Yep, it’s that time of the month again….SECRETS! I received quite a few this month, but as per usual I’m sticking to my 8 per post so that I’ll have enough to use during the ‘dry times’.
If you’d like to take part in my monthly feature, please e-mail your secret to: rubyletters@gmail.com and make the subject of the mail ‘Ruby’s secrets’. Anonymity is guaranteed but if it would make you feel better you can create an anonymous e-mail address and send it from there. I look forward to hearing from you guys:)
I’ve noticed recently that there is some genuine confusion around the whole concept of driving. What is it? What should you do? What shouldn’t you do? How should you do it? When should you do it?
So I’ve decided to set up a bit of a ‘Ruby’s tips to drivers’ list to guide you through the very basics. Please, for the love of apple pie, USE IT!
1. Driving is much the same as colouring in. If you’re not purposefully changing lanes you need to stay in-between the lines
2. Should you decide to change lanes, whether it be on the highway or while passing a slower moving vehicle, ALWAYS check your blind spot.
3. If you’re the one screwing up and someone hoots…don’t be an ass and flip them the bird or shake your fist at them. You’ve already acted like an idiot, a disarming gesture will be of better use.
4. If someone gives you a gap. Don’t, for the love of all things nice, take 5 minutes to take it or become all flustered. Just GO GO GO.
5. If the car in front of me is driving slowly, driving on my ass will NOT solve the problem.
6. If I’m driving the speed limit or slightly over there is absolutely NO reason for you to be driving on my ass. I have no obligation to move over to the slow lane if I’m keeping to the speed limit. In fact, driving on my ass will probably ONLY cause me to slow down a little, or strategically make me hit the brakes for a milli- second to make you back off.
7. That being said…if you’re not keeping up to the speed limit you have NO business driving in the fast lane of the highway and probably deserve someone driving on your ass…move over!
8. Now, the cute little sign below shows you where your indicators are. If you’re going to turn or change lanes…use them to INDICATE where you’re going. It’s amazing how much less stressful driving becomes when all the people around you aren’t shouting at you for not indicating.
9. If your lane is the one ending and you have to move into another lane…YOU DO NOT HAVE RIGHT OF WAY. The guy in the lane you’re moving to does. So if there isn’t enough space you need to wait your turn.
10. Aaaah….the infamous traffic circle. People, it’s not that hard. A circle is NOT a four-way stop. In a circle you yield to the right. This means that if the person on your right went over his yield line before you did you have to wait for him. If you guys reach your lines at the same time and bearing in mind that you should BOTH be traveling at the speed limit, you should technically both be able to enter at the same time. And for crying out loud…it is impossible to signal right in a traffic circle…if you do that means you have every intention of turning into the circle and causing severe damage to your car. You have to exit the circle to you left and will therefore indicate to your left as you near your exit.
11. A solid line on a two-way road means you are not allowed to pass as it is dangerous to do so.
12. If you are driving on a truck’s ass the driver can not see you…not with all the blind spot and mirror checking in the world.
13. Just because you drive a stupidly expensive car does not mean you own the road and everybody needs to get out of your way.
14. Parents of little children –> I don’t care if your child is screaming blue murder because he/she hates sitting in the safety seat. YOU are the parent. Strap your child in. It is incredibly dangerous to let a child stand on the back seat/front seat/sit on your lap/move around freely in the car. If you love your child you will strap him/her in. My first thought when seeing an unstrapped child in a car is –> you should be charged for negligence and put in jail.
15. My safe little following distance is not an invitation for you to shove your big ass car right in front of me. If I wanted to give you a gap it would be clearly visible.
16. If someone clearly gives you a gap/helps you out of a jam/ moves slightly over the yellow line to let you pass more easily thank them. You’d be surprise what a difference it makes.
17. Do not even get me started on a set of rules for SA minibus taxi drivers. I’ll be busy for the rest of my life and STILL not finish.
So my lovelies, there you have it. Ruby’s list of helpful tips for South African drivers. Please feel free to add any others you can think of:)
So a while ago I received an e-mail from a certain Mr. Andy Hadfield (which I’m ashamed to admit I didn’t even know existed until very recently) that got me all excited. The subject line read as follows: A little Real Time Wine / WineStyle Magazine soiree! Now who of you can HONESTLY say that didn’t make you just a little bit excited?? I mean, it involved the word wine and insinuated a social event, which meant that it definitely promised a HappyRuby moment. The event was to take place on Wednesday, 01 June 2011 at HQ restaurant in Sandton, and I for one could not wait!
I was greeted at the door by a very friendly Brett Mulder, the owner of HQ and a chipper Jenny Ratcliffe-Wright, editor of Winestyle Magazine, who promptly made sure I had a flute of delicious bubbly from Pongracz MCC. Once all the guests, a mesh of food and wine bloggers, lifestyle bloggers, realtime winers and Winestyle writers, were all gathered Andy and Jenny proceeded to introduce the magazine, the blog and the reason for our little gathering.
Yep, he's wearing a shirt that says 'designated drinker'. --Pic courtesy of Cindy
We would be blind tasting 6 different wines, and we were expected to have an opinion on each of them. They had also, very kindly, supplied a list of banned words (punishable by tequila shots) which we weren’t allowed to used. Considering that the list consisted mostly of words such as acidity, sweaty saddle, notes, nose, and a whole bunch of other wanky words, I knew right from the word go I was in no danger of being forced to drink tequila. The reason for the list was quickly explained and, as a non-trained wine lover, made absolute perfect sense to me. Most people don’t understand what the professional wine tasters mean when they use all these swanky words. Their aim is to get normal people who love wine to give normal wine reviews that every Tom, Dick and Ruby will understand. Power to the masses! Or something like that:)
The reviews that followed were, quite frankly, hysterical. I’m not even going to attempt to remember some of the quirky and funny opinions that were raised…I simply would not be able to do them justice. I will, however, include my little, absolutely non-technical opinions of the 6 wines that were presented to us.
Wine 1: It’s alright. Not good, not exceptionally bad but nothing worth remembering. Also, it tastes vaguely familiar. Wine 2: Stinks like the farm, tastes like osbloed Wine 3: Smells a bit like raspberry chocolate….didn’t like the original taste…kinda grew on me. Wine 4: Smells like coffee and holds promise. I got all excited and then….nothing Wine 5: Smells rotten and sweet at the same time, but not like rotten fruit. love the taste….it doesn’t taste anything like it smells…thank goodness. Wine 6: Smells like clean dirt and a bit of fruit….don’t like the taste..uber osbloed.
As you can see…none of those would ever be considered a GOOD and PROFESSIONAL review…but it explained EXACTLY what my experience was and as far as I can gather that is exactly what you guys were after. As you can see wine 5 (2010 Simonsig Adelberg Red (Bordeaux blend) @ R48) was my absolute favourite, followed by Wine 3 (2009 Vondeling Baldrick Shiraz @ R58 – which shall affectionately be known as the Blackadder wine) in second place. This also happened to be the general consensus of the group. Great was our surprise when Jenny did the big reveal and it turned out that the 2 favourites were considered ‘low end’ wines from estates. Also, the 3 I had considered to be pretty much awful turned out to be ‘high end’ wines. Seems like good wine is not determined by it’s price after all:)
We were then allowed to drink only our favourite wines while we enjoyed an absolutely fantastic meal from HQ. I love the concept of HQ. They serve ONLY salad, sirloin and chips and have a little menu of yummy desserts. While the concept may sound slightly arrogant (a restaurant that ONLY serves ONE meal) I can tell you with confidence that these guys have the right to be arrogant. They make the most yummiest sirloin in the whole wide world (honest) and the salad is pretty amazing too. I ended my dining experience with a super yummy Chocolate Fondant, which I believe to be on the same level as the chocolate Fondant by The Attic. And since I maintain that The Attic makes the best Chocolate Fondant in the world….that says a lot:)
All in all it was an awesomely fun night and I got to meet a bunch of interesting and funny people whom I hope to see again. This included Andy the dude from RealtimeWine, Jenny the editor of WineStyle Magazine, Greg, Snowgoose, Cindy, Sue, Carly, Lexi, Jono the taxidermist, Clayton, Sam the ex-US government person and Thembi. (Hope I didn’t miss anyone).
Thank you so much RealTimeWine and WineStyle magazine for putting up this event. I look forward to doing it again real soon:) I even got to take home a copy of WineStyle and a bottle of the Pongracz….guess who is drinking bubbly this weekend:)
Love
Ruby
xxxxx
P.S. Allow me to just punt the magazine and the bubbly, RealTimeWine and to let you guys know about a really awesome event coming up.
Firstly……The Magazine: Wine Style is a quarterly magazine, which is much more coffee-table book like than magazine like really. The pictures are absolutely gorgeous and what makes this mag even better is the fact that it is probably one of the greenest mags around. They only print the exact number of copies needed for their subscribers and print about a 100 extra to give away at events like the one we had at HQ. So no over prints and no wastage. Best of all the magazine is free…so off you go…Subscribe HERE.
Secondy…..the bubbly:
These people were awesome enough to donate the bubbly for the evening. It’s a brand new product which launched on the same night as the event. It comes in 375ml bottles and come in both Brut and Rose…and I can guarantee you it’s absolutely yummy…the extra bottle i got to take home proves this:)
Thirdly…..RealTimeWine
This is their tagline and I think they don’t need any more explanation than that: Down with wine snobbery. 140 character wine reviews for the people!
Yes, I realise that this was supposed to be a monthly feature on my blog, and yes, I realise that i haven’t done one since very early this year. But life happened and the secrets have been backing up in my e-mail. So it’s finally time for another installment of Ruby’s secrets:) And I promise to be better about doing it on a monthly basis from now on.
Please note that I can never have enough secrets to choose from so keep them coming, and if your secret hasn’t been published, don’t dispair…watch this space, it’s bound to follow sooner or later.
If you’d like to take part in my monthly feature, please e-mail your secret to: rubyletters@gmail.com and make the subject of the mail ‘Ruby’s secrets’. Anonymity is guaranteed but if it would make you feel better you can create an anonymous e-mail address and send it from there. I look forward to hearing from you guys:)
Today marks the 35th celebration of the day that you got married. 35 YEARS!!! I consider this to be an exceptional feat in the times we live in. Our world is filled with broken families who couldn’t survive the challenges that being married to one person for the rest of your life brings, and yet here you stand, 35 years later, still in love, still discovering each other, still enjoying each other and still working towards making your union even more perfect.
I look around at the families of friends, colleagues and family and I realise that I am in an a very blessed position. Very few of the people I know were able to dodge the bullet of a broken home. Not only are my parents still married, but they are happily married, which is certainly something to celebrate.
Thank you so much for the beautiful example that you have set for my brother and I. Thank you for putting me in a position where I can believe in a fairy tale marriage and know that I too can have that. Thank you for loving each other so much that you faced whatever hard times there might have been and grew into the future together. I look at the two of you and I smile. How rare is it that 35 years on you are still holding hands when you walk, delivering little kisses randomly, become completely miserable when you are away from each other for longer than a day and consider each other your best friend.
So here’s a toast to the two of you. Congratulations on accomplishing something this amazing, and may there be many, many many more of these. Happy 35th anniversary.
Your loving and devoted daughter
Ruby
xxxx
Too cute…caught them on camera while Daddy letter was being all soppy with Mommy letters:)
One of my favourites! I took this picture when we were at the Victory Falls. It was just so adorable, the two of them walking side by side under the umbrella on this little path, completely unaware of the rest of the world
Enjoy:)
Rubyletters 