said he was tired and he got up to leave. I watched his headlights reverse out of my driveway and wept. This was my second major loss in 2 months - my dad died the month before. I think the knocking noises we heard in the ceiling, which became persistently louder, is what finally propelled Sid out of the rocking chair. Alive my father never let him past the front porch, he certainly wasn’t going to let death get in his way now. Dating me was not for the faint hearted.

My dad had been ill for some time and we knew he was dying. I still remember waking up on Monday morning November 17^th 1986 to the loudspeaker call on our dormitory floor.  “Olive Schweps 708 phone call, Olive Schweps 708 phone call.” I ran down the passage, picked up the phone and my mom said, “Olive my darling, I am so sorry, your father died last night”. I ran back down the passage to my friend’s room. Bridie pulled me into her arms and lodged my cheek against her cleavage and in her rigorous attempts to comfort me she took my muted sobs as a sign of her success, not that her enormous breasts were suffocating me. I can still smell the scent of the talcum powder she used. Bridie died in a car accident 6 months later.

My best memory of Bridie was driving to Llandudno beach in an old white Toyota Corolla inherited from my older brother. We would start the engine by throwing a rock at it and somehow it would come to life. We kept the rock in my cubbyhole for these occasions. My mom allowed me to drive the car when I convinced her Bridie had her driver’s license even though my mother was aware, deep in her sub-conscious, that Bridie was a year younger than me. This is the first law I ever recall breaking in my life. I only break laws when I absolutely have to. 

Don’t Date Actors – Only Marry Them

I’ve got another message from MC and nothing from ‘slow fucking dance’. I wonder if that’s even possible – slow dancing and fucking at the same time. The guy would have to be very strong to pull it off but I bet my ballet skills would come in handy. I can’t remember whether Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey had a slow fucking dance in Dirty Dancing – maybe not in the movie itself but certainly off set I would imagine. Slow fucking dancing sounds kinda cool, like pornography for two. Why do all the people I am not interested in call and the ones I am interested in seem to have broken their dialing fingers? Maybe my dream board and I need to have a cut-the-bullshit heart to heart.

MC is full of ideas. An invitation to dinner and a movie, or just dinner, or just a movie. Whatever Casanova. I need to tell him he’s too old and that I don’t date actors.

Actually that’s not true. I was married to an actor for 5 years. We met at Fudruckers in New York over a pina colada. He was finishing his bar shift and I was there on a high after a Madonna concert. High on life that is, and determined more than ever to stop my papa from preaching, to always cherish my boy when he made an appearance and to adopt a more serious approach to materialism as a lifestyle that would get men to start justifying my love. Ted looked so damn shagable, but it looked like I was too late. He and the other bar tender, Darleen, seemed to be an item. Her deep voice didn’t tip me off and I didn’t notice the lustful gazes she was sending in my direction. When I discovered her sexual preference I dragged my Iranian neighbours to the bar as often as I could persuade them, to feast our eyes on Ted.

One month later Ted and I were dating and 8 months later we were married. Ted hated seeing me clean other people’s apartments and not able to apply for legitimate jobs or acting auditions, so he did what everybody else was doing at the time in New York, he asked me to marry him one lazy Sunday morning after we had made love. Ted not only looked like a shagger, he shagged like one. I said yes and watched the panic set in on his face. I told him he could take the proposal back, so he did. But a few weeks later and after a few more clean apartments in the City, he proposed again. 

We got married at City Hall while it was snowing outside; the ceremony lasted under 2 minutes. My Scottish friend Trish was my witness. She had married her down and out American rock and roll boyfriend so she could stay in America. Annabelle was Ted’s witness. She married her Israeli boyfriend so he could stay in the country and was making great progress teaching him English. Wherever you went in their apartment you found labels stuck to objects, such as ‘toilet’, ‘sink’, ‘garbage bin’.

After our marriage I moved up in the world and instead of cleaning apartments I joined Ted and Annabelle waitressing at Fudruckers. The night before our immigration interview, all the waiters gave Ted and I a test quiz. My nerves grew as I realized that my inability to notice small details in life, like the colour of my husband’s toothbrush was going to get me deported. But our interview actually went quite well. It was pretty obvious Ted and I were deeply in love. It didn’t go so well for the Russian guy in a long fur coat and the girl who arrived with a very big hair-do, chewing gum.

At the end of that year Ted and I returned to South Africa for our wedding tour. It started in Johannesburg with 150 guests, 5 of which were my friends, the rest my mom’s. Sid and his parents were also there and he congratulated me awkwardly during the slow fucking dancing. We both looked at each other a second too long. My other two friends Stephen and Jules ended up in the pool and then in bed together, which was rather a surprise as we all thought he was gay.

Ted and I took the wedding tour down to Durban, along the wild coast and ended up in Cape Town for the 2^nd wedding reception, this time with all my friends. Sid made this one too, but it was a bit easier for him seeing me in my wedding gown the 2^nd time round. The only people who didn’t know we were married were Ted’s parents. We only let them in on the news two years later when Ted felt for sure that we were really married. We got divorced 5 years later and maybe it will turn out to be my second regret.

But I plod on and am going to the Levi’s exclusive new spring / summer launch tonight. There has to be a good range of sexy men in their skin-tight Levi’s. I must remember to look at my dream board long and hard before I go.

When I was a little girl, I always dreamed of having a testosterone injection.

I’ve decided to take the job with the British documentary company and started doing some research for them today. My adrenalin is pumping. After 2 phone calls to a couple of journalists, I have the cell phone numbers for some of the Cape’s biggest gangsters. I hope these Brits know what they are getting into. I sent the numbers to the producer and said "Nix - not calling them – you can. You don’t have to live here and face the consequences of sticking your hand into a bees nest and shaking it all about". I made a few more calls to various people and am alarmed at how many dodgy people I actually know. When I called a friend of mine who owns a restaurant and started kidding around asking him if he paid protection money, he got very angry with me, warned me not to mess around with things I didn’t know about and hung up.

The phone rang a few minutes later. It was June calling to conduct the hormone questionnaire telephonically. On a scale of 1-5 (1 being minimum and 5 being max):

Fatigue                                                5

Libido                                                  0

Sense of well being                               3

Mood and Motivation                           1

Muscle Strength                                  2

Body Hair                                            2

I decided to take the bull by the horns and proceeded to my local pharmacy for the testosterone shot and was escorted into a room smaller than a shoebox. The pharmacist, Melvin, pulled the curtain closed with a flourish and whisked out a needle the size of a horse’s penis. He instructed me to lift my dress up (if only I had thought this far ahead I wouldn’t have worn my G-string) and gave my bum a crisp whack. “Now that’s a beautiful bum! God you’re gorgeous!” He then started rubbing my cheek muscle vigorously. “This stuff is very thick. It’s going to sting like hell. Ready? 1,2…” He jabbed it in and I lurched forwards yelping. “Sorry darling, thought I’d catch you by surprise. Nearly done.” I left rubbing my bum and my hands, eyeing out every male walking past me trying to assess whether he would be my next shag. If all else failed I could always rely on Mel.

When I got back to the fishbowl there were no hits from the dating site. The only message I had was from MC – the overweight actor who popped in yesterday. This really sucks – having to wait for a man to make first contact. Don’t believe a word when someone says we’re in the 21^st century in which women can make the first move – hogwash – every time I do, it ends in a bloody disaster. But then again, if I don’t take a chance……?

He looks interesting. 'Slow dance – Sensual guy seeks life partner'.

'I am real, compassionate, sincere, fun to be with and enjoy life. I enjoy the outdoors, socializing with family and friends and generally having a good time.'

Fuck it, I'm sending him a message

'Apparently we both like dancing. That's a start'.

As long as he doesn’t live in Uzbekistan.

Ciggy called and said I can’t give up after 'risking it' so she has booked us all in for speed dating on Saturday. The trick here is do I tell the guys the truth and nothing but the truth about myself or is it acceptable to drop in a few white lies to ramp up my chances. After all it worked for Miranda in Sex and the City.

Petri called to say that she thinks her dream board is working. She’s made an appointment at the AI clinic, where there is usually a three months wait, but there was a cancellation and she goes in on Friday! I need to make one – a dream board, not an AI appointment. Apparently you have to find pictures of the things you want in your life, stick them onto a board and hang it up where you can see it every day. A friend of Petri’s met the most amazing man that way. He was everything she ever dreamed of, except he lived in Australia. According to the hard science of dream boards, that was her fault. She forgot to tell the dream board that he should live in South Africa.

I found a useful site that helps you make your first dream board:

Step 1

Gather a stack of magazines (around 50 to 100), (This is best done over the course of the year and then do this exercise in January for a New Year's resolution.) The magazines should be different types, covering all the topics that you are interested in.

Step 2

Go through each magazine and cut out any random pictures that appeal to you, and search for keywords that apply to your wants and desires. Allow your mind to wander and follow your instinct. Find bright, colorful images that make you feel fantastic or get you thinking about what life could be like if it were you in that picture. 

Step 33

Purchase a magnetic board or a large blank painting canvas that is pre-strung on a timber frame and paper glue. Or for an added artistic touch purchase a customized leather or suede magnetic board.

Step 4

Schedule some time in your diary for cutting and gluing day! You may need 2 or 3 days.

Step 55

On the day, put on your favorite inspiring music, make some coffee or whatever you like to drink. Buy some goodies to nibble on. And go to it!

Step 66

Cut out the pictures neatly and stick them on your board. Paste over any faces of the people you have cut out. This is your dream board! (And we don’t want you thinking about other people!).

Step 77

Place the dream board beside your bed or in your office and look at it at least twice a day for about 5 minutes. Enjoy the images, enjoy your work and imagine yourself leading the life that is in your dream board.8

You will notice in the following 12 months that you are starting to achieve some of the dreams you have stuck on your board.

I have to say that any dream board that I communicated through would have to be smart enough to realise that if I provide ample photographic cues as to the man I want, I shouldn’t have to make a further submission that he shouldn’t live in Uzbekistan. 

You’re even meant to put down what size penis you want. Apparently I mustn’t leave any room for misinterpretation - after all I will get what I ask for (or don’t ask for in this case). I think that on this penis size stipulation, I am going to give the dream board some wiggle room. If I am taking no bids less than 12 inches fully erect then the dream board might present me with some barely bipedal Welkom cage fighter who thinks that foreplay is beating up spectators before tournaments. Or, if he is of a gentler frame, someone who passes out during sex due to loss of blood to his vital organs. So Mr. Dream Board, bring me a man with a 7-11 inch willy and I will get back to you soon with all the other requirements. 

For the first 2 decades of my life, the only photos plastered on my dream board were of ballerina’s and I was very fortunate to have my family’s support. When any guest came to our house my father would get me to hand out snacks and do a little dance for them on the lawn. When I turned 15 and my pride kicked in, I started charging my father R20 per dance. Little did I know I would be dancing in a cage in a New York club 10 years later earning $100 per shift.

My second commercial venture in my teens was to hold a party at our house to help all the girls at school to find a partner for the high school dance. I charged an entrance fee – until my father called the police and had everyone removed from the premises. That’s when my father dropped the bombshell that he wanted me to take my brother to the dance. My brother refused and my mother put her foot down and I arrived on Sid’s arm, thankfully.

There is a stream of men filing past the fish bowl today on their way to a casting of some sorts. If they weren’t all over 50, partially balding and over balanced by their beer boeps, I would leave a sign-in sheet outside my door and collect their details. One of the actors popped in to say hi, but it got a bit awkward when he hung around after the conversation dried up and I had assured him I wasn’t going to make another film.

He’s intelligent, passionate, and hopefully not a Psychopath.

Have you ever been in a relationship where the other person doesn’t know? I have. His name was Zorba. I’m not sure when the fantasy began, possibly while watching him play scrum half for first team rugby team on a Saturday afternoon. We would all go along to watch, one girl in the lead and the rest of us following like good little ducklings. It was one of the only places we could hang out with boys - no cell phones and internet in those days. This is where we would find out where the ‘party’ was that night and then somehow try and convince our parents we actually knew the person having the party. Needless to say, Zorba was slightly bemused when I arrived at his hospital bedside when he was suffering from a Kidney infection.

Yes, here we go, another hit from the dating site! This time from, 'risk_it.' He says he has been living in Cape Town for 3 years now and he loves the lifestyle here but what’s missing is a lady whom he can spoil …………………… sounds good. At least he is polite enough to speak in code. Alwaysup, Iscream4U and Dangeroused were essentially saying to me, “Send me a picture. If I think you look fuckable, and you find me fuckable then we can fuck a lot until we have to make the awkward admission that our relationship is going nowhere except in and out. 

'Risk it' is an honest way of capturing the unavoidable perils but possible delights of love in general and love online in particular. He says he is intelligent, passionate, generous, loving, attentive and humorous. The important thing is whether I find him all those things, but it’s a good list. I hope he is passionate about a lot of gender neutral stuff like restaurants, books and rom coms. Men can also be passionate about things like Harley Davidson transmission systems which, as a group, are one of the world’s most effective causes of vaginal dryness.

Oh shit, he’s online.

“Hi! You shouldn’t be dancing on your own.”

Shit, shit, shit. What do I say? Can’t take too long or he’ll think I’m slow. Aggg “Then come dancing with me”

“How about a picture first?”

“On its way”

“How about coffee tomorrow?”

“Does this mean you approve?”

“Yes. Balducci’s at 5”

“Assertive.”

“Why waste time?”

“True. See you there”

Oh my God, I’ve got my first date tomorrow. I try calling Ciggy, but she can’t talk because she is in an executive board meeting. I get hold of Petri who is also in the film industry and is between Make-Up jobs. What if he is a psycho? Psychologists say that psychopaths can be extremely charming, so if he is very hot and suspiciously charming, I’ll insist that the alley we shag in is well-lit and not too far from a police station.

Time to leave the fish bowl, Nikki needs to pee. She is my darling black Long Island shelter special that I found when I lived in NY. She has floppy long ears and soft brown eyes and fellow dog walkers think she is an American Spaniel, which I suppose is entirely possible. She has a particularly weak spot for chicken and to my horror stole some from a homeless man in Central Park. He looked a touch crazy so I didn’t want to get too close to him. Using all my mental powers I tried to get Nikki to part with the chicken. Then I resorted to yelling “Nikki!” and he replied “Nikki is eating my chicken!” I still have huge guilt that Nikki snatched food from a hungry man and get very pissed off when she practices selective hearing because I know she understands everything I say to her. The cleaner at my office confirmed this the other day saying “Nikki speaks very good English”.  Here’s a perk of working for yourself – taking your pet to work everyday.

Zoned Out

We went bar hopping last night. Petri escaped, she was having an early night protecting her eggs. She seems very serious about this AI thing and has even stopped smoking! All I wanted to do was get home for some emergency beauty sleep, but Ciggy was on a roll. Mission – meet man before sunrise. I got home at three and am now running on 4 hours sleep. I’m starting to panic about what to wear and what to do with my mop of hair.  I always thought that other women were really good at doing their own hair – turns out their hairdressers are – so I made an appointment. They’re also really good at giving advice. Without missing a beat Ralph instructed me to wear a good pair of jeans, t-shirt, dressed up with some high heels. He said it was imperative that I shouldn’t appear too eager. Just casual, fresh, sexy.

To help pass the time and my seriously stressed ovaries I took Nikki for a walk along the pipe track when it occurred to me that there may be several men sitting by themselves and I may have to go up to all of them.

 Dating Disaster

How did I get to this point in my life? I arrived at Balducci’s, he raised his hand to summon the waitress, but then realized he was signaling me over. 'Risk_it' tells me to take a seat. He looks vaguely like his picture on the site. Then he takes out a black notebook and clicks his Mont Blanc into action. Where was I born? How long have I maintained my current weight? When did I last have sex? Would I be prepared to have a threesome, with 2 men? After the interrogation the bill arrived and he went to the bathroom. ‘Risk_it' not only wants a threesome, but he also wants me to pay for it. So I left.

If I wanted to date a control freak I could have stayed at home and dated my dad. He was 25 years older than my mom, Greek and stuck in the last century. If a boy ever called me and my dad happened to answer the phone, he insisted the boy should speak to him and he would relay any messages to me. I caught him once interrogating a very brave suitor, Darrell. I threatened to go live with my neighbours forever. 

So you can imagine that when I finally forgave my first love Sid for ignoring my existence for the last 16 years and we started dating, our relationship became the top family secret and everyone was drawn into the deception. My father insisted that my older brother escort me to any functions involving boys. We would leave the house together and then I would wait in the dark driveway, hiding behind a tree, waiting for Sid to arrive in his sister’s car. One night Sid was particularly late. Sitting behind the tree I cursed him as cell phones had not been invented and if I went back into the house without my brother the ruse would be up and I would be grounded for the rest of my life.

Maybe my father suspected something because sometimes he would wait up for me, sitting on a chair at the end of the driveway. Sid and I would arrive, I would fling myself out the car and he would screech off. My father would ask who had just dropped me off and I would say “Ciggy’s father”. “Why didn’t he stop to say hello? Didn’t he see me?” “He was in a rush and he had other girls to drop home”. The next day he actually asked my mom to call Ciggy’s father to verify my story. So my mom dialed any old number and spoke to some baffled person on the other side to confirm my story.

During a lapse of sanity, one Sunday afternoon, my mother informed my father that I was in fact lunching at Sid’s house. When he discovered I was there without my brother, he was outraged and needless to say my brother was immediately dispatched to fetch me. I refused to leave the lunch table until Sid’s mother persuaded me otherwise. After a huge row at home, I snuck out of the house and walked 2 hours back to Sid’s house and hid in his bedroom. 

But the story to top them all was when I devised a plot to get my father to send me to London on a holiday with Sid and his family without him knowing. The Brookes had invited me to join them providing my parents agreed - how the hell was I going to do that? I approached my mother while she was sitting at her dressing room table and she said “Absolutely not. Don’t entertain the thought for another second.” Ten minutes later I went up to my dad and said “I’ve been invited to take some ballet classes in London and mom won’t let me go.” He couldn’t believe it and said “Of course you can go” and went looking for my mother.

Rearing to Ride

I’m back in the fish bowl suffering after a late night at Jade lounge with the girls celebrating my early triumph on internet dating. It might be a bit premature, but it feels good being wanted, even though my eyes are burning, my head feels as though it will explode and my mouth tastes like an ashtray. I have to stop smoking when I drink. It is so disgusting, but bloody fantastic after the second glass of wine. Petri couldn’t stop going on and on about AI so we dared her to get an appointment at the clinic. 

As usual, not a decent guy in sight in the bar, unless there was a woman attached to his left calf. They say there is 1 man to every 7 woman in Cape Town. Not sure who ‘they’ are or if this is an urban legend, but it certainly feels true. C, whose favourite pastime is to debunk this kind of thing, said that according to the last available census, the actual figures in the Western Cape are 107 adult females to every 100 guys. The originator of this particular contribution to the collective ignorance can at least be credited with the fact that there was a 7 somewhere in his source material – just not the 7 we are all quoting. 

But it really feels like there are no places left for single freaks over thirty.  Abraham Maslow, the great humanist Psychologist, said that, “when all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.” I might be clouding my perspective because I’m single or it may be a sociological fact that damn fine alpha males in peak career phase are in Jo’burg or London because Cape Town is only attractive to ambitious males if you are gay or want to stand on Camps Bay beach in your Speedo and get a free blow dry, which, come to think of it, amounts to the same thing. 

C says we are fishing in the wrong ponds. I told C to dispense with hackneyed metaphors and give us clubs, street addresses, numbers and flirting tips. I also told him to show me a pond where I don’t bring up the bar’s average age and I’m there. C paused ominously and said he would get back to me. I told him the WWII veterans’ pub doesn’t count.

Shit I’m feeling tired. Maybe if I angled myself correctly under my desk passersby might not notice me taking a little nap.

The phone has just rung and woken me up. I hit my head crawling out. It’s June. She seems very excited and asked when I could drop off her R5. She said my blood test results have come back and I officially have no testosterone. Not a low reading, just none. I am her first patient with this condition, hence her excitement, and she is hoping I will agree to be her test bunny. 

She wants me to consider having a testosterone injection. Testosterone is your vavavoom / get up and go hormone, which could explain why I have been so tired. Testosterone is also linked to chest hair, penises, gonads, bass vocalists, wars, arm wrestling, beards, abnormal clitoral growth, Caster Semenya’s problems and a whole host of male-related anatomical and personality traits. No doubt June knows what she is doing but I better check with her that the shot is just enough to get my groove back but not enough to have me bench pressing with the Stormers down at the Sports Science Institute or telling the bouncer at Jade bar that I’m going to “Fuck him up,” if he doesn’t get out of my way.

If I agree to do it after establishing the downside risks, June is going to design a questionnaire, for before and after the injection. This will allow her to objectively assess the impact of the hormone treatment.  I’ve got nothing to lose except a bunch of kilograms during the physically rigorous task of being ravaged up against a wall by a visiting Matador when my levels of hormones and horniness become unmanageable.

This is amazing! I can blame being single on my zero testosterone level.  This will hopefully restore it to a normal level and, more importantly, have a similar effect on my social life.

My in box flashes. Work is looking up too. I have just been offered a job ‘fixing’ a documentary for a British company. The focus is on crime in South Africa and Cape Town in particular. I will have to do all the research, find the candidates to be interviewed and generally ensure the shoot goes smoothly. It could be quite risky, safety wise, and I’m not sure if I should do it, but shit I need the money. I haven’t had a regular income since my first film was released and I’ve been living off the spare money on my bond. When Ciggy found this out she nearly turned grey and her voluptuous boobs nearly dropped half an inch. 

The Virtual Virgin gets Clicked

I’ve had a hit! Unbelievable. Here’s to the internet, computers, cutting and pasting and blog sites. Out with my ballpoint pen and 25 diaries.

After years of trawling bars and sweaty clubs, all I have to do is hit send from the comfort of my own home and I have a hit. 'Camper – take it higher' has contacted me and has asked me to send a picture of myself. Not sure I should – he has a nipple ring and a tattoo on his ‘long dong silver’. At least somebody is interested in me and I shouldn’t be too quick to eliminate, especially when I am living next door to zero for the time being. 

Maybe I should spend a bit of time researching the implications of dating a man who has tattooed his long dong. I could start by asking him what image he has chosen and then move on to consult a few of my male and female friends for some healthy prejudices about this state of affairs. If he has a Ferrari, a steroidal bicep or a list of initials on display then I can confidently inform him that I would prefer to sleep with 'long John silver' himself, even if it meant losing my retinas to his sailor’s breath and suffering the pain of splinter inserts from his peg leg when he came. And it would go without saying that 'Camper – take it higher' would not be getting a picture of me.

I don’t have a history of impulsive elimination of potential mates so maybe I shouldn’t start now. From the age of 5, I refused to eliminate Sid from my list of eligible bachelors. He waltzed into my brother’s birthday party – half an hour late (warning signs for the future I chose to ignore) wearing bovver boots, tartan pants and his sister’s brown school tie. It felt like I had been hit by a bolt from the almighty heavens and I had no control of myself around Sid from that day on. When I was 13 my mom found me in her darkened room crying because Sid was slow dancing with Jane. Her boobs had started growing already. My mom said he would be sorry when I blossomed - and he was. 

I walked into Hyde Park shopping center aged 16, sporting a pair of striped stretch jeans, which I had peeled on by lying flat on my back and using a coat hanger to drag the zip up.

Frustratingly for Sid, it wasn’t only the lack of a similarly robust coat hanger that prevented him from removing those jeans for the next little while. Moral standards were high in those days, but if tattooed schlongs are not being immediately weeded out of the internet pond scum, then maybe my standards are beginning to slip just in time. Those are moral standards that are slipping by the way – I still want his dong to be long and for him to be a hottie if possible.

C has just read yesterday’s blog and is outraged I called him a ripening male. He says he is way past ripening. He reckons he is a low hanging fruit, ready to be plucked.