I Am Getting Married!!!

That’s it! I am marrying 30 Seconds To Mars.

Yes, I know that you’re busy wondering whether you should inform me that Jared Leto isn’t actually the entire band but that isn’t the (only) reason why I want to marry the band. While Jared Leto may possibly be the sexiest man alive followed closely by his brother Shannon (the drummer) and while he may be an actor as well as the lead singer of an amazing band this is not in fact why 30 Seconds to Mars is the love of my life.

It all started back in high school. I was dating a drummer and trying desperately to impress him so I went to the local Musica and spent hours listening to music in the shop without actually buying anything, after all I was on a budget. Most of it was completely cheesy rubbish that can be found on albums such as Now 34 or Hot Summer Mix that I absolutely loved but I knew then already that there was no way in hell that he would approve of Westlife and Britney Spears.

I therefore moved onto the next album. It had a scary looking picture on the front and the band responsible for this hours’ worth of screaming and too much distortion had managed to put the words satan, blood, death and something about a veil all into one name. I was terrified but my need to impress this boy meant that I put my ears through this torture for as long as I possibly could before eventually, with bleeding ears, I gave up.

It was at this point that, in the corner of my eyes I saw the cover of a compilation album call Rock Till You Drop. I decided to give it a try and to my relief found that most of the songs had enough autotune and cheesy lines to keep me happy while still containing a lead guitar and a drum with the occasional scream too impress my boyfriend.

I eventually managed to convince my mother to buy me the album and spent the rest of the weekend listening to the album as many times as possible so as to learn all the words before I got back to boarding school and showed him. It was on this album however that I discovered 30 Seconds to Mars.

The album consisted of two CDs as well as a DVD which contained the better music videos and it was on this DVD that I found the music video for From Yesterday by 30 Seconds to Mars. I took one look at Jared Leto with his longish black hair and sexy eyes highlighted by eyeliner and knew that life would never be the same again but it was only after I had watched the entire music video that I realised that this band would change my life.

I collected more of their music along the way and even after ditching the boyfriend I still loved everything about them. It has got me through good times, bad times, random bouts of depression and happy holidays spent in the sun. The music videos are always exquisite and interesting and there is a certain ‘darkness’ to their beautifully written music that can make anyone feel welcome and un-judged. The lyrics, the music, the videos, the character; what’s not to love?

There is really no aspect of this band which isn’t absolutely superb. It was therefore no shock to me to hear that their fan base, ‘The Echelon’ consisted of a group of people that differ from one another so vastly and yet somehow all get along because they share one simple love; the band. Never before have I seen such a diverse, loving and caring fan base where even the strangest and most ‘out there’ people fit in. The Echelon seems to accept anyone and everyone so long as you share their love of music and 30 Seconds to Mars. And it is impossible to not LOVE 30 Seconds to Mars.

It is therefore with all of this in mind that I get down on to one knee and beg you, 30 Seconds to Mars, please will you marry me?

Dear Friend

Dear Friend

I guess that I miss you… I can think of no other reason why I might be writing to you. It’s not that we haven’t chatted recently. I suppose if you count the few words that we say to each other every now and again, then we could still be considered friends. Yeah, we’ve spoken to each other recently but we haven’t really. I’ve listened but I haven’t heard. I’ve smiled but haven’t had fun. I’ve laughed but haven’t meant it. 

I’m not really sure what happened.  One moment we were okay and the next moment you were avoiding me. Plans were cancelled, conversations cut short, promises broken. It seemed as if my world was falling apart and that you had no intention of helping me through it. 

I suppose you have your reasons. I wish I knew what they were. I wish that I could understand what it is that you’ve been going through. I know you well enough to see that that smile is a fake and I’ve spoken to enough of our friends to realize that something’s up. But truth be told, it’s no longer my business. What ever the issue is, you haven’t trusted me with it. 

I get so sad when I think about the friendship we shared. It upsets me to think that it could fade so quickly. I’m angry with you all the time and just the mention of your name gets me worked up. I get angry at you for not caring, for not being there for me when I needed you, for not making an effort and for allowing our friendship to fade into the abyss and barely even notice. 

But I’ve come to realize something. The reason it has fallen away from your life so easily is because it probably wasn’t that important to you to begin with. And so it is with that in mind that I will laugh at your jokes and pretend to make promises about catching up soon. I will greet you as a long lost friend and ask the right questions. But it is also with that in mind that I will leave and remind myself that I was never more to you than an acquaintance. 

I need you to know something before I build up my walls to bloke you out of my life, I need you to know that I have always and will always love you my friend. And if ever you need me I will be there to lend a hand or provide a shoulder on which to cry. My friendship is forever and although you may not deserve it, it will always be true.

I write this letter with all the love in my heart.

From Kat

Home Safe But Going Crazy!

When I got home last night, I was so excited to see my family that my mum could have told me pretty much anything and I would have accepted it regardless of what she said. Luckily what she said was music to my very exhausted ears.

She had made an appointment for me to have a facial and pedicure with the local beautician who can honestly work miracles.

Something about lying on that bed, with her well chosen (especially for a Carolinian) collection of classical music and the calming smells of soaps, creams and other pampering materials really works for me. There is nothing quite like a facial to help a girl get over the stress of exams.

I was so excited in fact that I nearly missed the part about my mom telling me that I also had an appointment with the 'SCIO woman'.

For those of you who don't know SCIO is one of the latest pseudo (voodoo) sciences that allows someone with a bachelors degree in Science to make important medical decisions. To say that I was skeptical would be a massive understatement.

Basically what she does is hook you up to some machine that sends electrical impulses through your body and her computer then tells her all these super cool things about your mental, emotional and physical well-being.

Well, 5 minutes in and I was balling my eyes out and telling her my life's story. Seems her little machine could pick up better on my emotions than I could and the things she said seemed to ring true for me.

Now, I am well aware that it could be a scam and if it is well, then I'm a major sucker but the fact of the matter is that I don't really care whether it was a scam or not because it was true for me. And while I am more than one hundred percent certain that some of it is guess work there is just no denying that that woman knew her stuff.

So what's next? Am I suddenly going to start a religion and lose my mind? Well no. It isn't that kind of voodoo science and I was not that impressed that I intend to dedicate my life to it.

I was impressed by it even though my mind was rather opposed to the idea and if that has taught me anything it is that in future I need to ensure that I maintain an open mind even when dealing with something I don't actually believe in.

Also, maybe she can SCIO me into being a wizard, because being a muggle is getting boring.

The Question Must Be 'Ham and Cheese?'

Once again I find myself in the aftermath of a break-up and I use the word ‘break-up’ quite loosely here as I wasn’t in an actual “relationship” to begin with. It’s quite a complicated story but to put it simply, I recently found out that the guy I have spent the last year chatting to and the last five years crushing on is actually a bit of a douche bag. 

Not to worry however as I was given some top advice by a friend of mine; the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else. Well, I didn’t go out and slut around (although it did seem like a good idea at my very lowest point) but I did give this rather crudely put advice some thought. It is certainly true that crushing over someone else preoccupies your mind while you manage to get over a heart break that you originally thought might kill you. 

So who was to be my rebound? Which sucker was I going to pick on? 

When I first considered this question I thought it was going to be rather fun; I had images of me sipping cocktails with my girlfriends while stalking through multiple Facebook profiles and profile pictures judging all the candidates as if I was Miss South Africa and could have any guy in the world. The reality was a lot less appealing… 

In reality I didn’t really want to be with anyone, I was upset, moody and didn’t want to be in public and especially not around girlfriends who I had told about this ‘amazing’ guy. I went through a couple weeks of hating myself, followed by a week of hating ALL men and finally arrived where I am now and I am delighted to tell you that I have the answer.

If ‘Pineapple’ is not the answer then the question is ‘Ham and Cheese.’

In hindsight it seems pretty obvious but at the time this answer just would not come to me, I therefore might have to explain it to the rest of you. A couple nights ago I went to a friend of mine’s 21^st birthday party. It was an awesome function with a group of her closest friends all dressed in various shades of purple and good food and free alcohol. Essentially it was the recipe for a great evening and after being cooped up in my own little cocoon of self-pity for just over a month I was now ready to re-join the world and have a good evening.

And wow, it was a goodie! 

Finally I was laughing and joking with old friends and making new friends. There was some drinking but loads of talking, squeeling, laughing and throwing of popcorn. It was at this point when things turned sexual as they inevitably do when you put a whole whack of horny, tipsy university students together in one room and remind them that this is there very last chance for a jol before exams. Conversations suddenly had two meanings and were filled with sexual innuendos and if you didn’t think your sentences through then you eventually found your mind back in the bottom of some dingy gutter desperately trying not to blush.

It is in these situations where I generally use the word ‘Pineapple’ as my get out of jail free card. Say it with a slight blush and a nervous giggle and nearly every male will forgive you regardless of what you may have said before that. It is my bulletproof way of getting out of nearly all awkward situations and depending on the situation I follow it up with a particular laugh and it works nearly every time. 

Of course I say nearly because on this particular occasion it didn’t work at all. In fact, if one were to consider the true meaning of Pineapple (according to Kat’s Dictionary) then you’d realize that using it as your answer was in fact rather disastrous. 

Somehow throughout the evening’s conversation cheese had been turned into dried up semen. And ham, being deemed unclean by the Jews, was therefore converted into a foreskin (try not to ask too many questions, your brain will melt). It was at this point that a friend joined in and said; “Kat, would you like a ham and cheese sandwich?”

Well, me being me and being physically incapable of thinking my actions through burst out laughing at the prospect of a semen and foreskin sandwich. And anyone who knows me will be able to tell you that my laugh can be heard from space. 

Now, I don’t care who you are or how good you are at getting yourself out of awkward situations, but trying to explain this to a rather tipsy friend when the birthday girl’s parents are within earshot is no easy feat. It was then that I realized that not even a pineapple would get me out of the situation regardless of what laugh I followed it up with. Never have I been more excited about the prospect of the world opening up and swallowing me whole and it took every ounce of my rather limited self-control not to turn around and run away. 

Anyways the point of the story is that I very quickly worked out that I seriously love my friends and Mr Super-insecure-ex-crush can take his ultimatum and PINEAPPLE!

The Monsters in my Bed

When I was younger there were monsters that hid under my bed. They waited until I was alone and the lights were out and then, when I was most vulnerable they would creep out from underneath my bed. Their shadows would flicker across my room as they moved towards me, ready to strike. 

As I grew older I stopped believing in the monsters. I could lie in my bed at night and fall asleep without worrying about the various monsters that may or may not have lived under my bed. I found safety and comfort under the covers of my bed and knew that if I was in bed then none of the world’s monsters could get at me. 

But I was wrong. The monsters still exist and they still hide under my bed. They are not the big scary monsters of my childhood imagination though. They are the terrifying shadows of emotions with which I have not yet dealt. They are all the bad in my life and they wait till when I am most vulnerable, when I have sunk into my darkest depression or the deepest alleys of my mind and then they strike. 

They no longer creep in. They surge forward all at once and suddenly I am overwhelmed with too many monsters and not enough weapons to fight them all off. It is in my bedroom where the monsters come out to get me and it is here where I have learnt to fight life’s battles. It is in the seclusion of my own room. And once I have left my room I once again form the façade that doesn’t believe in monsters. I tell myself that it was my imagination, isn’t that what daddy used to tell me? 

It is not in our everyday coming and goings where the monsters of our souls attack us, no it is in the ‘safety’ of our bedrooms that we find these monsters and we are given two choices; we can hide under the covers and hope that they don’t find us till morning or we can face them and deal with them. It’s your choice but don’t let the monsters get you.

I am a Toy

I am a toy, factory packed into this brightly coloured box that has been okayed by society and siting safely on the shelf in an aisle full of toys that look, smell and sound similar to myself. I have a barcode which identifies me, defines me; although very few of my potential buyers would have noticed what it is and those who have probably won’t remember it.

I have watched men come in and out of this shop, selecting a toy an examining it from head to toe. They do this with many of the toys until they find one that they like. These toys are lucky. They will be bought, taken out of their boxes, dressed up and taken out for a night on the town. They will be wooed and spoilt, their owners paying for their food, opening their doors and treating them like royalty. But just like so many others, they will eventually become boring or be deemed ‘not good enough’ and replaced. They will end up, discarded, in second hand stores or broken and lying in a corner. 

Some of them, very few of them, will be bought by ‘the right guy’ first time around and will never be discarded. Others will pick themselves up, mend their broken hearts and find a way out of the broken toys box where they hope to find an owner who will treat them right. Those in second hand shops will eventually be rebought although their value would have depreciated substantially. And others still will sit on that shelf all their lives, never being good enough to be bought, probably working their way down into the ‘sale’ rack or even the ‘final clearance’ bin. 

It comes down to this one simple thing though, if you’re not looking to keep, don’t buy and if you’re not looking to buy, stay out of the shop.

Please Forgive Me Robbie

I may actually be the worst friend to ever have been befriended by anyone anywhere. I realised today in horror that I had missed not one but two days of perfectly good weekend party days not so that I could get some much needed work done, or pretend to study for a genetics test that I write on Wednesday evening nor did I miss out so that I could spend time with the family. So why did I miss out? Well I missed out because I was hopelessly and inexplicably hung-over. 

I awoke at four o’clock on Saturday morning, a mere two hours after having collapsed into bed, make up still on and barely pausing long enough to remove my shoes, to find myself dying of a thirst so severe I thought I had surely made out with a desert the night before. I stumbled out of bed to find that my darling sister had left a bottle of water on my desk, whether on purpose or by mistake was not important at the time. I grabbed the bottle and was soon sitting on the side of my bed, shivering from the cold and seriously regretting the fact that I had stopped drinking the night before.

After drinking about half a litre of water my thirst was finally subsiding to the levels of a normal hangover and my pure exhaustion became a more pressing matter. I slide back into bed and was instantly asleep. It couldn’t have been five minutes later when I woke with a start to that horrible sickly sweet taste of my own saliva that pre-empts and inevitable vomit. 

After rushing to the bathroom and throwing up most of my stomach contents into the toilet bowl in a not-so-ladylike manner, I slowly rose to my feet. What awaited me in the mirror was something out of a horror movie. I looked absolutely terrible. The rest of the morning continued in much the same fashion and when my sister came in at lunch time to check on me my situation hadn’t much improved.

It was then; with much self-loathing that I cancelled my Saturday night plans much to my best mate’s disappointment. Two hours later my sister virtually dragged me out of bed and marched me off to the Pulp Cinema to watch a movie. By the time we reached the opening credits I had already thrown up twice and things were not looking up for me at all but after taking a friend’s advice I managed to hold down a coke (or most of it anyways). 

But I still didn’t feel much better and Sunday proved to be not much better until I got to the Eastern Food Bizarre. For those of you who have never been lucky enough to stumble into this hole in the wall on Longmarket Street that happens to be one of Cape Town’s greatest features, I highly suggest that you get on it, SOON. I instantly felt better and my appetite returned to me tenfold. My sister and I had driven all the way to Cape Town to get Asian take outs and it was worth every cent and every litre of petrol.

Finally I was starting to feel like a fully functional human being and damn, it felt good. 

So to those friends who helped me get horribly wasted on Friday evening and to those of you who I ditched on either Saturday or Sunday, I humbly apologise for being such a lightweight and a completely useless friend. I promise to start training to improve my alcohol consumption immediately. Anyone want to help?