I am buying a new car, a Fiat Multipla MPV, to replace my five year old Nissan Sentra. It will be great in two ways. Firstly it will be easier for Mela to have the higher vehicle so it won't be such a battle for her to get in and out. Secondly it will be great for my boys to have enough leg room in the back, especially Christopher, who is taller than I am. I should take delivery tomorrow and will post a brief review once I have had it for a few days.

I was up at 6:30 this morning, early for a Saturday, prompted by cramps in my calves. I've been getting cramps in my legs on most nights for the last 10 days or so. Thinking that it was a lack of magnesium, I have been taking Slow-Mag for the last week. I hadn't had cramps for a few days now so I thought it was working, but now I'm not so sure. Mela thinks I should see the doctor as there might be some other underlying cause. It's a real pain in the buttlegs.

This past Sunday the Sunday Times reported as follows;

A BLOEMFONTEIN matric pupil refused to answer an English exam question on Harry Potter because he believes the fictional wizard boy promotes witchcraft. Full Story Here

I can't understand how people can believe Harry Potter is promoting witchcraft, yet are quite happy to accept many other children's fantasy tales. It's all just fantasy. Surely the issue is more about parents educating their children in what is real and what is fantasy and should be read without being taken literally.

Just received the following by e-mail from Friends of Live.

LIVE fans...it's coming! The new CD/DVD combo package, "Awake, The Best of LIVE" hits stores worldwide on November 2nd, less than 2 weeks away!!

The album is a CD/DVD combination. The CD contains 19 of LIVE's most memorable songs, including a cover of the Johnny Cash tune, "I Walk The Line" and the previously unreleased "We Deal in Dreams." The DVD contains 22 videos, plus an album by album commentary by Ed Kowalczyk!

I was reminded yesterday evening of just how much I dislike Spur restaurants. Mela persuaded me that we should go to our local (Strand) Spur for dinner because she was in the mood for some cooked vegetables with her meal and thought that Spur would be a good place to find these.

We arrived early, around 18h15, so were seated attraight away, even though we didn't have a reservation. Unfortunately that is the only thing that happened quickly. I don't know if there were problems in the kitchen or whether we had a rookie waiter but the service was appalling. We took very little time to decide on what we wanted yet it was 20h30 before we got out of there as we spent most of the time waiting on the waiter. Their choice of cooked vegetables was lousy too, so all Mela had were some carrots.

Then there is the fact that, while they call themselves steak ranches, their menu highlights only steak smothered in some kind of cheesy or mushroomy sauce. It's quite hard to spot the subtle little box listing the unadulterated steaks. Except that even those are ruined, to my mind anyway. I like to enjoy the flavour of a nicely grilled steak just as it is, although I sometimes add a pepper sauce. Unfortunately Spur kills the flavour by not only marinading their steaks but basting them with some awful, toxic, sweet, BBQ flavoured glop, so that the taste of the steak is totally masked.

I really must resist more strongly if Mela ever asks to go to the Spur again.