George was unexpectedly pleasant to visit. It’s a well run municipality sure, with tons of money being poured into the area, but the people are so friendly and helpful! The campsite manager warned me of heavy rains coming, so I set out on a tarp discovery mission, which took me to the AgriLand SSK. My new favourite store. I asked the assistant where I could find tarps and he sent me to the tubs section. It took some walking back and forth before I realised the problem. I ended up with super discounted poles because… I don’t actually know why. Unlikely to have been my charm. Probably because the people in George are so friendly.
Setting up the tarp was such a joke and I was hoping nobody was watching but… the whole campsite was watching. And quietly laughing. I saw. It didn’t stop me from creating a hobbit home for the night though. To get in and out I had to leopard crawl, but I framed that as part of my rehab to strengthen my shoulders. And my tent stayed perfectly dry that night. Mostly… well, completely, because it didn’t rain. But it could have. And I was prepared. Since then I’ve used my tarp as a sunshield, a rainshield, a dirtshield and a peopleshield (for privacy), so I’m happy with that buy.
I adventured a bit with a friend who was visiting George for the week. We went to the Redberry Farm which has tons of activities for kids, so we had a lot of fun there. We jumped onto the seesaw and squealed up and down and up and down, while the sad adults gave us the stink eye. There was a random pipe sticking out of the ground with a sign that said “talk here”. I had a long conversation into the pipe for reasons unknown and there was no response, which was disappointing. It felt a bit like those conversations I used to have with the Universe, before we stopped talking. Well, before I stopped talking. Have you noticed that now that I have, the Universe can’t shut up. Messages all day, every day.
There’s also a 10km maze at Redberry. I can’t imagine ever getting out if I went in there, and it got me thinking that maybe that can be my backup exit plan. It seems a lot of people have a plan to checkout if they get some dreaded disease, but like Alice, in the movie “Still Alice”, it’s more about the comfort of thinking that we have a plan than having an actual workable plan. It’s comforting me to think that I could get lost in that maze forever. I’ve actually had long and darkly entertaining chats with friends where I present my checkout plan and they then just poke holes in it. There should be an app to play that game. I’d never get beyond level one. Of course with me, all I really have to do is pretend I’m going to take a panado, and then let the choking begin.
I found my second favourite guitar in George. Also, bought from a very friendly person. My favourite guitar is one I bought from Carol’s Mom when I was 11 years old, and it helped me through my teenage years and beyond. When the peace in our home was shattering around us, my Dad would come and shelter with me in my room and I’d play my guitar for the two of us. He would make requests and his favourite was the country song “Blanket on the Ground”. He loved it because I had this trick of playing my guitar as a guitar and a drum (with my elbow) at the same time. It made us both laugh so much, when we needed to be laughing. That memory makes me smile. No storm surges. So I love that guitar and didn’t want to risk bringing it on my trip. My second favourite guitar is a smaller blues guitar, to plinky-plonk around the campfire while I venture around. I thought they said it was a blues guitar, but now that I think about it, and on closer inspection, I think they probably just said it’s a blue guitar. Either way, I’m also happy with that buy.
I met the Gypsey mother and daughter duo in George as well. Within minutes of arriving Patricia offered me the best cup of coffee. She has a fully kitted out van with all the comforts and her coffee was a welcome change from the instant sludge I’d been drinking. She’s been travelling for years and between her and her daughter I was given a masterclass on drifting, over the following days. We were also sharing the campsite with a group of cops who were loudly celebrating something. We started out with the attitude of “they do dangerous work so it’s good for them to let off steam”, which progressed to “They’re cops, they should know better” by 3am that night, and eventually to “hell f@%#g no, this is not ok!” by 2am the following night. I had a plan (another of my plans that was never going to work, but comforting) to play my own music loudly to drown out theirs. The main problem with that plan was that Hindu mantra Jai-Jagdeesh music was never going to even dent the doof doof brain-hammering music that they were playing. I did try though. And it wasn’t a complete bust because a few days later, by using that same misguided strategy with new noisy campers, I was able to reciprocate, in part, the gifts I’d been given by the Gypseys. More on that in a bit.
Actually, I see I got really chatty in this blog so it’s now already longish. I want to tell you about the Gypseys and the energy exchanges but I don’t want to rush, so I’ll end this here and push it (again) to the next blog. You’re probably thinking now that there were no Gypseys and I’m making it all up. There were. I promise!