Lead the Way

Yesterday’s evenings, work function was actually a whisky tasting workshop, I’ve been to a previous whisky tasting before so I already had a head start with all the pomp and ceremony that comes with swirling and nosing the whisky. The one thing I clearly recall is that after swirling you should notice the “legs” of the whisky, apparently this is the only time you want “legs” to be close together...The closer the legs of the whisky the more complex and well aged it is.

Being a self-professed connoisseur of coffee I respect the technical aspects of whisky tasting, but to be honest I could not distinguish the hints of apricot, or cherry that we were supposed to be savouring. To me it just tasted like petrol, maybe a hint of dirt and death! Then again I suppose I’ve never been good with alcohol and recall how I once tried to show off my sophisticated side, by going wine tasting on the wine route, only to have the girl I escorted, drive us home after the first farm due to my alcohol intolerance…”Smuuv Benny Smuuv”

Anyways right after I posted my blog last night, the one about how bad I am with directions…my defiant brain, or at least the subconscious part decided to prove me wrong. I was pretty determined to get to bed before 11pm…I was never really able to get the bigger picture of Joburg and only knew one or two routes off by heart, which I thought were pretty disjoint at the time. Because of this I relied heavily on old trusty, Garmin to lead the way.

I’m pretty acceptant of the fact that I’m crap at directions, and really, it doesn’t bother me! But somehow the mere mention of my being bad at it somehow triggered a defense mechanism in my brain and for the next few hours it spent mapping all the routes I ever took in Joburg, keeping me up late into the wee hours of the morning…Useful? It would have been, perhaps a few months ago…but I guess at least next time I’m back in Joburg I won’t get as lost.

It feels as if I have two minds at times, one which is aware and one which hides away chilling in the back with great latent potential! When I was younger I had a border line photographic memory, however it was not on command… I remember that it came and went. In one particular instance I remember having to study for a Biology exam in Grade 9.

It was two days before the exam and I remember stressing because I had not started studying for it yet, however back in those days we were forced to copy down notes from an overhead projector; so deep in the recesses of my mind, there the information lay. For some reason I decided I’d try not to stress, just chill out, go to bed early and pull an all-nighter the next day. Only when I slept I dreamt that I was studying and somehow I remembered line for line, diagram for diagram, page for page everything that I had copied down. In the morning without opening a single book I was done studying…If only I had tried to nurture that talent, instead of being a lazy surf bum!