So we figured a radio is a must

So, we figured that a radio is a must.
This was put on my list. Sonja entrusts me with all the important stuff like this, while she handles the simple things like home-schooling, actual paid for work, and raising two million to build a school.
Then I spent literally about two weeks looking for a good old fashioned, battery operated FM / AM radio.
I couldn't find one anywhere, and I looked everywhere.
Eventually I found a decent one in a small local electronics shop.
I got the specifications, had a good look at it, and returned on the week-end to buy it.
Unbelievably the shop was closed.
I got really grumpy. The pressure is mounting. Time is short. The to-do list is long.
How can they frigging close on a week-end.
Its not the frigging sixties. They are not selling booze on a Sunday. Its not a hash bar.
Its just a radio !&$#%!@#&!! and another ( %7$#*!! )
So, after staring coldly at the window, I stormed off into Pick n Pay to buy some chicken for dinner. (yes, free range)
This is a completely different shop, in a different place. I am alone. I speak to nobody.
(Concentrate)
(Cosmic forces are about to strike)
Now normally, when you need a staff member to find a really obscure item, you can look for one for hours.
Not this time. I am walking down an isle, heading for the chicken section, and a staff member cautiously approaches me.
I feel nervous. I haven't shop-lifted since I was ten years old. And that was the only time ever. It was a Spider man comic from CNA in Rondebosch if you are interested. It was dead easy, but I was so wracked by guilt I couldn't enjoy the comic. That was my last and only criminal act.
Anyway, I know I am not about to be nabbed for that, but still, this guy was looking at me pretty funny. Whacko.
(so back to my story.)
He says. (And now this is true and not exaggerated in any way)
He says
"excuse me sir, are you the man looking for the radio"
Eh, eh.
Read that line again.
That is not just friggin weird, it is frikken weird.
So I tell him I haven't asked anyone in this store for a radio, but I am actually looking for one.
(are you getting goose pimples yet)
So he looks at me and he tells me this is the last one in the store, he got it out of the back, and he was told a man wanted one, but there is nobody else, so it must be for me, and then he gives it to me and walks off.
So now I have the radio packed and ready in the garage, and I have to tell you.
I am going to treat this radio with the utmost respect.
I am expecting cosmic utterances from the beyond to eerily float around the room at 2am.
I am expecting big things.
Special things happen to special people.
Perhaps that dude who had that whole Pyramid / UFO vibe happening was right.
Maybe (Robbie Williams) there are little chaps in spinning craft hovering over Los Angeles and the Sun Valley Mall in Cape Town.
You have to keep an open mind about these things.

What to take with us.

Three days to departure. House chaos (check) Kids chaos (check) Charles ratty (check) Sonja lucky to have Charles (check) Boxes everywhere (check) Checks-lists being lost (I put it next to the microwave, the kids must have moved it) General mayhem and bedlam (check)
Not calm (no) Not peaceful (not) Enough time to do everything (no) Enough space (no)

I pack well.
Packing a months equipment into a boot before heading off into the Namib dessert for a camping trip, and ending up fitting a pair of binoculars into a perfectly sized space, a perfect fit, why - it gives me goose pimples.
I love packing.
And you mess with my packing system at your peril.
Keep the hell away.
I'll get what you need.
You don't mess with the way I lay my wood on a fire, and you don't mess with my packing.
Obviously.
I still have a picture in my head of Robin Knox Johnson, the lone sailor about to head off for the first solo, unsupported circumnavigation of the world in his yacht. He is on the jetty, surrounded by a mountain of supplies. All carefully calculated to the last tin. The last needle.
Beautiful. Exquisite.
I can add one thing at this junction.
I can promise you, he did not have children on the jetty.
Packing with kids is very, very trying.
Packing with kids who are home from school all day is even worse.
Trying to reduce your entire life into what you can fit into the family car and a small trailer starts off as being cathartic, but quickly turns you psychotic.
Luckily for the kids it is illegal in South Africa to bury them alive, sign them over to the neighbours, or dangle them upside down from the top of the stairs.
Our new cottage suddenly seems a very small place to be moving to.
We have been absolutely ruthless packing. To fit enough to make a small cottage functional, while having enough of the basics is not easy.
And we have stuck to the basics:
Solar system and batteries - tick (enough to operate laptops and communicate)
Tools and spares - tick (we need to build a loo, shower and a long list of other things urgently)
Fishing kit - tick (we have to catch fish, three meals per week are earmarked as seafood)
Pots, pans and kitchenware - tick (very little of anything, just enough to cook and get by)
Wood, buckets, drums, pipes - tick (we need that shower and loo)
Beds and bedding - tick (one short, two kids must share)
Gas fridge - tick
Two plate cooker - tick
Gas Bottles - tick
Clothes - tick
Kids homeschooling material - tick
Suddenly we are out of space, damn.
What to take out.
What to leave.
And when we think that we have the balance just right, its one thirty A.M, you can't see straight, you hit your bed feeling good, and the next afternoon when you return home from work the kids have got creative with your packing.
There will be no smiling final photo just prior to departure.
I promise you.
The worst part is. The worst part.
We have got so little. So very little to take with us.
The worst part is.
It is still so much more than everybody else in the village.
So I am going to have to feel guilty moving in with what little we have.
There will be no Kudos.
It is like cooking without an audience - you may as well eat toast and egg.
I remain sane by reminding myself that I can still at least pack perfectly, and feel excited, in a very satisfying TETRIS way, when I slip the last tin of paint perfectly into position.
If you knew how little you could take.
You would freak out.