As a general rule I don’t make new year resolutions. I dislike new years celebrations in general, too many bad memories. I’m sticking to my guns and so what follows isn’t a list of resolutions and I won’t hold to them absolutely, but they are some goals and things to look forward to in 2016. Here’s to another 12 months around the sun.

1. Make a list ☑
2. Tick items on list as they’re completed ☑ (so far so good)
3. Write more on my blog & in other mediums (not sure if I should put a number here)
4. Complete ‘semi’ secret project One by April
5. Start on ‘semi’ secret project Two
6. Build a Aquaponics system
7. Create/Design my first weave
8. Learn isiXhosa (difficult one, I gave up learning years ago as I sucked)
9. Learn some signs (sign language)
10. Complete the Otter Trail
11. Upgrade/Fix my website
12. Help my wife fix her website
13. Increase vegetable production 10% from 2015
14. Teach old dog new trick (Ted needs a new trick)
15. Go on a holiday
16. Camping….

I’ll probably have to add to the list through the year, but that’s not a bad start.

My mother and father did and do some amazing things. My mother is simply put a bad-ass and continues to do some awesome stuff and my late father remains an inspiration to me.

Which is why I’m really glad to have married into a family that also does really cool shit. My father-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law and my wife run Mungo a truly unique textile company based in Plettenberg Bay. In a country where the textile industry is struggling against Asian imports and ever rising costs and where dye houses and weaving mills are shutting down, they have kept at it and they make truly beautiful products (which I will continue to shamelessly promote.)

And then they go and do more amazing stuff.

The pictures above are of one of their new tea towels being woven on a 19th Century Hattersley Loom. Years of work went in to sourcing parts to restore this 100 year old machine to working order. Sure you could have woven this product on a modern machine, but these guys are the real deal, authentic and dedicated. That right there is a piece of history worth saving. I find it inspiring.

Read more about this restored loom on their blog.

Exactly two years ago on a Saturday the 22nd of September in the Crags near Plettenberg Bay I married Tessa after nine years of us dating. We’re hitting our stride at eleven years together!

Thanks again Modern Hearts for taking such great pics of our day.

Never mind the rampant corruption. Never mind our presidents big house paid for by our taxes. Never mind the crime. What follows is a horrifying list of all that is truly going wrong in our country.

• The Halal hot cross bun crisis
• The no more Christian magazine sales saga
• The hummingbird pillow huff
• The Frankie’s ginger ale trickery
• The no longer hiring white people saga
• The melodramatic milk saga
• There’s a frog in my salad
• Gross, I bit a condom in my sandwich
• There’s something other than ground up pig bits in my Frankfurter
• This faux fur seems really lifelike…
• The bread that went on a diet & lost weight saga.
• The baby-carrier Bugger-up
• Woolworths water is Thrash!

*I will attempt to keep this list up to date. Please let me know if I have left any out.

Fellow South Africans. This is a stair that moves. Although it goes by the name escalator, you can still walk up or down it like any other stairway. If you’re lazy, an idiot or unable to walk, please stand to one side (the left side) so that everyone else may pass you by. All around the World this is how escalators are used, we too can do it.

Yesterday I got back from our two week trip to New York. Mungo had a successful stand at the NY Now show and we got to see the city on our own steam for a week thereafter. Much good food was eaten and great places explored. Here’s a selection of photos from my instagram feed and Tessa has more on her instagram.

A month and five days doesn’t seem like a long enough holiday. Also I left Thailand in shorts and arrived 36 hours later in Cape Town to find someone had left the fridge open. Anyway here’s a mixed bag of pics from my Instagram feed. Tessa’s instagram feed is probably nicer than mine 🙂 I’ll get to blogging and updating as soon as I’m settled in.

Tessa and I are off on a trip to Turkey, Italy and Thailand. The first holiday we’ve taken since our honeymoon. I’ll be trying to update this blog, my Twitter and Instagram… But I’ll probably be enjoying myself rather than making digital updates a priority.

Take care of yourself and always remember…

Today is the first Monday in six years that I haven’t had a job to go to. This fact has brought on an existential crisis. Am I self-employed or just unemployed? That is the question. Even my dog is a little confused to see me at home after eight and still in my pajamas. His stare is making me feel guilty, until I remember he spends his days sleeping, licking his balls and fetching his stick. I’ll be spending the rest of today contemplating the number 42.

After six years working at Rhino Africa Safaris the time has come for me to move on.

Friday the 30th of May will be my last day. Just thinking about it makes me sad and depressed. Leaving this family behind is one of the toughest things I’ve ever had to do. At the same time I’m also excited (and scared) for what the future holds. If the next six years are even close to as good as the previous, I’m in for some good times.

At ten years old, Rhino Africa is undoubtedly the leading safari company in Southern Africa. When I joined in 2008 we were thirty people working in a small office in Gardens. Now we’re over a hundred and thirty, we take up four floors of an office building in Gardens, have a satellite office in London and we have French, German, Portuguese and Spanish divisions.

While the company has undergone great changes over the past few years, so have I. I was dating the wonderful Tessa back when I started and since then I proposed to and married her. Thanks to this amazing company I got to take her on trips to some of the most beautiful parts of Africa and to stay in some of the top lodges and hotels, trailer parks and camping from here on out! No one could ask for a better company to work for. When my father got terminal cancer, our CEO David Ryan helped send my parents to East Africa to see the Great Migration, the last thing on dads bucket list. I’m going to dearly miss everyone here, what an amazing bunch of people, the biggest thank you to each and every one of you.

As for what I’ll do next? Which way is the wind blowing?