Standing on my kitchen table to wash the high windows, as I was too lazy to fetch the ladder from the store room, I was one very frustrated woman! I was BORED! Just back from Scotland, where I have a lovely summer job as a chef in an inn, a little Fiat Panda car to take me to my lochs and rivers and mountains I so love, and a very busy social life, I was suddenly cooped up in a little one bedroom flat, with a garden of about two square metres, and nothing much to do. I couldn't stand the nagging of my children about my safety any longer, so I sold my beautiful home in the Strand, and moved to this secure flat across from my eldest, and regretted it ever since. So this morning, rumbling and grumbling while cooking breakfast, I noticed the poor sunrays that tried their utter best to penetrate the film of dirt on the  windowglass, and thus it was that, taking a page from the George Herald that I was using to shine the glass with, my eyes fell on this ad, stating that somewhere in a place called Haarlem, there were plots, with irrigation water, for sale at a ridiculous price! I flew off the table, well, would if I could, but as I am not exactly a springchicken anymore, I had to first lower myself onto the chair, and from there onto the floor, and then onwards to my phone to contact the agent. This person, with a strange kind of accent, answered with a happy voice, but when I stated my case there was a few seconds of silence, and then the voice came back on, a bitty subdued, and said that she didn't know if this was quite the place for a woman alone! But as the location was perfect, and the price something to make me want to chirp like a nightingale, I was adamant, as smallholdings in South Africa do not come cheap, and with a bit of reluctance from her side, we made an appointment for the next week, Thursday! So, seeing myself in flowing dress and colourful wellies, droving my cattle to lush grazing fields, and growing weird and wonderful organic fruit and veggies , I bundled up all my really fancy city clothes in a plastic bag and presented it to a very happy Elisabeth, my daughter Irma's househelp, and my friend, and made her cup flow over when I also gave her a big bag of make-up! Kept the anti- wrinkle cream though, as I would not like to look like an old prune in a couple of years under the Haarlem sun! I was always too impulsive, and regretted my hasty actions within a day, like I always do, but never seem to learn! The week dragged by, and when I told my kids what was in the weather, they put up such a bally row that I was sorry I ever told them. I then tried to paint, but after I had covered the table, floor and myself in oil paint, my muse suddenly left me, and I had to go on my knees to try and get the floor clean, and had to almost have a bath in turps to clean myself, so then I just kicked my heels until Thursday!