Darkness at Noon

It could not have been a less auspicious beginning. My first post on my brand new blog was rudely interrupted by one of a series of power cuts in the Cape Town area yesterday, the third successive day of what the utility operator fancifully calls "rolling blackouts". So instead of launching into my carefully composed manifesto, I trudged cursing up the stairs, candle held aloft. And so to bed.

The cuts, better described as random crashes of the system, have apparently been caused by a generator failure at the geriatric nuclear reactor which provides a significant amount of the city's power. They would be more accurately described as random collapses of the system. Or else someone is sticking a pin in the map blindfolded. An excuse early on was "damp soot from bush fires on transmission lines". At least it wasn't leaves on the line or the wrong kind of snow. Didn't they lie about Chernobyl at first?

However, the so-called manager of public lighting, no doubt keen to avert the possibility of being hanged from one of his own streetlights, has given one firm promise to this rugby-crazed city -- there will be power at Newlands Stadium on Friday night for the "Super 14 " game between the local Stormers and the visiting Brumbies. Praise the lord! "I may be stupid, but I'm not that stupid," he declared. I rest my case.

Thus this goodly frame is born under a foul and pestilential cloud and I have indeed, for the moment, lost all my mirth. Sorry about that.

So no manifesto except to say this is my baby, it is for my own amusement first of all and, I devoutly hope, the delectation of my bloggy friends. And to any visitors who might be googled into my clutches, come in, pull up a chair and feel free to spout off. To wandering trolls: don't even think about it.

Topics will be whatever my dilettante wafting may alight upon, but will certainly include the odd poem (mine, mostly), photograph (likewise), music bulletin, rant, encounter with idiots, pseuds and posers and more. Anything to keep it going.

Big ups to midwives and cheerleaders Pashmina of Grammar Puss and Patroclus of Quinquireme, and to the eminent Norm Geras, he of Normblog, who first sowed the seed. And to the little circle of blog friends who have endured my incessant and often facetious comments. Welcome to my twilight zone.

FADE TO BLACK