The Cape of Storms, they call it. Well this weekend is a biggie. The wind has been howling, snapping off trees and dislodging things in the roof. After a braai dinner, we went to bed quite early, to try and get some sleep amid the noises and gusts. After about 30 minutes, we were woken up by the phone and a very panicky neighbour. The phone said that the neighbour's house was on fire. The neighbour was a bit more accurate, and when I looked out of the window I could see the illumination from the flames on our side of the wall.
Stumbling downstairs half asleep, I whipped the curtains open to find that I had missed most of the action. The wind had reignited the braai, and then fanned some sparks that had caught on the dog's bean bag. That had apparently gone up - quite spectacularly according to the neighbour - and signed the door and the window frame. Luckily nothing else other than the braai had been caught in it, and the only thing that was left for me to extinguish was the melted plastic wheels of the braai. The tongs are a bit singed, and all that's left of my wire brush is the bristles. Thank God, nothing else caught fire. The patio is a bit singed and the paint on the door bubbled, but we were very lucky.
This morning I ran in the same wind. On one roller-coaster bit of track I struggled to the top of a rise, then started to head downhill, only to hang there as the wind gusted. It was bloody hard work, but I ran over to Constantia where it's more sheltered, and suddenly it felt easy again. I think I'm getting used to longer distances - I don't really get going properly until I've done about 5km.
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