We scrounged a really little and really old TV from the garage of things for container-less new immigrants - no remote (0f course) and some buttons missing, but for the most part worked - on some channels - other channels needed to be tuned to each time, but it did the job for the amount of TV that we actually watch. Unfortunately, there is still a deafening silence in our home during the day and so often the TV was on in the background and to keep abreast of the latest in World events and such like. A few days ago, switching the said TV on one morning produced a really wicked humming noise and zero picture - not even snow - ziltch, niks, nothing. Fiddling about with connections, giving the set a hefty thump or switching on and off a few times, did nothing to improve the problem - I think it died in the night - we logged into Trade Me (like e-bay for those of you who haven't been following this blog too closely) and found a plethora of TV's for sale - some of which were so cheap that one wonders what's wrong with them. We decided to bid on a couple and that's eventually exactly what we got - sold as a 'lot' we now have two TV's and paid the princely sum of $50.00 for both. The idea is that we can sell both again once ours arrive, or sell one and donate one to the aforementioned container-less new immigrants garage. While we were at it, naturally browsed around other things that we could do with in the meantime and are now the proud owners of a smallish gas braai (bottle included) - 3 burners with wooden shelving on either side of the grill and the whole caboodle on wheels so we can move it around easily - price? $11.50. Have arranged with the present owner - who is moving to Australia, to collect sometime on Saturday - not too far from Hamilton so another chance to see a different town.
Sales at the shops are exactly that - as far as I can remember, a SALE usually means a big sticker on things but prices don't look THAT much cheaper - so far, as far as we can tell, a sale item is VASTLY cheaper than usual - even we can see that, so it seems that if you can get your finances to co-operate, you can pick up amazing bargains on almost anything from big appliances to furniture to clothing - just a pity there aren't these sorts of sales on property!
Lots of the shops have regular 'get one free' sorts of deals - if not actually get one free, there will be for example, buy three and pay only whatever. Great for things that you use all the time like milk and bread and basic household things like soaps and tea and cooking oil.
I am the proud owner of a 'temporary One card' - (just waiting for the plastic one to arrive) - this gives us discounts on certain items and also works on a sort of points system - basically, when you get to the till with your trolley full of goods, they check everything through and then you swipe your One card and the 'tin brain' (computer) works out how much discount you are entitled to on that lot of stuff - the other day we got almost $5.00 off the total bill - which will obviously go into the 'ticket fund' - I'm not going to do the conversions for you guys anymore - we are trying to get away from doing it ourselves but if you really have to, basically the exchange rate is between R5 and R6 to the dollar!
Our front garden, like almost everyone's here, is open to the street - we have quite a pretty bed along the front of the property with a few standard roses and a couple of other things planted in it - a fair number of succulent 'roses' which I for one am not crazy about, but anyway - in the four weeks that we have been here, the weeds have sprung up in amongst the good stuff, like there's no tomorrow. Since there are no 'odd bods' hanging about looking for weeding jobs, there was nothing for it, but to get out there and do a bit of a clean-up. The dilemma for us, is that here and there, we have no idea whether what we are faced with is actually a weed, or whether it is some exotic variety of grass which has been specially imported into NZ at enormous expense! Years ago, a friend of ours, when faced with the gardening thing, asked his dad how you know if something is a weed or a plant - to which his dad replied - "pull it out - if it comes back, it was a weed, if it doesn't, it wasn't"
Dis al!
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